A Vietnamese Family Chronicle

by Nguyen Trieu Dan

  Sorties by French troops had moved closer and closer to Kim Bai. Vil-lagers had had a few false alarms, but that morning they knew that it was going to be the real thing. Not only was there the sound of gunfire, they could also hear the creaky noise of tank tracks. People from upper areas ran past, telling us that French tanks were destroying the obstacles erected on the highway and the dike, about five kilometers from our village. Hurriedly, we grabbed our bags and fled across the dike to the Lichee Field. There, the trees offered good cover and the absence of the motorable roads would, we hoped, deter the French from venturing in. My father, as president of the evacuation committee, stayed back to make sure that all villagers were warned to leave. My elder brother, uncle and some other committee members stayed with him. When it was their turn to leave, it was too late. The French had broken through the obstacles and their armored trucks were racing towards Kim Bai, both on the highway and the dike, taking our village in a pincer movement. My father’s group first tried to cross the dike; they could not. They turned back and fled in the direction of the highway. There, they were caught. Strangely enough, the French never went into the village on that operation, so my father and his group would have been safe by just staying back inside Kim Bai’s bamboo enclosure. In that cold day of spring, my uncle-the one of my age-was wearing an old heavy coat which years ago my father had used when going duck shooting. By a piece of bad luck, inside a pocket was an old cartridge shell. On searching him and finding the shell, the French took him for a guerrilla fighter. Immediately, they ordered him to be shot. My father, who studied in France in his youth, pleaded with the French lieutenant for his brother’s life. He asked him to look closely at the shell; if it was fired recently there must be the smell of gunpowder. The officer checked and agreed that it was fired long ago. That detachment of troops was men from metropolitan France, who did not behave as harshly towards the population as did the colonial troops. My uncle’s life was saved. But all in the group were told to follow the troops and carry their ammunition. My father asked whether my uncle could be allowed to go home, as my grandparents were old and needed help. Again the good lieutenant agreed and my uncle was released. Later on, my father told me that in that evening, he and my brother were put in a truck and driven to Hanoi. On the way, he suddenly remembered having in his pocket a paper mentioning that he was president of Kim Bai’s evacuation committee. If the French found out, he would be taken as a communist. Quietly, he rolled it into a ball and slipped it into his mouth. All went well until a French soldier in the truck asked what he was chewing. Mumbling a reply, he swallowed.

  A month or so after that operation, the French came back. This time, they were colonial troops and went into Kim Bai, pillaging it. Our ancestral home was ransacked. From then on, Kim Bai was at their mercy. They re-turned at intervals to plunder and terrorize. During the day, the village was abandoned. The villagers took refuge in the nearby Lichee Field. Those who had to still, went out to work in the fields, ready however to flee at any moment. Only at night would some people get back to the village to look after their houses. A few months before, Kim Bai had been a hive of activity. Now the people, their buffaloes, cows, pigs and domestic fowl were all gone. There were afternoons in summer when I walked into the village. The sun was shining and everything was looking bright. Yet, I found all paths deserted, all houses empty. No barking dog greeted my passage. The impression was a scary one; it was as if something had happened to take away all living things and only an empty shell of a village was left.

  Grandfather was evacuated to the neighboring village of Sao, on the other side of the Hat River. The family followed him. During the last months of his life, we remained gathered around him. But after he died, we began to disperse. It had become too dangerous to stay in our region. “I will remain in Kim Bai to look after his grave and light incense on it,” grandmother said. “But all of you will have to go, for your security and to build your lives.” Some of my uncles and aunts left for the western highlands, farther away from the front line. My family returned to Sao, to wait for news from my father. Daily, it came under increased surveillance from the communist authorities. We knew that every night spies were posted outside the cottage where we lived to try and overhear any secret conversation that we may have, and which would show that we were in contact with my father in Hanoi. My trips to the far markets to buy latinia leaves for making conical hats were suspect. More and more, I became aware of being followed. One day, just going back to my village from Sao, I crossed an open field and took a fancy on following a zigzag way on the edges of rice fields instead of a more direct route. The next day, a friendly source told me that the spy who was tailing me reported that I was trying to shake him off. It was also alleged that every morning I was making signals to French planes, when in fact I was doing my daily calisthenics at the back garden. The signs were unmistakable. They were preparing to arrest me. I was then seventeen.

