Kien met Hien on the train back to Hanoi after the North Vietnamese Army won the war. Like Kien, Hien was a soldier for the North—unlike Kien, though, she didn’t escape the war without lasting physical injuries. For the several days it took the train to make its way through Vietnam, Kien and Hien got to know each other. Every night, Kien would pick Hien up and place her in his hammock. They would then spend the night kissing and whispering to each other, enjoying some fleeting happiness after years of violence and turmoil. When the train reached Hien’s village outside Hanoi, Kien wanted to get off with her, but she told him not to, saying that it was time for them to go their separate ways—the war was over, she told him, so now they had to return to their civilian lives on their own.
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Hien Character Timeline in The Sorrow of War
The timeline below shows where the character Hien appears in The Sorrow of War. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Pages 79-100
...while riding the train back to Hanoi. He grew close with a young woman named Hien, who had fought on battlefields in South Vietnam. She’d been wounded in battle, so each...
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Pages 108-116
...with Kien, though he was always at an emotional remove—he mistook her for Phuong, for Hien, for Hoa (a woman he knew in the Jungle of Screaming Souls), and even for...
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