Eskişehir, Türkiye, Monday 7 November 2022

Recently, a friend wrote a poem and asked of me an opinion.

Had he written well?

The qualities of a good poem include consistent language which presents the main idea and that emotionally supports that idea.

Poetry is a beautiful form of expression.

It is versatile, giving freedom to writers who want to stretch themselves creatively.

You shouldn’t worry about whether your poetry is good or bad, but how it conveys the topic and emotion you want to share.

Poetry is a classic form of expression.

Many writers got their start crafting poems.

Many who have moved on to other forms of literature still occasionally create poetry.

Nothing quite conveys the complexity of human emotion as this writing style.

Poetry gives both the structure and freedom to present big ideas in bite-sized forms. 

Poetry limits the space we have to write by its very nature, which can seem restrictive but it is an excellent means of following a built-in structure.

That being said, it isn’t so different from other literary forms as you still need a central idea that holds it together. 

Your focus should always be on that primary concept. 

It can be easy to get off-track and introduce too many ideas that detract from the principal point.

As you are writing, ask yourself if it builds on the initial concept. 

All writing is a form of storytelling, including poetry.

No matter what you are trying to convey, the reader should be able to follow that story as they go.

That doesn’t mean it can’t be abstract or even hard to decipher.

A lot of poems are based on interpretation by the reader, but there should be some story woven throughout the lines. 

Read through your poem as if you didn’t write it.

Do you see the story?

If not, then you might need to revise it.

Emotion is the driving force behind a successful poem.

For instance, in a novel, the reader should be emotionally connected to the characters and what is happening in the plot.

How the reader feels lends context to the story being told and connects them to what has been written. 

There is less time to make that connection in a poem, so it has to be done quickly.

The reader should be hooked from the first line, feeling their way to the end. 

Above: Russian writer Anton Chekhov (1860 – 1904)

Think about “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe.

Immediately, we are drawn in by the incessant knocking of some unknown visitor.

But as the poem goes on, it draws us in even more through words like, “filled me with fantastic terrors” and “to still the beating of my heart”.

These words have us on the edge of our seats because they describe basic fears.

When you can write your poem with such vivid words like that, then you can resonate emotionally with your audience.

Above: American writer Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849)

A good poem has visual imagery that paints a picture in the head of the reader.

Descriptive language is critical.

Without it, poetry falls flat and feels one-dimensional, without color or depth.

It is why metaphor is so often found in poems. 

Whatever you are trying to present to the reader, it should always have a strong visual element. 

There is a standard piece of advice in writing that states that you should go back through your work and remove 10% of it.

This can be harder in poetry, where you are already more limited in your verbal space.

But it remains a tried and true way to improve the work. 

Flow is crucial when writing a poem.

It isn’t easy to get a sense of that flow when reading it in your mind.

You should always consider speaking your poetry out loud.

If it is written well, it will feel good to speak out loud. 

Reading aloud is also a great exercise in developing your writing style and confidence, especially when done in front of an audience. 

Is my friend a poet?

Poets and writers see patterns not only in their writing, but in life itself.

A poet sees patterns and rhythm in each line and verse of every poem.

A poet’s personality is the essence of pattern and rhythm.

A poem or verse or poet without pattern is chaos.

They write for themselves, for their own personal reasons.

The best poets and writers are driven/led/guided by their failures/experiences/heartaches.

They want to spread the misery/insights/information to help readers live fulfilling lives.

Trust the process regardless of the progress.

In seeking an answer to my friend’s query I turned to Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet.

Letters to a Young Poet could as easily have been called Letters FROM a Young Poet.

Rilke was only 26 years old when Franz Xavier Kappus first wrote to him in 1902.

Above: Austrian writer Franz Xaver Kappus (1883 – 1966)

As the addresses on Rilke’s Letters indicate, he had no settled home.

Three years before these Letters start, Rilke had married the sculptor Clara Westhoff and fathered a child, but they rarely lived together nor did they raise their daughter.

(They left that task to Clara’s parents.)

Above: Portrait of German artist Clara Rilke-Westhoff (1878 – 1954)

Nonetheless, he was not without a sense of family obligation.

“The last two years since my marriage I really have tried to earn, continually, day by day.

Not much has come of it.

I am left feeling as if someone had closed the window towards the garden in which my songs live.

I have written twelve books and have received almost nothing from them.

I dream that I might seek rescue in some quiet handicraft.“

Above: German poet Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 – 1926)

In August 1902, six months before his Letters began, Rilke travelled to Paris.

He hated it.

He felt invisible and alone, surrounded by men and women driven like machines, people “holding out under the foot of each day that trod on them, like tough beetles.”

Their “burdened lives” threatened to swamp him:

“I often had to say aloud to myself that I was not one of them.

And yet, when I noticed how my clothes were becoming worse and heavier from week to week, I was frightened and felt that I would belong irretrievably to the lost if some passer-by merely looked at me and half unconsciously counted me with them.“

Above: Paris, France

In the Letters, Rilke hints at his own difficulties as when he says that his “life is full of troubles and sadness.”

Rilke often speaks of being anxious and afraid.

Afraid that he might never become his own person.

Rilke mentions the way in which most people, faced with the difficulties of sexual love, “escape into one of the many conventions which like public shelters are set up along this most dangerous of paths“.

Rilke himself did not wish to take shelter, but the temptation was there – to settle down, to support his wife and daughter, to buy himself a good suit, to follow a path that no one could call imprudent.

He lived in fear of two false fates:

Either he might end up as lost as the ragged poor who had surrounded him in Paris or else that he might succumb to the safe but numbing comforts of convention.

Above: Portrait of Rainer Maria Rilke, Paula Modersohn-Becker (1906)

I wondered if Rilke’s struggle is not so dissimilar to the struggles of my friend and myself.

The fear that we might never become our own persons, driven by the desperate need to express that fear.

Above: Castello di Duino near Trieste, Italy, was where Rilke began writing the Duino Elegies in 1912, recounting that he heard the famous first line as a voice in the wind while walking along the cliffs and that he wrote it quickly in his notebook.

I posted on Facebook the following:

“I listen to women and sometimes I think that there are some (perhaps many) who are so wrapped up in themselves that they neither know nor care about the struggles that men must endure.

I am not suggesting that a woman’s life is necessarily a bed of roses, but rather that there are women who cannot understand the way men feel, some that don’t want to know, because knowing may demand changing the focus of entitlement from themselves to those with whom they wish to share a future.

Women of this day and age seem to act from inner feeling and spirit, more and more knowing who they are and what they want.

But I think too many men spend their lives pretending to be happy, not knowing who they are supposed to be nor knowing what it is they should want for themselves.

Men are hurting and in the process they hurt others.

So, instead they plug on, in quiet desperation, not knowing how they should be, for too many men lack the kind of family and friendship networks that seem atypical for women.

Women have had to overcome suppression, but men’s struggles are with isolation.

Too many men are tragically lonely, compulsively competitive and emotionally timid.

Men live fewer years than women.

Men routinely fail at close relationships.

40% of marriages break down.

70% of divorces are initiated by women.

90% of violent acts are committed by men.

67% of their victims are men.

In school, 90% of children with behaviour problems are boys.

80% of children with learning problems are boys.

Men comprise over 90% of inmates in jails.

Men are 75% of the unemployed.

The leading cause of death amongst men between 12 and 60 is self-inflicted.

75% of suicides are men.

And yet this is supposedly a man’s world?

Men are in many countries compelled to do military service.

For women, this is optional.

Men are universally expected to work.

For women, traditionally, this has been an option.

Men consistently lose in divorce settlements and consistently lose access to their children in custody battles.

In our pursuit of women, we are expected to make them happy.

But is not men’s happiness just as crucial as women’s?

The Isle of Man is a geography of solitude.

Solitude is not merely a matter of being alone.

It is a territory to be entered and occupied.

Solitude exists, a lack of connection to other people, a fact we are not eager to seek, acknowledge or welcome.

We are alone in a crowd, unaided even by those in similar straits.

And yet identity cannot be found in a crowd, but must be sought in the silence.

Women are the Earth.

Men are both a part of and apart from the Earth.

Islands unto ourselves, our own teachers, for rare is the boy who is taught to be a man by other men.

I wish I could explain this to women, but first a man must decipher this for himself.

Men do not need make-up.

Our pretense runs deeper than skin surface.

The Isle of Man is a geography of solitude desperate for a bridge.

Some men manage the bridge construction.

Many do not.“

Life offers the human being two choices: animal existence and spiritual existence.

I believe that too many women choose the former, opting for physical well-being and an opportunity to indulge in habits.

Men and women have the same potential.

There is no primary difference in intelligence between the sexes, but that potential if neglected will stagnate.

If the capacity is not utilized, it will disintegrate.

Men are compelled by society to develop theirs.

Women have the choice to do so or not.

I believe women can be anything they wish.

If only they would choose to be.

Above: The Isle of Man in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland

My friend (and he is not alone in this respect) has pain seeking release.

I seek to answer him in the manner of Rilke:

“You ask whether your verses are good.

You ask me that.

You have asked others before.

You send them to magazines.

You compare them with other poems.

You worry when certain editors turn your efforts down.

Now let me ask you to give up all that.

You are looking to the outside and that above all you should not be doing.

Nobody can advise you and help you.

Nobody.

There is only one way.

Go into yourself.

Examine the reason that bids you to write.

Check whether it reaches its roots into the deepest region of your heart.

Admit to yourself whether you should die if it should be denied you to write.

This above all:

Ask yourself in your night’s quietest hour:

MUST I write?

Dig down into yourself for a deep answer.

It should be affirmative.

A loud and simple “I must”.

Construct your life according to this necessity.

Your life right into its most inconsequential and slightest hour must become a sign and witness of this urge.

Make use of whatever you find about you to express yourself, the images from your dreams and the things in your memory.

If your everyday life seems to lack material, do not blame it.

Blame yourself.

Tell yourself that you are not poet enough to summon up its riches.

For there is no lack for him who creates and no poor trivial place.“

Above: Château de Muzot in Veyras, Switzerland, was where Rilke completed writing the Duino Elegies in “a savage creative storm” in February 1922.

Within herself, Heidi Ho sits and ponders.

There is music within that seeks expression.

Does her everyday life in Zürich and St. Gallen seem to lack material to set to music?

Above: Zürich, Switzerland

Perhaps.

Perhaps one needs to have beauty within to see the beauty that surrounds us.

Perhaps this is why she has travelled, why she will continue to travel in future.

A search for self, the soul’s expression, the music of the road.

Above: St. Gallen, Switzerland

Vinh to Huê, Vietnam, Saturday 27 April 2019

It is 2 hours and 28 minutes, should the motorcyclist not become distracted en route by hunger, toilet needs or sites seen, from Ha Tinh to Hoan Lao.

