Ba Giai and Tu Xuat

Late in the afternoon in old Hanoi, when the sun turned golden on the mossy tiled roofs and a cool wind blew in off the lake, the old streets filled with sound. There were the cries of street sellers, the clatter of wooden clogs on the road, and the chatter outside the little stalls that served fresh green tea. And somewhere in all that noise, people would trade stories about two names that made the whole street smile.

They were Ba Giai and Tú Xuất.

These are folk tales, told and retold about two gifted men of the old capital. The stories carry no clear dates, and every teller tells them a little differently, adding and trimming to make them funnier. But one thing everyone remembers, and everyone tells the same way. Both men were clever and quick, and they mostly used that gift to stand up for the poor and to tease people who flaunted their money and looked down on everyone else.

The real name of Ba Giai was Nguyễn Văn Giai. Ba means three, and he was the third child in his family, so people fell into the habit of calling him cậu Ba Giai, young master Ba Giai. Tú Xuất was born Nguyễn Đình Xuất. He was a learned man who sat the examinations, but his road through them was blocked again and again. Both were Confucian scholars with talent but no luck. Neither took up an official post, so they wandered the streets at their ease, with laughter for company. Ordinary people loved them so much that a saying went around: "First comes Ba Giai, second comes Tú Xuất." It means that for quick, playful wit in old Hanoi, those two stood at the top.

A few of the tales show what that wit was like.

One tale tells of a night when Tú Xuất, on a long journey, stopped at a roadside inn to rest. A cat merchant had arrived before him. The man had taken the high bed, the best spot in the room, and had stacked his cat cages until they blocked the way. Tú Xuất, who came later, had to make do with the low bed below, right beside the cages of cats that would not stop mewing.

The innkeeper felt sorry for the new guest, squeezed in like that. So the innkeeper gently asked the cat merchant whether he might swap places, or stack his cages more neatly to make room. The merchant lifted his chin. Whoever comes first sleeps on top, he said, and whoever comes later sleeps below. That is the way of the world, so why should he give way? Tú Xuất only smiled and said nothing at all. But in his head, he had already thought of a plan.

Late at night, when the merchant was fast asleep and snoring loud enough to fill the room, Tú Xuất got up quietly. One by one, he slipped open the latches of the cages. The cats, set free, ran off happily in every direction. Some jumped onto the beds. Some climbed the rafters and the roof beams. Some crept under the beds or sprawled on the floor. The merchant woke with a start. He rushed back and forth in a panic, grabbing one cat and then another, dripping with sweat.

Only then did Tú Xuất sit up at his ease and turn up the lamp. He looked around and praised the cats. Your cats are truly clever, he said, and they know what is right. The ones that got out first sit up high, and the ones that got out later lie down low, just as you said this evening. The merchant knew he was being teased, and he turned red to the ears. But he was too busy catching his cats to argue back with a single word. The innkeeper, standing at the door, had to hide a laugh as well. People who hear the story love it, because with one light remark, Tú Xuất turned the stubborn man's own rule back on him.

Another tale has a cat in it too, and it shows off the two men's gift for wordplay. It is great fun to hear.

At a tea stall by the street, the woman who ran it kept a plump tortoiseshell cat. It spent all day lying in the sun by the doorstep. That day Ba Giai and Tú Xuất were sitting there over their tea, and in the middle of their talk they challenged each other. Could they get that cat to answer a question? The woman laughed out loud when she heard. A cat only knows how to cry, she told them. What would it know about answering? The two of them should stop talking nonsense.

Tú Xuất only smiled. He turned to the cat and asked, in a very solemn voice, "Now then, cat, is your back bent or straight?" The cat, half asleep, let out a long meow. Tú Xuất clapped his hands and cried out. There, he said, the cat has answered. In Vietnamese, the cat's cry sounds just like the word méo. And méo means bent or crooked. So the cat had said its back was méo, and méo was bent, of course.

The whole tea stall roared with laughter. Even the woman had to shake her head and admit defeat. However many times she heard that meow, it really did sound just like méo, the word for bent and crooked. With nothing but a cat's cry, the two men had built a clever piece of wordplay that left everyone surprised and delighted. The people of old Hanoi told this story to praise their quick minds and their knack for catching words and bending sounds. It sounds light and easy, but no one else could keep up with them.

One story after another, the names of Ba Giai and Tú Xuất traveled all over the streets of old Hanoi. Wherever the two men went, they left behind a laugh and a story. Sometimes it was a satirical poem that gently mocked officials who took bribes while putting on an air of honesty. Sometimes it was a witty remark that punctured a rich man's bragging. The rich and powerful with something to hide feared the pair. Ordinary people, though, loved them and held them dear. The two men never once turned their talent against the weak.

What made them special was never wealth or rank. They were poor, and they never held office. What set them apart was their wit and their good hearts. Their wit could see what was laughable in people's arrogance. Their hearts kept them always on the side of those who had no voice.

Of course, these are only folk tales, told long ago for fun, and different from place to place. They are not history recorded day by day in the chronicles. Some pieces may be true, and some were added by later tellers and pinned on the two men to make the stories livelier. But what remains, passed down through many generations in Hanoi, is a picture of two gifted, good-humored men who used laughter as a gentle weapon.

So whenever someone repeats the old saying, "First comes Ba Giai, second comes Tú Xuất," it calls up an old Hanoi full of laughter. It brings back two poor scholars walking its streets, using words and quick wits to defend the honest and tease the proud. And in the old quarter of Hanoi, a cat still meows on someone's doorstep, and the sound can bring Ba Giai and Tú Xuất to mind, the two cheerful friends of the old capital.