The Shame of the Bicycle and Seven Wise Steps

This story is drawn from a dharma talk that awakened a sense of national pride, comparing Vietnam's development with that of South Korea and Japan, and offering seven steps toward becoming a wise nation.

The late afternoon sun poured like honey over the courtyard of Linh Mieu Pagoda (Cat Pagoda) in Thanh Hoa, gilding its ancient tiled roofs. Inside the assembly hall, the air was utterly still, with only the whisper of wind drifting through the leaves of the surrounding forest. Hundreds of young faces, eyes wide open, gazed attentively toward the podium where the Venerable Thich Chan Quang stood. He held no microphone, yet his voice rang out warm and resonant, like the heartfelt words of a father anxious for his children's future.

He began with an unexpected question that broke the silence:

"My dear children, what was our country like a century ago?"

A few whispers rose: "We were under French rule..." "We were poor..." The teacher nodded, his gaze growing more solemn. He recounted a painful yet heroic history: since ancient times, the Vietnamese people have been fiercely resilient, driving out foreign invaders despite a thousand years of domination. From Uncle Ho, with his extraordinary brilliance, through the two resistance wars against the French and the Americans, our nation proved itself a heroic people who would never accept enslavement.

But then the teacher paused, gesturing toward the objects on the table: a video camera, a microphone, a watch, a pair of eyeglasses, and even the motorbike parked outside.

"Who invented this? Who manufactured that?"

The young people hesitated, then answered in ever softer voices: "Foreign countries... Japan, Germany, America..." The teacher smiled sadly and asked the crucial question:

"So what can Vietnam itself make?"

Silence fell over the hall. Then a hand went up, and a trembling voice answered: "A bicycle." Gentle laughter rippled through the room, but it quickly faded when people saw the teacher's thoughtful expression. He emphasized each word, which fell like stones cast into a still pond:

"Exactly. In a world of progress and fierce competition, we still mostly buy things to use. We have not yet been able to build a complete Made in Vietnam automobile, nor do we possess refined high technologies. This is a shame. But today, I am old, and I no longer have the strength to wash away that shame. I hand it over to you."

The atmosphere grew tense. Some of the young people bowed their heads, a wave of embarrassment rising in their chests. The teacher then guided them to look across the sea, to South Korea and Japan. He told of South Korea's miraculous transformation: forty years ago, they were as poor as Vietnam, even more backward. But they knew shame. They looked at Japan—a civilized, clean neighbor where people bowed to one another and returned lost money to its owners—and they resolved to rise. Today, Samsung chips sit inside the iPhone, and Kia cars have among the fewest defects in the world. The only reason? They felt ashamed of their shortcomings and turned that shame into motivation.

The teacher then drew a lesson from the failure of the Bphone—an admirable effort flawed in its strategy. He analyzed that if the leader of the Bphone project had been more humble, treating it as an experiment to gather the wisdom of the whole people, rather than declaring it "second to none in the world" while the product still had many flaws, the outcome might have been different. It was a lesson about arrogance and a lack of realism.

Then the teacher outlined the path out of that shame through the "Seven Wise Steps." He asked a young person to stand and recite them, and the young man did so well that the whole hall burst into applause:

Steps one and two: Study well and test well. Vietnamese people excel at this, with prestigious international mathematics awards, such as those won by Professor Ngo Bao Chau.

Step three: Work well. This is our weakness; our working style is not yet professional.

Step four: Create excellent products. At this step, we have almost nothing to show.

Step five: Sell well. Marketing and distribution done effectively.

Step six: Provide good after-sales service and warranties. Building trust.

Step seven: Recover and recycle. This is the pinnacle of universal civilization, where the very concept of "waste" no longer exists.

The teacher concluded with an image full of symbolism and dreams:

"Dare to dream of creating a smartphone embedded in the body, or a flying car that needs no wings by dissolving gravity. Do not be afraid to dream. If you carry within you the 'tam quy'—the sense of shame—of the Buddha's teachings (Dharma), and feel deep concern for your country falling behind, then one day Vietnam will be not only a nation heroic in war, but also a technological power, contributing to the peace and prosperity of the world."

## The Meaning of the Story

This story conveys a profound message about the responsibility of the younger generation toward the country in the modern era. Shame is not something embarrassing to hide, but a powerful catalyst for rising up, just as South Korea did. The core lesson lies in the "Seven Wise Steps": from studying and testing, to creating, doing business, and especially cultivating environmental awareness through recycling. The teacher emphasized that wisdom is not merely IQ or book knowledge, but the ability to transform knowledge into practical value, serving the community and elevating the nation's standing. Paying homage to the Buddha and planting wholesome seeds were also mentioned as a practice for opening the mind, combining personal effort with the law of cause and effect (karmic law).

Compiled from a dharma talk by the Venerable Thich Chan Quang.