été 90, enfance 80

last summer's serotonin season was kinda hype. this summer was more hypo and reflective, hence the name été 90, enfance 80. été 90 (90s summer) is a song by therapie taxi, and enfance 80 (80s childhood) is a song by videoclub. if there’s a linking theme between things I did this summer, that’d be the fact that I redo a lot of things in the past: I reread old books, visited buildings that I used to study in, met people I used to see, etc. and came to one big realization. fuck, heraclitus was right.

I tried to romanticize this summer, turned out I couldn’t. many things happened that made this summer not a particularly fun one. I had expectations about things I want to do, and I ended up doing most of them, just in different proportions. if there’s a thing I can say, that’d be “I tried”. and in parts, this summer was a success. before I start my sophomore year, I just want to take time to celebrate the little moments of happiness that happened this summer and introduce you to some vietnamese things.

excuse me one pretentious title

I admit that these were too ambitious lmao

things I tried

failed attempts (things that I ditched shortly after)

• chinese (finished hsk 1 by july but I think I forgot most things by now)
• french (learned like 1 unit of vocab then ditched, reviewed 0 grammar point)
• orgo (the most I did was watching nile red shorts)
• write a novel (or fan fic, if you will. I got stuck at ch2, I’m still pretty proud of the intro and ch1 tho)
• embroidery (I still haven't touch the project since spring break)
• dancing (hmm I ditched this and tried out running instead)
• singing and playing piano (didn’t really touch these but in return I studied a few discographies)

bye bye chinese

and successful attempts

• chores
• running, neighborhood exploration, trip planning
• read books
• watch films
• make art
• curate discographies
• write blogs
• gardening
• cleaning
• reconnect with people (the best!!!)

chapter 1. chores and reverse culture shock

the end of 2023, I had a catchup session with a lad that helped me write my college essays. we talked about culture shock, and what he said slowly hit me, especially the food scene and the weather. what I underestimated ended up as things that matter the most. we also talk about homecoming and reverse culture shock. a remark that he left was “I always seem to run out of time for myself once I’m back in vietnam.” I came back to vietnam over winter break, but one month is probably not long enough for the effect to unveil. when I come back for the summer, it’s a different story.

many things can make you run out of time, especially if your family run a home restaurant or a grocery store (this is not my family but quite common in vietnam). helping out with family business and chores can lowkey take all of your time if you’re not careful. going back home means that I don’t have to do every single chore, but for every chore I do it’s 4x the amount.

I do dishes for all of our meals, except for days when I go out. sometimes I’ll cook and take out the trash if my mom’s busy. my nightmare is fridays after my mom got back from the supermarket and picked my sister up from english classes. processing fresh food (meat, seafood, etc.) and dividing it into daily portions take a lot of time. some nights my mom would eat dinner around 10pm (our usual time is 7-8pm).

after this summer, I’ve also unlocked a new fear: big houses. mopping the floor and dusting are my least favorite chores. having a big house makes it even worse. I mop the floor with my sister twice a week (our house is 4 floors including the ground floor). my dad usually sweep and clean the ground floor every day but ever since bro’s accident I did that too. I don’t know if this is my house’s thing or a vietnamese thing, but we mop every room twice (including the staircase) instead of once. I made a pact with myself that I’ll try to have as few things as needed in my room after moving out as it simplifies the process by a great amount.

one of the things that I miss the most about the us is the dryer. in vietnam, we do laundry by gathering everyone’s clothes in one place, wash them, roughly fold them (when they’re still wet, a process developed by my mom to decrease the creases in clothes and save time ironing), hang them, take them in, fold them, and ship them to everyone’s closet. in the us, you can do your laundry anytime and never have to worry about the weather outside. in vietnam, it’s a different story.

