| Consultant Services   | People  | Business & Investment Articles  | Business & Investment Property Development   | Handicrafts |

Return to the Cua Lap Main  Page |  People Of Cua Lap

Cua Lap Homes

When we first visited the site in January 1996 we found fifteen families in residence.  When the fields dried allowing us to go deeper into the site, we found four other long time residents on the site.  There are currently twenty-eight homes as of January 2005.

The homes are all simple, many made of palm fronds and bamboo.  Only three homes had brick fronts in 1996. Today more than 12 have concrete or brick facades.

The people raised there since 1975, when the first families took up residence on this remote and undeveloped stretch of beach, work as hard as any one. Perhaps even harder than most.  It is not their fault that their living is at the bare subsistence level. 

Our intentions are well known to all the families. Our representatives visit many of them several times a year.  For each of the 15 family households that existed on the site before January 1, 1996 we intend to (i) offer each adult member full employment at the Cua Lap Resort to help them to achieve economic independence; (ii) help these workers to learn new skills that will give them and their families a stable income. 

For all residents at the time the project begins who have resided at the site for at least five years before the Resort is licensed, it is our intention (iii) employ as many adults who can be trained for jobs and learn the skills needed; and (iv) for the time at least one resident family member is employed at the Cua Lap Resort, provide a single cottage (no more than one cottage for each extended family of the first 25 households) in the Cua Lap Fishing Village for the time of their full time employment at the Cua Lap Resort.

For all residents, both long-timers and those more recent, provided they meet Vietnamese requirements, we will also provide full compensation for the house, out-buildings, and site they occupied. 

The cottages (one per extended family) provided to the long-time residents who are also employed at the Resort will, along with 175 other cottages, form a living diorama, an architecturally and culturally correct fishing village, on the Cua Lap Resort lands.

However, unlike their current homes, the new ones will provide better-built structures of a traditional design but with modern conveniences such as cement floors, running fresh water, indoor waste facilities, and electricity. [Note: each household will remain responsible for normal upkeep and the cost of utilities consumed.]

Each house may be constructed of bricks and concrete, but all cottages will be sided and roofed in traditional materials. The village will look similar to a traditional Vietnamese fishing village.

The work for current adult residents who are employed at the Cua Lap Resort will utilize and expand upon their current skills.  Farmers will be trained by skilled domestic and foreign horticulturists to care for the 150 ha of exotic and flowering plantings.  Fishermen will be trained to raise farm fish that will be grown to 5 kg (11 pounds) and stock the Exotic Fishing Lake.  They will also raise crab and tiger shrimp that will stock the Fishing Village ponds.

Those seeking new skills at other jobs will be encouraged to learn any of the new fields that will open up to them at the Cua Lap Resort.

We celebrate these fine people for who they are, for what they have achieved, and for what they may yet attain.   Please join us on this special journey they have allowed, as we visit their homes.

Driving down Cua Lap Lane in late 2004, the first beach exit off of Highway 51C, we saw and photographed  28 houses and one commercial sand operation.  Since 1996, several homes were raised and others built.  While we have not uploaded more recent images, this is the order of the lots on which they sit (or sat) on the dates noted.  Click on each photo below and take a closer look. We intend to retain many of these house styles in the Fishing Village.

1 Mr. Dau's House April 10, 1999	2a November 4, 1998 Nguyen Van Ky's House	2b November 4, 1998	3 Tran Thanh Tu's house April 10, 1999	4 November 4, 1998

5 November 4, 1998 accessible from beach	6 November 18, 1997	7 December 18, 1998 Off footpath	8 December 18, 1998 Off footpath	9 December 18, 1998 Off footpath

10 December 18, 1998 Off footpath	11 December 18, 1998 Off footpath	12a November 18, 1997	12b November 4, 1998	13a October 7, 1998

13b November 4, 1998 Only frame remains	14a November 18, 1997	14b November 4, 1998	14c November 18, 1997	15 November 4, 1998

16a November 18, 1997 Nguyen Thi Nuong	16b November 4, 1998 Nguyen Thi Nuong	17 November 4, 1998 Mrs. Le Thi Dap	18 November 18, 1998 Mr. Tran Van Chau	19a November 4, 1998

to be loaded later
19b February 1999 House dismantled	20a November 4, 1998	20b November 18, 1997	21a November 18, 1997 Khuong Thi Ho	21b November 4, 1998 Khuong Thi Ho

Please now visit, or return to the People Of Cua Lap

Or, return to the Cua Lap Main Page