June (p.2)
6/19/23
After reading my reference to Vietnam being the land of the "Ascending Dragon", one of my Vietnamese friends (Hà), shared a Vietnamese origin story with me. I'm pretty sure you won't find this story on internet travel blogs written by people traveling through Vietnam on their "gap year", and I'm 100% certain you won't hear it on those five-minute You'all Tube video clips where video bloggers boldly proclaim only they have the real inside scoop on the best street food to be found in Hanoi, HCMC, or Da Nang".
In a very condensed retelling I give you:
"Con rồng cháu tiên" - Child of the Dragon, Grandchild of the Fairy (or the First Dragon Children)
A long time ago, there were two sons of a great God. One son ruled over all the people who lived above the Yangtze River in the north (in China) and the other ruled over all the people living below the Yangtze river in the south. The son living below the Yangtze River fell in love with a Fairy, they got married, and they had a son, who was a Dragon. The Dragon grew up. One day, he met a Bird and they fell in love and got married. The Bird laid 100 eggs, and the first egg hatched was a man. That man grew up and became the first King of Việtnam. In the ancient Vietnamese language, "Việt" refers to "descendants of a dragon" and "nam" means "southern lands/territory". So...Việt Nam means "descendants of the dragon living in the south".
6/20/23
So...today I counted the steps from my apartment building entrance to the coffee shop where I am becoming a regular. Get this...it takes 48 steps to to get from my apartment to the coffee shop. That's less steps than it takes to get from my office on the fourth floor of the College of Education to the Dean's office on the second floor! And, sadly, I can't get a cup of coffee there.
It's been raining most afternoons since I got here. Real gully washers.