Farewell to the seagulls at the end of the sky!

BTO-This morning, March 21, 2025, the family took Huynh Hai Au to the crematorium in Ba Ria-Vung Tau. Due to health reasons, I was unable to witness and say goodbye to him at the moment he turned into ashes.

About 30 years ago, in a small town in Ham Tan district, there was a watch repairman who, when there were no customers, would take out paper to write stories and poems for the monthly magazine Ao Trang, edited by writer Doan Thach Bien. Later, he confided to me that it was the most peaceful time of his life. Peacefully and leisurely, he worked as a watch repairman during the day, wrote poems and articles, and in the evening, he would gather with friends over a glass of rice wine, humming along with his guitar. When his legs were wobbly, he would drag himself back to Chuong Ngua hamlet on the banks of the Dinh River. There was a thatched house with a lonely old mother who sat awake every night waiting for her son to come home and put down the mosquito net for him to sleep.

Huynh Hai Au (blue shirt) and the author.

While everything was going well (as he liked to say jokingly when talking about his career), in January 1999, journalist Ha Thanh Tu called him (a fellow Ham Tan native with him, me, Thai Khoa and Khanh Ngoc in the editorial office) to go to Phan Thiet to join Binh Thuan newspaper. The BT newspaper editorial office at that time (Mr. Chau Van Thu was the Editor-in-Chief) was recruiting talented people to improve and "soften" the provincial newspaper. Mr. Tu was the editorial secretary, and because he loved literature, writer Huynh Hai Au was highly regarded by him to write in the fields of culture, arts and education.
The first night, Thai Khoa and I welcomed him into the Binh Thuan Newspaper dormitory at 6 Hoang Van Thu with a liter of Ly Chan Ky wine and a pot of steamed clams. He said, "I've always been a writer, now that I'm a reporter, I'm probably having trouble. If anything, I'd like to ask you guys for help." I took out my journalist jacket and Pratika camera and gave them to him, telling him to use them to work at the base. I don't need them anymore, but if you have any interesting topics, remember to send them to the weekend newspaper.
At that time, I was in charge of the Binh Thuan Weekend magazine, so I took the opportunity to order from him. So from then on, he made a living as a journalist, but his forte was still literary composition. During his literary journey, Huynh Hai Au achieved some successes. He published 5 books (including 2 short story collections, 2 poetry collections, and 1 music collection with CDs with journalist and musician Khac Dung at the Lam Dong newspaper office). He also won a number of awards in journalism and literature, including a third prize book - the Duc Thanh Prize for literary and artistic composition of Binh Thuan province. But the most impressive was his short story "Khuc song doi", a unique phenomenon in the creative community in Binh Thuan in terms of distribution. In the two rounds of publication and reprinting, his "Khuc song doi" sold out 4,000 copies, a quite impressive number in the province at that time and even now.

In 2012, due to his age, he was not suitable for the job of a reporter who had to go to the field regularly, so I introduced him to Mr. Vo Dinh Nghia, Chairman of the Binh Thuan Provincial Journalists Association. Mr. Nghia liked him very much and assigned him to be in charge of editing the special issue of Binh Thuan Journalists. After serving as the Provincial Journalists Association for a term, Mr. Nguyen Duc Hoa, Chairman of the Provincial Literature and Arts Association, accepted him to the Association Office and assigned him to be the editor of the Binh Thuan Literature and Arts magazine. In 2018, he retired and lived a peaceful life with his virtuous wife, teacher Ngo Thanh Tuyen, by the Van Thanh Lake park, where he often liked to take pictures to show off the view every morning while drinking coffee.
Huynh Hai Au - writer, journalist, poet, composer, those "jobs" were enough to create for him a romantic person hidden under an austere exterior. In his later years, due to poor health, he lived a closed life, rarely gathering with friends. At the end of his life, he practiced meditation but liked to drink alone, wrote but refused to publish, only writing for himself to read. To me, he was a talented but eccentric person, cold on the outside but with fire on the inside.

Birth name is Hoang Ngoc Chau, born in 1957, Dinh Dau, the year of the Rooster, but he likes to wander life like a bird, so he took the pen name Huynh Hai Au. After nearly 70 years of flying around this world, he now spreads his wings and flies into another world. I wish him success in flying into a world of paradise.

Source: https://baobinhthuan.com.vn/tien-biet-canh-chim-hai-au-ve-noi-cuoi-troi-128751.html