June 21, 2024

Vietnam

The flight from Phnom Pehn to Saigon was one of my greatest in-flight sleeping feats yet, if I do say so myself. I fell asleep on one runway and awoke on another. Not too shabby. Upon arriving in Vietnam, I must say that I felt a bit like a yo-yo at the end of its string, slowly running out of rotational speed, coming to a still hang without even the potential to curl back up. This is a long trip, nearing on six months since I left home. Never in my life have I had a period of half a year so packed with new experiences, new places, new people, so unrelentingly experience-full. I cannot complain whatsoever, this has been an adventure that I have enjoyed beyond measure. Still, it has stretched me to near breaking more than once, and several times past the point where I have any spin left to offer, with the only option to lay still, rest, and wind myself back up. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. 

This is somewhat the approach I took in Saigon. I had four nights booked in the same city, a single-bed streak longer than any I’ve had since leaving Belgrade. I took no nights past midnight and slept in when I could. I ate well and drank plenty of water. I walked and did a couple workouts, something I’ve been neglecting for the most part of this chapter. It’s paid off, I am feeling pretty good now, hopefully with momentum to keep being healthy through my final chapter. 

I’m getting ahead of myself, though. My first night in Saigon was spent, shocker, walking around. I met a really cook guy in the park who taught me “Foot Badminton”, a popular pickup park game in Saigon that’s essentially badminton with a specialized shuttlecock designed for kicking, or a bit like hacky sack with a birdie. Super fun! It took me a while to get the basics, but it was a blast. He sold me a birdie to take on my travels and gave me some great food recommendations. I took his recs, and had a giant and yummy bahn mi that I think actually gave me a bit of food poisoning. I was staying in a nice hostel right over Saigon’s version of Khao San Road, the center for debauchery in the city. Huge clubs with speakers, scantily clad women dancing on platforms, waiters hounding you with their drink menus and subtly offering you marijuana, and masseuses inviting you into their dungeons. The bass thrummed until the wee hours each night, but I dug my earplugs into new depths. 

The next day I wandered around a bit more, failing to find fun undies despite moderate attempts. I cry. I was picked up around 1 for the first of two day-long trips I had booked through my hostel. This one was to the Cu Chi tunnels. The guide, Bao, charmingly gave us some background on the American War as it is called here. I’d heard much of it in the US, but this was all from the perspective of Vietnam, particularly the victorious North Vietnam, who fought the US. I completely agree with the perspective of liberation from imperial US and French forces, but it was still oddly jarring to hear a narrative so different from what I’d learned in school. 

The site of the tunnels, one of the headquarters of the Viet Cong, was about two hours away from Saigon. I chatted with some folks on the bus, an American family of 3 on a 9-month world tour and a lovely Aussie couple. The tour itself was intense and interesting. Just like S-21 and the Killing Fields in Cambodia, this was the real, mostly unchanged place where the actual horrific events took place. We saw an array of traps that the VC used against GIs, as well as going through some of the tunnel systems themselves. Bao gave us lots of interesting insights into why they were designed how they were, from zig-zags to reduce shooting lines, to fake entrances, decoy air vents, and three different levels of tunnel. I crawled through about 100 meters of tunnel and was sweating as hard as I ever have in my entire life. I can’t imagine the greater part of two decades living in there.

I also had the opportunity to fire a gun at a shooting range there. Throughout the whole tour, the distant sounds of gun fire were haunting in the air. I’ve never fired a gun and I don’t think I’m in a hurry to again, but I shot ten rounds from an AK-47. I guess I wanted to for a combination of the novelty of it, the cheap price, and mostly for the tiny morsel of greater understanding of what it may have been like to be a soldier in that jungle during the war. It was a terrifying experience if I’m being honest. The drive back to Saigon (most people call it Saigon, outside of official government communications, I found) held a reflective silence. 

That night I wandered some more, including along a the main river, as well as through a park with a really nice sand volleyball net. I asked if I could join, and they said that next set I could hop in! I played for about an hour with a group of really good guys! I was glad that the rust I’d built up on my setting skills was so thick that it looked more like muscles. Still, my side lost the set. But I think it was close. The guys were really happy to practice English, and one guy who I talked with for a while is a tour guide who talked with me about politics and international affairs for a while! Score!!!

