Deep and splendid memories*

Nguyen Linh Giang (birth name: Nguyen Van Khoi), hometown is An Binh village, Cam Thanh commune (now Thanh An commune), Cam Lo district, Quang Tri. He is a journalist with 30 years of experience (1988 - 2017). In 2017, he transferred to work and became an editor at Thanh Nien Publishing House - Ho Chi Minh City branch. Nguyen Linh Giang is a member of the Ho Chi Minh City Writers Association. Recently, writer Nguyen Linh Giang has just published a collection of essays: "The River Still Flows, the River's Life" (Thanh Nien Publishing House, 2023) about his hometown of Quang Tri.

Quang Tri Newspaper would like to introduce the preface extracted from the book by writer Nguyen Linh Giang.

1. Once you love and cherish the land where you were born and raised, if you have a heart, you will always remember that you must “do something”. Depending on your profession and economic conditions, everyone wants to contribute a hand and an effort to that place. This expression is the heart for the homeland, no matter how little or much, you will contribute, according to your ability. There are many ways to “repay” “your” land, writing is also a way. In a broader view, this is the expression of the spirit of “remembering the source of water when drinking”.

The essay collection "The River Still Flows, the River's Life" (Thanh Nien Publishing House - 2023) by journalist and writer Nguyen Linh Giang is one of the vivid examples.

2. Reading a person's book, through that, we can clearly understand the nooks and crannies of their soul. The words speak. They can resonate for a long time. They can pass by briefly. But then, in the end, it is still their heart about the things they want to share. Confide. Confide in the reader.

In this book, although divided into two parts: “Memories” and “Homeland Flavors”, it is only one flow of emotions. It is the feeling of a person far from home, sometimes remembering things that are far away, that belong to the past, that are years and years away.

Deep and splendid memories*

Writer Nguyen Linh Giang and his work just published in 2023 - Photo: TL

“When I was a buffalo herder, before each hunting session to catch planthoppers, we prepared young squash leaves, salt, fresh pepper, and chili. After the hunt, a fire was lit on the edge of the melon field and then each whole planthopper was grilled over charcoal. When the wings and legs of the planthoppers were burned, the planthoppers were cooked. Peel off all the remaining wings and legs, remove the heads, leaving only the soft, fragrant body. Take young squash leaves and wrap them around the grilled planthoppers, dip them in salt and chili, and eat them with exclamations of deliciousness echoing between the sky and earth at dusk. The fatty, sweet, and nutty flavors blend together, making them indescribable. Not only does the grilled planthoppers have a fragrant aroma, but we also feel like we are tasting the smell of the land, fields, villages, and countryside.”

The passages are full of sentiments about the old days, about the hometown, oh, so many memories come flooding back, making the reader ecstatic. Suddenly, sometimes letting my soul drift along with Nguyen Linh Giang's memories, I imagine the state of mind of the musician Vu Duc Sao Bien: "In the middle of the golden autumn, beside the hill of ripe sim fruit/I sit alone and cry over my lost childhood". Nguyen Linh Giang's childhood is filled with this book. A gentle nostalgia. Like: "Remembering something like porridge on a bed/Standing and smelling the smell of onions, sitting and feeling sorry for the smell of onions".

Among the myriad of memories, even though the objects that make us miss are different, for example missing our homeland, missing our beloved, missing our old village... how can we measure and compare that nostalgia? I think it can only be compared to... food. To create the masterpiece "Thuong nho muoi thap" by Vu Bang, the nostalgia for delicious food of the North is still pervasive and consistent. Strangely, there are memories that fade over the years, but strangely, not with... food.

How to explain?

Although Nguyen Linh Giang or anyone else has enjoyed many delicious and strange dishes, how can that dish compare to what they have eaten since childhood? Nguyen Linh Giang thoughtfully remembers the fish and fish stewed in a pot: “The clay pot is lined with young ginger leaves. The fish stew is only selected from small fish, only the size of a finger, but plump and round, still alive and healthy, so it snaps very strongly. After preparing the fish, put the fish in the pot, marinate with fish sauce, pepper, and crushed taro. The fish is marinated, my mother puts the pot on the wood stove. When the pot is boiling, my mother adds dried old chili, sometimes one fish and one chili. After that, my mother reduces the heat, and the pot simmers.”