  Luckily, we finally heard from my father. The situation in Hanoi had settled and he told us to join him there. The problem was to find a guide whom we could trust, and not to arouse the suspicion of the communists while we made preparations to leave. To them, my mother was bringing her children back to her own village, since Kim Bai was not safe anymore. My great-uncle, the former mayor, recently released by the communists, con-tacted an eastern medicine man who had made several trips to Ha Dong, across the zone of fighting. A fellow villager and member of the old scholar class, he was totally reliable. He would take us with him on his next trip. At Ha Dong, we would be met by my brother. All was arranged. We were only to wait for a signal from him.

  The guide’s signal came as the lunar year was drawing to a close. We took leave of our hosts in Sao and returned to Kim Bai. With our belongings now reduced to a bag for each person, we crossed the Hat River for the last time. It was a few days before the Tet festival. The mighty river at monsoon time was a peaceful stream running at the edge of a white sand beach. We all forded it, including the youngest ones, for water only came up to our knees. I felt sad to leave the river and its adjoining Lichee Field. As I walked away, images came flooding to my mind. The Field covered in mist, with shapes and colors indistinct, like the delicate shadings of an oil painting. A fine layer of steam rising above the water, warm from the sunshine of the day before, as a cold drizzle came down in the early morning. Autumn was a most beautiful season, perhaps never more so than in evenings when the moon was full and had risen high in the sky. Then the white sand of the beach acquired an unreal brightness and the dark shadows cast by trees were so sharply defined that they looked like being printed over. I was very fond of poetry and was reading all that I could lay my hands on of the “new school” of poets who made their marks in the thirties and forties. From the lyricism of Tan Da and The Lu to the romantism of Xuan Dieu and Huy Can, and the mysticism of Han Mac Tu, that was a flourishing period of Vietnamese poetry. Xuan Dieu, in particular, was the poet of my youth and many of his poems were copied in my schoolboy note book.

  A virginal mist floated in the air trying to follow the moon... The sound of a two-stringed violin increased my loneliness, It brought no tears, but a feeling of passing sadness.

  These verses by Xuan Dieu, every time that I read them, brought back to my memory the image of the Hat River under the autumn moon, so calm and peaceful as to make one forget about war and its misery. I could hear the faint sound of a flute coming from somewhere around the bend of the river, smell the fragrance of ripening paddy, of corn, sugar cane, all the fruit in the Field and feel an inexplicable sadness before the magic beauty of an autumn night. Even as war spread over our native region, that area of the Hat River remained untouched. French troops moved along the dike only a few hundreds meters away, but they never ventured into the Field, still less to the other side of the river. Therefore, once in sight of the Hat, fleeing refugees could slow down their steps. A safe zone had been reached. For them, the river became a symbol of security.

  The Tet of 1948 was an
austere affair as it followed my grandfather’s death and because the war front was so near our village. Several family members had already left our region. Those who remained gathered in the ancestral home for the Tet and to say good-bye to us. We all knew this might be the last get-together for a very long time. In the new year the family would be further dispersed. Some people would, like us, try to reach Hanoi. Others planned to remain in the communist zone and to seek refuge farther into the foothills. As the war dragged on, the future appeared totally uncertain. It was a strange festival. No special food was prepared as offerings to the ancestor’s altar except for a few traditional chung cakes. Among fellow villagers, no visits were received or made to exchange the season’s greetings. There was no card playing and no gambling. Of course, firecrackers were not allowed in the war situation. Even the rite of sweeping the ancestors’ graves was observed by few because of the risk of going out into the open fields and being spotted by French planes.

