Vietnam Week is Vietnam Society’s marquee annual event held in October in Washington, D.C., in partnership with the Smithsonian, Kennedy center, and other major institutions, to showcase Vietnam’s four thousand-year-old culture and art forms. It is a celebration of traditional and modern art and culture, emphasizing a modern-day Vietnam with contemporary artists who are creating new directions.

Program content and participants for Vietnam Week are carefully curated from Vietnam, the U.S. and around the world by a group of respected authorities in the fields of art and culture. Programs include:

• Film Festival
• Fine Art Exhibitions
• Black Tie Gala
• Live Performances
• Educational Programs
• Culinary Demonstrations
• Interactive art displays and demonstrations

For more information about Vietnam Week or on how you could get involved, please contact us at info@vietnamsociety.org.

SATURDAY, October 29, 2022

A Conversation with Viet Thanh Nguyen, Author of The Sympathizer and The Committed
Pulitzer Prize winning author Nguyen Thanh Viet will speak on the themes that make up much of his work – displacement, memory, and language and how they make “going home” a challenging experience. For Viet, the topic of “home” is filled with extremes; it’s raw and immediate, but also cold and distant. Filled with positives and negatives, love and abuse. Going home is complicated, but it’s these complications that bind everything together.

He will also discuss how the “war” has been portrayed in literature and popular culture and touch on the current state of the Vietnam – US relationship, their convergence on issues and missed opportunities, and how these two former adversaries come work together to forge a new relationship.

Moderated by Ted Osius, former US Ambassador to Vietnam (2014-2017), this is an opportunity to hear from two of the most unique views of US and global events. It is one of the main events of Vietnam: A Celebration of Food, Film and Literature, co-sponsored by the Vietnam Society.

• October 29; 2 – 4 pm
• The Meyer Auditorium, National Museum of Asian Art
• Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://bit.ly/3UfGeB1

SUNDAY, October 30, 2022

Vietnamese Culinary Demonstration and Tasting with Kevin Tien
Kevin Tien’s career was supposed to be filled with numbers and spreadsheets, not pots and pans. But his passion for creating unique culinary experiences led him to chose the kitchen over the C-suite, and he hasn’t looked back.

Kevin has taken his approach to Southern, Asian and Latin American cuisine to some of the region’s most talked about restaurants such as Momofuku, Emilie’s on Capitol Hill, Hot Lola’s, and now Moon Rabbit. His success at these locations led him to be recognized as a James Beard Finalist for Rising Star Chef of the Year as well as on Food & Wine Magazine’s Best New Chefs List, and by Washingtonian Magazine’s and Washington Business Journal’s 40 under 40.

During the Vietnamese Culinary Demonstration, Chef Kevin will display his award-winning culinary skills and combine the traditional with the modern by preparing entrees inspired by the flavors of Vietnam

• Gallery 27, National Museum of Asian Art
• Session 1: 11 am – 12 pm. Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://bit.ly/3S8IjNc
• Session 2: 2 – 3 pm. Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://bit.ly/3QRIJ9B

Public screening of Em Va Trinh (Phan Gia Nhat Linh, 2022)
“Em và Trinh” tells the life story of Trinh Cong Son (1939-2001), one of Vietnam’s greatest songwriters. His prolific career stretched from the 1950s to the 1990s, during which he composed hundreds of love songs and anti-war songs.

The film revolves around Trinh Cong Son and the muses that have come and gone in his life, from his passionate youth in the 1960s to his later middle-aged 1990s. In particular, Dao Anh, who was his greatest love and the inspiration behind some of his most famous songs. The movie features more than 20 remastered pieces composed by Trinh Cong Son and captures beautiful shots of the Vietnamese countryside to make the movie a sensational piece of art.

• Meyer Auditorium, National Museum of Asian Art
• 1 – 3 pm
• Q&A with the Director of Em Va Trinh; 3:15 – 3:45 pm
• Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://bit.ly/3BML7Kp

Public screening of Children of the Mist (Ha La Diem, 2021)
Children of the Mist is a documentary story about the clash between ancient customs and modern values, in a place where children from a traditional culture also have access to the outside world. This is a moving film about the challenges faced by Di, a 12-year old Hmong girl, but above all is about a teenager with a strong character, and who is not just a victim.  Di belongs to an ethnic minority in which girls get married at a very young age. This is often preceded by a controversial “bride-kidnapping,” where the girl is abducted by her future husband on Lunar New Year Celebration. Negotiations between the families follow.

This also happened to Di’s sister and their mother, so it doesn’t seem strange that in preparation the women and girls discuss sex and married life without embarrassment. But Di also goes to school, where she learns very different values.

• Meyer Auditorium, National Museum of Asian Art
• 4:30 – 6 pm
• Q&A with the Director of Children of the Mist; 6 – 6:30 pm
• Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://bit.ly/3LontqV

SATURDAY, November 5, 2022

• Studio K at The REACH, Kennedy Center
• Session 1: 2 – 3:30 pm
• Session 2: 7 – 9 pm
• Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://uqr.to/1c065

Centering on a group of characters who live in an apartment block on the verge of redevelopment, the movie offers an authentic and gritty perspective of working-class life in Ho Chi Minh City. The film explores many different facets of poverty. Characters in the film have various motivations—often heartbreaking—to take up gambling. There’s an old lady who wants to regain her life as a well-respect teacher; a widower who lost his wife and child in a car accident and continues seeing them as ghosts; a painter who wants to help his wife open a tailor shop; and a mother who wants to pay for her child’s cancer treatment. Rom himself has a tragic motivation as well: he wants to see his parents again. All these characters’ fates become intricately interwoven through not only the lottery, but also constant threats from high-interest debt collectors.

• Justice Forum at The REACH, Kennedy Center
• 3 – 4:30 pm
• Click HERE to reserve tickets or use this link: https://uqr.to/1c063