Talk:Kim Bồng woodworking village

Photos
Two more images for use in this article—I didn't add them since the article is too small right now for all of them: One more pic for this article:

Spanish Navy
Ever since I started working on this article, I've been plagued with the problem of verifying the claim, presented in the referenced VietnamNet article, that carpenters from Kim Bong were commissioned to build a warship for the Spanish navy. It's bit of a grandiose claim to be sure, but it's in the realm of possibility. The problem is, there's simply nothing available on the subject anywhere I've looked on the internet. I don't even know where to begin looking. Complicating the process, of course, VietnamNet removed the article (as it inexplicably tends to remove a great number of its old news items). I think the "verify credibility" tag that's currently applied to the reference mainly concerns the VietnamNet site itself, and understandably so—Vietnamese media have been known to fabricate facts (entire stories?) on occasion.

Now for what I have learned: I've been to Kim Bong a few times, and on my last visit, I spoke to the man who was interviewed in the VietnamNet article, Huynh Suong (the son of Huynh Ri, mentioned in this article). He confirmed the claim about the Spanish warship, but he wasn't able to give me a reference where I could read more about the claim (or maybe my request didn't filter through my interpreter properly). That means VietnamNet wasn't fabricating the story, but it also means the claim is still not verifiable (a master carver's word does not a source make, and I'm not about to publish OR). For now, I've removed some of the language that focuses on the claim. If others believe it should be removed entirely, then I'd be OK with that, but I will keep searching to see if the claim can be verified. If I can find a source that specifically quotes either Huynh Ri or Huynh Suong to that effect, I'll probably add the claim back and attribute it to them, i.e. "Master Carver Huynh Suong says...". --dragfyre_ ʞןɐʇ c 17:43, 25 March 2011 (UTC)