Full Moon night, the best moment of the moon in a single year

The festival is celebrated at the 15th day of the 8th month in Lunar calendar, the day that the moon is the most beautiful in a single year. In the day, families will hold a small party with the hightlight is Moon cake, the indispensable dish in the table for Full Moon. Children will be given a tables full of sweets and fruits for “Pha Co”, literally means ruin the table of food but actually, it’s a pretty tradition. In the past, the country was very poor so children hardly had so much sweets, only at Full Moon day, a group of families living near one another would share the cost to buy their kids a table of sweets and fruits so they have a small party. The food was well decorated at first, then when adults allowed, the kids would eat them together, that’s called Pha co.

Little party for children in full moon festival

Besides, there are many stories and folklore weave their way through Vietnam’s Full Moon day. One of the best-loved legends relates to a man named Cuoi. The story said that Cuoi was lucky to find a magical sacred banyan tree in forest that could cure even the dead. Thanks to its, he cured many people in the village and successfully cured the daughter of a rich man in his village and he approved 2 young people’s marriage. However, after reviving, the lady memory went bad. One day Cuoi was away from home, his wife forgot that the tree could only be water with clean water and used urine instead. The tree felt offended and flew into the sky, right at that time Cuoi reached home and immediatedly hang on to the tree in a hope that he could drag it back to the earth. Unfortunately, the tree dragged him to the sky and kept flying until it reach the moon and he was eventually stuck there. Since this incidence, Vietnamese people claim they see a man resting under the tree in a full moon. Nowadays in Vietnam Tet Trung Thu commonly known as the Children’s Festival sees, on the night of its full moon, children parading with lanterns to help Cuoi find a lighted path back to his home.

Lantern parade in Full Moon festival

Coming to the famous street of Hang Ma in Hanoi, the place for selling paper version of most necessary items in daily life to send to the dead people in “the other world” by burning them you’ll find the Full moon festival is quite colorful.

Hang Ma street is full of people

Around 1 week before the festival, the street is usually full of people, most of them are the young hanging out for shopping little lovely things sold here and taking colorful pictures and children with their parents to shop for toys and lanterns. The entire street is full or colorful light from lanterns hanging everywhere in many shapes: stars, fish, lotus flowers, mini pagodas, rabbits (the latter represents the Jade Rabbit who also lives in the moon).

Lanterns are all the ways

Under the moonlight, children, hiding behind papier-mache masks, parade the streets, singing songs while carrying brightly lit lanterns. Lion and Unicorn dancers perform; mooncakes are eagerly devoured while other traditional foods are enjoyed. Every area in Vietnam comes alive at this time of year but Hang Ma Street remains the brightest star, leading the colorful traditions and festivities year after year.

Lion dance in the festival

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Every year, there’re tons of visitors coming to Hanoi to admire its pretty landscapes, explore its culture values and taste its food, so obviously traffic is totally not a reason for their visit. But somehow, traffic, as a part of daily life, makes itself a little highlight in the overall picture of Hanoi either in possitive or negative way.

Hanoi-a crowded city

For years, there’ve been so many visitors on their way to explore the city of Hanoi, suddenly stop by the entrance of a drink bar or restaurant for a short rest order a seat having the view towards the street for nothing but observing how the local drive. It’s a quite funny fact that the traffic in Vietnam in general and in Hanoi in particular could impress the guests from far away. But, if you, as a stranger in this amazing country, try looking at the ways local people control their vehicles on a street, you might feel the same way.

Traffic at the old quarter

Negatively, the traffic in Hanoi is a really chaos, vehicles run all the ways on the street and look as if they were running irregularly, some time didn’t care about signals from traffic lights and might crash into each other any time, but they doesn’t in fact. The crazy machines on streets somehow manage to be right on their track without causing any accident. However, just observing the traffic is still a pleasant experience, but as a tourist, you obviously must on the move to every corner of Hanoi to explore it and this is a very interesting part.

Crazy traffic at a cross-road

There’re some foreign visitors had to utter that they were just too scared of crossing a street as they always felt as if the vehicles were about to crash into them. However, sooner or later, visitors have to get used to with the ways things operates. And, eventually there’s now a common known by expats in Vietnam for street crossing, which says “Don’t look back or step back, keep moving forward and vehicles will find a way to avoid you themselves”. This sounds silly but it is in fact so true, people on vehicles doesn’t look caring about what is going on the street but they do and they know very well how to avoid obstacles so once you get off the street, keep walking ahead and nothing bad happens as once you step back, people usually lose track of your moving orbit and might not have enough time to respond to the change.

Don’t step back and you’ll cross the street successfully

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Hoa Sua-the symbol of the autumn in Hanoi

Hoa Sua is not so colorful as peach blossom, phoenix flowers or daisies, it’s not so as noble as rose or orchid. It has a simple and rustic beauty. Tiny white and green flowers stand on the green leaves, spread their magic scent in the wind. On the ground, countless of tiny flowers make a flower carpet.