The terrain is flat.

The East Sea is glimpsed in the distance, shimmering, beckoning, whispering:

“Linger“.

Above: Flag of Vietnam

Heidi and her travelling companion do not.

They left Vinh this morning.

They hope to reach Hué this evening where their booked rooms await.

Above: Images of Vinh, Vietnam

Above: Imperial City, Hué, Vietnam

The days are warm Swiss summer, the nights are cool Helvetian spring.

The roads are congested.

Full alertness required.

They have been on the road for much of the morning.

Highway 1 rises from the plain of Ha Tinh into and across the Hoann Son Mountains through Ngang Pass, the Jain temple of Dèn thö Bâ chu’a Liêu Hanh marks the border between Ha Tinh and Quang Binh Provinces.

Above: Highway 1A (red line), Vietnam

Above: Ha Tinh Province scene

Above: the Jain temple of Dèn thö Bâ chu’a Liêu Hanh, Vietnam

Ngang Pass was once a major hindrance to land transportation with its winding and steep grade.

A modern tunnel has since bypassed the climb, shortening the driving time through the pass as well as making it safer for drivers.

The serpentine road ascending the pass is now used by sightseers only.

“A tunnel through a mountain.

How Swiss!“, Heidi thinks.

Above: Ngang Pass, Vietnam

The Pass is 2,560 m long, ascending to the height of 250 m (750 ft).

It marked the former boundary of Champa and Dai Viet until the 15th century when the Vietnamese pushed south and conquered the Cham lands piecemeal.

Controlling the strategic pass was a priority through the ages as the narrow neck of land could be choked off.

At the summit of Ngang Pass remains the Hoành Sơn Quan (Transverse Mountain Gate), a masonry gateway built by Vietnam’s last dynasty, the Nguyen to regulate the foot traffic across the mountain.

The scenic pass is also well known in Vietnamese literature, its beauty having been sung by many writers, perhaps the most well-known is the poem by Ba Huyen Thanh Quan.

Above: Hoành Son Quan, Ngang Pass, Vietnam

Nguyễn Thị Hinh, popularly known as Bà Huyện Thanh Quan (Lady of the Thanh Quan District Chief) (1805 – 1848) was a Vietnamese female poet.

Most of her Nom poems are descriptions of scenes and confessions, but all of them are good and show that she is a virtuous, ethereal person, an educated person who often thinks about home and country. 

The lyrics are very elegant and skillful.

Ba Huyen Thanh Quan’s poetry is full of poetry. 

Her poetry is skillful, sharpened, and beautiful, like an ancient painting.

Words are used skillfully, selectively, appropriately, with very fine tuning, very sentimental, conspicuous, elaborate, concise, beautiful words, sleek and graceful, elegant and gentle, satire in a scholarly form.

Her poetry often writes about nature, mostly in the afternoon, evoking feelings of silence and sadness. 

The scenes she describes in her poems are like watercolor paintings, dotted.

Moreover, strictly speaking, the scene in her poetry is not actually a scene, but a love. 

Her affection is often a painful nostalgia for the golden past that has gone and never returned. 

Therefore, people call her a nostalgic poet. 

Her poetry is also noted for another reason, it is extremely skillful art. 

The rules and regulations of poetry are strictly followed without causing a feeling of restraint or arrangement. 

Her verse is elegant, her words polished and carefully selected.

Above: Portrait of Nguyễn Thị Hinh, popularly known as Bà Huyện Thanh Quan (1805 – 1848)

Crossing Ngang Pass

Arriving at Ngang Pass at dusk

Grass trees mix with rocks, leaves mix with flowers.

Hunched below the foothills, a handful of woodcutters,

Scattered across the stream, a couple of market stalls.

Missing homeland rends the heart of the quail,

Loving home tires the mouth of the partridge.

Stopping to see, sky, mountains, water,

A private feeling of utter lonesomeness, myself with myself.

Highway 1 crosses the Gianh River over the Cau Gianh bridge.

The Gianh River (Sông Gianh) is a river in Quang Binh Province along Vietnam’s North Central Coast (Bắc Trung Bộ).

The river is 268 kilometres (167 mi) in length.

It was the border between ruling families during the partition of Vietnam following the Trinh-Nguyen War of the 17th century, serving to effectively divide the country between northern and southern regions.

The 17th parallel, used as the border between North Vietnam and South Vietnam from 1954 to 1975 was located just to the south, at the Ben Hai River in Quang Tri Province.

Boats can cross the river downstream, from Cua Gianh to Ba Don 6 km, to Dong Le town, Tuyen Hoa district is 47 km.

The upstream section from Khe Net back to the source is about 70–80 km long, with many waterfalls and rapids in the river bed. 

About 20 km upstream, rocks are scattered in the river bed. 

To Dong Tam, the river bed is about 80 – 90 metres wide, the largest is 110 – 115 metres. 

The section from Phu Hoa and Quang Tien continues to Ba Don town.

Above: Ba Don town market, Quàng Binh Province, Vietnam

The riverbed has five dunes, small islands in the river, of which the longest island is about 3, 8 km, the widest about 0.8 km. 

Right below Ba Don, the river bed is up to 1 km wide.

Above: Gianh River, Vietnam

Gianh River and Ngang Pass are geographical symbols of Quang Binh province. 

The upper part of Gianh River is named Rao Nay, another branch is Rao Son leading to Phong Nha Cave in Phong Nha Ke Bang National Park. 

The river mouth has a seaport called Cang Gianh.

Above: Song River (Rao Song) in front of Phong Nha Cave, Quàng Binh Province, Vietnam

If the Ngang Pass was the boundary between Dai Co Viet and Champa after the Vietnamese gained independence from 939 to 1069, then the Gianh River was the boundary of the Trinh-Nguyen dynasties between Dang Trong and Dang Ngoai (1570 -1786), with armed conflict for nearly half a century (1627 – 1672). 

Above: Gianh River, Vietnam

The main battlefield in the Bo Chinh region, Ngang Pass is associated with the legend of “Hoang Son Nhat Dia, Ten Thousand Dai Dung Body” by Trang Trinh. 

During the Trinh Nguyen war, the Trinh army stayed at the Ngang Pass.

Above: Ngang Pass, Vietnam

But the real boundary separating the North and the South of Vietnam was the Gianh River from 1627 to 1774.

The north bank of the River had Ba Don market where Trinh troops bought food. drink and other goods.

Above: Gianh River, Vietnam

In July 1885, King Ham Nghi (1871 – 1943), who was deposed by the French for lack of cooperation and launched an appeal to the people to revolt, the king’s army (“Help the King“) took refuge in the upper reaches of the River, a wilderness area. mountains and dense forests. 

It was there, in the small village of Ò, that he was arrested on 2 November 1888 and exiled to Algiers, where he died in 1943.

Above: Ham Nghi

Ham Nghi was Nguyen Phuc Ung Lich.

When he ascended the throne, he changed his name to Nguyen Phuc Minh.

After King Tu Duc died in July 1883, although the ministers Nguyen Van Tuong and Ton That Thuy held full power in dethroning one king after another, they were very passive in finding people to take the throne. 

Above: Tu Duc (1829 – 1883)

Before Ham Nghi’s reign, all three kings Duc Duc, Hiep Hoa and Kien Phuc, in turn, went against the path of the warlord faction or were lost early, becoming elements that could not be excluded from the troubled government.

Above: Tomb of Duc Duc (1852 – 1883), Long An Palace, An Lang, Hué Province, Vietnam

Above: Portrait of Hiep Hoa (1847 – 1883)

Above: Painting of Emperor Kien Phuc (1869 – 1884) dressed in military uniform

King Kien Phuc suddenly died while the situation was favorable to the war faction in the Hue court. 

After the King’s death, King Tu Duc’s second adopted son, Nguyen Phuc Ung Ky, should have ascended the throne, but Nguyen Van Tuong and Ton That Thuyet were afraid of establishing an older king who would lose power and the two men firmly advocated a king who supported their stance against the French, so they chose Ung Lich. 

Above: Nguyen Phuc Ung Ky (1864 – 1889)

This was a person qualified in terms of lineage, but who had not been contaminated by the rich life of the capital, contained the spirit of national pride and, most importantly, the two men could orient the King easily.

Ung Lich from a young age lived in poverty, with a rustic life with his biological mother, but was not raised properly like his two biological brothers in the Palace. 

Above: Thai Hoa Palace, Hué, Vietnam

When the messenger came to pick him up, the boy Ung Lich panicked and did not dare to accept the hats and robes offered. 

On the morning of 2 August 1884, Ung Lich was led between two lines of bodyguards, entered Thai Hoa Palace to celebrate the coronation of the Emperor to be named Ham Nghi. 

At that time, Ung Lich was only 13 years old. 

It is said that Ham Nghi ascended to the throne according to the will of the former King Kien Phuc.

However, in fact, Ham Nghi was established by warlords to the throne. 

In July 1884, after King Kien Phuc suddenly died, the court honored Ham Nghi to the throne. 

Above: Ham Nghi

Nuncio Pierre Paul Rheinart saw that Nguyen Van Tuong and Ton That Thuyet freely established themselves as kings, without consulting the French as they had agreed, so they sent troops to Hué to force the Nguyen Dynasty to ask for permission. 

Rheinart sent a note to the Hue court:

“If the Southern dynasties establish anyone as King, they have to ask permission from France.”

Above: Flag of France

Nguyen Van Tuong and Ton That Thuyet had to make an application in Nom script, but the Nuncio refused, forcing it to be made in Chinese. 

The two men had to rewrite the application, the new Nuncio accepted and then went to the main door to the Palace to consecrate King Ham Nghi. 

Above: Coronation of King Ham Nghi

The first role that King Ham Nghi had to play, under the guidance of Ton That Thuyet, was to organize the reception of the French delegation from the Nuncio on the south bank of the Perfume River to Thai Hoa Palace to celebrate the King’s enthronement ceremony. 

This is the victory that the warring faction of the Hue court had achieved in defending the throne of Ham Nghi.

As for the French, after their claims and demands failed, they had to make concessions to avoid new troubles by accepting a fact that it had already happened.

At 9:00 a.m. on 17 August 1884 , the French delegation – including Colonel Guerrier, Ambassador Rheinart, Captain Wallarmé and 185 military officers – pulled up to the Imperial Citadel of Hué. 

Guerrier forced the Hué court to let the entire French army enter Ngo Mon by the middle way, which was the only way for the King to go.

Ton That Thuyet definitely refused. 

In the end, only three messengers could enter the main gate, the rest of the members went through the gates on both sides. 

Both the Hue court and the French delegation were in a disagreeable mood, but the ordination ceremony finally ended peacefully. 

