March 22, 2002
After waiting until one o'clock in the afternoon, we proceeded to wait some more for our van driver. He finally arrived at about 1:50 pm and we got on the van and settled in for a long drive. It took at least an hour to get out of Saigon, and then we had another two hours to wait before we arrived at the Cu Chi Tunnels.
The drive was actually very interesting. The scenery started to look a little more like the Vietnam that I had pictured in my head when I first went to the Vietnam Trip meeting. The streets started to become just a two-lane road of paved asphalt. Then, the road turned into asphalt with a dirt and dust covering from time to time. Then, the road became dirt and dust, with an occasional rock or gravel patch. Finally, gravel was the only path through the fields and any signs of pavement were long gone.
In addition to the roads, the view changed drastically. When we started outside of the Legend Hotel, there were large buildings, plenty of shops, and a whole lot of scooters and mo-peds. As we got to the outskirts of Saigon, the number of vehicles seemed to decrease with the quality of living of the people. We started to see run down shacks and huts made not of brick and cement, but of grasses, bamboo, and straw. Dogs were running around freely and people were carrying on with their lives at home, as opposed to busying themselves with their work. Kids who had been let out of school were out in fields (which also became more numerous as we got further away from central Saigon) playing soccer or were using the hacky-sacks(Yes, those little bags of beads that Americans were fascinated with for a year or two still exist in the world). But these kids weren't sitting around doing nothing. Even though they had very little by our standards, they made the best of what they did have and were happy with it. Huh, happiness from simplicity. Imagine that.
Anyway, we left Saigon and passed through the city of Hac Mon before we saw our first glimpse of rural Vietnam. However, rural Vietnam is nothing to look down upon. The vast fields leading to small houses are truly beautiful. We saw rice patties and many fruit trees. Also in the fields were cows and water buffalo, which Adam seems intent on riding.
We finally arrived at the Cu Chi Tunnels at about 4:45 in the afternoon. Mr. Dang led us over to the main tourist stand and we decided to go to the shooting range and then the tunnels, since the range was going to close soon.
Now, gentle reader, you may be wondering what exactly the shooting range is. Please allow me to explain. The shooting range is a series of targets about one hundred feet away from the designated shooting area. What do you shoot at the targets? Good question. We arrived at the booth and decided that we were going to shoot M16's and AK-47's. We purchased ammunition at about one dollar per bullet, put on some "ear protectors" that were basically cheap headphones that had had the cords cut from them, and followed one of the workers to a booth that was about one hundred feet away from some wooden targets. The object, of course, was to shoot the targets. We each took the amount of ammunition that we had paid for and fired away. Naturally, we all missed the targets because we were still adjusting to the guns and we had purchased very little ammunition, but it was still a lot of fun. I mean, how many people can say that they've fired an M16 and an AK-47.
From the shooting range, we proceeded to the tour of the Cu Chi Tunnels, which was led by a short, rather squat, Vietnamese man and his small dog. We followed man and dog into the woods along a well-beaten path. The first thing that was shown to us was a secret entrance to the tunnel, which was so small that none of us could get into it. My foot was larger than the width of the hole. After the hidden entrance to the tunnel, we saw some craters that had been made by U.S. bombing raids. We then progressed to the first of many entrances yet to come on the tour.
The first time that I looked down into the tunnels, I thought, "We can't seriously be going down there. We'll never fit." Well we did go down there and, just barely, we did fit. A bit of advice to anyone who goes down through the tunnels: don't wear or bring a backpack. It will just make life difficult for you. Anyway, we saw several things in the tunnels. We saw a bunker, a meeting room, a medical center, a couple of booby traps, and all the bats one could possibly want to meet. I was lucky enough to see a bat coming at me and ducked before it hit me in the face, but it was a narrow miss. We also got a whole lot of dirt on ourselves, a couple bumps from the rocky walls of the tunnels, and those of us who were stupid enough to wear sandals in the tunnels(me) got a couple cuts on their feet. But it was nothing serious. Our group opted out of the 100-meter crawl through the tunnels(the 60 meter crawl had been bad enough), and got back on the van for a long ride home.
That's another thing that you really notice in Saigon is how friendly most drivers are. Even though they drive like maniacs, Vietnamese drivers will take time to wave at you or smile at you if you show a similar gesture to them. We have taken up the task of waving at people who stare at us. This may seem really weird to the people back home, but you can't judge it until you've experienced it. It really is strange being stared at wherever you go because you're at least four inches taller than anyone else and you're American (though my hat does attract some extra attention).
We crashed that night after yet another good meal and got up early the next day to head off to the Mekong Delta.
We piled into yet another van the next morning at about eight o'clock. We then picked up about seven people at another stop and headed out for a two-hour drive to the Mekong Delta. When the bus stopped on a red sand road in the middle of a small village, I thought that there had been a mistake. However, we followed our tour guide over a rickety log bridge and to a house with a bunch of pineapple plant outside of it. The tour guide then informed us that the red soil was the best soil for the pineapple to grow in. Pretty interesting.
