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Hanoi. City of the Rising Dragon.
Maryland, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2002, 187 p.
with G. Boudarel (1926-2003), foreword by William J. Duiker,
translated by Claire Duiker
Hanoi. City of the Rising Dragon.
Maryland, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2002, 187 p.
with G. Boudarel (1926-2003), foreword by William J. Duiker,
translated by Claire Duiker





§ A City which Remembers



Rural City or Urban Village


The thousand-year-old city was also shaped by its people, who gave it a soul and a cultural richness that softened the more austere contributions of the scholarly community. Western travelers in the 17th century estimated the number of homes in the city at 20,000, which corresponds to a population of around 100,000 inhabitants. By the 19th century, though, there were no more than 60,000 people living in Hanoi. This is undoubtedly due to the transfer of the capital to Hue, which emptied the city of a substantial part of its population.

The French loved to repeat that “Hanoi was a big village,” a remark which actually has some truth to it. There has always been a constant influx of people from rural areas into the city, the numbers varying over the centuries according to political, economic, and social conditions. This steady migration, however, never became an exodus, since the countryside remained a place of security and refuge in case of war or social strife. But the city always exercised a powerful pull on surrounding villages because of its reputation as an active place of commerce. During the colonial era, the influx of destitute villagers was so great that the municipality of Hanoi had to pick them up every month by the hundreds and place them in a shelter for the homeless at Bach Mai, on the outskirts of town. This trend continues today as poor peasants arrive daily from the Delta, exacerbating an already heavy population density. On the outskirts of the city one still finds many beggars from Thai Binh, a Delta province that has been overpopulated for centuries.

The rural population that moved into the city did not, however, abandon their customs, traditions, or way of life. They brought with them a whole host of social and spiritual practices from their native regions which helped them to preserve the past while confronting the future. Many came to the city accompanied by their families, sometimes even their whole clan, and sought employment as artisans or merchants, without ever abandoning their habits of daily village life. Many have retained the physical mannerisms of their region, revealing an entire state of mind in a simple gesture. The way some recent arrivals squat, for example, with their feet planted on low stools or on a chair at a theater, reveals a certain nonchalance and carefree attitude towards the future which is characteristic of their region.

Street Life in Hanoi: the phuong


If the village is the heart of rural life, its urban counterpart is the phuong—a word which is usually translated by “neighborhood” and whose origin dates to the 13th century. The phuong was much more than an administrative zone, however, as each one included one or more trade associations which usually came from the same village. They were a kind of multidimensional space which, like the village, had their own customs, festivals, cults, spirits, and territory. These phuong sprang up and flourished outside of the imperial walls. One of the more classic examples is old Hanoi itself, bordered to the east by the Red River, to the south by the southern border of Returned Sword Lake—the old Petit Lac (small lake) of colonial times, which used to be much larger than it is now—and to the west by the fortifications of the Imperial City.

The growth and development of these working-class neighborhoods in Hanoi were based mainly on two factors: family ties and professional skills. Hang Dao Street, for example, known since colonial times as the Street of Silk, is occupied by silk merchants who sell merchandise bought in neighboring areas specialized in the making of silk11. It is the same for many other streets in Hanoi..

The origin of the phuong also had a social dimension. In order to combat isolation and marginalization, immigrants from the countryside worked together in an effort to constitute an economic and social force. Without ever severing ties with their native regions, these neighborhoods served as a kind of relay point between the two worlds. In this way, immigrants lived a sort of double life: their social life revolved around the city while their hearts remained in the countryside. The countryside served as a meeting place for families, where life was organized according to the rhythm of the major holidays like Tet (the lunar new year) or the anniversary of an ancestor’s death. It was also used as a kind of haven, whereby the scholar who found himself in disagreement with those in power could always return to his native village in order to avoid confrontation.

These city streets are much more than addresses for the people of Hanoi, they also carry with them traces of the city’s history: like 10 Pho Hang Dao, for example. In 1907 it housed the seat of the Dong Kinh Nghia Thuc movement (Tonkin Free School), run by Luong Van Can and other scholars who were at odds with traditional teaching methods. Using quoc ngu12 as a new vehicle of instruction, they offered free courses, day and night, to anyone who wanted to learn about the modern spirit. This school also served as a cover for anti-French political activities, and was forced to close its doors by the local authorities after several months of operation. Like Pho Hang Dao, just about every street in Hanoi bears witness to elements of the city’s history.

The Spirit of the Streets


The names of streets tell us a lot about the past, especially about the importance of water to the city. Thus we find Hang Be Street (Street of Rafts), which was situated on a pier, and Hang Buom Street (Street of Sails), which was devoted to the business of boating sails. Until the 13th century there were canoe races on the lakes and rivers of the city, the likes of which one can still see in Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand. These boats probably navigated heavy river traffic up the Red River to old Thang Long, which even then was an important crossroads for trade and commerce.

From the 19th century until the Sino-Vietnamese conflict in 1979, the Street of Sails was especially known for its Chinese restaurants which had set up there in the 17th century. Chinese residents were also grouped in the old Phuc Kien Street, named for their home province of Fujian. It is now called Lan Ong Street, after an 18th century pharmacist who specialized in traditional medicine, and shares with nearby Thuoc Bac Street (Street of Chinese Medicine) the specialty of traditional medicines. With the outbreak of hostilities at the Vietnamese border, the Chinese community of Hanoi was taken hostage and its people were forced to pack their bags and move out.