When the French delegation left, Ton That Thuyet secretly let the troops close the main door at Ngo Mon, so the French delegation had to use the two side doors to return. 

Above: Ton That Thuyet (1835 – 1913)

Acknowledging this, Marcel Gaultier wrote:

“King Ham Nghi has kept the sacredness of his subjects.

Unknowingly, the young King did something that had a resounding effect throughout the country:

With a determined will to be independent, and even though the French were stationed in Hué, the court still displayed a non-cowardly attitude.

The Council was rightly convinced that the people depended on the King’s attitude to follow, seeing it as an unspoken command against the French.“

The following year of 1885, General de Courcy was sent by the French Government to Vietnam to assist in the establishment of a protectorate. 

General de Courcy wanted to go in and see King Ham Nghi, but he wanted all his troops, 500 men, to enter the main door, which was reserved for great guests. 

The royal court asked the French soldiers to go through the doors on the sides, that only generals could go through the main door in accordance with royal etiquette, but de Courcy refused.

Above: Henri Roussel de Courcy (1827 – 1887)

On the night of the 5th and 6th of July 1885, Nguyen Van Tuong and Ton That Thuyet, seeing that the French despised their King, decided to take action first:

They took the army and attacked the French camp at Mang Ca Fort.

In the morning, the French counter-attacked, the Nguyen army lost and fled, leaving Hué Citadel. 

Above: Hué Citadel, Vietnam

Ton That Thuyet went to the Palace to report the night battle and implored the young Emperor Ham Nghi and Tam Cung to go. 

Hearing that he had to leave the city, King Ham Nghi was shocked and said:

“I didn’t fight anyone but I had to run.”

King Ham Nghi sat in the constantly wobbling palanquin, his head painfully hitting the wall of the palanquin many times.

Finally, the King had to lie down in a hammock for the stretcher soldiers. 

Nguyen Van Tuong sent people to bring King Ham Nghi to Quang Tri Citadel to take refuge. 

On the afternoon of 6 July 1885, the group arrived in Quang Tri. 

Above: Quàng Tri Citadel, Vietnam

Nguyen Van Tuong presented himself to the French army. 

General de Courcy gave Nguyen two months to find a way to bring the King back. 

Nguyen wrote to Quang Tri to ask for the King’s return, but Ton That Thuyet prevented the letter from reaching the King. 

After two months, the whole family of Nguyen Van Tuong was exiled by de Courcy to Con Dao, then taken to Tahiti Island in the Pacific Ocean. 

Some time after Nguyen died, his body was brought back to Vietnam. 

Above: Nguyen Van Tuong (1824 – 1886)

On 9 July 1885, under the pressure of Ton That Thuyet, King Ham Nghi had to go to Tan So.

Ham Nghi lived in Tan So and then retreated to remote communities. 

King Ham Nghi had to endure many hardships because he had to deal with mountains and forests and harsh weather, in the midst of countless deprivations, diseases, hunger and danger to his life. 

At Tan So, King Ham Nghi declared Can Vuong to call on scholars and people to rebel against the French to gain independence. 

The support, protection and enthusiastic participation of local people from Quang Tri to Laos as well as in Ha Tinh and Quang Binh showed Ham Nghi his own strength, so the King no longer felt as coerced as before. 

“The King was trained by hardships to be patient and received the ordination with a very calm attitude.” 

Above: Ham Nghi

His uprising was very large, but because it was scattered everywhere, his force was not strong. 

The King twice went down to Can Vuong, including once sending a letter of prayer to Governor Van Quy of the Manchu Dynasty and many other edicts to mandarins and leaders of the anti-French movement. 

His name had become the flag of national independence.

From the North to the South, the people had emerged everywhere at the call of the exalted King.

During the resistance war of King Ham Nghi, King Dong Khanh and the three Empress Dowagers repeatedly sent letters calling for the King to return, but he firmly refused. 

The Governor General of France in Indochina, Paul Bert, also tried to establish Ham Nghi as King of the four provinces of Thanh Nghe Tinh Binh but failed. 

Above: Paul Bert (1833 – 1886)

The King often said that he would rather die in the forest than return to be a King and stay in its embrace. 

As the base of the Can Vuong movement, King Ham Nghi was sent away for his own protection.

Admiral Le Truc and Nguyen Pham Tuan divided the defense and attacked French forces in the region.

In September 1888, the treacherous Nguyen Dinh Tinh team surrendered to the French at Dong Ca Fort. 

Nguyen Dinh Tinh again lured Truong Quang Ngoc to surrender. 

Then Nguyen Dinh Tinh and Truong Quang Ngoc volunteered with the French to bring troops to round up King Ham Nghi. 

Late at night on 26 September 1888, King Ham Nghi was arrested while sleeping.

Ton That Thiep was stabbed to death. 

At that time, the King was only 17 years old and had been fighting the French for three years. 

The King pointed directly at Truong Quang Ngoc and said:

“I would that you had rather killed me than to bring me out and hand me over to the West.”

Above: The arrest of Ham Nghi

From that night at the bank of Ta Bao Creek, Truong Quang Ngoc brought King Ham Nghi to Thuan Bai Fort on the afternoon. of 14 November 1888. 

The French army held a very solemn welcome to the King, but the King did not understand nor recognize himself as Ham Nghi. 

The lieutenant in command of the Bonnefoy army delivered Ton That Dam’s letter to King Ham Nghi, but the King threw the letter on the table and acted as if it had nothing to do with him. 

Admiral Thanh Thuy was sent by the French to visit the King, but the King pretended not to know. 

But when the French brought his former teacher Nguyen Nhuan to him, the King involuntarily stood up and bowed. 

Only then did the French rest assured that it was King Ham Nghi. 

Above: Ham Nghi after he was arrested by the French (1888)

From Thuan Bai, the French moved King Ham Nghi to the gates of Thuan An on 22 November 1888 .

At this time, the Hué court heard that Ham Nghi was arrested.

King Dong Khanh sent the Thua Thien mandarin and infantry to pick the King up and bring him back to Hué, but the French were afraid that the people would be agitated when they saw the face of the resistance king, so they informed the Institute of Secrets that King Ham Nghi had an unusual temper at this time, and there was an inconvenience in the business of transferral at that time. 

In fact, the French made a decisive decision that this resistance King would be exiled to Algeria in North Africa. 

Rheinart had informed him that the Queen Mother was seriously ill, and if the King wanted to visit her, he would send him home to meet her. 

Hearing that, King Ham Nghi replied: 

“I am already in prison, the country is lost, I don’t dare to think about my parents and brothers anymore.“ 

Then he said goodbye to his own room.

After being deposed, the former Emperor was officially known as Duke Ung Lich. 

At 4 a.m. on 25 November 1888, King Ham Nghi was taken off the train at Lang Co.

Before leaving his homeland, the King looked ashore, unable to contain his emotions because of his own feelings and luck, and he burst into tears. 

Above: Lang Co Beach, Hué Province, Vietnam

From Saigon, on 13 December 1888, King Ham Nghi was taken to a ship named “Bien Hoa” across the ocean to North Africa. 

Because he was not used to the sea, the King suffered from constant seasickness but still did not utter a single comment or complaint. 

On Sunday afternoon, 13 January 1889, Ham Nghi arrived in Algiers, the capital of Algeria. 

At this time, he had just turned 18.

Above: Flag of modern Algeria

For the first ten days, Ham Nghi temporarily stayed at L’Hôtel de la Régence (Regent Court). 

After that, he was transferred to Villa des Pins (Pine Wood Villa) in the village of El Biar, 5 kilometers from the capital.

Above: Villa des Pins, El Biar, Algeria

On 24 January 1889, Governor-General Tirman of Algeria received and invited Ham Nghi to have a family meal. 

A few days later, through Governor-General Tirman, the former Emperor received news that his mother, Mrs. Phan Thi Nhan (second wife of King Kien Thai) had died on 21 January 1889 in Hué.

Above: Louis Tirman (1837 – 1899)

For the next ten months, Ham Nghi refused to learn French because he considered it to be the language of the nation that invaded his country.

He still used a scarf and a five-piece robe according to the old habits in his homeland. 

All communication was through an interpreter.

But later, seeing that the French in Algeria were friendly, much different from the French in Vietnam, so from November 1889 he began to learn French. 

A few years later, Ham Nghi could speak and write French very well.

Above: The French language in the world –

• States where French is the majority native language, an official or administrative language (dark blue)

• States where it is a minority or secondary language (light blue)

• States that have a local francophone minority (green)

The following things have been changed since the publication of this map:

• Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos are no longer colored in light blue, this is because French is not used there very much these days.
• Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia have been colored light blue, because the French language is widely used.

There are even more French speakers in those countries where French is the official language.

• The Western Sahara has been colored light blue, due to the increased use of French there.

• A green square has been added in London to recognize the French-speaking minority there.

Ham Nghi also interacted with famous French intellectuals. 

In 1899, he visited Paris to see an exhibition of the painter Paul Gauguin. 

Above: French painter Paul Gauguin (1848 – 1903)

More than 100 years later, the painting Déclin du jour (Afternoon) of the former Emperor was discovered at an auction in Paris on 24 November 2010.

It was sold for €8,800.

In 1904, Ham Nghi was engaged to Ms. Marcelle Laloe (1884 – 1974), the daughter of the Chief Justice of the High Court of Alger. 

Their wedding was the cultural event of the Alger capital. 

Ham Nghi and Marcelle Laloe had three children:

• Princess Nhu Mai (1905 – 1999)

Above: Princess Nhu Mai

• Princess Nhu Luan (1908 – 2005)

Above: Princess Nhu Ly

• Prince Minh Duc (1910 – 1990)

Above: Prince Minh Duc

On 14 January 1944, Ham Nghi died of stomach cancer at Gia Long Villa in Algiers. 

He was buried in Thonac, Salat-la-Canéda district, Nouvelle Aquitaine region.

He left with an unrelenting sadness in his mind. 

Above: Final resting place of Ham Nghi, Thonac, France

On 25 January 2009, a boat accident took place on the Gianh River, near Quảng Hải Village.

A wooden boat sank 20 meters from the shore in strong currents during windy conditions.

There were reportedly over 80 people on board, yet the boat was capable of carrying only 20.

The accident caused 42 deaths and five people were missing.

Above: Personal effects of some of the victims of the 2009 Gianh River boat accident

The Prime Minister of Vietnam sent his condolences to the victims’ families.

Above: Nguyen Tan Dung (Prime Minister of Vietnam: 2006 – 2016)

The government of Quảng Bình Province decided to cancel the fireworks supposed to take place at midnight the same day, on the eve of Têt, New Year’s Day in Vietnam.

Above: A Vietnamese family is making bánh tét (or bánh đòn, Vietnamese sticky rice cake) on the biggest traditional holiday of Vietnam, Tết, the Vietnamese Lunar New Year.

