Vietnam

Wednesday, March 23, 2011 – Vietnam
We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam on Saturday, March 19 and it is not the same place we visited 14 years ago. On our first visit in 1997 most everyone rode a bike and wore traditional Vietnamese clothes. There weren’t any high rise buildings and the economy wasn’t good. I talked to another person who told me it isn’t the same as when he visited just three years ago. The economy is booming and people are now riding motor bikes and some ride in cars and very few are on bicycles. However, you still see ladies with a stick across their back and a basket of vegetables or whatever to sell hanging from each end. There are ten million people living in this town and there are seven million motor bikes. When you park a motor bike on the sidewalk you need to pay someone to watch it for you so it doesn’t get ripped off. It costs about 35 cents to have someone watch your bike for one or two hours. Restaurants have a person outside watching for their customers.

When you walk across the street you start walking keeping the same pace and don’t stop until you reach the other side. There are cycles, cars, buses and cars weaving all around you. We were told whatever you do don’t slow down or stop in the middle of the street. That is when accidents happen. I got to the point where I couldn’t look to the right or left but just straight ahead to avoid seeing what was coming at me.

I’ve noticed most people in Vietnam now wear western type clothes. I did see some traditional clothes on airline workers, school children, and people working in hotels. Today I saw two ladies getting on cycles with traditional garb for the first time since we arrived in Vietnam. It looks quite strange to see women dressed up with high heels, masks on their faces and helmets riding motor bikes. Our guide said the women wear face masks primarily to prevent them from getting sunburned. Women think the whiter their skin is the more beautiful they are. We didn’t see much sun but many ladies still wore face masks. I think a bigger reason for wearing the mask may be to protect them from pollution although the exhaust from motor bikes doesn’t seem to be too bad. They also wear the mask to keep the wind off their faces. When we were in Vietnam last time they carried everything from fruits and vegetables to cardboard boxes, eggs, chickens, etc. on bicycles. Now they carry it all on motor bikes. In a few more years there probably will be more cars as the economy keeps improving but I don’t think they have the infrastructure to handle the traffic.

We had a guide show us around Ho Chi Minh City on the Saturday we arrived. We visited a history museum where we saw a water puppet performance where the stage is a pool of water. We’ve seen water puppet shows before and this one wasn’t very good. Next we went to see the former Presidential Palace where everything has been left much as it was on April 30, 1975 when North Vietnamese military tanks crashed through the front gates and overthrew the South Vietnamese government. It felt very strange walking through the halls of this building remembering living through this time of history.

Next we visited Thien Hau Pagoda which is known for coiled incense which burn for as long as a month. Buddhists pray here for something they want like a good life, health or whatever they might have on their mind. They light incense and write their wishes on pieces of paper and burn fake money. They believe the smoke is the equalizer between here and the other world.

The men worship their ancestors. They worship at temples twice a month on the first and fifteenth. We learned from our guide that people are buried twice. The first time they are buried in a coffin and then four or five years later they dig the body up and clean the bones and then rebury the bones in a ceramic container. This is the way it has been done for many years and the older generation still wants to be buried this way. Our guide said the younger generation believes in cremation and the older people say they don’t want to be burned. But the old practice is going to change because 60% of the population is between 25 and 35 years old and they don’t think like the old generation.

The Vietnamese people prefer to have boy children. Only men are allowed to pray for ancestors so if you don’t have a boy there won’t be anyone to take care of you when you are old and pray for you when you are dead. The law is you can only have two children. If you work for the government and have more than two children you would be fired.

In the past most marriages were arranged and this is still the case in the country or agricultural areas. But in the cities most marriages are between people who have fallen in love and then get their parent’s permission to marry. In the past the Vietnamese have been very superstitious and have gone to a fortune teller to find out what day and time to get married. Each family has an altar in their home to keep the good spirits around and bring them prosperity. Every store, hotel and business has one too for the same reasons.

Our guide said Vietnamese people eat dogs, cats, rats and snakes. He said they would never eat their own pet dog but would be glad to eat their neighbors. He also said they wouldn’t eat a rat from the city but would eat those from rice fields or coconut groves. I guess he thought those would be better tasting. He said we didn’t need to worry that we were eating dog at a restaurant, as dog meat would be more expensive than other meat. I put these thoughts out of my mind when eating in Vietnam and really enjoyed all the food I had. They eat very healthy food – lots of fish, vegetables, fruit, noodles and soup broth. We were told the older generation likes to eat at home and they eat rice three times a day. But again the younger generation would rather eat out in restaurants. I wonder how big these people will get if they start eating western type food and are no longer riding bikes like they used to.

On Monday morning we left the ship at 4:15 AM for a trip to Hanoi and Ha Long Bay which is in the northern part of Vietnam. Ha Noi is the capital of Vietnam and is the second largest city. It has very interesting housing. They are taxed on the width of their homes so the people build very narrow and long houses rising up three and four levels. Extended families live together having a business on the first floor and the older generation living on the next and then the younger families living above that. The houses are painted and finished nicely in the front often times with French architecture influence. Most of the time another house will be built right alongside another so they leave one long side unpainted cement without any windows. There is a water tank on top of each house. Every day the city pumps water to the houses twice a day – once between 6 and 9 AM and then again between 4 or 5 to 9 PM.

Being a communist country there are loud speakers on many corners where news, weather and propaganda are played three times a day. Our guide said one of these speakers is outside his home and the speaker wakes him up every day at 5:00 AM. He said sometimes they play music over these speakers but it isn’t music anyone wants to listen to.

We went to the Ho Chi Minh mausoleum and shrine. His body has been embalmed and kept there for 40 years. There was a line several blocks long to view the body. Some of us didn’t want to wait in the line so opted out. But those who went in said he looked like a wax figure. A little girl from our ship said the body glowed. Vietnam used to send the body to Russia from September to December each year to have it refurbished but now they close the mausoleum to tourists and do the work themselves. They consider Ho Chi Minh the father of their country.

The next day we had a four hour bus ride that passed by rice fields and lots of farming country. We saw lots of people doing back breaking work in the fields. Along the roads and between rice paddies there were cows and water buffalo grazing. Our destination was Ha Long Bay where we took a four hour boat ride through beautiful islands. We made a stop at a cave that they called Palace in Heaven. It was a big beautiful cave lit with colorful lights. What a wonder nature is! We had a great lunch on board and even got to shop as we cruised along. Small boats with beautiful fruit displays and mothers holding their small children kept pulling up to our boat trying to get us to buy. It was a wonderful experience and the views are indescribable.

In the evening we were treated to another great Vietnamese meal in Hanoi and then on to another water puppet show. This one was much better than the one we saw in Ho Chi Minh City or Saigon. The puppets were colorful and gave the history of Vietnam. The music was live with women and men dressed in colorful traditional clothes and playing traditional instruments.

We had a wonderful time in Vietnam and now we need to rest up for two days to get ready for China.