About a half hour later, the bus stopped right next to a river and we all got out and onto a fair sized boat. It was painted light blue, seemed to be completely made of wood, and had light blue painted wooden bench seats. We took this boat up the river a little ways to a floating platform, where we met with two smaller boats built in the same style, but with bench seating. Our group divided into these two boats and we set off into a branch of the river that ran through a small island. We got off at an apiary and walked to the main area. On the way there, our tour guide pointed out hundred of mudskippers, a type of fish that can move on land. These were really amazing creatures. They blended in perfectly with their environment, and if you weren't looking for them, you wouldn't see them, but they could move fast enough to hide themselves immediately if they thought that they were in danger. We only saw a small part of the apiary, but as part of the tour, we were able to get honey directly from a honeycomb that was covered with swarming bees. There really is nothing like fresh honey, and this did not disappoint. We then sat down for some honey tea and tried some coconut candy while we listened to live traditional Vietnamese music. It was pretty cool.
From the apiary, we got into the boat for a one-and-a-half hour trip over to the coconut candy factory, where we sat down to eat before starting our tour. Once again on the animal rights, there were at lease ten animals in cages that were way to small for them. Oh well. Can't do anything about it now. Anyway, we were given soup, egg rolls, and some other types of meat and enjoyed a good meal. We also had the opportunity to eat snake, and took advantage of this. We ordered a cobra and we were told that it would be ready after the tour, so we started out to see the coconut candy factory. We walked along a canal for most of the time and passed a few little shops where people were selling bottled water and coconut candy. At the last shop, Mr. Dang had the people show us a little bit of a cockfight. By this, I mean that the cocks did fight, but were separated before one of them got killed. Once again, it was pretty cool. We then got into four-man boats and paddled our way down the canal to a little landing, where we departed and got to see the coconut candy being made.
Well, that was the end of the tour, so we hopped back on the original boat and went back to the very beginning of the candy factory where we had eaten before. We followed the tour guide into the main kitchen and got our cobra in a take-out bag (divided into four portions) and headed back to the boat, where we proceeded to eat the cobra. There were some things that were sort of rice tortillas in that they were thin and hard and used like tortillas (scooping the cobra), but I think that they were some sort of rice and sugar combination.
While we were snacking on poisonous snake, the boat kept moving back to the mainland. It was a very relaxing ride, despite a few minutes of rather rocky waters. Upon reaching the mainland, all of us enjoyed a coconut and, much refreshed, went back to the van and piled in.
After about forty-five minutes of riding, we arrived at a Buddhist temple. We were led by the tour guide through the main gate and given a brief explanation of the differences between Northern and Southern Buddhism (this was a Northern Buddhist temple). After this, we were given about a half hour to explore the temple. It was very interesting. Through the main entrance to the temple was an open space. Once in this open space, you turned left to see a basic altar flanked by two altars full of pictures of people who had worphiped there and had died. Along the left and right wall were hallways running perpendicular to the open space. These hallways each led to the central part of the temple, which turned out to be a garden. The garden area was situated on a tall rock, I'd guess about eight or nine feet tall, with a base about as large. There was a small pool of water around the rock and a few aquatic plants resided in the pool. Proceeding around the garden, I came to the main area of worship, in which I found at least twenty small statues of Buddha and one huge and magnificent display of what looked to be gold figures surrounding a statue of Buddha. Needless to say, it was magnificent.
Something that I noticed at the temple were the monks. The Buddhist monks have very little, but they were all happy with their lives. From the time that I first saw the monks to the time that I left the temple, the monks were smiling and seemed to be joking around with each other. They didn't have cars or even a television set, yet they were happy. Once again, happiness from simplicity.
We all went back to the van and rode home to the Legend. We went out to eat that night, but I know I was really tired from the trip, so I don't really remember the meal. What I do remember occurred after the meal, while we were standing outside trying to hail a taxi. Adam, Will, and Dan were already in one taxi and Mr. Dang was off trying to find another taxi for himself and me when this old man selling chewing gum tapped me on the shoulder. I told him, "No, I don't want any", which is the standard response that has to be given to avoid being mobbed by people trying to sell you stuff. He looked disappointed, but smiled at me as I stood waiting for Mr. Dang. Then, he said something to me that I couldn't understand, but I'm pretty sure that I picked out the words `Tai Chi'. Now, as anyone who knows me will tell you, I love doing Tai Chi and practice frequently, so naturally, this interested me. I asked, "Do you know Tai Chi?" He responded in Vietnamese, so I couldn't understand him, but then he started doing some basic Chi Kung movements, and I recognized them. We then had a brief pantomimed conversation and I think that he challenged me to a push-up contest before it was over, but then Mr. Dang came back with a cab and we had to leave. As I looked out the back of the cab, I saw the old man smiling and waving at me, and I waved back.
At first I didn't know what to make of the conversation. I was just
really happy that I had been able to communicate with someone one such a
basic level and that I didn't need a translator to do it. I can't express
how great of a feeling it is to know that you can have a conversation
without words and that you can break through all language barriers and
communicate in such a simple manner, but I smiled all the way back to the
hotel. Now, if you've read the rest of this essay, you probably know
what's coming next. I got to the hotel room and it struck me how happy I
was from something so simple. I was amazed at my own joy. Anyway,
that'll leave all the readers with something to think about: how and why
do some of the most simple things leave us so happy and why does it
sometimes take to much effort to produce only a little bit of happiness?
In America, we don't really experience simple things like that, I mean,
everyone speaks English. But maybe, if we try hard enough, we can find
things that are simple that make us happy. Just a thought. Thanks for
reading this.
Sincerely,
Murphy McHugh
Photos from day 3
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