There were four of them, four doctors: Pham Nguyen, the father and his three sons Phuoc, Loc and Tho*. A family of great success, wealth and various names but solely called, since they resided in this country, as 'Doctor Pham' - the Pham's.

The house was bustling with people. The luxurious house was located on a hill looking down the panorama of Waikoloa village, a village reserved only for the wealthy in the United States. It had been purchased just to be left unoccupied. Its owner traveled to Hawaii to get some sea air and play golf once or twice a year. The world paradise always offered various dreams.

Doctor Phuoc and his three sons were running after one another, playing rugby on the front grass. The kids were shouting, with an American accent they twittered and twittered like birds. The kids could not stand the very smell of braising fish in fish-sauce and the stench of Mam Ruoc (salted tiny shrimp paste) prepared by their grandmother. The kitchen was designed in combination with the dining room and living room. They cried, 'Thui qua, thui qua!' ('What a stink!').

The Vietnamese language of the kids who lived abroad sounded funny due to their difficulty in pronunciation. While running outdoors to play, they pulled their mother of American origin along with them. They could not stand the very smell of Mam Ruoc, a dear and rare food to be used in braising fish in fish-sauce only when Phuoc, the dearest son, came there to see his mother. Phuoc was fond of Hawaiian tunas, scads and having more than one wife.

The front side of the house was sheltered by a big screen made of bricks. Its architectural style was different from those on the island. A thick fence of hibiscus with red flowers surrounded the house.

The garden was grown with longans, mangoes, oranges, arecas, bamboos, etc. A big rockery was full of flowers. Their owner, Dr. Pham Nguyen, wished to create garden scenery of Hue style on this land so as to recollect the past at his old age.

The garden scenery had come into being for three years since he fled the Mainland, got rid of a land full of deaths and horror.

His younger sister was shot dead three years ago together with her children and husband right at Pham Tho jeweller's. All his family members might be shot. He fled to this island, an island with a few Vietnamese residents and a few murders with the hope that he might be alive for a few more years.

It was on this island where only wild boars which destroyed crops were shot. Every day on the island there was a helicopter flying over the mountains in search of mountain goats, a kind of devastating animal which disturbed the flock of rare birds, destroying the beauty endowed by nature.

At the thought of his younger sister's gloomiest day, he felt his hands chilly and trembling.

The sun was high. He looked up at the snowed mountain in the distance, arranging pincers, scissors and gardening knives in order. Such big and heavy type of knives and scissors had now replaced his scalpels and surgical scissors. Gardening seemed easier for him to be accustomed to since he retired from practising as a surgeon.

A lunch with sweat, sweat from the bitterness of mullets braised in fish-sauce. Intermittent smacks from Phuoc - Dr. Pham Nguyen's first son, fond of working - working all the week except Saturday night reserved for dancing. He had a lot of sweethearts, much money, and so much money that he forgot time and neglected his wife. His wife left him. Being divorced twice, he still had too many girlfriends.

His third wife was having meal with the two children of his ex-wife. They were eating roast chicken - Halu - Halku chicken. The chicken was cut open, like an opened dictionary. It was roasted in a manner that everything, including the chicken's head and the viscera, was left unused except for chicken bones, skin and flesh. The aboriginal on the island often flavours it inside and outside with spice of crimson like five-spices powder. It is roasted on a rotating device, as big as a tractor, installed on a crowded pavement. Its flavour smells like that of a roasted chicken over pavements of Saigon city.

The father's wife with a few black hairs left sat looking at her children and grandchildren eating. Her hands were busy intertwining red and white Frangipane flowers into leis, Hawaiian leis, traditional leis to be worn around her grandchildren's necks as prayers for luck and safety. Everyone was going to Kona airport that afternoon to meet somebody.

He glanced at those leis, nodding his head. 'You've just picked all flowers off my Frangipane tree, my dear!'

The old woman smiled, 'It costs US$35 for these seven leis in the market, and I've to pick your flowers then.'

He thought to himself, 'The more they become rich, and the more they turn thrifty. Only thrifty persons may become rich.'

At dinner that night, the deserted house resounded with chatting voice of the family members.

