'It's in our blood': how Vietnam adopted the Latin alphabet

Hanoi: At a calligraphy class in Hanoi, Hoang Thi Thanh Huyen slides her brush across the page to form the letters and tonal marks of Vietnam s unique...

Hanoi: At a calligraphy class in Hanoi, Hoang Thi Thanh Huyen slides her brush across the page to form the letters and tonal marks of Vietnam's unique modern script, in part a legacy of French colonial rule.

The history of romanised Vietnamese, or "Quoc Ngu", links the arrival of the first Christian missionaries, colonisation by the French and the rise to power of the Communist Party.

It is now reflected in the country's "bamboo diplomacy" approach of seeking strength through flexibility, or looking to stay on good terms with the world's major powers. A month after China's Xi Jinping visited, French President Emmanuel Macron will arrive on Sunday.

Huyen, 35, takes weekly calligraphy classes alongside six others at her teacher's tiny home as "a way to relax after work".