Huế

When I was a kid I loved wading in the floodwaters although my mama said the floodwater was very dirty and that it was dangerous out there. Now I think flood is a nuisance and no joke at all (People in Huế expect floods twice a year). Early this week, the flood kept me from […]

Here comes the rainy season again… Wet and cold Gloomy and cloudy days To expect When can I see the sun again?

One morning in rainy season, she woke up to feel something different – something peaceful, yellow, breezy and waltzing outside her window. She got baffled as what she saw, felt and breathed was something like fall season but she argued to herself that Huế had no such a luxury thing like FALL (there are only […]

Especially for sun-seekers, It was the first rainy afternoon of Huế’s wet season. Heavy and fast. When the rain died down in the sunset, it left behind the mist afloat on the Hương River and the clouds lost on the mountains upstream. My heart was filled with a mixture of joy and sorrow beholding the marriage […]

Especially for Y.Q., Huế people are very early risers. The sun does not wake them up but they stir the dark morning until the dawn breaks. They wake up around 4 in the morning or even earlier to start a pre-working day such as cooking, doing some cleaning, or doing morning exercises. One of the […]

Vietnamese people, old and young, call him “Tây” (Westerner) or “Ông Tây” (Mr. Westerner). At first, he had felt funny when a kid sang merrily “Ah, Ông Tây! Ông Tây!” or when the elder people talked to each other and a “Tây” was heard in their conversations whenever he passed by. But after a while, […]