THE GLOBAL AFRICAN COMMUNITY
T R A V E L N O T E S
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AN UPDATE ON THE AFRICAN PRESENCE IN VIETNAM
From RUNOKO RASHIDI
| DEDICATED TO BROTHER BILL JONES |
"My point is that if we reclaim all of Africa, all of those islands in the Caribbean, the islands of the Pacific populated by people of African descent, united with the millions in India, we will go into the twenty-first century with a billion people, a billion African people."
--Dr. John Henrik Clarke
I would like to believe that my life today is a constant search for African people. This search and the subsequent sharing of its fruits is my major mission and motivation. Where African people are located around the globe, where we have been, what we have done, our present living conditions and consciousness of Africa are the questions that fuel me.
My initial interest in the African presence in Southeast Asia started almost thirty years ago, stimulated by the reports that I received from the numerous friends, acquaintances and family members who had served in the United States military during the Vietnamese War. I remember, beginning even back then around the age of sixteen, how fascinated I was when I heard their descriptions of the different Black people that they had encountered. They referred to these Black folks as Montagnards. I was later to find out that these so-called Montagnards were not recent arrivals to Vietnam. Nor were they the offspring of African-American soldiers and Vietnamese women, but, rather, these were people who had been in Vietnam for a very long time.
THE KINGDOM OF CHAMPA
Chinese records from as early as 192 C.E. reference a kingdom in what is now central Vietnam known as Linyi, which meant the "land of black men." Its inhabitants possessed "black skin, eyes deep in the orbit, nose turned up, hair frizzy." The kingdom of Lin-yi was known in Sanskrit documents as Champa, a substantially Indianized kingdom (Buddhist and Brahmin) with close contacts with India and China. The Cham seem to have possessed what appears to have been a strong Melanesian element and are believed to have settled along the coastal plains of mid-southern Vietnam more than two millennia ago. Another view is that the Cham were actually Black colonists from south-central India. Either way, it is clear that the Cham dominated the region for centuries.
According to one account the kingdom of Champa was born of a victory by the Blacks "over the Chinese province of Je-Nan...later, it frequently demonstrated its unruliness and the spirit of conquest, including against China." Early records further note that, "For the complexion of men, they consider black the most beautiful. In all the kingdoms of the southern region, it is the same." Chinese scribes added that the people of Champa adorned themselves "in a single piece of cotton or silk wrapped about the body....They are very clean; they wash themselves several times each day, wear perfume, and rub their bodies with a lotion compounded with camphor and musk."
H. Otley Beyer believed that between 900 and 1200 C.E. a group of sea-farers made their exodus from central Vietnam and found their way to the Philippines. These sea-farers, noted Beyer, were called the "Orang Dampuans or Men of Champa." During this same period Cham ships, known to the Chinese by the appellation kun-lun-bo (the "vessels of Black men") were navigating the currents of the Indian Ocean ranging from Southeast Asia to Madagascar.
According to Leonard Cottrell:
"The term k'un-lun found in Chinese texts relating to south-east Asia, is an ethnic term which seems to apply to a number of peoples who are characterized by a `black skin and frizzy hair....Their geographical location and their maritime skills made them important contributors to the cultural history of southeast Asia and south China. There are also pointers to a connection with the Kao-li of Korea. By association, and as a conventional Chinese transcription, the term k'un-lun is also applied to the Khmer. Later, by extension, because of physical resemblances, the term was used by Chinese writers for African Negroes. The connection with the Khmer was justified because of the parallel between the mythical K'un-lun Mountain of Chinese cosmology and the mountain cult, assimilated with the Indian Meru, of the Khmer kingdoms."
The major centers of Champa were based near Dong Duong, Tra Kieu and Panduranga (Phan-Rang). The southern capital of Champa was Vijaya (the modern Binh Dinh); the early northern capital and religious center was Mi Son. From its inception in the fifth century, Mi Son was a cardinal center of Brahminic worship. More than seventy temples were constructed at Mi Son from the seventh through the twelfth centuries, of which only about twenty currently survive. The masterpiece of Cham architecture at Mi Son was an enormous, seventy-foot-high tower that was destroyed by United States army commandos in August 1969.
MY VISIT TO VIETNAM
At the end of August 2001 Runoko Rashidi actually visited Central Vietnam. During the course of his stay he toured the Cham Museum in Danang several times. The Cham Museum has many of the finest objects of Cham art in the world and is just magnificent. It is an open air museum holding about three-hundred artifacts. Many of the objects, superb sandstone Buddhist and Hindu works, I had previously only seen in books, and so in many ways the visit was a dream come true. Many of the pieces are as Africoid (dark skin, full lips, broad noses) as any art that you will ever see. The Cham Museum has to be one of the finest museums in all of Southeast Asia and is a must see for any African who goes to Vietnam.
Runoko also had an opportunity to meet with some of the Chams themselves. One of the highlights of the trip was a tour of several Cham sites, including mighty Mi Son--the holy city of Cham civilization.