Bánh tét is a must traditional food that is made and eaten only on Tet holiday by families in the South and the Central of Vietnam.

In the North, they make bánh chưng.

Nowadays, this kind of food is still available sometimes at some shops and markets during the year, especially at markets in small towns.

However, the quality is not as good as the ones that made by families for themselves.

In the past, families usually made bánh tét on the day before Tết.

They cooked it and celebrated the New Year’s Eve at the same time.

Gathering together to make bánh tét is a very beautiful tradition of Vietnam.

It is not only the time to make bánh tét, but also the time for family members to bond and come together by talking, recalling memories, laughing together and celebrating the holiday spirit after a long hard working year that they might even not meet each other.

It is also a special time for the young to learn about Vietnamese traditions and the legend of bánh tét.

This way, historical values are preserved.

As it takes a lot of time and technique to make bánh tét, many families now choose to buy bánh tét instead of making it by themselves.

This somehow makes the beauty of the traditions and customs of Tet holiday in Vietnam not as how it used to be.

There is nothing to make sure that images like this will still available to catch in the future as life has been getting more and more modern and people tend to choose convenient things.

Most of the victims were women and children, including three women who were pregnant.

At least 36 passengers survived, a few by swimming to shore and others being rescued, but several are still missing.

 Above: Tất Niên offering (New Year’s prayer)

According to Luong Ngoc Binh, provincial Communist Party chief:

“The waves on the river were big, the wind was strong and it was cold, so it was very difficult for people to survive.“

The boat was crowded because people were trying to cross the river to get to the market.

They were rushing to buy things for the Lunar New Year festivities.

The tragedy happened on the eve of the Tet Lunar New Year, the biggest annual festival in Vietnam.

It was supposed to reunite families for celebration meals and to pray for good luck in the year ahead.

Above: Altar to the ancestors

According to Phan Lam Phuong, the governor of Quang Binh:

“It’s a tragedy for the province, it should have been time to celebrate the Lunar New Year.”

Above: Pham Lam Phuong (1937 – 2020)

The provincial government decided to cancel the Lunar New Year fireworks show.

It was one of the worst ferry accidents in Quang Binh province.

Above: Sinkhole 2 in Son Doong Cave – the world’s largest cave – Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, Quang Binh Province, Vietnam 

According to the Vietnamese News Agency, following the event, the Ministry of Transport suggested that the Chairman of Quang Binh region determine who was to blame for the tragedy.

Some families of the victims were upset that the construction of a bridge was supposed to be finished two years before the accident.

The bridge was to be constructed around one kilometer from the accident site and might have prevented the tragedy.

Phan Thanh Ha, the provincial police chief of Quang Binh said:

“Authorities will give 10 million dong ($600) to the families of each victim.”

Gianh River is the biggest river in Quang Binh, so the residents call it the Mother River.

Gianh River’s water can be clear and still, but its average steepness is 19.2%.

So, throughout the flood season from September to November, the stream is brutal.

Above: Bridge over the Gianh River

According to the magazine Vietnam Heritage:

“Quang Binh people say only those who have witnessed the crest of its floods know its power and ferocity.”

Hoàn Lão is the capital of Bo Trach District, situated in northeastern Quang Binh Province, 13 km north of Dong Hoi.

The township is located about 30 km east of Phong Nha-Kè National Park National Park, a UNESCO Heritage Site.

Hoàn Lão covers 5,70 km² and had a population of 7,372 in 2012.

Above: Hoan Lao (where National Highway 1A passes), Vietnam

Quach Xuan Ky (1926 – 1949) was a soldier of North Vietnam, who fought and died in the Vietnam/American War (1955 – 1975).

Quach Xuan Ky was born in Hoan Lao.

His father was Quach Nguyen Ham, a famous doctor in the region.

Quach Xuan Ky is the 5th child in the family.

From a young age he participated in Viet Minh activities with many peers. 

Quach Xuan Ky was very fond of poetry, especially poetry by Phan Boi Chau and To Huu.

Above: Quach Xuan Ky

Phan Boi Chau (1867 – 1940) was a famous Vietnamese scholar and revolutionary, active during the French colonial period.

In addition to his revolutionary career, he also wrote many books and newspapers, which were widely popularized among the people. 

In the Literary Dictionary, after introducing him and his literary career, it was also concluded that:

In the history of Vietnamese literature, it is not easy to find literature that has the power to move the masses to stand up for the great revolutionary struggle, like that of Phan Boi Chau. 

Today in that literature, in terms of thought and concept, this point or other may no longer be relevant, but the author’s enthusiastic heart is still valid heart.

He is considered to be one of the great writers of Vietnamese literature in the first half of the 20th century.

Above: Phan Boi Chau

To Huu, real name Nguyen Kim Thanh (1920 – 2002) was a poet and politician, who rose to the post of Permanent Deputy Prime Minister of Vietnam (1980 – 1986).

Above: To Huu

In 1969, he was assigned to be the last person to edit the eulogy at the funeral of President Ho Chi Minh. 

To Huu used his pen and enthusiasm to help make the eulogy better and go into people’s hearts:

Dear compatriots and soldiers nationwide, comrades and friends

Our beloved President Ho is no more!

This loss is enormous, this pain is infinite.

The international communist movement, the national liberation movement and the progress of all mankind have lost an outstanding soldier, a resilient and close friend.

Our people, our people, our country’s mountains and rivers gave birth to President Ho, a great hero, and it was he who made our nation radiant, human. our people and the rivers of our country.”

Above: Ho Chi Minh (1890 – 1969)

In To Huu, there is a beautiful unity between the revolutionary life and the poetic life, between the ideal in the heart and the verses on the tip of the pen. 

To Huu’s poetic journey is the historical journey of an entire nation. 

He is considered the flagship of revolutionary and resistance poetry, honored as “the poet of the revolution“, “the poet of the people“, “the battle flag of the Vietnamese revolutionary poetry“, “who contributed to the construction of revolutionary poetry in Vietnam“, “a full life with Revolution – Art – Love“, “poet of revolutionary humanism“. 

During the two resistance wars, To Huu composed many poems to encourage the spirit of soldiers and people, associated with the entire history of the resistance. 

To Huu’s poetry is frugal and sweet, penetrating deeply into the souls of all generations, from the one who “fell into the forest of young men” or “who came to his poetry during his childhood“, preserved and promoted as a spiritual strength, a hidden cultural value in the people of the Ho Chi Minh era.

There is something reminiscent about the notion of revolutionary poets that finds me thinking of Yevgeny Zamyatin’s science fiction classic, We:

“This is merely a copy, word by word, of what was published this morning in the State newspaper:

In another 120 days the building of the Integral will be completed.

The great historic hour is near, when the first Integral will rise into the limitless space of the universe.

A thousand years ago your heroic ancestors subjected the whole Earth to the power of the United State.

A still more glorious task is before you —the integration of the indefinite equation of the Cosmos by the use of the glass, electric, fire-breathing Integral.

Your mission is to subjugate to the grateful yoke of reason the unknown beings who live on other planets, and who are perhaps still in the primitive state of freedom.

If they will not understand that we are bringing them a mathematically faultless happiness, our duty will be to force them to be happy.

But before we take up arms, we shall try the power of words.

In the name of the Well-Doer, the following is announced herewith to all Numbers of the United State:

Whoever feels capable must consider it his duty to write treatises, poems, manifestoes, odes and other compositions on the greatness and the beauty of the United State.

This will be the first load which the Integral will carry.

Long live the United State!

Long live the Numbers!!

Long live the Well-Doer!!!

I feel my cheeks are burning as I write this.

To integrate the colossal, universal equation!

To unbend the wild curve, to straighten it out to a tangent — to a straight line!

For the United State is a straight line, a great, divine, precise, wise line, the wisest of lines!

I, D-503, the builder of the Integral, I am only one of the many mathematicians of the United State.

My pen, which is accustomed to figures, is unable to express the march and rhythm of consonance.

Therefore, I shall try to record only the things I see, the things I think, or to be more exact, the things we think.

Yes, we;

That is exactly what I mean.

“We” shall, therefore, be the title of my records.

But this will only be a derivative of our life — of our mathematical, perfect life in the United State.

If this be so, will not this derivative be a poem in itself, despite my limitations?

It will.

I believe,

I know it.

I feel my cheeks are burning as I write this.

I feel something similar to what a woman probably feels when for the first time she senses within herself the pulse of a tiny, blind, human being.

It is I, and at the same time it is not I.

And for many long months it will be necessary to feed it with my life, with my blood, and then with a pain at my heart, to tear it from myself and lay it at the feet of the United State.

Yet I am ready, as everyone, or nearly everyone of us, is.

I am ready.“

In January 1945, at the age of 19, Quach Xuan Ky was admitted to the Communist Party of Vietnam.

Quach Xuan Ky joined the Viet Minh at a very young age, joined the Bo Trach District Uprising Committee from day one, and quickly became one of the leadership cores of the new government in his homeland after the August Revolution (1945) was successful.

In 1946, he was in charge of intelligence work in Bo Trach district.

In July 1948, Quach Xuan Ky was elected to the Standing Committee of the District Party Committee and then assumed the position of Secretary of the Bo Trach District Party Committee.

In February 1949, Quach Xuan Ky became a member of the Provincial Party Committee, Secretary of the Party Committee of Dong Hoi.

In the same year, he was captured by the French during a sweep. 

In prison, Quach Xuan Ky established and became the Secretary of the prison cell, resolutely resisting pressure from the French government. 

After a long period of torture and imprisonment without success, Quach Xuan Ky was publicly shot on 11 July 1949, at the age of 23.

Above: Images of the First Indochina War (1946 – 1954)

Quach Xuan Ky regularly wrote diaries, describing the process of revolutionary activities, fighting as well as love of life and people.

He had a deep love affair with a Dong Hoi girl named Hue.

His closest combat mate was Phan Khac Hy, a senior officer in the Vietnam People’s Army.

Quach Xuan Ky’s diary lines are still preserved to this day, including the following passages:

It is impossible for Vietnam to be enslaved again, just as the Vietnamese people cannot be oppressed and so why should we be in chains?

Right now, I think about that beautiful tomorrow. 

I believe in that beautiful tomorrow. 

Just as I’m sure I’m alive right now.

A Communist must have two working conditions in order to carry out the program:

1) Russian revolutionary spirit

2) America’s practical mind

Both parts are equally important, one cannot be missing from the other.“

Above: Emblem of the Vietnam People’s Army

Quach Xuan Ky is remembered as a loyal soldier, a passionate and profound lover of his homeland.

In 1999, Quach Xuan Ky was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the People’s Armed Forces by the State of Vietnam.

Today, his name has been given to streets of Dong Hoi, and streets and a secondary school in Hoan Lao.

