Streets named after cultural figures are very common worldwide, so the US is an anomaly, though few Americans realize this, or even care, I imagine.
Smugly, too many ignorant Americans routinely mock other nations. Casually, they refer to most countries on earth as "shit holes." What unspeakable arrogance! This attitude, though, has only hurt Americans, while also blinding them to the fact that their nation has become the biggest joke on earth, and a menacing shithole in way too many spots.
Though every ethnic group or nation can be chauvinistic, only one believes it is simply the best at everything, and congenitally so, an insane conceit. Perhaps only Jews are more smugly arrogant than too many Americans.
A comment at this blog, "Butt-ugly fat Chinaman. Flee back to your rice paddy you overgrown pimple. How many cat you eat, yellow? Amellica not buy enough of your photo books for you to afford life in a First World Country? You are so ignorant. Enjoy your native Vietnamese 'art' collection. What is it, a bunch of sticks tied together?" He came here straight from Unz, I'm sure.
Yesterday, I got two emails from Italian friends, and this week, I've been listening to a recording by a Vietnamese singer, Thái Thanh, whom I saw in concert in Washington DC in 1983. I had never witnessed so many people sob in one place. About 70 years ago, she released an album, "CIAO! BELLA." Here's the cassette cover and playlist:
For this album, Vietnamese lyrics are added to melodies by foreign composers, including some very famous ones, Brahms, Schubert, Strauss, Schumann. I often walk down these streets.
My favorite song by Thái Thanh, though, is "Tống biệt," which uses lines from a 1922 hát chèo play by Hanoi poet Tản Đà (1889-1939), with music by Saigon composer Võ Đức Thu (1911-1964). Hát chèo is a theatrical form from the 12th century.
The plot of the play is a Chinese legend. Going into the woods to collect herbs, two young men got lost and met two fairies. They became husbands and wives and lived in a heavenly realm. After six months, the men got so homesick, they returned to their village, only to discover they had been gone for seven generations. With nothing left, they went back to their fairy wives, but these, too, had become irretrievable.
Though this song has been recorded many times, none can even come close to matching Thái Thanh. Slowing it down, she draws out the grief of these men's departure from their loves and paradise, to return to a youth that had disappeared. Like much of great art, it is about loss of innocence, and death.
Several Thái Thanh songs have haunted me down the decades, and a key reason for this, I'm convinced, is that I heard them so early in life, as a small child in Saigon. While their sounds evoke my first notions of self, their mortal meanings deepen as I approach my own exit. Thái Thanh died in March of 2020 in Orange County, California.
In a recent essay, I pointed out the obvious, that "each language is a new, unsuspected universe." This brief discussion of Thái Thanh, then, is a reminder that each culture has an infinity of emotional resonances and moments of beauty outsiders have almost no access to. Those who sneer at others as somehow subhuman, living in "shit holes," are the only ones roiling in their own shit.
"Half a year of enchantment,
One step towards the dust,
Old dream, leftover love, that’s that."
8 comments:
americans can be a special variety of ignorant, though it ain't limited to just them. they've just had more practice.
in the mid seventies i worked with some recent viet refugees in annapolis md. we got on well and i was invited to their homes for food. the following year tin and mai became partners in a viet night club in wash. dc and they asked me to bartend for them so i did. i was well received by all present with one small item that i found interesting; during a break from pouring courvoisier and cokes, their main drink request, i was watching the band play 'don't that make my brown eyes blue' and told mai that i found the lead singer attractive. she said something like the following: for her you are nigger. i wasn't offended but knew she was attempting in her limited english way to tell me it wouldn't work due to too many differences. no matter we continued to be friends. they later moved to houston when my second wife and i visited with them with a notable trip by all of us to the mexican side of larado where i was entertained when tin's brother lieu was bargaining over the price of a switchblade with a mexican street kid. lost track of them in later years. so it goes.