When reading this, someone might chuckle: “Why are you talking so much? It’s just moderately delicious, it’s not like... dinosaur heart, dragon liver... that’s so delicious?”. I would like to say, the deliciousness of braised fish or goi ngot, termite mushrooms, moldy insects, big fish, fermented fish sauce, crucian carp, snails, tapioca dumplings... that Nguyen Linh Giang mentioned, is delicious because of the image of the mother, father, grandparents who cooked it for them. Because of that deep affection, it leads to a very funny mentality?

What kind of mentality is that?

Dear, at a certain age, even though the teeth are loose, chewing is already rough, only water is left... to sip a bowl of thin porridge, but then people sometimes sit there and eagerly think to themselves: "I wish I could eat the rustic dishes of the old days". Only when they are old? No, even when they are young. In middle age, full of spring love, Nguyen Linh Giang still remembers it, for example: "The 'field chicken' dish in the rainy season is so delicious, the meat is firm and fatty: "Bamboo shoots cooked with field chicken/Let's play a batch and see who will come back as husband?" (Folk song). Adults compete to go fishing. Beside the ponds, lagoons, and places with flowing water, dozens of people line up to catch fish. There are countless crucian carp, snakehead fish, perch, snakehead fish, and catfish".

When remembering that dish, old memories come flooding back. Overwhelming. Comforting. Comforting people a lot. Delicious food is not just a specific material, but delicious because it is associated with memories that belong to the past.

3. When reading “The River Still Flows”, I think that history is the fate of an entire nation, not just an individual or a region, but all are linked in a dialectical relationship, inseparable. Living in a country, there are events that mark milestones for the nation, which have a profound impact on all regions of the country. However, the manifestation of that event is different, depending on each specific region. So, when reading this book, readers will be extremely excited to have the opportunity to learn more, to know more deeply about that event/issue, because there are pages written from other regions that complement their own.

Here, Nguyen Linh Giang has written pages about his ancestors such as Lord Nguyen Hoang, Princess Huyen Tran, about his family's traditional profession, about the place names, products... of the land where he was born and raised. When reading, I realized that there are many very vivid and everyday details. That is also the way he "entices" the reader to have more affection for that land. Doing this is also a way to give thanks to the place where he lived.

Even when writing about the food of your hometown, the people of your hometown, the products of your hometown, whatever, in the end it still leads to a “common denominator”: the people of that locality. Because all and all are also a reflection of the personality, temperament, habits, way of living, customs, habits... of the people of that place.

If I were to choose a detail that could be more or less “typical” of the people in his hometown, I would choose this one: “Quang Tri people eat chili like… eating rice. Chili is present in every meal, in every dish, and eating chili is to take the spiciness as the most important thing. Quang Tri children are ‘trained’ to eat chili by their mothers since they are in their eggs, the gene for eating chili is passed on through breastfeeding; when they are weaned from breastfeeding, their mothers ‘feed’ them with mem (mothers chew rice to feed their babies, in the past there was no boxed milk like today). The whole family eats together on the same tray of food, there is no separate cooking for children; eating spicy food becomes a habit”. This sentence by Nguyen Linh Giang, to me, is a “discovery”, because I have heard the folk song:

Hand holding a bowl of salt and ginger plate

Ginger is spicy, salt is salty, please don't forget each other

Surely this "variant" is "copyrighted" by the Quang Tri people:

Also dare bite chili chew ginger

Sweet and sour, salty and bitter, we must not forget each other.

4. Dare to say that the people and land of each locality contribute to the history of the whole country becoming fuller and richer. Once we talk about the history of a nation, we need to understand it more broadly, including the cultural elements, customs, habits, cuisine... of many other lands combined. For that reason, books on this topic are always necessary. If after reading, the reader nods and says with satisfaction: "Ah, I wish I had the chance to visit that place once?". If so, the writer has succeeded.

"The River Still Flows, the River's Life" by Nguyen Linh Giang is one of those essay collections.

Le Minh Quoc

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*Preface to the collection of essays "The River Still Flows with Life"

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