The suburban afternoon hovers

Yes, in the late afternoon, I drive to the suburbs. Slowly, I cycle around. To breathe in the scent of the Lam River wind, the smell of ripe rice in the fields, the smell of water hyacinths blooming purple, the smell of buffaloes leisurely returning on the dike, the smell of grass that tickles my nose. Watching the bustling fishing village, the sedge village… I call that - the lingering suburban afternoons.

Floating in the golden sunshine, floating in the wind, floating in sadness, floating in longing. The suburban afternoons are for souls born in the countryside but for a living have returned to the city but their hearts cannot stop longing. Occasionally in dreams, they still call back to the grassy dike. Clover, spikelet, dog’s tail, five-color, crackling… As if waiting for the sun to rise, to grow and spread.

I, like many city dwellers, take the excuse of the early summer sunshine to head out to the suburbs to see… the countryside. Luckily, my city has the Lam River flowing through it, leaving long, long embankments that feel like they never end.

Stories on the dike

And the stories on the dike, seemingly random, linger in the mind. Like the story of old man Tran Xuan Hoe whom we met right at the dike section under Ben Thuy 2 bridge, for example. The old man was toothless, his face was full of wrinkles, his body was as thin as a reed. He sat on a broken sofa that someone had thrown out in the trash, which he picked up and leaned against the sign on the dike. The sign helped him avoid the sun while watching over his four cows – his family’s biggest asset. And he pointed, from afar, to his wife who was also watching over them: “A few years ago, I could herd them alone, but now I’m old, I have to ask her too, it takes two people to herd them home.”

Mr. Hoe is 88 years old this year, from Hamlet 7, Hung Loi, Hung Nguyen. He said that for many years, he has been attached to this dike. Maybe since he left the army. He spent many years on the battlefield, 3 years doing international duty in Laos. During the years of war, just thinking about his thatched roof house, thinking about the Lam River, thinking about this dike, he felt more strength to fight, had the desire to return. What he still dreams of is to return, to sit on a peaceful afternoon on the dike, smelling the river breeze.

The homeland has been peaceful for more than 40 years. Almost the same number of years, the soldier put down his gun to become a farmer and then an old cowherd. Every afternoon he sits like that, with a towel wrapped inside his worn-out pith helmet, holding a cow-herding stick in his hand. Like a skinny, silent statue on the dike blazing with sun and wind. He said, there are things that seem to only exist in dreams, but they have existed in this life, very real. Like the way he has enjoyed the dream of the battlefield for more than 40 years now. And there are changes that we have to accept. Like the story of him - a farmer who no longer had fields when the city gradually encroached on the countryside, so he struggled to switch to raising animals. Like the story of the Ben Thuy pumping station that his finger pointed to, right across the street, was once a famous project, carrying out the task of draining water for Vinh City and Hung Nguyen District since the late 1980s of the last century, but for more than 10 years now, it has been lying there silently, ending its historical role, the water outlet has become a volleyball court for young people in the suburbs every afternoon.

Then, the bridges across the Lam River, towering, where once there was only a small ferry. The dike also grew larger, the road along the dike also became wider, busier. Now standing on the dike, one can look out over the city with so many skyscrapers crowding up and reaching high.

That is also the story of Mr. Ngo Van Tan, 62 years old, Phong Hao hamlet, Hung Loc commune (Vinh city). He struggled to carry the boat where he had just sat and cast his net all afternoon on Lam river, then used it to hold water, release fish to keep them fresh, and sat selling right on the dike. That dike was right outside Tru market, the market suddenly became quiet and desolate when the afternoon came. He told about the river section he had just passed through to cast his net, told about the mangrove forest where birds were chirping in the green canopy.

