Planes, Taxis, and Turtles

Near the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, down a twisting alley, there is a small lake in the midst of the city. In that lake lies the wreckage of a B-52 bomber, shot down by Vietnamese forces in December of 1972. It's been left in the lake as a testament to Vietnamese tenacity and as a tribute to those directly responsible for its destruction. It's not particularly easy to find, so the area is not inundated with tourists.

In the middle of a residential area....

A few of us chose to walk to that site, rather than viewing Ho Chi Minh's preserved body in the Mausoleum. Ken had seen Bac Ho (Uncle Ho, as many Vietnamese call him) on the last trip, and I had chosen not to. Part of my reasoning for this was that apparently, Ho had not wanted a great fuss made over him or his death; he requested to be cremated and scattered over part of the Central Highlands. Given his determination not to be an icon, I wonder what he'd make of the mausoleum and museum(s), his picture on all the currency, and his image a constant presence throughout the country.

Heavily guarded Presidential Palace, near Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum

After a quick sprint through the Ho Chi Minh Museum, we caught taxis for our next destination. Now, just like any other place in the world, there are people who will take advantage of those whom they assume, at least, are not familiar with the geography. Unfortunately, some (not all, definitely) Ha Noi cab drivers have the reputation of taking tourists on much longer cab rides than necessary, using one way streets, construction, etc. as excuses for inflated fares. We got the other kind of less than honest cab driver -the guy with the double clicking meter. Ken was in the front seat, with another of our fellow travellers and me in the back. She and I were in charge of the map -allowing for some one way streets that we wouldn't know about, the driver seemed not to be going badly out of the way. Then Ken noticed that the meter would click at a steady rate for awhile, then speed up. He pulled out his phone to take a picture; the driver seemed nervous. Upon arrival, the fare he asked for was suddenly 30,000 dong instead of the 67,000 dong that the meter indicated. (30,000 was an entirely reasonable fare for the distances involved).

All of that was to get us to the Temple of Literature. Founded as the Temple of Confucius in 1070, it became the site of the National University in 1076, with the purpose of training promising men to serve the king and nation. In the 1400-1700's, the university was expanded to include classrooms and a dormitory for over 300 students. Today, the remains of the dormitories are likely somewhere under the businesses and streets surrounding the temple, but the refurbished temple and pagodas still exist. Students studied for three years before taking national exams; if they were successful in these, they moved on the Royal exams, in which they were questioned and assessed by the king himself. Depending upon how they did on which levels of exams were assigned a rank and corresponding privileges.

Great Middle Gate at Temple of Literature

Temple of Literature lake

Altars dedicated to the founders of the National University

 Scholars successfully passing royal exams between 1484 and 1780 had their names and birthplaces inscribed on one of a number of Doctors' Stele, which still survive at the Temple of Literature. These stele are massive stone blocks, carried on the back of a correspondingly massive stone turtle. In Vietnamese tradition, a turtle is one of the 4 sacred animals (along with the dragon, phoenix, and unicorn), and is the symbol of wisdom. The carving style of the turtles changed over time - I'm sure there's a dissertation on that topic filed somewhere!

Doctor's Stele

In spite of being a major tourist attraction, the Temple of Literature manages to maintain a peaceful and contemplative quality. It also remains a symbol of scholarly excellence; while we were visiting, there was a group of young women wearing traditional ao dais having graduation photos taken, and making offerings at various altars.

Lining up for graduation photos

A Trip to Ha Long Bay

Our first full day in Ha Noi was spent, not in Ha Noi, but on a day trip to Ha Long Bay. This was a trip I was really looking forward to -8 years ago, there was a typhoon the day we were supposed to go, so the trip never happened.


This time, perfect weather. The only downside of the trip was the 3.5 hour bus ride to get to the boat dock and of course another 3.5 hours back to our hotel. In terms of distance, access to the bay is about 130 km out of Ha Noi; in Canada, this would constitute at most a 2 hour trip, depending on speed limit and traffic. Here, the highway speed limit is lower (like between 60-80 km/hr) and even less when travelling through the many towns along the way, and the roads seem to be in a constant state of construction (kind of like parts of Saskatoon in the summer). Of course, there are always the fun traffic games of dodge-bike, chicken, passing in corners, and guess which side of the road we’re going to drive on. And those take time!