The next morning I awoke for a more upbeat tour, a break from three back to back days of heartbreaking historical tours. This day I was picked up around 8am for a tour of the Mekong Delta! We drove to a beautiful temple and rode on a series of boats, traversing water ranging from the largest neck (one of the nine “dragons”) of the delta to smaller paddled boats along tiny mangrove-lined streams under jungle sun. We visited a coconut candy factory,where I tried a shot of snake-infused rice wine, which is supposed to increase virility. We’ll see about that… I hope not! We saw a small crocodile farm and had a great lunch of local typical cuisine. I love the wordy “typical” for cuisine because it’s much more honest and true than saying “traditional food”.

The tour group was about half westerners and half chinese people, and the tri(at least)lingual guide gave the tour in both English and Chinese, which was great practice for me! And that’s not to mention the little conversations I had with all of the super kind folks on the tour. I also met a super hilarious Filipino family with a classic purposefully cringey dad and a hyper online teen daughter, as well as a super cool duo of deaf girls about my age travelling together. Really a fascinating band!

That night I bumped into a Chinese friend I made on the tour, Long, who I got some drinks with, and a couple of pool games in. At the club we went to I witnessed the most extraordinarily douchey man I have ever seen. Whoever hurt him needs to teach classes. Seriously next level. If you read this and want more details, hmu. 

My last day in Saigon was a bit of a rollercoaster. I visited the War Remnants Museum, a tribute to the suffering and pain caused in the US/Vietnam war. History, the murder of war correspondents, war crimes, and the lasting effects of agent orange were the main topics covered. All of it was in great detail, nothing censored at all. Intense and shaking to the core. I took a long silent, solitary walk after I left. 

Later on, I sough out my foot badminton friend again. On the way there, an older man flagged me down. This was not unusual. I’d gotten lots of saluting hellos while walking around the city, mostly from older guys, many asking where I’m from, how long I’m staying, and if I like Vietnam. This man asked me to sit with him and proceeded to give me an incredible give of conversation. He told me that he, Mr. Tran, 90 years old, born in 1933, had been a 2nd lieutenant in the South Vietnam army during the war, commanding an entire battalion, fighting alongside the US. He showed me a bullet wound in his shoulder and a bayonet scar in his arm. He asked if I spoke French, since he was raised under French Occupation in the 30s and 40s, I said no, and he said okay. He kept making sure I was following him, asking me “Understand?”. I said yes, yes, completely. His English was great. He told me that, when the US left, the South unconditionally surrendered a couple years later. He and his fellow commanders, well educated men, had gone to prison for 14 years. the whole time, his wife had no hope of his release. She died before he got out, and he still carries a picture of her in his wallet. It was one of those moments when you shut the hell up and listen to an old guy talk for as long as he wants to with compoletely rapt attention. He bade me farewell when he had told his story, wishing me safe travels and that I enjoy Vietnam. What a gift. 

I did make it to my foot badminton friend, and we got a new record (15 touches back and forth, including a triple controlled touch from me, as well as a couple chicken wings! iykyk). I promised him that I’ll play him in the Olympic finals in 2028 once they add it as an official sport. I got another early night, woke up, packed my bag, got one final bahn mi, and got a cab to the airport, where I’ve typed up my time in Cambodia and Vietnam over the last hour or two. 

Before I reflect on the final final chapter of my solo travel this year, I must say that a  visit to Saigon would not be complete without a description of the traffic. It is a ceaseless current. My tour guide Bao said that the best way to cross is to cover your eyes and just walk. That honestly might be true. It is like frogger. Dangerous and exhilarating, and quick to build a sort of motor-hubris. I love it. 

Soon I shall leave South East Asia, hopefully not for the last time. This is a land apart, a fascinating balance of infrastructure and desolation, of stability and chaos, of old world and new, of play and danger. In short, it’s a blast, it’s complicated, and more than anything it’s welcoming. Everywhere I’ve gone, I have had the feeling that the majority of locals would gladly give me their meal should I only ask, even if they had to go hungry. People smile, they’re curious and grateful for when these qualities are returned back onto them. The nature is mind boggling, the food is sensational, the art and architecture is stunning, and the culture is one of warmth and care. I hope to return to this region some day.