Education

Although Huy says the Vietnamese will be quick to say how unlike the Chinese they are (not a happy history there -- yet one more chapter in the domination of this country), there is much Chinese influence in the Vietnamese culture.  Nowhere is this more evident than the importance of education. The Temple of Literature in HaNoi provides centuries of evidence.  This temple is a tribute to Confucius who, in the 6th century, created a code of civil law.

The entrance to the temple includes rows and rows of giant tablets, sitting on the backs of huge turtles, inscribed with the names of those who passed their highest educational test. The oldest of these stone tablets -- each maybe 8' tall -- was inscribed in 1442.   The latest is from the 19th century.

Turtles appear everywhere: the feet of huge stone tables are turtles, there is an enormous golden turtle  featured in a glass box next to the altar to Confucius, and just outside the altar is a statue of a crane maybe 10' tall, its feet on the back of a turtle.

 The sculpture captured my attention, and if I can just figure out how to get my photos off my camera and onto this blog, I'll share it.  We didn't hear the story about that image until yesterday, which Marianne will share that in another blog.

But I am struck by the presence of the turtle, since in Native American tradition we are said to be living on turtle island.