So, basically, there was a lot of sitting on the bus, which didn’t have a lot of leg room. The air conditioning worked fine at the front of the bus, but apparently not at the back, which made the trip back to the city really unpleasant for some people. My first act of glory upon getting on the bus in the morning was to crack/dislocate/bruise/somehow injure a rib by tripping, landing heavily into my seat, and smacking my side against the window frame. No deep breaths for me anymore!

But Ha Long Bay itself was worth the long ride. A UNESCO World Heritage site, this is a submerged karst mountain landscape. In other words, limestone mountains, which have been gradually shaped through erosion, and chemical reactions, rising out of the ocean. There are a huge number of caves in the 1,969 islands, and more are being found every year.

We arrived at the boat dock, and after a wait for 2 passengers arriving from another bus, finally boarded the boat. The first item was lunch, which we fell on like ravenous wolves. When we lifted our heads from our plates, we realized that we were now well into the innermost ring of islands.

Our first stop was at a floating fishing village, where we had the option of kayaking or taking a small boat ride into a wet cave (cave immersed in the sea). Ken and I kayaked around the area, and were able to get a great view of the rock formations and clear water. The day was hot, the water was warm, and with no spray skirts, we were quite soaked by the end of the trip. We managed to partially dry out on the top observation deck on the way to our next stop.

Sung Sot Cave is a dry cave (out of the water) discovered in the early 1990s, and now modified and lit to receive tourists. The cave has a number of chambers, connected by constructed stairs. The tour guide warned us that the cave would be cool….it was cooler than the outside, but extremely humid, so everyone was still sweating by the time the tour was through. Inside the cave, the guide pointed out stalagmites and tites which resembled various animals, body parts, and other items.

After a leisurely ride back to Ha Long City, we boarded the bus for another long ride back to Ha Noi. When we got there, in spite of the late hour and sore butts, a few of us decided to go out for a Ha Noi institution -bia hoi. But, more about that in a later post!

While Ken and I were visiting Tu Duc's tomb and fending off offers of boat rides along the Perfume River, most of the group visited the former Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). We'd gone during the previous trip and decided against a return visit. I did want to talk a bit about one of the stops on the DMZ tour that I found particularly fascinating.

The DMZ is a complete misnomer. After 1954, when the French were defeated by Vietnamese forces, the country was divided into North and South Viet Nam, with a demilitarized zone between the two. During the American War, this area saw some of the heaviest fighting; unexploded mortars and landmines remain an issue today. Vinh Moc is just north of the DMZ. In the late 1960's, the US forces began a campaign of aerial bombardment of the DMZ area, and the inhabitants of Vinh Moc and the other villages were right in the line of fire. Some people fled in the face of nightly bombings, while others began to dig.

Over the course of 18 or so months, the villagers (with the encouragement of North Vietnamese forces) hand dug a complex tunnel network which allowed them to live underground, unseen. The tunnels are about 6 feet tall and three feet wide, with small family rooms opening off to the side. There was a larger meeting area, a well, and a maternity ward (something like 17 babies were born underground). There were air shafts, and the ventilation system was constructed so that cooking smoke was vented away from its origin. That way, if it were noticed and targeted, the attack would not be directed at the actual source. The villagers lived mostly underground for about three years. In spite of constant bombardment from both the air and sea, the tunnels sustained only one direct hit during this time; there was no loss of life, and the bomb crater was converted into another airshaft.

The part of the story that most struck me was the way in which the villagers dealt with the problem of where to put the excavated soil. Large piles of dirt lying around anywhere would definitely attract the attention and suspicions of American observers. Also, the soil is red. Piles of red soil on the sand would be blatantly obvious. So, what they did was dig a hole in the sand, bury the red soil, cover the soil with sand, and dump the excess sand into the ocean!