Above: Dong Hoi, Vietnam

Đồng Hới is the capital city of Quang Binh Province on the north central coast of Vietnam.

The city’s area is 155.71 km² (60.12 sq mi).

Population as per the 2017 census was 119,222. 

It is served by National Highway 1A, the Dong Hoi railway station and the Dong Hoi airport.

By road, Đồng Hới is 486 kilometres (302 mi) south of Hanoi, 195 kilometres (121 mi) south of Vinh, 160 kilometres (99 mi) north of Hué and 1,204 kilometres (748 mi) north of Ho Chi Minh City. 

Đồng Hới has a 12-km-long coastline with white sand beaches. 

Above: Fishing boats, Dong Hoi, Vietnam

It is the closest city to Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, 50 km northwest.

Above: Logo of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

I believe that Heidi did not visit Phong Nha-Ke Bang, even though I think she should have.

But as these are her travels and not mine so I will forego extolling the virtues of the Park and instead speak of Dong Hoi.

Above: View of Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, Vietnam

Almost entirely flattened in the Vietnam / American War’s bombing raids, Dong Hoi has risen from its ashes to become a prosperous and orderly provincial capital of over 160,000 people.

Tourists who stay here – Heidi did not – usually use the town as a base for the Phong Nha Caves, though there are plenty of accommodation options in Phong Nha itself.

However, Dong Hoi warrants a visit in itself, if only to step off the beaten track for a bit.

Above: Dong Hoi, Vietnam

Particularly pleasant is the esplanade along the west bank of the Nhat Le River, which leads to the East Sea and an attractive stretch of beach.

The city’s focal point is the remnants of a Nguyen-dynasty citadel – the only notable part is the restored south gate, where a lively riverside market has spring up and in summer vendors sell ice-cold glasses of sweet bean che.

Above: Eastern Gate of Dong Hoi Citadel

Crossing the Nhat Le River, you will find yourself on a small spit of land named My Canh.

This is also the name of the small beach sliding down the eastern edge of the isthmus.

As with sandy beaches up and down the land, My Canh has been developed as a resort area, though it attracts more Vietnamese than foreigners.

There is not much to do in Dong Hoi but relax, enjoy its beaches and drink a beer.

Get there now before the masses do.

Many hotels and tour groups operate tours to these nearby beaches and caves.

There are few tourists in Dong Hoi, so you will be greeted with many hellos.

Nhat Le Beach is nearby, but the focus of the town is very much on the river and canals.

Enjoy a massage by the blind while soft sultry saxophone music echoes in the corridor.

Not all the employees are actually blind, as they sometimes check and write text messages on their phones during the massage, but it has been claimed that they are all legally blind.

Good energetic massage by properly trained people. 

70,000 dong per hour.

Although Nhat Le Beach is nearby, the focus of Dong Hoi is on the River.

Accordingly, you will find the beach to be generally empty and abandoned, with just a few hotels, construction work, and piles of dirt.

The beach is pleasant, but the current is strong and the waves often too powerful for swimming.

Archaeological excavation in this area proved that humans lived in what is now Quảng Bình Province in the Stone Age.

Many artifacts, such as ceramic vases, stone tools, and china, have been unearthed in Quảng Bình.

In 1926, French archaeologist Madeleine Colani (1866 – 1943) discovered and excavated many artifacts in caves and grottoes in west mountainous areas of Quảng Bình.

She concluded that the Hoa Binh culture existed in this region.

Through carbon testing, the artifacts dated back to 10,509 (plus or minus 950) years ago.

Above: Madeleine Colani (1866 – 1943)

The Hum Grotto contains many stone tools and animal stones from an ancient human community.

Inside Khai Grotto, similar artifacts were found, including ceramics from the Dong Son culture.

Additionally, artifacts of the Stone Age were unearthed in grottoes in the Quảng Bình region.

Owners of these artifacts lived in the caves and grottoes and hunted for their food.

Human settlement in Đồng Hới can be traced 5,000 years back.

Many relics and remnants have been found in Bau Tro, a lake in the city, most of which date to the Stone Age.

Above: Bau Tro Lake, Dong Hoi, Vietnam

Around 2880 BCE, the site of modern Đồng Hới was a territory of the Viet Thuong tribe of Van Lang during the reign of King Hùng Virong (c. 2524 BCE).

Above: Vietnam, 500 BCE

Above: Statue of Hùng Vương at Hùng Temple, Tao Đàn, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

The site was a long-disputed territory between the Champa Kingdom and Dai Viet.

Above: Southeast Asia, 1400

It officially became Đại Việt territory in 1069  after Ly Thuong Kiet (1019 – 1105) took victory over Champaas a result of the Đại Việt-Champa War.

Above: Statue of Tuong Ly Thuong Kiet, Dai Nam Quoc Tu, Vietnam

The area ceased to be the southernmost of Đại Việt following the political marriage of the Tran Dynasty Princess Huyen Tran to Champa King Jaya Sinhararman III.

Thanks to this marriage, Đại Việt acquired lands (as dowry) of what is now Quang Tri Province and Thira Thien Hué Province.

Above: Statue of Huyen Tran (1289 – 1340), Hué, Vietnam

Above: Statue of Jaya Simhavarman III (1288 – 1307), Po Klong Garai Temple, Vietnam

During the time of the Trinh – Nguyen War (1558 – 1775), Vietnam was divided into two countries: Dang Trong (South) and Dang Ngoai (North) with the Gianh River as frontier line.

Đồng Hới was an important fortress of the southern Nguyen lords.

The Đồng Hới Wall was considered the barrier that protected the Nguyễn lords from the attack by the northern Trinh family.

Above: Vietnam, 1757

During the First Indochina War (1946 – 1954) (between the French and the Viet Minh), Đồng Hới Airbase was used by the French to attack the Viet Minh in north-central Vietnam and the Laotian Pathet Lao army in central and southern Laos.

Above: Dong Hoi Airport

During the Vietnam / American War (1955 – 1975), Đồng Hới was heavily devastated by bombardments from US B-52 bombers due to its location near the 17th parallel and the DMZ between North and South Vietnam.

Above: 1969 map of the Demilitarized Zone

On 11 February 1965, bombing destroyed much of the city.

Above: B-52 Stratofortress

The Tam Toa Church, a Catholic cathedral, was severely damaged.

Today the bell tower remains near the town center as a monument.

Above: Ruins of Tam Toa Church, Dong Hoi, Vietnam

On 19 April 1972, during a major North Vietnam offensive, a task force of four US ships were sailing off the coast of Vietnam — USS Oklahoma City, USS Sterett, USS Lloyd Thomas and USS Higbee.

They were attacked by three North Vietnamese MiG aircraft in the Battle of Dong Hoi.

In an attempt to surprise the task force, the MiGs came in low, described as “getting their feet wet“.

Despite the official stories, they did not surprise the task force, which had spotted them long before engagement range and were ready to shoot.

Two ships, Oklahoma City and Sterett, had anti-aircraft missiles, while Higbee and Lloyd Thomas were armed with dual purpose 5-inch (127 mm) guns.

All ships were at battle stations.

Above: A preserved Vietnamese MiG-17 used in the “Air Battle of Dong Hoi” on 19 April 1972.

Pilot Nguyen Van Bay B flew this aircraft and bombed the US Navy destroyer USS Higbee.

This city is the narrowest land of Vietnam (around 40 km from the east to the west).

After the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975, Quảng Bình province was merged into Bình Trị Thiên province.

Above: The CIA helps evacuees up a ladder onto an Air America helicopter on the roof of 22 Gia Long Street, 29 April 1975, shortly before Saigon fell to advancing North Vietnamese troops.

In 1990, Bình Trị Thiên was once again separated into three provinces as it had been before.

Đồng Hới then became the capital of Quảng Bình province.

Above: Dong Hoi seen from the air

Đồng Hới is endowed with beautiful beaches with fine sand and clean water of Nhật Lệ.

Above: Nhat Le River

Da Nhay and Ly Hoa beaches (60 km north of the city) are popular tourist destinations.

Above: Da Nhay Beach

Above: Ly Hoa Beach

Bang Spa (hot mineral spring) is ideal for those who enjoy spa baths.

As previously said, the city is 50 km south of the Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, which is ideal for cave and grotto exploration and biological research activities.

Above: Boats for tourists in Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park

Đồng Hới is included in former battlefield tours where travellers can visit once-dangerous fields along the Annamite Range and the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

Above: Pu Mat National Park, Annamite Range, Vietnam

Đồng Hới is accessible by road, by rail or by air.

Above: National Road 1A

Above: Dong Hoi Railway Station yard

The city provides tourists with 98 hotels and guesthouses from 1 to 3-star hotels.

The cuisine includes seafood, the traditional “hot pot“, Vietnamese and European-style meals.

Above: Hot pot

In 2005, the city welcomed nearly 300,000 visitors.

A complex of ten golf courses, three clubhouses, more than 1,000 villas, a large resort hotel, a commercial village and a convention centre has recently been constructed in the seaside area of Dong Hoi.

Above: Dong Hoi, Vietnam

Đồng Hới Citadel (Thành Đồng Hới) is a citadel in the centre of the city. 

The Citadel is located in the vicinity of Hùng Vương Street.

Today all that remains of the Citadel is one rather unsympathetically restored Quảng Bình Gate (located close to the new museum) and a section of the original wall next to Highway 1.

Above: Dong Hoi Citadel

This is an ancient architecture and a military construction built nearly 200 years ago by order of King Gia Long. 

Above: King Gia Long (1762 – 1820)

The citadel was built of earth, located on an important land on the trans-Vietnam road, and near the sea (about 1,500 metres from Nhat Le Estuary).

Above: Dong Hoi Ancient Citadel (East gate)

By the reign of King Minh Mang, the Citadel was built with bricks and stones. 

Above: Minh Mang (1791 – 1841)

A large part of Dong Hoi Citadel was destroyed during the French colonial period. 

Above: Quang Binh Quan

The remnants of Dong Hoi citadel were destroyed by bombs of the US Air Force (USAF) in the late 1960s during the Vietnam War.

Dong Hoi Citadel still preserves many vestiges of two wars, imprinted with the unyielding will of the army and people of Quang Binh.

Today, the ruins of Dong Hoi citadel are only Quang Binh Quan (newly restored but criticized by public opinion as not the same as the old citadel) and a section of the wall located on National Highway 1 passing through Dong Hoi. 

In August 2005, Quang Binh Province restored the Citadel at a total estimate of 31 billion VND. 

Dong Hoi Citadel is one of 32 works that the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism included in the list of key cultural projects. 

The wall is built of bricks about 6 metres high. 

Now this relic only has a few sporadic sections in Dong Hoi, the most visible from the map is a moat around the citadel according to the ancient citadel architecture.

