Nhớ lại cả một quá trình dài 3 năm đóng & chơi 4 chiếc xuồng, hầu như tuần nào cũng lội chợ Kim Biên, chợ Dân Sinh… Đến cô bé bán hàng quen thuộc ở Kim Biên cũng lãi nhãi: Yêu a đi, tuy rằng a ko có nhiều tiền, đồ a xài mua ở chợ Kim Biên, nhưng cam kết là a có xe đạp riêng… yêu a đi a ko đòi quà…
Nghe mà mĩm cười…
Đưa chàng lòng dặc dặc buồn,
Bộ khôn bằng ngựa, thuỷ khôn bằng thuyền.
Nước trong chảy lòng phiền chẳng rửa…
Có gì đẹp hơn hình ảnh một con thuyền trên sóng nước!? Beau le bateau, dansant sur les vagues…
Chẳng phải ngạn ngữ phương Tây đã nói, khắp cả thế gian, chỉ có 3 điều này là đẹp nhất: đầu tiên là khung cảnh một con thuyền giương buồm vượt biển, thứ hai là hình ảnh một con ngựa phi nước đại, thứ ba là dáng hình một người phụ nữ đang khiêu vũ.
Thế có nghĩa là trong cách đánh giá của văn minh Tây phương, thời điểm cách đây vài trăm năm, cái văn hoá vốn đam mê chinh phục và khai phá ấy, thì vẻ đẹp của một người phụ nữ đang khiêu vũ chỉ xếp thứ 3 mà thôi, sau ngựa và sau thuyền, những phương tiện thuỷ bộ cơ bản đã giúp xây dựng nên một phương Tây hùng mạnh như ngày hôm nay!
張旭
清溪泛舟
旅人倚征棹
薄暮起勞歌
笑攬清溪月
清輝不厭多
Tiếp tục công cuộc thuyền bè và chèo chống… Nhớ lại cách đây mới khoảng 3 năm, chèo thuyền ngang qua con sông rộng chừng 300 m là đã có cảm giác: như con chim non nhìn quãng trời rộng muốn bay, nhưng còn ngập ngừng e sợ
, đến nay thì 30 km (100 lần nhiều hơn thế) băng qua cửa biển rộng mênh mông, làm một phát không phải nháy mắt!
Nhưng từ đây lên đến 3000 km vẫn còn… 100 lần nhiều hơn thế nữa. Con đường còn xa, xa ngái, Xuyên à! Thôi thì cứ giả vờ như cái “sự nghiệp rong chơi” này nó nhàn nhã, tiêu dao lắm, mà ngâm câu thơ rằng: Lữ khách nhàn trên thuyền gác mái, Trong chiều tàn khởi hát dân ca. Mỉm cười vốc ánh trăng ngà, Ngắm hoài không chán bao la suối rừng.
Khởi động trở lại chế độ mỗi tuần 3 buổi tập, mỗi buổi 20 ~ 25 km như trước. 50 ngày đi xuyên Việt xe máy thì có tí vất vả, nhưng chẳng rèn luyện được sức bền như chèo thuyền chút nào. Thực ra ít có môn chơi nào đã gian khổ lại nguy hiểm như… chèo thuyền! Cố gắng lấy lại phong độ nhanh chóng, bao nhiêu “phiêu lưu” dự tính đang đợi chờ tôi ở phía trước!
Mùa này ở Sài Gòn, người ta bắt đầu chơi thả diều, tức là đã có gió, rất nhiều gió, nhất là ở trên sông, mãi cho đến tận tháng 4, tháng 5. Cũng là thêm một điều hay khi đi chèo thuyền. Dù nước ngược hay gió ngược, dù sóng to hay phẳng lặng, dù thế nào thì con thuyền vẫn luôn phải “tinh tấn” tiến lên phía trước! Không có gì “ẩn dụ” cho cuộc sống hay hơn thế!
Water is like a woman, and boats are like condoms, the bigger the boat, the thicker the later. It’s not too fun for a man to venture to water in a big yacht, trying to conduct a safer affair, hoping to buy some security, and at the same time, insulating himself from the very intimate pleasures of the water! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone!
Set your course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ships!
