Khum Bridge is located in the east of Yen village (Thach Xa Commune, Thach That, Hanoi City) adjacent to the Thach Xa – Huu Bang inter-commune road. In the past, the bridge spanned a stream flowing from Huong Ngai, Canh Nau, Dong Bui to Tich River, the water rushing all year round. Now people have adjusted the flow to make a large fish pond, and the bridge is also less crowded. Although, the bridge is no longer used for travel as before, but this is a spiritual place for people around the region in particular and throughout Hanoi in general. The bridge is designed in the form of “upper family, lower house”, meaning the upper is the house, the lower is the bridge. That’s why the people in the village gave this bridge the name Khum Bridge, which looks like an upside down bamboo boat from afar. When talking about the longevity of the bridge, the village elders all shook their heads, because they were born with this bridge. Only know that born in 1935, the bridge was badly damaged and was rebuilt by the people in the village as it is today. Mr. Do Duc Long (70 years old, Yen village, Thach Xa commune, Thach That district, Hanoi) a member of the Management Board of Yen village’s communal house and temple relics shared: “The bridge has the characteristic that the upper is the house, the lower is the bottom. is a bridge for water to flow through, so it is called upper house, lower house. The bridge is shaped like an upside down boat, so there is a verse: Crouching on the shrimp’s back / Squeezing the scales / Water flows through / Swallowing people in and releasing people. Now, this address has become a spiritual place, people often come to pray for health and fortune. In the past, Khum Bridge was the main way for people in the village. All production and living activities pass through this way. Later, people’s lives were more developed, and vehicles began to travel. When they felt that the road was no longer suitable, they began to build outside roads. The part on the bridge deck is built like the architecture of a house. The middle space is planned to be an altar with a set of 6-leaf door panels, the two sides are left empty to make a wooden stall that can be used as a place to rest. Thuong Gia’s house is made of wood, with 2 rows of female columns and 2 rows of military columns. The because of the connection by rafter, with momentum connecting 2 tops of the rafter, armpit beams connect the main column with the child column. The two sides of the middle compartment are sealed to make an altar to worship Quan Than Linh, the two borders are left empty to make wooden stalls. The architecture inside the temple is made of wood, roofed with tiles from ancient times, the Upper part is over 12m long, divided into 5 compartments. Inside the temple, there is also a place for the villagers and the guardians of the temple to sit and rest. The bridge over the flowing water leads to Dong Hoa Temple, both a bridge and a place of worship for the people of Yen village. The fish-scale tile roof of Khum bridge. The entire wall is built of ancient laterite. According to people here, the bridge was repaired in the year of the Pig 1935, in which the lower part of the country was completely redone. In 1948, the French invaders swept over, burned the bridge, the villagers came to put out the fire to save it, the dark gray burns remain to this day. Every day, especially on the full moon day, the first day, people around the area come to burn incense to pray for good luck.

What is octopus?

To answer this question, perhaps most of the public will think of a delicious, popular seafood, or at most remember the octopus Paul, who once attracted the world’s attention thanks to his “predictions. “Exactly about the 2010 World Cup matches.

For those reading Wikipedia “addicted” or good students in Biology, maybe the answer will have more about the superior intelligence of molluscs if compared with other inhabitants of the ocean kingdom. . These are the easy answers, for we naturally consider only the “common” octopus (common octopus or octopus vulgaris) to be an animal, nothing more, no less.

But for South African filmmaker Craig Foster, such a “common” octopus is not an animal, much less delicious food. That creature is the middle-aged man’s “teacher” about nature, life, and is also the main character of the excellent documentary. My Octopus Teacher (My octopus teacher).

Friendship between humans and octopus

Crafted by directors Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed for Netflix based on documentary footage of Craig Foster’s strange and amusing meeting with the octopus at the end of the black continent bordering the Atlantic. Cape of Storms, My Octopus Teacher recounts the seemingly impossible friendship between a man who has gone through all stages of his life with a seemingly inanimate octopus.

Craig Foster is not a dreamer with the ability to find soul in every creature in the world. On the contrary, he is a filmmaker tired of the events of his life, feeling helpless in communicating with even those he loves most, like his son Tom.

