At 10am one recent day, Sanh, 45, inserted a key into a lock and opened the door of the Saigon - Cho Lon Chinese Cultural Gallery, where he keeps his collection of objects from Chinese families living in HCM City. 

In 2021, the collection helped Sanh set a Vietnamese record. He is the owner of the largest collection of Chinese memorabilia before 1975 in Vietnam.

He had never thought of collecting the items, but then felt regret witnessing ancient houses owned by Chinese families in HCM City dismantled to be rebuilt. He felt sad when the owners of the houses threw away old things bearing the typical cultural characteristics of the Chinese.

Ten years ago, when he helped an old woman move a wooden house and give up many old things, he decided to bring the things home. However, he left the items idle as he didn’t know what to do with them.

Later, he thought of collecting similar things to make a collection of his own with an aim of storing typical cultural characteristics of the Chinese.

At first, Sanh faced difficulties when asking for memorabilia from Chinese families. No one had confidence in his plan.

However, many friends and relatives believed in him. They gave him remembrances of theirs and their families. Sanh learned about the life and significance of the items and wrote interesting and touching stories about them.

The stories and values discovered by Sanh touched the hearts of many people in the Chinese community in HCM City. They better understood Sanh’s willingness and aspirations, and donated more things.

The special feature of Sanh’s collection is that it mostly contains items of the Chinese people prior to 1975.

And he only receives items that have interesting stories behind them, with a clear origin. 

He once visited an antique market to collect antiques to enrich the collection. However, surprisingly, he did not have a special feeling after buying them.

“They did not bear any specific stories or messages,” he explained. “If things don’t contain any stories and don’t bring feelings, I won’t keep them.”

With his special collection, Sanh doesn’t actively seek out physical remembrances, but instead remembrances come to him. 

Chinese individuals and families come to meet him to give him significant and valuable items.

Whenever he receives a remembrance, he learns carefully about the origin and relations with the former owners. 

One item is a baby carrier owned by Huynh Dat Minh, 93, in HCM City. In the years when China was invaded by the Japanese, Minh’s parents and his two younger brothers went with two carriers to flee to Saigon.

Later, Minh’s wife used the baby carriers to take care of his children. Minh has kept the carriers all his life as priceless remembrances.

Minh has many other things, such as fragrant sachets of powder that Chinese women used, watercolor paintings, and calligraphy relics of famous painters. 

Sanh does not consider himself a collector. He only sees himself as the keeper of memorabilia.

“As I help keep memorabilia, I have the responsibility of storing and preserving them carefully and respectfully. I am happy that my work is supported by people,” he said.

“With the collection, I hope that young people of Chinese origin will better understand their origin and culture,” he said. “Meanwhile, older people, when seeing the items, can recall their childhood and their homeland."

Ha Nguyen