Scene in Saigon - Saigoneer

A Slice of Life in Coupon-Era Hanoi via Colorful Vintage Lottery Tickets

2025-08-18T15:00:00+07:00

What can tiny sheets of paper reveal about a whole time period?

Xổ số kiến thiết Hà Nội, which could be loosely translated as the “Hanoi Development Lottery,” came to be during a time when northern Vietnam was rebuilding itself from the rubble of the resistance war against the French and establishing a socialist society. From the illustrations to the way it was promoted, the lottery exemplifies Vietnam’s coupon era.

At the time, while the government was still trying to make ends meet, there was great demand for infrastructure projects and amenities to improve the quality of life of the people, such as roads, schools, healthcare facilities, factories, and other public projects. Northern Vietnam was also saving money to channel revolutionary efforts in the southern region. In that economic climate, Hanoi was searching for a way to secure financial contributions that could both promote the collective spirit and appeal to the people. Thus, for the first time, during the Tết holiday of 1962, the state issued its first lottery tickets named “cần kiệm kiến thiết” (frugal development) as a lunar new year gift to Hanoians. These tickets became the initial foundation for a future lottery program that expanded to the entirety of northern and, later, the whole of Vietnam.

The lottery operation shared some similarities with its counterparts in the Soviet Union and other communist nations at the time. In the USSR, for example, the lottery was wholly state-run and tickets were distributed via official platforms like local workers’ unions, youth unions, kiosks, and state-owned stores; the government also strongly encouraged civil servants to buy tickets. This model was generally adopted by Hanoi: xổ số was both sold at physical locations and sent to state agencies so workers could purchase them at their workplaces.

The way the state promoted the lottery program in its early days displayed a strong sense of collectivist mobilization and socialist messaging. Tickets were often depicted with poetry excerpts and slogans like “Lottery purchase benefits both the state and the household” or “First, [we] build the capital / Then, [we] strengthen the nation’s future” to spread the maxim that buying these tickets was a way for the individual to play a part in developing the nation.

Overall, lottery design during this period wasn’t too elaborate, as the material and technology to produce them remained quite primitive. Both the subject matters and text on the tickets were displayed simply, using bright, eye-catching palettes and straightforward layouts, evoking propaganda posters or illustrations in old textbooks from the 1980s and 1990s. Tickets usually highlighted public buildings, Hanoi’s famous landmarks, or scenes showing Hanoians going through daily activities.

As this was viewed as a key state project, xổ số kiến thiết was run quite seriously. The lottery draw was conducted under the supervision of municipal officials at live events, most famously at the Đoàn Kết Club near Tràng Tiền Street. During the decades of a planned economy, when most commodities were tightly controlled by the state using coupons, the lottery was among the few goods that the people could buy freely. Hence, the lottery was warmly welcomed by Hanoians as a form of state-sanctioned gambling.

Đoàn Kết Club. Photo via Báo Tri thức & Cuộc sống.

Trần Minh Hải, a writer who lived through the prime years of xổ số, shared that he used to watch the lottery draw every afternoon because he “liked chum change, tiny prizes — whatever seems within reach tends to draw people in.” True lottery-heads back then even developed strategies to maximize their luck. The set price was just VND2 for a ticket, but a set with auspicious numbers can fetch VND22–24 on the black market.

The atmosphere at live lottery events could be compared to that of football matches. Fans arrived early to find the best, closest seats to the stage to watch the numeral balls spin in the case and the winning sequence on the blackboard; this was because the events took place in the evening and the electricity grid was unreliable, so one needed to stay close to the stage to read the numbers. Every spin was closely followed by hundreds of spectators eagerly waiting for the host to read out the numbers.

Lottery ticket booths. Photo by John Vink.

Hải recounts the sense of palpable disappointment in the air when the sequence was finalized: “1,001 participants simultaneously morphed their faces into a rainbow of emotions — very few of joy and most were of chagrin and regret. Shoe-clad legs stomped on the ground like a percussive symphony, harmonizing with a choir of woeful groans and thundering kneecap slaps [...], leaving behind their seats a white blanket of torn tickets and strewn shreds of hope.” Still, Hải adopted a rather sanguine outlook, reminding us of the true purpose of the lottery: “Losses also meant my beloved capital might gain a few additional bricks to build.”

In the following decades, as Vietnam’s economic model and situation shifted, the lottery operation also changed accordingly: on each ticket, socialist slogans and pastoral scenes were gone, replaced by flashy motorbikes, color TVs, and even the faces of celebrities enticing passersby to pick up a few tickets. Crowds of capital residents gathering around lottery draw events, once a highlight of the local social calendar, disappeared too. Albeit still run by the state, xổ số today is much more commercialized, and much less about fostering a sense of collective nation-building. Still, it remains a unique facet of Hanoi’s cultural history worth remembering.

Images courtesy of Lê Khanh.

Tàu Cánh Ngầm: The Curious Case of Saigon’s Lost Soviet Hydrofoils

2025-08-07T10:00:00+07:00

Not long ago, hulking “creatures” glided atop the waters between Saigon and Vũng Tàu. Like the dinosaurs that came before them, they slowly disappeared, until all that was left were their skeletons.

As the sun began to set on the Soviet Union in 1990, a run of hydrofoils, dubbed “Design 352,” began to emerge from Feodosiya, USSR’s Morye shipbuilding plant. Designed to roam within rivers and reservoirs, these vessels found themselves with what some might consider a more palatable moniker — “Voskhod” — better known in Vietnam as tàu cánh ngầm.

In their infancy, Voskhods proved themselves up to the task of coastal migratory routes and in 1995, at least 21 of the finned vessels were transferred to Vietnam where they were put into daily use across numerous localities, including Cát Bà and Hải Phòng, but could be found in their greatest numbers in southern Vietnam.

At their peak, they annually ferried some 500,000 passengers between Saigon and the oil-stained beaches of Vũng Tàu at the confluence of the Saigon River and the East Sea, with tickets priced at around VND200,000.

However, as more roads were built and the once-spry Voskhods aged, their numbers began to dwindle and, by 2014, signs of decline were obvious and they became accident-prone.

After a number of service suspensions, including a major fire in January 2014, the Voskhods were removed from service and their lifecycle officially came to an end in December 2016, when their operating permits weren’t renewed by authorities.

But as is often the case, a new type of vessel appeared on Saigon’s waterways not long after to appease traveler’s seafaring appetites. The Saigon-Vũng Tàu route is currently served by a new fleet of catamarans, amongst others, that have been operating since 2017.

Remnants of the Voskhods endured on dry docks around Saigon; the dilapidated carcass of one was still visible along the right side of the Saigon Bridge, when traveling from Bình Thạnh to District 2. It was removed in late 2018, putting an end to the Voskhod's existence in Saigon.

Image by Brian Letwin.

Though the current services are a safer option than their Soviet genus, what we’ve gained in security and stability, we’ve lost in mystique and thrill.

Watch this video from Rusty Compass, filmed about seven years ago, to witness a nostalgic first-hand experience of traveling on these historical relics shortly before they were pulled from service:

The Surprisingly Recent History Behind Bình Thạnh's Lonely 'Gia-Đinh' Gate

2025-08-01T10:00:00+07:00

It’s claimed by several tourism websites that a gateway from one of the ancient Gia Định citadels has survived and may be viewed on the Lê Văn Duyệt-Phan Đăng Lưu intersection in Bình Thạnh District, close to the Lê Văn Duyệt Mausoleum. However, a little research into the history of that area reveals that the gateway in question has more recent origins.

The gateway, popularly known as the “Gia Định Citadel Gate” (Cổng thành Gia Định), is built into the outer wall of Trương Công Định Secondary School and does bear a very superficial resemblance to the east gate of the 1837 Gia Định Citadel as depicted in the famous drawing of the French attack of 1859, although clearly it was conceived on a significantly smaller scale.

A 1966 map of what is now the Lê Văn Duyệt-Phan Đăng Lưu junction.

In fact, since neither the Lũy Bán Bích city walls of 1772 nor the two citadels of 1790 and 1837 (see “The Citadels of Gia Định”) were located anywhere near this neighborhood, the idea that it ever formed part of those structures may be ruled out.

Old maps reveal that the secondary school stands on the site formerly occupied by the historic Gia Định School of Drawing (École de Dessin Gia-Dinh), an applied arts school set up by the French in 1913 to provide continuing studies for graduates of the Thủ Dầu Một School of Indigenous Arts (École d’Art Indigène de Thu-Dau-Mot, teaching mainly woodwork and lacquerware) and the Biên Hòa School of Arts (École d’Art de Bien-Hoa, teaching mainly ceramics and bronzecasting).

The École de Dessin Gia-Dinh, pictured in the 1920s.

An important training ground for many pioneering southern painters and sculptors, it was renamed the Gia Định School of Applied Arts (École des Arts Décoratifs de Gia-Dinh) in 1940, and after 1954 it became the Gia Định Secondary School of Decorative Arts (Trường Trung học Trang trí Mỹ thuật Gia Định).

In 1955, the Saigon National College of Fine Art (Trường Quốc gia Cao đảng Mỹ thuật Sài Gòn) was opened right next door to the secondary school to teach painting and sculpture. After reunification in 1975, the two schools merged to become the Hồ Chí Minh City College of Fine Art (Trường Cao đảng Mỹ thuật Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh), and when this institution was upgraded to the status of a university in 1981, all teaching was confined to the 1954 building.

The facade of the Gia Định Secondary School of Decorative Arts, picutred in 1960.

The original École de Dessin Gia-Dinh building of 1913 was subsequently demolished to make way for the Trương Công Định Secondary School, but its attractive gateway bearing the name “Gia-Đinh” clearly caught the eye of city planners, who had it preserved as part of the school wall.

As of 2025, although the gate still exists, its facade has been completely painted over to match the white-beige color palette of the secondary school, making it harder to spot compared to its previous shade of bright yellow, as shown in the top image taken in 2016.

Tim Doling is the author of the guidebooks Exploring Huế (Nhà Xuất Bản Thế Giới, Hà Nội, 2018), Exploring Saigon-Chợ Lớn (Nhà Xuất Bản Thế Giới, Hà Nội, 2019) and Exploring Quảng Nam (Nhà Xuất Bản Thế Giới, Hà Nội, 2020) and The Railways and Tramways of Việt Nam (White Lotus Press, 2012) For more information about Saigon history, visit his website, historicvietnam.com.

The Legends of Thăng Long Tứ Trấn, the 4 Guardian Temples Protecting Hanoi

2025-07-25T15:00:00+07:00

In the edict to move Vietnam’s capital to Hanoi, Emperor Lý Thái Tổ described this land as the middle of heaven and earth, the center of the four directions. Such a place would bring peace and prosperity, he believed, and deserved sacred protection.

Over the course of the Lý Dynasty, the tradition of worshiping Thăng Long Tứ Trấn, or the Four Sentries of Thăng Long, emerged. These are the four temples dedicated to four deities guarding the cardinal directions of the citadel.

The Eastern Sentry: Bạch Mã Temple

Located in the heart of the Old Quarter, Bạch Mã Temple is the sentry of the east. It was built in the 9^th century — the oldest temple of Tứ Trấn — to honor the god Long Đỗ, literally the Belly of the Dragon.

The entrance.

The god Long Đỗ.

Legend has it that when Lý Thái Tổ moved the court to Thăng Long in 1010, he failed to construct a fortress many times. One day, he sent people to pray to the god Long Đỗ, and they saw a white horse walking out from the temple. By tracing the horse’s footsteps and building the fortress accordingly, they finally succeeded. Deeply grateful, the king changed the name of the temple to Bạch Mã, or White Horse, and declared Long Đỗ as the Thành Hoàng, or the One to Bring Abundance, of Thăng Long.

The White Horse with a sun amulet on its side. In Vietnam and many other cultures, worshiping the east is also worshiping the sunrise.

The temple has four main structures. First is a courtyard featuring huge ironwood columns with stunning carvings. The front shrine is dedicated to the White Horse, followed by the mid and back shrine where Long Đỗ himself is honored.

