Flower street during Tet

(Baonghean) - Spring hasn't even arrived yet, but on one street corner, countless flowers are already displaying their beauty and color in the brilliant sunshine. The daily hustle and bustle suddenly seems to slow down in the minds of passersby, who exclaim joyfully, "Oh, Tet is here!" For many years, flower vendors in Vinh City have chosen Lenin Avenue as their Tet flower market. All we know is that many people on the street have naturally come to call it the "Tet flower street"...

Every city has its own sources of pride. Lenin Boulevard (formerly known as "3-2," referring to the founding date of the Communist Party of Vietnam) is also one of the sources of pride for Vinh City today. This wide, two-way, eight-lane road can be seen as a testament to the aspirations for resurgence and strong development of Vinh City, a first-class urban center.

Flower-lined street on Lenin Avenue. Photo: Thu Huong

Before offices, hotels, supermarkets, car showrooms, and high-rise urban areas sprang up, this road, nestled amidst the lush green fields of vegetables, was a truly romantic thoroughfare. For young couples in the city, especially during the summer, everyone surely had the opportunity to leisurely cycle or ride their motorbikes along the street, chatting happily while enjoying the refreshing breeze under the bright moonlight. The road transformed into a unique urban space, and gradually, with urban planning and expansion, it became a central hub connecting all the roads crisscrossing the city. Houses became more numerous, and the road busier, but its romantic and expansive charm did not diminish.

It's unclear whether the original planners, when designing this road, immediately envisioned it becoming the grand boulevard it is today; but visitors from both the North and South to Nghe An, whether arriving at the airport or traveling along the boulevard to Cua Lo beach, all acknowledge this as a strategically important road, considered the long-term backbone of Vinh's inner-city transportation. Starting from the roundabout in front of the Nghe An Customs Office, Lenin Boulevard is nearly 2 km long, running alongside Soviet Nghe Tinh Boulevard at the point where the Sara Group building stands—considered one of the first high-rise buildings to be erected along this route. On both sides of the boulevard are the wards of Hung Dung, Hung Phuc, Ha Huy Tap, Nghi Phu, etc., so the road is also considered a street axis where the cultural and historical influences of these regions, spanning centuries of migration and convergence, intersect.

But perhaps the most striking and seemingly endearing aspect of Lenin Avenue is its status as a "flower street during Tet (Lunar New Year)." Before the city began clearing and leveling the land at the Customs roundabout, a long stretch of the avenue was lined with ornamental trees and artistic sculptures. It could be said that at that time, this was the largest and most diverse area for selling ornamental plants in the city center, a place where connoisseurs and those simply in love with plants, regardless of age, could immerse themselves in a miniature green nature, feeling the sprouting roots and the blossoming flowers dedicated to life under human care... For nearly a decade, these ornamental trees existed like that, along with the remaining bamboo, banana trees, and wild plants in the empty land behind them; and strangely, no one walking on the wide avenue noticed the unevenness of the street construction; and romantics even imagined it as a deliberate design to liven up the street. Now that the rows of ornamental plants have been moved to the end of the street, some even onto Soviet-Nghe Tinh Boulevard, the street seems to have lost its charm; a few ornamental plant shops with gardens in Nghi An and Nghi Duc occasionally seem to miss the street, bringing plants to sell sporadically across the street, only to pack them up and leave for a while after a few days...

Initially, the flower stalls along the boulevards were scattered along both sides, mainly featuring peach blossoms and kumquats from the North; later, there were also Kỳ Sơn rock peach blossoms and even from Laos. Now, there are kumquats, apricot blossoms, peach blossoms, and a myriad of colors and fragrances from various regions, bringing spring to the streets. Starting in the last week of the twelfth lunar month, when the cold weather begins to set in, many families, even those who haven't bought flowers yet, gather here to admire and comment on the blossoms, anticipating when the apricot and peach blossoms will bloom and show off their colors... If you stand on a high-rise and look down, stroking the view along Lenin Boulevard at this time, you will see the road suddenly appear like embroidered silk, strangely beautiful. In Vinh City, many streets like Phan Đình Phùng and Trần Phú have also become "Tet flower streets" at some point, but surely none have the leisurely way of buying and selling as here. Prices vary, from a few hundred thousand dong for a single plant to tens of millions of dong for a potted plant. Yet, it seems that those who are fortunate enough to receive blessings at the end of the year, as well as those who are thrifty, all share the same mindset in buying and selling, creating a warm atmosphere of traditional Tet.

The city of Vinh is becoming more modern and attractive every day. With each Tet holiday, the city seems to become even more impressive, promising a promising direction for development in the North Central region. Lenin Boulevard, in particular, embodies the spirit and aspirations of people striving to contribute to the "growth" of their hometown. This boulevard carries a unique sense of pride for Vinh, a vibrant and youthful city, yet it retains the fresh, gentle spirit of a "Tet flower street" in the hearts of its people.

Dinh Sam