I am a student of session 2013 – 2016, so my class does not have a chance to meet Mr Le Tat Ton or be taught by him. However, I was luckier than any other students of my session to be able to meet him during his retirement.

When it was drawing close to 11^th the November, my sister, a student of session 1997 – 2000, had the intention to visit him, so I had the chance to accompany her on her visit to the class he was teaching.

Image of Mr Le Tat Ton – source: https://www.facebook.com/tatton.le)

When I first saw him, my first impression about him was the grey hair characteristic of his old age, his plump figure and especially his “fat” belly. Although he was at the age associated with health degradation, his sound was still loud and sonorous just as that I often hear from other teachers.

He inquired after my sister’s life, but since there was so little time that he could only ask after a few things and then had to go on with his class work, we had no time for a chat and had to leave immediately.

In my sister’s retrospection, when she asked him why he did not take a rest from teaching, he said: “After my retirement I usually revised knowledge to keep my mind from being stagnant and keep myself from growing old… (chuckle)”

That is what I remember the most, because it is so strange how he, a teacher decades older than us, in a moment became so close just for a saying and a smile.

(Image of Mr Le Tat Ton – source: https://www.facebook.com/tatton.le)

After that my sister told me a lot about him: he was friendly and usually chuckled a lot but at the same time he was extremely strict, never allowing students to chat during his class. Maybe on the one hand because of that his students never made loud noise or interupt his Math lessons. On the other hand, it was because of the interest of his lessons. Through his experience during years of teaching, he always had his own methods to renew and make the lessons easy to understand. For example, when he taught his student about signs of functions, he would use “A thousand years of Thang Long” method or when he talked about the theory of straight lines in parallel with a plane, he would call it with the flamboyant name “The rope theory”…Every time he talked about these theories all students laughed out loud at his “lovely explanations”, which made it easy for all of them to learn those supposedly long and complicated knowledge.

My sister also told me he often forbidded his students from using correction fluid, since “it is erasing your own mistakes and forgetting them, so isn’t it like you have not learnt anything for yourselves?” He often told his students to cross out their mistakes instead of using correction fluid. She remembered every time she got caught using correction pen she was reminded with her pen raise high in front of class that she should not keep using it; therefore, in the long run she did not dare to touch the correction pen again.  

(Image of Mr Le Tat Ton – source: https://www.facebook.com/tatton.le)

What my sister has always loved about him is his sympathy towards his students. Although he was a teacher of the prior generation, he could always understand those adolescents with impulsive and naïve thoughts. He always sympathized with such ordinary psychological problems, and sometimes even shared with them his old stories to make the distance between him and them closer.During his lesson he was really amusing, using his sense of humor to break the some time stagnant atmosphere of the class so that his students could be relaxed and focus on the lesson again.

My sister said such characteristícs were perhaps his own charm, the charm that his students always held in high esteem, the charm that made him amusing while being a strict teacher, the charm that gave him the spirit of a young man at his old age. That’s why even when he has retired for a long time and my sister has graduated for years, she still came back to visit him to once again see his smile and have a chance to express her respect for such a teacher like him.

(Mr Le Tat Ton’s image during his fieldtrip – source: https://www.facebook.com/tatton.le)

On celebrating Vietnamese Teachers’ Day 11^th the November, on behalf of all students I wish you will be healthy,  keep your youthful smile and always keep Hanoi – Amsterdam in your heart as a beautiful memory! We would like to send you our most sincere love!

Reporter: Nguyen Minh Hieu (Lit 13 – 16)

Translator: Tran Mai Anh (Eng 13 – 16)