Born in 1962, Thanh holds a PhD in computational chemistry, awarded by the University of Minnesota in 1990. That same year, he received an award from the US National Science Council. He later continued postdoctoral research in the field of physiological structure simulation.

In 1992, he became a full professor, teaching quantum chemistry at the University of Utah in the US. A year later, he was recognized as “one of America’s most promising young scientists.”In 2002, at the age of just 41, he was promoted to senior professor, one of the highest academic ranks in the US university system.

The scientific path of Truong Nguyen Thanh is associated with laboratories, lecture halls, and rigorous academic standards. Yet running parallel to that journey has always been an unbroken cultural thread: Tet.

In 2007, at the invitation of the then Vice Chair of HCMC People's Committee, Professor Nguyen Thien Nhan, he returned to the country to lecture on the role of computational science and technology, and was tasked with developing a project to establish the HCMC Institute of Computational Science and Technology. 

However, it was not until 2017, when he held the position of Executive Vice President of Hoa Sen University, that he had the opportunity to celebrate a full Tet in Vietnam.

At that time, Thanh drew public attention when he appeared before students in shorts and a T-shirt during a lecture on creativity. Facing mixed opinions, Thanh stated that it was not an act of rebellion but a pedagogical intent.

“To unleash creativity, we must remove prejudices and the mental limits we have long imposed on ourselves. I first lectured in my usual suit, then asked students to wait a minute while I changed clothes. When I returned in shorts and a T-shirt, the whole class reacted with surprise. That reaction itself was a vivid lesson in how strongly we are influenced by stereotypes,” he shared.

Tet is time of connection

That same year, for the first time after 37 years away from home, Professor Thanh celebrated Tet in Vietnam, the place of his birth. He said that during many years living and working as a professor in the US, Tet often fell in the middle of the academic semester, leaving him no opportunity to return. “Celebrating Tet in the homeland” was not merely a trip home, but a compensatory experience.

However, that first Tet took place when he was quite busy with work at Hoa Sen University, especially during the enrollment season considered vital after the school’s internal upheavals. His wife returned to Vietnam, and she took care of all the Tet shopping.

According to Thanh, the Tet atmosphere is strongest from the 23rd day of the 12th lunar month to the 1st day of the 1st lunar month. “In the days leading up to Tet, coming home from work and seeing crowded streets, bustling shops, everyone excited to shop, employees preparing to go home, I felt happy and remembered the excitement of celebrating Tet in my youth,” he said.

Celebrating Tet in his homeland, on the first day, he maintained the tradition of ancestral offerings. In the US, every Tet, he usually drove his wife to the pagoda while maintaining the habit of wrapping Banh Tet, a way to keep Tet alive amid Western life.

His family’s Tet feast at home, like many other Vietnamese families, includes Banh Tet eaten with pickled vegetables, leek bulbs, dried shrimp, and century eggs. After deciding to retire in Vietnam, he has more opportunities to celebrate Tet in his homeland. During Tet, he often chooses to cycle through many provinces instead of staying in one place. One year, he was in Da Lat on the first day and continued his journey from the second day.

Thanh perceives Tet not only as a cultural ritual but also as a problem of the integration era. “If a Vietnamese company has a contract to provide services to foreign countries, while employees go home for Tet and 90 percent of the world still works normally, how will the business solve it? Every choice has gains and losses. There are values that cannot be measured,” he said.

Thanh Hung