The courtyard and dedicated carvings.

The front shrine of the White Horse.

The shrines of Long Đỗ.

The Southern Sentry: Kim Liên Temple

Kim Liên is the sacred temple defending the south, here, the god Cao Sơn is worshiped. Cao Sơn was one of the 100 children of Lạc Long Quân and Âu Cơ — the founding legend of the Vietnamese people. He was among the 50 who followed mother Âu Cơ up to the highlands, and he helped Sơn Tinh, the God of the Mountains, defeat Thuỷ Tinh, the God of the Water, and brought peace to the people.

The entrance within Kim Liên temple with the sign "Southern Sentry."

The temple was built in the 16–17^th century after the capital relocation, making it the youngest of the four. Over time, the people of Kim Liên Village built a cổng tam quan, or a three-entrance gate, right next to the Kim Liên pond. They also added some buildings and turned the temple into a đình, or a communal house, of the village.

The three-entrance gate of the đình.

The pond in front of the temple.

The most important relic of the temple is a stone epitaph erected in 1510, which was carved with legends of the god Cao Sơn, along with 39 imperial edicts of the Lê and Nguyễn dynasties.

The stone epitaph.

The Western Sentry: Voi Phục Temple

Under the peaceful green canopy of Thủ Lệ Park lies Voi Phục temple, the western sentry. The temple is dedicated to Prince Hoàng Chân, the son of Emperor Lý Thái Tông. He fought against Tống invaders in the 11^th century and died in the battle. To honor him, the king ordered residents to build the Voi Phục Temple, which was named after the two kneeling elephants in front of the temple.

The design of the roof is in line with the traditional style of ancient pagodas with the tail curved up to the sky, furnished with carvings of spiritual creatures like dragons, unicorns, and phoenixes, etc.

The Northern Sentry: Quán Thánh Temple

Next to West Lake is the sentry of the north: Quán Thánh Temple. Here lies the seat of the god Huyền Thiên Trấn Vũ, who is an important Taoist figure representing the North star.

The gate of Quán Thánh Temple.

As legends go, once there was a nine-tailed fox terrorizing the people. So the god Trấn Vũ came down from heaven and killed the fox. Its body sank to the ground and created West Lake as it is today; this narrative is also why the lake is sometimes called the Xác Cáo (Fox Corpse) Lake.

An altar with a Tang poem in the background.

The temple has many invaluable relics, including around 40 wood carvings of Tang poems dating back to the 7^th century. There is also a magnificent copper sculpture portraying life activities from the three interlinked worlds: Thiên (sky), Địa (earth), and Thủy (water).

The copper sculpture hanging from the rafters.

Perhaps most impressive of all, however, is the four-ton, 3.96-meter black copper statue of Huyền Thiên Trấn Vũ at the main altar. According to legend, the statue presents the Taoist god precisely when he reached the highest enlightenment.

The statue of Huyền Thiên Trấn Vũ.

As befits a place worshiping a god of great martial power, the temple courtyard becomes a dojo in the afternoon.

People honing their martial arts skills at Quán Thánh.

More than 1,000 years have passed since the relocation of the capital, and still the legend of Tứ Trấn remains an iconic part of the city. As long as their stories are still being told, the sentries continue to stand tall to protect this land.

This article was originally published in 2022.

Feel the Pulse of a Fast-Changing Vietnam in the 1990s via This Lively Photo Album

2025-07-18T10:00:00+07:00

By the mid-1990's, Vietnam's astounding economic transformation was well underway.

Markets crowded with crops, vast flocks of poultry ready to be sold, and kids sitting down to full bowls of food as shown in these photos by Japanese photographer Hiroji Kubota make visually clear what fiscal growth looks like on a local level.

Inside a shrimp processing facility in Cái Răng, Cần Thơ in 1996.

Shot between 1995 and 1999, they depict a country at the nexus of globalized modernity and tradition. Locals roast coconuts with brick ovens in Bến Tre, while employees processing shrimp for export at a plant in Cần Thơ adhere to strict safety standards. In Sapa, H’Mông wear traditional, handmade clothing while motorbikes sneak onto streets overwhelmed with bicycles.

No culture or country ever exists as a static concept, but there are moments of accelerated flux. Truly, Vietnam did not saunter towards the 21^st century, but hurled ahead driven by a manic hunger to grow, expand and change for the sake of people's prosperity.

Have a look at these frantic years below:

Making candied coconut for Tet.

A market in session under Long Bien Bridge in Hanoi.

The morning rush in Hanoi.

A parade celebrating reunification in Saigon in 1995.

That doesn't look comfortable for the quackers.

A monk and his apprentice at a Hue pagoda.

A sculptor with his artworks in Saigon.

A floating market in Phung Hiep, Can Tho.

Fresh produce ready for shoppers in the Mekong Delta.

Bundles of sugar canes for sale in Ha Long Bay.

A farmer works on his terrace field.

H'Mong children in a mountainous area.

Helmet, pants, and cool dép tổ ong.

Buying a steamy market snack.

[Photos via RedsVN]

Street Cred: Dauntless Antiwar Icon Nguyễn Thái Bình and His Tragic Death

2025-07-11T10:00:00+07:00

If one were to see the streets of Vietnam as a tangled network of people whose names they took, every city would resemble a messy collection of historical fragments.

Saigon's streets occasionally remind one that to ride around a city is also to move within a nation's history, to engage with a geographical past and glide through the events of collective memory. In Saigon, the Trưng sisters, Võ Thị Sáu, Phạm Ngọc Thạch and Sương Nguyệt Anh all take residence at a certain location perceived to be part of modern-day Vietnam. The history behind the namesake of Nguyễn Thái Bình streets in District 1 and Tân Bình District, however, takes place on a whole different continent.

Born in Cần Giuộc, Long An Province in 1948 to Lê Thị Anh and Nguyễn Văn Hai, Nguyễn Thái Bình had eight siblings and moved to Saigon after finishing primary school to attend secondary school at Petrus Ký, today's Lê Hồng Phong High School For The Gifted. In March 1968, not long after the Tet Offensive began, Bình got a scholarship from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to go to the US for his undergraduate studies at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Vietnamese Students' Revolts

Established in 1961 by John F. Kennedy and a successor of the Development Loan Fund and the International Cooperation Administration, USAID oversees all American aid programs, including technical, economic and military training, in foreign countries, including Vietnam. USAID’s main role during the American War, according to a report from the agency, was to aid US counterinsurgency efforts and later the Vietnamization policy while developing a nation-building program in the country.

Besides military training and economic assistance, the agency also sponsors grants and scholarships. According to Ngô Thanh Nhàn, who received a scholarship at the same time as Bình and is now a professor at New York University, there were several USAID student groups who came for different purposes and lengths of time.

The first group (USAID Group I) mostly included personnel from the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, although there were some exceptions. Bình and Nhàn were part of USAID Group II whose members were selected based on exemplary academic achievement and involvement in extracurricular activities. Bình studied at the University of Washington's Department of Fisheries.

According to an article on the experience of Vietnamese students in the US published in the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars in 1971, Ngô Vinh Long notes that when one accepted a USAID scholarship, there was an obligation that lasted from about five to ten years requiring the student to work in positions sponsored by the American government after they graduate. On top of these requirements, Vietnamese studying at American universities received very limited academic freedom or freedom of speech, as they were subject to deportation if they expressed opinions that were deemed against the “national interest.”

This particular circumstance didn’t stop these students from expressing their voices against the war, Washington’s policies and the nature of USAID itself. Nhàn notes in “Many Bridges, One River: Organizing for Justice in Vietnamese American communities”: “By the time we got to the United States, we started to oppose the war, immediately after Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. We participated in antiwar activities locally, and exchanged ideas through zines in Vietnamese.”

Nguyễn Thái Bình was no exception. While he didn’t express political opinions while still in Saigon, Bình became more frustrated and anguished at what the American government was doing in Vietnam after his arrival in the US. In an open letter addressing his resistance, Bình wrote that during his time in the country, he had studied the damage the war was having on the people of Vietnam. In the summer of 1970, Bình took an opportunity to travel across southern Vietnam, and what he witnessed had strengthened his antiwar stance.

Nguyễn Thái Bình. Photo via University of Washington.

On February 10, 1972, Bình participated in an antiwar protest with nine other Vietnamese students, a majority of whom were also on the USAID scholarship. The sit-in lasted for three hours, and every member of the group was later arrested on charges of criminal trespassing. In the following months, Bình gave a series of speeches in an auditorium, federal court, churches, halls and coffee houses.

A flyer for an event in February organized by Bình and friends and a list of Bình's activities from February to April in 1972. Photos via University of Washington.

In the process of learning more about the role of US imperialism, Bình had also realized the nature of the very program that had brought him to the country in the first place. On April 24 of the same year, Bình, together with 15 other Vietnamese, staged a “Vietnamese Invasion of Carbondale” at Southern Illinois University (SIU) to protest against the policies of Saigon and Washington, USAID and the Vietnam Studies Center at SIU. The establishment of the center was funded by USAID to provide consultant and training services to US corporations and government agencies, and offer technical assistance and support in postwar reconstruction projects.

SIU’s involvement in the war had become a controversial issue within Asian academic circles, such as the Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars (CCAS) and Association for Asian Studies (AAS), for its complicity in Washington’s neocolonial efforts and resemblance to the earlier Vietnam Advisory Group project at Michigan State University (MSU) when Diệm was still in power. The MSU advisory helped build the then-puppet government police force and trained secret police for political policing.

Poster for the event. Photo replicated from the Douglas Allen article “Universities and the Vietnam War: a Case Study of a Successful Struggle.”

Douglas Allen, a member of the CCAS, wrote in an article that, while resistance among academics helped shut down the center, it was this group of Vietnamese and local antiwar activists that played the most important role in making “the issues of neocolonial technical assistance and postwar reconstruction projects moot.” These Vietnamese include “Nguyen Thai Binh, Le Anh Tu, Nguyen Huu An, Tran Khanh Tuyet, David Truong, Doan Hong Hai, Tran Vu Dung, Ngo Vinh Long, Vu Ngoc Con, Vu Quang Viet, Do Hoang Khanh and Nguyen Trieu Phu.”

“The Vietnamese, most of whom were in the U.S. on AID scholarships, came at great personal risk; several were visited by immigration officials shortly before their trip to Carbondale,” writes Allen in “Universities and the Vietnam War: a Case Study of a Successful Struggle.”

The event at Carbondale was led by Ngo Vinh Long, who was among the USAID Group I students and was a major Vietnamese anti-imperialist radical and activist. Both Long and Bình are the co-founders of Thời Báo Gà, a monthly newsletter that published analysis, literature and essays on the peace movement. The Vietnam Studies Center at Carbondale ended up closing for three days during the sit-in.

Deportation, Death and Legacy

Bình planned future activism, though he was aware of the risks he was facing and even predicted his own death in four letters: one addressed to the “peace and justice-loving people in the world,” another to US President Richard Nixon, one to his friend Nguyen Hữu An and the last to his family.

In June 10, 1972, Bình officially graduated from the University of Washington, Seattle with honors. At the ceremony, he turned his graduation into a one-man protest by handing out leaflets and attempting to grab the microphone to speak. On Bình's graduation gown, white tape spelled out “Blood Debts” and “US in Vietnam Immoral.” On the skull of his academic mortarboard, “Viet Nam” was written.

Nguyễn Thái Bình at his graduation. Photo via Flickr user manhhai.

Three days before his graduation, the New York Times reported, Bình and three other USAID scholarship Vietnamese students received phone calls from the aid agency to inform them of the termination of their program under USAID sponsorship, and that their tickets to return to Vietnam were available. The students included Nguyễn Tăng Huyền from the University of California, Berkeley and Nguyễn Hữu An and Vũ Ngọc Côn from the Northrop Institute of Technology. The latter two also participated in the Carbondale incident and all three students, including Huyền, were among those arrested at the consulate sit-in back in February. However, the students refused to go home, fearing that the Thiệu-led government would prosecute and torture them for their views.

