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very different meanings depending on the time in our nation’s history.
The Nguyễn and Trịnh lords, under the pretext of serving the Lê Dynasty (1533–1788), split the country into two by waging a war, which lasted two centuries (from 1570 to 1786, among many dates used). The demarcation line was the Gianh River in Quảng Bình Province, north of Huế. Foreigners—in particular Portuguese and Dutch traders—called the northern part of Việt Nam “Tonkin” and the southern part, “Cochin China.” Quang Trung (a.k.a. Nguyễn Huệ, life: 1753–1792; reign: 1788–1792) re-unified the country.
But then the French conquered Việt Nam in the mid-1800s. During colonial reign (1884–1945), France divided Việt Nam into three parts—the Northern Region, which the French called Tonkin (Bắc Kỳ); the Central Region, called Annam (Trung Kỳ); and the Southern Region, called Cochin China (Nam Kỳ). The French ruled Tonkin and Annam as protectorates and administered Cochin China as a colony. On September 2, 1945, Hồ Chí Minh proclaimed the independent Democratic Republic of Việt Nam (DRVN) and reunified the country. After nine years of war, the Geneva Conference ended the First Indochina War Against France and divided Việt Nam into North Việt Nam and South Việt Nam at the 17th parallel. This division lasted two more decades (1954–1975) during the Second Indochina War Against the United States.
Thus, the border between the North and the South changed three times, with the Center sometimes in play. In each case, the words “North” and “South” are capitalized, since they refer to distinct regimes. After 1975, there has been only one regime, one country, with formal re-unification on July 2, 1976. This is a little complicated, but lower case for “north,” “center,” and “south” and variations of those words should be used after April 30, 1975 and for periods before French colonialism except from 1570 to 1786 (the War of the Trịnh-Nguyễn Lords during the Lê Dynasty).
At present, when speaking of “the people of the south” in reunified Việt Nam, we think of the inhabitants of the Mekong Delta. Although their mentality is different from the mentality of Vietnamese in other areas, it is by no means secessionist. The French colonialists failed to realize this when they attempted to create the autonomous Republic of Cochin China in 1946. The US military made the same mistake during the American War when trying to sever the Hồ Chí Minh Trail, which connected North Việt Nam and South Việt Nam.
One cannot deny the different mentalities of our northern and southern people. In Europe, Nordics are generally less easy to approach and less talkative than Mediterranean peoples. The same might be said traditionally of northerners and southerners on the US East Coast. In a way, the same also applies to Việt Nam. But in Việt Nam, explanations should be sought by carefully considering history. The ethnic Việt were wet-rice farmers, who created an original cultural identity in the Red River Delta during the first millennium BCE. After freeing themselves in 938 CE from a thousand years of Chinese domination, the Việt began advancing southward, reaching the Mekong Delta during the 1600s.
The Mekong Delta’s first Việt settlers—famished peasants, peasant-soldiers, adventurers, and banished criminals—cleared virgin land. They did not experience the hard work and chronic deprivation of northern farmers plagued by scarce land and frequent natural calamities, such as typhoons and floods. The villages built by the Việt who moved southward were not, as in the north, isolated communities surrounded by bamboo hedges and burdened by age-old Confucian customs, rites, and taboos. New religions, such as Cao Đài and Hòa Hảo, which were unknown in northern Việt Nam, attracted millions of followers. No distinction was made between guest and host villagers.
The Việt lived in harmony with the region’s other ethnic groups, such as the Chăm, Khmer, Mạ, Xtiêng, and Chinese. There were enough resources for all. The Chinese, many of whom were political refugees, engaged in a thriving trade. Direct French colonial rule and, later, the capitalist economy under American sway reinforced the psychology of the “people of the former South,” some traits of which call to mind the American frontier spirit.
On Naming a Child
My first daughter-in-law, Lan, glows with happiness. She has just given birth to a baby girl; her nine-year-old is a boy. One boy, one girl—both “glutinous and ordinary rice,” as the saying goes—is the dream of Vietnamese couples after the family-planning limit of two children. My other two daughters-in-law have two daughters each. Having a male descendant is still the wish of all couples, although the custom decreeing that only a male descendant can perpetuate ancestral worship is waning.
While all our family was busy looking after Lan and the baby, it fell to me as paternal grandfather to choose a name for my new granddaughter. This rather pleasing spiritual exercise brought a challenge in poetic logic. Since my daughter-in-law’s name is Lan (Orchid), what system should I use to choose her daughter’s name? I could select an ideogram from a classical verse, a moral maxim, or an old adage containing the word “lan” to accompany my choice as an adjective. Or I could choose the name of a plant or flower, since “orchid” is both. Or I could opt for the name of one of the more than 10,000 orchid varieties!
In the end, a name—“Cúc Hoa” (Chrysanthemum Flower)—flashed through my mind from a treasury of childhood memories. Cúc Hoa is the heroine in a folk tale written in verse with ideographic Vietnamese ideograms (Nôm) during the 1700s. The story is set in China during the early first millennium. I remember being moved to tears when, at age eight or nine, I saw a chèo (popular opera), Phạm Công and Cúc Hoa (Phạm Công Cúc Hoa), based on this tale. In a particularly moving scene, two children find solace in the arms of their mother, Cúc Hoa, who returns from the Other World to protect them.
Here, in a few lines, is the story:
Phạm Công was very young when he lost his impoverished woodcutter father and had to beg in the market to support his mother. A kind-hearted scholar looked after his education. A fellow student named Cúc Hoa fell in love with Phạm Công and, with her parents’ agreement, married him. However, the couple faced hard times. Cúc Hoa was expecting a baby, yet they owned nothing. Phạm Công presented himself for the royal examinations. He earned the first laureate degree and the offer of marriage to the Ngụy king’s daughter. When Phạm Công declined the marriage offer, the Ngụy king banished him to the Hán Kingdom.
There, Phạm Công was again honored with the first laureate title and a marriage offer to the Hán princess. When Phạm Công refused this marriage, the Hán king ordered the young scholar’s hands severed, his eyes gouged, and his teeth pulled. The Emperor of Heaven punished the tyrant king and restored the victimized scholar’s health. On his way home, Phạm Công passed through the Triệu Kingdom. This king also honored him with the first laureate title and a royal bride, but Phạm Công managed to escape and was reunited with Cúc Hoa. The couple had a daughter in addition to their elder child, a son.
Alas, Cúc Hoa fell ill and died as foreign troops invaded. Phạm Công, who was an army commander, set off to fight the enemy, carrying his wife’s coffin on his back. When the campaign ended in victory, Phạm Công took a second wife, Tào Thị, hoping she would tend to the two children. Three years later, Phạm Công became governor of Việt Nam’s Cao Bằng Province. In his absence, Tào Thị took a lover and turned Phạm Công’s two children out of the house. Cúc Hoa, by then in the Land of Shades, was broken-hearted. She returned to the World of Mortals to comfort her children. Before going back to the Land of Shades, she wrote letters deploring her children’s fate and sewed the letters into her children’s clothes. On his return, Phạm Công learned the truth and repudiated Tào Thị, who subsequently died from a lightning strike. He went to the Other World to search for Cúc Hoa. The couple’s sorrow so moved the King of Darkness that he allowed Phạm Công to take Cúc Hoa back to the World of Mortals. At last, the couple knew happiness.
My choosing “Cúc Hoa” also has another reason. A line in The Tale of Kiều (Truyện Kiều), the masterpiece by Nguyễn Du (1766–1820), matches “chrysanthemum” (“cúc”) with “orchid” (“lan”):
Spring’s