ForewordBack then, it was very exciting news as I learned from my English professor that an essay of mine was chosen to be presented by the English Composition Program at Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania in the Write the Ship 1996-1997: A Journal of College Writing.
Since English is a second language, I never once thought nor dreamt of having my essay for publication, not even in the school journal. So, the news came as a surprise. I honestly did not think of my writing presentable due to my lacking in sentence structure and grammar skills. Even today, I’m still continuing to learn in mastering the language. Nevertheless, it is undeniable that I was and I'm now glad to see that my essay is being shared with a larger audience, not just for the pride in having it published.
Looking back, I realize that I had tried to capture the essence of life in my writing besides the norms of story telling and creative writing for the sake of assignment grading. And it had become a trademark in my writing. Using sincere words from the heart, my hope is to reflect a sense of understanding with the readers who share the same feelings and life.
So, enjoy! And happy reading…Write the Ship 1996-1997: A Journal of College Writing
Presented by the English Composition Program
at Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania
edited by Kim van Alkemade
The essay chosen from Basic Writing exhibits many sophisticated College Writing skills, including effective use of supporting sources and a strong, clear argument. While the writer continues to develop her mastery of sentence structure and grammar, I hope readers will appreciate both the content of her work and the accomplishment her essay represents.
- An excerpt from Introduction to Write the Ship
by Kim van Alkemade,
Director of Composition English Department,
Shippensburg University
The Mid-Autumn Festival
Written by M. Nguyen for Prof. Stewart's
Fall 1996 Writing 100 Course
There was not much going on in a small quarter near the “old market” in Saigon, Vietnam. The majority of the people in this quarter were made up of the laboring class. Everybody seemed busy with their daily lives; they worked hard without interruption all day long to make sure that there was enough food to feed their families. No matter how busy they were, they never forgot to celebrate the mid-autumn festival in the eighth month of the Lunar year. Annually, this festival is celebrated in the honor of the god of the moon.
Oo…oo...oo… A long siren sound, coming from the nearby harbor, signaled the beginning of a new day. Through the door in each house, there the flickering of the light from the oil-lamp. The children, crawling out of their beds, joined with the other members in the family to gather around the rice pot. The chilly wind in the morning blew off their thin piece of clothes to uncover the flatted bellies which clung nearly to their backs because the rice and water from last night did not last for long. Sometimes, the kids did not have any food, and they had to carry their empty stomachs to school. Around six o’clock, the quarter came to life. The street was filled with noises of the children who yelled and called each other to walk to school. In the meantime, the adults got ready to go to work as a porter or a small scale seller of food at the market. After the kids and the adults went off to school and work, the quarter was left behind with the quiet daily life of the elderly group. The elder males gathered to play chess, smoke cigarettes, and drink tea while the elder females dried coconut shells under the sun. The dried coconut shells were used in place of charcoals for cooking.
On the way to school, the kids were attracted by the mooncake and the lantern shops on two sides of the street. Their eyes and noses glued onto the glass displays of the mooncakes and the varieties of the hanging lanterns up above their heads. The fragrance of the cake was enough to make their mouths water. Standing in front of the shop, they dreamed about having a delicious mooncake or a colorful lantern on the night of the festival. Although, they themselves knew that their parents could not afford to buy it for them. Still, the kids comforted themselves by just looking at those things. But not for long, the store owners drove them away. The kids hurried off the place, and they ran to be on time for school. In class, they constantly thought about the mooncake when the math teacher drew the square on the blackboard. That was the longing of the poor children whose minds were filled with may sweet dreams while their lives were bitter in reality. The classes went very quickly. Soon, it was time go back home. On the way back, the kids talked to each other about the plan of making the homemade lantern.
At noon, the quarter came alive again when the kids got back from school. They raced each other into the kitchen to grasp something to eat. After which, they followed their grandmothers to pick up the discarded coconut shells at the market. Helping their grandmas was one of the things they liked to do. The other was the opportunity to visit the lantern and the mooncake stores. Returning from the market, they joined with each other to find the condensed milk cans in the garbage for making the lantern. After dinner, kids came together on the pavement to drill the holes around the side of the can and make the handle by connecting the wooden stick to its side. When they lit the candle inside the can, it looked like the reflections of the mirrored ball in a dance hall, flickering through the holes. The children loved to march this lantern on the night of the mid-autumn festival.
On the festival day, the adults came home earlier than normal. They bought some mooncakes from the bakery vendor on the street at a cheap price. They came home early to set up an altar with incenses, mooncakes, rice, salt, candies, and bananas to worship the heaven and the earth, and especially the god of the moon along with the family’s ancestors. The altar had to sit for a long time until the incenses were burned out. Meanwhile, the kids marched their lanterns around the quarter and sang songs. They share their candles and relit it when one of them was blown off by the wind. One of the kids was fortunate enough to have the real lantern. That lantern was shared to everybody in the group, and it was handled with a special care. Sitting in the circle with the lanterns, watching the moon, and singing the mid-autumn songs was the most beautiful thing to do. Life seemed hard, but it had its own beauty for all classes to enjoy. When it got late, the children had to come back to the house to have a piece of mooncake and drink tea. As the day was ended, the kids carefully wrapped their cans and the leftover candles in plastic bags to save for next year, and they went to bed waiting for the next morning to come.
The mid-autumn festival is one of the traditional festival which is celebrated by all Vietnamese and Chinese people. Each quarter had its own way of celebrating. Regardless of class and lacking of material things, the people still keep the traditional practice. Especially for the kids in the quarter of the “old market,” they had part of their dreams completed. When they got up the next morning even with their empty stomachs, they felt happy because this festival brought them together in love and brotherhood. Then, they could look back ten or twenty years later to have a sweet memory of what their childhood was like.~
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