Bình’s visa was also revoked on that day and his flight home was scheduled for July 2, 1972 on Pan Am flight 841 departing from San Francisco for Saigon through stops in Honolulu, Guam and Manila. After the aircraft took off from Manila, Bình, carrying a knife and a package that he claimed contain bombs, took stewardess May Yuen hostage.

Through her, he passed a note to Captain Gene Vaughn demanding that the plane fly to Hanoi instead, where it would be shot down, according to the New York Times. When the captain didn’t comply, Bình passed up another note, this time written in his blood, emphasizing how serious he was about being taken to Hanoi. Vaughn then went to meet Bình after the plane touched down at Tân Sơn Nhứt Airport. Bình threatened the captain with his “bombs,” which were later found to be two lemons. Vaughn had guessed that Bình was bluffing, so he told Bình to come closer and found an opportunity to grab him and pin him down, with the help of several passengers.

The captain then shouted “Kill that son of a bitch!” to a passenger on the plane who was believed to be an ex-cop flying to Saigon for a security guard position and had a gun. Bình was then shot five times while Vaughn held him by the throat, according to Vaughn’s statements. The captain then threw Bình’s body out of the plane.

A snippet of reports on Bình's death in the Bangor Daily News. Photo replicated from Bangor Daily News.

“A lot of time and effort has been spent on trying to prevent hijackings, but the only thing that will be effective is a mandatory death penalty, without any loopholes,” said Vaughn at an event honoring him for killing the unarmed hijacker. The shooter, who was never publicly identified, even gave Vaughn the cartridge from the gun used to kill Bình as “souvenir,” and Vaughn showed it to reporters from the Bangor Daily News like it was a trophy.

May Yuen, the stewardess who was taken hostage, didn’t share this celebratory spirit. In an interview with the Bangor Daily News, she said she felt “sorry for him [Bình] because he ended in such a disastrous way” and that “he was very nice to me and he did not mean to do anything rough.”

“Bình's death hit the front pages of all major newspapers. The clips were a startling contrast to how his friends describe him. His college professors and friends knew Bình as a peace activist. He was the one always seen on campus carrying a ‘Stop the War’ sign. An honors student at the College of Fisheries, he wrote poetry, but he could also box and play soccer,” wrote Lily Eng in the Seattle Times in 1992.

A report by the Airport Security Committee was filed and led to a preliminary investigation by the local authorities. According to a Tuổi Trẻ article series investigating the files of the incident in the National Archive in Saigon, both reports from the Airport Security Committee and the police conclude that Bình didn't intend to blow up the plane, and further investigation should be conducted to determine whether it was illegal or just to apply deadly force in such a situation.

Report from the Airport Security Com (top) and the police report. Photos via Tuổi Trẻ.

However, the investigation mysteriously ended and the shooter immediately returned to the US and canceled his plans to work in Saigon. Though never publicly identified, according to the confidential documents that Tuổi Trẻ gathered, he was revealed to be William H. Mills, an ex-cop in California who was flying to Saigon to work for the Federal Electric Corporation.

The ambiguity surrounding the investigation also led Bình’s mother, Lê Thị Anh, to write a letter to the US president, to no avail.

To read the letter in full, visit the University of Washington.

Among activists, Bình’s death led to anger and mourning. Ngô Thanh Nhàn writes in the book Many Bridges, One River that the assassination prompted the formation of the first leftist union of Vietnamese in the US: “As soon as we learned Nguyễn Thái Bình was secretly extradited and later on killed on the tarmac of Tân Sơn Nhất airport, all the groups joined together to form the Union of Vietnamese in the United States.”

This group started out with 2,000 to 3,000 people, who were mostly from USAID group II, and were later joined by more members from more backgrounds and perspectives, such as the anti-colonial Vietnamese refugees who arrived in New York in the 1940s as French “coolies” during the World War II, as well as anti-war wives of GI and army trainees.

The union’s first joint action was a memorial for Bình, conducted with the help of the Black Panther Party in Oakland. From that point on, the group formed alliances with other activist groups in different communities, such as Asian Americans, African Americans, Iranians, Palestinians and Latinos.

Photo via Many Bridges, One River (top) and the University of Washington (bottom).

Bình’s name was also taken to name the Thái Bình Brigade that marched in Nisei Week, an annual Japanese American cultural festival, to oppose Japan’s militarism and advocate for peace. One month after Bình’s death, the Thái Bình Brigade, along with the Văn Trỗi Brigade, took to the streets where Nisei Week was held and burned the Rising Sun flag as a demonstration against militarism and Japanese corporations profiting from the war.

The brigades in Gidra, a revolutionary Asian-American newspaper-magazine. Photo via Densho Digital Collection.

In his letter to “the peace and justice loving people around the world,” Bình writes:

Going home to stand in the line of the Vietnamese people in the struggle of national salvation, to take part in the resistance against the U.S. aggression, to confirm the justness of our cause,to dedicate to the freedom fighters of Vietnam, living and dead, to strengthen the confidence in the eluctable victory of our people, I direct Pan Am 841 to Hanoi.

I promise myself I shall not hurt any innocent person.

This article was originally published in 2020.

Street Cred: Pháo Đài Láng, Home of Ông Voi and Where the War Began

2025-07-01T10:00:00+07:00

More often than not, a country’s independence is won with guns. The location where the first shots were fired for Vietnam is memorialized to this day.

Tucked at the end of a small alleyway, Pháo đài Láng, or Fort of Láng, is surrounded by houses and apartment buildings. With no venerable battlement, the only structures here are a small memorial hall and a nondescript artillery mount.

The artillery, a 75mm anti-aircraft gun, is set in concrete at the center of a hollow mount where a stone plaque reads: “At 20:03 on December 19, 1946, Pháo đài Láng fired the first shots at the French army in the Hanoi Imperial Citadel, beginning the nationwide Resistance War. This was one of the two guns of the fort back then — a memorial for the ‘Brave Death for the survival of the Fatherland’ spirit of the people of Hanoi.”

The last gun at Pháo đài Láng. Photo by Linh Phạm.

The place that heralded Vietnam’s Resistance War was built by the French in 1940. Upon taking the land from the people of Láng Trung Village (now Láng Thượng, Đống Đa District), they erected the pháo đài to ward off Japanese air attacks. After the August Revolution in 1945, the Việt Minh, or League for the Independence of Vietnam, claimed the fort.

On June 29, 1946, the Pháo đài Láng platoon was formed, led by Nguyễn Ứng Gia. However, they lacked equipment. Though a place meant to specialize in long-range artillery, they did not have a sighting device, binoculars, or even a radio. Gia had to borrow things like a tapeline from a tailor and a compass from a geomancer.

The compass used at the fort. Photo by Linh Phạm.

One day, General Võ Nguyên Giáp came to visit the fort. Lieutenant Gia reported: “Without sighting equipment, we drew a circle on cardboard and marked the degrees. Then we put the cardboard on a map to find firing directions.” General Giáp replied, “Comrades, you must be more creative. When needed, you can lower the barrel and fire directly at the incoming enemies. But always remember to maintain and protect the weapon.”

Between 1945 and 1946, Vietnam and France struggled to redefine their relationship. The former wanted its independence recognized, while the latter wanted to protect its interests in Indochina. Tensions built with events like the Hải Phòng incident, which left 6,000 Vietnamese civilians dead and eventually, all negotiations failed, leading to the inevitable war.

On the morning of December 19, 1946, France's General Morlière issued an ultimatum — the third one within two days — demanding Vietnamese forces disarm and concede Hanoi. The Vietnamese rejected the ultimatum and decided that the time had come for open conflict. That afternoon, the fort received the order: “Tonight, Pháo đài Láng will fire first. Order from above: at 20:00, our forces will bomb the Yên Phụ power plant, lights will go out in the city.”

Caption: Artillery formation in Láng, Hanoi ready to fire on French troops. Photo by Linh Phạm.

In an interview with An Ninh Thủ Đô, Đỗ Văn Đa, a member of the Pháo đài Láng platoon, reminisced about that day when the war began. “I still remember clearly, the afternoon of December 19, 1946, Gia told us, ‘Comrades, have early dinner tonight, afterward, get to your positions and await orders.’ It was a freezing winter night. We, the village boys from outside of Hanoi, more used to planting rice than holding guns, were so nervous. We could not imagine what battle would be like. At 20:03, the city plunged into darkness, Gia commanded: ‘Fire!’ For the first time, I got to hear the furious roar of ông Voi (Mr. Elephant, the gun’s nickname). My ears were numb but I didn’t stop reloading. Three bouts, six rounds, soared away. It was so cold but we sweated like pigs.”

The fort’s target was the French command complex in the Hanoi Imperial Citadel. But without a radio, they didn’t know if their rounds found their mark or not. It wasn’t until noon the next day that reports came in. “We were like kids,” Đa said. “Overwhelmed with joy when the scouts reported that we hit the targets in the citadel. The mothers and sisters bringing us food were also happy.”

“The next night, the French fired at us,” Đa continued. “Shells hit the village, houses were burnt, people died and were wounded. But the supply squad still brought food to the fort. The steaming rice was warm with the love of the people. On December 21, we shot down a plane. Comrade Võ Nguyên Giáp sent a letter of compliment: ‘To praise the spirit of the soldiers at the fort.’ Contributing to the feat of ông Voi are the people of Láng Trung Village, feeding us and maintaining the guns.”

People of Láng Trung supporting Pháo đài Láng, oil on canvas. Photo by Linh Phạm.

The conflict that Mr. Elephant started would become known as the Battle of Hanoi, the opening salvo of the anti-French Resistance War. This battle would also be his last. After 60 days of fighting, the Việt Minh withdrew from the city and prepared for a prolonged war. On January 11, 1947, Đa’s platoon received orders to disable the guns and retreat to Hà Đông.

More than 70 years have passed since those days of smoke and shells. Now, the only things falling on Pháo đài Láng are autumn leaves. Đỗ Đức Thành, the caretaker, tells Saigoneer that sometimes he has to sweep 40 kilograms of leaves a day. And in this time of peace, the fort faces a new kind of foe: poor urban planning. A road construction project is threatening to cut this national historic site in half. Hopefully, ông Voi will be protected this time.

This article was originally published on Urbanist Hanoi in 2020.

Buôn Ma Thuột's Thriving Elephant Culture in 1957

2025-06-23T13:13:23+07:00

In the not-too-distant past, elephants were an important part of highland lifestyles, including use in cultural activities, agriculture.

Before they had achieved their current position of closely guarded endangered creatures, elephants had many roles in Vietnamese society. As glorified by the Trung sisters and Bà Triệu, two hundred years later, they were once important war machines. The Nguyễn lords in Huế even built a large arena to watch them battle tigers to the death. They have also been used for more peaceful, but certainly not stress-free, purposes. As the VND1,000 bill pays homage to, they were instrumental in 20th-century forestry efforts. Meanwhile, hundreds of domesticated elephants tamed from wild populations were adopted into highland communities to assist with agriculture and take part in important cultural activities.

Elephants were used for routine transportation along the dirt roadways.

Seasoned photographer John Dominis (1921 - 2013) documented this later use for LIFE magazine. These photos from 1957 reveal how elephants were an everyday occurrence in an Ê Đê community in Buôn Ma Thuột. Saddled with baskets and chairs, they transported people and materials in the remote village while taking part in celebrations and gatherings. Tended to trainers and accustomed to the rhythms of daily life, they appear little different from domestic cats or dogs.

Elephants grow to great sizes but never outgrow their curiosity.

Economic development, as well as technological, ecological, and societal change, in tandem with evolving understandings of human-animal relations, have all made these scenes one sof the past. But viewing them allows us to more deeply understand the gentle giants that acted as intermediaries between the wild and developing world.

An elephant arriving at a traditional Ê Đê stilt house.

Elephants at work would have been a familiar sight in this village, little different than a buffalo set to plow.

