2812 This lady's bike is so loaded she's walking it.
2823 This isn't the most heavily loaded motorbike I saw, it's just the one I caught in a picture.
2856 The fire-breathing dragon puppets. The one to the left has run out of flames.
2869 The two fisherman boat trying to net a fish.
2886 The puppeteers and their stage.
Oct 24 - Phu My-Saigon, Vietnam. Today we are docked in Phu My, on the Mekong Delta. The Delta is a maze of small islands, many of them mangroves like the swamps in Louisiana. We sailed through them for about an hour to arrive at our dock. We are in an industrial area outside the main city and there's nothing here but a few factories of some sort. We are headed to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) about 2 hours away.
During the drive in we passed through several sizeable cities without much trouble. This far out traffic is not a problem. We've been told that Saigon is a different story. After Shanghai, I don't think we're going to see anything new. The main sights you see in the cities are motorbike sales shops, motorbike repair shops, small restaurants (most of them Phở (noodle soup) shops, but Bún (cold noodles) is also very common.) and hardware stores. Of course, fruit, vegetable and meat stores are mixed in with all the others. I'd say the number one business by volume of outlets is motorbike repair.
Between the towns we passed by rice paddies, cashew orchards and fields with other unidentifiable crops. Rice is the big winner by acreage. Our guide says that they get three crops a year here, one every three months except in the wettest part of the monsoon season.
Motorbikes also serve as the light pickup truck of Viet Nam. It's always amazing to see just how much stuff they can get on that little bike. Sometimes it's too much for even the ingenious Vietnamese so they attach a little trailer to the bike.
Our first destination is the Southeast Asia Museum. It looks like a royal palace from the outside but has always been a public building. Inside they have artifacts from all over Southeast Asia. Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Malaysia are all represented but mostly it's Viet Nam. Built in 1929, this facility houses an excellent collection of artifacts illustrating the evolution of the cultures of Viet Nam, from the Bronze Age Dong Son civilization to Cham, Khmer and modern-day Vietnam. They had an interesting chart showing the Nguyen dynasties in the country. The family was in power from 1802 to 1945. In that time there were 13 emperors, 4 in 1883 alone. Between 1883 and 1885 there were 6 emperors. Must have been turbulent times in those years.
We were ushered into the Water Puppet Theater almost immediately. The water puppet art was developed hundreds of years ago for the entertainment of rice farmers and their families. The puppets are operated on long poles with wires attached to make the puppets move. The poles and all the operational apparatus are underwater and the operators stand behind a screen that hangs just far enough into the water so they can't be seen. In 1121 an emperor of the Ly dynasty saw it and loved it so much that he had a water stage built so he could have the shows in his palace for visiting royalty and dignitaries.
The stage is a pond about 30 feet by 12 feet. The backdrop is structured to look like a temple or pagoda. It has a series of hanging slats, like a vertical blind, that go from the lintel of the temple's roof, a distance of about 28 feet, into the water about an inch. The slats are about 2-3 feet wide and it's from behind these that the puppeteers work.
The first puppets to surface were a pair of red dragons that had the ability to squirt water from their mouths. The performed a zigzag dance that covered a lot of the pool while squirting water into the audience. It was a very small stream of water but quite refreshing on this hot and humid day. After they submerged for the final time they were replaced by another pair of dragons, this version had a Roman candle type firework in their mouth that spit fire and smoke in a large volume. After they made about two passes all you could see through the fog was the fire from their mouths. The stream of fire and smoke continued even when the dragon put his head underwater. Watching the glow in the water with smoke bubbling to the surface was interesting. Admittedly this particular set of puppets was difficult to capture on film but I had to try. On the, "I'd rather be lucky than good" I managed to get a pretty poor but interesting photo.
Next a fisherman, wading in the water casting his line in various directions was not having any luck. In true slap-stick style, where ever he put his line in the water the fish came up behind him. The fish would make a run directly toward him and then submerge just as he would turn to put his line in the water in that direction. We've all see the Three Stooges, Laurel and Hardy, Abbot and Costello and others do this same shtick many time and yet it's funny every time. At least it is to men. Sometimes the ladies don't seem to appreciate it as much as we do. He's followed by a fisherman in a small boat. When he gets a strike the fish pulls him into the water but he's not deterred. He proceeds to chase the fish back and forth across the pond using varying swimming strokes. At this point everyone is laughing pretty hard. Finally the fish jumps on his back and they swim under the curtain.
A four-fish chorus line of Koi, or carp if you prefer alphabetic alliteration, not just phonetic, danced various designs in the water. A boat with a helmsman and fisherman started chasing them with a net. Still more slap-stick, and still funny. Soon the boat was replaced by two wading fishermen one with a basket and one with a net. All they managed to catch was each other. Of course, a large slapping battle broke out between them at that point. This was truly Three Stooges comedy. And still funny. When the fish and fishermen disappeared they were replaced by four large men in G-strings that proceeded to perform what I could only classify as water ballet or synchronized swimming.