Above: Dong Hoi Citadel from above

At Bau Tro, relics were found, such as tools made of sea creatures (such as snails and shells) and stone. 

Research shows that they are about 5,000 years old. 

In the summer of 1923, two Frenchmen of the Institute of the Far East of the Ancients, Max and Depiruy, discovered the archaeological site of Bau Tro. 

At the end of the summer of 1923, geologist and archaeologist Etienne Patté organized the excavation of the Bau Tro site and published the research results in a report in the journal Bac Co Far East School titled:

“On a site indicating Neolithic prehistory, piles of shells in Bau Tro, Tam Toa near Dong Hoi“. 

The collected artifacts are still stored at the Vietnam History Museum, consisting of:

• 46 stone axes
• 140 shards
• two quartz stones
• a stone tool used to repair presses
• 14 bead mills
• a net lead
• some ocher
• vertebrae of a fish
• shells
• pieces of pottery.

Above: Bau Tro Lake

Built during the war of Trinh Nguyen, Luy Thay Citadel was built by Lord Nguyen Phuc and ordered by Governor Dao Duy Tu to protect the border at Dang Trong. 

The Citadel is made of earth with a length of 8 km surrounding Dong Hoi Citadel. 

Thay can now be seen from Quach Xuan Ky Street street to the west of Phu Hai Ward.

This part of the dyke is now named Truong Dinh Street.

Above: Dong Hoi Citadel

Tam Toa Church was built in 1886. 

Poet Han Mac Tu was baptized here in 1912 with the holy name Francois Nguyen Trong Tri. 

In the eight years of 1964 to 1972, when the USAF bombed North Vietnam, Tam Toa Church was destroyed, leaving only the bell tower. 

Above: Tam Toa Church, Dong Hoi

Dong Hoi Hospital was donated by the Cuban government in 1975.

Above: Dong Hoi Hospital

Han Mac Tu (né Nguyen Trong Tri)(1912 – 1940) was a Vietnamese poet, the founder of the School of Poetry and a pioneer of Vietnamese modern romantic poetry.

Above: Banner of the Chaos School of Poetry

Han Mac Tu is known as the marshal of the school of chaotic poetry.

Han Mac Tu had a weak physique and a gentle simple personality.

He was studious and liked to make friends in the field of literature and poetry. 

Because his father Nguyen Van Toan worked as an interpreter and scribe, he often moved to many places and had many assignments, so Han Mac Tu attended many different schools.

Above: Han Mac Tu

He had a talent for writing poetry from the early age of 16. 

He decided to go to Saigon to start a business, when he was 21 years old;

Arriving in Saigon, he worked as a reporter in charge of poetry pages for the newspaper Cong Cong. 

Above: Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon)

At that time, Mong Cam (1917 – 2007) in Phan Thiet also wrote poetry and often sent it to the newspaper. 

The two began to exchange letters.

He decided to go to Phan Thiet to meet Mong Cam. 

A romantic poetic love blossomed between the two.

Above: Han Mac Tu and his lovers in poetry: Thuong Thuong, Kim Cuc, Mong Cam, Ngoc Suong and Mai Dinh

According to Han Mac Tu’s family, around early 1935, they discovered signs of leprosy on his body. 

However, he did not care because he thought it was an insignificant leprosy. 

Until 1936, when he published the book “Country Girl“, Han travelled to Hué, Saigon and Quang Ngai.

When Tan Van newspaper decided to invite Han Mac Tu to be the editor, then he thought about his illness. 

He meant to completely cure a disease of the “itchy” type, so that he could go to Saigon to work as a newspaper without expecting an incurable disease. 

By 1939, Han Mac Tu was in severe pain. 

However, no one heard him groaning. 

He only screamed in his poems. 

Above: Rash on the chest and abdomen due to leprosy

Before Han Mac Tu entered Quy Hoa leprosy camp, Nguyen Ba Tin, the poet’s younger brother, said his brother’s illness was as follows: 

His skin is dry, but a little wrinkled in his hands, because he has to exert strength. strong to pull his fingers when holding a spoon to eat rice. 

Therefore, he looks like he is wearing a raw leather “glove”. 

His whole body is dry.

Nguyen Ba Tin, during a visit to Quy Hoa Hospital, visited Dr. Gour Vile – the director of Quy Nhon Hospital. 

The doctor said: 

Leprosy is difficult to distinguish. 

The medical community (at that time) did not know very well. 

Although the symptoms are the same, there are many things. 

The doctor insisted that leprosy could not be easily transmitted.

Above: The Wind Tomb, Quy Hoa Leprosy Camp, Quy Nhon, Vietnam

It is said that one day, Han Mac Tu went for a walk with Mong Cam in Phan Thiet, passing a cemetery with a newly buried grave when it rained. 

Suddenly he discovered red spots flying up from the grave. 

He went back to the motel, only to find out early in the morning that he was like that. 

Above: Phan Thiet, Vietnam

At that time, because of the misconception that this was a contagious disease, patients were often rejected, isolated, shunned, and even mistreated. 

Han Mac Tu was no exception. 

At this time, his family had to deal with local authorities because they have learned that he had an infectious disease, demanding that he be isolated from everyone. 

After that, his family had to hide him in many places.

In terms of treatment effectiveness, this was unscientific because he should have been brought to the place with the most adequate treatment conditions at that time, which was Quy Hoa Leprosy Hospital. 

Dr. Gour also said that from experience from leprosy camps, no patient can live after suffering for so many years. 

He blamed Han Mac Tu’s family for not sending the poet to the leper camp early. 

The doctor said that Han Mac Tu died because his internal organs were damaged too quickly because he took too many quack drugs before being hospitalized.

He died at 5:45 a.m. on 11 November 1940 at the age of 28.

Above: Signpost marker to the grave of Han Mac Tu

Above: Grave of Han Mac Tu, Ghenh Rang, Vietnam

Han Mac Tu’s life had a predestined relationship with the word Binh: born in Quang Binh, worked as a newspaper in Tan Binh, had a lover in Binh Thuan and died in Binh Dinh. 

He was known for his many love affairs, with many different women, that have left many marks on his poetry – some he had met, some he only communicated through letters, and others he only knew by their names.

There are many reviews and comments about Han Mac Tu’s poetic talent, here are some evaluations of famous poets and writers:

“No one before, no one after, Han Mac Tu is like a comet passing through the sky of Vietnam with its dazzling tail.

I promise you that, in the future, those mediocrity and standards will disappear, and what remains of this period is Han Mac Tu.“

(Poet Che Lan Vien)

Above: Ché La Viên (1920 – 1989)

“It will not be possible to fully explain the phenomenon of Han Mac Tu if only using the poetic of romanticism and the influence of the Bible.

We need to study more the theory of symbolism and surrealism.

In Han Mac Tu’s surrealist poems, people cannot distinguish between the void and the real, the form and the void, the worldly and the other worldly, the visible and the invisible, the inner and the outer, the subject and the object, the emotional and the non-emotional world.

All the senses are mixed up, all the normal logic in thought and language, in grammar and poetry is suddenly turned upside down.

The poet has made the contrasts and combinations strange, creating a uniqueness full of amazement and horror for the reader.“

(Literary critic Phan Cu De)

Above: Phan Cu De (1933 – 2007)

“Han Mac Tu has about seven good songs, four of which have reached perfection.

The rest are genius verses.

These verses could not be written by anyone but Han Mac Tu.“

(Poet Tran Dang Khoa)

Above: Tran Dang Khoa

“In my opinion, there was a lot of poetry left in Han Mac Tu’s life.

He was a very talented person who made a worthy contribution to New Poetry. “

(Poet Huy Can)

Above: Huy Can (1919 – 2005)

“A source of strange poetry, a vast and boundless garden from which the further away you go into it, the more chilling you become.“

(Literary critic Hoai Thanh)

Above: Hoai Thanh (1909 – 1982)

A person who suffered so much, when we lived we indifferently forgot, now that we are gone, we gather around those who criticize and praise. 

Criticize or praise me, I see nothing cruel.

Above: Han Mac Tu

Many localities in Vietnam use his name to name streets such as:

• Binh Dinh

• Vung Tau

• Da Nang

• Dak Lak

• Hué

• Nghe An

• Phan Thiet

• Quang Binh

• Thanh Hoa

• Ho Chi Minh City

Above: Han Mac Tu

(A tip to travel writers:

Place names give you the flavour of the community.

California’s San Jose and La Jolla, New Orleans’ Bienville Street, Chartres Street and Beauregard Street, evokes the areas’ origins.

Above: San Jose, California

Above: New Orleans, Louisiana

Notice what they call their plazas and squares and how they name their streets.

Is the town laid out with First Street and Second Street intersecting A and B and C?

Are the streets, the squares, the gates, the areas named for famous people?

What kinds of famous people?

Politicians?

Generals?

Writers?

Artists?

Musicians?

Entertainers?

Millionaires?

Sometimes it is the date that is important – for example, Mexico City’s Avenida 16 de Septiembre (named for the Mexican Independence Day) or Buenos Aires’ Avenida 9 Julio (a crucial day in Argentina’s struggle for liberty). )

Above: Mexico City, Mexico

Above: Buenos Aires, Argentina

With images of inner expression, descriptive writing, delicate language, rich in associations, the poem This is Vi Da village is a beautiful picture of a country’s countryside, the voice of a person’s heart. life, love people.

Vi Da village sparkles with metaphorical colours: 

There is sunshine, there is moon waiting, there is smog has haunted the mind of the talented poet. 

Although he left life in a hurry, Han Mac Tu always loved people, loved life with all his passion, and had a thirst for life.

Vi Da village is the most gentle poem of Han Mac Tu in the collection of Poems Crazy. 

Because at this time, he was in a period of illness, insane pain both physically and mentally. 

His poetry is always screams of anger, choking.

Vi Da village is so beautiful, so complete, suddenly torn apart by a wind, a cloud, the Moon, the poet released his soul and hugged the shadow of a beautiful woman, and then finally doubted, asked who seems to wonder: “Who knows whose love is rich?”. 

So, isn’t it a harmonious and beautiful world, but also fragile, perceived by a poet carrying a monstrous disease, at a young age, still too earnest for the world? 

Under his pen, Vi Da became incredibly beautiful and poetic.

Under the eyes of Han Mac Tu, the landscape, no matter how small and insignificant, also became soulful, lively, and great.

The fragrance is magical like a miracle, so beautiful and poetic that everyone wants to visit this Vi Da village, that is full of love, light and whispers.

Love, light and whispers have worked together to create a miracle.

Han Mac Tu’s poetry is a complex phenomenon that is not easily unified in its assessment and interpretation. 

Vi Da village is such a poem.

Overall, the poem has an increasing movement towards the end. 

From the real world to the dream world. 