Hoa Sua bloom on a street in Hanoi

In the autumn, on the streets that lots of Hoa Sua are planted as Quang Trung, Nguyen Du, Quan Thanh, Thuy Khue or Thanh Nien, the scent of Hoa Sua wake up all human’s senses. The white color of Hoa Sua blooming under the tender sun and its scent make the little Hanoi more romantic and poetic in the autumn. The scent of Hoa Sua has printed an impression in the mind of Hanoians and many tourists who once witness the autumn of Hanoi.

The rustic flowers have inspired the masterpieces of many composers and poets

Hoa Sua, the symbol of Hanoi’s autumn has become and endless inspiration for many artists to create their masterpieces, the most famous one should be mentioned is “Miss Hanoi’s autumn” by Trinh Cong Son, a beloved composer in Vietnam, whose music has its own name that is called Trinh music. The special thing is that Hoa Sua is not planted only in Hanoi but for Vietnamese people, Hoa Sua always reminds them of Hanoi with scented streets of Hoa Sua, the crisp nights of Hanoi’s autumn.

Hoa Sua quietly show their scent at a lightly cold night in the autumn of Han

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Dancing peacock-symbolize the noble and help to prevent devils

With the consent of the Prime Minister, the Ministry of Culture, in collaboration with the Provincial People’s Committee of Bắc Ninh and the specialized agencies conducting research, have set records for Đông Hồ folk paintings to be submitted to UNESCO for the recognition of intangible cultural heritage.

Vinh hoa-a chubby boy hugging a chicken. In Chinese Chicken rythem “great luck”

As their name, Dong Ho paintings are woodcut paintings, how many colors there are in a single painting, the same number of original woodcuts there are. Before, people usually buy Dong Ho paintings to decorate houses for Tet holiday but today, Dong Ho paintings are more commercialized so no one has to wait until Tet to buy a painting.

Pig and her babies-the image of wealth

The kind of painting has been existed for quite long and it did feature the culture of Bac Ninh province and you might be questioning how the art make the way until today modern life. Well, it’s not just about paintings but it carry the cultural values and that is how it manages to survive.

The first thing that features Dong Ho painting is the paper. To made papers for paintings, craftsmen blend seashell powder with a kind of glue made by cooking the rice powder until it is sticky. Then, they use pinetree brush to spread the mixture onto the surface of paper. This explains the exotic exotic sparkling hard background and is able to conserve the durability of colours.

Final look of paper used for paintings

Colors used in paintings are all natural, there are only 4 basic colors: green (made from cajuput or copper rust), black (made from ash of bamboo leaves), yellow (from Hoe flowers) and red ( from wood or red stone). Craftsmen will adjust the colors mannually to reach the desired tone in paintings. Being simple but not rustic, the colors of Dong Ho paintings are quite different from other type art of painting, thus it stands strongly in the flow of time and even step in the list of national intangible cultural heritages.

4 woodcuts with 4 basic colors to make a completed painting

The meaning of paintings

The inhabitants of Dong Ho village consider the art as their breath and life. The paintings reflects desire about a harmony and wealthy life full of love, mercy and grace by showing daily life activities. This is also the reason why most of people buy Dong Ho paintings at the beginning of the new lunar years as in Vietnamese perspective, new year is the start of new things and the existance of the paintings in Tet holiday is the expression of their belief.

Dragon dance

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Lotus at West Lake

Being one of the biggest city in Vietnam, people would usually imagine of Hanoi with modern buildings, towers and busy, non-sleeping streets. But, for years in a corner of West lake, lotuses are there lightening the surroundings every May with their beautiful flowers and the pleasing scent, which is an abnormal beauty that is hard to catch in a big city.

Lotuses in West lake are mostly a precious kind called “hundred petals” meaning each lotus has hundreds of petal. Lotus is a rustic kind of flower close to Vietnamese people for thousands of years as a friend. Lotus does not only charm people with its beauty but helps a lot in their live. Lotus leaves are there for people in Cốm season, or they usually call young rice flakes. People make Cốm from young rice and pack it with lotus leaves and let it sit for some days. At the end, the leaves deliver a scented gift making you feel the peace even smelling it.

“Hundreds petal” lotus

Or, in flower season, every early morning people rowing into the lotus pond, pick the most scented bud to embalm tea. The tea is proven to be one of the favorite kind to Vietnamese for hundreds of years. Also the flowers, Vietnamese use them to decorate their worship table to commemorate ancestors.

A vendor selling lotus on a street of Hanoi

When the flower season ends, it leaves lotus seed pods, people collect seeds for cooking. Seeds could go with Chè-a kind of dessert soup or Xôi-sticky rice. Also, lotus seed is a part of many traditional medicines. The empty pods then could be dried to use as a kind of wood.

