Banter Addressed to Chieu Ho Poet: Ho Xuan Huong Is this student out of his [...]
Besides poetry, Ho Xuan Huong had another passion: contemplating landscapes. A free woman without husband [...]
For Ho Xuan Huong poetic contests are not futile rhetorical exercises. In those times, literature [...]
In the following poem, she sketches the caricature of the bonze who must, in principle, [...]
Ho Xuan Huong denies the male’s superiority consecrated by Confucian ethics. She complains of the [...]
Banished by Confucianism, the nude is absent from ancient Vietnamese art, except for a certain [...]
The Mountain of Ba Doi Poet: Ho Xuan Huong A gap, a pass and still [...]
The Grotto of Cac Co Poet: Ho Xuan Huong Heaven and earth gave birth to [...]
The Mount of Husband and Wife Poet: Ho Xuan Huong What a funny sight the [...]
The Swing Poet: Ho Xuan Huong Glory be to whoever so pleasantly placed the four [...]
The Fan Poet: Ho Xuan Huong Seventeen, eighteen… what is the proper number? Never mind, [...]
Troi Cakes Poet: Ho Xuan Huong My body is white, my shape, round, Many and [...]
Ho Xuan Huong is feminine not only in her fight for woman’s rights against interdictions, [...]
The King’s Cat and The People’s Cat Poet: Doan Thi Diem When the tom-tom resounds, [...]
Autumn Evening Poet: Doan Thi Diem The rain falls drop by drop on the banana [...]
Evening of Regret Poet: Doan Thi Diem In the sky at dusk lingers the sun’s [...]
Thien Quang Pagoda (The Pagoda of the Light of Thien) opens on one side onto [...]
No other work, except perhaps Nguyen Du’s Kim Van Kieu has found more resonance in [...]
The name of Ho Xuan Huong explodes like fireworks in classical Vietnamese literature. She is [...]
Don’t be misled by the apparent modernity and sometimes Western- imitating looks of some urban [...]
Stretching 1,650 km from North to South (7 degrees of latitude) and from sea level [...]
Vietnam is divided in 64 provinces including…5 cities with ’provincial’ status (Hanoi, Haiphong, Danang, Can [...]
By the heart of the XIXth century, the Nguyen Dynasty had restored the feudal regime [...]
Above all, DO show respect for the country’s most illustrious leader. No, you won’t be [...]
Everywhere you travel, politics and national issues can stir very emotional responses from citizens. Vietnamese [...]
Because of its tumultuous history and especially because of its ‘communist’ label, Vietnam reaches deep [...]
The National Assembly is the governing body of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. The country’s [...]
After the Ming occupation and the reconquest of national independence by Le Loi and Nguyen [...]
If the XVIIIth century was a time of crises and convulsion, it was also that [...]
Princess Mai Am, another daughter of King Minh Mang, composed poems on the life of [...]
Vietnamese attach considerable importance to their appearance and cleanliness. Very few people – however poor [...]
Do you prefer rice or noodles? Sometimes the question is legitimate, like when you are [...]
Comrade (dong chi) is still used sparingly in the North as a means of addressing [...]
Vietnamese like to smile and laugh in all situations. A little bit of humor will [...]
Although English has been widely spread throughout Vietnam, it still has some difficulties during your [...]
The other day my 13-year-old granddaughter Van Chi came home very excited from school. “Grandpa, [...]
It’s now peak time for the “wedding season” — the “season of crimson kakis and [...]
The August Revolution of 1945 that put an end to eight decades of foreign domination [...]
Mild color blindness is characterized by the inability to distinguish between greens from blues. Does [...]
Marriages between Vietnamese and foreigners have become common here since the 80s. Before that they [...]
Some sensitive areas in Vietnam, like military installations, prisons or nuclear research plants (there’s at [...]
An off-the-beaten-track trip in Vietnam stands out of the crowd with interesting experiences and amazing [...]
Throughout the history of 4000 years, Vietnam has suffered from thousands of wars. But the [...]
Single parenting, though still a new notion in Vietnam, is gaining acceptance by the public [...]
Namstalgia, as wartime photographer Tim Page calls it, is the more visible lingering effect of [...]
Located in Quang Tri, the goriest battlefield during the Vietnam War, Vinh Moc tunnels used [...]
Successive social upheavals – the August 1945 revolution with its democratic ideas, the ensuing thirty [...]
The first words that spring to the minds of many first-time travelers to Vietnam are [...]
During a dinner at the house of a mutual friend, Mr. Francisco Roque, a Filipino [...]
