In Paradise of the Blind Duong Thu Huong Has created a touching portrayal of three women fighting to maintain their dignity in a society that expects them to make sacrifices and be subservient to men .Paradise of the Blind is beautiful journey through a Vietnam landscape and culture. Duong Thu Huong impresses and captivates the reader with her ability to evoke the colours, the foods, the smells, and the age-old rituals of her country. The novel’s plot revolves around Hang, a young woman forced to grow up too fast in the slums of Hanoi and the turbulence of modern Vietnam. Duong Thu Huong brilliantly captures Hang's rebellious attitude towards her mother and the despair and loneliness of her search for self identity. On the other hand Hang’s mother is seen watching powerless, as her life is shattered by a fanatical political campaign led by her own brother. And there is the mysterious Aunt Tam, who is wealthy and bitter in equal parts and seeks to pass on both to her niece, Hang.

Throughout the text we find symbolism of food. A symbol is an object, image, or action that is conventionally understood to represent something else. Food is particularly powerful as a symbol because it is associated to everyday life. Food fulfils physical as well as emotional and psychological needs; it may be intentionally utilized as a symbol in Paradise of the Blind. Since food engages all the senses, it tends to evoke strong sensory and emotive as well as cognitive associations. This range of association adds to the potential symbolic power of food in the text. In paradise of the Blind Food represents social distinctions and also implementation of Russia embodies patriarchal society. Food symbolises the financial fluctuations of hang and other other characters .Various dishes are used throughout the text as a representation for culture and political issues such as at Aunt Tam dinner for Hang enmity towards President is very vivid. Thus we see that the author uses food to bring out conflict and touch various social and political issues in Vietnam at that time. The imagery is vivid, and much of it revolves around the sharing of food, one of many notable Vietnamese traditions set forth in Paradise of the Blind.
There are a variety of foods with different names mentioned such as sticky rice, che pudding for full moon festival, pickled white cabbage, but the basic principle is simple –humans must eat in order to survive. From fancy banquets to meagre dishes, the mode of consumption varies. This is often shown in direct proportion to social and financial situation. The rich and powerful like Aunt Tam hold the banquets, middle class families eat comfortably, and the poor and homeless devour their insufficient servings like hangs mother who keeps aside food for her brother and her nephews (male members have the right to eat first according to cultural implications).

Food like any other culture is of great significance in Vietnamese culture. Throughout the novel, the fluctuating status of Hang and her mother is easily defined through the descriptions of the sort of food they eat, what they buy, and the food that is served by others around them. A person or family’s financial circumstance can be found by examining his/her/their eating habits. A situation where the wealth of a member of Hang’s family is portrayed is when Hang first meets her Aunt Tam. Throughout her life, Tam worked relentlessly to become rich and powerful in her home village. She lives in an opulent house with grand furniture. Most importantly, she has a large variety of food and beverages to choose from, “An enormous plate heaped with five kinds of fruit formed a centrepiece. Behind it were offerings of cakes and wines and a vase filled with fragrant white orchids. Aunt Tam pondered her choice among bottles of lemon, orange, plum, and coffee brandy.”This imagery of the abundance of food in Aunt Tam’s home is the description that best depicts Tam’s wealth. Hang continues to describe the immense feast her aunt serves for just the three of them, and her mother Que exclaims, “Why such a banquet? Who are we expecting?” Because food is so essential important in the culture, it is the almost abundant amount of food that illustrates Tam’s financial position, as well as her self-congratulatory characterization. She does not deny her extravagance, instead she asserts it.
Therefore we see that the writer Dong Thu Hong uses food to bring out the social hierarchy and the political dilemma that existed in the Vietnamese society. Besides this food imagery is also used to give the readers an insightful glance of the culture of the country.