Loc's wife, from the South of France, was residing in the neighbourhood of Paris. Her brown and black hair is different from the glittering platinum blonde hair of Tho's wife. She's a Swedish, residing in the US.

While being French-hybrid, her two sons liked eating nuoc mam (fish-sauce). They were sitting with their grandmother at the end of the dining table.

There were 13 persons at the dinner. They listened to various languages spoken among them: English, French and Vietnamese, but there was no key language in their conversations. There were different dishes since their tastes were not the same. Just as their hair colours and complexion are not identical. The native land of their grandparents was too far-off. This temporarily adopted land might become the native land of the boys with different tastes: a land of differences - a melting-pot.

That was the first time the house witnessed a gathering of all the family members.

The three daughters-in-law were not Vietnamese - three respective wives of the three doctors, Jimmy Pham, Billy Pham and John Pham. Their names were no longer Cu, Cot, Keo, etc. They only called one another 'toi' and 'moi', you and me.

Loc broke the silence, 'Let's play cards, Daddy!'

Loc - having a mania for playing cards - graduated from France as an acupuncturist, with a lot of French clients. They played cards at weekends, played cards throughout Saturday and Sunday, all Sunday night. Not until early Monday morning did he drive back to his consulting room, 100 km away from Paris. Sometimes we have a passion for doing something just to forget life, to forget other obsessions. 

He shook his head. Only his wife responded with her radiant face. She suggested, 'How about Tu Sac*?' Perhaps it had been a long time since there were enough players for Tu Sac. What an island! - no bosom friend to talk to her, no longer in an excited state of playing To Tom** and Mah-jong as in those days.

'Go to bed early, swim in the sea tomorrow morning!' proposed Tho. With this, he stood up and, together with his wife and the kids, went into the bedroom for a sleep.

'It's Tho,' Pham Nguyen remarked, 'who is crazy about the sea, diving to watch shrimps and fish in the deep. He came to this island to see us just only because he loves the sea. It's not so good.'

At his bedtime every night, Dr. Pham recollected Nha Trang, its blue sea with coconut trees, just as beautiful as that of Hawaii where he was living. He recalled Nha Trang hospital where he used to work when he was young, where he used to have a bath in the sea before going to work in his operating room. The Nha Trang sea water was blue and clear and different from the water from Hawaiian sea of light green, the colour of coconut juice in Hawaii.

Tho is somewhat like him in character when he was young: crazy about the sea.

Again, he recollected the white sand of Dai Loc area, next to his village, the sound of the waves splashing day and night over Tam Giang Lagoon near the village. He felt melancholic and could not sleep, but kept tossing about in bed all night.

On the next morning, his Swedish daughter-in-law took her two children into the garden to pick oranges and grapefruits. Rustling was heard in bushes and plants, Aquatorim flowers were quivering slightly. There were strange sounds.

'Cobra, snake over here!' she cried out.

Her father-in-law came running to explain in American language: 'There's no snake on this island, dear. They're weasels only. Several years ago the government released thousands of weasels around the island to kill mice. Mice were too abundant, destroying crops of the inhabitants. While weasels went hunting their preys, mice slept and vice versa. It was difficult for weasels to meet mice. The only way weasels could do was to hunt snakes instead. They ate so many snakes that there was no snake left on the island. Since then weasels had multiplied rapidly everywhere on the island. Mice had grown up everywhere on the island. Poisonous snakes no longer existed on the island. What a pity!' 

All the members of the family were gathering in the garden to find out what had happened. They were listening to the story about snakes. The doctor showed his sons and grandchildren around the two-hectare-garden. Particularly, he showed off his garden scenery, with a rockery which he had taken diligent care of for the last three years.

The area of his garden was ten times the width of the house he was living in. In the garden there was a high artificial hill of volcanic rocks, which he had hired tens of aboriginal inhabitants to carry in. On the top of the hill existed a fishing house by the Huong river of King Duy Tan's style. Around the hill, a small stream was created, perhaps as a reminder of that river.

The landscaping included several Vietnamese temples and pagodas. The garden revived his childhood spent in Nguyet Bieu village opposite Thien Mu pagoda. Each of the memorial sceneries was accompanied with a phrase of white stones. The pure white stones he picked up in the sea. The white phrases read: Thien Thai Mountain, Ke Mon temple, Lon Bridge, Tay Thien pagoda, etc.

