Fito Museum ~ The Museum of Vietnamese Traditional Medicine 15 Nov 2017

It took us quite sometime to the FITO Museum, also known as the Museum of Traditional Vietnamese Medicine.

We were quite surprised to find out that the museum is one of the few privately operated museums in Saigon.

We immediately felt welcomed once entered the museum, because the staff were very friendly from the start, and the museum had a wonderful cosy, almost family run feel to it.

The Museum of Traditional Vietnamese Medicine is housed in a five story home, built and renovated to resemble a traditional style Vietnamese home. The wooden carved decorations and details within the house were incredible.

The owner of the Museum moved the whole house from his ancestors’ birth place from the north Vietnam to south Vietnam. We can see the very traditional and ornaments carvings in the house.

There was a guide whom gathered all the visitors and gave us a brief history of the museum and the Vietnamese traditional medicine.

The philosophy seems to me is the same as the Chinese traditional medicine roots from the same place, which was China.

The Vietnamese traditional flourished from there, and it had become more and more prominent till in Vietnam have traditional medication practitioners side by side with the western medication practitioners in the public hospitals.

Our tour started from the 5th Floor. We have brought to the area which shown The Historical Chronology of Traditional Vietnamese Medicine. The chronicle of Vietnamese traditional medicine has shown an important events and a remarkable people during its forming and developing process.

After which we came to the Altar of Medicine. This room dedicated to 2 greatest physicians in Vietnam: Tue Tinh (14th century) and Le Huu Trac (18th century).

A Prehistoric Traditional Instruments room displays some items from Stone and Bronze Age that were used in traditional medicine.

Before we turned to 6th Floor, we saw The Tree of Traditional Vietnamese Medicine which a wooden carved picture named “Viet Nam Bach Gia Y”. It shows a big tree with 100 royal physicians and Vietnamese traditional medicine authors from 12th to the early 20th century.

At the 6th Floor, there are a 15 pictures of famous physicians and authors of Vietnamese traditional medicine from 13th – 18th centuries in the Vietnamese Physicians Room. These showpieces were created by Vietnamese traditional handicraft ways, especially the painting on the yellow pigment paper.

The highlights of the 6th Floor is The Charm Tower. An architecture of museum shows an unique traditional architecture of Vietnamese regions. There are house in the style of North, of Red River valley (a portal of temple),the Hue style (a balcony) and some styles of Cham people.

The other side of Cham tower looks like the gate of Thang Long which was built in Ha Noi in 1780. Its top has a 2 stone carved words “Medical Temple”.

In this room of The Oriental Traditional Medicine, we have been introduced to the oriental medicine along with a history of Chinese medicine, a history of Vietnamese traditional medicine and medicine in Korea.

At the 4th Floor, we came to The Collection of Medical Ingredients, where this room displays a medical trees, animals, minerals that were used in the traditional medicine. There also displays a collection of paintings “Vietnam Ban Thao” - it includes a 20 pages (1,2 meters high) and an images of nearly 300 medicine herbs.

The Oriental Apothecary Instruments: knifes, boat mortars. This is a collection of tools for preparing of traditional medicine such as knifes and apothecary’s mortars. An apothecary’s mortar is a tool to grind a dried herbs into powder.

Every visitor can try to wear a doctors traditional clothes and take a photographs here.

The Pharmacy House Model of 19th Century corner of this room is situated the full size model of oriental pharmacy.

The Collection of Wine Jars room shows some jars to keep medicine wine. Almost in all houses in countryside was made a wine in the past. A herbal wine was the one of main methods of medicine preparing.

Came to 3rd Floor, The Collection of Ceramic Teapots room is called “Tang Kham Khai”. There are some pictures describing traditional medicine operations such as picking, preparing medicines, feeling the pulse and writing a prescription. An exposition of this room shows an items such as bowls and teapots.

The Collection of Scales and Mortars room shows an items from drug stores or usual life of Vietnamese people such as mortars and pestles, scales and set of weights of 19th century.

The Collection of Metal Teapots room shows some pots collecting from the whole Vietnam (from Ha Dong, Lai Thieu, Hoi An & etc.).

The Collection of Tincture Jugs room displays some items in the collection of our museum such as small bottles of wine, wine jars, wine pots. Their styles and materials are much diversified with different dates from Han Viet pottery (1st-3rd century) to modern pottery (20th century).

At the 2nd floor is The Royal Medicinal Academy floor. This floor is decorated according to the palace style of Royal physician academy. This academy took care of the King and the royal family.

Finally, we have came to the Ground Floor again, arrived in the Cinema Room. All of us invited to watch a short fifteen minute film about the progression of ancient Vietnamese medicine.

We can enjoy a complimentary cup of tea on the Ground Floor in the small Pharmacy and Souvenir Shop. The cup of tea, used specifically to reduce anxiety, stress, and to help one relax. All visitors could try and buy a tea, wine and other medicine made from plants.

Overall, we were pleasantly surprised with the FITO Museum, and I thought it was a very educational attraction. Also, there were a couple hands on things to try, like putting on a traditional Vietnamese medicine doctor outfits, and rolling a sharp stone to grind medicine.

We left the museum around 12.25pm and headed to our next destination - Cơm Gà Xối Mỡ Su Su.