Tet: By the time you understand it, it will inevitably have changed
Posted: February 7, 2011 Filed under: change, family, Food and drink, Reflections, tet | Tags: food banh chung, tet, vietnam 12 Comments »
Tet, like just about everything else in Vietnam, defies accurate western description.
You can attempt to sum it up and then, when you experience it, you realise you haven’t really grasped it all.
Tet is *their* New Year. Tet is like Christmas and New Year all rolled into one.
In reality, it seems to me, there is no direct comparison except perhaps that in both cases nostalgia and anticipation set a high benchmark that is had to live up to.
This was my first Hanoi Tet with my Vietnamese family and I expected a party.
My wife and I turned up mid afternoon and the food was already all but prepared. It was then put out on trays and carted up several flights of stairs to the altar. It stayed there as long as it took for a stick of incense to burn.
The altar is in honour of the family’s ancestors. We were asking for luck and protection.
I’ve noticed Vietnamese don’t have the western need to eat food as it’s prepared and still warm. Much of what we ate at Tet was cold after it had sat on the altar. In the end, on a very cold night, it was whisky that warmed us rather than the food.
At the heart of the food on offer was banh chung. Among expats the general perception is negative though a few have developed a taste. Those who have, mostly say that fried up with pickles it’s not too bad. But this glutinous rice cake, with a ground green bean and fatty pork centre, certainly doesn’t win any beauty competitions – whatever it tastes like.
I wasn’t entirely surprised, however, that the banh chung laid out for the family at Tet wasn’t fought over. I had started to harbour doubts over just how loved it really is. It seems that while it has a special place in the hearts of Vietnamese as part of Tet tradition, it’s not quite as loved for its texture and flavour.
In the end one of eight banh trung slices were eaten. And even then mum-in-law needed to do some arm twisting.
Won’t someone have some banh chung?
Pre-tet my wife wistfully talked of banh chung but it was mostly nostalgia. Much in the way that she talks of Tets gone by in general. Long trips into the countryside on bicycles to see extended family. The same era she refers to when day-by-day there were just handfuls of rice to eat. Nobody had money. Vegetables were a luxury, never mind meat.
Then banh chung was a just-about-affordable treat. Now, I’m told, many young kids won’t touch it. They’ve grown up with more expensive tastes.
Over Tet, wincing as I watched my wife dunk chicken feet into duck blood, east and western tastes still seemed miles apart. Then again, in the short time I’ve been in Vietnam, I have started to see the traditional Tet dried fruits slowly being replaced with imported fancy biscuits and even chocolates. Again it’s hard not to see the dried fruits as an obtainable treat from days gone by – slowly being replaced as increased international openness and wealth offer more options.
Conventional wisdom says, after the pre-event madness, the roads empty over Tet. That’s not quite true if you live within kilometre of a pagoda. With Hanoi having more pagodas than any other city in the world, that’s still a lot of traffic.
Repeatedly travelling past the Tran Quoc pagoda on Truc Bach, most days the traffic was jammed. Even worse was the crush near Tay Ho Temple. Outside there were plenty of uninspiring cheap balloons and toys to buy for kids but inside, I’m told, it’s a case of burn your money and incense and keep moving.
For a nation that seems more superstitious than actually religious, it appeared a fairly uninspired attraction hardly worthy of such chaos.
In cities the New Year arrives with firework displays which seem the only bit of real razzmatazz of the whole celebrations. The young take to motorbikes to clog the centre’s streets.
In the meantime, back at my in-laws, we’d all had a little sleep between dinner and midnight. Once it arrived my wife and I walked around the block before I re-entered with a gift of a small green branch. The first visitor, as it was explained to me, must be male and generally speaking a nice guy. I’m flattered, however, there was more to it than that. Born in the Year of the Pig, I was okay to enter in the Year of the Cat. However tiger, for example, eats pig. On another year I’d have been overlooked for the job.
There was no big countdown as I had expected. We weren’t all waiting with champagne corks ready to pop. Sure, we had another couple of drinks but this felt more about tradition, duty and superstition than celebration.
My father-in-law gave us each 100,000 VND lucky money. Later I spent it without thinking and when my wife asked me where it was she was momentarily shocked. It seems that the gift was more about passing on luck than monetary worth. I should have kept it.
Past midnight, at the neighbours they sang karaoke as they had been doing in shifts for the previous eight hours. In some houses, at least, celebrations were wilder. Pavements the next day appeared to be have been widely glitter bombed.
Broadly speaking it seems inevitable that Tet will become more like western Christmas. Food will become more lavish and more international. Lucky money will accompanied by more expensive gifts.
