These days, the working atmosphere at Hong Lu forge in Hoa Huong ward, Tam Ky is more bustling than ever. The sound of grinding machines rings out regularly, signaling the peak season for those polishing bronze pots.
Mr. Nguyen Thanh Vinh - a long-time blacksmith - said that every Tet holiday, his family accepts orders to polish bronze incense burners from the full moon day (ie December 15) until the evening of the 29th of Tet.
“We start working from 5am until late at night. We polish 5-7 sets of bronze incense burners each day. The salary ranges from 150,000 to 200,000 VND per set, depending on the size.
Although it is a part-time job, it still requires skillful, meticulous, and careful hands from the craftsman to avoid breaking, damaging, or deforming the customer's items, because many incense burners are precious family heirlooms," Mr. Vinh shared.
Not far from Mr. Vinh's forge, Mr. Pham Thanh Hung is also busy with a homemade tool kit including a motor with a scrubbing blade, along with some other items such as a bleaching cake and brush, and star fruit or lemon vinegar to soak copper items.
On normal days, Mr. Hung does electrical repairs. Around December 23, he takes on an extra job polishing bronze incense burners.
To polish a bronze incense burner set like new, sounds simple but is also very elaborate, especially when dealing with large incense burner sets with elaborate carvings - Mr. Hung said.
Before starting the process of polishing the bronze incense burner, the craftsman disassembles the structure, then sorts it to use industrial detergent or acid to remove the oxidation layer on the bronze surface.
There are incense burners that customers use a layer of glue (to prevent oxidation) that is very difficult to clean and requires a lot of effort to remove the old glue layer.
After using bleach and acid to clean the product, the next step is to use sandpaper to remove the layers of stains on the product surface.
"It looks simple, but this job is very tiring, back pain because of having to sit for hours. At the same time, having to face the harmful effects of dust and cleaning chemicals.
Although it is hard work and has many potential health risks, this job brings in an income of more than 20 million VND, just within half a month before Tet. I have to try to earn more to take care of my family" - Mr. Hung said.
