Kenh Ga

Introducing Kenh Ga

The village of Kenh Ga (Chicken Canal) gets its name, apparently, from the number of wild chickens that used to live here. It’s a lovely area, and one of the best places outside of the Mekong Delta to see river life – but nowhere in the Delta will you find stunning limestone formations like the ones providing the backdrop here. Another difference: people in Kenh Ga row boats with their feet, leaning back and watching the world go by.

The local people seem to spend most of their lives on or in the water: at their floating fish-breeding pens, harvesting river grass used for fish feed, trawling in the muddy shallows for shellfish or selling veggies boat-to-boat. Even the children commute to school by boat. The river is used for every­thing from bathing, to washing plucked chickens, to defecating in.

Until recent years this was largely a floating village, with just a few permanent buildings on the riverbanks. You’ll still see some tiny wooden shelters on boats where the poorest of the poor live. However, as fortunes improve, people aim to stake their claim on solid ground.

From the pier you can hire a motorboat (868 560; 40, 000d) to take you for an hour or so touring around the village.

Last updated: Feb 17, 2009