“I haven’t been everywhere, but it’s on my list.”  Susan Sontag  “When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.” Clifton Fadiman

“In the days coming, see many things we will. Buddhist shrines and temples and the Saigon Jews,” said our guide, Minh.   Rick and I had seen Jewish quarters in Amsterdam, Rome, Prague, and Paris, but we were surprised that a community of Jews lived in Saigon, yet Minh said repeatedly that we would be visiting the Saigon Jews, and he said it like this was going to be the best part of our tour.  Really, there are Vietnamese Jews? Really?  Well, this is why you travel:  to be surprised. The bus looked cute, with eyelet-trimmed curtains.  The air-conditioning was of the little engine that could variety, chugging out little wisps of coolish air.  The seats looked fine, until I sat down and one butt cheek went overboard.   My husband shot me a look that said No midnight buffet for you.  This bus would be the mode of transportation for prosperous, big-assed Westerners for the next three days. I looked back longingly at our well-appointed cruise ship wondering why these ships, veritable floating cities, which could access Internet in Antarctica and get my husband to sing karaoke, couldn’t move attractions closer to the ports.  Really.

We first noticed the honking conversation among vehicles, honking that seemed less like a warning than a statement, “I am here.”  The road was uneven and full of potholes, and at times I thought my kidneys would be shaken loose as the driver negotiated the journey within the apparently wobbly driving laws.  Fifteen minutes into our journey, I had to go to the bathroom. Flanking our bus were hundreds of motorcycles.  Motorcycles carrying one to five passengers who may or may not be wearing helmets.  Motorcycles hauling all manner of commercial and domestic items:  tires, mattresses, dishes, balloons, sticky rice, bags of koi.  In Hanoi, a city of 6 million residents, there and 3.5 million motorcycles.  Only rich Vietnamese can afford cars.  Most families manage with one motorbike, either a Honda, which costs $1500, or a Honda knock-off for $500. Many of the motorcycle drivers and riders wore medical masks or scarves to protect their lungs from the dust and pollution.  Some women wore hooded garments with extended sleeves to protect their hands from UV rays and unfashionable tanning.  People of all ages rode the motorcycles. There were whole families (we spotted one with two adults and three children) crammed on motorcycles, the children often wearing no more protection than baseball caps and flip flops.  We saw mothers nursing their infants as they rode behind their husbands. Mile after mile, we saw tiny shops in the first floors of dwellings.  There was no front wall on the stores (though many had grates that could be pulled down over the opening), so you could easily see inside.  There were no signs in English, so we could only speculate what type trade was going on; a tire store with tires stacked to a ceiling; a restaurant with a simmering pot of pho and  a few tiny plastic tables and chairs, like those you’d find in a kindergarten room; cell phones and computers; wedding dresses; produce.  Above the little shops were one to three floors where the shop owners lived. The overall impression was poverty, abject poverty, scraping by day-by-day poverty, poverty endured in 100 degree temperatures and 90% humidity.  In the two-hour trip to Hanoi, we saw no “modern” housing, no place where anyone on that bus would ever consider living.  We saw no English signs and no western businesses. We stopped to visit a middle class Vietnamese home.  The home was across the street from the rice paddies the residents owned.  When rice is a few inches tall, a paddy is a glorious site.  The fluorescent green rice plants wave gently in the breeze. Hulking water buffalo pull plows, and small-framed farmers wearing iconic conical hats labor in the fields.  When people say, “I’ve heard Vietnam is so beautiful,” I imagine this is what they mean.  This, and the brilliant flowers with lush velvety blooms that seem to grow like weeds in the tropical climate.  Our bus somehow managed to park on the bricked front patio of the home where rice blooms and bamboo were laid to be parched by the sun. We walked in and saw a huge altar above a table that could seat six.  Plastic bags protected shiny brass figures on the altar.  This tidy room was where visitors were received.  On either side of the table were wooden platforms about the size of double beds set about three inches above the tile floor.  Half-inch sleeping mattresses covered the platforms.  To the right of the altar was a doorway covered by a curtain which was the entrance to the bedroom of the married couple in this four-generation home.

How do you say “whatever” in Vietnamese?