Elephants were enlisted in cultural performances.

The few hundred elephants that remain in Vietnam are now allowed off the roads and out of the chains to stomp around in the forests freely.

[Photos via RedsVN]

A Collection of Scenes in 1964 Saigon, Bến Tre, Biên Hòa on Film

2025-06-19T13:00:00+07:00

In 1964, Saigon’s Phù Đổng Roundabout didn’t feature the towering bronze statue of folk hero Thánh Gióng. Instead of the congestion hot spot the intersection is known as today, it was actually spacious and airy, with nary a shop or bubble tea parlor in sight.

These film shots, taken by American serviceman Chris Newlon Green, are perhaps some of the most well-preserved and –composed images of 1960s Vietnam that we’ve come across: arty night shots with light painting, intimate portraits, and expansive landscapes: Green shows a knack for photography, aided by the roll of film’s incredible colors.

Follow the chronicles of Green’s stay in Vietnam through the photos below:

Phù Đổng Roundabout.

The intersection between Trần Hưng Đạo (right) and Trần Phú (left).

Downtown Saigon from above.

The Đề Thám-Trần Hưng Đạo intersection.

Mekong Delta children.

The holiday home of Madame Trần Lệ Xuân in Bến Tre.

A villa in Bến Tre.

A bird's-eye view of Vũng Tàu.

A Vietnamese lady in Long Hải.

An inter-province bus in the Mekong Delta.

A ferry taking commuters from Mỹ Tho to Bến Tre.

Biên Hòa from above.

A rubber plantation in Biên Hòa.

The central roundabout of Bến Tre.

A railroad bridge in Bến Tre.

Vĩnh Kim Market in Châu Thành, Tiền Giang Province.

Going across towns by boat was and still is a common aspect of life in the Mekong Delta.

[Top photo: Phù Đổng Roundabout at night/Photos vis Redsvn]

Vauban Architecture: The Foundation of Central and Northern Vietnam's Citadels

2025-06-11T15:00:00+07:00

In our previous article on Vietnam’s southern citadels, we covered a mix of ancient structures and those constructed just before the dawn of French colonization of Indochina. In particular, we focused on Gia Định Citadel, a hulking structure that once stood in what would become Saigon’s city center. Undertaking a similar exercise for Vietnam’s central and northern regions is less practical, given the sheer quantity and variety of citadels in those regions. So, for the second part of our citadel series, we instead will focus on a unifying feature across such fortifications — Vauban architecture.

The style is the brainchild of Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban, a Frenchman described as one of the most prominent and influential military strategists during the reign of Louis XIV. His designs, strategies, and principles remained in use until the early 20^th century. The development of Vauban architecture emerged against the backdrop of the turbulent geo-political and religious strife which engulfed Europe in the 17^th century, which involved major siege warfare. At this point in military history, it was accepted that even the strongest fortifications would eventually fall, so their ultimate function was to absorb the attacker's energy to take the wind out of the larger offensive at hand.

The fortress Neuf-Brisach in France, Vauban's final work and the culmination of his "Third System." Completed in the early 18^th century after Vauban’s death. Photo via Forte Cultura.

With this in mind, Vauban improved upon previous designs by using specific shapes, including pentagonal and hexagonal outer walls and layers in his fortifications. They would sometimes include residential and commercial districts within a fortification’s walls. Therefore, Vauban theory went beyond simply military strategy, architecture and construction, but also extended to civil engineering and economic and social organization.

Fortifications of this style which, per UNESCO, “bears witness to the peak of classic bastioned fortification, typical of western military architecture of modern times.” Some of them endure long after Vauban’s death in 1707. During his prolific career, he personally oversaw the construction of 300 such structures across the globe, from the Americas to what is now Vietnam, where French engineers helped construct such fortifications for the Nguyễn Dynasty.

Pigneau de Béhaine, painted by Maupérin during his 1787 trip to Paris with Crown Prince Cảnh, on display at the Paris Foreign Missions Society. Image via Wikipedia.

According to a research paper by Frederic Mantienne, the influx of European military technology coming in to Vietnam arose out of the need to overpower the Tay Son army after their victory against the Nguyen dynasty in 1773. Four years later, Nguyễn Ánh, the Nguyễn family survivor, became acquainted with a French missionary named Pierre Pigneaux de Béhaine — whose mausoleum was replaced by a roundabout near Tân Sơn Nhất Airport in 1983, better known by the name Lăng Cha Cả — more commonly known in Vietnam through his Vietnamese name Bá Đa Lộc. Bá Đa Lộc became Nguyễn Ánh’s advisor and the individual that persuaded him to seek military support from France, a major reason for Nguyễn Ánh’s rise to power.

Five years after Nguyễn Ánh proclaimed himself king in 1780, Bá Đa Lộc was sent to Pondicherry, in modern India, and then France to lobby for French military assistance for the Nguyễn army. The trip resulted in the Versailles military treaty (Traité de Versailles de 1787) between France and Cochinchina. While the treaty ultimately wasn’t enacted, Bá Đa Lộc managed to create enough French commercial interest to bring ammunition and a number of French naval officers, including two army specialists, to Cochinchina. These specialists were trained in fortification and artillery techniques.

With this new assistance, Nguyễn Ánh, who went by Emperor Gia Long at that point, ordered the first citadel to be built using the Vauban technique — Saigon’s Gia Định. According to Mantienne, French engineer Theodore Le Brun was tasked with the design for the citadel, and Oliver de Puymanel and the king would oversee the construction.

The second and last citadel with French involvement in Vietnam was Diên Khánh, located in Khánh Hòa Province near Nha Trang, which was built in 1793 after Nguyễn A!nh succeeded in leading a campaign there against the Tây Sơn. It was constructed under the command of Bá Đa Lộc, Puymanel and Gia Long’s eldest son, Nguyễn Phúc Cảnh.

Portraits of Gia Long. Images via Disan Vietnam.

The Diên Khánh Citadel witnessed many battles between the Nguyễn army and the Tây Sơn. One of particular importance is a 1795 attack on the citadel led by Tây Sơn General Trần Quang Diệu. The Tây Sơn army managed to win the battle, however, they could not take the citadel. In this way, Diên Khánh proved to the Nguyen leaders the effectiveness of Vauban fortifications in their tactics.

Left: Diên Khánh citadel plans. Image via Wikipedia. Right: Present-day Diên Khánh Citadel in Khánh Hòa Province. Image via Google Maps.

French scholarship points to Oliver de Puymanel as the mastermind behind the Diên Khánh Citadel, and that it was Le Brun and Puymandel who also designed and built the Saigon citadel. However, Vietnamese intellectuals continue to debate Puymanel’s roles in the construction. Some, such as critic and journalist Thụy Khuê, in her collection of research essays, suggests that French colonial scholars might have exaggerated the two Frenchmen’s importance in the construction thanks to a reliance on flimsy sources. The inflated claims were published in Vietnamese texts as facts and became a myth.

Regardless of whether it was via direct or indirect transfer of French technologies, there is no denying that the Vauban style made its way into the design of fortifications in Vietnam and continued to exist and influenced fortifications under Gia Long, Minh Mạng and Thiệu Trị.

The third citadel that has Vauban influence after Diên Khánh was the famous Huế imperial city, which was built in 1802 when Gia Long (Nguyễn Ánh) moved the capital to Huế. From 1802 until 1844, 32 new citadels with a design resembling Vauban architecture were built in Vietnam, their placement and location obeying feng shui principles. Some also featured details reflecting traditional Vietnamese architecture elements.

Under the rule of the Gia Long emperors, many citadels were polygonal, with a few exceptions. In the north, Bắc Ninh Citadel was the first fortification to be built with a hexagonal shape. The citadel was built in 1805 under Gia Long using soil. Under the sixth Minh Mạng ruler, the citadel was rebuilt using laterite (a metal-rich clay), and in 1841 under Emperor Thiệu Trị, the fortification was rebuilt again with bricks.

Left: Turcos and fusiliers-marins at Bắc Ninh, 12 March 1884. Image via Wikipedia. Right: Present-day Bắc Ninh Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

The Hạc Thành Citadel, or Thọ Hạc, is another example of a hexagonal citadel. It was built in 1804 and marks the birth of Thanh Hóa Province as the geographical area as we know today.

Right: Hạc Thành Citadel seen on a French 1909 map. Image via Wikipedia. Left: Present-day Hạc Thành Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

In his paper, Mantienne mentioned that pentagonal citadels, a hallmark of the Vauban style, also appeared during Gia Long’s rule, including ones built in Quảng Ngãi and Hải Dương in 1807. However it’s unclear if this is indeed true, as the remaining outline of the Quảng Ngãi Citadel today has a square form with eight protruding corners. As for the citadel in Hải Dương, Vietnamese sources suggest it had a hexagonal shape instead. While the citadel in Hải Dương was left in ruin by French colonialists and the Second Indochina War, a search on Google Maps reveals its remaining outline.

Left: Present-day Quảng Ngãi Citadel. Image via Google Maps. Right: Present-day Hải Dương Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

Citadels built under Minh Mạng emperors no longer saw an abundance of polygonal shapes. Instead, square or rectangular forts were used more often. While this may seem like a simplification of the design of earlier citadels due to lack of French assistance, Mantienne and Cong Phuong Khuong argue that these citadels followed some of the latest fortification innovations in Europe at the time.

An example of a citadel that exemplifies Minh Mạng-era fortifications is the Đồng Hới Citadel, which comes in a generic quadrangle shape with an additional four corners, each sticking out from the center of each side. The citadel was originally built by Emperor Gia Long using soil in 1812. However, in 1824, under the reign of Minh Mạng, the citadel was redesigned and rebuilt using bricks. It is located in Đồng Hới, Quảng Bình Province.

Present-day Đồng Hới Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

Another example of a citadel that underwent reconstruction during the Minh Mạng era is the old Quảng Trị Citadel, located in Quảng Trị Province. It was first constructed in 1809 with soil and rebuilt using bricks in 1837. Square in shape, with four bastions extending from four corners, the citadel shape is more similar to some inner layers of Vauban structures in France, such as the fort of Saint-Martin-de-Ré built by Vauban himself in 1681. Under French colonial rule, a prison, along with other buildings, were erected inside the citadel (seen in map below). Today, the citadel is known as a “cemetery without headstones,” due to the death toll during a 1972 battle that occurred there.

Left: Quảng Trị Citadel seen on a 1889 French map. Right: Present-day Quảng Trị Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

New citadels built under Minh Mạng existed too, such as the Sơn Tây Citadel. Its square shape, with four round protrusions on four sides, differs slightly from others. It was one of the earliest built after Minh Mạng became emperor in 1820. Erected in 1822 with laterite and located in Sơn Tây, 40 kilometers outside of Hanoi, the structure is currently known for its octagonal 18-meter high flag post, which also doubles as an observation center. On the top of the post, a transmitter was installed for emergency communication.

Left: Sơn Tây Citadel seen on an old British map. Right: Present-day Sơn Tây Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

While Gia Long and Minh Mạng hold an impressive Vauban fortification portfolio, only one citadel is credited to Emperor Thiệu Trị, perhaps because of his relatively short reign of just six years, from 1841 to 1847. This is compared to Gia Long’s 18 years of rule (1802–1820) and Minh Mạng’s 21-year rule (1820–1840). The citadel in question is located in Tuyên Quang Province. Though not originally built under Thiệu Trị, the emperor conducted a massive reconstruction of the structure, which was first erected during the Mạc dynasty in the late 16^th century with a square shape.

Thiệu Trị was also involved in another large reconstruction project at Điện Hải Citadel in Đà Nẵng. According to historian Tim Doling, it was first built by Gia Long as a fortress. The Vauban architectural elements spotted in the remains of the citadel today are courtesy of Thiệu Trị’s reconstruction in 1847, which is also the year that he died.

Left: The current entrance to Điện Hải Citadel. Photo via People's Army Newspaper. Right: Present-day Điện Hải Citadel. Image via Google Maps.

