Baron Adventures: Destination Singapore & More: Vietnam Part II: Saigon

After a few days in relatively peaceful beach mode, we headed to Ho Chi Minh City- otherwise known as Saigon. Saigon was renamed to Ho Chi Minh City after the fall of Saigon in 1975- and while it’s called Ho Chi Minh City officially, all of the locals call it Saigon. We were busy bees in Saigon. We hired a tour guide recommended in Luxe Guide (Thanks Shanny!). For anyone planning to do a bunch of travel, definitely pick up one of these handy guides for whatever city you are headed to. They are truly fantastic. Kevin (obviously that wasn’t his real name) became our guide for the next 3 days.

On day one, we started with the War Remnants Museum. The museum is meant to be an expose of the war crimes committed by the US government in the “American War”. The museum is done in a photojournalistic style- so all photos and captions. The story told is that of the United States Government invading Vietnam to murder and poison the men, women and children of Vietnam. There are some graphic photos of naked children running from US soldiers, horribly deformed victims of Agent Orange, dead babies in the streets clutching their mothers… who are also dead. Obviously it was disturbing, but it was also educational. For one, I didn’t know much about Agent Orange before. It’s clearly one of the darkest moments in US history and I couldn’t help but feel shame for my country after seeing some of the gruesome impacts of the “American War”. In one photo there is a giant tanker filled with poison with a “Purple People Eater” spray-painted on the side of it- and young soldiers (like 18 years old) smiling and laughing. It’s impossible to understand the insanity of war. I also didn’t realize that so many generations of people were impacted by Agent Orange- I mean babies being born in the 1990s were still being impacted- perhaps they still are today.

That said, I also re-learned a few important facts- 1) History is in the eyes of the history teller. The history told in this museum was so completely one-sided that it felt more like propaganda than truths in parts. That said, I’m not used to seeing history told through non-American eyes and voices- and it really made me think about the museums I’ve been to in the US that tell the stories of wars. Are we so one-sided? I don’t think so, but I know we’re quite patriotic. Where does the line get drawn? I think I’ll have a different lens next time I visit a historical place in the US. 2) War is just incomprehensibly brutal and wrong for everyone involved in it. The US did terrible things, but so did the North Vietnamese. I do feel a new interest in learning more about the Vietnam War though.

A few days later, we visited the Cu Chi tunnels and got another side of the “American War” story in Vietnam. Cu Chi is a small village about 90 minutes from Vietnam which is famous for creating a vast tunnel network and booby traps that successfully defeated US troops. The tunnels were largely manned by young women- like 10-13 year old girls. The story told here (via black and white 1970s videos) is again, the evil Americans (literally the word “evil”) invading Cu Chi village and the brave villagers fighting back with ingenuity. The Cu Chi attraction is set up as just that an “attraction”. There are places where you can crawl through the tunnels yourself (which we did) and test out the booby traps. At first we were as interested as the other tourists, but as we progressed through the various stations, we became more and more disturbed. Eventually we got an old half-blown up US tank where half a dozen US soldiers were killed. Dozens of people were posing for pictures around the tank and it just made us all sick. There was no reverence being given anywhere or by anyone it seemed. Hundreds of young boys were mutilated or died here, and the tour groups seemed to be all laughing about it. In juxtaposition to the War Remnants Museum, it started to tell more of a complete story. I mean it’s never fathomable to see children killed in war, but it’s hard to know how to handle a situation when children are pulling the triggers of guns… what were the US soldiers suppose to do? It’s just horrifying…the whole situation.

On a lighter note… we also got to experience a lot of the beautiful cultural elements of Saigon and the Mekong River Delta including gorgeous Chinese Temples, people making lacquerware by hand, a bee farm selling honey and bee nectar promised to cure all ills (of course my mom bought some), amazing, amazing food, coconut candy making (by hand), rice paper making by hand as well as the famed water puppets. Avery loved the water puppet show best of all- a funky stage where a group of people sing and voice puppets in Vietnamese while the puppet operators skillfully make beautiful puppets swim, and glide through the a big pool of cloudy water (see pictures). Really cool.

Shopping is a haggling game (which I hate!) but we did our best in some of the crazy markets in Vietnam and picked up some cool souvenirs. We also successfully learned to cross the street by the end of our trip. I know that I mentioned motorbikes already in the Mui Ne post, but I have to talk about crossing the road…. There really are no cross-walks and very few traffic signals (at least signals that people adhere to!) so to cross the street, the strategy is focus your sights on your destination on the other side of the road, and slowly walk there without changing pace nor looking to the right or left. If you change pace or turn your head to see the masses of motorbikes coming your way, you’ll probably get hit, but if you calmly stay the course, the motorbikers will ride around you. Totally frightening but also kind of exhilarating.

Final thoughts on Saigon: really loved my time here. We all did. We all learned so much about Vietnam and also about our own history and perceptions of Americans. For my mom most of all, who lived through the Vietnam War, it was really an emotional journey as well. I’m grateful we had this experience and yet was also quite grateful to land back in Singapore and feel for the first time that I was “home” even though it’s 9000+ miles away from Philadelphia.

Wendy lighting incense at the Thien Hau Pagoda- The Pagoda of the Lady

Thien Hau Pagoda

Lion Dance- the women performing this were all 80+ years old!

Did I mention it was hot and tiring to do so much sight seeing? She was a trooper!

Parliament building

Yummy fancy dinner- Avery's came with a giant carrot carved into a beautiful bird. She played with it all through dinner and insisted in taking it with her when we left. Suddenly in the taxi we heard a crunch, and she was eating her carrot bird friend!

Since it was Tet while we were there (week long holiday for Lunar New Year) the streets had an amazing festive look and vibe- Avery chose a dinosaur balloon to celebrate Lunar New Year.