PREFACE
I
never have a thought that I will write and publish my own book someday in the
future. Writing is not my forte. In fact, with me, writing a three-page-essay
is much harder than solving one hundred Mathematics problems. I have my ideas,
but it is difficult to express them by words. Therefore, with this project, I
thought too much what the good topic to write about. Finally, I choose reading
and books, because those things inspire me too much by the way they came into
my life and delight it. I hope you all will have good moment with my memoir,
also can get some good things from my work.
A BOOKWORM’S CONFESSION
People
around me have always talked about their love, true love, with someone; how
they were happy when they are falling in love with a person and how their
hearts were broken after relationships. In my case, I have a lover which will
never hurt me; it help me improve instead. This is books. However, whenever I
buy books, people usually wonder why I spend too much money for those. Once, a
classmate said to me that it would be better if I used those amounts of money
for the clothes, food or something else. I cannot help accepting that they do
not love to reading, and this truth makes me sad. Let me talk about how the
books change my mind and become an important element of my daily life.
Firstly,
I had to say that I was not a naturally bookworm. In fact, I was used to really
hate reading and usually got the low scores in reading at school. All I could
read during my childhood time is comic, or manga
in Japanese, or manhwa in Korean, or
whatever people call the stories with mainly images. And maybe I would never love reading book if
my teacher did not give to me a book, for the English highest final grade in
class. I still remember how I felt when I received the reward from my teacher,
neither happy nor sad, just confused. Because I had never receive a gift like
that one, a meaningful and useful thing.
My
teacher’s gift is a Korean novel named Please
Look after Mom. The author – Kyung-Sook Shin - wrote about the perspectives
of members in a family after found out their mother was lost. Till the end,
they could not meet their mother again although they tried their best to find
her. I felt the pain and regretful of those characters while they were thinking
about their missing mother, about the days that they did not treasure her. The
ugly truth that they did not understand her and also know where to find her.
Finishing this touching novel, I immediately stood in front of my parents and
expressed how much I love them. Looking at their wide smiles after my confession,
I was glad because finally I could tell to them. That book did not help me find
out that I love my parents – indeed I have been always know that. It just
taught me how to express myself by the simple way.
Since
then, I started to walk in the bookworm’s life. Buying, reading and saving them
as the most precious things in the world. My parents were so surprised with the
fact I spent most of my time in reading books. Because, as my two closet
relatives, they understood how much I hate reading. However, they were very
happy by my change, especially my mother, who had been a high school teacher
before I was born. As a result, the most wonderful birthday gift when I was
sixteen was the set of five books of my favorite author, a Vietnamese writer
who writes the story for children – Nguyễn Nhật Ánh.
In
addition, the kind of book I like the most is travelling book. The authors
write a review, sharing their experiences of travelling to somewhere. You do
not need to go to a place or a country to know about its culture, climate,
people and so on. Just by a travelling book, you will know all simple things
about the place that you want to go to. Those information also help you to
prepare well before travelling to somewhere, avoiding the culture shock and
some common problems with the native people. By this way, your trips will be
going on well without regretful or anger.
One
more thing, I do not remember when the electronic book, called briefly is
e-book, became popular in the society. But, there is one thing which I am very
sure that I do not like the e-book. The reason is simple, I cannot find the
love feeling when I touch the screen of electronic devices as when I hold the
books in my both hands. Maybe I was born and raised up at the time that people just
knew about the printed book, so it is hard to change the habit to something
new, something I cannot have a real touch. I am used to the touch between my
hands and my fingers with books. I also like to smell them, although I know it
is not good for health. It is like there are many people have similar points
with the one you love, but you cannot love them like the way you love him or
her.
In conclusion, I really do not hope to listen to some
questions like “Why you must waste too much money for books?”. It is not have
any concrete reason when you are falling in love with something. It is just the
way I consider that is good for my life. Books, as first love, are something
that I find my peace.