A deeper understanding of these structures, some of which have faded from view, and others prominent symbols of Vietnam’s heritage, gives one a deeper appreciation of their roles in the country’s history. They also show that many of humanity’s best ideas often migrate, across constructs including borders and time, like humans themselves.

Read the first part of Unearthed, our series on Vietnam's past citadels here.

Unearthed: Tracing the Past Citadels of Southern Vietnam

2025-06-03T13:00:00+07:00

Although the forces of modernization encourage constant progress and leaving behind the pre-modern past, the trails of yesterday never fail to leave our presence.

Old citadels in southern Vietnam are a testament to the above remark. Unlike their northern and central counterparts, which are preserved as heritage sites, citadels built in southern Vietnam no longer have their total physical presence seen and felt by most residents living near them. However, their remnants are still somehow present: the area where the Gia Định Citadel once stood now forms Saigon’s center and encloses government buildings representing the centralization of power; the remainders of a citadel wall in Biên Hòa can still be spotted; and the round vestiges of ancient lives in Bình Phước Province yearn to be studied and explored.

Saigon Citadels

Lũy Bán Bích

Before Saigon had a true fortress or citadel, a city wall called Lũy Bán Bích was erected by the Nguyễn Dynasty general Nguyễn Cửu Đàm to ward off Siamese invasions in 1772, when the city carried the name Gia Định. Though, like much of Saigon’s feudal fabric, no physical remnants of the wall exist, it did help to inform the trajectory of Lý Chính Thắng and Trần Quang Khải streets. The name Lũy Bán Bích is also used for a street in modern Tân Phú District.

The Lũy Bán Bích wall (red line). The map was drawn by Trần Văn Học in 1815 and republished in a 1987 geography book on Saigon. Photo via Wikipedia.

Gia Định Citadel

Saigon’s first true citadel was constructed by 30,000 laborers under the auspices of Nguyễn Phúc Ánh with French technical support in 1790. Meant to act as a temporary royal capital during the Tây Sơn rebellion, the polyhedron-shaped citadel was made of Biên Hòa granite. The fortification — which sat in the middle of today's Lê Thánh Tôn, Nam Kỳ Khởi Nghĩa, Nguyễn Đình Chiểu and Đinh Tiên Hoàng streets — featured five-meter-tall walls and a deep moat, with its main entrance located at the intersection of modern-day Đồng Khởi and Lý Tự Trọng streets.

The citadel had royal housing, military support structures and medical facilities; it acted as an interchange for the Thiên Lý road, which linked the city to the Mekong Delta, Huế and Hanoi.

Following the Nguyễn Lord's victory over Tây Sơn rebels, the capital was moved back to Huế, and Gia Định was officially downgraded to a provincial capital. In addition, following a separatist uprisings in the south which occurred in 1832–1835, the grand Gia Định citadel was demolished and replaced by a smaller “Phoenix Citadel” (thành Phụng) constructed in 1837 in the area now bound by Nguyễn Đình Chiểu, Nguyễn Du, Mạc Đĩnh Chi and Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm streets in Vauban style, similar to its predecessor.

The outlines of the Gia Định (in red) and Phoenix (in blue) citadels superimposed over a map of colonial Saigon. Photo via Flickr user manhhai.

The Phoenix Citadel’s lifespan was a short 22 years, as French forces razed the structure in 1859 and replaced it with a military compound (Caserne de l’infanterie), though the area retained its “citadelle” moniker through the colonial period.

French forces attack the Phoenix Citadel. Photo via Wikipedia.

This military complex served as a barracks until 1945, when, under Japanese control, it was used to intern French officers. Following independence from France, the compound was again a historical focal point during the 1963 coup against Ngô Đình Diệm and suffered extensive damage.

The site was then redeveloped with educational and telecommunications facilities and today is occupied by the Hồ Chí Minh City University of Social Sciences and Humanities and the headquarter of local TV network HCMC Television (HTV).

Today, all that ties the location to the long line of citadels and military facilities are the two colonial buildings that stand where the Gia Định citadel’s main gate was.

Gates of the Caserne de l’infanterie seen in the colonial period. The buildings to the left and right are still standing today at the intersection of Lê Duẩn and Đinh Tiên Hoàng streets. Photo via Flickr user manhhai.

Photo by Brandon Coleman.

Biên Hòa Citadel

While Saigon’s citadel might be the most well-known, the Biên Hòa Citadel, also known as the Kèn Citadel or Cựu Citadel, is believed to be the oldest fortress in southern Vietnam. In his work on the history of the area, Biên Hòa Sử Lược, Lê Văn Lương mentions that the citadel was first built by the Chenla Empire during the 15^th and 16^th centuries using soil.

Under the 15^th Minh Mạng ruler in 1834, the citadel was reconstructed by 1,000 laborers who were paid in money and rice for their work, according to the verified records of the Nguyễn Dynasty, Đại Nam Thực Lục. Three years later, under the 18^th Minh Mạng ruler, the citadel was renovated using laterite as the main construction material. The citadel had four gates and a flag post and covered an area of 18 hectares, making it the second-largest citadel in southern Vietnam after Gia Định.

An old map illustrating the Biên Hòa Citadel. Photo via Thanh Niên.

The citadel would have retained its original scale if not for the infamous French capture of Biên Hòa, a battle that was part of the Cochinchina Campaign which brought French colonialism to the country. In December 1861, allied French and Spanish troops led by Louis-Adolphe Bonard and Diego Domenech captured Bien Hoa and seized the citadel. The French destroyed most of the structure, and only an eighth of it remained. The east side of the fort was re-purposed for new residential areas, military camps, hospitals and mansions preserved for high-level French officials and military personnel.

Biên Hòa being captured by the French and the Spanish. Painting via Flickr user manhhai.

The only remnants of the Biên Hòa Citadel today are part of the wall made of laterite, two French colonial buildings and several blockhouses located inside the area at 129 Phan Chu Trinh, Quang Vinh Ward. The wall is up to three meter in height. Lê Văn Lương notes that before 1940, two cannons were buried under the main gate. However, when the Japanese captured the area, they were dug up and relocated.

In 2014, the citadel's remnants were renovated by the Biên Hòa Central Fine Arts Company.

Bình Phước’s Round “Citadels”

While most of the fortresses and citadels in southern Vietnam were constructed during the Nguyễn Dynasty, following Vaubanesque military architecture, the mysterious thành tròn in Bình Phước are a different story.

Also known as circular earthworks in archaeology papers, each citadel typically has a diameter of about 200 meters, while larger ones can reach 330 meters. Many of these earthworks have been discovered by archaeologists in Bình Phước and Tây Ninh provinces in Vietnam, and Kampong Cham in Cambodia.

The existence of these round citadels was first mentioned in writing in 1930 in a volume of the Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient. The text mentions the discovery of two earthworks that the author called forteresses moï, or mọi fortress (mọi is a derogatory term to refer to people living in the highlands and Khmer people), in two areas of Quản Lợi and Lộc Ninh, which housed two huge rubber plantations in Bình Phước at the time. According to Nguyễn Khải Quỳnh, by 1959, another 11 sites were discovered by Louis Malleret, a French archaeologist at the French School of The Far East. More sites were discovered and studied by Vietnamese archaeologists after 1975, while the ones in Cambodia also received attention in the country.

A typical thành tròn has two walls with the same center, separated by a ditch. However, others only have either one outer wall or inner wall. Underneath the inner platform of these sites, stone tools, weapons and ceramics were found.

A 3D image of the Hourn Khim circular earthwork in Cambodia. Photo via Memot Center for Archeology.

Archaeologists have yet to reach a conclusion on the function of these circular earthworks. The existence of artifacts in the inner platform indicates they might have been a habitation area of an ancient community. However, no artifacts have been found in the ditches of these thành tròn. Some have argued that the ditches were used as a water reservoir, but this theory doesn't make sense to some, as red soil is very permeable. Some argue that besides habitation, the sites could have also provided protection against enemies and wild animals, although some of the ditches are not deep enough to serve as a moat. Another theory is that the ditches served as a place to keep animals.

The outline of some identified circular earthwork sites in Bình Phước can be spotted via Google Maps below:

Long Hà Circular Earthwork 3.

Lộc Ninh Circular Earthwork.

Read the second part of Unearthed, our series on Vietnam's past citadels here.

10 Rare Illustrations Offer Glimpses Into Life in Tonkin in 1923

2025-05-29T14:00:00+07:00

What’s your typical Sunday routine? If your answer includes grabbing some noodles on the street, getting your earwax removed and mustache shaved, and maybe smoking some opium to take the edge off, congratulations, you might be living in 1923 Tonkin.

This collection of 10 colored sketches, whose author remains unknown, is titled “10 peintures annamites représentant les métiers au Tonkin, don 1923” (10 Annam paintings representing trades in Tonkin, donated in 1923). Digitized in 2019 by Gallica, the digital archive of the National Library of France, the illustrations depict a range of activities and careers of northern Vietnamese living in the early 20th century under French colonization.

From a jeweler, a barber to two female cobblers hard at work, it seems that grooming and fashion remain a timeless concern for Vietnamese in any century. Scenes of carpenters and farmers also showcase a number of traditional working methods that predate today’s mechanized work conditions — just people hard at work, not a smartphone in sight! Curiously, the author decided to include two opium smokers in languid poses as a demonstration of a “traditional trade.”

Have a closer look at the illustrations below:

Two jewelers hammering away.

Earwax removal was popular even 100 years ago.

Ploughing the field.

Irrigating the rice field.

A servant milling rice.

Cobblers making shoe soles.

Smoking opium.

Carpentry.

Tirailleurs (lính tập) having lunch. They are local militants organized by the colonial government.

Facial hair shaving.

[Images via RedsVN/Gallica]

Revisit 1990s Saigon in 'L’Amant,' the Film Adaptation of Marguerite Duras' Famous Novel

2025-05-20T10:00:00+07:00

When filming the movie adaptation of Marguerite Duras’ 1984 autobiographical novel The Lover, French director Jean-Jacques Annaud made extensive use of Saigon locations. Here’s a run-down of the local landmarks to watch out for when you view the movie.

Jean-Jacques Annaud’s 1992 film of Marguerite Duras’ Prix Goncourt-winning novel L’Amant (The Lover) was one of the first western films to be shot in Vietnam after reunification.

Based on Duras’ own experiences as a teenager in French Cochinchina, it depicted a forbidden interracial romance between a 15-year-old French girl (played by British actress Jane March) and a 32-year-old Chinese businessman (played by Hong Kong actor Tony Leung). Neither main character is named, and is only known as “The Young Girl” and “The Man.” The film featured narration by Jeanne Moreau and a haunting César Award-winning score by Gabriel Yared, but, despite its impressive performance at the box office, it garnered mixed reviews from the critics.

The Lover film poster.

Unlike Régis Wargnier’s 1992 film Indochine, which used Butterworth in Malaysia as a substitute for Saigon, The Lover made extensive use of historic locations in and around Hồ Chí Minh City, Sa Đéc and Vĩnh Long. A Paris studio was used to film most of the interior shots.

The Mekong Delta's bustling riverine life.

The Mekong Delta sequences all used locations which, at the time of filming, had changed little since the colonial era. These include the opening scene in which the girl meets the man on a ferry, the École de Sa Đéc and “the horror of the Sa Đéc house” where she lives with her dysfunctional family.

Those sequences filmed in Saigon also made extensive use of its then still relatively abundant colonial heritage, affording fascinating glimpses of parts of the city which have since been completely redeveloped.

Most of these bridges have been demolished.

One early sequence follows the man’s car as it makes its way toward Saigon, passing rows of old colonial shophouses near the Xóm Chỉ Bridge over the Arroyo Chinois (Tàu Hủ-Bến Nghé Creek) in Chợ Lớn. The bridge and most of the shophouses in this area have long since disappeared.

The bandstand installed at the Tôn Đức Thắng-Nguyễn Huệ junction.

