HO MINH HOANG – CHAIRMAN OF DEOCA CORPORATION
I remember the first impression in the meeting with Ho Minh Hoang, a young businessman who made an important contribution to the construction of Deoca Highway Tunnel, known as the "King of Vietnam Highway Tunnel". The project opened up a system of traffic infrastructure, tunnels, and highways from Deoca to Huu Nghi Quan.
It was late in the afternoon, right at the construction site of Deoca Highway Tunnel. We spent the whole day on field research, meeting technical staff, construction managers, interacting with skilled engineers, technicians and tunnel boring workers, listening to everything...
I also know that along with this construction site, at the same time, Ho Minh Hoang General Director Deoca and board of management of the group are preparing very urgently for the simultaneous deployment of other construction sites and projects ... I guess that everyone on the board of managements of this group would be facing a lot of new pressures and challenges.
During a simple wine party in the evening, we sat after a day tired from the wind, the noise of the construction site and the moving around ...
Ho Minh Hoang appeared when the wine party just started. Still looking like a journalist, Chief-editor Nguyen Ba Kien described in the article "The King of the Highway Tunnel" in Traffic newspaper, Ho Minh Hoang seemed still tired.
Hoang entered the wine, but it seems that there has been still many thoughts, obsessions, needed to think to solve. No one asked what Hoang was thinking about but seemed to feel the same thing and all wanted him to temporarily forget to enjoy the party. There was a young official sitting next to me, whispering to me: "Probably the "boss" has to solve a new problem. In this task, of course there are always complex and complicated problems. The problem can come from real construction site, maybe from colleagues, partners, from superior, or anywhere ... And then, "boss" Hoang is still the person in charge to "solve" it, and will "solve" ... Shelf "boss", we just have fun ".
At that time, someone took out a guitar, strolled on some music and sang a few songs about homeland, about the love of men and women ...
Hoang sat in silent for a while, silently touching a few cups throughout the turn, then suddenly raised his hand to signal and took the guitar from the musician Le Bao Long. He hugged the guitar, his fingers sprinkled on the neck of the fretboard chords and sang ...
Song "Entrepreneurial Life " by musician Tran Tien resounded ... I sat and listening in silent. I have never found this song to contain so much confession ...
Ho Minh Hoang has a strong, high, and long singing voice. In my opinion, the song seems to have a special sympathy of the person singing with the composer. The song is like saying instead of a person who sings thoughts containing:
“Một đời doanh nhân, đắng cay và thăng trầm
Một đời sóng gió lái con thuyền đi… tới
Một đời người lính chiến tranh thương trường
Một đời nghệ sĩ khát khao kiếm tìm
Đồng tiền biến hình, có đây mà trắng tay…”
The whole party went silent. It seems that everyone has deep feelings and wants to share about the hardships of the entrepreneurial life:
“Một đời doanh nhân bước chân về muôn trùng
Lạnh lùng hào hoa giấu đi niềm sâu… kín
Một đời nước mắt nhớ thương quê nghèo
Một đời cười vui mỹ nhân bạn bè
Đêm đêm bước về… bóng ta lại với ta!”.
Ho Minh Hoang took the glass of wine and drank it, and then he continued to spread the chords on the neck of the guitar and began to sang.
“Thuyền không lớn sao vội ra khơi?
Chí không cao sao cùng thế giới?
Dân không giàu sao mà nước mạnh?
Lòng không bền sao làm doanh nhân?”
Then he didn't catch the next song but sang the song again. He sang the sentence in the song over and over, "Lòng không bền sao làm doanh nhân?" (if your heart is not strong enough how can u be an entrepreneur).
I started to feel very interesting about Ho Minh Hoang since hearing the song “Đời doanh nhân” ("Entrepreneurial Life") by Tran Tien musician. It is not always this man who will easily expose all what he has to face. He must have a lot of internal force, others are not easy to grasp, but from a song filled with the confession he sang, we can imagine a part of issues.
***
I have heard the song "Entrepreneurial Life" in many places ... Most impressive is that for the first time, Tran Tien musican has sang this song on live television on the occasion of a great business event in the early 2000s. Journalist Lai Van Sam was the MC of this event, immediately sang along and asked everyone to sing along with him. Tran Tien's song began to be popular and spread from that event. Before that, there was no song written specifically for business class. The song "Entrepreneurial Life" has become an official song of businessmen, bringing with it the emotions, feelings, concerns and aspirations of business people.
Tran Tien was born in 1947 in Hanoi city, He was the man experiencing so much bitterness and glory ... Tran Tien has written many songs which has a long life and contains many emotions, for people to sing through each other through historical periods of the country. In the period of getting rich and developing the country, he had a “Entrepreneurial Life" for business people.
Now, I heard a young businessman who was born after Tran Tien for decades, belong to the 7X generation singing that song. So I had a very different feeling.
Talking with composer Tran Tien, he talk about the process of writing this song is also very interesting. Tran Tien has many friends everywhere, many of whom are entrepreneurs. One of the close businessmen with Tran Tien is Ba Phong, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Ben Thanh Group. Ba Phong's life was also ups and downs, when became a businessman he has many achivements as well as failures. Tran Tien, in many alcoholics, sat listening to Ba Phong telling his life story, business story, and the story of an old soldier joining in the new war …
Once talking together, Ba Phong said, "You are so close with me, write to my business a favorite song." Tran Tien is very happy with this friendly offer. Later, Tran Tien said to Ba Phong: “I will write a song not only about your business, but also about the story of your life, about businessmen, and about yourself again!". Ba Phong excitedly exclaimed, "If it's a song for the business class, then I have a big profit!". And so the song "Entrepreneurial Life" was born ...
The song has told the story about the life and bitterness of a businessman, that’s Ba Phong, it’s also the life story of many entrepreneurs in our country today. The song has turned up emotions from the blood of businessman lying in the musician. Tran Tien comes from a business family. His parents were bourgeois, his family ranked 6th in Hanoi before the August Revolution. Many years haven’t opportunity to get rich, the blood of entrepreneurs still silently aspires to flow in the musician ...
Because of such reasons, the song "Entrepreneurial Life" has spread, which is well received by business people, including many young entrepreneurs today ...
Vu Thien Phong