He spread out his calloused hands, pale from soaking in water, and told about the customers who often bought fish from him. “Mainly people in town. Many people come here for exercise, maybe women walking, or newly retired men, forming a cycling team to cycle all the way down to Cua Hoi and then come back, conveniently buying fish for dinner. There are also many people who ride their bikes to see the river and enjoy the cool breeze, stopping here to buy. Some days are busy, but other days they keep calling out but not many people stop by. The buying and selling is very erratic, but it is still a way to make a living. It is like the people in the lower Hung Hoa who make sedge, but for the past few years they have not made any profit. The sedge fields are still immense, but the wages are not worth much. The sedge is harvested, dried, and sold to traders, but now they are not woven directly because hand weaving is not economically efficient. Weaving all day (2 people) gets a pair of mats, selling for about 50,000 VND, minus the money for the jute rope, each person has less than 20,000 VND. So few people still stick with the job. Fortunately, many people are also dynamic, also reaching out to make shrimp ponds, raising duck, income is also quite good”…

The stories, as if to open up, but contain many concerns. About a suburban life as if a "break" from the hustle and bustle of the city. But, for me, it is also a necessary break connecting the countryside with the city, with the rush of dizzying, chaotic changes. Perhaps, I am being selfish, the selfishness that carries a dreamy shadow when thinking about the word "suburbs" must necessarily be a place that holds many promises of peace, tranquility, slowness, openness, poetry, contemplation...?

You will meet, you will love…

But isn’t it true that you also love those things when you come to the suburbs of Vinh. Where you suddenly utter the name of a movie “Vertical Afternoon Summer”. At that time, the sun seems to stand still in the midst of the yellow-brown clouds. And the road along the river flows leisurely towards the sea with leisurely footsteps, cycles, stories, and softly humming songs. Oleander flowers are bright pink along the median strip. Then red phoenix flowers and purple lagerstroemia are also flashing above the green canopy with the noisy sound of cicadas.

The grassy banks of the river rustled with the afternoon football matches, the shops began to welcome the cool breeze and opened right under the waves. The bridge, the oil tanker dock, was gradually crowded with people enjoying the cool breeze and fishing.

You will see the lush mangrove forest standing in the rising tide with the birds chirping back like in the story of the old fisherman in Phong Hao village. Be overwhelmed by the immense green color like the steppe of Hung Hoa sedge. The rays of the late afternoon sun shine shimmering on the sedge fields. The wind blows, making the sedge waves appear as halos of light. And in the midst of that vastness, the shadows of the sedge villagers diligently preserve a craft that is somehow fragile, patient, and resilient. I stood from the dike, looking down at those small dots and thought to myself, do those people in the sedge fields not only know loyalty and regret, but also know how to nurture hope?

Or go back to the other side, just a short distance around the side of Quyết mountain, past the Ben Thuy pumping station, and you will reach the countryside, the ripe rice fields. There are already a few fields with only stubble left. There are children who have just passed the exam and are chattering along with their parents to harvest and catch grasshoppers and locusts. The shadows of people fall in the afternoon sun with heavy burdens from the corn and rice fields. The baskets and bicycles of mothers and sisters hurry back in the headwind.

You can go on forever until you reach the river channel of the fishing village of hamlet 9 Hung Loi, Hung Nguyen, where nearly twenty boats are coming back to dock to listen to the bustling kitchen sounds of dinner, chatting with people who have lived their whole lives with the Lam River on a simple wooden boat. Born on a boat, learned to swim when they could walk, and then met and got married through those "wasp" arches. Hard work, worries but also full of peace and serenity.

What do you think when you stand on a grassy dike, with the clover and the prickly pear grass clinging to your feet like a childhood friend you haven't seen for a long time, breathing in the river breeze? What do you think about the purple color of water hyacinth suddenly blooming in a corner of the pond, or the green color of grass blooming with growth despite the harsh sunlight, spreading out before the eyes of the cows, an endless source of food? What do you think about the kilometer markers, as if to remind you of the boundaries and limitations in life, but at this moment you are not thinking about them, when your soul wants to melt into nature?

Surely, like me, you can only think that you are so lucky to live in this place, to enjoy such peaceful afternoons. Things that were only in the dreams of the old cow herder who, more than 40 years ago, was still a soldier fighting on the battlefield.

Thanks to the suburban afternoons, suspended between sun and wind and sadness and joy, isn’t that also a “resting moment” for the soul to continue loving the city and people? What could be more beautiful than that moment, when you return, carrying with you a windy suburban soul, when the street lamps have just lit up and run along the winding road along the river and in the sky, the blue evening star is twinkling like a smiling eye?