The closing act was two very large and toothy koi jumping and snapping at the air. After that the puppeteers came out from behind the curtain to take a bow. They were standing in waist deep water. Until then I could not figure out how deep the pool was. It was a unique show and everyone seemed to enjoy it. I know Diana and I did.
Then it was back to touring the museum's exhibits. They had some excellent pottery and ceramics from the last 800 years or so and many stone carvings from ancient architecture. Various tools, musical instruments and everyday utensils were also on display, baskets, etc. It's a fairly small but representative collection.
Our next stop was at the Reunification Palace. Completed in 1966, four years after his assassination, Diem's Presidential Palace was so excruciatingly 60s-modern that it looks more like a shopping mall building than the residence and offices of a head of state. It's definitely like dropping into a time warp. Many of the rooms open to the public still contain the original furniture and decorations. The cabinet room and dining room are the original tables and chairs, as do the various reception and meeting rooms. I remember the oval shaped table in the cabinet room from newsreels and photos. Just like the oval office in Washington DC, decisions made in this room and that one affected the lives of a generation of Americans. It was here that some of the emotions I had expected finally showed up. I should probably put this in italics but I'm not going to because I hope everyone who's following my journal reads it and I'll just let the chips fall where they may.
Everyone now knows the Diem regime that was in charge in Viet Nam during the formative years of the war was corrupt beyond measure. I certainly am losing no sleep over the fact that he was assassinated. My personal view is that the people in charge of the executive branch of our government were no better. Lyndon Johnson and Robert McNamara mismanaged, misused and abused our fighting men (sorry no women in combat at this time although the Air Force nurses I served with paid a heavy emotional toll) in a treasonous manner. The restrictions and tactics the Air Force was mandated to use during the bombing of North Viet Nam, specifically Ha Noi and Hai Phong Harbor were tantamount to suicide. And these restrictions and tactics were put in place by the two aforementioned numbskulls, neither of whom had the slightest clue or apparently the smallest amount of concern for the lives and families of the men whose lives they were so cavalierly throwing away.
These tactics were so outrageously bad that they were questioned up and down the Air Force chain-of-command and the answer was always the same, "Whitehouse orders, not to be altered." The pilots that flew these missions, day after day, were among the bravest men I've ever encountered. Despite the fact that they knew the missions were unnecessarily dangerous and had little chance of achieving their goals due to the way they were forced to conduct them, they nevertheless, strapped in and flew. It is not my intention to downplay the courage and dedication of any other group in the military by this statement. It's what I feel and I would not be at all surprised to find that my feelings are shared by many others regarding all types of units serving in Viet Nam.
I have stared at that last paragraph for a long time hoping I could change it in some way or just delete it, but I can't. Instead, I'm going to quit writing for this evening and hope to pick it up tomorrow when I'm in a better frame of mind to talk about travel. If anyone reading this is a Viet Nam Vet, "Welcome home, brother!"
Good morning, and welcome to a new day. I'm in a much better mood but still unable to delete my last rant or even put it in italics. Sorry!
Upstairs at the Reunification Palace there are two reception rooms, one on either side of a very wide hallway with a huge circular red and gold dragon rug at its center. The room on the left is smaller and furnished with embroidered gold on gold fabric covered chairs and has a large wood carving with two tall elephant tusks extending upward in an almost closed circle. This is the room in which top officials of foreign governments were received. The larger room across the hall is furnished with carved wood chairs partly covered in gold on red material embroidered with the same designs as the gold. Lower foreign and all domestic officials were received here.
Opening onto the second floor balcony, centered directly across the atrium from the wide hall is an even smaller and much more opulent yet warm room than either of the former in which foreign heads of state were received. The room is furnished with two chairs facing each other at one end of the room At that end of the room is a long, narrow table/desk with one chair. The wall behind the desk is 90% covered with a beautiful inlaid wood mosaic showing various scenes from life in early Viet Nam as you would have seen them from a low flying airplane. You can see people going to temple, farmers reaping rice, a procession of soldiers, gardens and a small town market interspersed woods and mountains. On the other end of the room are two facing couches and coffee tables. The fabric on the chairs is gold on cream in a zigzag design and almost all the wooden surfaces on the furniture are covered with wood inlay. It's a very rich room but still can't completely escape the stark chill of the overall design.
The most interesting part was the basement. The war room still has the maps of the war on the walls and the old communications gear is still in the various rooms, radios, teletypes and phones that should go directly to the Smithsonian's Museum of Ancient History, if they had such a place. Down another flight of stairs is the bomb shelter, not open to the public. Our last stop was the large kitchen in which the banquets and other meals were prepared. Most of the equipment was of Chinese manufacture but looked like industrial strength gear everywhere.
There's a display of two Russian designed tanks on the lawn just to the right of the front façade. These tanks commemorate the tanks that broke through the walls into the palace grounds in 1975, an event that has come to symbolize the end of the war. Depending on whom you believe they are either the actual tanks or similar tanks, with the actual tanks being in a museum in Ha Noi. The story goes that the North Vietnamese drivers had to stop and ask directions to the palace since they were totally unfamiliar with Saigon.
