(QBĐT) - Through a poet in Ho Chi Minh City, I learned about Associate Professor, Doctor (PGS.TS.) Ngo Minh Oanh, a native of Quang Binh. He is a member of the Ho Chi Minh City Writers Association. Also through this poet, I learned about "Our Fatherland, the Land and the Sea, Forever in Harmony" , the third collection of poems by teacher and poet Ngo Minh Oanh.
Poetry filled with emotions
Previously, Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh introduced to readers two poetry collections "Lying at Night Listening to Memories" (2022), "Land Turns into a Land of Love" (2023). Still simple, passionate and experienced, as commented by poet Nguyen Hung, "Our Fatherland, land and sea are forever in harmony", including 50 poems, including main groups of topics: Homeland, country, places he had the opportunity to set foot on; sea and islands, soldiers; teaching profession. The broad theme of his homeland Quang Binh appears quite a lot in the poems: "The sound of chickens in the countryside", "Kien Giang river", "Before Quang Binh gate", "Ma's broken rice"... He wrote "My poems are restless in the long night/The soft intestines and blood flow inside and outside the world" (My poems) - it can be understood as the "feeling" of his poems.
“Before Quang Binh Quan” is a rather long poem, with 8 stanzas and 44 verses. Quang Binh Quan is a cultural and historical symbol, not only the pride of Quang Binh people. “Before Quang Binh Quan” - a poem by Ngo Minh Oanh is almost an epic poem, both concise and evocative in the poetry of a historical researcher, a son of the homeland.
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Who traveled a thousand miles to cross Hoanh Son
The main road through the burning sand
A Viet Thuong with long sea and wide river
Borderland Glue
Van Lang
(Before Quang Binh gate)
One must understand the process of building, defending the country, and expanding the territory of our ancestors; one must understand the legendary and official history of the nation to understand the message that the poet conveys through his poems.
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Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh was born into a farming family in Cam Thuy commune (Le Thuy). “My mother stood in the early morning dew on the riverbank/A few shrimps and a few fish to raise her children/My father enjoyed a cup of tea/The smoke from his tobacco pipe lit up the plowed road” (The Sound of Country Chickens). He was proud of his rural roots; haunted by the sound of country chickens; or in other words, it was a part of his memories: “The sound of country chickens echoed throughout the night/I heard the scent of ripe rice wafting in the air”; “Country people were honest and simple/Human feelings blended with the sound of chickens and the countryside” (The Sound of Country Chickens).
Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh is a man rich in nostalgia. The past always flows in his soul, connecting with the present; through poetry he sends a message to the future. Quang Binh in general, Le Thuy in particular and Cam Thuy where he was born are the same, after nearly 40 years have changed. However, the poet always remembers his mother's broken rice bowl of the past, even though broken rice has now become a luxury; the fragrant broken rice bowl makes his heart flutter: "I love the broken rice grains of my hometown to make it delicious" (Mother's broken rice). "Rice grains", "broken rice", "broken" are poetic metaphors of the past, of hardship, of the qualities of the people of a land.
Le Thuy is a land of “spiritual people” , where there is the Kien Giang River. Ngo Minh Oanh is proud of this river of life, this river of culture. “Quietly hiding itself in the green corn and rice/The underground river filters itself through the sand/Hoa Nhat Le, drop by drop, a source of freshness/Contributing to the purity of my hometown Le Thuy” and he feels guilty towards the river:
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Oh Kien Giang, forever flowing silently
I grew up carelessly
We do not know that the river divides itself and flows.
A pure source circuit
through so much pain
(Kien Giang River)
Not only loving the homeland, the place where he was born and grew up; "Our Fatherland and sea are forever in harmony" confirms that Ngo Minh Oanh's poetry is a poetry attached to the country, the Fatherland. In this topic area, we can mention "Before the Independence Palace", "Don't call our Fatherland S-shaped", "Autumn", "Ben Ngu on the day Uncle returned", "To friends in Truong Sa", "Con Co", "How miraculous are the drops of blood of the race", "There is a legend", "By the grave of an unknown soldier", "Recorded at the border cemetery", "The reed banks along the border", "Binh Lieu white reeds", "What to write on the seventeenth of February"...
If we count all the poems that poet Ngo Minh Oanh composed when he went to Ha Giang, Dien Bien , Son La and wrote about the Central Highlands, it can be said that “Our Fatherland, the land and the sea are forever in harmony” is a collection of revolutionary lyrical poems. As writer Kao Son said, the collection of poems shows a pure and loyal heart to the Fatherland.
Heart for homeland
Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh is an excellent teacher. He has more than 40 years of teaching experience in many localities; former Head of the History Department; Director of the Institute of Educational Research, Ho Chi Minh City University of Education; currently working at the Ho Chi Minh City Historical Science Association, member of the Tran Van Giau Award Committee.
He graduated from the Faculty of History (Vinh Pedagogical University) and the Faculty of Philosophy (Ho Chi Minh City University of Science); is an expert of the Ministry of Education and Training in many educational innovation projects; has held important positions: Member (2017) and Vice Chairman of the National Council for Evaluation of Comprehensive General Education Programs (2022); 4 consecutive years as Chairman of the National Council for Evaluation of History-Geography Textbooks for Secondary Schools (from Grades 6 to 9) of the Ministry of Education and Training.
As a historian, her whole life is devoted to research and teaching; to date, Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh has published 15 works and more than a hundred research articles on world history, history of human civilization, Vietnamese history and studies on Vietnamese educational innovation.
He loves teaching, is passionate about history and is dedicated to his profession. “The teaching profession also has a special “magic”, even though life is difficult and the pressure of the profession is very heavy, but most of those who have entered the teaching profession still stick with the profession until retirement. The greatest asset of the teaching profession is personality and a heart with the desire to impart knowledge to students…” , he confided after more than 40 years of being attached to the lecture hall.
Rabindranath Tagore, the great Indian poet, said: When we educate a man, we will have a useful person; when we educate a woman, we will have a family; and when we educate a teacher, we will have a generation. Educating teachers plays a very important role, because when they graduate, their labor objects are people, their products are also people. If a teacher is weak in ability, it will cause great consequences for society because this is a chain reaction.
Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh used to worry about the teaching profession, teachers, and the pedagogical environment. He is a person who has a deep affection for his homeland and worries about the education career of his homeland. In April 2024, he returned to his homeland and donated more than 1,000 reference books for all levels from preschool to secondary school, including reference books on history, geography, science, children's stories, etc. to Cam Thuy Primary and Secondary School.
At the ceremony, Associate Professor, Dr. Ngo Minh Oanh shared: “As someone who was born and raised in Cam Thuy but lives and works far away from home, I always want to contribute to the development of the education of my hometown... In order to repay the teachers' teachings and the deep affection of my hometown, I would like to present to my beloved teachers and students this small gift with the hope that teachers and students will have a rich and diverse source of reference materials to serve their teaching and learning in the future.”
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I want to be a green leaf
Contribute green to the forest
If tomorrow falls
Incubated young plants
(Incubation of young plants)
The last verse of the poem “Nurturing young trees” is not only an obsession from the reality of the Central Highlands forest - where teacher Ngo Minh Oanh taught for a long time, being destroyed, but behind the poem is also a “spiritual reality” and a “manifesto” of virtue.
Ngo Duc Hanh
Source: https://www.baoquangbinh.vn/van-hoa/202409/pgsts-ngo-minh-oanh-anh-muon-lam-la-biec-2220955/
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