Good Morning Vietnam!!!!

Gahm uhn, (Vietnamese for Thank you)

Movie Trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mJoHqmtFcQ

I recently had the absolute honor and privilege of hosting the woman who brought me in to this great world, my Mom. Lovely mother of mine visited me here in Singapore for 10 days. We spent most of our time in Singapore playing tourist but we then made our way to Ho Chi Minh City aka Saigon, Vietnam for 4 days. During this blog I am going to focus on our Vietnam trip. I have to say having my mom here was really great and I am so happy she came.

I will start by saying that we had a blast on our trip but there was a lot of dealing with the Vietnam War. This was tough to handle at times but part of the reason why I wanted to visit Vietnam. Being a tourist in a place where so many American’s lost their lives was not easy to take but I felt learning about our history in Vietnam and visiting the country was important. You will see the war played a role in most of our trip in one way or another. On to the itinerary:

Wednesday:

2 hour flight to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Cab it to our hotel. Realize that of the approximate 7.5 million people living in Ho Chi Minh City nearly all of them were on the road that night riding scooters. Seriously it was a like a sea of fish/scooters gliding through the streets. If a car moved they all just some how sensed it and shifted right with it. The unison was amazing.

We grabbed dinner at a really nice restaurant and it was amazing. We had steak with fries, Pho (traditional Vietnamese soup, very good), chicken and shrimp skewers, tea, coconut milk and three desserts and spent just over 400,000 Vietnamese Dong which was equal to about $20 USD. Love that!

Thursday:

This was probably one of the toughest days emotionally. We visited both the War Remnants Museum and the Reunification Palace. The Reunification Palace was the site of the end of the Vietnam War during the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975, when a North Vietnamese Army tank crashed through its gates. The site was used by the South during the war and is still used today for some events. This was an interesting place to visit but the really emotional stop was at the War Remnants Museum.

The War Remnants Museum was full of horrible horrible pictures, stories, etc. I know I was not around for Vietnam and the war is quite controversial for many reasons but to see the images of war up close and personal was an experience I won’t ever forget. The evidence of propaganda was quite clear throughout so that needed to be taken into account but the stories and experience were painful to hear about. With nearly 60,000 US soldiers killed, over 150,000 wounded and 3 million Vietnamese killed the amount of death and pain during the war was unbelievable. The effects of Agent Orange seem to be one of the most shocking aspects. I won’t share pictures but if you care to take a look you won’t be able to look for long as they are painful to look at. It seems to affect the next generation of children as well, adding to the pain of it. The Red Cross has as many as 3 million Vietnamese people being affected by it including at least 150,000 children being born with birth defects. Vietnamese Foreign Affairs have much higher numbers than those.

War is sadly necessary at times but no matter what it always leads to unbelievable amounts of pain and suffering. I pray that one day we can rise above this. If there is anything I take away from this it is that war and the effects of war should never be taken lightly.

That night we took a dinner boat cruise and really enjoyed it. It was a little interesting though because they had a female entertainer that was eating fire, bending over backwards and at times dancing quite provocatively. I thought it might be a little much but the women on the boat seemed to be the most entertained. Pretty funny if you ask me.

Friday:

Visit the Cu Chi Tunnels.

Info: The tunnels of Củ Chi are an immense network of connecting underground tunnels located in the Củ Chi district of Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam, and were the location of several military campaigns during the Vietnam War, and were the Viet Cong's base of operations for the Tết Offensive in 1968.

Told you there was a lot of dealing with the war on this trip. Interesting part of this trip was that one of our tour guides assisted the US and the other guide’s father was a Viet Cong fighter. Being the only Americans in our group placed my mom and I in a bit of an awkward place especially when our guide was asking us why the US went to war with Vietnam. We did not engage in the discussion.

We learned about the traps the Viet Cong set for Americans and how they lived and worked in the Cu Chi Tunnels. The most awkward point of the day had to be learning about the “heroes” of Vietnam who killed hundreds of American Invaders and the medals and honors they won for doing so. I get that they were fighting for their country and their cause but I don’t take kindly to people celebrating US casualties. The really weird thing was that the impression given was that they didn’t care as much about Communism as the fact that they didn’t want another country taking them over. They had just gotten done fighting the French and were all about killing the foreigners. That is at least how it was portrayed to us by our guide.

I did crawl through the tunnels for over 100 meters and it was hot, stuffy, uncomfortable and not a place I ever would like to be again. My mom and I also shot AK47’s on the gun range and that was awesome. Not nearly as much kick as I might have thought. Another history lesson day and we ended it by taking a boat ride down the Saigon River back to town. It poured halfway back and I couldn’t help but think of Forrest Gump when the rains appeared out of nowhere and the rain came from every direction.

That night my mom treated us to massages at our resort hotel for $25 a piece. That is very high for Vietnam but worth every penny. We got another one the next night as well (with an exfoliating scrub as well), thanks mom, you are the best. I hadn’t felt that good in a while, might have to make a habit of getting massages more often.

Saturday:

Trip to the Mekong Delta

Info: The Mekong Delta “Nine Dragon river delta” is the region in southwestern Vietnam where the Mekong River approaches and empties into the sea.

So early that morning we take a bus ride for about 2 hours until we get to the Mekong River. We get into a boat with about 20 other people and head up the river. The water was very murky and dark but it made me think of all the Vietnam war movies I have seen where the soldiers are riding up the Mekong River.

During the day we took 3 different boats of different sizes in all (two motorized, one powered by a guide paddling), ate coconut candy, had Elephant Ear Fish (both delicious), fresh fruit, rode a bike through a village and had honey tea. We got to wear the very typical Vietnamese hats called Conical Asian hats, which are worn by the locals. We learned that you cannot bury your loved ones underground due to the water so they have mausoleums similar to New Orleans but the amazing part is that if you sell the land you have to take the mausoleums with you.

It was a great day and the only one that wasn’t consumed by the war, which was a nice change of pace.

The trip was amazing and a great time with my mom. I am so happy she made it out, really was great to spend time together. All in all I learned a lot during those 4 days and had a great time with my mom. I am really glad we went to Vietnam.

On a different note, I am all done with my classes, have presented at all the Rotary Clubs that would respond to me (over 12), am headed to Johor Bahru, Malaysia this weekend for a Rotary District Conference and am awaiting the visit of the most beautiful girl in the world, one Emily Martin. Emily and I are going to be spending 4 days in Singapore and 3 days in Thailand (Phuket and Ko Phi Phi) before heading back to the US together April 6^th.