WAR IS
NEVER A GOOD THING
I
was born in 1993. Fortunately, that was the peaceful time, no more war, or
famine. It was not like my mother, or even my grandmother time – the war time.
“There was the shot sound everywhere, people did not have an enough safe place
to stay over 3 hours” – my mother said. Most children in my generation, hardly understand
all the difficulties, the pains and the losses during the war time. However,
whenever I listened my mother talk about that time, I felt the pain deeply in
my heart, for my country – Vietnam – and people also. Our beloved country was
covered in the death and crisis for more than one hundred years, lasted from
1858 to 1975. I did not know much about the time that France dominated our
country; but concerning the Vietnam War, I got much tragic stories from older
people – who were born or underwent that age – about their family, friends,
losses and tortures.
War,
by any reason, was never a good thing. Even the World War II – which might be
considered as the only way to settle the complex circumstance of the world –
dragged many society and environment problems in later years. Through reading
books relate to the War, I knew the causes of Vietnam War. However, in my
opinion, the war should not occurred, when after it, neither the America nor
the Vietnam get benefits in economy or society.
One of the most famous pictures from the Vietnam War. The picture was taken by Nick Ut, when the children ran on the street of Trang Bang Town, Tay Ninh Province after it was bombed. NickUt/AP.
I
have a disabled cousin in the paternal side. He was born with an imperfect
body, he could not talk, walk or do simple things like eating and urinating. He
passed away last year, after laying in one spot and getting his mother’s help
for almost eighteen years. He was affected by the remnants of Agent Orange – a
mixture of two herbicides that America had dropped to our country. My cousin is
not the only one lived all life with the disease. Now, after forty years, many
children are still ravaged by the Agent Orange and many families must suffer
the pain from this. How exciting and happy parents are when they are looking
forward a newborn baby? And at the moment when baby comes out, they suddenly
freaked out by the fact their baby is not complete. There is the love go along with
the yearning whenever they look at their child, at the consequence of the
meaningless war.
The
Vietnam War was officially ended in 1975. Our country was united again, but we
had to pass the difficult time ever. Southern had to transport the food to the
Northern, helped to build the new economy. Everybody, every families did not
have the rights for freedom in trading food and goods. My mother said each
family had a book with which they would get food every month as the amount in
the book. No more, but sometimes less. At that time, the book was like the life
of everyone, it was precious than anything else. Furthermore, there was not
much rice or meat; there were just sweet potato and pumpkin. Therefore,
sometimes people had to eat them in many months instead of rice. There was a
story from one of my teachers, which might be funny and bitter at the same time.
When he was a child, his family were just given the pumpkins for daily meals.
He had to eat pumpkins for almost a year. Therefore, now whenever he looks at
the pumpkin; he will have headache and his breath become heavier. At the first
time I knew his sickness, I just found it funny. However, after learning about
the War; I gradually understood why my teacher could be scared of pumpkins too
much.
Moreover,
in recent years, the relationship between Vietnam and China started to tighten
again. Most young people could not control their angers with China’s acts on
the South China Sea – which Vietnamese usually call as Eastern Sea; so, they
called for a war with that neighboring country. Maybe they thought that war
could solve all political problems. However, I do not think so. War is the last
thing in the Earth you can think about for solving conflicts. It is not like
you can get what you want without losing. In my opinion, war is the long
process in which people must exchange their lives for the peace. It also like
the lasting nightmare, covering our history and following nations no matter how
many years have passed.
Even
though I never lived through a war day, but I completely understand the
direness of wars. I knew that through the tears in parents’ eyes when the think
about their children who sacrificed in the wars. I also got it directly by
looking at disabled children and old pictures also. And so on. There is nothing
truer than the feeling of people who had walked through the excruciating pain.
They had hoped for a miracle, then they were disappointed and had to accept
that the war got their relatives away, forever and ever. I hope there will be
no any war occurs in our world again.
