We came to visit Liem’s house on a very special day – Mid Autumn or “Tet Trung thu” which is a holiday for children in Asia, and water puppet used to be a favor gift for kids years ago in Hanoi. The zigzag way that leaded to his house was also very interesting to see how locals’ live in this area of the city.
The 4-story house is surrounded by puppets and many of them have been hand made by Liem. Before performing his amazing work, Liem introduced us some things about his family and history of Water puppety Art, while his wife was inviting us some traditional sweets and black tea of Vietnam. Liem was born in a family with seven generations that have been preserving water puppetry in the northern province of Vietnam. His father, the famous puppeteer Phan Van Ngai, made chu Teu (a humorous farmer) puppet, which is displayed in France’s Louvre Museum. Mr. Ngai also helped create the mobile water puppetry stage. And right now, Liem’s younger son has been showing his early talent by following his father for the puppets. What an adorable family!