first, we don’t hang clothes at night because there’re religious beliefs that evil spirits will get into your clothes. scientifically speaking, night is also not a very ideal time to dry clothes as the dew descends and your clothes end up damp and moldy. this means that hanging clothes must be done at a very specific time in a day, from early morning to sundown. second, even if you hang your clothes during these hours it may still rain (and you’ll have fun running up 4 flights of stairs when doing the dishes to get them). last, space limits how much clothes you can hang at a time. we can hang all of them at once but on days where we also do bedsheets it’s a different story (4 beds, do the math).

the only pros I see to doing laundry this way is that your clothes smell fresher (natural rays from the sun™) and it gets you more outdoorsy. laundry serves as an excuse to wake up early to see sunrise and sunsets (I’ve had spectacular shots of the sky just by taking off clothes) and life in the neighborhood like children cycling and people talking (our house is tall so it offers a great vantage point). but would I still choose it over the dryer? hell no. cut off on time doing laundry to actually walk outside and actually enjoy nature. I also do some gardening, which you can learn more in chapter 8.

people hanging out in the streets

les nuages magnifiques

readers of kinderszenen will know that that's the pagoda built by thích nhất hạnh in the backdrop

pourrions nous revenir sur cette histoire?
oui, c'est bon j'avoue j'aurais du te croire

chapter 2. running, neighborhood exploration, and trip planning

I start planning trips that I wanted to do but was cancelled this summer and scheduled it for future trips. having something to look forward to makes me happy, hopeful, and chase away the looming doom at home. planning puts me in the active role, where I make things happen for myself, cause no one else would. I feel more confident and professional planning trips these days, probably due to the amount of planning I did for the past saigon and philly trips. for trips I didn’t plan, I tend to write a blog by vomitting photos and adding comments. now that I plan, my blog is more coherent and serves as an actual guide.

in addition to far trips, I also did a lot of trips right in the city and the neighborhood, where I could just walk. after the philly explorations with goethe, I think I’ve learned something about the pride one has for one's city. I've seen people that looked down on vietnam and saigon as soon as they left. and to be honest, their complaints indoctrinated my mind for a period of time. however, to actually plan trips and see the city for myself, I think every city is unique in its own way, and I'm proud of it. more on this in future blogs.

most of my trips are still in progress or haven't taken place yet. so far the only one that's done is kinderszenen. other than that, I also reflect on past travels like my journey in the us in my freshman year.

chapter 3. read books

I kick off summer reading books by bryn mawr faculty (shout out to dr francl's steeped and dr schulz's the good life). after that, I read mason currey's daily rituals as mentioned in austin kleon's keep going. after frying my brain in non fiction long enough, I revert to my rereading fiction series. I reread books from ib (international baccalaureate, every high school kid's worst nightmare): the kite runner (for vietnamese oral), nắng trong vườn (light in the garden) just for fun, and lolita (for my english extended essay). I reread all of those in vietnamese to get in touch with my mother tongue.

during those rereads, I start seeing more stuff that I didn't see when I was reading at the ripe age of 16. I wasn't pressured to finish them within a deadline or to overanalyze texts. amir's immigration story to the united states hit me particularly hard. I relate so much more to the culture shock, the struggle to fit in, the first gen experience, and amir's mixed feelings about his home country. homesick is tender memories and traumas intertwined. nắng trong vườn is still as gentle but not as feminist as I wanted it to be. lolita remains as hard to read as always (harder this time as I read it in a week instead of over the span of a few months). as I did french, I understood more of nabokov's subtle word play and appreciate the aesthetics of the work more (but definitely not its ethics tho).

I also read thư tình gửi một người (love letters to a person) by trịnh công sơn, a renowned vietnamese musician. I've never seen vietnamese used so poetically and aesthetically. this is a work that I always left off after a few letters so I was glad to finish it. finishing it also helps me understand more about the stance of artists in the vietnam war and trịnh công sơn's influences to modern music and the film industry.

after that, I reverted to austin kleon's trilogy of steal like an artist, show your work!, and keep going (but not in that order, I read show your work! last) and spotted a bunch of translation mistakes. so I read both the english and vietnamese versions in parallel and emailed the publisher with my suggestions. after that, I also reread sasaki fumio's goodbye, things.