As the car enters Saigon, we’re treated to several views of the river port, where the filmmakers even went to the trouble of installing a bandstand in the middle of the junction where Nguyễn Huệ Boulevard meets the waterfront.

To represent the exterior of the Pensionnat Lyautey, the boarding house where the girl stays while studying in Saigon, Annaud chose the former St. Paul’s Convent building on the corner of Tôn Đức Thắng and Nguyễn Hữu Cảnh Streets.

This particular building was taken over by the government after 1975 and has functioned ever since as the Nursery School Teacher Training Faculty of Saigon University. The film also treats us to several shots of a leafy and peaceful Tôn Đức Thắng Street outside the Pensionnat, then still lined with colonial buildings and a world away from the busy traffic artery of today.

The former St. Paul’s Convent building on the corner of Tôn Đức Thắng and Nguyễn Hữu Cảnh streets was used as the Pensionnat Lyautey.

Marguerite Duras herself studied at the Lycée Chasseloup-Laubat (now the Lê Quý Đôn Secondary School at 110 Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai in District 1), and on several occasions the film shows the girl entering and leaving a colonial school compound marked Lycée Chasseloup-Laubat.

However, if you look closely you’ll see that the compound filmed by Annaud was not the Lê Quý Đôn Secondary School, but rather the former Lycée Pétrus Ký, the only work in the city by urbanist Ernest Hébrard and now the Lê Hồng Phong High School for the Gifted at 235 Nguyễn Văn Cừ in District 5.

The former Lycée Pétrus Ký was used instead of the former Lycée Chasseloup-Laubat.

For a subsequent shot in which the car heads out to Chợ Lớn, Annaud set up a cafe next to the great banyan tree in Lý Tự Trọng Park, opposite the former Lieutenant Governor’s Palace (now the HCMC Museum).

This sets the scene as the car passes — traveling the wrong way along a one-way street!

A café was set up in Bách Tùng Diệp Park, opposite the former Lieutenant Governor’s Palace.

On the way to Chợ Lớn, the car takes something of a detour, crossing one of the six bridges which once spanned the former Canal Bonard before depositing the couple at the Chinaman’s garçonnière (bachelor pad).

The exterior of the garçonnière itself was represented in the film by 7 Phú Định in District 5 while, needless to say, the X-rated interior shots were all filmed in France.

Annaud also filmed his restaurant exteriors in Chợ Lớn, selecting the two blocks between Phạm Đôn and Phan Phú Tiên Streets which Joseph L. Mankiewicz had used 34 years earlier for crowd sequences in his much-maligned 1958 version of Graham Greene’s The Quiet American.

The man later goes to see his father in an unsuccessful attempt to be released from his arranged marriage to a Chinese heiress, so that he can be with the girl.

The Dương family residence in Cần Thơ stood in for the real family home of Duras’ “North China Lover” in Sa Đéc. Photo via Thanh Niên.

At the time of filming, the former family house of Duras’ real “North China Lover” Léo Huỳnh Thủy Lê, located at 255A Nguyễn Huệ in Sa Đéc, had been transformed into a government office and could not be used for filming. After scouring the area for a suitable location, Annaud chose instead the old Dương family house at 26/1A Bùi Hữu Nghĩa in Cần Thơ.

The 1920 ocean liner called the Alexandre Dumas.

Toward the end of the film, we see the departure by ship of the girl’s troubled elder brother and subsequently of the girl herself. Annaud arranged for a 1920 ocean liner called the Alexandre Dumas to be brought from Cyprus to film these two key sequences, which both feature panoramic views of the old Messageries Maritimes port area.

A rare panoramic view of the Bạch Đằng Wharf.

Like the 1958 version of The Quiet American, Jean-Jacques Annaud’s 1992 film of The Lover affords us a fascinating glimpse of Saigon before its transformation in the 1990s.

Vibrant Watercolor Paintings Take Us Back to Northern Vietnam in 1890

2025-05-13T12:00:00+07:00

Way before colored photography appeared, generations of our ancestors had to rely on the finesse of painters to create visuals records of their everyday routines. This collection of watercolor paintings from the 1890s is a particularly vivid example of that, depicting lively scenes of Vietnam two centuries ago that are full of humor and personality.

The illustrations below are part of a set of 21 watercolor paintings on paper listed by British art broker Sotheby’s. Little is known about the album’s origins and author, save for the number “1890” which can be found on the back side of one painting. Some of the artworks belong to different museums and private collectors.

Each of the artwork portrays a daily scene in late 19th-century Nam Định, shortly after the French started colonizing Vietnam. The use of color is playful, especially in details like the patterns on the back of lion dancers or ceremonial flags. While the author is unknown, viewers can see their tongue-in-cheek humor in sketching out the scenes, like how one fisherman is shown with a fallen loincloth and has to cover his private parts.

Have a closer look at the illustrations below:

A procession accompanying a mandarin, who's being carried in the palanquin.

A ceremonial procession during a festive parade.

A group of lion dance performers on the way to perform.

A local monk leads a family through important rituals.

A groom (under the umbrella shade) and his family on the way to his bride-to-be's homestead for the dạm ngõ ritual.

Young men and women catch fish using different traditional tools.

Village men catch fish using dậm, a traditional crescent-shaped basket. One of them lost his loincloth and is trying desperately to cover himself.

A rudimentary tea stand at the village entrance.

A busy morning market in session.

A rickshaw driver relieves himself after gettting a noblewoman to her destination.

At a lumber mill.

[Images via RedsVN/Sotheby’s]

From North to South: Memories of 1990s Vietnam via the Lens of a French Photographer

2025-05-05T14:40:13+07:00

What do you miss most about the 1990s?

Just barely a decade after opening its market to the world, Vietnam in the 1990s was still riddled with hardships and scarcity, but there was much hope from everyone about a brighter future. Vietnam joined the ASEAN block in 1995; the first KFC in the country opened in Saigon in 1997; and South Korean TV series brought in the first inklings of Hallyu in the same decade as well.

French photographer Michel Troncy captured some glimpses of Vietnam during his 1990s visit, from north to south, presenting a collage of multifaceted local cultures. Nature and ethnic minority members, urban street styles, and wildlife captures — these handfuls of shots showcase a diverse Vietnam full of life and intrigue.

Have a look below:

Mê Linh Square in Saigon from across the Saigon River.

A H'Mông family in Hà Giang.

Plucking silver hair on the sidewalk.

Freshly baked bánh mì in Chợ Lớn.

Traveling by xích lô in Hanoi.

Captive wild animals in a market in Phụng Hiệp, Cần Thơ.

Jars of snake wine in Cần Thơ.

Young Mekong men at a neighborhood cock fight.

Saigon high school students going to school by bike.

After a full harvest day.

A traditional junk in Hạ Long Bay.

A Dao woman weaves dividers out of bamboo strips.

Selling nón lá in Điện Biên, Lai Châu Province.

A woman from the Dao ethnic minority.

[Photos by Michel Troncy via Reds VN/Getty Images]

The Story of Quách Đàm, the Man Who Shaped Modern Chợ Lớn — Part 2

2025-04-24T09:00:00+07:00

By the 1920s, the old Bình Tây Market and much of the surrounding land had belonged to Quách Đàm, so he proposed to the colonial authorities the demolition of the existing building and the construction, “on an area of not less than 9,000 square metres,” of a new and much larger Bình Tây Market, to serve as the new central market of Chợ Lớn.

This is Part 2 of our miniseries on the origin story behind Chợ Lớn. Read Part 1 here.

The Colonial Council gave its approval and, in 1925, Quách Đàm donated the land to the city and also contributed 58,000 francs towards the construction costs of the new market.

The new Bình Tây Market was Quách Đàm’s crowning achievement and garnered much praise and admiration in both local and colonial circles. Over the next two years, Quách Đàm, already a naturalized French citizen, received a succession of awards, including the Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur, the Chevalier de l'Étoilè Noire and the Chevalier de l'Ordre royal du Cambodge, as well as the Order of the Precious Brilliant Golden Grain (Order of Chia-Ho) from the Republic of China.

Bình Tây Market pictured in the 1950s.

Construction of the new Bình Tây Market began in February 1926 and was completed in September 1928. Built in reinforced concrete using western techniques, it was noteworthy for its bold Chinese architectural features. However, Quách Đàm never saw the finished building. He died on 14 May 1927, aged 65.

The Echo Annamite newspaper carried a long article describing Quách Đàm’s funeral on Sunday, 29 May, 1927. Special trams and trains were laid on to convey the great and the good to Chợ Lớn to join the funeral procession from 45 boulevard Gaudot to the family plot at Phú Thọ Cemetery.

A Chinese funeral procession in Chợ Lớn.

Those in attendance included: the Mayors of Chợ Lớn and Saigon and their senior staff; the heads of the Chinese congregations and the Chinese Chamber of Commerce; and the Directors of (amongst others) the Banque de l’Indochine, Banque Franco-Chinoise, Distilleries de Binh-Tay, Société Commerciale française d'Indochine, Maison Courtinat, Maison Denis-Frères, Usines de la Compagnie des Eaux et Electricité, the Services du Port, the Hôpital Drouhet, the Lycée Franco-Chinois and the Ecoles de filles de Cholon.

Two large huts had been built on the boulevard immediately outside the Thông Hiệp headquarters, one to accommodate the guests and the other to house the coffin and more than 1,500 commemorative banners and wreaths, which had been sent from all parts of Cochinchina, Tonkin, Cambodia and even China.

A camera crew from Indochine Films was on hand as the procession set off, led by family mourners, to the accompaniment of Chopin’s 'Funeral March' performed by “several Annamite and Chinese orchestras.” Behind the hearse, family members held aloft a dais which displayed all of Quách Đàm’s honors on a large gold and blue silk cushion. They were followed by a guard of honor comprising riflemen from the Compagnie de Cholon du 1er Tirailleurs.

A tram car of the Saigon–Chợ Lớn line traveling on Đồng Khánh Street (Trần Hưng Đạo B)

In order that as many people as possible could offer their respects, the procession did a complete circuit of the city, starting with eastern Chợ Lớn: rue Lareynière (Lương Nhữ Học today), rue des Marins (Trần Hưng Đạo B), rue Jaccaréo (Tản Đà), quai Mytho (Võ Văn Kiệt) and back to boulevard Gaudot (Hải Thượng Lãn Ông), and then returning to quai Mytho and heading along the Arroyo Chinois (Bến Nghé Creek) into the west of the city. There it turned up rue de Paris (Phùng Hưng) and made its way north along rue Boulevard Tong-Doc-Phuong (Châu Văn Liêm) and rue Thuan-Kieu (Thuận Kiều) towards the cemetery at Phú Thọ. “As they processed,” added the Echo Annamite reporter reverently, “the banners shimmered and the usually noisy city descended into respectful silence.”

Fourteen months later, the Annales coloniales reported that on 28 September, 1928, the new market was inaugurated in the presence of the Governor of Cochinchina, amidst a host of festivities which included a cavalcade and a fireworks display.

After Quách Đàm’s death, his eldest son Quách Khôi took over as director of the Thông Hiệp company, but in May 1929 tragedy struck when Quách Khôi himself died suddenly and Chợ Lớn was treated to another grand public funeral.

Later that year, with the authorisation of Chợ Lớn Municipality, Quách Đàm’s family commissioned an elaborate marble fountain in the central courtyard of the Bình Tây Market, surrounded by bronze lions and dragons and topped with a bronze statue of Quách Đàm by celebrated French sculptor Dueuing.

The Dueuing statue of Quách Đàm is now kept in the rear courtyard of the Hồ Chí Minh City Fine Arts Museum.

Inaugurated on 14 March, 1930, it depicts the man French newspapers dubbed the “king of commerce,” holding in his left hand the act by which he had donated to the city of Chợ Lớn the land on which the market was built. In his right hand is a scroll which lists the philanthropic works for which he was known — Écoles, marchés, oeuvres, assistance (schools, markets, works, assistance). The opening ceremony for the fountain “was presided over by M. Eutrope representing the Governor of Cochinchina (absent from Saigon), M Renault, resident-mayor of Cholon and a large audience of European, Annamite and Chinese personalities.” A friend of the family delivered “a remarkable speech recalling the beautiful life of the deceased.”

