VO VAN TAN

It suddenly dawned on him that it was a matter of shame to put up with injustice, and being a colony of a foreign country was one of them.
Vo Van Tan was then working as a rickshaw puller in Sai Gon, having moved from his village in Duc Hoa District in Cho Lon Province (now Duc Hoa District, Long An Province).
He returned to his native village and led the villagers' fight against a tax imposed by local landlords. He was arrested and imprisoned for a few years, but this only strengthened his resolve to fight. After his release, he moved to Sai Gon and in 1926, when he was 32 years old, he joined the Viet Nam Revolutionary Youth Association.
Three years later, Tan was admitted to the Annam Communist Party located in South Viet Nam then known as Nam Ky or Cochin China by the French and the following year, he led the people in seizing power in Tan Phu Thuong Commune in Duc Hoa District. The movement was put down by the French and Tan was sentenced to death in absentia.
In 1932, Tan was appointed the secretary of the Gia Dinh provincial Party Committee and the member of the Nam Ky Regional Party Committee. He went on to become the secretary of the committee and was elected to the Central Party Committee of the Indocjinese Communist Party founded two years earlier as a result of the merger of three communist groups.
During the Nam Ky Uprising in 1940, Tan was arrested and jailed. It was during this incarceration that he expressed his defiance of the colonialists as well as his commitment to the revolution in an act that will forever be remembered by his grateful and proud countrymen.
On his cell wall, he proclaimed in blood: "I will die, but will never kill the revolutionary movement."
Late in 1943, he was executed by the French at Hoc Mon on the outskirts of Sai Gon.
After the nation's reunification, in August 1975, the Provisional Revolutionary Government paid tribute to Vo Van Tan (1894-1943) by naming a major street in Sai Gon after him.
It is in the fitness of things that the street hosts the War vestiges Museum where the sophisticated bombs, tanks and helicopters used during the American War in Viet Nam are displayed.
The museum, at 28 Vo Van Tan Street, also contains other exhibits, including photographs, that remind visitors of the heroic resistance wars waged by the people of Viet Nam to preserve their national freedom and unity.
Outside in the street, cyclo drivers relax in their vehicles under the shade of big trees, reading newspaper or dozing off as they wait patiently for passengers. Tricycles selling fruits stand nearby.
For old Saigonese, the street has even stronger links with the sprit of patriotism and sacrifice. It is well-know to them as Tran Quy Cap, the name given by the Sai Gon administration, who changed it from Rue Testard to Tran Quy Cap in March 1995.
Tran Quy Cap (186-1908) was a native of Bai Nhi Village of Quang Nam Province's Dien Ban District. After obtaining the laureat doctor title in 1904, Cap was given a senior post in the education service in Quang Nam Province. A patriotic scholar, Cap secretly worked with other Vietnamese patriots to encourage local inhabitants to reset the French colonialists.
Cap is famous as one of the leaders of popular movements like Can Vuong (Support to the King), Duy Tan (Renovation) and Dong Du (Journey to the East).
He was executed by the French on June 3, 1908 for "exciting the populace to revolt" following a betrayal by one of his acquaintances. In April that year, Cap who was serving at Khanh Hoa Province, 200 km south of his homeland, had received a letter from his native village informing him about a revolt by the people of Quang Nam against the heavy taxes imposed by the French. He immediately expressed his joy in a few words that he scribbled on the back of the envelope. One of his colleagues, who saw him write, stole the letter and passed it on to the French.
Not many people are likely to remember the street's earlier name - Rue Larclause Prolongee - because this tag applied only before December 1897.
Of course , the street's revolutionary history has not prevented the development of commerce, and its central sections is dominated by shops selling safes. The 1.3km long street is also a good place to go shopping for brand-new and second-hand fridges, air conditioners, washing machines and wooden furniture.
the street runs southwest from the Ho Con Rua (Turtle's Lake) o meet up with Cao Thang Street in District 3..
Formerly it used to house big villas of the Americans and rich Vietnamese, and a few of the concrete box designs favoured by the former can still be found on the street. This, however, pertains only to the section that stretches from Ho Con Rua to Cach Mang Thang Tam Street.
the rest of the street used to be marsh land before 1975.
"There were only thatched houses and the street was very muddy after a heavy downpour," says a 82 years-old man who has been living on Vo Van Tan Street since he was 14. His family hails from Tra Vinh Province, and his parents moved to Sai Gon in 1932.
The veteran said that the road was upgraded after 1955 when the French had left, and then the main means of transport were bicycles and rickshaws, with a very few cars owned by the very rich people.
And, throwing light on one of the street's traditions, he recalls: "Almost every family in this part of the street would have a trolley selling bot chien (a kind of fried duck eggs dipped in soya sauce) in front of their houses."
This tradition is fortunately being kept alive by some Chinese-style eateries in this part of the street who sell bot chien as a specialty originating from China. today's benificiaries of this culinary creation are students from the Open University and members of the Youth Cultural House as the special bot chien trolleys are often parked outside the gates of these institutions of learning. - VNS