I'm basically done with my summer reads except for saint-exupéry's le petit prince. I've read it in vietnamese a ton of time. however, this is my first time reading it in french and it's been quite challenging. I hope to finish it before summer ends.

I see reading francl's tea book in the presence of coffee as an act of rebel

the signed bmc faculty books trilogy. I no longer keep the good life as I gave that away to my high school teacher as a gift. it was dedicated to her anyways ;)

photo credits to my sibling and her majestic fish eye lens
we're glad to have mme flying shrimp here as our librarian

ngô vũ dao ánh, the muse of trịnh công sơn
also another pic by my sibling and her majestic fish eye lens

from left to right: trần anh hùng, tony leung chiu-wai, trịnh công sơn, trần nữ yên khê
this was recently added to my updated blog on trần anh hùng cinematography

chapter 4. watch films

I planned to watch all movies by trần anh hùng and wes anderson this summer. I was too ambitious. it took me a few months to watch all 11 movies by trần anh hùng (7 feature-length movies, 2 co-directed movies, 2 short movies) and write a blog on it. after that, I was essentially drained and had no space for wes anderson left. wes anderson's filmography is also more humongous and diverse in terms of genres so I had to give it time. I had this bright idea of studying wim wenders' cinematography instead. I've watched paris, texas before thanks to anh tu's movie list. I've heard good reviews about perfect days and seen its poster in the wild. his filmography turns out to be even more humongous than wes anderson's, so I ditched the idea afterwards and reverted to making art.

hands down the best movie to my current taste
I admit that I'm sentimentally attached to the soundtrack of this movie,
it's lowkey been my getting out of bed music for a while

chapter 5. make art

welcome to my canva is my passion era. most of these are making digital birthday cards for people. I also had other projects such as designing my birthday party invitations and room decor things for my dorm next year. after too much canva time, I reverted to a more analog approach in my bullet notebook and in vietnam airlines' magazines, or 42,000ft above.

chapter 6. curate discographies

from may, I've listened to discographies by girl in red, therapie taxi, and videoclub. initially, I planned to listen to cigarettes after sex, cá hồi hoang, and vũ as well. however, the thing about discographies and blogs in general is that they are very unpredictable. what you like at the time may no longer resonate with you as you write it. for discographies, the main stages are I like this music → create a playlist with all of their songs → listen → analysis → blog. however, the opposite may happen, where I like their music → create discography playlist → listen → this is quite shit → save for later.

I might save a discography for later for many reasons: (1) there are too many songs, (2) I don't think I'm at the level to handle them quite yet, or (3) too monotone. for the first one, humongous discographies take a lot of time to listen to. the longest I've had is a discography that's more than 22 hours long by yann tiersen. however, his music is instrumental so it's easier to listen to. for the french ones, I waited until this summer so that I can at least have some skills to understand what they're saying. I had intentions of doing videoclub discography as soon as 2023 summer. lastly, their music maybe too monotone that I just essentially got bored because every song sounds the same. I like looking at artists with consistent performance and evolution between albums. 

discography size is not a problem, but for artists with big discographies I have to really like their music to commit through all of them. middle-sized (~3 hours) and small (<1 hour) discographies (~3 hours) are ideal, as they're more condensed. however, smaller discographies may be more challenging to analyze as there're not enough songs.

chapter 7. write blogs

I realize that making blog the end form of what I do makes me feel more motivated to do things. this doesn't mean that I share everything, but it rather works by creating a structure in my creative process, from idea synthesis to actions and reflection. ever since summer starts, I have more time to write blogs. so far, I've written 12 of them (including this one). I plan to write a couple more before school starts. summer and breaks is my high season, the schooling period is my low one.

