Oh another Vietnamese day I wasn’t aware of. I’ve just watched a news story VTV referring to Vietnam Family Day (June 28, make a date in your diary), and I’m gravely disappointed.
Apparently I’m something of an outcast, one of the great uncivilised - academically unwashed, as so far I have failed to secure a certificate from my local ward praising my intellectualism with a much needed ‘culture family’ stamp of approval.
Do I not read the London Review of Books, The Economist and well known football magazine Four Four Two? Is that not sufficient? Perhaps my taste in art-house Vietnamese cinema (yes, the Scent of Green Papaya did drag on, but check the colour gamut!) or appreciation for Soviet film-maker Eisenstein’s revolutionary adoption of rapid-cutting in Battleship Potemkin’s steps of Odessa’s gun battle scene (later ripped off by Brian De Palma in The Untouchables) isn’t high-brow enough? Is Jazz musician John Coltrane’s Love Supreme album really filed under easy listening in the local CD shop? I’m beginning to wonder.
I curiously browsed several websites trying to find the missing elements in my cultural life that would win me this prestigious award, but apparently there aren’t any criteria laid out in English, so via the ever trusty Google translate I discovered that in order to qualify I had to meet the Ministry of Culture’s guidelines at http://www.bvhttdl.gov.vn/vn/vb-qly-nn/1/306/index.html. So I did a list:
Obey the law – check!
Maintain security… - I do lock the door every night, does that count?
…Political and social order and safety - OK…I think, I drive on the correct side of the road and wear a helmet
Do not violate regulations on the implementation of a civilized lifestyle during marriage, funerals and festivals - hmm might have failed this when I drank a bit too much at the CAMA music festival?
Preserve family harmony, happiness, progress, support and help people in the community – Sorry, what, there’s a regulation on ensuring you’re polite to your mother in law, and you have to be dutiful to your parents and grandparents - thankfully mine are several thousand miles away
Each couple has one or two, not a third child - I only qualify if I have one or two children?! I can’t be cultured with none?
Regular exercise and sports – What is this, how is it quantified?
I’m beginning to wonder how anyone can actually qualify for this amazing honour. What starts off as a regular list of obeying the law (yes there is such a regulation, I always assumed that was quite normal as a citizen but apparently not), we then move into the morality lessons. The criteria read more like a lesson in stuffy etiquette rather than anything to actually bettering yourself as a person in the wider sense – as apparently you’re a perfect renaissance man if you thank your mum for cooking and then go and play football with the lads rather than read a book. I’d have thought whether you do voluntary work, have studied at university, did additional vocational training, practice music in your spare time or have a collection of books to rival the National Library as more appropriate. The list seems to be more to about conforming rather than excelling as an individual or family, and the criteria in themselves do nothing to enhance culture at all. They’re just basic guidelines about how to be a normal person…maybe I’m just not spending enough time drinking tea and smoking Vinataba with the local ward Bas and Ongs to qualify as the perfect citizen?
I was a disappointed as I continued watching the story about Vietnam Family Day as it trotted out supposed truths about social development in such a clichéd way. Modern realities were dismissed out of hand, such as the increasing rate of young couples getting divorced being cited as a negative phenomenon, rather than recognising the fact that for the first time in centuries people can escape being entrapped in a life they no longer want. While an increase in reported cases of domestic violence was decried, ignoring the fact that domestic violence long preceded Doi Moi, and it is only now that women feel confident enough to report the cases. I was equally disappointed that the report mentioned little about the emphasis that Vietnam puts on education as one of the more noteworthy tenets of Confucianism. Isn’t it better to judge that a person has achieved a degree than to worry yourself whether she’s a divorcee and shouldn’t a man be judged more by the books he reads than the make of mobile phone he uses?
So while celebrating your family, perhaps give a thought to that one project that you’ve always put off, be it learning to dance salsa or a musical instrument, taking up painting, cooking spaghetti bolognaise or some equally exotic dish at home, or like me try to learn Vietnamese (again), then you’ll really be deserving of that ‘cultural family’ certificate.