We walked to the adjacent room where the 80-year-old great-grandma sat smiling in a hammock. Some of the tourists pressed dollar bills into her hands;  I cringed at what I deemed Ugly American behavior, but the wizened woman smiled, revealing just a few teeth, all stained black from chewing betel nuts.  Also in the room were members of the other three generations:  a little girl of about eleven (who rolled her eyes just like an American kid) and her mother and grandmother. Behind this room was a large kitchen.  There was a table with stools where they ate and another table for prep.   There was a small refrigerator and a hot plate.  The electric outlets on the wall accommodated a dozen plugs in a fire-friendly arrangement. We walked to the back porch where one resident demonstrated the making of rice wine.  He offered the tourists samples to buy in repurposed water bottles, though none of us seemed thirsty.  We were told by the guide that rice wine is Vietnamese moonshine, and that it could kill you – or cure you — if you ingested a toxic fish worm.  There were chickens to the left of this porch and pig pens to the right. Immediately behind the porch was a detached bathroom/laundry room.  I couldn’t really figure out how this worked as there was no evidence of plumbing or a hole , but I did see a chamber pot and a large rack of freshly laundered clothes.  Nearby a dozen shirts hung neatly on a free-standing clothing rack.  Somehow, Vietnamese manage to look crisp and clean despite the heat.  Oh, did I mention that it was hot? Our next stop was a “5-star Happy Room,” a rest area and gift shop designed for the delicate dispositions and refined bathroom habits of tourists.  The toilets were western-style, as opposed to the “squatty potties” we saw in other less desirable Happy Rooms. When we arrived in Hanoi, we knew it because of the streets clogged with trucks and motorcycle traffic.  Unlike in China, where locals took pictures of the blond Americans and practiced their English with us, the Vietnamese didn’t seem to notice or care about us except for a few enterprising merchants who waved fans and hats at us and cried, “One dollah, one dollah.”  Although the locals were unfailingly polite, I didn’t feel admired or interesting.  After all, Vietnamese were plenty accustomed to westerners from our Cold War-era intervention there.  *(We call it the “Vietnam War”, but it is called the “American War” by the Vietnamese.) The electrical wires, tangled like dozens of chains in a jewelry box, fascinated me.  Never had I seen such a configuration in America or any other city I had visited.  I can’t imagine this is safe, and I wondered how many electrical fires occurred in this tinder box of a city. It’s easy to get cranky when you travel, particularly in a country like Vietnam that doesn’t have a strong infrastructure and has not perfected their tourism industry. It is a country stalled in its development by war, colonization, and rebellion.  Although it’s beautiful and interesting, it’s searingly hot, the traffic is terrible, it’s not terribly clean, and the bus seats are designed for small Asian bottoms.  Spoken English is mostly indecipherable. Our guide repeatedly told us that we were going to visit the” Saigon Jews.”  We were all puzzled until we pulled up to the Saigon Zoo!

Who wouldn’t want to go see the Saigon Jews?

We ate dinner with our friends as our ship sailed away from Vietnam.  As we tucked in to our lobster bisque, we talked about the inconveniences of traveling in Southeast Asia.  We were still talking about the lack of infrastructure as my filet mignon was served.  Over crème brulee, we droned on about how hot it was in Vietnam.  I adjusted my pashmina over my shoulders.  It can get so cool on a cruise ship. But there’s no place like home, and that’s why you travel.  If I want infrastructure, I could stay home.   I could stay home in America where I get up in the morning and brush my teeth using water from the faucet, safe water that doesn’t come from a sealed bottle.  I make my coffee and feel pretty confident that I won’t set my house on fire.  I eat my breakfast without thinking twice about the safety of the eggs or bacon.  Kids wait for buses to take them to schools that are compulsory and free. I turn the key in my car’s ignition, a Honda, a real Honda, I am sure.  I drive on roads that are smooth and safe, knowing that other drivers are reined in by laws and police.  I get in the elevator in my lobby, and I hardly notice that there is a prominently displayed inspection label.   I take advantage of this American infrastructure all day long, and I take it for granted.  Sometimes I complain about taxes and what cheaters, liars, and thieves politicians are.  American pundits complain about big government and decry Big Brother’s bullying impact on our lives.   I often forget about what I get for that government intervention.  I forgot, until I went to Vietnam.  And I can’t wait to go back. *About the war:  Most Americans my age know that about 58,000 U.S. troups were killed in the Vietnam War.  I don’t recall ever hearing during the war how many Vietnamese died.  It is estimated that during the American engagement from 1965 – 1974, that at least 1,234,000 Vietnamese died.  Our guide’s father took a second wife after the war, as many Vietnamese men did, because there were so few men.

Lan Ha Bay, Vietnam

Last Days in Vietnam is a documentary that has just been released.  CLICK HERE to order or view this  movie through Amazon.com

 Many of you have complimented the photos on my blog.  If it’s a good picture, it was probably taken by my husband.    Copyright © 2015 Sandy Lingo, All Rights Reserved