The Seven Necessities In ancient Viet culture, there is a very famous old saying: Quan môn thất kiện sự, sài, mễ, du, diêm, tương, thố, trà” When translated, it means, “The seven necessities to begin a day: firewood, rice, oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar, and tea.” It was very underwhelming to be honest. What in the world do basic kitchen ingredients have to do with … Continue reading Firewood, Rice, Oil, Salt, Soy Sauce, Tea
(Continued from Ancient Viet 2: Sunken Paradise) As a young Viet-American child growing up smack dab in the middle of the US (New Orleans no less), I quite often identified with the Vietnamese/Chinese community living in and around the south because there weren’t really that many of us Asians in that part of the neighborhood where I grew up. Heck, I was even hanging out … Continue reading Ancient Việt 3: Following the Genetic Trail
(Continued from Lên Đồng 2: Mounting the Medium) Folk beliefs are all the rage nowadays. Everybody wants to go tribal. It is the hottest new trend. The Japanese have their Shinto. The Chinese have their Zhōngguó mínjiān xìnyǎng. And us Việts, we have our Đạo Mẫu. I am not surprised that this is so. Remember, we were a matriarchal society, which meant women were valued … Continue reading Lên Đồng 3: Mother Goddess
If anyone told you that they had a firm grasp of history because they went through years of university, studying through historical books on the subjects, don’t walk—run away from them. Run far, far away. They only have the officially sanctioned, creative-writing version of what actually happened. This version is fine if all we want to do is pass our college exams and get our degrees, … Continue reading Ancient Việt 08: Lý Giang Nam
(Continued from Ancient Việt 7: Văn Khoa Đẩu) I am one of those individuals who never learned my people’s ancient history from a classroom. Everything I have learned all came from ancient books which I have had to painstakingly translate and/or decipher, using a very thick ancient Viet dictionary. Famous foreign sources (Chinese) usually have English translations, so that is a great help, but most ancient Viet … Continue reading Ancient Việt 8: Bách Việt
Vietnamese Women Rule. OK, so maybe not at this time, but in the past we did…kinda, sorta, in a way. Even as early as two-thousand years ago, we were a Matriarchal society. In my previous post on the Trưng sisters, I noted that not only were they twin queens of a huge geographic area, their generals were also women of great note. But they were … Continue reading Ancient Việt 14: Matriarchy and the Female Lineage
Picture credit: Linh Nguyen We are an ancient people. Việt history goes back far, far beyond what is the current accepted history of what Vietnam is suppose to be, spanning over four thousand years into the murky past. Unfortunately, much of it was destroyed by the Han dynasty during the third (as well as the fourth) invasion and domination, to be eventually replaced by Chinese customs and … Continue reading Ancient Việt 05: Văn Khoa Đẩu
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