Framed by bananas, immaculate straight rows of hand-planted paddy
This collection of pages has been introducing you to the area just north of Hà Nội. The tour continues by moving eastwards from Truyên Quang, (featured on
last page)
and across into the neighbouring Thái Nguyên province. This allows a thread to be picked up that was left hanging on the page about day trips from Hà Nội. On that page photographs from the
Định Hoá Security Zone (ATK)
were shown, on this page there are photographs of those, admittedly modest, monuments, but here they are from Thái Nguyên - through the historic buildings runs the provincial boundary, with its inevitable bureaucracy. Further down, the page continues with photos from across the province including a couple on tea production; this area is regarded as producing some of Vietnam's most delectable teas.
Sometimes the hero worship for Hồ Chí Minh is a little excessive. Here he is memorialised in the place where he fished and washed - that's really all the guilt lettering is saying:
Khuon Tat stream - Where Uncle Ho and his brothers stood guard, helped fish, and bathed
Here are three of the (reconstructed) huts that were used by Hồ and his government in waiting. The one above is labelled as: The security Guard's Shack
The label on this more upmarket hut: Khuôn Tát shack where Hồ Chí Minh worked in 1947/8, 1953/4
The above plaque, which is on this part of the memorial site, reads:
Trinh Keo hill, Phu Dinh commune, Dinh Hoa district, Thai Nguyen province. [This was the] centre of the capital of our nation's resistance war against French colonial invasion (1946-1954). Where President Ho Chi Minh lived and worked many times in the years from 1948 to the end of 1953 [as he led] the national resistance. Here, on 6 December 1953, President Ho Chi Minh chaired the politburo conference of the Party Central Committee and decided to open the historic Dien Bien Phu campaign, [this was] based on the combat plan of the military committee (the general command), [this] brought our people's resistance to victory. [Thanks Google]
...meeting houses
A simpler open hut with no dedication
And two of the larger...
On out into the province - road workers on their break
A stele deep in the woods with full honours,
but to a person unknown
Another person having his break - not the only person in Vietnam to find such
a
resting place
A good place to slip in a photo of the motorbike in action; this was our transport when in Thái Nguyên...
...Which took us, not only to those national monuments...
...but remains like these, with no explanations at all
A female Moscovy duck...
...is joined by a male...
...not much fun being a female duck
Other rivers offer more peaceful circumstances, as for this hut-boat
Above, tea fields appear to the back right of the photo...
...in this case just the lush paddy of mid-spring
Another common feature, near houses, is the fishpond - this one is unusually large and should keep a house in permanent good stock
The spring paddy has been cut; most land, away
from the hills in Vietnam, can support
two different crops per year
Across the field, this is the glutinous variety, or xôi as it is called once cooked. Rather ragged in growth compared
with the regiments of ordinary rice
Besides fish and rice the other key agricultural
interest in Thái Nguyên is tea. This is the
furnace used to dry the leaves
Beyond the garden where the furnace is, a tea plantation with a small group of workers. The typically misty atmosphere making them barely visible
The same furnace from the other side showing the rotating drum which keeps the leaves moving as they are dried. Very roughly black tea is picked and then encouraged to oxidise, this can be by kneading, so breaking the cell walls down and enhancing the flavour, as well as caffeine levels. Green tea is not allowed to ferment in that way. The hot drying process is used to prevent any (green tea), or any further (black tea) fermentation.
Trailers...
The next Picture Posting
page is to take you further north and into Bắc Kạn Province.
The next page
of the Mosaic Section is headed 'Translating Realities'.
Or go to the contents Go to the contents of the Mosaic Section. of the Mosaic Section. Monitors can keep the layout, which phones may need to discombobulate.
The previous page had photos from Truyên Quang Province
More pictures of fields in northern Vietnam
...guide to this site