Tết

There are pictures that look ordinary like this, nevertheless really mean a lot to me. Indeed, those who are faraway are those who appreciate the commonness the most.

It's almost the Lunar New Year in my home country. According to Vietnamese time zone, today is the 30th of Tết, i.e. the thirtieth day of the December, or the New Year's Eve. On this day, my family would make spring rolls as an offering to farewell the old year. Things like showering, nail cutting, house cleaning, motorbike washing must be completed on the same day. Sure, it is a busy day.

For me, being so faraway from home, the only thing that I can do is to gather with my Vietnamese friends to have a big meal celebrating the end of the old year.

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Now, coming back to the reasons why ordinary photos can thrill the heart of the faraway:

This old lady brought home green bananas to decorate the Five-fruit offering which would be presented during the Lunar New Year. Every year, I would accompany my mom to the market, looking at her choosing the best looking fruit for the Five-fruit offering.

In focus is the electricity post that is so familiar and typical of the Old streets area in Hanoi.

But out of focus is something even more typical of my hometown, and specially of days before Tết. Crowd of people flood the streets. Every one was purchasing new clothes, decorations, sweets and food for the holiday. I was once, part of that flow of hurry to prepare for Tết.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1841835221480&set=a.1025319169089.3861.1708571393&type=1&theater

Chợ Hoa ngày Tết

Flower fair, 

sell mostly peach blossom, but sometimes small cactus, camellias, and daffodils. 

There's also flower arrangement, and vases.

Crowded,

but if one doesn't visit it for once,

one wouldn't feel like New Year is coming.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1819359379598&set=a.1025319169089.3861.1708571393&type=1&theater

Just a common corner of a street that I can find anywhere in Hanoi. But this lady who sells paper clothes hints that Tết is coming. During New Year offering, we presented our ancestry with money, gold and clothes made of paper and burnt at the end of the New Year holiday.

There are much more details of life, bits of soul, fragrance of heart that when I walked around, I never knew were embedded in the land where I live. As I become faraway from it, these pieces become golden and so valuable that it engulfs my body with warmth, just looking at the photo.

There would be many years more until that day when I step into the scene of these pictures again. And toward this, I am powerless. Apart from waiting, I have no way to sooth myself.