When I Was Young

Folks, forgive me for being a little of nostalgia amidst our humanity in current crisis.

My family was among the poorest in Vietnam during and after the War. I could not afford almost anything. As I was about to enter the adulthood I possessed an old cheap broken locally made guitar discarded by someone and I managed to mend and repair it. I learnt to play guitar by myself with all the “knowledge” of music theory from highschool lessons.

Apart from all favorite Vietnamese songs of my time e.g Trinh Cong Son, Vu Thanh An, Pham Duy, Le Uyen Phuong, Tu Cong Phung et All .. French songs were still popular among certain group of youth in Saigon despite the the new wave of yanky pop culture after 1965. (My second language was French BTW with just a little bit of newly acquired English from highschool)

I still recall vividly the feeling and the joy as we youth hanged around together listening and trying to sing and play these songs with guitar despise all uncertainty and life threatening danger of war surrounding and above our head!

My own “group” were aware of Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, Creedence Clearwater Revival and others but somehow we did not pay much attention although our group were very much anti-war at the time.

Actually, I myself only began to listen and play some English songs after the War alongside with Russian songs! Yes, that’s kind of weird! :-) :-) :-)

It’s even weirder … My interests in music generally had been almost completely subdued by a completely new life in the Australia until much later and recently. Perhaps because my entire life, apart from struggling with new life economically and culturally, has been full of political turbulence.. I myself have been very much high political, so to speak.

Folks, that’s all little thing I want to share with you in this Saturday. I just feel I want to do this without any particular reason at all.

This Andy Williams’ song is actually a reminder and the perfect conclusion, folks.