Hi Craig,
With her limited English, she probably didn't know the full weight of the word "nigger." That said, Vietnamese can certainly be prejudiced against people with darker skin. Many think of Cambodians as black, thus dirty and ugly, though I disagree. I've told many Vietnamese I find Cambodians to be more attractive, and, moreover, with a much greater cultural heritage.
Even newer Cambodian architecture is more interesting. Consider Vann Molyvann, for example. In Phnom Penh, I went to admire his gorgeous stadium.
There are no Vietnamese slur for blacks, or whites for that matter, with "Tây mũi lõ," or "hooked nose Westerner" perhaps the closest, though very seldom used.
Following the Chinese, Vietnamese call USA the "Beautiful Country" ["Mỹ Quốc"], France the "Lawful Country" ["Pháp Quốc"] and Germany the "Virtuous Country" ["Đức Quốc"]. In every day conversation, then, an American is a "beautiful person," though mỹ, as a Chinese derived, somewhat fancy word, is much less common than đẹp.
Linh
P.S. In my "Lebanese Snippets", I quote a Filipina maid as saying, “I have three sister in Lebanon, sir. I had four, but she married a nigger.” Since she arrived in Lebanon without any English, I have no idea where she picked up "nigger." Maybe from the internet? Perhaps it's in use in the Philippines from long exposure to Americans?
americans have spread good to some degree and bad many times worse since they started taking over things in 1898 in disregard of the promise to the Philippines. nigger is one they've spread too far and hard. they know who they are but can't admit it so self hate propagated by hating everything seems to be their solution. bullies, they're so sure of themselves until a larger bully arrives. its beginning to look like putin is finally showing them that they ain't who they have thought they are and its many years late but still welcome.
Hi Craig,
On January 7th, the US Supreme Court will consider whether to put a temporary hold on Biden's vaccine mandates while various legal challenges in lower courts are being heard. If they actually block Biden, there's still some hope left.
Linh
Hi Craig,
Regarding Vietnamese racial slurs, the only nasty one, and the only one with any popularity, is "chệt," to refer to Chinese. In daily life, you rarely hear Vietnamese speak badly about anyone but the Chinese. Although heavily influenced by Chinese culture, Vietnamese are very militant about not being Chinese at all!
After the Mongols conquered China in the 13th century, they established the Yuan Dynasty. Invading Vietnam, they captured a 26-year-old Vietnamese general whom they tried to persuade to serve them, but Tran Binh Trong said, "I'd rather be a southern devil than a northern king," meaning he'd rather be the lowest Vietnamese than the highest Chinese.
This also showed his contempt at the Mongols for becoming Chinese royalties. For this insult, the Mongols chopped his head off, of course, but that defiant utterance is known by every Vietnamese.
Linh
i just saw a documentary film by john pilger titled; the coming war on china. i'd include the url here but i suspect your security program might object. i highly recommend it for the limited indictment it quietly and at the same time, loudly contains. when you consider all of the other areas which could also have similar documentaries made it lends itself to our only hope: a collapse from within which appears to be quite possible right now. as a birthright quaker from some of the neighborhoods you once explored i can only hope. as i remember the bits of history, one of my lifetime focuses, centered on vietnam, it appears your heritage has never taken the knee, as was demonstrated in the sixties, but the price remains in places like agent orange remains. good to see you're well situated in africa as it may be one of the few remaining 'safe' places. the iranians are right to call the empire the great satan.
Hi Craig,
Because of computer problems, I had to go to the shopping mall twice today, but it was very enjoyable. The place was packed with beautiful people, many of whom dressed splendidly for Christmas. There were plenty of kids, all enjoying themselves. Yes, there was mask wearing, but most people had their nose sticking out. At many store entrances, there's a guy to squirt your hand with some bullshit sanitizer. Otherwise, everything was normal, and there's absolutely no fear of Omicron here. The vaccination center at the mall was brightly lit and mostly empty, as usual.
Namibians are quite mellow and gentle, I've discovered, and I have not heard anyone use profanity, not even once. A Philly guy, I sometimes say shit or fuck, but I'm learning that it's just not cool here.
Linh
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