For Japanese people, Vietnam has become a very familiar country.
Pho, fresh spring rolls, ao dai, and streets filled with motorbikes. Vietnam is now a common travel destination, and there are also more opportunities to meet Vietnamese people living in Japan.
Look at a clothing label, and seeing “Made in Vietnam” is hardly unusual.
And yet, if someone asks, “What do you actually know about Vietnam?” the answer can suddenly become much harder.
Food is probably the strongest association.
In Japan, pho and fresh spring rolls are widely recognized as Vietnamese dishes.
There is also a general image of Vietnamese food as something that uses plenty of herbs, and banh mi has become increasingly familiar as well.
Some people also think of Vietnamese coffee.
The combination of strong coffee and condensed milk is not as universally known as pho, but it has become one of the recognizable tastes associated with Vietnam.
Food is one of the main ways Japanese people become familiar with Vietnam.
Another strong symbol is the ao dai.
Japanese travel programs and photographs often show women wearing white or brightly colored ao dai.
Some Japanese women may even think, “If I go to Vietnam, I would like to try wearing one.”
On a map, Vietnam is easy to recognize because it is so long and narrow from north to south.
Many people know the names Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.
But ask, “Which one is the capital?” and some may hesitate for a moment.
The capital is Hanoi, but Ho Chi Minh City is such a famous name that the two can easily become mixed together in people’s minds.
We know both names, but we may still hesitate over which one is the capital.
That kind of half-familiarity says a lot about how Vietnam is known in Japan.
As a travel destination, Vietnam no longer feels particularly unusual either.
Hearing that someone has been to Vietnam, or seeing travel photos from there on social media, has become quite normal.
One of the strongest images of Vietnamese cities is still the motorbike.
When Japanese people see roads packed with motorbikes, many probably wonder, “How am I supposed to cross that street?”
Street stalls, markets, lantern-lit nights, and the conical hat are also familiar visual images.
Rice fields and life along the Mekong River can create another impression: a country shaped by rice cultivation and by life close to the water.
Among natural landscapes, Ha Long Bay is especially memorable.
Its limestone formations rising out of the sea can look almost like an ink painting.
Even if the name does not come immediately to mind, some people may recognize a photograph and think, “That is the place in Vietnam.”
At the same time, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City also show a very modern side of the country.
High-rise buildings and shopping complexes stand near streets crowded with motorbikes, markets, and food stalls.
Old and new seem to move together.
From Japan, Vietnam can look like a country changing very quickly.
And in Japan today, Vietnam is not only a country seen on screens or visited on holiday.
Vietnamese people work in factories, agriculture, construction, restaurants, and many other fields, and some Japanese people meet them through work, school, or their local communities.
Vietnam is becoming less like a distant Southeast Asian country and more like the home country of someone you actually know.
At the same time, the starting point for thinking about Vietnam can differ greatly by generation.
Some older Japanese people still remember Viet and Duc, the conjoined twins who received enormous media attention in Japan.
For others, Vietnam first became familiar through the Vietnam War, American films, jungles, soldiers, and images of conflict.
Younger people, on the other hand, may think first of pho, banh mi, travel, or lantern-filled streets.
The first image that comes to mind can be very different depending on the generation.
And despite how familiar Vietnam has become, there is still an interesting blank space.
Famous Vietnamese people.
Ho Chi Minh is, of course, widely known.
Football fans may also remember Le Cong Vinh, who played for Consadole Sapporo in 2013.
He was a major star of the Vietnamese national team, and other Vietnamese players such as Nguyen Cong Phuong later came to the J.League as well.
Even so, if you ask Japanese people to name a Vietnamese actor, singer, or current national celebrity, many would probably struggle.
The country and its people have become much more familiar, but Vietnamese celebrities are still not widely known in Japan.
The language, however, remains surprisingly unfamiliar.
Japanese people have more opportunities than ever to meet Vietnamese people in everyday life, yet if you ask, “How do you say hello in Vietnamese?” not many could answer immediately.
We meet Vietnamese people.
We eat Vietnamese food.
We travel to Vietnam.
And yet we still know surprisingly little about the language they speak.
Vietnam is no longer a country that Japanese people only see from a distance. But compared with how quickly it has become familiar, there is still a surprising amount we do not know about it.
