Growing up from the fields, steeped in rustic flavors of the countryside - “salty fermented vegetables, sour white eggplant”, yet it was not until my late forties that I first heard of mut ca phao (white eggplant preserves) from Hue. The humble eggplant, so familiar on simple family meals, appears here in an entirely unfamiliar form - a delicately beautiful preserves for the Lunar New Year.

On Facebook, amid the flood of news and images of inundation, among the urgent rescue and relief efforts by authorities and functional forces, I came across an image that warmed my heart: hot meals being packed and prepared for their journey from the area of fomer Phu Thuan to Hue Central Hospital, to be given to hungry patients trapped by the floods.