From the very beginning, the scene and the people of Vi village appear together as a vision in a dream.

The second stanza is full of fantasy.

The third stanza is full of dreams.

Because it is the product of a dream state, it is illogical on the surface, co-occurring and spontaneous, but it has deep logic:

The sound of a desperate, startled and painful love…

In 2001, the publishing house Arfuyen published an anthology of Han Mac Tu’s poetry into French, named Le Hameau des roseaux (Here is Vi Da village) translated by Hélène Péras and Vu Thi Bich.

Above: Han Mac Tu

Many languages have next to nothing translated into our own language.

There are in the world tiny tucked-away places where very little is written down at all.

Some governments don’t like to let works of art leak out to corrupt Westerners.

Most of us barely touch works by foreign language writers even if their works have been translated.

Most of us are literary xenophobes.

Our literary insularity has created within us a narrowness of mind, thought and perspective.

Above: State and University Library, Copenhagen, Denmark

Since Goethe first introduced the term Weltliteratur in the late 1820s, numerous would-be world readers have quailed in the face of the enormity and even ludicrousness of the task.

Above: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749 – 1832)

“What can one make of such an idea!

The sum total of all national literatures?

A wild idea, unattainable in practice, worthy not of an actual reader but of a deluded keeper of archives who is also a multimillionaire.

The most harebrained editor has never aspired to such a thing.“, exclaimed the critic Claudio Guillén in 1993.

Above: Claudio Guillén (1924 – 2007)

Back in 1964, French polyglot René Étiemble, who specialized in Arab and Chinese culture, was thrown into a cold sweat by the notion of trying to tackle all stories written everywhere ever.

“I am immediately seized by a kind of panic terror.

What would such theoretical openness of spirit to all literatures, whether present or past, bring us given that any mind, however capacious we may imagine it, is limited by the average length of our lives?“, he confessed in a speech to the Fourth World Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association.

Above: René Étiemble (1909 – 2002)

The idea clearly niggled Étiemble, for he gave it some detailed thought:

“Do the sum yourself:

Give yourself 50 years of life without one day of illness or rest, or altogether 18,262 days.

Rigorously take into account periods of sleep, meals, the obligations and pleasures of life and of your profession.

Estimate the time left to you for reading masterpieces with the sole purpose of finding out what precisely IS literature.

As I am extremely generous, I will grant you the privilege of reading every day – good ones as well as bad ones – one very beautiful book of all that are accessible to you in your own language and in the foreign languages you have mastered, in the original or in translation.

You know that it will take you more than one day to read “The Magic Mountain” or the “Arabian Nights”, but I also take into account that with a little bit of luck and zeal you might read in one day the “Hojoki”, the “Romancero gitano”, the “Menexenos” and “The Spirit of Conquest” by Benjamin Constant.

Above: Thomas Mann’s Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain)

Above: Benjamin Constant (1767 – 1830)

This will give you the couple of days extra you will need to read “And Quiet Flows the Don”.

Now, when measured against the total number of very beautiful books that exist in the world, what are 18,262 titles?

Sheer misery.“

Above: Russian edition of Quiet Flows the Don by Mikhail Sholokhov (1905 – 1984)

One wonders what Étiemble would have made of today’s rate of publication, which, leaving aside the hundreds of thousands of books published every year, sees around 51 million websites added to the Internet annually and 100,000 new tweets going live every minute.

The truth is that the volume of printed words in the world has always been unreadable by a single individual.

By 1500. a mere 50 years after Gutenberg’s first printing press rattled into life in Mainz, some 27,000 titles had been churned out across Europe – considerably more than even Étiemble’s proposed regime could allow getting through in a single lifetime.

With covering all bases definitively off the menu, some element of choice has to come into the equation, which creates a new dilemma:

Because if no individual can have read all the books in the world, how can anyone be in a position to say that one text is more deserving of attention than another?

Above: Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden zum Gutenberg (1400 – 1468)

The most powerful impression that anyone encountering Goethe’s comments on reading internationally is likely to take away is his impatience with national divisions and distinctions altogether.

Far from developing a concept of reading the world that might involve sampling literature from every country, Goethe was anxious to encourage his contemporaries to work towards “a common world literature transcending national limits“.

This, he thought, could be achieved by and could in turn promote exchanges between “the living, striving men of letters” of the age, such that they “should learn to know each other and through their own inclination and similarity of tastes, find the motive for corporate action“.

It was a conviction that stayed with him throughout his career spanning more than 73 years.

“I am more and more convinced that poetry is the universal possession of mankind, revealing itself everywhere and at all times in hundreds and hundreds of men.

I therefore like to look about me in foreign nations and advise everyone to do the same.

National literature is now a rather unmeaning term.

The epoch of world literature is at hand.

Everyone must strive to hasten its approach.“, Goethe said in the final years of his life.

Above: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

For me, world literature is whatever I can get my hands on, books that have reached me, books I have travelled to and have travelled with.

So, what is it that makes some stories cross national boundaries while others remain shut up in their local markets?

Some commentators have tried to maintain that quality is the key, that the litmus test for texts of any kind is whether they add value to the global community, in that it addresses and enriches all of humanity.

But when you look at which books actually do reach us, the idea that benefit to humanity should be the main criterion when it comes to assessing works from elsewhere is problematic.

Most of what we read does not fit unconditionally into that category of indisputable world greats.

There might be good books, indifferent books and even bad books in our literary diet.

There might be guilty pleasures and indulgences that we have no intention of expanding our souls or advancing world harmony by reading but we nonetheless enjoy all the same.

Indeed, it is estimated that 99.5% of all literature in non-canonical.

Above: Sistine Hall, Vatican Library

A man may protest against using popularity as a yardstick when it comes to defining great literature because the great majority of us are “lethargic, ignorant and of poor judgment“, the truth is that there are many things we want to read for reasons other than their objective excellence.

For better or worse, our imaginary worlds are made up of all manner of books.

Above: Scene from A Knight’s Tale (2001)

The other problem is that most writers don’t write with the aim of addressing the whole world – and if they do, they usually don’t succeed.

For most writers, an attempt to address everyone will usually result in reaching no one.

That which is written directly for the world will hardly be a work of art.

Indeed, it is often the specificity of a book that is the secret of its success.

For example, the beauty of Mongolian writer Galsan Tschinag’s The Blue Sky lies in the author’s ability to inhabit the thoughts of his protagonist, a young shepherd boy in the Altai Mountains and to thereby bring us into his hopes and dreams.

By feeling connected to and invested in Tschinag’s very distinctive creation, we can take the imaginative leap needed to recognise truths about the world, its capacity to connect the specific and the local with the universal.

Connection is the key here.

It is not enough for a book simply to go into the intricacies of a particular culture or situation in great detail.

In order to travel beyond its milieu, a book must have the ability to make its specificities meaningful and engaging to people with little knowledge of them, to “make one little room an everywhere“.

What makes books travel?

They speak at once to where they have come from and where they are going to.

They meld discovery and recognition – enlightening, flattering, challenging and comforting in varying degrees.

It is a stranger trying to communicate with another faraway stranger local truths and distinctions in a manner recognizable to the other.

Above: The bookmobile of the Ottawa Public Library, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

I stumble across books much in the manner of a blind man tripping over cobblestones.

I fall upon a writer’s work and embrace it as my own.

Books drive me to travel and travel drives me to books.

As I travel, I seek out works written by those who were once standing in the spot where I find myself.

For example, this past July, I travelled from Eskişehir to the Black Sea coast, visiting Zonguldak, Safronbolu, Amasra, Kastamonu, Sinop and Samsun.

Prior to packing my bags I read what I could of these places.

“He who would bring home the wealth of the Indies must carry the wealth of the Indies with him.

So it is with travel.

A man must carry knowledge with him if he would bring knowledge home.”

(Samuel Johnson)

Above: English writer Samuel Johnson (1709 – 1784)

One longs to see Alexandria after reading Lawrence Durrell.

Above: Lawrence Durrell’s The Alexandria Quartet

One promises oneself a trip to Spain after reading Don Quixote, Australia after Colleen McCullough’s The Thorn Birds, New England of Nathaniel Hawthorne, the Hawaii of James Michener.

Above: Flag of Spain

Above: Flag of Australia

Above: American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804 – 1864)

Above: Location of New England (in red) in the United States of America

I longed to visit Kars in winter (and I did last February) just because of my enjoyment of Orhan Pamuk’s Snow.

Above: Turkish edition of Orhan Pamuk’s Snow

Above: Kars, Türkiye

Some of the world’s best travel guides are Charles Dickens and Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway and Joseph Conrad, Robert Louis Stevenson and Pearl Buck, Somerset Maugham and Charles Darwin, Rudyard Kipling and Jack London, Herman Melville and John Steinbeck, just to name a few.

Above: English writer Charles Dickens (1812 – 1870)

Above: American writer Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) (1835 – 1910)

Above: American author Ernest Hemingway (1899 – 1961)

Above: Polish writer Joseph Conrad (né Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski)(1857 – 1924)

Above: Scottish novelist Robert Louis Stevenson (1850 – 1894)

Above: American writer Pearl Buck (1892 – 1973)

Above: English writer W. Somerset Maugham (1874 – 1965)

Above: English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809 – 1882)

Above: Indian-born English writer Rudyard Kipling (1865 – 1936)

Above: American writer John Chaney (aka Jack London) (1876 – 1916)

Above: American writer Herman Melville (1819 – 1891)

Above: American writer John Steinbeck (1902 – 1968)

My travels to the Black Sea were determined by time and money, but my choices were decided by my reading and research.

I learned that Zonguldak is more than its port and its coal, but is also famous for footballer Ergün Penbe, entertainer Murat Boz and entrepreneur Nilgün Efes.

Above: Zonguldak, Türkiye

Above: Turkish footballer Ergün Penbe

Above: Turkish singer Murat Boz

Above: Turkish entrepreneur Nilgun Efes

Safronbolu is more than Ottoman buildings and saffron trading, it was home to 17th century spiritualist Cinci Hoca – Think of an Ottoman Rasputin. – Grand Vizier Izzet Mehmet Pasha, sports writer and former wrestling association president Ali Gümüş, and film producer Türker İnanoğlu.

Above: Safronbolu, Türkiye

Above: Tomb of Izzet Mehmet Pasha (1743 – 1812), Safronbolu, Türkiye

Above: Turkish film producer Türker İnanoğlu

Above: Turkish journalist Ali Gümüş (1940 – 2015)

Amasra is more than its castle and coal.

Above: Amasra, Türkiye

It was mentioned (as Sesamus) by Homer is his Iliad and was administered by avid letter-writer the Roman Pliny the Younger.

