That week
in Da Nang.

Vietnam won the ASEAN Championship again last night, and the way it happened is the part people will be retelling for years.

The first leg in Bangkok on 22 August finished Thailand 0, Vietnam 2, both goals from substitutes, Nguyen Hai Long on 62 minutes and Nguyen Quang Hai seven minutes later.

The second leg at My Dinh in Hanoi last night finished 2-2. Thailand scored through Yotsakorn Burapha after twelve minutes and Wanchai Jarunongkran with five minutes left. Vietnam's two goals were both own goals: Chatchai Budprom turned one in after 52 minutes, and in the third minute of injury time Jarunongkran put through his own net.

So the same player scored the goal that put Thailand ahead and then the goal that took it away, inside eight minutes. Thailand also missed a penalty along the way. Not one Vietnam player was credited with a goal all night, and Vietnam still won the final 4-2 on aggregate.

If you were anywhere near Bach Dang or the Dragon Bridge after the final whistle you already know what the city sounded like.

Vietnam's National Day holiday runs Saturday 29 August to Wednesday 2 September. Five days, and it is the longest break of the year outside Tet.

That is the public sector schedule, confirmed in Notice 9441 from the Ministry of Home Affairs. Government offices, banks and public services are shut for all five. Monday 31 August is a working day being moved, and it was already made up by working Saturday 22 August.

If you work for a private company here, the rule is different: you get 2 September plus one adjacent day, either the 1st or the 3rd, and your employer chooses which. They are supposed to have told you at least thirty days in advance, so if nobody has, ask.

What it means for the rest of us. The beach will be full, domestic flights and buses will be booked out, and anything you need from a bank or an office should be done before Friday afternoon. Restaurants and cafes mostly stay open. It is the busiest week Da Nang has all summer.

Today is Vu Lan, the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month. Walk past any temple this afternoon and you will see people with a small flower pinned to their shirt. Some red, some white.

Red means your mother is still alive. White means she is not. That is the whole thing, and nobody explains it because everybody here already knows.

The custom is younger than it looks and it did not start in Vietnam. We wrote the full story of where it came from, and it involves one monk, one afternoon in Japan in 1962, and a song almost everyone in this country knows without ever deciding to learn it.

Read it at lifeofdanang.com/story/vu-lan-rose

If you are out today, Ngu Hanh Son is where a lot of the city goes, and nobody will mind you standing at the edge.

Over the National Day break, entry is free at the Da Nang Museum, the Da Nang Fine Arts Museum and the Museum of Cham Sculpture.

The Cham Museum is the one to take. It holds the largest collection of Cham sculpture anywhere in the world, most of it lifted out of My Son and the temple sites along this coast, and a lot of people live here for years without going in.

There is also an exhibition at the Fine Arts Museum from 26 August to 15 September on how this city was formed and how it has changed, which runs past the holiday if you miss the free days.

And the Dragon Bridge still breathes fire at 9pm on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The Heineken Pickleball World Cup 2026 runs Sunday 30 August to Sunday 6 September, at Tien Son Sports Palace, Tuyen Son Sports Village and other courts around central Da Nang.

The numbers have gone up since we last wrote about it. The organisers now say more than 5,000 athletes from 81 countries and territories, where the earlier figure was 4,000 from 80.

Play starts on the Sunday, but the opening ceremony is on 2 September, National Day itself.

That is a genuinely large international sporting event, in this city, for a week, in a sport most people here had not heard of three years ago.

Hoi An Creative Week runs Friday 28 August to Tuesday 2 September, centred on Hoai River Square and spreading through the ancient town and the craft villages.

Exhibitions, performances, talks and hands-on workshops, with maps and QR codes so you can walk it at your own pace instead of following a group.

It sits inside the National Day holiday, so the town will be as full as it gets. Go early or go late.

The Co Tu Village Festival runs Saturday 29 August to Wednesday 2 September at the Cong Troi Dong Giang ecotourism site.

The Co Tu are one of the ethnic communities of these mountains, and the festival is their culture on their ground rather than a performance brought down to the city.

It is west of Da Nang, up into the hills, and it is the opposite of the beach on a holiday weekend.