Minh N. Ta

Viet Nam stretches over 1,600 km from north to south, and traveling through it feels like moving across different countries. The north has four seasons with cooler winters, the center mixes coastlines and mountains with unpredictable weather, and the south stays warm year-round.

Food is one of the best reasons to visit. Try phở (especially in the north) and bánh mì (everywhere, but Saigon-style is the most loaded). Each region has its own style: northern food is lighter, central food is spicier, and southern food is slightly sweeter.

Travel tip: There is no single “best time” for all of Viet Nam. The north is nicest around October–April, central Viet Nam can flood around October–November, and the south is best during the dry season (December–April).

Please check out the official tourism website if you want to know more about Viet Nam. Don't hesitate to ask me for recommendations if you need any help through social media instead of LinkedIn or email (urghhh these things remind me of deadlines and never-ending to-do lists).

• Vietnamese is a tonal language, which means that the tone of a word can change its meaning. For example, the word ma (ghost - with the level tone) has different meanings depending on the tone. The acute-angry tone is má (mom), the grave-lowering tone is mà (but), the smooth-rising is mả (tomb), the chesty-raised is mã (horse), and the chesty-heavy is mạ (baby rice).
• Vietnamese is a monosyllabic language, which means that most words have only one syllable, and we need to use several words to express a single meaning. This leads to an interesting fact, for example, the word cake is bánh ngọt in Vietnamese, which shares a common word with wheel (bánh xe). This makes tokenization and word segmentation more challenging in our language.
• Vietnamese is a completely non-inflective language - no word ever changes its form in any context. That means, it has no concept of "masculine" or "feminine" words, and no plural forms for nouns, no participles for verbs.
• Tenses are super simple in Vietnamese. To put the verb into tenses, we just add an adverb before it. For examples:
  • Past tense: đã (already): đi (to go) → đã đi (already went).
  • Future tense: sẽ (will): đi (to go) → sẽ đi (will go).
  • Present tense: đang (is): đi (to go) → đang đi (is going).
• In contrast to the simple tenses, nouns and verbs, pronouns in Vietnamese is a different universe. We use nouns as pronouns, so:
  • If I'm talking to my friends (same age), I will be tôi, tớ or tao; my friends will be bạn, cậu or mày
  • If I'm talking to my family, I will be con or cháu; my dad will be cha, bố, tía; my mom will be mẹ, má, bầm; my grandpa will be ông; my grandma will be bà.
  • If I'm talking to my teacher, I will be em or con; my teacher will be thầy or cô.

Urghhh I think I can stop here for you not to be confused 😢

My hometown is Phú Thọ province, Viet Nam. An interesting fact about my hometown is that it has a temple called "Đền Quốc tế", which dates back more than 2,300 years. Some people may translate it to "International Temple", but its name means "Temple of the Country" in Vietnamese (i.e. Quốc gia Tế lễ).

Some interesting facts about my hometown:

• It's the first capital of Viet Nam, which is from 4000 years ago.
• It is known for a “ngã ba sông,” where three rivers meet.
• We have a form of performance art called “Hát xoan,” which is recognized as a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage.

However, I was raised in Thanh Hoá, a large province with many famous places. Only 20 minutes away from my hometown, there is a place called "Am Tiên", which is known as where the heavens open. Thanh Hoá also has a well-known beach called "Sầm Sơn", with amazing waves and sand dunes.