He explained and interpreted what he had been doing there to the bewildered faces of his grandchildren. The history of that far-off country remained controvertible. The place where he used to live was home of his previous incarnation where he sometimes desired to be back. He wanted to burst into tears. His grandchildren wanted to go to bed.

Perhaps, the only home image left in the memories of his three sons was Nha Trang and not his garden scenery. The primary school by Hon Chong seaside, the memories of school-days under Taberd high-school next to the church, the love with a British lady, etc. Ke Mon village was famous for its exclusively traditional trade of processing and selling gold and his sister used to earn her living by this trade. It was a pity for her to die tragically from gold. He recalled the temple built by a small river. Such land had actually slipped their memories as a far-far-off land. It might become a legend in the mind of his grandchildren. They had their own ways of living: having a lot of hamburgers, sandwiches, cheese, bread instead of white cooked rice and other things.

At the last farewell dinner for his sons and grandchildren, there were Northern Pho, Bun Bo and Nem.

'There are,' he explained, 'well-known Vietnamese names, crossing the national frontier to become internationalised: they are Pho and Nem.'

An appellation that cannot be rendered into any foreign language but it wins the popularity. Thousands of Pho and Nem restaurants right in Paris, the US, Australia, etc. The signboards of 3 - 4 meters long are written with only a big word Pho or Nem.

Pho is cooked with beef, Hu Tieu My Tho with pork while Bun Bo, a dish in front of his son, includes both beef and pork mixed together through Ruoc (tiny shrimp paste) seasoning.

His daughters-in-law and grandchildren liked Pho. His sons liked Bun Bo and Nem. The garden he created as a kind of Ruoc seasoning used to harmonise the ideas of his sons and grandchildren about the far-off land.

Sitting alone in the house, he admired the sunset drifting swiftly down to the sea. Below, golf players were leaving their golf-court at the bottom of the hill. Far away, thousands of cherry blossoms in full bloom were seen in a Japanese garden, in the centre of the city. Again, he thought of his garden as compared to Ruoc, kind of seasoning used to combine beef and pork. There was a drop of tear on his cheek. Something of melancholy. Something of self-pity.

The cheerful days elapsed so quickly and a New Year just came round. How many years had passed while he still failed to integrate well? He had to undergo a frigid life in the house with a garden full of memories.

Two years later, his wife left him quietly: myocardial infarction! On the afternoon of that day flowers and fruits in the garden were in bloom. His three sons came back just in time to lay their mother to rest at the cemetery newly built at the bottom of snowy Mauna Loa mountain. The lonely tomb faced west of the island - facing the land where she was born, half of Pacific Ocean away. Why too far?

'You're the first Vietnamese resting here,' he whispered.

The corpse of his wife was cremated on the other side of a volcano. He picked some of garden fruits: custard apples, papayas, mangoes and rambutans and arranged them in a tray as offerings to his intimate and beloved wife - a person who had accompanied him almost a span of life.

Evening had set in. They were craving for Kailua-pig, a kind of pork stewed by the aboriginal in volcanic cinders. The pig was wrapped in banana leaves, buried in the soil and surrounded with piles of hot cinders for twelve hours. The pig head, skin, and fat burnt to liquid except flesh and bones, separately.

They were eating Kailua - pig with appetite. He smelt something burnt the burnt smell of human flesh, of pig flesh. He sat still, deep in meditation. His teardrops tasted sharp.

By the end of that year and from that luxurious house emitted a stench. A corpse was found almost disintegrated for over five days by a small stream. Its head was banged to Thien Thai Mountain - a last and quiet farewell.

The three sons of the doctor were unable to come back to lay their father to rest just as they did with their mother. They were all busy taking their holidays at the end of the year.

On the day of the doctor's funeral, no prayers were said for the peace of his soul, no drop of tears were shed, there was only the garden full of memories standing still in melancholy. Melancholic as it failed to accommodate all the ephemeral lives, failed to tell his descendants in time and in detail all about the way of living of Vietnam today.