When I was ten (Hanoi, 1978)

The most beloved member in my family is a little "man", my son Hoang Minh. He was born in Budapest, at 10h10' A.M., Tuesday, May 6, 1997. His horoscope is Taurus, the same as my wife's. Since 1997 is the year of Buffalo, his nickname is Little Buffalo Calf - Nghe' o.. His passionate hobby is playing with auto and motor models. He started to learn names of cars and he was able to recognize them when he passed the second birthday celebration. Now he knows almost all popular kinds of cars and motors. His favorite car is our old Lada that we used in Hungary. After our family moved to Hanoi, he always remembers his beautiful time in Budapest when "…apu, anyu, Min, csucsul Lada, Mc Donalds…" (by his words, and in Hungarian it means: Dad, Mum, and Minh sit in the Lada, leaving for Mc Donalds).

My father is an architect. He graduated at the Tsing Hua University, Peking. Before his retirement, he held the associate professorship at the Hanoi Institute of Architecture where he had been teaching for more than thirty years. He is a specialist in the old and traditional vietnamese architecture. As a person, he is kind, sentimental, and cheerful, always in good mood. He is a man of art indeed, showing interest in painting, literature, poetry, history, and vietnamese culture.

My mother was attending to Hanoi's well-known high school, the Trung Vuong girl-school in the 50's. She studied History at the Hanoi Pedagogical University. After twelve-year-teaching in high-school, in order to unify the family, she moved to the Hanoi Institute of Architecture, working as an administrative officer. Right now, in the retirement days, she spends most of her time in the kitchen. Her favourite spare-time activity has been mentioned above: she enjoys every soap opera film that just goes on TV.

Our neighbours are my sister's family. She is working in a Hanoi kindergarten. My nephew and niece, O^'c (10 years) and Cu?m (2 years), often spend their time in our house, playing with their cousin, Nghe' o..

The best friend in my childhood was a classmate of mine. His name is Nghia "ddi.a". We were in the same class in the Chu Van An school for four years. Everyday I walked to his house first on the way to the school and we went together to the Chu Van An school on either Thanh Nien road or Quan Thanh street. We had almost the same interests and hobbies: keeping goldfish and fighter fish, collecting cigarette boxes and stamps, etc. We both belonged to the football-fan group of the class. What's a funny company ! We used to stay in the school after class hours and to play football without break until afternoon. Usual members of this group were Dzung "be'o", Dzung "mi't", Tung "ca^`y", Hai "so+'", Minh "gu`", Kien "to'", Nghia "ddi.a" and myself (alias Linh "nho?"). Nowadays, the most dominant figures - Dzung 'be'o" and Nghia "ddi.a" - are still staying somewhere in Russia after their university years.

My best Hungarian friend is Laszlo Horvath, my neighbor in the Otto Herman student hostel, Szeged, in the late 80's. He is a passionate football-fan, too. We enjoyed chatting with each other about football. I respected much his wide knowledge and excellent expertise not only in football but in any kind of sport. Both of us liked playing football. We had good time playing with other students on the ground behind the hostel we lived in. Sometimes we played football meanwhile snow was falling, another time the sun was heavily shining. Sometimes we started matches at midnight. This beautiful time is still in my memory. Now Laci is a math.-phys. teacher of a high school in Szeged. I am really glad that we are able to continue our friendship by keeping the relation via Internet.

Last but not least, it is my pleasure to introduce the best and most faithful friends in the past more than ten years: Binh "ca^`y" (alias Bandi), Hu`ng "po^", Sy "be'o" (alias Simi), Hiep "ho+.i" (alias Hipi). We all were classmates on the Hungarian courses in the Foreign Language School of Hanoi and the Budapest International Preparation Institute. One of them, Hung "po^", who was also my classmate in the Chu Van An school, tragically passed away in his early twenty-seven, causing our sorrow and leaving a deep pain in our soul. He was a real friend, always full of love of life. God will bless his widow and his little son ! One of our favorite common programs was going to football matches. We were at almost all stadiums in Budapest and had chances to see famous national and club teams. Bandi, Simi, Hipi , myself (alias Li) and our families often gathered when my family were staying in Hungary. When I decided to go back to my home country, one of the most things I am sorry for is that we will not have chances to meet each other as often as we like. However, I am sure that the distance does not mean a barrier in our friendship.

In my childhood, I had many hobbies. I used to collect almost everything that children like collecting: marbles, cigarette boxes, stamps, etc. Commonly sharing with Nghia "ddi.a", the best friend of mine, I had a great collection of cigarette boxes of which we were very proud. In addition, keeping goldfish and fighter fish had been one of my passions for many years. Dreaming of being an architect some day, I spent much spare time with painting. I really enjoyed it. I had been a member of the painting group of the Children Cultural Palace of Hanoi for two years. One of my paintings was awarded the first prize at a children's painting exhibition organized by the Hanoi Organization of Art.

In the student years in Hungary I enjoyed collecting Pop and Rock cassette and videotapes which I liked to listen. The number of them exceeds two hundred. In this collection I can find many favorite songs performed by favorite singers and bands. When I moved back to the home country, one of the hardest decisions of mine is whether to bring or not the most part of the collection with myself. I feel as if they would be small pieces of my youth. Sometimes if I listen to a piece of this collection, I enjoy recalling the time period in which I bought it.

Right now I have no special hobbies but many favorite relaxing modes: walking with my wife and our little son in the evening, looking after ornamental plants on the front of our house, staring at goldfish swimming in the aquarium, etc (Oh, yes! They are the old's hobbies, but I am not old yet, sure!). Of course, I still enjoy my usual spare time activities: watching matches on TV, listening to good music, and looking around in books and music stores.

My evergreen love is football but I enjoy any other kind of sport. I think that in the sport, besides the attraction and the excitement, there are many valuable human properties that we can learn.