Winds of peace on this blessed land.
The wind still blows, the clouds still drift, and for me, peace is simply when everyone's lips curve into the most serene smiles!
April 22, 2025
These days, everyone is looking towards Ho Chi Minh City with eager anticipation for a historic moment. Half a century has passed, and no one could have imagined that the land once illuminated by the light of dawn would now shine so brightly with magnificent skyscrapers and a modern tram line running through the city. My mother still exclaims how beautiful the city is now! This woman, who went through the war in her early twenties, now has hair as white as morning mist as she still tells her children old stories about this land.
For about half a month now, the city sky has been filled with the roar of airplanes. The strange thing, as my mother says, is that in the past, people would hide at the sound of planes, but now, people pour out into the streets, look up, and laugh and talk with immense joy. That joy can only be brought about by peace. But the peace of this S-shaped land is the result of a long period of arduous but indomitable struggle. The war is over, but it has left behind stories that, even after 50 years, still resonate in the hearts of the nation. From our grandparents to our parents and to us, those of us not born during the war, the memories of our generation are passed down and etched into our minds with an incredibly sacred sense of pride.
Just recently, in the early days of that historic April, I attended a gathering with students from a university in Ho Chi Minh City. The auditorium, filled with about 300 students, fell silent when they chose to perform a play about war right on the stage. Surprisingly, when the play ended and a song about youth and those resilient years played over the sound system, the students below the stage applauded and sang along enthusiastically. When I asked them if peace was beautiful, almost all 300 students shouted in unison: "It's very beautiful!" Peace isn't beautiful because of magnificent skyscrapers, not because of trams, and certainly not because of branded smartphones, but because right here in this auditorium, we sit, enjoying peace while still singing revolutionary songs with gratitude to those who laid down their lives so that our country could be united. Peace is beautiful and can be even more radiant if each young person knows how to beautify it with knowledge and dedication to their homeland. At that gathering, I was quite surprised to see that the young people had arranged to wear red shirts with yellow stars, a meeting on April 30th along the routes where parades and marches would pass. That is the beauty of peace that young people are building through their actions and awareness.
My maternal relatives insisted on renting a 16-seater van from Dong Thap to Ho Chi Minh City a day in advance and staying until the end of the week to celebrate the holiday. Celebrating the holiday meant watching parades, marches, cannon firing, riding the tram… Everything was meticulously planned by my uncle. He fled to Saigon with his maternal grandparents when he was just a teenager. On Liberation Day, he was terrified and hid at home. When he heard the radio announce the surrender, his grandmother led him to the end of the alley to watch the tanks pass through Nga Bay towards Phu Lam, heading towards the military assembly center. He said that was the moment he knew the country would be silent, and he would be able to return to school and study properly. Fifty years passed in the blink of an eye. He returned to his maternal grandparents' village and chose to live there, working as a civil servant from the commune to the province until his retirement. For him, peace meant living, living without the constant fear of being caught between life and death. Like the stories of my brother, my relatives, there are those who left home and never returned.
The citizens of this land are undoubtedly the most eager to await the moment of national pride that will be solemnly celebrated right in the most developed metropolis of the country. People often liken this land to a blessed place where people from all directions gather, live, work, and play together. Nowhere else is quite like this land, where openness, tolerance, generosity, magnanimity, and righteousness have created a multifaceted and thriving city. Here, everything can intertwine and gradually become an indispensable harmony on the path of development. As Hero of the People's Armed Forces – Colonel Nguyen Thi Thao once shared with me, this is the fruit of peace. Only when living in peace can people and the country have the conditions to progress. In the memories still etched in the mind of this 85-year-old female intelligence agent, the very first moment of Saigon's liberation, she and her comrades embraced each other and exclaimed: "Peace has come!" Their joy at that time was a smile mixed with tears. However, 50 years later, her joy at peace is more complete, with a smile on her face than ever before.
In April, Ho Chi Minh City was bathed in sunshine and gentle breezes. I walked from the bustling Nguyen Hue Street to Bach Dang River Park, where the artillery pieces were on display and being used in drills. It was a weekend afternoon, and the place was packed with people, all laughing and taking photos as souvenirs. Couples in love had chosen this moment to capture meaningful wedding photos. Artillery soldiers were constantly approached by people asking to take pictures with them. Everyone wore the brightest smiles. The wind continued to blow, the clouds drifted by, and for me, peace was simply the serene smiles on everyone's faces!