“THE HEN WHO DREAMED SHE COULD FLY”
I
am always fascinated by Asian literature, such as China, Japan or Korean. On my
bookshelves, there are about thirty or forty books from the authors of those
countries. Growing up in a country which belongs to Asia; so, my mind is
affected by the Eastern culture; as a result, I have better nexus with those
books. Two days ago, I looked at my bookshelves to find a book that could
inspire me to write an introduction for.
It did not take me too long to find out what was the good choice at
current time - “The Hen Who Dreamed She
Could Fly” of Korean author Sun-mi Hwang.
In
Korea, this novel is listed as a book for children, but it could not be denied
that it also affects to the adults. First, let me quote a brief summary about
the novel from website goodreads.com: “This is
the story of a hen named Sprout. No longer content to lay eggs on command, only
to have them carted off to the market, she glimpses her future every morning
through the barn doors, where the other animals roam free, and comes up with a
plan to escape into the wild—and to hatch an egg of her own”. That is
not just the adventure of Sprout – the hen’s name – to escapes from the cage
and find her own freedom. Through the story, I see the relationship of
characters, differentiations, parenthood, and friendship and so on.
The
first version of this book I read is Vietnamese version, under the name “Cô Gà Mái Xổng Chuồng”. Although the
novel is not too thick, exactly just equal one third of a novel of Harry Potter series, I spent about four
hours to finish it in the nice summer morning. When reading it, I had to stop
many times, thinking about the meanings behind each sentences and details.
Author draws good pictures through words. I found myself and my situation in
some corners of story. I like the way Sprout dreamed and used all her efforts
to make it came true, even though she knew there was many difficulties outside
the cage, even though she understood she could die. There was no food outside,
there was also the weasel – who could suddenly attack and eat her. She had to
learn how to survive alone, which a lay-egg hen would never did. Her dream
might be fabulous, but she still tried to catch it anyway.
To
be honest, I did very admire Sprout; because during my early life, I had been
never tried by all my ability to reach my dreams, like she did. I was bother
too much about what I should and should not do, what people would think about
me if I did something. I had lived a life that was limited in the boundaries of
people around which I listened from time to time since I was a child. There
were many sentences began with “You cannot…” or “You must…” from older ones. It
was kind of culture of my younger years’ habitat, older people were always true.
They also had many prejudices of how we should to act and live. Therefore,
sometime I could not determine what I want and be confused with my future. When
I read this book, I just realized that how foolish I was when I lived based on
opinions of the others in many years.
Furthermore,
in “The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly”,
Sun-mi Hwang built an amazing mother and son relationship. Her son – Greentop –
was not born by her, and was not the same species like her also. He was a
mallard, and she took care for him since he was just an egg. They had lived
together until he met his fellows and came back with them. At the ending
chapter, Sprout was very lonely, she wanted to live with her son, but she could
not. The most touching moment was when the mallard flied over Sprout’s head and
called “Mom”, then he followed his group to fly away from her, forever. A
bitter truth, he could fly when she could not; so, no matter how much she
wanted to fly with him, she just could stand on the ground and looked at his
figure. I remembered I stopped at that moment so long, thinking about my
parents. They gave birth to me and raised me up for eighteen years. They were
used to the life that their children were there with them. However, the
children might be not. At eighteen years old, they just started the new chapter
of their own life and tried to chase their dreams. They would have many new
relationships outside, were busy with their plan and work; by those they forgot
their parents. Actually, I do not understand the culture of America or Western
countries too much; but in my country, that was true.
Finally,
Sprout died, but she was contented. She had completed her dream – hatched an
egg and beheld the moment Greentop break the shell. Her life was moving from
the small cage to the garden, and the field, and the sky. The wider places went
along with more dangerous and lonely; however, Sprout was never think about
comeback to the cage and continued living as a laying-egg hen. Generally,
Sprout had a perfect and meaningful lifetime.
WORD
CITED
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17707648-the-hen-who-dreamed-she-could-fly
