Keeping the border alight

At A Pa Chải, the westernmost point in Sín Thầu commune, the Vietnam Youth Federation of Điện Biên province, together with the A Pa Chải Border Post and Nà Tấu prison, recently organized the program “I love my fatherland” and a flag-raising ceremony at the Vietnam-Laos-China border junction. The event was solemn and deeply moving, leaving a lasting impression on young participants, local residents, and guests alike.

As the national anthem echoed through the mountains, all eyes turned toward the flag waving high above. It was more than a ritual; it was a living lesson in patriotism, peace, and civic responsibility.

A highlight of the program was the presentation of 100 national flags and 100 portraits of President Hồ Chí Minh to border households. Though modest, these gifts carried profound meaning, ensuring that every home on the frontier bears the national flag, and that faith in the Party’s leadership and the aspiration to build the homeland burn brightly even in the most remote villages.

Mùa Chiến Thắng, Vice Chairman of the provincial Vietnam Fatherland Front Committee and Standing Deputy Secretary of the provincial Youth Union, explained: “This is not the first time. For years, the Youth Union has maintained similar programs for border communities. Presenting portraits of Uncle Hồ and the national flag is not only symbolic, each flag is another marker of sovereignty. Guarding the land and its people is not done only with weapons, but with care, companionship, and responsibility in people’s everyday lives.”

The spirit of “I love my Fatherland” extends far beyond A Pa Chải. In Mường Nhà commune, Youth Union members recently brought gifts to children at Tin Tốc school. Alongside meaningful supplies, 60 sets of “I love Vietnam” uniforms offered encouragement for the new school year, instilling a love for the homeland in young hearts on the distant border.

This spirit also resonates strongly through propaganda campaigns marking the 80th anniversary of the August Revolution, National Day, and Party Congresses at all levels. Across the province’s border communes, flags, banners, and posters have brightened streets. Youth motorcades and mobile loudspeakers carry patriotic songs and historic reminders to villages, spreading both excitement and pride as the nation looks ahead to the Party Congress.

Nurturing patriotism

From the Điện Biên border today, the Fatherland comes alive in the red flag flying over A Pa Chải, in the stirring anthem sung beside border markers, and in the bright eyes of children receiving gifts to help them return to school. Every flag-raising, every act of charity, every banner or flag in a remote hamlet affirms sovereignty and nurtures patriotism in the frontier.

Pờ Mý Lế, Standing Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of Sín Thầu commune, noted: “For many years, authorities at all levels have paid special attention to ethnic minorities in border areas through diverse programs. These efforts not only demonstrate the Party and State’s care, but also foster patriotism, self-reliance, and trust among local officials and residents in the cause of building and safeguarding the nation.”

Beyond formal ceremonies, patriotism at the border is also forged through the deep bonds of soldiers and villagers. Soldiers work alongside farmers in rice fields and corn plots, sharing techniques in animal husbandry and cultivation. When disasters strike, they help rebuild houses, restore clean water, and repair roads swept away by floods.

Patriotism is also “sown” in extracurricular lessons on border markers, in trips retracing the steps of border guards, and in children learning the names of their villages, communes, and provinces. From these first lessons, they begin to grasp the shape of the Fatherland, and grow in gratitude to those who defend it, with the hope that one day they themselves may take up that responsibility.

Change is evident in today’s borderlands: electricity, concrete roads, new schools, and better living conditions keep people rooted to their villages. Community border patrols and youth, women’s, and veterans’ clubs help strengthen unity and vigilance. As Lỳ Xuyến Phù, a respected elder of Tá Miếu village, Sín Thầu commune, shared: “Life has changed so much here. We are proud that every house now has the national flag. That flag flying is our faith, our motivation for our children to study, work, and protect our homeland.”

“The homeland through the eyes of the borderlands” is thus not just a line on a map or a stone marker. It lives in the smiling faces of villagers, in the calloused hands working the fields, and in the enduring determination to hold fast to the land. And from the border, looking back across the country, one sees clearly that the nation grows stronger as each frontier village finds peace, prosperity, and unyielding hope.