  The guide had sent word that we would be leaving very soon after the festival. I thought that he would take advantage of the lull in the fighting which occurred around the Tet. But days went by without news from him. Already, it was the tenth of the month. Communist cadres came to enquire as to when our party was going to leave for my mother’s village. Had they found out about our plan to escape? My mother was terrified at the thought that they may arrest me before the family could leave. Indeed, the longer the delay the greater the risk that we might run into a hitch. If the French launched an operation in our area, we would be dispersed and everything must be reorganized before we could try again. That evening however, my great-uncle came to tell us that the date was fixed for the thirteenth. “Everything was fine,” he assured us. “The communists knew nothing of our plan.” From our village to the town of Ha Dong, the distance was only fifteen kilometers. But the front line had to be crossed and to do so, our party would have to avoid the open fields as much as possible. We would have to skirt villages and take a roundabout route. That way, the guide ex-pected that by leaving at dawn we would be in Ha Dong by mid-afternoon. Once in Ha Dong we would be safe and the next day could go on to Hanoi.

  On the eve of our departure, my uncle took leave from his school to come and stay the day with us in Kim Bai. Until then, I had kept the two copies of our family chronicle written in the Chinese script, one by my grandfather and the other by Licentiate Duong. Now that I was leaving, we decided that he was to take one copy to his school, which was located in a still safe area held by the communists, and I was to bring the other copy to Hanoi. I wished to keep grandfather’s calligraphy. I believed that my uncle did so too, but before I could say anything, he told me that grandfather’s copy should be in my keeping. “You were his student,” he gave as a reason, referring to the fact that for several years I had learned Chinese script and the classics from my grandfather.

  That afternoon we presented offerings to our ancestors. We prayed for their blessings and their protection to make my family’s journey a safe one. All cult instruments in metal and porcelain, including the big gong and all the ceremonial swords, had been buried in the hope that they would be spared by the hostilities. The big pair of elephant tusks in front of the altar had likewise gone underground. The altar room looked bare and already had an abandoned appearance.

  Dinner was taken early to allow my uncle to go back to his school. All day, while busy sorting things and packing up for the trip, we did not get around to asking the question that was uppermost in our minds. When were we to meet again? My parents had made their decision; my family was going to Hanoi. What about him? Was he going to stay in the communist zone, or join us one day? It was only as I saw him off at the village gate, when the two of us were alone, that we finally touched on that subject. He said that as long as my grandmother and great-grandmother remained in Kim Bai, he would stay close to them. After a pause, he added: “The French have committed many atrocities. In time I may join the army to fight them.” An expression of anger passed through his eyes. Indeed, French soldiery had descended several times on our village and sacked our ancestral home. Members of our family had suffered under their hands. I watched his bicycle zigzag down the highway, going round numerous trenches dug to prevent its use by French motorized troops, until he disappeared behind the next village. We have not met since.

  After saying good-bye to my uncle, I proceeded to the family tomb to pay a last visit to grandfather’s grave. It had been four months since he died. The soil looked still new, although grass had grown evenly over the grave. For a long time I sat there. Since he died, I had the impression of being nearer to him and understanding him better. If he were still here to teach me the classics, as in those stable and peaceful summers of yesteryears, there would have been so many questions that I could have asked, so many matters that I could have raised with him. Winter that year was cold and miserable. Grey clouds filled the sky. In the fields all around the tomb, the barren land looked poor and forsaken. My mind turned to harvest times of not so long ago, when the countryside turned into a golden sea of ripening paddy, swinging like waves in the wind, and the air was filled with the sweet scent of the new crop. I remembered the festival-like atmosphere in the fields after the monsoon had broken out, with crowds of villagers busily working the soil to prepare for a new season.