I've been scattering blogs throughout this post in relevant activities. if you want the ones I wrote but weren't featured, here they are.

the rite of spring (photography)

les bouteilles (art)

on happiness (philosophy)

a guide to deptoongmaucam (philosophy)

chapter 8. gardening

I've said on many occasions that the vietnamese household signature is having a garden beside having good food and being a part of the 5am club. the fact that I did well in bio in high school doesn't translate to me having exceptional gardening skills. I still struggle to identify plants that we eat and grow and basic facts like where to put certain plants (like you don't put orchid out in the blasting sun, for example). the sort of bio that I learned has been deeply theoretical and although we got to set up our internal assessment by growing plants, that doesn't really help with my gardening skills. so, truth betold, I'm quite shit at it, but bear with me.

I start off by cleaning the leaves of garden floors and picking up debris in the pots. then I trim some of the leaves and rearranged the pots to make watering easier. at the start of summer, I also bought 10kg of soil, 3dm3 fertilizer and a hand driller. I add more soil and fertilizer to the pots after removing dead leaves and debris. I should've bought more fertilizer as I had no idea how much 3dm3 is (apparently it means not enough). beside providing plants with water, nutrients, and sunlight (saigon has too much of it), it also needs air.

when we talk about air, we usually think about the air around the tree, but the important thing is also the air in the soil. you can use a driller to aerate the soil by creating more draining holes for water. you can also use the driller to directly aerate the soil. you can also use scissors to poke holes after watering as I did before I bought the driller. the idea situation would be to repot them and add more soil, but I didn't have the resources and the power to do all of that so I just aerated the soil, as instructed in this video. you also shouldn't put the pot directly on the ground as a thousand holes won't help. giving it elevation will allow water to drain better. you can do this by puttin on a couple bricks.

I bought a cheap driller and it turns out to be quite shitty. it's strong enough to aerate the soil but not strong enough to drill holes in the pots as the drill bit keeps falling out. my advice would be to stick with the more expensive ones like bosch and makita as they're better. also get a hand driller as it's more flexible than the one with the power source.

I'm quite bad at watering plants regularly, which means sometimes the leaves go pretty yellow and I have to water it consistently for the next few days so that bro won't die. in the 30 degrees celsius sun (that's 86 degrees fahrenheit my friends), I sold my soul to this garden. after toiling hours of labor, drinking cool drinks feels like a blessing. my favorite recipe that I've developed remains nata de coco and milk. if you don't have milk you can use rice water (the bottled one sold in supermarkets not the one you strain off rice when you cook them) as an alternative, but I still think the one with milk tastes better.

bro needed a haircut and some love

cleaned

soiled

aerated

tell me that you're a vietnamese without telling me that you're a vietnamese 101:
open soil bags and rice bags like these without cutting them

my sister helped, too

I still dunno why my parents threw these things into plant pots. there're better pot cooling alternatives out there. also dead leaves won't recompose properly if you just throw it there.

after a few rounds of cleaning I find it easier to just throw them on the ground and sweep them

mysterious dying orchid that was here before I got back to vietnam

what are we even growing in here?

I know this is a crab claw herb but does this count as 4-leaf clover? they're as rare

before rearranging

thank you for choosing life
(this is the boy who lived in the 4 other boys that wilted away,
yet bro passed away a few days after repotting just because I'm shit at watering
and I put bro out in the open blasting sun while bro preferred the shade)

an alternative to this would be meiji melon milk, which also tastes heavenly
yet I prefer strawberry milk to it

have you heard of books that people would sell their souls to read again for the first time?
this is quite the experience, I'd sell my soul to drink this again for the first time
this is what pure bliss tastes like

monsieur araignée having a fine day out
I last saw bro in the trash bag so how bro made his way out is still quite a feat

mme papillon, if you see her

happiness is a butterfly - lana del rey

apparently the fertilizer was not enough for everyone in the room

be with yourself in the sowing season

because you will be there too during full bloom

chapter 9. cleaning and rethinking minimalism

I spend quite an amount of this summer grieving over things that I've deleted in the 2019-2021 period. this was a result of me reading goodbye, things by sasaki fumio without understanding the significance of history. sasaki fumio reduced the amount of physical objects in his life and digitally back things up. it's important to have history and memories with people. it's important to have footprints.

