Journey to Peace Village

I recently paid a visit to Co Loa Citadel with my students. This is an important ancient site right outside of Ha Noi.

The citadel was built around 200 B.C. by one of the legendary kings of Viet Nam, An Dương Vương. He had a magic crossbow that could kill hundreds of soldiers at a time. Again, the turtle theme comes up, as the crossbow was given to him by a golden turtle.

The king had one daughter, My Chau. She married a Chinese general. Eventually, she told him about the crossbow and he was able to learn its secrets. With this weapon, the Chinese were able to conquer Viet Nam. In anger, An Dương Vương killed his daughter and her body was turned into a stone which is found in the temple today. A priest was telling my students the legend in detail. I wish I knew more Vietnamese!

The buildings on this site are very old and there is current archaelogical work going on in the area. Ha Noi is going to celebrate its 1000 year anniversary in 2010 and this site is due for a "face lift."

Labels: Vietnamese culture, Vietnamese history

Viet Nam isn't a top competitor at the Olympics. There's only been two silver medals won at the Games since the country started competing in 1952. One came this week and electrified the country. Hoang Anh Tuan pulled an upset and won a silver medal in the men's 56 kilogram weightlifting competiton.
He lifted a total of 290 kilos (600 pounds) in the snatch and "clean and jerk" phases of the competition.

Vietnam doesn't put a lot of budget into international sports (except for soccer). In soccer, while they haven't made it to the Olympics, they improved mightily in the Asian cup, making it into the quarterfinal round and beating rival Thailand.

This is not to say that the Vietnamese are not sports minded. People are great at participant sports and you see many folks of all ages playing soccer, basketball, table tennis and badminton. This is reflected in the coverage of the Olympics on tv. Live coverage of the Games is broadcast all day and into the night. There is more coverage of sports that are unusual in the US--including badminton, Judo, table tennis, volleyball and weightlifting. This doesn't mean I haven't been able to keep up with some of the activities of team USA--last night I watched James Blake upset Roger Federer and I've been treated to games of the men's and women's basketball team.

All and all watching the Olympics gives me a chance to improve my Vietnamese and learn about some unusual sports.

Labels: sports, Viet Nam and the West, Vietnamese culture

Truong is my newest student. He was working with George before he went back to England. Truong is an agriculature student who is going to Israel in September. I'm trying to do a lot of work to help him with listening and speaking skills. He's got great vocabulary and is creative. When we went to the Co Loa castle he showed me how to make a whistle from a banana leaf!

Labels: education, Vietnamese culture