Before
we got to Vietnam we'd heard a few negative reviews about how it was dirty,
busy and how the locals were unfriendly so I wasn't sure what to expect. I
found the Vietnamese to be warm and helpful people. Ha Noi and Mue Ne were
super relaxed towns and I didn't really experience any major issue with hygiene
levels so I'm not sure if we were just lucky or if perhaps India just set a
very, very, very ... very, very low benchmark? Either way, I thought Vietnam
was a lovely country. Apart from the amazing food, Ha Noi was probably the
highlight for me being a very beautiful and picturesque town with some great
spots to eat and drink. While we were there we also did a 1 day diving trip to
the Cham Islands - the diving wasn't quite what it has been in Malaysia or
Indonesia but I still enjoyed it and the islands hid some stunning idyllic
beaches (which would have been even nicer without the rain!).
Rolling
on the river with our lovely guide, Mui who tried in vain to teach us to speak
Vietnamese:
The
Japanese covered bridge:
Selling
candles to float down the river:
Hoi
An by night:
Mui
Ne is a beach town where we had time to relax and top up our fading tans,
although I over did it somewhat and ended up more rouged than bronzed! Another
day tour here took us to the fairy stream ... Which is really just a stream and
to the red and white sand dunes ... which were really just sand dunes. Cata
decided she'd rent a quad bike to zoom around the dunes on which I sat on
screaming for all of 10 seconds... I hate the bloody things after a somewhat
embarrassing experience in Greece involving bad steering, a giant bush and some
attractive male witnesses (The worst kind of witness to any embarrassing
incident).
Cocktails
on the beach:
The
fairy stream:
Sand
dunes:
After
all that relaxation we dived right back into the hustle and bustle of Ho Chi
Minh -though I prefer to call it by its old name, Saigon because it easier and
it sounds more exotic... As the capital of South Vietnam this was also the
olace to learn about the Vietnam war. Travelling through South East Asia
you get a feel for how the whole region suffered relatively recently during the
war against communism, but it's only in Vietnam where you really get to see the
deep impact that it caused and also insights into how the locals view the
conflict. Plenty of shops sell old Vietnamese propaganda posters which although
visually striking have pretty dark anti-American messages behind them. Messages
such as 'What are you doing here? For whom are you dying?', '3000 enemy planes
shot down' 'Nixon the murderer' respectively accompanying images of American
soldiers, USAF war planes and the American president portrayed as a monster.
There is definitely a sense that the war here was not an conflict between
the communists and the anti-communists but a war against the invading
Americans. This theme continues into the rather one sided and harrowing war
museum. Plenty of quotes from journalists and World organisations discrediting
the inhumane actions of the US during the war hang on the walls alongside
horrific pictures and accounts of the terrible war crimes that were committed.
In any situation where man is 'legally' killing man atrocities are carried out
and innocent people suffer and die, so in a war that spanned over 20 years you
can imagine that there was plenty on show to be horrified by. Photographs of
dead women and children, annihilated villages, the effects of chemical warfare
which the people in South Vietnam suffer even now due to the prolonged effects
of the previously untested Agent Orange, which can affect genes across several
generations. Outside in the courtyard a collection of US military vehicles and
weapons including tanks and fighter jets as well as a chinook helicopter gives
you a real sense of what these people were ip against. Of course losses were
suffered on both sides, the USA suffered 58,000 military deaths due to the war
... but in a death toll of up to 3 million more than half of those killed were
Vietnamese civilians. Although the museum clearly gives a one sided view, with
statistics like that it's very clear to see that something went terribly wrong
here.
With
53 year old Song whose legs of steel have been cycling around these streets for
the past 20 years!:
American
military vehicles:
