Fluttering flags of Thailand and Vietnam can be seen from afar while driving on Road 115 to Ban Dong, in Muang district.
Below the flags is the big sign board stating the name Ban Dong Ho Chi Minh Museum. The museum was opened last September as a memorial to Ho Chi Minh, the founder of Vietnamese Communist Party and the president of North Vietnam from 1954 to 1969.
Below Exhibit items from Vietnam. \
"Almost everyone who visited the museum has the same questions, whether it is true that Ho Chi Minh once stayed in Phichit and why was he here," said Phuri Hongthong, an officer of the Tambon Administrative Organisation (TAO) in Pa Makhab and also a volunteer guide for the museum.
With the support of his office, he started his research in 2012. Phuri worked with the Vietnamese embassy and confirmed the name of Ban Dong and the existence of a Vietnamese community.
A replica of a letter written by Ho Chi Minh mentioned staying in Pichit.
"But there was no Ban Dong in Phichit. No one knew where it was," he said. He searched many places that carried the word "dong" and found that there was no Vietnamese community. Later he learned that there was an old graveyard which had a signboard written in Vietnamese. When he visited some people living around the site, he found old Vietnamese people in their 80s and 90s who fled from their country to Ban Dong.
"I found out that Ban Dong was the name that the Vietnamese called their community. The name refers to a community in the forest," he said.
As a result, the museum was built on a 4 rai plot of land, which used to be the Vietnamese graveyard to indicate that the people lived here.
Siam welcomed Vietnamese immigrants early in the Rattanakosin period. They scattered to many provinces including Bangkok. During the reign of King Rama V, some key people from the nationalist movement such as Dang Thuc Hua and Dang Quynh Anh resided in Ban Tham in tambon Pak Nam Pho of Nakhon Sawan's Muang district. The Vietnamese community was the centre of the nationalist movement so it was closed by local authorities in 1914 under French pressure. The Vietnamese moved further north to Ban Dong, about 110km away.
The people scattered around and mixed with locals. When Ho Chi Minh travelled to Ban Dong in 1928, or 14 years after the Vietnamese arrived in Ban Dong, he spent about two weeks in the community. He spent time updating his commands about the communist movement in Vietnam and the world and working on plans for the Vietnamese revolution.
Before reaching Ban Dong, Ho travelled from Bangkok by train to Phichit where his people brought him to Ban Dong by boat via the Nan River and Tha Luang Canal.
This hut shows the simple life of Ho Chi Minh when he stayed in Ban Dong.
"He was introduced as Thao Chin [meaning an old Chinese person] who was a teacher and herbalist. He lived like locals by working in farmland during daytime, but he gathered his people at night in the graveyard to plan for the revolutionary movement," he said.
When Ho left Phichit, he brought with him key people and strongmen. They moved from Phichit to Phitsanulok, Loei, Udon Thani and Nakhon Phanom. They crossed the Mekong River to meet the Vietnamese in Laos before reaching Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh was in Siam from 1928-29 and again in 1930, but only for a brief period.
Students wear ao dai dresses at the museum.
To highlight Phichit as one of the historical places where Ho visited, the Thai government allocated about 30 million baht for the museum. The facilities include a two-storey building (6,400m²), a sculpture of Ho Chi Minh and a hut representing the home where he once stayed in Ban Dong.
The Vietnamese government also showed its support by providing some items from the Ho Chi Minh Museum in Hanoi to be displayed. One of the highlights is a replica of Ho's letter, which he wrote about the time he spent in Phichit. There are pencils used by Ho, his photos and his clothes displayed in one section of the museum. The main exhibition shows the history of the Vietnamese people who resided in Siam and their lives in Ban Dong.
A bust of Ho Chi Minh inside the model hut.
The museum is the third memorial site of the late president beside sites in Udon Thani and Nakhon Phanom, but it was the first facility that has support of both the Thai and Vietnamese governments, said Phuri.
Although the museum is quite small, it can attract people from many places including visitors from Vietnam, Korea and Bhutan.
"Now when people asked me the questions about Mr Ho and Phichit, we have evidences and the centre to explain our history," he said.
Ho got off the train at Pichit Station.
TRAVEL INFO
- Ban Dong Ho Chi Minh Museum is open from Tuesday to Sunday, 9am to 5pm. There is no entrance fee.
- Visit its Facebook at http://bit.ly/2DMYsDq or call 056-671-371.