Today, the tunnels have been somewhat modified to receive tourists, but are very much the same as they always were. Not a comfortable experience for the extremely claustrophobic, but a great example of determination and ingenuity.

After three hours of purgatory, also referred to as a bus ride, we arrived in Hue, the former residence of the emperors of Viet Nam. The imperial capitol was moved from Ha Noi in the very early 1800s by the first emperor of the latest Nguyen ruling dynasty (I say latest because there have been MANY Nguyen rulers throughout history). That emperor, Gia Long, intended to unify the south and north, even selecting a throne name to reflect this intent - Gia from the old name for Sai Gon, and Long from the former name of Ha Noi. 

The main attractions in Hue proper are related to its role as imperial capital from about 1802 to 1945. Like Beijing, Hue has a Forbidden City, surrounded by a citadel. Unlike Beijing, most of the Citadel, places of government, and royal residences were heavily damaged, if not destroyed, during fighting with first the French and then the Americans. Today, major work is being done to restore the Citadel, palaces, and pagodas to their former splendour. The Forbidden Purple City itself has not yet been restored; only some foundations and staircases remain. Occasionally, you can see a fragment of floor tile which would have been exclusively walked on by the royal family and their closest servants. Except for these few tiles, grasses and mimosa now rule the landscape. There are still pockmarks from bullets and shrapnel visible in many of the standing walls, as well as a number of walls partially demolished by both shells and neglect.

Citadel's Flag Tower - the flag pole is 37m tall

Restored Hall of the Mandarins

Topiary elephant - originally, there were real ones

One of the few remaining floor tiles from the Forbidden Purple City

One of the many gates of the Citadel complex

 In spite of or perhaps because of, the combination of destruction and newly restored buildings, the Citadel has an ambiance of its own. Gia Long’s advisers and astronomers chose the location for the palace based on astronomical portents and river access -the area also seems to be able to capture whatever breeze there may be. And the place is quiet - even in the modern city, with traffic and shops right outside the Citadel walls, you can barely hear the motorcycle horns (which really do say “beep beep” here) from near the walls on the inside. In Georgian England, those associated with the royal court referred to their particular circle as ‘The World’. At the Citadel, it’s not hard to imagine how the Vietnamese royal court could be its own, self-contained world and completely unaware of the existence of anything or anyone outside of that world.

Recently restored walkway

Restored Hung To Mieu Temple, dedicated to Gia Long's parents

And you thought unicorns weren't real!

 Ken and I continued the theme of visiting monarchs’ private worlds the next day with a visit to one of the royal tombs. A number of the Nguyen emperors built tombs in the Hue area, and we hadn’t had the chance to see any of them on our last trip. We went to the tomb of Tu Duc, who reigned from 1847 until his death in 1883. His tomb complex was built during the 1860’s -it was quite common for a reigning emperor to design and build his own tomb. During his lifetime, Tu Duc’s used his tomb, which included a small stream and island, as a retreat from the stresses of the court at Hue. Of course, his mandarins, eunuchs, and many, many concubines accompanied him on such occasions. The stream is still there, as are the pavilions, mandarins’ quarters, and the foundations of the concubines’ residences.

Roof detail from a building in the tomb complex

Lake and partially reconstructed pavilion

 The emperor’s mausoleum begins with an honour courtyard, flanked by stone elephants and mandarins. The mandarin statues are quite intricate, but short -Tu Duc was a short man (about 5 feet or so), and it simply wouldn’t do to have tall mandarins serving him in the afterlife. From here, you enter the Stele Pavilion, which contains a massive stone stele detailing Tu Duc’s accomplishments. Through another gate, and you enter the area of the actual stone sarcophagus, where he is not buried. His remains and grave goods were interred in a secret location - apparently, every servant involved in the burial was executed to ensure that the secret endured. Tu Duc had made a number of powerful enemies during his reign (the French and the Catholic Church); this increased the chances of grave-robbing and desecration.

Elephant and horse in the Honour Courtyard

Tu Duc's Stele Pavilion, in the midst of restoration work

More about our time in Hue in the next post - then we're off to Ha Noi!

