{"id":6915,"date":"2026-01-16T00:32:28","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T00:32:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=6915"},"modified":"2026-01-16T00:32:28","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T00:32:28","slug":"5-temples-temples-everywhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=6915","title":{"rendered":"5. TEMPLES, TEMPLES EVERYWHERE!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today it’s Tuesday 6 January.\u00a0 We are going to visit a “UNESCO village” this morning.\u00a0 Duong Lam Village.\u00a0 I bet it’s got a temple!\u00a0 Ahh, yes.\u00a0 It does!\u00a0 The Phun Hung Temple …<\/p>\n

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Lots of offerings and lots of Buddhas.\u00a0 Lady Buddhas, normal ones and some with fuller figures!<\/p>\n

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Phung Hung (761-802) and Ngo Quyen (896-944) \u2013 two of Vietnam\u2019s Kings, were born in Duong Lam, giving the village its prestige as \u201cThe Land of Two Kings\u201d.\u00a0 Both men led resistance wars against northern invasion and were crowned kings after gaining national independence.\u00a0 (Thank you AI.)<\/p>\n

We visited the home of this happy chap … for tea and cookies – or was it rice wine and sticky rice cakes?\u00a0 I can’t remember!<\/p>\n

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And this is the lady of the house – doing the actual work …<\/p>\n

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Wandering on, we wondered what makes a village a UNESCO village.<\/p>\n

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The Mong Phu Communal House …<\/p>\n

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In villages in the Red River Delta, the communal house serves both as the administrative centre and the place of worship for the guardian spirit, whose sacred powers, sanctioned by a royal certificate, were believed to secure the village\u2019s prosperity.\u00a0 In addition, it\u2019s also the public gathering space for ceremonies and festivals in the village.<\/p>\n

In Vietnam, ladies of a certain age have taken to colouring their teeth.\u00a0 They like black!\u00a0 The blacker the better!<\/p>\n

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The Vietnamese tradition of black teeth was a historic beauty standard, especially for women, symbolizing beauty, status, and protection from evil spirits.\u00a0 White teeth were seen as demonic. This ancient practice involved staining teeth with natural dyes like charcoal, ant nectar, and betel nut.<\/p>\n

On the way back to the bus, we walked through the Mong Phu Village Gate …<\/p>\n

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Historically, there were several entrances to Duong Lam Village, but today there is only this one original gate left.\u00a0 In ancient Vietnamese architecture, the village gate is considered as the sign marking the edge of the village space.<\/p>\n

We left the place still uncertain why this village warranted UNESCO status.\u00a0 I guess, in this case, it’s a combination of very old residential buildings, a surplus of temples, a community house, an old gate and an enthusiastic town planner with a grasp of economics!\u00a0 Having had two local boys crowned king wouldn’t have been a disadvantage, either!<\/p>\n

The “back-to-the-boat-for-a-four-course-lunch” arrangements cut in every day just before noon.\u00a0 Well, you just don’t get enough food with only two cooked meals a day!\u00a0 We are getting used to the routine by now.\u00a0 Up the gang plank, shoes off, disinfect hands, be given a cool towel to dry hands, collect cabin key, receive welcome drink – all in the space of 10 feet.\u00a0 It’s quite a knack!<\/p>\n

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Lunch in the main (only) dining room, top deck at the rear.<\/p>\n

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With Duy and his little assistant Salai.<\/p>\n

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Except those of you who are still awake will realise that the picture in actually of an evening meal, not lunch!\u00a0 Who said this blog was totally correct?<\/p>\n

Can we fit in another temple this afternoon?\u00a0 Sure we can!\u00a0 The Ch\u00f9a Th\u1ea7y, or Master’s Temple, one of the oldest temples in Vietnam.\u00a0 Allegedly, this is a Statue of a Tr\u1eebng \u00c1c dharmapala inside the temple ??? …<\/p>\n

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… and this is a lady bashing a drum continually and monotonously while chanting her way through a 60 page book of words.<\/p>\n

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A lady in yellow not chanting, BUT LOOK – an actual monk.\u00a0 We haven’t seen many of them about!\u00a0 In fact, I think that he’s the first.<\/p>\n

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Moving onwards and upwards.\u00a0 We need to learn how to make traditional conical hats.\u00a0 Essential training!<\/p>\n

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The process involves a number of distinct stages starting with a template, adding the radial spines and the hoops of progressively decreasing diameter, reinforcing the edge, then adding the radial leaves and stitching everything into place with very fine nylon thread.\u00a0 \u00a0A bit of embroidery at the peak for looks and strength, and Bob’s your uncle.\u00a0 You have a perfectly formed example of a hat that most agricultural workers wear.\u00a0 Six or seven ladies can turn out a number of these every day.<\/p>\n

Here’s me with my new best friend – presumably the CEO of the Viet Tropical Hats Inc..\u00a0 Or ar least the owner of the premises where the hat making takes place.<\/p>\n

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Tomorrow it’s back to Hanoi.\u00a0 During the evening the captain relocated a short distance down stream …<\/p>\n

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… and moored just upstream of the Nhat Tan Bridge which flashed a cycle of bright colour’s at us all night.<\/p>\n

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So, now we have Hanoi City (again) to look forward\u00a0 to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today it’s Tuesday 6 January.\u00a0 We are going to visit a “UNESCO village” this morning.\u00a0 Duong Lam Village.\u00a0 I bet it’s got a temple!\u00a0 Ahh, yes.\u00a0 It does!\u00a0 The Phun Hung Temple … Lots of offerings and lots of Buddhas.\u00a0… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6915","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vietnam-and-australia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6915","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6915"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6915\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6941,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6915\/revisions\/6941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}