  Across the highway, the market of Kim Bai was reduced to a few standing walls. All the roofs had been pulled down. There were no more market meets. The stalls that had sprouted up a year ago had disappeared. As evening approached, I could see one or two lamps lit up. Those few shops that remained open, what could they still sell and to whom? Leaving the tomb, I went along the highway and turned into the brick path leading to the village gate. How many times had I walked on that path, dragging my wooden clogs to make a deafening noise. But now I silently made my way along the tall and proud bamboo enclosure, under the Si gate with its familiar assembly of ghosts, past cottages, ponds and gardens, before coming to the long and straight brick wall of our family compound. As I walked, I tried to etch into my memory all the familiar sights. The new house in our compound had been partially destroyed by order of the authorities while all the other houses were more or less empty not only of occupants but also of furniture. The air of animation and prosperity in grandfather’s time had vanished, to be replaced instead by sadness and desolation. Many family members had gone from the ancestral home. Tomorrow was going to be my family’s turn. After tomorrow, only two old women would remain in the large compound.

  Instead of turning into our gate, I kept on following the narrow path that ran between the Communal Hall and the Nguyen Ancestral Shrine. It led to the old market and from there to the dike. I wanted to climb on its top to once more look towards the beloved Lichee Field and the purple mountains in the horizon where, so we were told, our Viet race had origi-nated. But winter evening spread its veil quickly. All of a sudden, it was dark and I had to trace my steps back to go home.

  At dawn tomorrow we would depart. How to avoid communist patrols who were trying to stop people from getting to Ha Dong? How to reach the no man’s land of the front line early enough so that French troops had not started their daily operations? And yet not too early, because we could be taken for communist troops and fired upon? How to make the trip a suc-cessful one, so that my family could be reunited. My head was full of problems and of plans to deal with contingencies.

  That night may be the last spent on the soil of my forebears. But in the optimism of my youth, I refused to think about it. I was confident of going back one day, like my ancestors four centuries ago. Others in the family must have had the same thoughts, but as is always the case with us, we talked about other things and not about what was the innermost of our feelings. When would we see our native place again? When would we be reunited with grandmother? Those who were leaving and those who were staying, no one raised these subjects and so the thoughts of each of us remained silent and secret like prayers. It was the last night and yet, I do not recall fe
eling the pains of separation, only a feverish expectation to meet the challenge ahead. That night, I wished that dawn would soon break so that we could finally set out on our journey.

  Chronological Table

  Important dates in Vietnamese history with corresponding generations of the Nguyen family in italics.

  Legendary Hong Bang dynasty (2879-258 B.C.). Thuc dynasty (257-207 B.C.). Trieu dynasty (207-111 B.C.). Millennium of Chinese domination (111 B.C.-A.D. 939). Queen Trung (A.D. 40-43). Independence wrested from the Chinese (939). Ngo dynasty (939-965). Dinh dynasty (968-980). Earlier Le dynasty (980-1009) our ancestors then had the name of Le (?); our village was already called Kim Bai. Ly dynasty (1010-1225). Tran dynasty (1225-1400) Mongol invasions defeated. Ho dynasty (1400-1407). Later Tran dynasty (1407-1413). Ming domination (1414-1427). Liberation and Le dynasty (1428-1527). Great King Le Thanh Ton (1460-1497). Mac dynasty (1527-1592) first generation-Nguyen Tue, Count of Hung Giao, minister under the Mac; wife not known. Country divided between the Northern and Southern courts second generation-Nguyen Uyen, academician and Mac envoy; second wife, the Phung lady / third generation-Nguyen Hoang, rallied to the Le, deputy minister; wife, Trinh Khiet. Restored Le dynasty (1592-1788). Rule of the Trinh overlords fourth generation-Phuc Thien, opposed the Trinh, banished (?); wife, My Hanh. Country divided between the Trinh and the Nguyen fifth and sixth generations-Recluse scholars and Zen followers. Expansion towards the south completed seventh, eighth and ninth generations-village teachers, impoverished scholars. Tay Son dynasty (1788-1802) Victory over the Chinese. Nguyen dynasty (1802-1945) Reunification of the country tenth generation-Nguyen Quang So, the businessman; wife, Tu Thuan / eleventh generation-Nguyen Dinh Dat, the Hermit of the Mountain of the Twins; wife, Chu Thi Uyen. French conquest (1858-1883). French rule (1883-1945) twelfth generation-Nguyen Ba Tiep, the governor; wife, Dang Thi Duyet. Communist revolution 1945. First Indochina war started 1946.