Tue Tinh Street - Green street corner

(Baonghean) - Among the streets of Vinh City, there are streets with their own characteristics. There are streets whose names match the scenery, people, and typical activities of the street. The sun is shining and the autumn rain is capricious, passing through the streets makes you know autumn has come, to reminisce, to feel nostalgic... Come and slowly feel the green color of the street on Tue Tinh Street...

Tue Tinh Street

At first, it must be said that on this street there is Nghe An Traditional Medicine Hospital. Then there are many pharmacies concentrated at Hung Dung market at the beginning of the street (intersection with Nguyen Phong Sac street) and then gradually spread out to the end of the street deep in Nghi Phu commune bordering Hung Loc land (the end point connects with Truong Van Linh street). The provincial Traditional Medicine Hospital is hidden behind a wall embracing the campus with thick canopy of ancient trees, its quiet appearance is of course suitable for the elderly to rest and receive treatment. Then I wonder if the traditional medicine and western medicine sellers have ever meticulously paid attention to the fact that they are practicing a profession that requires virtue on the street named after Tue Tinh - the founder of the country's pharmaceutical industry? However, I have walked on that street many times, whether through the hustle and bustle of a market or the many offices and houses on the street that are built spaciously, I still unconsciously have realistic associations with the street name.

Only about one and a half kilometers long, Tue Tinh Street has witnessed a rapid change in the street surface over the past decade. But the impression is the green color of the sidewalk with trees and grass. Zen Master Tue Tinh has a saying that is passed down as "Southern medicine treats Southern people", expressing a dialectical view on the close relationship between humans and the surrounding living environment to build an independent, autonomous medical perspective, close to the reality of the ancient Southern country (Dai Viet) which had a strong will to resist the assimilation of the North. In his medical theory, Tue Tinh did not put "metal, wood, water, fire, earth" first but placed trees and grass (medicinal materials) first. So, do you think that the intention of naming the street sometimes creates a characteristic green color of trees and grass on this street?

Now it is Autumn. The trees and leaves will shed their last sap to start the season of shedding leaves. Just like that, all the plants and trees will naturally shed their leaves, show off their buds, and display their flowers... but the "herbs" on Tue Tinh Street are still imbued with the "autumn spirit" as a memory of a street that forces us to remember and ponder. I remember the road when it was still a path in the city, not letting people think it had been "plasticized", because of the patches in the long process of urban traffic restoration after the war. The whole route, including Hung Dung market, was a street with bamboo trees and dense wild trees along the fence. Going all the way to the end of the road at the Provincial Military School, there were a few old casuarina trees on the grass bordering the road with the green rice fields of the young season.

But, if we want to talk about a green color, if the old people in the street are reminded, they will also "yes" to "compromise" that the street is honored to be chosen to be the location of the C20 Military Uniform Factory, which is now a joint stock company with a facade that has opened many services. But more than ten years ago, it was still crowded with boarding houses for contract garment workers, and shabby shops selling military uniforms. Next to that, Hung Dung market at that time had not been newly built, and there were also rows of green vegetables and fruits stretching out onto the street. If it were not for that market, perhaps the whole first part of the street would not have had the connecting section that makes up the expanded and beautiful Tue Tinh street, with some parts bustling and some parts quiet like it is now.

At the end of the first section where Nguyen Sy Sach Street and Phung Chi Kien Street intersect, running parallel to the two banks of the North Canal, is the Provincial Party Committee Bridge. The land where Nghe An Provincial Party Committee once stood behind the Provincial Traditional Medicine Hospital running to the North of the street was later divided among residents who were cadres and employees, contributing to the creation of the "official's house" area along with the western side of the street belonging to Ha Huy Tap Ward. Due to such residential conditions, the alleys leading to both sides of the street, whether wide or narrow, are all cared for with a clean, beautiful standard and harmonious green color of meticulously trimmed ornamental trees, many places are covered with yellow, purple, and red climbing plants that linger in the heart. Each sidewalk section, therefore, becomes like a small green natural landscape, depending on the homeowner's preference, clinging to the green color of the newly planted trees of the Green Park Company.

Many streets in Vinh City are planted with parasol trees. There are several types of parasol trees. But perhaps the type planted on the sidewalk is the one that poet Bich Khe created a masterpiece in Vietnamese literature: "Oh, sadness lingers on the parasol tree/Falling gold! Falling gold! Immense autumn"; or literary allusions often mention the two sentences: "Ngo dong nhat diep lac, thien ha cong thien thu" (Translation: one parasol leaf falls, everyone knows autumn has come) to describe the scene of separation or the scene of autumn coming, bringing with it the melancholy sadness of "autumn heart"... Well, because it's autumn now, I want to mention the parasol trees at the beginning of Tue Tinh street. There are 3 parasol trees at the beginning of the street opposite Hung Dung market and a few trees in front of C20 Garment Factory, not mixed in with the green trees on the sidewalk like in other streets, nor are they complicated in their branches, but are strong, showing off their thick, sharp thorns, standing alone like sentinels reminding people in the crowded street to protect the green nature. Parasol trees "port" to the sidewalk of Tue Tinh street, as writer Bang Son said about the Hanoi banyan tree, those trees are also "citizens" of Vinh street.

I wonder if the saint of traditional medicine - the famous physician of the past and present, Tue Tinh, has ever "soured" some of his herbal prescriptions with insects that thrive on the dew of plants and grasses? But on Tue Tinh Street in Vinh City, a year later, a drinking place has opened... insects! Crickets, grasshoppers, stink bugs... processed with chives, lemon leaves, Vietnamese coriander, lemongrass, betel leaves... to make a spicy dish that is of course delicious! Ah, but strangely, the owner of that drinking place, a very young math teacher at a central college in the province, opened a drinking place to eat insects but was interested in selling clean vegetables and fruits, including melons, eggplants, salt... just displaying them abundantly on the sidewalk to sell, making people in the street trust them more than packaged goods from supermarkets. So, I wonder if that "teacher" chose the street or the street chose him, creating a street feature that makes people associate passersby with the street name of the saint of traditional medicine, Tue Tinh.

Sam Temple