Above: Bust of Greek author Homer (8th century BCE), British Museum, London, England

Above: Statue of Roman writer Pliny the Younger (61 – 113), Cathedral of Santa Maria Maggiore, Como, Italy

Kastamonu is more than Ottoman mansions, rose jam, hot sauce and lamb kebab.

Above: Kastamonu, Türkiye

It was visited by the Berber explorer Ibn Battuta (1304 – 1369) (who travelled more than any other explorer in pre-modern history, totalling around 117,000 km (73,000 mi), surpassing Zheng He’s 50,000 km / 31,000 miles and Marco Polo’s 24,000 km /15,000 miles), noting it as “one of the largest and finest cities, where commodities are abundant and prices low.”

He stayed 40 days.

Above: 1878 illustration by Léon Benett from Jules Verne’s book Discovery of the Earth showing Ibn Battuta (right) and his guide in Egypt

Above: Statue of Chinese explorer Zheng He (1371 – 1435), Stadthuys Museum, Malacca City, Malaysia

Above: Italian explorer Marco Polo (1254 – 1324) in Tartar costume

Türkiye’s Dress Code Revolution started on 23 August 1925, when Kemal Atatürk made his historical speech during his visit to Kastamonu.

Above: Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (1881 – 1938)

(Beginning in the fall of 1925, Atatürk encouraged the Turks to wear modern European attire.

He was determined to force the abandonment of the sartorial traditions of the Middle East and finalize a series of dress reforms, which were originally started by Mahmud II (1785 – 1839).

The fez was established by Sultan Mahmud II in 1826 as part of the Ottoman Empire’s modernization effort.

The Hat Law of 1925 introduced the use of Western-style hats instead of the fez.

Atatürk first made the hat compulsory for civil servants. 

The guidelines for the proper dressing of students and state employees were passed during his lifetime.

Many civil servants adopted the hat willingly.

In 1925, Atatürk wore a Panama hat during a public appearance in Kastamonu, one of the most conservative towns in Anatolia, to explain that the hat was the headgear of civilized nations.

The last part of reform on dress emphasized the need to wear modern Western suits with neckties as well as Fedora and Derby-style hats instead of antiquated religion-based clothing such as the veil and turban in the Law Relating to Prohibited Garments of 1934.

Even though he personally promoted modern dress for women, Atatürk never made specific reference to women’s clothing in the law, as he believed that women would adapt to the new clothing styles of their own free will.

He was frequently photographed on public business with his wife Latife Usakligil, who covered her head in accordance with Islamic tradition.

He was also frequently photographed on public business with women wearing modern Western clothes.

But it was Atatürk’s adopted daughters, Sabiha Gökçen and Afet Inan, who provided the real role model for the Turkish women of the future.

He wrote:

“The religious covering of women will not cause difficulty.

This simple style of head covering is not in conflict with the morals and manners of our society.”

Above: Atatürk with his Panama hat just after his Kastamonu speech in 1925

Ottoman poet Latifi (1491 – 1582) was born in Kastamonu and is known for his Memoir of the Poets (which narrated the life and work of around 300 poets of the period from 1421 until 1543) and Qualities of Istanbul (which gives a historical overview on the city of Istanbul, intertwined with geographical data, and information on the city’s neighborhoods, architecture, and social life).

Above: Illustration of Latifi

Greek musician Iovan Tsaous (1893 – 1942) was also born here and is particularly noted for the unique instruments he played, that were custom-built for him.

Above: Iovan Tsaous

Oğuz Atay (1934 – 1977) was born nearby in the town of İnebolu and is known as a pioneer of the modern novel in Turkey.

His first novel, The Disconnected, appeared in 1972.

Never reprinted in his lifetime and controversial among critics, it has become a best-seller since a new edition came out in 1984.

It has been described as “probably the most eminent novel of 20th century Turkish literature”.

I have been unable to obtain an English translation, but I nevertheless bought Tutunamayanlar in the original Turkish as its description intrigued me.

The book, rather than presenting a specific event, consists of impressions, associations, satires, details and spiritual analyses.

Learning that his friend Selim Işık committed suicide, the protagonist Turgut Özben tries to trace Selim’s past, whom he thinks he neglected, and to get to know him through people Selim knows. 

The image of Selim, who shows a different side to each person, will become clear to the reader and Turgut as a result of Turgut talking to these people. 

There are many people in the novel, but each of them is actually a person in Selim’s life and all the stories illuminate Selim Işık. 

Selim Işık is the symbol of the thinking and questioning person, and therefore he could not hold on to life and became disconnected, one of those who cannot hold on.

Above: Bust of Oğuz Atay, İnebolu, Türkiye

Sinop is more than just its harbour’s northernmost location on the Black Sea.

Above: Sinop, Türkiye

Named after the mythical Amazon Queen Sinope, she attracted the attention of Zeus who promised her anything she desired in return for her favours.

Her request was for eternal virginity.

Zeus uncharacteristically played the gentleman and complied.

Above: Sinope

Strabo mentioned Sinop and connected its mythical founder with the legendary Jason and the Argonauts.

Above: Greek geographer Strabo (64 BCE – 24 CE)

Above: Poster from the film Jason and the Argonauts (1963)

Julius Caesar established a colony here.

Above: Bust of Julius Caesar (100 – 44 BCE), Archaeological Museum, Torino, Italy

One of the Roman Republic’s fiercest opponents Mithridates VI Eupator was born here.

Above: Bust of Mithridates VI (135 – 63 BCE), Louvre Museum, Paris, France

It was also the birthplace of Diogenes and Diphilus and Marcion.

Above: Greek philosopher Diogenes (in the barrel) (412 – 323 BCE)

Above: Bust of Greek poet Diphilus (342 – 291 BCE)

Above: Illustration of Christian heretic Marcion of Sinope (85 – 160)

Marcion preached that God had sent Jesus Christ, an entirely new alien god, distinct from the vengeful God of Israel who had created the world.

Ibn Battuta visited the city and stayed for 40 days.

He noted it was “a superb city which combines fortification with beautification“.

Above: Sinop, Türkiye

In November 1853, at the start of the Crimean War (1853 – 1856), in the Battle of Sinop, the Russians, under the command of Admiral Nakhimov, destroyed an Ottoman frigate squadron in Sinop, leading Britain and France to declare war on Russia.

Above: Battle of Sinop, 30 November 1853

Sinop hosted a US military radar station that was important for intelligence during the Cold War era.

Ayancik Base was closed in 1992.

Above: Ayancik Radar Station

The list of Sinop’s noteworthy people is long, so I will name only one more.

Among the poets who can be called the last generation of syllabic poetry, Ahmet Muhip Dıranas (1909 – 1980) was a poet who was closest to contemporary Western poetry (Baudelaire, Verlaine) and still has a long-lasting influence on poets a couple of generations after him, even with his small number of poems. 

He wrote little, published sparsely, and published his poems into a book almost fifty years after he started poetry (1974).  

He wrote unforgettable poems with an unconventional pattern of sayings, keeping within the limits of syllabic meter, but changing the places of stop and emphasis, which catches the modernity in tradition.

His writing has high therapeutic (associative) power, for Diranas was at peace with his homeland, people and nature. 

In his poems, love, nature, death, memories are given in a shallow and thought-provoking way.

His Fahriye Abla (Sister Fahriye) poem is one of the most famous poems of Turkish literature, showing the feelings of an adolescent boy towards Fahriye, the beautiful and beloved daughter of the older neighbor, told with details from the neighborhood and Fahriye’s life.

Samsun is more than simply the place where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk began the Turkish War of Independence in 1919.

It is more than its port and its shipbuilding, more than its alleged illegal exporting of Ukrainian coal to Russia, more than its medical devices, furniture, tobacco products, chemicals, automobile spare parts and flour mills.

Above: Images of Samsun, Türkiye

Samsun has as well a long list of notable people who were either born here and/or made their homes here.

I will mention only three names:

A.I. Bezzerides (1908 – 2007), born in Samsun, was an American novelist and screenwriter, best known for writing films noir and action motion pictures, especially several of Warner Brothers’ “social conscience” films of the 1940s.

Above: Albert Isaac “Buzz” Bezzerides

Abdülkadir “Demirkan” Pirhasan (1919 – 2016), known by his pen name as Vedat Türkali, was a Turkish screenwriter, novelist, playwright, intellectual and teacher.

Türkali wrote more than 40 screenplays, four theatre plays and eight novels throughout his career since 1958. 

His novels are prominent literary works in modern Turkish literature.

He is often recognized one of the greatest writers in the history of Turkish literature.

He was detained 51 times over his controversial writings and political movements.

Türkali primarily wrote about different aspects of issues, ethnic and minority groups, including Hamidives, Armenians, Kurds, social issues, Turkish politics and literature.

He covered the Armenian Genocide in his writings, making him the first novelist in the history of Turkish literature who wrote about the conflicts involving Armenians and Turkish.

Above: Vedat Türkali

Xenophon Akoglou (1895 – 1961), born in Samsun, was a Greek folklore writer, known as well by his nickname Xenos Xenitas.

Above: Xenophon Akoglou

The point of my digression from Heidi‘s wild motorcycle ride down the coast of Vietnam to my discoveries along the shore of Türkiye’s Black Sea is to illustrate that a little reading and research brings life to the places which seem to be merely names on a map or fast fading blurs as we speed past them.

A little examination of our own lives creates the need to express ourselves.

I am, at best, a traveller.

Above: Your humble blogger

Heidi is, at present, a travelling student.

Wherein I hone my talents as a wordsmith, Heidi is a musician, studying music in Zürich as I type these words.

As she reads these words, as my poetic friend (aforementioned at the start of this post) reads these words, it is my hope that they construct their lives according to their needs to express themselves: my friend through words, Heidi through her music.

They need to observe nature, both wild and human.

Take refuge and comfort in life.

Seek out the joy, the richness, the incomparable greatness.

View your memories as both blessings and lessons.

What does this day have to teach me?

What does this place have to teach me?

And this above all else:

Live long and prosper.

Above: American actor Leonard Nimoy (1931 – 2015) as Spock, Star Trek (1966 – 1969)

I do not know what my poetic friend will do next.

I do know that Heidi and her travelling companion carried on that day to Hué, which is deserving of a blogpost of its own.

Heidi would then continue travelling down the coast of Vietnam until…..

Well, that is another story for another time.

Suffice to say, that unbeknownst to her the places she sped by were filled with stories and inspiration for many a tune just waiting to be expressed.

It is my wish that she sees the magic of her memories and the beauty of the two Swiss cities wherein she presently lives.

I am optimistic, for I know that this magic and beauty are also part of her.

Sources: Wikipedia / Google / Rough Guide to Vietnam / Steve Biddulph, Manhood / Ann Morgan, Reading the World / Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet / Esther Vilar, The Manipulated Man / Louise Purwin Zobel, The Travel Writer’s Handbook