After 1975, the Dueuing statue was removed from its plinth and placed in store. However, in 1992, it was returned to public view in the rear courtyard of the Hồ Chí Minh City Fine Arts Museum, where it can still be seen to this day.

In recent years, a bust of Quách Đàm has been installed in front of the statueless plinth. Behind it, the Chinese inscription of 1930 reads: “Mr Guō Yǎn was from Longkeng, Chao'an, Chaozhou, Guangdong province and came to Việt Nam when he was young to build a family while working in the rice business; he became very wealthy and generous, and as a good and righteous person, he resolved to build a new market for Dī Àn [Tai Ngon]. Through great effort, he finally realised this and the government awarded him with this bronze statue to remember him. Guō Yǎn was born in 1863 and died in 1927.” (translation by Damian Harper)

Following the death of Quách Khôi, his younger brother Quách Tiên took over the reins of power at Thông Hiệp, but according to historian Vương Hồng Sển, his willingness to act as guarantor for the debts of insolvent traders during the years of economic crisis eventually also dragged Thông Hiệp into debt.

After 1933, the Thông Hiệp company name disappears from the records, though in 1937 and 1939, Quách Tiên reappears as proprietor of the “Plantation Quach-Dam,” a rubber plantation in Biên Hoà Province, with its registered office still at 45 boulevard Gaudot in Chợ Lớn.

45 Hải Thượng Lãn Ông (the former 45 quai Gaudot) in Chợ Lớn was once Quách Đàm's Thông Hiệp company headquarters.

The Story of Quách Đàm, the Man Who Shaped Modern Chợ Lớn — Part 1

2025-04-15T10:00:00+07:00

Hải Thượng Lãn Ông Boulevard (the former quai Gaudot) in central Chợ Lớn preserves several elegant old colonial shophouse buildings, but perhaps the most interesting of all is the one at No. 45, once the modest headquarters of Cantonese millionaire and philanthropist Quách Đàm.

This is Part 1 of our miniseries on the origin story behind Chợ Lớn. Read Part 2 here.

The bust of Quách Đàm, located in front of the fountain at Chợ Lớn's Bình Tây Market.

Born in 1863 in Longkeng Village, Chao'an District, Chaozhou Prefecture of Guangdong province, Quách Đàm (郭琰 Guō Yǎn) left home in the mid-1880s to make his fortune in French Cochinchina. Starting out by buying and selling bottles, he later progressed to the trading of buffalo skins and fish bladders. By the 1890s, having ploughed the money he made from these early ventures back into business, he had acquired his own steamship and set himself up in Cần Thơ as a prosperous rice merchant.

In around 1906–1907, Quách Đàm relocated to Chợ Lớn, founding a new company known as Thông Hiệp, its name a quốc ngữ romanization of two auspicious characters from a Chinese poem.

A paddy depot on the quayside.

The company initially rented a magasin de dépôt at 55 quai Gaudot, a two-storey shophouse directly overlooking the Chợ Lớn Creek which then ran right through the centre of the town. However, a geomancer is said to have convinced Quách Đàm that the most auspicious shophouse on the wharf was in fact a few doors east at No. 45, a three-storey building which at that time was the offices of soap makers Nam-Thái and Trường-Thành. Beneath that building was said to be the head of a dragon whose body stretched out to sea, promising to whoever worked there that the money would keep flowing in.

By 1910, Quách Đàm had relocated his headquarters to 45 quai Gaudot. However, despite his repeated attempts to purchase the building, the owner refused to sell. Quách Đàm was thus obliged to continue renting this modest shophouse as his company headquarters. Over a century later, it still bears the “TH” (Thông Hiệp) logo which Quách Đàm had inscribed on its parapet.

45 Hải Thượng Lãn Ông (the former 45 quai Gaudot) in Chợ Lớn was once Quách Đàm's Thông Hiệp company headquarters.

In subsequent years, in addition to his factory in Cần Thơ, Quách Đàm built two large rice husking mills at Chánh Hưng (now District 8) and Lò Gốm (now District 6). He also registered the Quach-Dam et Cie shipping company in Phnom Penh to manage his burgeoning fleet of four steamships.

One of the numerous rice mills in colonial Chợ Lớn.

However, the business venture which really cemented his fortune was the acquisition, in around 1915, of the Yi-Cheong Rice Factory, the largest and most profitable rice mill in Chợ Lớn. By 1923, statistics published by the Revue de la Pacifique showed that every 24 hours, the amount of paddy processed in Quách Đàm’s mills amounted to 230 tons at Chánh Hưng, 250 tons at Lò Gốm and a massive 1,000 tons at Yi-Cheong, confirming his status as the most successful rice merchant in Cochinchina.

With money came prestige and power. As early as 1908, Quách Đàm was one of the few Chinese businessmen to become a member of the Chợ Lớn Municipal Council, and in this capacity he served for many years as 3^rd Deputy Mayor of Chợ Lớn, taking an active role in city affairs. He built a spacious family residence at 114 quai Gaudot, on the north bank of the creek, and is said to have enjoyed being chauffeured around town in what the French newspapers called his “beautiful automobile.”

It was during this period that Quách Đàm began to make a name for himself as a prominent philanthropist, “royally subsidising many hospitals, schools and workers’ associations and never remaining indifferent to poverty.” (obituary in the Echo Annamite, 1927). He was particularly active in funding local nurseries and schools for the blind.

For much of the last decade of his life, despite being beset by ill health and also suffering partial paralysis, Quách Đàm continued to play an active role in Chợ Lớn’s business and community affairs. Today he remains best known for the crucial role he played in the establishment of the Bình Tây Market.

This 19^th-century map shows the Phố Xếp Canal (marked in red) which connected the Chợ Lớn Creek with the original Tai Ngon Market (Chợ Sài Gòn).

Before the arrival of the French, the main market in the Chinese settlement went by the name of Dī Àn (堤岸) or Tai Ngon, literally meaning “embankment,” a name which is believed to reference the extensive reconstruction which followed the destruction of the Tây Sơn attack of 1782. In the 19^th century, that market appears on several maps, not as Tai Ngon but as “Sài Gòn,” the name the French appropriated after 1859 to rechristen the former Bến Nghé as their new colonial capital, Saigon.

The original Bình Tây Market, pictured in the early 1900s.

Located in the vicinity of the modern Chợ Rẫy Hospital, the old Tai Ngon market was originally connected to the Chợ Lớn Creek by a waterway known as the Phố Xếp Canal (now Châu Văn Liêm Street). However, after the conquest, the French established a new main market right in the centre of Chợ Lớn, on the site occupied today by the city post office, leading eventually to the abandonment of the old market and the gradual disappearance of the Phố Xếp Canal.

By the early 20^th century, as Chợ Lớn grew in economic importance, French newspapers complained frequently that the Marché central de Cholon “had become too small for the ever-increasing number of its users.” However, what really sealed its fate was the 1925 scheme to fill the Chợ Lớn Creek and its connecting waterways and replace them with roads. After that project was completed, merchants could no longer access the central market by boat.

The new Bình Tây Market, pictured in the 1930s.

In fact, for several decades before the filling of the Chợ Lớn creek, an ever-increasing number of merchants had relocated their business to the Bình Tây Market, which opened in the late 1870s and became even busier after 1891, following the completion of the canal Bonard, known in Vietnamese as the Bãi Sậy Canal), an alternative waterway dug to connect central Chợ Lớn with the lower reaches of the Lò Gốm Creek. The canal Bonard ran straight past the Bình Tây Market and its wharf was always busy with merchant shipping.

Tim Doling is the author of the guidebooks Exploring Huế (Nhà Xuất Bản Thế Giới, Hà Nội, 2018), Exploring Saigon-Chợ Lớn (Nhà Xuất Bản Thế Giới, Hà Nội, 2019) and Exploring Quảng Nam (Nhà Xuất Bản Thế Giới, Hà Nội, 2020) and The Railways and Tramways of Việt Nam (White Lotus Press, 2012) For more information about Saigon history, visit his website, historicvietnam.com.

Visit a Serene Đà Nẵng in 1991 During a Time Before the Tourism Boom

2025-03-30T19:00:00+07:00

As a special municipality of Vietnam, Đà Nẵng is considered by many as one of the most livable cities in the country, with lower costs, delicious local cuisine, and a languid, wholesome pace of life. This, in conjunction with readily available modern services, has turned the coastal metropolis into a magnet luring young professionals away from the chaos of Saigon and Hanoi, and attracting snowbird tourists from Russia, China and South Korea seeking tropical warmth.

Hans-Peter Grumpe, a German academic and photography enthusiast, was one of the earliest international tourists to visit Đà Nẵng, as part of his many trips traversing the length of Vietnam in the early 1990s, starting from 1991. Through his lens, Grumpe captured a version of Đà Nẵng that was nearly devoid of signs of its contemporary development, though the peaceful atmosphere was fully intact.

A view from the hotel.

“Besides Indonesia, Vietnam is the country I've traveled to most extensively. I visited the country during a time of upheaval, when tourism was just beginning,” Grumpe writes on his personal website. “Thus, I experienced a Vietnam that was still quite 'original,' and not yet 'spoiled' by tourism. I documented these travels on 151 pages and with approximately 1,600 photos.”

In his images, some motorbikes exist here and there on the streets, and fairly modern buses are operational to take citizens across the country, but local arts and crafts are on display during visits to local silkworm workshops and carpet weaving collectives.

Thanks to the assistance of a tour guide who previously studied in East Germany, Grumpe was able to travel the country with relative ease. See more of his photos taken in Đà Nẵng below:

Most houses were constructed in the modernist or countryside styles.

A street corner with xích lô, Honda Super Cubs, and bikes.

A quaint neighborhood view.

Terra-cotta roofs were common.

Fixing a bike on the train track.

Workers treating silkworm cocoons.

Most of the work was still done by hand.

Inside a weaving collective. Grumpe was initially denied entry, but the tour guide told the manager that he was a famous textile expert, so he could see the interior.

Most employees were women.

The colorful design of the carpets.

Inter-locality coaches. Air-conditioned travel was unheard of.

Ngũ Hành Sơn.

View from Ngũ Hành Sơn.

An old tank became a very badass chicken coop.

The sparseness of Đà Nẵng from above.

Mỹ Khê Beach.

A stone carver at work.

Local kids sold joss stick bundles on the mountain.

An empty beech without resorts or foreign tourists.

A rudimentary setting to make firecrackers.

Old books were dyed to be repurposed as casing of firecrackers.

Mat sellers.

Only daredevils sat on top.

The sleepy coastal town from the plane.

A Personal History of Hồ Tây: Romance, Colonial Rule and Subsidy-Era Fishing Heists

2025-03-26T11:00:00+07:00

My father-in-law has spent decades visiting Hồ Tây (West Lake). His personal story both contrasts and reflects Vietnam's history as a whole and, as a result, offers a profound insight into the importance of Hanoi's largest lake.

In northwest Hanoi rests the city’s most expansive freshwater lake. Offering relative quietude in a frantic metropolis, Hồ Tây’s unique allure has drawn locals to its shores for centuries. The lake covers an area of around 530 hectares and is one of the few places in the city where one can still easily see the skyline. Lovers, friends, and loners alike all come here in search of privacy. The constant yield of bloated fish carcasses along the shore highlights the deteriorating water quality in recent years, yet it doesn’t stop people from casting rods or handlines trying to catch the tilapia and tench that are still alive.

Hồ Tây is many things to many people. For me, it’s the ideal place for riding my bike around on the weekends. For my wife, it’s served as a place to find solace from heartbreaks, arguments or depression. For her family, along with hundreds of others who have lived beside the body of water for generations, the lake has helped sustain them through times of great hardship. As my father-in-law, Nguyễn Văn Quân, puts it: “Thanks to West Lake, many families can continue to live until this day.”