Filmmaker Craig Foster.

Therefore, Foster decided to give up the camera to go back to his homeland at Storm Cape alone, where he could enjoy himself in solitude amid the beautiful and mysterious kelp forest. contact people, not think about life.

It was in the underwater forest that he met an octopus, who had no name, no voice, but showed incredible intelligence in hunting or camouflage to avoid the pijama sharks who were always prowling in the darkness of the ocean. . Out of curiosity, Foster began to really pay attention to learn, only to realize that the “animal” has much closer to the lonely man in the cold southern water.

From here, Craig Foster tried to build a “friendship”, a seemingly impossible emotional chain with that unnamed and voiceless octopus. Throughout My Octopus Teacher, viewers can see many different moments of that friendship, from nervousness, sadness, to happiness, anxiety, and at the same time feel the maturity, toughness of the emotional rope between the two sides. .

In the end, all will have to admit that the friendship between man and the seemingly small, dark octopus is not impossible.

The film’s sincerity

If you have to pack it up My Octopus Teacher In a word, perhaps it is sincerity. In each movie describing the wonderful nature of South Africa in general and kelp forest in particular, or in Craig Foster’s words for her octopus or for the vast ocean world, viewers can feel sincere feelings.

It is the feeling that filmmakers and movie characters like Foster, like his son Tom, for her octopus and the natural world. Honesty and sincerity are of course the required qualities of a good documentary film.

The film is about the heartfelt friendship between Craig Foster and an unnamed octopus.

But the careful, meticulousness of Craig Foster and his colleagues to describe the most accurate, clearest, easiest to grasp the diversity and depth of life in the ocean has helped the audience understand. out a truth. That man is just a part of the big world with a real connection that always exists and waits to be unearthed, as the way Foster realized his feelings for the “octopus teacher” .

Perhaps for many viewers, the name “My octopus teacher” will bring many doubts because of the stereotype “octopus is just an animal” due to the lack of contact with nature in a natural way. . But Craig Foster, and My Octopus Teacher, will quickly resolve that skepticism thanks to excellent footage of a strange world at the end of the world.

On the ocean floor, in the shadow of the giant kelp trees, viewers will find a feeling of sedimentation. Seeing the way the octopus took the tentacle and touched Foster’s hard but trembling hand, many fathers and mothers will surely remember the moment they saw their baby born, holding the table. the small, fragile hand of a being who still could not speak, but already had a seed of affection within him.

Foster’s troubled gaze when talking about the dangerous moments – which filled the short life of an octopus in the raging ocean – perhaps reminded many viewers of the anxiety and restlessness they had. for your loved one in the stormy turns of life.

My Octopus Teacher there are many moments like that for the audience to feel the real friendship between Foster and the octopus teacher.

Humans are only part of the Earth

In the context of modern society gradually taking over the wild, people destroy natural life at a dizzying speed and then have to face the consequences of their own cause, many filmmakers have been try to call for human conscience in preserving nature, preserving the precious remaining life resources on Earth.

Usually, directors will choose to speak face to face, outlining the dire consequences that humanity will suffer as in An Inconvenient Truth (2006) by David Guggenheim, or specifying a variety of breathtaking yet fragile beauty, in need of the protection of the Earth as in Our Planet led by legendary David Attenborough.

Humans are, after all, only part of the Earth.

Also a beautiful work of nature, but My Octopus Teacher choose another way of giving your message. Through a seemingly rare encounter between Craig Foster and his octopus teacher, the film simply tells us that we – modern humans – are just inhabitants of a vast world on Earth. . There are many other residents here, with different destinies, different ways of life, different behaviors.

Only efforts to protect the environment, with a real desire to come to nature, to return to nature, can humanity have the opportunity to truly get acquainted, experience precious emotions like Foster in almost one. His octopus teacher track year.

From a beautiful lifestyle, people can find opportunities to make their life less lonely, to see life more beautiful, worth living, like how Craig Foster nurtured feelings for his son through feelings. The inspiration was obtained from the sea, from the octopus teacher.