Apparently I’m something of an outcast, one of the great uncivilised - academically unwashed, as so far I have failed to secure a certificate from my local ward praising my intellectualism with a much needed ‘culture family’ stamp of approval.Do I not read the London Review of Books, The Economist and well known football magazine Four Four Two? Is that not sufficient? Perhaps my taste in art-house Vietnamese cinema (yes, the Scent of Green Papaya did drag on, but check the colour gamut!) or appreciation for Soviet film-maker Eisenstein’s revolutionary adoption of rapid-cutting in Battleship Potemkin’s steps of Odessa’s gun battle scene (later ripped off by Brian De Palma in The Untouchables) isn’t high-brow enough? Is Jazz musician John Coltrane’s Love Supreme album really filed under easy listening in the local CD shop? I’m beginning to wonder.
I curiously browsed several websites trying to find the missing elements in my cultural life that would win me this prestigious award, but apparently there aren’t any criteria laid out in English, so via the ever trusty Google translate I discovered that in order to qualify I had to meet the Ministry of Culture’s guidelines at http://www.bvhttdl.gov.vn/vn/vb-qly-nn/1/306/index.html. So I did a list:
Obey the law – check!
Maintain security… - I do lock the door every night, does that count?
…Political and social order and safety - OK…I think, I drive on the correct side of the road and wear a helmet
Do not violate regulations on the implementation of a civilized lifestyle during marriage, funerals and festivals - hmm might have failed this when I drank a bit too much at the CAMA music festival?
Preserve family harmony, happiness, progress, support and help people in the community – Sorry, what, there’s a regulation on ensuring you’re polite to your mother in law, and you have to be dutiful to your parents and grandparents - thankfully mine are several thousand miles away
Each couple has one or two, not a third child - I only qualify if I have one or two children?! I can’t be cultured with none?
Regular exercise and sports – What is this, how is it quantified?
I’m beginning to wonder how anyone can actually qualify for this amazing honour. What starts off as a regular list of obeying the law (yes there is such a regulation, I always assumed that was quite normal as a citizen but apparently not), we then move into the morality lessons. The criteria read more like a lesson in stuffy etiquette rather than anything to actually bettering yourself as a person in the wider sense – as apparently you’re a perfect renaissance man if you thank your mum for cooking and then go and play football with the lads rather than read a book. I’d have thought whether you do voluntary work, have studied at university, did additional vocational training, practice music in your spare time or have a collection of books to rival the National Library as more appropriate. The list seems to be more to about conforming rather than excelling as an individual or family, and the criteria in themselves do nothing to enhance culture at all. They’re just basic guidelines about how to be a normal person…maybe I’m just not spending enough time drinking tea and smoking Vinataba with the local ward Bas and Ongs to qualify as the perfect citizen?
I was a disappointed as I continued watching the story about Vietnam Family Day as it trotted out supposed truths about social development in such a clichéd way. Modern realities were dismissed out of hand, such as the increasing rate of young couples getting divorced being cited as a negative phenomenon, rather than recognising the fact that for the first time in centuries people can escape being entrapped in a life they no longer want. While an increase in reported cases of domestic violence was decried, ignoring the fact that domestic violence long preceded Doi Moi, and it is only now that women feel confident enough to report the cases. I was equally disappointed that the report mentioned little about the emphasis that Vietnam puts on education as one of the more noteworthy tenets of Confucianism. Isn’t it better to judge that a person has achieved a degree than to worry yourself whether she’s a divorcee and shouldn’t a man be judged more by the books he reads than the make of mobile phone he uses?
So while celebrating your family, perhaps give a thought to that one project that you’ve always put off, be it learning to dance salsa or a musical instrument, taking up painting, cooking spaghetti bolognaise or some equally exotic dish at home, or like me try to learn Vietnamese (again), then you’ll really be deserving of that ‘cultural family’ certificate.
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