Growing and grounding
How the bamboo tree embraces my Vietnamese identity
Can you believe it is already May? I feel like time has gone by so fast this year. In honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month, I would like to share with you an exerpt of a piece I wrote three years ago, highlighting the similarities between my Vietnamese cultural background and the ecology of bamboo (Bambusoideae). Access to the full article is at the bottom — please enjoy! :)
Thân gầy guộc, lá mong manh,
Mà sao nên lũy nên thành tre ơi?
Ở đâu tre cũng xanh tươi,
Cho dù đất sỏi đất vôi bạc màu.Slender canes, fragile leaves,
How could you form a fortress?
In all places you thrive,
Despite how parched how barren the soils.
(Vietnamese Bamboo by Nguyễn Duy)
Bambusoideae spp. can be found pretty much anywhere, from the tropic to the temperate regions, from the lowlands to over 4000 meters above sea levels, across continents except for Europe and Antarctica. There are 88 genera and 1642 species worldwide, but as bamboos belong to the Poaceae family, most of them are herbaceous. They are a perennial plant with a very interesting life cycle: new culms sprout in the spring, grow in height and diameter, and produce limbs and leaves for about two months. Then they never grow again; every year, they put on new foliage, produce more shoots, and expand their root structure to form a bigger cluster. A bamboo colony takes a couple of years to get established, but after then, new canes can grow taller and more numerous because they can acquire more food and faster. The colony closely resembles my family and community in how it supports the youth. As much as I’d like to credit my hard work for everything, studying abroad is a privilege, and the sacrifices my parents have made for me are paramount. They text me every time the news features something bad happening wherever I am and used to send me care packages that cost more to ship across the globe than their actual values. Moreover, during my years abroad, I have been more in touch with the Vietnamese immigrant narrative and deeply moved by the many families that uprooted everything they had and knew to reground half the world away. In growing and establishing their “colonies,” they struggled with language and cultural differences and settled for laborious works like the old canes that stop growing too early too soon, so that their children have the means to adapt, afford an education, and better thrive than they ever did.
Bamboos remain in the vegetative phase for decades; the Japanese manake (Phyllostachys bambusoides) doesn’t even flower until 120 years later. But once the seeding cycle is up, the so-called gregarious flowering occurs, witnessing a massive and synchronized flowering area of more than 50% within a bamboo population. Large-scale bamboo death follows suit, but then a single clone is able to repopulate an entire forest with its strong asexual reproductivity capability. There’s a Vietnamese old saying that perfectly sums up the bamboo life cycle:
Tre già măng mọc.
When the bamboos are old, bamboo sprouts appear.
Old sayings are meant to deliver wisdom, and as such, this one tells me that though people get older, there is always the youth to carry on. The youth carries on and adds to the knowledge and accomplishments that were passed down to them. I come from a family with a doctor mom who taught me how to take care of myself in times of sickness, and a civil engineer dad who taught me cardinal directions, but came before me was also ten generations of rulers, generals, merchants, and teachers that built my city stuck in time, my city of ancient charms, and cultivated everything I have to my name and personal values.
Full article HERE!! (takes only 7 mins of your time)🎍❤️🔥