A woman sits on the steps of Quán Thánh Temple, once known as Trấn Vũ Temple, with West Lake reaching into the distance behind her.

Up until the mid-20^th century, the lake was home to a rich ecosystem. Seaweed and hyacinth freely propagated the lake, which made it the ideal breeding ground for all kinds of fish, plants and snails. Carp once grew to be 30-40 kilograms, and there were so many snails that one could scrape up hundreds of kilos of the creatures in a day. Consequently, flocks of birds such as mallards, swamphen and coots were all drawn to the water’s edge. “In the foggy season, huge flocks blackened a whole corner of the lake,” Quân says.

For locals, the lake became a haven for fishing, and methods of exploitation were plentiful. In his book Ký Sự Ven Hồ (Lakeside Chronicles), author Hoàng Quốc Hải writes about the plethora of techniques fishermen used on the lake, and said they ranged from “angling, fly-fishing, bait fishing, and trawling to using various types of nets…The means of fishing were not modern, yet they were intricate. They were capable of catching eggs or fish as small as a pinhead, as well as huge fish weighing tens of kilos…”

Myths abound in Vietnam over how the lake itself was formed. It's believed that over 1,000 years ago, the Red River shifted course, creating an oxbow lake that slowly grew into the capital’s largest body of water. According to folklore, however, the lake's formation is linked to Vietnamese Buddhist monk Minh Không, who had been working as a medical practitioner in China. After treating a Chinese emperor, he asked for payment in bronze, which he brought back with him to Hanoi. Upon returning, he melted down the metal, poured it into a mold and formed a giant bronze bell.

The Myth of the Golden Buffalo. Illustration by Hannah Hoàng.

When struck, its song was so powerful it awoke a golden buffalo in the emperor’s house. Mistaking the sound for its mother’s call, the animal plodded south and stomped around searching for her. His heavy footfalls gradually formed a hollow that filled with water. Eventually, the resultant lake consumed the Golden Buffalo.

For millennia, people fished freely at West Lake, perhaps with these myths fresh in their minds. Yet when Hanoi hunched under French colonial rule, the right to manage the lake was put up for bidding. The highest bidder had to pay half a million Indochinese piastre into the city’s coffers each year, but they could sell tickets to fishermen, with prices varying depending on the method of fishing used. Thus, the lake was divided into many different zones that were rented out to individuals or groups of people.

In 1954, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam took back control of the city, and the government allowed people to fish tax-free for three years. Then, in 1958, the city’s socialist labor force cleared all the hyacinth in the lake, and the management rights were given to the state-owned West Lake Fish Farming Company. From this point on, all unsanctioned fishing was deemed to be “illegal appropriation of socialist property.”

An aerial view of Trúc Bạch Lake and West Lake in the 1930s. Image via Flickr user manhhai.

Quân, my father-in-law, was born the same year it became illegal to fish in the lake. Still, he learned how to fish from his father at a young age. As a teenager, Quân would go fishing and take naps when he was bored. Yet when he was 19, he received a call to join the military. He didn’t see his village or the lake again until 1981, when he returned home. During this time, Vietnam went through bao cấp (the subsidy period), when the government controlled all aspects of the economy.

Ask any Vietnamese who lived through bao cấp and they’ll tell you this was a time of hunger and suffering. “One of my friends was a skilled worker at Yen Phu power plant,” Quân recalls. “He and his wife have five children, and the whole family had to share one pot of cháo.” Like many people living around the lake, Quân had to go kéo trộm (illegal fishing) in order to provide for his family.

Under the cover of darkness, Quân would wade into the cold, murky water with his fishing net. Wary of the lake guards, he had to walk with his head tilted back, so his face barely broke the water, in order to avoid detection. “Sometimes, when it got really dangerous, I had to bring a towel to cover my face so light didn’t reflect off it,” he says. The lake guards used to patrol the lake on a motorized boat, but their system had a weakness. “When underwater, the boat sounds much louder than in the air,” he explains, “so even if they turn the gas very low, you can still hear the ‘oooooooo’ sound.”

After those clandestine night raids, he sometimes brought home between five and seven kilograms of fish. Then came the arduous process of disentangling the bounty from the net so he could sell them the next morning. “Alone, with just a gas lamp, I spent hours untangling the fish. Once done, when I stood up…my back was all crooked,” Quân says.

A family relaxes together by the lake in 2016. Photo by Chris Humphrey.

Many families depended on the lake during this time. “One year, when it got so bad there wasn’t even enough rice to sell to people, clams started to appear in Hồ Tây,” Quân says. “You only needed to reach down to the bottom and bring up a fistful of clams. There were so many of them. Just bring them home with a handful of rice to make congee and the whole family can survive.” Weirdly, the clams only appeared during that one period. The next year, he says, they were gone. “They appeared like they do in legends, where God or Buddha provides food for people.”

The bao cấp era is long gone now. Since 1986, economic and political reforms have propelled Vietnam’s GDP to among the world’s fastest-growing. While my father-in-law no longer has to go kéo trộm, the experience of doing so left a mark on him. “My health deteriorated a lot because of it,” he shares. There were times he spent the whole night drenched in chilly water trying to catch fish. “Nights like that, now that I think about it, I was only harming myself. Firstly, nights like that were too cold for the fish to go up to find food. Secondly, it was extremely bad for my body. But, I was young and didn’t know any better back then.”

He still goes to the lake now, but only to exercise or take his grandchildren out to play. Where there was once a lotus swamp, there now stands a playground. It serves as a gathering spot for not just kids, but also for parents and grandparents in the village. There are shops offering ice-cold drinks and pop-up, street-side karaoke that goes on late into the night. The lake still nourishes Hanoians, but now, instead of food, it offers a sense of belonging.

This article was originally published in 2020.

A Brief History of Cung Văn Hóa Lao Động and Saigon's First Swimming Pool

2025-03-20T09:00:00+07:00

Once a fashionable rendezvous for the elite of colonial society, the Labour Culture Palace (Cung Văn hoá Lao động) at 55B Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai is today one of Hồ Chí Minh City’s most popular sports and recreation facilities.

Early colonial newspapers frequently encouraged French settlers to take regular exercise, and by the 1870s, in the absence of formal sports facilities, the northern corner of the Jardin de la ville (now Tao Đàn Park) had become an unofficial sports ground for athletics, horse racing, shooting and other sporting pursuits. In the 1880s, the Cercle cycliste Cochinchinois opened a vélodrome here, but by the end of the century this had fallen into disuse.

This 1890 map shows the location of the velodrome which occupied the northeast corner of the Jardin de Ville from the 1880s.

A sports center for the colonial elite

The Cercle Sportif Saïgonnais was set up by a group of amateur fencers on 10 May, 1902, to “encourage and develop the taste for and the practice of sports.” However, at the outset, it was based not in the Jardin de la ville, but in a modest villa on the corner of rue Catinat and rue de La Grandière — the site currently occupied by the Catinat Building at 26 Lý Tự Trọng.

Described in a 1904 account as “a school which gives lessons in fencing, shooting, riding and a number of other sports,” this early Cercle Sportif enrolled its members by subscription, and its rather basic facilities included a fencing room, a shooting gallery and a gymnasium. Because of its educational status (its sports coaches included teachers from the nearby Collège Chasseloup-Laubat), it qualified for an annual subvention of 500 piastres from the Colonial Council.

In 1905, because “the original location could no longer meet its needs,” the Cercle Sportif was relocated to the Jardin de ville, where the municipality of Saigon placed it in charge of sports activities there. However, the facilities inherited by the Cercle in the city park “amounted to little more than a 30-metre square pavilion and an abandoned cycling track.” This was a difficult time for the Cercle; its membership dropped to under 40 and its finances were in a poor state.

Luckily, in 1906, the municipality stepped in, funding the construction of an athletics track on the site of the old vélodrome. Two tennis courts and a football pitch followed, along with a set of roller skates which could be rented on an hourly basis by Cercle members! In 1910, a sailing section was opened at the Sài Gòn Botanical and Zoological Gardens, next to the arroyo de l’Avalanche (now the Thị Nghè Creek). In subsequent years, the Cercle’s membership grew rapidly, providing it with the funds to enlarge its facilities in 1909, 1913 and again in 1920.

The current buildings date from a major reconstruction carried out in 1925. The rebuilt Cercle Sportif Saïgonnais at 55 rue Chasseloup-Laubat was inaugurated on 5 December, 1925 at “a brilliant reception attended by the Governor of Cochinchina and key notables of the colony.”

The Cercle Sportif building pictured before its reconstruction of 1925.

The Cercle Sportif building pictured after its reconstruction of 1925.

According to a press release issued on 31 January, 1926 by the Agence économique de l'Indochine, the Cercle’s upgraded facilities included “10 tennis courts, a football field with spectator stands (which may rarely be found in France) and comfortable buildings with rooms for fencing, billiards, games and reading, a dance hall, and vast changing rooms.” It concluded: “Saigon now has a club worthy of the colony, which can easily be compared with those in Shanghai, Hong Kong or Singapore.”

The country club's tennis court in 1948. Photo by Jack Birns.

Grabbing a drink by the pool in 1948. Photo by Jack Birns.

From that date onwards, in reflection of the Cercle’s ambition to be a “gathering point for the elite of Saigon society,” its Board of Directors selected their Honorary Presidents exclusively “from the ranks of notables, politicians, scholars and industrialists who want to give their moral support to the Cercle.”

However, what really cemented the Cercle’s reputation as the retreat of the city’s rich and famous was the opening in September 1933 of its “splendid outdoor swimming pool.”

Saigon's first swimming pool

The Cercle's "splendid outdoor swimming pool" pictured soon after its opening in September 1933.

According to the 1934 edition of Le Génie civil: revue générale des industries françaises et étrangères (Civil engineering: general review of French and foreign industries), the construction of an open-air pool had been planned as part of the 1926 reconstruction, but at that time “its realisation was impossible due to the lack of clean water.” The pool proved so popular that by 1934, “a poolside apertif at the famous Cercle Sportif” had become an integral component of the itinerary for Vergoz travel agency tour groups arriving on the cruise ship Compiègne!

Le Génie civil writing about Le Cercle Sportif.

In the late 1930s, a new vélodrome was opened a few blocks to the west near the Collège de jeunes filles indigènes (now Nguyễn Thị Minh Khai Secondary School), on the site currently occupied by the Xá Lợi Pagoda.

To cater for more athletically challenged colons who nonetheless wanted to spend time here mixing with the hoi polloi, the Cercle reading room always held the latest newspapers and magazines sent from France, along with an impressive collection of over 5,000 books and journals. The Cercle also issued the bi-monthly bulletin Revue du Cercle, which was circulated widely around the city to promote its ongoing programme of activities.

Aside from the lavish receptions organized to mark the visit of foreign athletic teams, the Cercle Sportif also became famous for its annual Spring Ball, one of the highlights of the Saigon social calendar. By the late 1930s, tickets were in such demand that Le Nouvelliste d'Indochine commented sarcastically in 1938 that the ball, held that year in the Continental Hotel, had become “more of a spectacle than the manifestation of elegance it once was.”

The annual Cercle Sportif Spring Ball was one of the highlights of the Saigon social calendar in the 1930s.

After the departure of the French in 1954, the Cercle Sportif continued to function as an upmarket sports club where the elite, local and foreign, gathered to drink, dine, swim or play tennis. Famous visitors of the 1960s included US Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge and South Vietnamese politicians Nguyễn Cao Kỳ and Dương Văn Minh, the latter fêted as a skilled tennis player.

After Reunification in 1975, the Cercle Sportif was transferred to the management of the Hồ Chí Minh United Trades Union. In 1985, it was renamed Hồ Chí Minh City Labour Culture House (Nhà Văn hóa Lao động Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh) and, in 1998, Hồ Chí Minh City Labour Culture Palace (Cung Văn hoá Lao động Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh), the name by which it is known today.

The ppol proved popular on hot days in 1969.

The pool in 1950.