Many moons ago… the internet was booming in Vietnam (let me recall it was only in the 2000 years that the Internet gradually became more popular in here, quite late compared to other countries). I’ve just finished college and started a career in software engineering back then. A whole new world, an immense pool of knowledge to be learnt.
Subscribed to lots of news agencies, a ton of discussing groups, various programming and technical forums… before becoming overwhelmed by the amount of information available. Soon, I’d learned to filter out the not – too – good sources, first by ignoring the social, viral websites. There’s really very little salt of truth conveyed by them, the mass media.
Next come RSS, the news feed, which allows me to follow only the very selective persons, topics. My list now contains many hundreds of talented programmers, computer scientists… around the world. While admiring their thinking in many ways, I usually find it cumbersome to browse the huge piles of information to figure out what’s really useful to me.
My thirst for knowledge spans across many domains, so my RSS list has become exceptionally long. Just for examples, my list for boat building contains more than 600 sources, or my list for typewriter exceeds 100… Yes, I love those mechanical typewriters and their fonts. And I have many other technical interests that you probably wouldn’t think of!
Normally, I would read about 70 ~ 90 new posts every day, that helped developing my quick reading ability. In a sense, I “consume” a huge daily doze of information, and my thirst has not been satisfied yet (or it would ever be), and I find it not too troublesome to continue on that way. But then come a time, I realized the needs to see the things differently.
We are all “producers” and “consumers” in one way or another, even in the particular area of “Information”. Why do we have to consume that much, why don’t just concentrate on things that really matter for our life!? And furthermore, why don’t we transform ourselves from the role of “consumer” into “producer”, producing some very little fine of it!?
Lots of thinking suddenly sparked in my mind, just by the strikingly simple saying quoted on the left: set your course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ships
! Even though they’re giant and luxurious ocean liners (like the Titanic), and you’re only on your tiny bamboo draft, but hey, it’s your life, your ship, your journey and your own course, isn’t it!?
Vive le vent, vive le vent, vive le vent d’hiver, Qui s’en va sifflant, soufflant, Dans les grands sapins verts, oh! Vive le temps, vive le temps, Vive le temps d’hiver. Boules de neige et jour de l’an, Et bonne année grand-mère…
Núi xa, nhà vắng, mưa mau,
Mênh mông cồn cát trắng phau, ngõ dừa…
A watery Saigon p1
A watery Saigon p2
A watery Saigon p3
Serene – 1 p1
Serene – 1 p2
Serene – 1 p3
Serene – 1 p4
Hello World – 3 p1
Hello World – 3 p2
Hello World – 3 p3
Hello World – 2 p1
Hello World – 2 p2
A very brief recall of moments on water with my boats: Hello World – 1, Hello World – 2, Hello World – 3 and Serene – 1… Maybe I should make a calendar from these 12 pictures (for the next 12 months of the year 2016) and put it on my working table. Some flashbacks: 2 years, 4 boats, and lots of fascinating memories on the flows of rivers and sea!
Final entry of the Serene – 1 series. There wouldn’t be any major updates, add – ons for the kayak since most everything is completed, and I need to shift my times and efforts into some higher – priority tasks. In a sense, an important milestone has been reached, the designing, building and equipping of my newest beloved kayak. A fascinating process at the beginning of which, I didn’t even think I could make it, and I didn’t know where it would lead to, a nice useful watercraft, or… a disaster!
Serene – 1 is the best kayak of mine until now, outperforms all others in term of performance, lightweight and agile, pretty much fast, with some sacrifice in primary stability. Yet, it is not without some weak points that could be further improved, and that would be the concerns of my next boat project (still have no plan for that at the moment). I’d tried to get out with the best design, the best building as I could, learning lots of new things about a hull’s hydrostatics and hydrodynamics along the way.
But let me make a clear point about this, even the best cruising hull, the best equipments won’t improve your mileage by 15 ~ 20 percent, for a whole – day paddling. After all, it’s you, your horse – power output, your determination and physical endurance, which are the factors that could make a key difference. To be honest, sometimes, I have a strange self – satirising feeling that I’m quite like Popeye, the Sailor man cartoon character, especially before embarking on some longer journey!
