Photos: Vietnam children during wartime

Growing up amidst bombs and war, the first lesson of Vietnam children during wartime was tunneling to shelter, communication trenches, braidng straw hats, raising chickens, and hewing sticks for soldiers who hit the road to the battle.

June 07, 2016 | 09:45

Photo exhibition Children during wartime introduced nearly 100 photos depicting scenes of living, learning and production labour of Vietnam children during the war. The exhibition was held at VanMieu – Quoc Tu Giam on June 1^st under the Children books’s program by Hanoi city.

When war broke out, the first lessons of students were tunneling to shelter, communication trenches, and braiding straw hats to go to school. To ensure safety, schools were scattered into many places, each of which offered communication trench systems to avoid bombs.

Children and pupils in cities were evacuated to the countryside. With no electricity and no parents besides, the children gradually learnt to adapt to the life in wartime.

Classes were organized everywhere: storage yard of the cooperative or local houses. Ruined schools because of bombs didn’t prevent pupils from walking to classes.

The bombing matured “the prodigies” such as Nguyen Ngoc Ky, Dang Thai Son, Tran Dang Khoa. Nguyen Ngoc Ky (Hai Hau, Nam Dinh) was paralyzed in both arms since childhood, and learned to use his legs to write instead of hands. Good at learning and poetry, Nguyen Ngoc Ky later graduated from Faculty of Literature, General University and became a teacher to thousands of proficient students in his hometown.

Attentive faces of a pupil when listening to the lecture.

Besides academic tasks, children also contributed significantly to the resistance war with the movements such as Small plans and Thousand good deeds. In the picture, children were giving Truong Son sticks to soldiers who were about on the way to the battle.