The Street of Sails is famous for an edifice that is older than the city itself, Bach Ma Temple (Temple of the White Horse), which dates back to the 9th century. According to legend, when Ly Cong Uan, founder of the Ly dynasty, transferred the capital from Hoa Lu to Thang Long, he decided to build a fortress for their protection; but the fortress periodically collapsed. The young monarch called for a solemn ceremony to invoke protector-spirits who could help him in his enterprise. A white horse then emerged from the temple, made one circle around the fortress, and returned inside. The emperor understood the message and ordered the fortifications to be erected along the tracks left by the spirit-animal, and the temple thereupon remained standing. To show his thanks, he elevated the horse to the rank of protector-spirit of the capital.

The Temple of the White Horse also had a second function, serving as the eastern gate of the city. Abandoned and left in ruins for decades as part of the fight against superstition, the temple has recently been renovated and given back to the people of the neighborhood who are once again bringing it back to life.

Hang Trong Street (Street of Drums, renamed Avenue Jules Ferry by the colonists) presents a different case, where the shopkeeper was also the artisan. The street was once inhabited by three guilds: the drum makers from Hai Hung province fifty kilometers [31 miles] to the east of Hanoi; the parasol makers from the village of Dao Xa, in Ha Tay province, some thirty kilometers [19 miles] to the south of the capital; and the printers and designers of popular engravings, from Ha Bac province, which borders Hanoi on the northeast13. Today all of these guilds have moved elsewhere, thereby altering the appearance of the neighborhood. In 1954, Nhan dan [The People], the official organ of the Communist Party, set up its seat in this neighborhood along Returned Sword Lake. Nowadays one must go to the village of Dong Ho, still in the province of Ha Bac, to find the engravers and printers, one of the rare places which has preserved this tradition. At the approach of Tet, their market comes alive with traditional engravings marking the beginning of festivities in vivid colors.

Other streets have kept their names from days gone by. There is Hang Bac, or Street of Silver (renamed Street of the Money-changers by the French), which contained three separate guilds (for casting coins, money changers, and gold and silver smiths), all from neighboring provinces. The first group built a temple there to venerate the founder of their profession, but ceased their activities in the 19th century after the transfer of the capital to Hue. The second guild continued its operations during the colonial era, while the third erected a temple in a neighboring street in homage to the founder of their trade.

Hang Gai (Street of Hemp) has a slightly more complex history. In olden times, local artisans made and sold rope made of braided hemp. Later, engraving and printing workshops were set up there in the 19th century. It was here that the imperial viceroy lived, across from the residence of the French Résident Supérieur, the seat of the new colonial power. As for Hang Chieu (Street of Mats), the French renamed it in honor of the merchant and arms dealer Jean Dupuis—instigator of the colonial conquest of the North—who had opened a shop there in 1872. Hang Non (Street of Hats) was marked by another memory, that of the “Red” labor union which held its first congress there in 1929 at the house at number 15. Revolutionary memories also enliven Hang Ruoi (Street of the Beetle Grub)—so named because every year in the ninth lunar month a market was held to sell this popular delicacy. In 1930, the house at number 4 on this street harbored the office of the newly-founded Central Committee of the Communist Party.

Other streets of old Hanoi had less political destinies. Hang Than (Street of Coal) was originally a pier where limestone was delivered to ovens set up all along the river, then it became a coal market. Then there is Hang Giay (Street of Paper), where shopkeepers sold paper that they had bought from the artisans who lived in the village of Buoi, situated at the extreme western edge of West Lake. At the beginning of the colonial era, the street housed many Maisons des Chanteuses14, before they were moved to the outskirts of town during the 1920s.

Curiously, today there is no street in Hanoi called the Street of Rice. Previously, the commerce dealing with this important grain took place either in the central market, where the consumers usually dealt directly with the producers, or on the docks along the river. During colonial times there was a Street of Rice (Hang Gao), which passed in front of the market of Dong Xuan. The street eventually took the name of the market after independence and following the collectivization of the agricultural sector which brought about the disappearance of the rice trade.

People often speak of the “Thirty-six Neighborhoods of Hanoi,” an expression which has been in use since the 15th century and which underscores the importance of the phuong in Hanoi’s history. Each of these neighborhoods has been shaped by history, by the complex forces of immigration, trade, and political changes. The expression took on even greater popularity in the 1940s after the writer Thach Lam used it as a title for one of his stories.

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Notes

11. Hang means “merchandise” and dao means peach. At first glance, this doesn’t seem to correspond to the idea whereby the name of the street reflects the products sold there. However, the “peach” in this case refers not to the fruit but to the color of the dye most commonly used on the raw silk made in the area.
12. A Romanized transcription of the Vietnamese language devised by the Jesuit Alexandre de Rhodes and other missionaries of the 17th century.

13. On January 1, 1997, Ha Bac province was split in two: Bac Ninh and Bac Giang, returning to the old provincial borders from colonial times.

14. Centuries ago, these houses were places where women would sing and recite poetry for scholars and refined gentlemen. As a result of modernization and colonization, however, the women became less popular for their voices than for their “easy virtue.” Over the years, this tradition has died out, and today they no longer exist.




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