Nguyen Thanh Ngan, an 8-year-old student of Hanoi, has won the excellent prize at the ENEOS x MOGU Children’s Story Award 2021 with her comic story titled “The Wind Train”.

She imagines the wind as an industrious, hard-working train driver who works for the sake of life. It took her a day to write and a few more days to edit the story.

Nguyen Thanh Ngan will have the chance to visit Japan for attending the awarded ceremony of ENEOS x MOGU Children’s Story Award 2021. Photo: Mot sach Mogu

Through Ngan's imagination, everything in the book is very magical, the smile can also be sad and the leaf can turn into a dreamy butterfly. “The idea of my story originated from an outdoor picnic, watching the trees flutter in the cool breezes,” she said.

The junior high school category’s first prize went to 11-year-old Dang Phuong Lan with the story titled “Opens The Door” and Nguyen Thi Oanh, 48, won first prize in the open category for the story “Cats Fall Asleep in Chicken Nests”.

Nguyen Thanh Ngan will be awarded a trip to visit Japan to attend the award ceremony in November.

Jurors of the contest included Japanese popular writer and cartoon illustrator Nagano Hideko; children’s writer Le Phuong Lien; Doctor in Education and Chairwoman of Book Reading with Children Club Nguyen Thuy Anh and others.

The winning stories are printed in a Vietnamese-Japanese bilingual anthology by Kim Dong Publishing House. Photo: Mot sach Mogu

According to Hideko, this year’s entries are of better quality than in previous years. She was impressed with the contestants in the primary category for their ability to observe, perceive, and their interesting way of conveying messages.

“Children always surprise us by expressing the world around them, unexpectedly and contrary to common logic. Their works are not inferior to the works of adults. This is something that even I myself have to learn about,” she stated.

The winning works will be translated into Japanese; edited, illustrated, printed, and distributed as a Vietnamese-Japanese bilingual anthology.

Children’s Story Writing Award Dowa Hanataba was initiated by ENEOS Corporation in Japan in 1970. The contest was held in Vietnam for the first time in 2018 on the occasion of the 45th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Vietnam and Japan.

2022 is the 5th year ENEOS Vietnam and More Production Co., Ltd. (Mogu bookworm) co-sponsor this meaningful award to help nurture Vietnamese young literary talents.