Lotus tea

Going deep down to the mud under the water, we find lotus rhizome, which is a perfect ingredient for salad. It does feel as if none part of lotus is useless, the plant is a close friend that sacrifices a lot for local people.

Back to West lake, every years from May to around August, the pink beauty attracts so many people who love photo shooting, especially youngsters. They flock there every flower season to take the best shoots with lotus flowers. Wandering here in the flower season, you might easily find pretty women dressing up, some wearing Vietnam traditional camisoles or Áo dài, busy posing next to flowers. And, if you are or even just next to the lotus pond, you must smell the scent, it is quite pleasing to inhale the fragrance. If you are in Hanoi in the lotus season some day, you definitely should not miss the incredible flower, come and immerse yourself in the scented atmosphere and let the fragrance relax your mind and body and don’t forget to take some pictures.

A lady posing next to flowers

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Earlier, under a community art exchange project funded by the Korea Foundation, UN-Habitat, and the Hoan Kiem district People’s Committee, Vietnamese and South Korean artists also conducted a mural project on Phung Hung Street.

The mural project has been carried out on a section of wall on the street by a group of artists who were former students of Phan Dinh Phung High School on the occasion of marking the 45th school birthday on October 14.

To date, many works have been finished, while some have been still underway.

The pictures from left to right depict Hanoi’s landscape and historical sites from the past to the presence.

One Pillar Pagoda in the past and present

A corner of Dong Xuan Market

Hanoi Old Quarter

Long Bien Bridge

Phan Dinh Phung Street

A flower vendor, the common image on Hanoi streets

The paintings attract the attention of many young people

A foreign visitor

Source: Dan Viet/Dtinews

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Location: It is located between the Lake of the Restored Sword, the Long Bien Bridge, a former city rampart, and a citadel wall, the Old Quarter (consisting of 36 old streets inside) started as a snake and alligator-infested swamp.

Although the old section of Hanoi is often called the “36 Old Streets,” there are more than 36 actual streets. Some researchers believe that the number 36 came from the 15^thcentury when there might have been 36 guild locations, which were workshop areas, not streets.

Hanoi Old Quarter in the past.

An amazing view of Hanoi Old Quarter

Rarely anywhere in the world where railroad tracks are located in the middle of residential areas such as Hanoi’s Old Quarter

Years ago, different craftsmen came to work at the guilds represented in the different streets. Each street carries the name of the goods that used to be traded there. Nowadays, the street names don’t always match the products sold there. But today you can still find silver jewelry on Silver Street and silk and other clothing on Hang Gai or Hemp street.

Hang Gai – Ancient street of silk is Hanoi

A stall in Hang Trong Street

The colorful stalls on Paper Street (Hang Ma) in Hanoi’s Old Quarter.

How to explore a day in Hanoi Old Quarter: 

To fully explore the Old Quarter in Hanoi, prepare your feet for a day of walking street to street and taking in the locals’ daily life, the old-style narrow streets and houses, the colorful souvenir shops, and of course trying some of the most tasty traditional foods of Hanoians.

Many agree that joining a Hanoi walking tour or food tour offered by travel agencies will give foreign visitors a full experience of Hanoi Old Quarter, including the daily lifestyle, the history lesson and the feast for their tummies.

This guide of the best things to do in Hanoi Old Quarter is ideal for travellers looking to experience the rare sense of timelessness that seems to sum up this area of the city – you can still see glimpses of previous generations despite the modernisation that is going on relentlessly.

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Workers are busy creating the animal sculptures out of plants and flowers at Thong Nhat Park, which welcome many people to visit.

The pig is receiving its final few plants, which flourish in the rich soil within its body; then watered regularly to keep it in top condition. The frame of each animal is built out of steel before being covered with plants and flowers. And each topiary animal is 2-3m tall.

 

Pictured is a tall leafy snake.

The verdant animal designs attract much attention from local people.

The dog – the symbol for 2018 – is yet to be finished for display.

The picture of buffalo – This is the second time Hanoi has erected the 12 topiary animals vibrantly decorated with plants and flowers to welcome Tet.

 

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Photos: Zing.

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Let’s take a look and find some interesting things about this form of folk arts as below:

1. In the past, water puppetry only served for the King’s family and ancient Vietnamese aristocracy amusement.

2. A water puppet show is performed in a pool of water as the stage of the puppets.

3. Water Puppetry is full of joys, lighting and colors and surprises for the audience.

It is one of Vietnamese tradition that referred to Vietnamese traditions by means of water puppets, like daily life of Vietnamese farmers (cultivating, tending buffalo, catching fishes…), communal entertainment (swimming contest, dragon dancing…), or historical legends.

Many funny faces of Puppets 

4. The puppets are controlled by no more than eight puppeteers hiding behind a bamboo screen.

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