An entry in the TFS Travel Journal
Finally, a full night’s sleep, though we did use earplugs as the chaos of outside never ceases. We enjoyed the fruit we’d purchased in the market yesterday (a Washington apple and a deliciously juicy local orange (the skin of which is actually green)), then went downstairs for the breakfast buffet. We had an international sampler of local fruit, dim sum, pastries, and a bowl of some sort of Asian noodles with pork and scallions which we were about to eat when the waitress communicated to us that one is supposed to pour hot water over them to create a broth and soften the noodles. It was all pretty good, though as we’ve found with most buffets, not as good as it all looked.
We met up with Cong and got on the road to Tay Ninh. As the drive was about 2 hours, we got to have some fascinating discussions with him. We learned, among much else, that he was one of 12 children (he’s the youngest at 43 and the oldest is 66) though only 7 are still alive; he lives in a two story apartment of slightly less than 700 square feet with his wife, two children, mother, sister, brother, and some of their families that all aggregates up to 15 living there (and he’s probably one of the better paid workers in this economy). This country (which has a population of over 73 million) is Communist, but seemingly in politics only — although citizens (comrades?) can not easily leave the country, students and business people do so frequently, there is much private property, virtually complete freedom of religion, American music and movies are sold and shown here (though he readily acknowledged that most were not-so-good copies from China), and movement within the country is unrestricted.
We arrived at the Cao Dai temple around noon, in time for the mid-day service. No point in going into the whole bizarre religion here, but they believe in much communication with long-dead ancestors, and have deified many historical figures including Victor Hugo, Christ, Moses, Winston Churchill, Confucious, Muhammed, William Shakespeare, etc. It attempts to synthesize virtually all other religions into what sounds like Theology’s Greatest Hits; it has over 1 million observers, though. The church itself was a garish, almost whimsically decorated large worship hall with bold, bright colors, shiny stars on the arched light blue ceiling, pillars with painted dragons winding up them, and in the front where an altar would normally be was a huge sphere with a large watchful eye in the center. We stood on one of the side balconies and watched 20 minutes or so of the 1 hour service. The faithful came in and knelt on the tiled floor as a choir of women chanted melodically while several men played instruments like we’d heard last night. This evidently is the service for the entire hour. It is certainly a meditative atmosphere, if that’s the goal.
We then drove off in search of lunch, settling at a place that obviously caters to tourists. It was a homey place, though, and the 5 courses were all very good and fresh. Notable was the red curry with chicken, that was flavorful and a bit sweet. It was then off for an hour or so drive to the Cu Chi tunnels.
Wow, what a place! The Cu Chi district is about 35 miles from Saigon, and starting in 1954, a network of underground tunnels was dug there first for fighting the French, and later the Americans and South Vietnamese. The soil made conditions perfect for supporting the tunnels, which at their peak ran for over 155 miles! We first watched a propaganda film (which Cong forewarned us about) about the Cu Chi fighters, especially those “American-killer heroes”, then we toured the area. Though most of the network has been filled in, some tunnels and rooms have been left for tours. Over the duration of the American war, over 10,000 VC were killed here, but there was a population of more than 5,000 who inhabited the tunnels at any time, and used them as a base for attacks on the nearby US and S. Vietnamese army bases. The tunnels themselves were astonishingly small, usually 25 inches wide and 40 inches high. There were, however, meeting rooms, operating rooms, sleeping quarters, kitchens, dining quarters, all mostly on the top level (which was about 10 feet underground), though there was in many places a second level and even a third (over 30 feet underground), for short term hiding. We also saw many different booby traps placed strategically within the tunnels, like bamboo-spear pits. The tunnels even ran several hundred meters to the Saigon river for escaping. We crawled several meters through some of them (one of us, anyway), once disturbing a bat, though they’re now sprayed with insecticide daily for the tourists’ benefit. Despite over 500,000 tons of bombs being dropped on the area, and perpetual attempts to destroy the tunnels, they seemed to always get rebuilt.
As it was hot and humid as hell, we passed on the firing range (where we allegedly could have tried out an AK 47, a Kaleshnakov, or several American models; at $1/bullet, an automatic rifle is not what you want to be playing with) as well as on the souvenier shops, which sold such things as model jets made of bullet casings. We did have an enjoyable conversation with a nice Danish couple who were traveling here for 3 weeks.
We then drove the 90 minutes back to central Saigon. The drive was quite the odyssey: the countryside was at times beautiful, with lush green rice paddies and palm trees, then we drove along endless miles of third-world looking shops and shacks. All along the two lane road we had to pass trucks and buses, while competing for space with more motorcycles and bicycles than we knew existed on the planet earth. As we got nearer to the city the congestion became almost comical. It was interesting, though, to see the many women and girls riding along with long, colorful gloves that covered their entire arms and matching fabric covering their mouths like a surgical mask, to protect from the sun and dust. We made it back alive to the Majestic where we freshened up and walked the few blocks to the Vietnam House for dinner.
Absolutely delicious! The mixed appetizer plate, braised tofu w/black mushrooms, chicken w/lemongrass, stir fried vegetables, and noodles w/shrimp were all tasty. Not as spicy as Thai, but wonderful nonetheless. Including a large bottle of mineral water and a 333 beer, the total came to $23. We then walked over to Apocalypse Now, the famous local bar, but it was several hours too early for the action, so we headed home. En route we passed what seemed like whole communities living along the broad sidewalks, cooking dinner, watching tv, etc. We also stopped at Dong Du restaurant for some ice cream, which turned out to be not bad.
Then back to the room for the evening.