Life in war. Vietnam became known all over the world for the Vietnam War. So a trip to Ho Chi Minh City would not be complete without a visit to the “ War Remnants Museum”. The museum vividly presented the horrible life during the Vietnam war; it showed pictures of dead and injured American and Vietnamese soldiers, deformed bodies of babies as a result of the herbicide spraying of the Americans, and pictures of families fleeing away from their bombed villages including children crying in pain and fear. The warning in Lonely Planet Vietnam should not be taken lightly – it takes a strong stomach to look at these scenes of war and torture. However gruesome the exhibits maybe, the museum made me very grateful for the life in peace we are enjoying now.
Life underground. I signed up for a packaged tour that included trips to the usual tourist spots in and around Ho Chi Minh City: a Lacquerware factory, Ben Than Market, Notre Dame Cathedral, and Minh Long Ceramic Showroom. Since the tour was also an industry study trip we also visited factories and industrials parks, and attended forums on how to do business in Vietnam.
One very popular tourist spot in Vietnam is the Cu Chi Tunnel, where one can also learn a lot about war strategies (and if one thinks harder can also apply these strategies to business). The tunnel is located north of Ho Chi Minh City and was built by Viet Cong (VCs) over a period of 25 years as an “improvised response by poorly equipped peasant army to its enemy’s high tech weapons”. The VCs ate, slept and planned their attacks against their American enemies inside these tunnels. When I first saw this tunnel featured in a Philippine TV show, I said to myself that if ever I got the chance to go to Vietnam I would not enter the tunnels for fear of triggering my asthma. But when I was already there, I couldn’t pass up the chance of experiencing how it feels like to live underground. Batman made living in underground seem so glamorous, but certainly it is not!
Life on Water. On the bus trip to the Mekong Delta, our tour guide was telling many stories about the delta but I couldn’t quite follow him. I was so sleepy because I spent the night before talking to Filipino friends and finding out how they are living in HCMC. So I really don’t know the background of Mekong Delta or how historic it is, or how it shaped the life of the Vietnamese people. All I know is that trip was very relaxing, exactly what I needed in order to reflect on my life. Hien, my Vietnamese friend who accompanied me to that one-day Mekong Delta tour, described it as a “silent trip”. The people in that tour were talking so softly as if they were afraid to disturb the calmness of the delta; there were no boisterous laughter, just awe for the calmness and beauty of the delta. Even the two-hour bus ride from and to the city was calming. For me it wasn’t just a “silent tour”, it was a “soul tour”.
Life with friends and families. I was fortunate to have witnessed how Vietnamese people celebrate life as I was able to witness the few days before the Tet Festival, Vietnam’s most important holiday. The atmosphere in the city was characterized by holiday shopping, friends’ getting together, city people going back to their families in the provinces. It was like experiencing Christmas all over again after only one month of celebrating it in the Philippines (minus the Christmas carols, of course).
I was also happy to have seen the temporary park made especially for the Tet Festival. The park creators temporarily closed two center lanes of the six-lane Nguyen Hue Boulevard (parang Ayala Avenue sa atin) and elaborately decorated the road with extraordinary jars, arch-shaped ‘monkey bridges’ over man-made lakes, and other displays such as carts, paintings, old-style houses that illustrate the life of Vietnamese people.
There were also different kinds of flowers from Mekong Delta; it was like attending the Flower Festival in Baguio with a warmer and friendlier weather.I especially love seeing families and friends enjoy each other’s company as they take leisurely walk around the park. Children were dressed in their Vietnam national costume (ao dai) and they happily posed in front of every display. Vietnamese teenagers were creating big scenes with their lively laughter, and families were simply enjoying their time together.
Ah, the holiday spirit!
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