Da Nang's Dragon Bridge

After a short flight from Nha Trang to Da Nang, further up the coast, we took a (relatively) short drive south again, to Hoi An. Since Ken and I were here 8 years ago, Da Nang and its surrounding area has grown immensely. Da Nang is now the third largest city in the country, with two new bridges, and a staggering number of resorts under development on the East Sea coast both north and south of the city proper.

Hoi An's riverfront

Hoi An itself is much smaller, with a population between 100-150,000. According to one restaurant owner we were talking to, the city received about 2.3 million tourists last year. The old city of Hoi An is a UNESCO world heritage site. Before the late 18th century, Hoi An was a major trading port. Vietnamese ceramics shipped from Hoi An have been found in archaeological sites in other parts of Asia, as well as ports in Europe. Lage numbers of Japanese, Chinese, and Dutch traders settled in the city; many of the Japanese and Chinese community stayed permanently.

Hoi An's full moon celebration - everyone who is anyone is there!

Hoi An’s days as a major trading port ended by the late 18th century, partially due to a change in international relations (rulers’ isolationist policies), and partially for a very practical reason: the river silted up and the city was no longer accessible to sea-going vessels. The building of a modern deep-sea harbour at Da Nang sealed Hoi An’s decrease in status. Like Da Lat, Hoi An wan’t bombed at any point during Viet Nam’s conflicted history, so the old buildings, homes, and assembly halls in the old city have remained intact.

Model of Vietnamese trading vessel

Today, many of the old houses and businesses have been restored, and contain museums, restaurants, and hotels. The architecture in the town centre is a mixture of traditional Vietnamese and Chinese, as well as French colonial. Though busy, the old section is peaceful - for certain hours of the day, no motorised traffic is allowed, and cars are not allowed at all. In spite of this, both Ken and I came the closest to being hit by motor bikes as we ever have! Part of the problem is that since Hoi An is so quiet and peaceful, tourists feel comfortable renting motorbikes. However, they don’t know how to drive properly here, so all the crossing the street rules go right out the window!

Tiled floor of restored house, now the Museum of Trade Ceramics

Apart from the history of the old section, the other major tourist attraction in Hoi An is the innumerable cloth shops (tailors and dressmakers). At least every second storefront is filled with examples of the latest fashions, whipped up by that particular tailor. Custom-made clothes are inexpensive and can be ready in a few hours. Almost everyone in the group had at least one garment made - we all used the same tailor, and kept running into each other in her shop. Common conversation: “I saw your shirts - they look nice!” “Really? I haven’t seen them yet -but I saw your jacket!”

Delicious, delicious chocolate tart

Most of our time in Hoi An was spent visiting the various historic buildings, eating at a delicious French-style bakery, going back to our cloth shop for fittings, and standing in the hotel pool. Our first full day in Hoi An was cooler than usual - only 34 C (with humidity). The other days were much closer to normals of 39 C; you don’t really have energy to do much more than stand in the pool.

One morning, we made a trip into Da Nang to visit the Marble Mountains and the Cham Museum. The Marble Mountains can be seen from all over the Da Nang area; the area is absolutely flat, with 5 short (as mountains go), but craggy peaks rising out of the sand. Da Nang is surrounded by a mountain belt, but I’ve not been able to locate any specific information on the formation of the Marble Mountains. The 5 peaks, each named for an element (wood, wind, fire, water, metal), are composed of limestone and marble. The surrounding area is composed, not surprisingly, of marble carving shops. The mountains are no longer quarried (eventually, they’d disappear), so the marble sold is imported from other parts of the country.

The largest mountain, Thuy Son (Water Mountain), is the only one open to the public. You can walk up steep and uneven steps to a pagoda partway up, OR - you can take an elevator (new since our last trip). Once there, you can climb more steep and uneven stairs to natural caves, many of which contain large altars and statues, carved out of the marble itself. During the American War, Da Nang was one of the largest military bases in the country; nearby China Beach is famous as an r and r site for American troops. 