What was called Duong Truong Son or the Ho Chi Minh Trail was actually a [...]
Cu Chi Tunnels is an underground defense system in Cu Chi District, 70 km north-west [...]
Today is a happy day indeed. As a husband, father and would be grandfather, I [...]
After the defeat of the French at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, the Geneva Accords [...]
Beyond mentality, culture and food, political opinions and war history still distinguish the North from [...]
Vietnam is a single country but regional variations in history, language, mentality, and culture are [...]
De gustibus et coloribus non disputandum (you can’t argue about tastes and colors) said the [...]
What is a Viet Kieu? – Viet Kieu Meaning You’ll hear this term used very [...]
We have no intention of jumping on the gender analysis bandwagon. Numerous evaluations and studies [...]
Vietnamese names can be veritable Chinese puzzles for the unwary foreigner. Shortening a Western name [...]
In fact, there are three pillars of Vietnamese society, and they are family, family and [...]
If 85 percent of Vietnam is of the Kinh ethnic origin that still leaves 15 [...]
Everyone gets it. If you don’t, you probably haven’t left home yet… physically or psychologically! [...]
Last week a tragicomedy broke the monotony of our humdrum domestic life. Our daughter-in-law, an [...]
In the days following Tet, spring festivals are held throughout the countryside. Boys and girls [...]
The man-wife-lover relationship, through a common subject for literature in the West, was rarely talked [...]
Sociologists have tried to attribute the “Japanese Miracle” to the Japanese sense of community. A [...]
European and American friends often ask me the meaning of the ideogram “phuc” embroidered on [...]
Foreign obsen’ers who have known Vietnam since before the Revolution of August 1945 may easily [...]
The other day I received a letter sent from California by Mr X., colonel in [...]
A symposium was held in July on the work of the late Duong Quang Ham [...]
Of all my books in Vietnamese, the fondest memory is of a translation of Grimm’s [...]
The Western skirt has become ubiquitous in Hanoi these days, giving an almost European look [...]
I have met, in Paris and Marseilles, Vietnamese in their sixties or seventies who left [...]
A letter from New York published by an overseas Vietnamese magazine has moved me deeply. [...]
My friend Nam, a retired college professor, lives on Goldsmiths’ street, in the heart of [...]
In many Third World countries a vigorous and. alas, seemingly little effective campaign against corruption [...]
I am thankful to Yoshiko Higuchi for sending me the manuscript of her thesis “Collectivism [...]
“Chang thom cung the hoa nhai Dau khong thanh lich cung nguoi Trang An” (Without [...]
In Vietnam the Chinese minority numbers about one million. Most are Hoa, i.e. Chinese who [...]
Hanoi, with a population of three million (75.000 in 1926; 130,000 in the 1930’s) comprises [...]
A thousand years ago, the embryo of Hanoi was a cluster of villages. Some twenty [...]
Since the adoption of the market economy in 1986, there has been a marked improvement [...]
Dragon has long been the legendary animal of oriented countries. Since the end of the [...]
In Vietnam, when one is visited by some distinguished guest or a rarely seen friend, [...]
The perennial character of a myth is measured by the survival of old folklore practices [...]
Along the centuries Vietnamese patriotic traditions have crystallized in great figures, the most moving and [...]
The France Association, in collaboration with USA Foundation, has launched a world-wide operation to choose [...]
In the 10th year of the 21st century, Hanoi will celebrate its millennium. It was [...]
Hanoi is composed of four parts: the old commercial quarter known as “Thirty six streets [...]
We are going out of town. A fine drizzle is falling on the plastic hood [...]
Lan Ong (The Lazy Old Man) is the pseudonym taken by Le Huu Trac (1720-1791) [...]
Whenever Liz got the blues I would tell her: “Listen straddle your bike, we’ll pop [...]
Under the Le and the Trinh, Ho Tay (West Lake) was the scene of many [...]
The terminology of human sciences includes quite a few often misleading ambiguities. This stems from [...]
To the freshly-arrived tourist in Hanoi the guide will most certainly show the temple named [...]
After crossing the Chuong Duong bridge which was built parallel to the Doumer (Long Bien) [...]
Last Thursday I accompanied my friend Condominas to Thai Nguyen. Condominas, or simply Condo or [...]
On the eve of Tet Vietnam, the Lunar New Year, when the wish of all [...]
Whoever comes back to visit the mountain district of Bac Son Will remember the time [...]
The juvenile public – aged between 3 and 14 – applauded wildly when on the [...]
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