Duong Huong - The Zenith

“True. Visiting people, I have. But myself, it is the first time.”

“I heard that.” He starts laughing: “Just stay here a few weeks and you will see clearly. Before you heard people threaten: ‘Staying in here a few days is longer than a century, don’t believe it.’ Once in here the truth becomes evident.”

“Is that so?”

He also laughs. Even the laugh makes his face painful and stiff. However, he is awake. His body cannot be destroyed so quickly. This is a reward from a life of healthy living, with moderation, and with so many chi gong classes. He rubs his cold stiff hands together, waiting for them to warm up, then he uses them to rub his neck.

“I will not submit to failure before I fight back. Old age: I accept thee but in the spirit of competition. I won’t be your servant.”

The doctor in charge steps into the room. A man in his forties, calm and weary. He approaches the bed and smiles: “Greetings.”

“Greetings to you, too,” Vu cheerfully replies. “I live thanks to you, therefore I welcome you. That’s more accurate.”

“Not quite. You have a strong constitution, which is why you recuperated so quickly. If it had been another, it…”

“Another person would have died?”

“I didn’t mean that. But if it had been another, it could have had long-lasting consequences.”

“Because the side effects of a brain aneurism can be total body or organ paralysis or at least a twisted neck, crooked mouth, and so on…Is that right?”

“You know the prognosis like a professional.”

“I read medical books. Not much but enough to have simple knowledge. When I opened my eyes I know that I was lucky. As our elders said: ‘Meet the right doctor and you get the right medication.’ If I say more, people will say I am pompous, but, whatever, I still have to say thank you. Thank you very much.”

“Don’t mention it. It is our duty.”

The doctor seems embarrassed. He quickly says good-bye then leaves the room. Later, a nurse comes in.

“Today you drink milk. Tomorrow, too. From Friday on your diet will change given your health situation. The doctor said you might want to eat rice porridge today but that would not be helpful.”

“Thank you. I will follow the order. No need for you all to be concerned.”

“Should I mix you some milk now?”

“No need. I am not hungry yet. Later, I will help myself.”

The nurse walks away. He continues to rub and shake his neck. He figures that during his days lying unconscious, people had continuously fed him with IV fluids, sugar and minerals, which explains why he does not feel depleted. There is only a feeling of stiffness all over his body. Twenty minutes later, he sinks into sleep. He sleeps straight until nine o’clock before waking up, feeling hungry. He scratches his stomach. He sits up. There is a moment of unsteadiness but later all his movements become accurate and sure. He stands up, mixes some milk, and drinks it. While drinking, he listens to his body slowly coming alive, the warmth spreading from his chest out to his limbs, feeling his blood moving in the veins — all in all a brand-new feeling he has never had before: revival!

“I am your neighbor. Do you remember me?”

He hears someone talking at his ear. He turns over to see a meticulously dressed man leaning against the wall, looking at him with a pair of warm eyes, smiling.

“Maybe…” he replies with embarrassment, trying to recall this stylish look, the fashion of the 1940s, the hair wavy and a light-colored shirt collar turned out to cover the dark jacket:

“The truth? I kind of remember…It is old age…” he replies, one more time trying to conjure the identity of this hefty man with hair à la Yves Montand, the eyes in parallel, the nose bridge regular and the mouth bright pink, lips turned up, definitely the kind of man who is talkative and…

“I am Tran Phu, not the Tran Phu who was general secretary of the Party during the First Uprising, but the one who was a classmate in 1947, during training at Nam Mai Hamlet. Do you remember now?”

“Ah, ah…now I remember,” Vu answers. “Because you said you were a neighbor, I kept searching among my acquaintances in the old hamlet, my birthplace.”

“Lying next to each other for two months, hammock to hammock, foot touching foot. We were more than neighbors. It’s lucky that we were of different dispositions, or else things might have happened.”

“True,” Vu confirms and bursts into laughter.

Tran Phu asks, “Are you still tired?”

“It’s better.”

“Sit up to straighten out your back then try to get off the bed and take a few steps. After the first few steps, you will want to go down the hall and back at a speed just enough to carry you forward. That’s the best way to get your blood flowing. You will recuperate very quickly; I believe that.”

“Thank you. I also hope so.”

Casting his eyes in curiosity to watch the other, Vu says, “And you, what is your secret that time seems not to have touched you at all? It has been more than twenty years. After the first few minutes of surprise, I find you keep most of your old demeanor.”

“I have changed quite a bit. Twenty years is not a moment. You do not see my tummy?”

At that moment Tran Phu pulls the lapels of his blouson to let Vu look. Vu finds his stomach to be quite ordinary. Very normal even for a man of forty.

Vu says, “I see nothing. At the most the waist is eighty centimeters. Compared with others, that is an ideal number.”

“Oh, no…I cannot accept it. Do you remember in the old days I was famous in the front as ‘Tran Phu with the frog’s waist’? My waist was sixty, not a millimeter more. My stomach was smaller and firmer than those of the ladies.”

“Are you crazy? That was more than twenty years ago.”

“The fact is that it is a weakness to let ourselves atrophy over time. I know an old man who is over eighty and his skin has no wrinkles, his waist is still sixty-eight, not more nor less.”

“Eighty and skin without wrinkles? You are joking. Sorry, but I can’t believe it.”

“You must believe. Then, you’ll come to believe. I will explain to you right now: beautiful women keep their beauty by rubbing their face. Massaging is a traditional method to keep beauty as well as health. In Persia people sell hundreds of different perfumes for bathhouses to serve customers; of course those customers are only royalty, aristocrats, or wealthy businesspeople. But even massage cannot prevent skin from wrinkling, as the masseuse has to pull the skin across the horizontal, forcing it to expand. When it expands, it changes form. Thus, massaging makes the blood flow and the skin pink, fresh, and healthy, but still the skin continues to wrinkle. To correct this shortcoming, people have to adopt a new method.”

“Your theory sounds very appealing. Now I am growing very curious,” Vu replies with a smile that is both open and full of awakened alertness.

Tran Phu also smiles. “You don’t believe it yet. Whether you believe or not, it is all the same to me. I am not that Son Dong character who sells medicine in the middle of the market just to pull some coins out of your pocket. I act only according to the motto ‘If you see something nice but don’t tell anyone, you are too greedy; and if you see a hole in the middle of the road but don’t yell out a warning, you are too nasty.’”

“Oh…don’t swing a big hammer like that…Well, tell me about the special techniques of that eighty-year-old man with the smooth skin.”

“That old man is a master of the Nhat Nam teachings. He lives next to the Dong Da dike. If you wish, I will take you there for a visit, and at the same time you can watch his disciples practice. I believe you will fall completely in love with this martial art. And the technique to keep skin from wrinkling is very simple: slap yourself!”