The Viet Cong hid in the Marble Mountains, practically under the noses of the Americans. Again, the juxtaposition of religious site and war zone is obvious. Bullet holes are still present in some walls; in the caves, some of the inscriptions carved into the walls are related to the caves’ religious use, while others are carved by VC soldiers. The largest cave, containing a huge carved Buddha statue, was used by the VC as a field hospital. The cave has a number of skylights, allowing enough natural light for the altar to be used as an operating table.

View of the large cave

More (again, steep and uneven) steps lead to the top of the mountain and a spectacular view of the ocean and city of Da Nang, including the area which was the US airstrip. The staircase is new in the past few years; previously, you could reach the top by going through a cave and climbing through a narrow crawlspace. When we crawled through 8 years ago, Ken barely fitting through the space with his daypack, we did so with a group of Vietnamese people who were planning to picnic at the top. They enthusiastically passed food through the narrow spaces, and then skipped nimbly through themselves, the women in high-heeled flip flops.

View from the top of Thuy Son - another of the mountains can be seen in the distance

Detail on an altar

The Cham Museum displays artifacts from the Champa Kingdom. This regime, heavily influenced by Hinduism and later Buddhism,  controlled the central-south portion of present-day Viet Nam from about 200-1600 C.E. They built huge brick temples, some of which still survive and are in use as Buddhist worship spaces. My Son, near Da Nang, was a major site - unfortunately, the American Air Force used the site as target practise during the American War, so many of the surviving structures were damaged or destroyed. The quality of carving in the statues and temples themselves is astounding - archaeologists believe that the buildings were built with dried bricks, mortared with a kind of plant resin, then fired in situ. The carving was done after the firing process. The museum displays well-preserved artifacts collected from My Son and other nearby sites. As far as I know, the Cham remains are limited to temple-related artifacts, and some pottery. No domestic or residential sites have been excavated at this point.

Elephant god, Ganesh

Remainder of peacock statue

Cow statue from a Cham site

What's left of a temple statue

Someone we met at the Cham Museum

A rare empty street (almost) in the old section of Hoi An

Currently, we’re en route to Hue, our next stop. We’re on a local bus, which has had to make a number of stops in Hoi An and Da Nang to pick up other passengers. The AC doesn’t work well; the speedometer, oil pressure, and temperature gauges don’t seem to work at all. And we’ve encountered road construction, just after leaving a rest stop which wins the prize for the worst bathroom in Viet Nam.  3 hours on the road so far! I may have to burn the shirt I’m wearing, but I suspect it is too sweaty to catch fire.

The Real Viet Nam?

Back from the Central Highlands - it’s hard to know where to start! Tin, our tour guide, said that he wanted to show us the real Viet Nam, away from the tourist trail along the coast. And he definitely succeeded in his goal of teaching us about the other side of Vietnamese life.

Elephant Falls

For three days, we drove through fields of both wet and dry rice, coffee, cassava, bananas, corn, flowers, and almost any tropical fruit you can think of. We stayed in hotels mostly frequented by Vietnamese travelers, ate pho bo (beef noodle soup) and boiled corn at roadside restaurants, had coffee with Tin’s cousin, and grilled chicken dinner at the house of a local family.

A teeny resident of a minority village

A tapped rubber tree

Sunset with fish farms in the background

Traditional M'nong longhouse 

As we drove through the incredibly green mountains, we stopped often for pictures, and for Tin to explain Vietnamese history and culture, coffee growing and roasting, rice growing,"happy water" (rice wine) distillation, rubber production, and information about the minority tribes, who were the original inhabitants of the Central Highlands. One of our longer stops was at a small silk-making factory; we were able to see examples of the whole process - from winding the silk strands off the cocoon to weaving the silk thread into the intricate patterns of the fabric.