I couldn't see this clearly at the time as I was stuck in a toxic relationship, which made me believe that it's sufficient to have one relationship in my life. this is, obviously, not true. at the time, when something doesn't work out or when my life seems off, I attribute the cause to not being minimalistic enough, when the cause is in fact not working on my support system.

altogether, my obsessive minimalism got worse. I deleted almost everything until I'm left with the void. I've deleted all photos in the past to 2021 (my photo gallery only starts from the end of 2021 until now), digital cards that I send to people at the end of 2019 and 2020. my biggest regrets are around deleting those cards, photos of myself and also of people I love during that period (but not that toxic ex lol).

this lack of photos means that my memory about middle school and the first year of high school remains a blur. I could partly recover photos from messenger, but it would never be everything. what I have are remaining pieces to a puzzle of my past selves and people in my life during the 2019-2021 period.

studying abroad means that I have to do a lot of cleaning up last year to pack for the us. now that I'm back, things've gone a bit untidy. but this time, when I'm cleaning it up, I'm wiser because I know what to keep.

some observations.

1. it's easier to clean up other people's stuff than yours. when doing so, you are more objective, which gives a healthy amount of self-distancing. I find cleaning up my shit the most frustrating as I constantly have to think about every piece's worth to me, where to put them, whether to take them with me next year.

2. the efficient way to clean up is not relocating stuff, but to throw unnecessary shit away. it doesn't limit to the shit that no longer works, but also the shit that you don't use. my process is a mix of both as my parents get attached to things and they would tell me off if I throw things away.

3. relocation is not necessary bad. it puts things in a more ready mode to get thrown away.

4. when you throw things away, do not regret the original amount of money you paid for them. be happy about regaining the space and the hours doing less cleaning instead.

5. the best way to manage books is to have a library membership. you can borrow books and return them, but you never have to own them. this saves space and money. compared to kindle, you don't have to pay for every book and you get real physical books instead of a screen.

6. alwyas think about the moving day before you commit to buying anything. especially large and expensive things. think about summer storage fees and moving costs too.

when I went back over the summer, I didn't have enough space to store things as my space were taken over. I only had the 2 white drawers, that walmart box, a slot in the shelves, and half of the wardrobe that I shared with my dad.

this was originally my table but it's now my sister's

for my vietnamese readers who get it

my sister's table is now my mom's. during the first few weeks I mostly sat on my bed. gradually this table became mine. but I only use its top surface and none of its drawers.

chapter 10. reconnecting with people

most of friends that I know from secondary school or high school now study abroad in university. my high school teachers are expats that leave vietnam after a few years. this means that it's very hard to keep in touch and see all of them. to make things happen, you have to make the move. things won't happen unless there's a plan: a time, a place, a thing to do. the easiest to see are the ones that still live in the city or came back to the city or nearby provinces for the summer. for other cases, you can still call them, but setting up times to meet will be a bit more difficult due to time difference.

reconnecting with people is always an interesting experience, but a sentence that sums up most of them is this, people are not as I remembered. I don't blame them as I'm quite sure I'm not as they remembered too. time passes, people change. not the same river, nor the same person. no one ever steps into the same river twice. fuck, heraclitus was right.

beside seeing friends and teachers, one of the highlights was seeing my extended family. I gathered enough courage to come out to my grandpa, who we can now see in his altar together with his dad.

thảo nguyên đẹp nhất khi có tát nhật lãng rực đỏ,

lòng người đẹp nhất khi có cố nhân.

the plains are the most gorgeous when the red sarilangs are in full bloom,

the human heart is the most beautiful when it has old folks.

whever you are tea will find ur way

epilogue

after the high tides and low tides, what I've realized while recovering from illness is this. happiness is possible. don't miss out small joys in hope for big happiness. peak experiences are fine, but happiness must be found in daily waking life.

let nothing disturb you. leave no prerequisite for happiness. be happy doing nothing. the more I age, the more I aspire to be the person that can be happy with themselves just by waking up and enjoying the early morning air.