Blog 2

In the movie The Scent of Green Papaya There is lots of symbolism that relates to the war and the every day life of the Vietnam people. The biggest symbol expressed in the film is the symbol of nature and natural beauty. The Vietnam people respect their nature and the beauty of their plants and animals and what they don't see coming from the war is the destruction that the nature in Vietnam is going to endure. Mui is a great symbol of how Vietnam endures this resistence and everything that effected the Vietnam people in the war. For one, Mui puts up with her brothers who constantley hagle her, but she contiunes of with her work and all the things she has to do in order to keep the family running, especially after the death of the father. When Mui goes to work for the musician, Khuyen, his fiancee is a symbol of a western power starting to influence the Vietnam people. She trys to pull Khuyen from his work often and also complains about Mui and worries about Mui ruining her relationship with Khuyen. In the end it can be argued that Khuyen picked Mui of his fiancee, because of all the time they spent together and how he teaches her to read with this poem which is about a cherry tree and no matter how battered it gets it will always be a cherry tree. This whole situation shows how the Vietnamese people can hold off the resistence of the western powers and no matter how much their nature gets battered, it will always still be Vietnam and they land love and embrace.
Some of the other symbols in the movie is ants getting burned and covered by wax. Foreshadowing the effects of napalm on the Vietnam soldiers in the war. And how they used the land to their advantage to win the war by running around in tunnels to coordinate their attacks against their enemies. To stay witht he idea of insects they have the symbol of the cricket being good luck and how the Vietnamese people veiw the cricket to be good luck. Lastly the film really teaches us about the Vietnam home living. Men a pretty lazy and just do as they please while woman accept the role of doing all the work and truly running the family. But most of all the film symbolize what they Vietnamese people embrace the most and that is the natural beauty of their land and no matter what happens to it they will always stand together and call it Vietnam.