Town

In the morning, we went to Tung's grandma's house to say goodbye, since we'll be flying back to the States in a few days. However, I got a surprise when my Ba 1, whom I had invited to dinner, dropped by our hotel early at 6:30AM to drop off gifts I was supposed to bring back to America for my family and relatives. So much dried shrimp would put me over the limit for my already-stuffed check-in box, but I had no choice but to accept it after she had come the long way to call on me.

"Long ago," she told me, "our house used to be packed with family during reunion nights when we gathered to pay respect to our ancestors. Now, everyone's either dead or moved away. It's not really money that I'm lacking to comfortable live out the rest of my days. It's the love and companionship from family long gone; I don't know if I'll ever lay eyes on them again before I die."

At Tung's grandma's house, we had a breakfast of noodles and chicken. He spent some time chatting with his uncle and neighbors and grandma. Seven years ago, on his last visit, Tung's dad was supposed to bring home a big wooden plaque with his family surname etched in gold lettering. It was a board made for a traditional, daily tear-off calendar to be screwed on, and it was supposed to be shipped with their order of furniture, but somehow it got left behind. So today, Tung bade farewell to his grandma and carried home the wooden placard bearing his family surname.


After Di Oanh got off from work, she dropped by my place to pick me up. Together, we went to get my mom's "ao dai" that we ordered during our first week in Viet Nam.


Di Oanh also took me to see two houses. One was the one in which my mom grew up with my uncles. This house is on Ba Hat street, where we dropped off our other "ao dai" fabric. I hadn't realized I've been passing my mom's old house every time we came by taxi along this street.


The other house was on Hai Thuong Lang Ong Street, a commercial district where I grew up. Di Oanh couldn't remember the exact address of the second house, so I took a few pictures of the street and went with Di Oanh to her neighborhood to bid farewell to my relatives.


After I lit incense at my grandfather's altar and asked hime to safeguard our journey home, Di Oanh took me to eat dinner at a little diner specializing in "Mien Trung" (central Viet Nam) food. I had my last bowl of "bun ca," vermicelli seeped in broth, eaten with fish and plenty of green onions. We went out for dessert later at Che Hue Cung Dinh, where I had a strange combination "che" topped with toasted coconut that was quite tasty.

After a brief tour of the city, Di Oanh dropped me off back home. It was my first ride on a motorbike since coming back to Viet Nam. When I was a little girl, I sat on a motorbike wedged between my father (who drove and sat at the front) and my mother at the back. It was so different than riding in a sheltered vehicle; on a bike, I could smell the city as it whizzed past in a blur of lights and sounds. Passing by bakeries, the sweet, warm smell of bread and milk cooked with sugar awakened my senses. At night, the city sat aglow with lights, strung up since Christmas and left on to welcome the Western New Year.


Colorful red "li xi" pouches hung with lanterns and golden mai flowers for sale for the upcoming Lunar New Year. The brisk breeze carressed my face as our motorbike bumped along the road, and though I hadn't ridden one for 24 years, somehow the steady pace of a motorbike zooming along during the city's evening traffic made me feel very much at home. Even the balloon vendors marching slowly up and down the streets brought back memories; colorful inflatable plastic cartoon characters bubbled up around a skeletal man, making him seem heavy but light, weighed down by quantity, buoyed up by air.


I had hoped to feel as sense of familiarity as my feet touched the streets in front of the house where I grew up, but everything is so much changed that I was caught up in the hustle and bustle of the evening market scene. I kept telling myself that once upon a time, I ran up and down the sidewalks hugging these wide commercial streets of Hai Thuong Lang Ong, refusing to eat anything but a simple meal of rice and bananas, my mom chasing me with a bowl and spoon. It's been so long and I've forgotten, all except for the sweet taste and milky color of the "vu sua" fruit; the light, mellow flavor and chewy texture of "chuoi xiem" bananas that I've been addicted to since Week 1 of my stay; the refreshing, juicy sweetness and slightly crunchy seeds of "thanh long" (dragon fruit), the overwhelming smell of a hundred food vendors selling their wares on the street in an overpopulated city; the sense of neighborliness among clusters of houses built high and close to each other; the hospitality of families distant and near.