Silk worm cocoons

And the coffee....mmmmm......coffee. Every place we stopped seemed to have better coffee than the last. Apparently, Viet Nam is the second largest coffee exporter in the world, and the coffee grows in the Central Highlands, some of the plants so high on a hillside to be almost vertical. According to Tin, what makes Vietnamese coffee unique is the roasting process. After the coffee berries’ two skins are removed (the obvious outer layer and a thinner layer right around the bean), the green beans are roasted over charcoal, with inclusions of butter, rum, and a bit of fish sauce (!?). Anyway, the result is wonderful. Another uniquely Vietnamese coffee is ca phe chon, or weasel coffee. Why weasel? Well, first, you feed the coffee berries to a weasel. The weasel then digests the berry part, and the bean...uh....passes through. You collect the result, wash it off, and then continue with the normal roasting process. This is the most expensive type of coffee available (other countries do a similar process with civet cats). And no, I’m not sure who first thought that maybe this would be a good idea.

Coffee berry-eating weasels, strangely relaxed

Along with the coffee, one of my favourite things about Viet Nam is the fruit. One of my highlights from the highlands was our visit to a local market. A REAL local market, not the big city markets which are set up for tourist visits. No iPho t-shirts here! But, if you wanted dishes, tools, shovels, shoes, and clothes, this was the place to go. This is also where the local people buy all their food, including fresh vegetables and herbs, and very fresh meat and fish (some of it not quite dead yet kind of fresh, like).  We went to one of the fruit sellers, sat down on the ground on a tarp, and were given longans, tangerines, and dragon fruit to try, all beautifully fresh and sweet.

Then Tin asked, “Who wants durian?” Now, durian smells. In Canada, it’s sold frozen, partially for preservation during transport, and partially to prevent undue retching in the produce aisle. My friend’s mother likes durian, and the rest of the family makes her eat it in the garage. You cannot bring fresh durian on planes or into hotel rooms in Viet Nam. So, of course, I said, “I’ll try some!” It was...ok. Not fruity at all. To me, it tasted like roasted onions and garlic. In fact, I thought it would go well with a nice coconut curry sauce and maybe some shrimp.

The last part of our journey took us from the Central Highlands to Nha Trang. All of the Central Highlands saw heavy fighting during the American War; one area in particular, the Phoenix Pass, was heavily bombed with Agent Orange. During the American War, the North Vietnamese were able to camouflage themselves enough so that American planes could not detect them moving through the jungle. US command reasoned that with no jungle, the enemy could be easily seen, and with no crops, the enemy could not be fed. Between 1961-71, over 75 million litres of Agent Orange, a dioxin-based defoliant, was sprayed in Viet Nam, Cambodia, and Laos. The effect on the land was devastating, as was the effect on the people. What had been lush jungle became a barren desert, and over 40,000 people were killed outright as a result of the bombings.

After 40 years, the soil is still too contaminated to support plant growth

40 years later, the soil is still contaminated. In parts of Phoenix Pass, nothing grows. In other parts, only one type of tree grows - a type that draws the contaminants out of the ground. Eventually, the contaminants kill the tree, but the local people rejoice, believing that at least some of the poison is gone from the land. Approximately 3 million Vietnamese people have health problems, ranging from cancers, skin diseases, and physical and intellectual disabilities. Children whose grandparents were exposed to Agent Orange are being born with birth defects.

This is what the area should look like

What makes a horrific situation even worse is that there was research available in the early 1960’s, warning against the use of dioxin as a defoliant because of its effect on humans and the environment. The US chose to use the chemical anyway. Furthermore, the US government has admitted that Agent Orange adversely affected US war veterans, and has provided some compensation to them, but refuses to acknowledge the effects on Viet Nam and its people. The government and chemical companies involved (Dow and Monsanto) continue claim that the other should be responsible for any compensation. The US government has begun to pay for the cleanup of former US bases, but experts claim that the payment offered is in no way adequate for a proper job to be done. Meanwhile, the Vietnamese people get on with life as best they can and continue to advocate for acknowledgement and compensation.

At the end of our journey was Nha Trang, a long-time beach city and more recent resort centre. It was like entering a different world, or waking up from a dream. Which Viet Nam was the dream?

School uniforms also double as swimwear!