Less mindful of the old days and less susceptible to poverty, luck will not be so acutely pursued.
Such is Tet, such is Vietnam.
By the time you’ve totally grasped it, it was already have changed into something else.
I loooove my mom’s Bánh chưng. It’s comforting and juicy and yummy. It is an acquired taster though. I guess I liked my food drier and saltier as a kid.
Another family, another perspective. Here we couldn’t care less about the actual passing moment between the years, midnight is for sleeping and the occasional diaper changing. Têt is the occasion for family reunion and visits, perhaps to enjoy some fireworks if there’s any around but that’s totally optional. I actually mentioned to my wife how almost bland Têt felt compared to New Year or Christmas in France
The several (I hope) banh chung seen have been and will be eaten rather quickly, at least as fast/slow as other foods. I rather enjoy banh chung, it’s actually the Tet folklore I look forward to the most and, dare I say it, one of my favorite food here, fried or not.
Were you made to sample each and every dish?
That last picture looks like one I would have politely passed on.
Tiviet, in my experience everyone speaks highly of banh chung – but not everyone likes the taste as much as they like the idea. Although it seems both you and GWH are fans.
GWH – not so different. Though we “saw in” midnight, half the house slept through it and the rest didn’t see nearly as interested as I was about the the new year chiming. You said bland – i thought…is that it? A similar sentiment.
It’s all about family and there is also that inevitable countryside thing – where the city folk visit their relatives and vice versa.
Simon, when I first came here I used to eat everything that was put in front of me as I thought it was just good manners. Later I realised that the Vietnamese are a lot less precious than western hosts and because the food is a selection of dishes to share – no one really keeps count which ones you try and which ones you don’t.
Boiled chicken is not a favourite – never mind the feet. Chunks of bone and gristle and the occasional still bloody bit on the bone. Not a big fan. Then again Vietnamese chickens are so thin and bony that the idea of being able to carve off a decent bit of breast meat can be wishful thinking.
Not what you might call a vegetarian paradise, Steve.
I spent Tet with a poor coffee farm family in Dak Lak three years ago. After participating in making the banh chung, we then had banh chung for breakfast, banh chung for lunch, and banh chung for dinner for the 5 days after Tet. And since frying the banh chung would be “work’, which is unlucky to do in the first 5 days, we ate it as is. After the 4th day, I lost my appetite completely and thought I would never eat it again. But I have eaten it at each Tet since. This year I stayed with a family in Thanh Hoa where they fried the banh chung and had a large selection of dishes at each meal.
– Mel
Good post. Each time I talk about Tet or experience, it seems to change a little. It seems there are general Tet traditions, but it depends on the family. Similar for westerners the way we each celebrate Christmas differently in our families. I know you probably don’t want me to even make that much of a comparison between Christmas and Tet, sorry! My point is that each family will observe a holiday their own way.
oh happy new year everyone. i wish u many happy, successful and jubilation. yea man thats exactly how banh chung went at my wifes hometown (hai phong) this year. i ate a piece cuz i do like it, but nobody else even touched it. the only reason i dont eat more of it is purely a digestion matter. it just stays in your stomach for so long u feel full for days! oh yea and fried banh chung is awesome breakfast food.
but tet. tet is boring. for twentysomething vietnamese at least. in my class, a week before the holiday i asked my students, 18 of them said boring, 3 said its ok, 1 said it was great. i just think of tet as a family reunion that takes place every year.
yes a big scheduled national family reunion.
I like banh chung, the chicken feet I can do without.
I have a huge preference for the warm Pre-Tet dinner on New Year’s Eve. Pretty much the same food but not cold.
Bob, you’d be surprised although the chicken isn’t going to impress them.
Layered, good to hear from you – as mentioned in a later post I very quickly get VN food overload. Being stuck in a place where there is little choice on offer – for any length of time – well that’s my biggest nightmare. By the way, when are you going to start blogging again?
Alex, I think you are right – each to their own as far as families are concerned.
Dave, that is interesting. I wonder what the young people will make Tet into by the the time they have their own holidays.
SN(K) Cold feet is rarely less appealing that in cold weather.
I love banh chung, my mom cooked a bunch this Tet and I was only able to eat two before it was all gone. Most Vietnamese I know in the States love banh chung. “more expensive tastes”? – thanks for insulting our tradition and culture.
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Yeah, nostalgia is the right word for it. It’s not the food that she misses, it’s the memories attached to those food. I think taste wise banh chung is overrated, but when some of your most precious memories are linked to that food; there’s no comparison. Little things mean a lot when you have very little growing up.
@tuyen: There’s nothing inaccurate about what Steve wrote. You shouldn’t be offended.