The white-haired man relaxing in the café was wearing stylish sunglasses

Man relaxing in cafe — Man relaxing in a cafe

Walking through an alley off the market street in Bến Tre, I came across a small café quietly open for business. Several well-worn benches stood out front, and on one of them sat an elderly man, his white hair drifting in the breeze. He wore a not-quite-new white T-shirt over sun-browned arms, and a large pair of sunglasses rested across his nose. Through the dark lenses, it seemed as though he was observing me with curiosity. Perhaps, reflected in his glasses, my figure—wandering about with a DSLR in hand—looked strangely small.

In Vietnam, cafés and coffee are part of everyday life, almost akin to a religious ritual. The Arabica and Robusta varieties introduced during the French colonial era now steam away at nearly every street corner. In the south, the norm is cà phê sữa đá—iced coffee with sweetened condensed milk—more like something to be savored than simply drunk. The old man had such a sugary cup at his side, but it remained mostly untouched. Maybe, for him, simply sitting here and letting time pass was the true purpose.

Bến Tre is known as the coconut town along a tributary of the Mekong River, and locals generally greet visitors with warmth. Still, the man’s smile seemed less like wholehearted welcome and more like a half-formal “why not sit a while?”—the kind of courtesy that reminded me of encounters in Uchida Hyakken’s travel writings. There was no needless conversation; he was photographed, and the rest was left to the wind. In this way, I shared, just for a moment, in the quiet afternoon of a white-haired gentleman in a small corner of Vietnam.

Ben Tre on Google Map

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