Perhaps by now, folk songs and proverbs are just a faint memory for you. But they are still there, close to your hearts like the "sound of your native tongue." From your childhood, you have heard these folk songs in your mother's lullabies during summer afternoons:

The stork flies low, flies high
From the gate, it flies out to the field

Or in your grandmother's recitations on bright moonlit nights:

Oh, lady scooping water by the road
Why do you scoop and pour away the golden moonlight?

Or from the pages of the Vietnamese language books when you first learned to read, echoing the teacher's words:

If you want to cross, build a bridge of love
If you want your child to be literate, love the teacher

So, even today, as you mix some Western or Chinese words into your daily speech, the feeling of closeness and warmth remains intact when you turn back to those old folk songs.

At least, that is what we hope.

We hope to hear our friends, siblings, and later on, our children not just talking about a war movie, a piece of music with an electric guitar, or a choreography with baggy pants and sneakers. We wish that now and for many years to come, Vietnamese people will still sing folk songs to lull their children, make poetic comparisons, and read to each other the sentiments of our ancestors from the early days of building and defending our country.

There are already some websites that archive folk songs and proverbs. Unfortunately, these websites are quite rudimentary in quantity and quality. Readers cannot know what "giá gương" or "nhiễu điều" is, where "truông nhà Hồ" is located, or why parents compare their love to "bitter ginger, salty salt," or what "mối tơ," "cau," and "trầu" are. We want to do better. We want every folk song to be accompanied by explanations of every ancient word, every dialectal phrase, every historical or literary reference, and every geographical location that once existed or still exists in our beloved country.

Read more at cadao.me