Next we stopped as a small square in the center of the government district..Notre Dame Cathedral, neo-Romanesque red brick structure built in 1877 stands on one side of the square and the Saigon Central Post Office is off to the right. The bricks to build the cathedral came from Marseilles and the stained glass from Chartres, France. Of course it was built during the French Colonial period so that makes sense. It wasn't open so there's no way to see the inside which I've been told is very attractive.
We did cross the street to the old post office. It looks much like a train station inside and out. The design would be at home in the older part of any European city especially France. It has a very large open space at its center and long counters on either side providing various services not usually available in post offices in the US. I did manage to mail two post cards from here despite the fact that I had no dong. Apparently even the government prefers the US$ to dong just like everyone else. I did get some small dong bills in change for my $2US, about 7,500, about 32 cents US. Cost to mail two postcards to the US, $1.68. Very reasonable actually.
Many of the streets are very broad avenues, also very French. The motorbike traffic downtown is very orderly for a large Asian city. The bikes range from very small moped types, to scooters and small motorcycles. Large motorcycles, bigger than 350cc, are very rare indeed. One scooter caught my eye as we passed it. The scooter was white with red trim and had been decorated with decals of strawberries, large and small; the larger ones were shown plopping into cream. It was the best looking motor scooter I've seen so far. Most are in darker colors and try to maintain their anonymity.
It was time for lunch so we headed to the Winsor Hotel. A very nice place and a good buffet lunch. Unfortunately, not a genuine Vietnamese dish on the menu but the food was well prepared and very tasty. The green beans sautéed with onion, tomato and sesame seeds were delicious. Stir fried in a wok until just hot and infused with the spices in the oil, they were a crunchy delight. There was a seafood stew in a tomato sauce, an obvious nod to bouillabaisse, one of my favorites from French cuisine. The surprise of the meal was the small (about 1 2/3 inch in diameter) dark crusted rolls with the split top. It looked a little like a roasted chestnut. I found them on the desert table but assumed they were bread of some sort. Early on I had picked up some cold cuts and cheese to I grabbed one to make a tiny sandwich. After eating everything else on my plate I assembled by little sandwich and discovered on first bite that the roll was made from the same dough used to make pretzels. Essentially it was a soft pretzel sandwich and it was good. So good in fact I went and made another.
Diana had four deserts, most decidedly French, a light and tangy lemon roll, apple crumb cake, Tiramisu (the exception) and opera cake with a wonderful chocolaty flavor that took a while to develop but was worth the wait. Like I said, lunch was very good. The only disappointment for me was that it did not offer any truly Vietnamese dishes.
Our next stop was on Nguyen Hue Plaza directly in front of the Saigon City Hall. It's a small plaza but very well decorated and home to a large statue of 'Uncle Ho' as Ho Chi Minh is called here. If you look toward the city hall you could be in Colonial Viet Nam. Built in 1902, it was originally a French hotel. The exterior is richly decorated with plaster carvings and statues.
To the left of the city hall is the infamous Rex Hotel. During the Viet Nam war it was the headquarters of the CIA and home of the daily press briefings that became known as the 'Five o'clock Follies' by journalists, one of the clearest cases of all time of the pot calling the kettle black. The only thing more distorted than the information given to the journalists was their use of it in reporting the war. Diana and I posed for an impromptu shot of the Rex's front door.
If you turn your back on the city hall and look the other way down through the small plaza you could be in any fair sized city in the world. There are modern buildings and skyscrapers including one very tall one that belongs to a bank.
KFC, Baskin-Robbins and Burger King have hit it big in Saigon but McDonalds apparently withdrew after being here a while. Our guide did not explain why. Might have been political.
Our last stop of the day was at the Minh Phuong lacquer ware factory. They do the entire process here by hand and we walked in through the workshop. I don't believe the area we toured is large enough to provide all the inventory but it did have all the operations needed to produce the finished product so I could be wrong. More likely the main production facility is outside downtown where the occupancy costs are lower. Most lacquer ware is black with painted subjects on the surfaces. They produce a series of boxes here that are black on the bottom like the traditional style but the top is brilliant red with gold leaf applied in a bamboo design. I usually have excellent sales resistance in places like this but the red and gold topped boxes were so attractive I purchased one that's about 4 inches square and about 1.5 inches high. The dong price was 420,000 which is $20US and I couldn't resist. I've seen lacquer products all over the world and have never seen work of this quality for so little money. A box of this size and quality in Russia would be at least $100, if not more.
On the 2 hour drive back to the port of Phu My I was lost in thought about my experiences past and present. The drive didn't seem nearly as long as the one going in.
I did go to the show, not really expecting to stay but the scheduled performer was under the weather and the barbershop quartet I didn't go see a few nights ago filled in for her. They were both funny and entertaining and I wound up staying until the end.
Oct 25 – At Sea. Nothing unusual about today. Resting and writing. We did have to turn the clocks ahead one hour at 2PM. I guess Singapore doesn't do daylight savings time.
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