I was surfing the internet and randomly came across this song. It's hauntingly sad but beautiful. The singer is Khánh Ly, popular in the 1960s and early 1970s in South Vietnam. She collaborated often with the songwriter Trịnh Công Sơn. Trịnh Công Sơn is famous for his melancholy songs of longing and heartache related to the war, and is one of the most renowned Vietnamese composers and songwriters.
The video begins with a Khánh Ly interview. I can catch about 70%. She says there were many songs about the war. She talks about the emotional connection people have with the songs, and how they bring back memories about those times and loved ones lost.
Here are the lyrics in Vietnamese:
Chiều đi lên đồi cao, hát trên những xác người
Tôi đã thấy, tôi đã thấy,
Trên con đường, người ta bồng bế nhau chạy trốn.
Chiều đi lên đồi cao, hát trên những xác người
Tôi đã thấy, tôi đã thấy,
Bên khu vườn, một người mẹ ôm xác đứa con
Mẹ vỗ tay reo mừng xác con
Mẹ vỗ tay hoan hô hòa bình
Người vỗ tay cho thêm nhịp nhàng
Người vỗ tay cho đều gian nan
Chiều đi qua Bãi Dâu, hát trên những xác người
Tôi đã thấy, tôi đã thấy,
Trên con đường, người cha già ôm con lạnh giá
Chiều đi qua Bãi Dâu, hát trên những xác người
Tôi đã thấy, tôi đã thấy,
Những hố hầm đã chôn vùi thân xác anh em.
Mẹ vỗ tay reo mừng chiến tranh
Chị vỗ tay hoan hô hòa bình
Người vỗ tay cho thêm thù hận
Người vỗ tay xa dần ăn năn.
And here is my translation:
This afternoon, climbing a hill, singing on top of corpses
I have seen, I have seen
On the road, people holding each other and running to hide
This afternoon, climbing a hill, singing on top of corpses
I have seen, I have seen
In a garden, a mother holding her child's lifeless body
A mother claps her hands and celebrates her child's corpse
A mother claps and cheers for peace
People clap their hands for more harmony
People clap their hands for more miserable hardship
This afternoon, passing through Bai Dau, singing on top of corpses
I have seen, I have seen
On the road, an old father holding his child gone cold
This afternoon, passing through Bai Dau, singing on top of corpses
I've seen, I have seen
The graves dug and dear brothers and sisters buried
A mother claps her hands and celebrates war
A sister claps and cheers for peace
People clap their hands for more revenge
People clap their hands less and less to repent
Translating from Vietnamese to English is tricky. Vietnamese has a pretty different grammatical structure from English. Not only are words strung together in ways that don't work in English, but sometimes the directly translated word has slightly, or very, different meanings depending on the word or context. For example, "vỗ tay" litterally means "to clap your hands." Here I think it is being used figuratively to mean cheering, encouraging, agitating for or even longing depending on the context of the verse.
I had a hard time with the verb "reo mừng." "Reo" means to shout or cheer. "Mừng" is a word that loosely translates to "wishing" as in "wishing you a happy birthday." My dictionary says "reo mừng" means "celebrate" or "shout with joy." A mother shouting with joy over her dead child only makes sense if the songwriter meant it ironically, which is my guess.
Although I did my best to translate, the song is more poetic and spare and haunting and beautiful in Vietnamese. For example, "People clap their hands less and less to repent" is a poor substitute for the Vietnamese "Người vỗ tay xa dần ăn năn." Translated word for word, it means "People clap fading to repent." Makes little sense in English, but in Vietnamese it works great.