Serene – 1 p1
Serene – 1 p2
Serene – 1 p3
Serene – 1 p4
Where to go from here, now!? I have so many ideas on boat and boat – building, so much that I fear that I wouldn’t have enough time to carry them out all. But sometimes, I should be pleased with what I’m having, me, a nice little boat, and the immense water space to indulge myself in!
Time on water is the time well spent, constant hard struggles, always keep a cautious eye on wave, wind and weather, be prepared for bad things, and reserve the other eye to enjoy the many different shades, different faces of the water. That’s truly serene for my mind then!
Contrary to my initial thinkings, the second Greenland paddle has proved to be the most satisfactory. Despite its short length (190 cm), I’ve found it the best balance between length, blades’ width, weight and force. And that’s explainable, cause I have small arms and quite a short arm span, in body building, could be called a “bottom – heavy” type, my upper part is not too strongly built, unlike the lower part. And that has some advantages as well as some disadvantages in kayak paddling.
I could often balance the boat better in shaking situations, compared to the “top – heavy” type, but also, I usually find myself understrength when prolonged heavy paddling is required. Overall, I’m very pleased with my new pair of Greenland paddles, especially the second one. And that’s an attractive appearance, my boat with the two paddles, all of one same nice wooden style! On my paddling route, I usually meet and have some talks with the captain of a 2000 – ton dry – cargo vessel named UT Glory.
He proposed buying my kayak, and before I could make a polite refusal, he insisted: you know, price is not the problem!
. Well, at least someone who really want to have a nice little boat like her that much! It takes some moments choosing the right words to answer him, that I won’t gonna sell her, Serene – 1, my self – designed, self – built boat! And for sure, he wouldn’t be able to find anyone who could produce just a simple, hand – crafted kayak in Vietnam though, as far as I know.
Serene – 1 p1
Serene – 1 p2
Serene – 1 p3
Serene – 1 p4
Apart from some plastic, fiberglass kayaks used for “tourist attraction”, kayaking as a real hobby in Vietnam is virtually non – existent. That explains why the kayak – building, kayak market in VN is virtually zero, though designing, building one is not any big thing, I would say. Why so!?
Frankly speaking, I think VNese is busy drinking and talking bullshit! Seriously speaking, I think VNese has salt in their mouths, but no salt in their blood! Truly speaking, I won’t hope they would do anything besides trying to cheat someone for some dirty purposes! That’s all facts!
Having gained some know – hows from my first Greenland paddle, I proceed to making the second one. This is not a “storm paddle” as mentioned in the previous post, but rather just an auxiliary, backup one. It would be shorter (190 cm), and wider (10.5 cm), as my first one, though suitable for long range paddling, lacks the force needed to compete against strong current and wind. I think it’s wiser to have a pair of paddles to compensate each other (and stop using the plastic one completely).
But first, I need to reshape my first paddle a bit, to make it even lighter, and turn the cross – sections from “rounded – rectangles” into real flat – ovals. The blades are still quite thick, especially at the edges, and they’re making quite some noises when entering the water. A good paddle should make as little sound as possible, so that the water birds wouldn’t fly away until you’d approached them within 4, 5 meters or so. Well, those lovely water birds, an interesting story I would tell in another post.
5th image below: using a spokeshave to carve the edges (the rougher job is done with the machine planer already). I’d turned to love this tool, it removes wood easily and nicely. As I’m gaining more experiences with wood working, I feel more confident and rely more on the manual tools, as they allow me to do the finer jobs. 6th image: the pair of paddles, they’re just a little bit heavier than the plastic paddle, but feel like firm enough for hard uses though! Now ready for the glassing and painting tasks!
Serene – 1 p1
Serene – 1 p2
Serene – 1 p3
Serene – 1 p4
For true wild birds, it’s hard to approach them within 10 meters without signaling them on your presence. But for those “half – civilized” birds around my area, they only fly away when I’m just 3, 4 meters apart. That implies some things on the city’s noise – pollution, I would suggest.
8th image: the blades’ tips get one layer of 6 – oz glassing on each side (which cover about 20 cm of blade length). Some light painting still needed to really finish them though, to protect the epoxy resin from UV! I’m eager to try out the two paddles in action in the next couples of day!
