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VIETNAM is becoming a travel hot spot in spite of itself.
It has no monuments or cultural sites on the scale of those you will find in Thailand and Cambodia. Ha Lon Bay, is its only major geographic attraction. It's not a place that will dazzle and amaze you. What Vietnam and its people will do is charm you.
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 Group tours are the most common. Many visitors even take the kids and simply book a flight and a car and driver-guide, find fine meals, good hotels and comfortable travel. In a group you may find the usual suspects on the travel circuit, Ruskis and Northern Asians on a trip in search of a warm place, Euro-fueled Europeans on a cheap trip and Americans. Not to worry, the Vietnamese are glad to see Americans for even with the dollar in the doldrums, they are still far and away the world's best tippers. The object is to have a fine time and to be glad to be there before everybody else shows up.
You will ride on air-conditioned buses and fly on Vietnam Air's nice new airplanes. Vietnam proves to be an easy country to explore, approximately the size of California, with adequate roads and good-to-excellent airports providing convenient access to every destination. Ho Chi Minh City(a.k.a., Saigon) has a spectacular new airport.
It's clean, relatively crime free, and feels safe. You can drink bottled water (most hotels provide two bottles a day.) and excellent local beers such as: "Tiger", "Saigon", and the wonderfully named "333", which in Vietnamese is "Bah, bah, bah". With reasonable care you'll get through in good health and happy. You won't be bothered by a lot of beggars; you won't see many street bums and social discard; peddlers can be ignored; and you won't be hassled by hookers and pushers. There are green clad tourist police watching out for you in the major centers. Tripping on a rented scooter leads to being surrounded by concerned cops and people eager to help you up.
You can read the signs but probably not pronounce the tonal markings that distinguish the Viet alphabet, the gift of a French Jesuit who relieved them Vietnamese of the burden of learning Mandarin characters as a means of written communication. While English is now the second language of choice and mandatory in schools, the Viets do have difficulty with pronouncing it as well as in solving the problems of our grammar with its tenses and verb forms. You somehow work things out at shops and restaurants.
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The cities of Hanoi, with its 4 million residents, and Saigon, with 8 million are enormous but manageable. Both are still French in the pattern of their urban design, and there are many relics of the French period: colonial buildings, parks and boulevards. The colonial buildings are all painted in a vivid yellow and have a curious architecture that is a blend of European and Vietnamese styles. You see them marking the centers of all major cities and towns.
The most remarkable of these eclectic structures is the Saigon post office, a cast iron building shipped from France and finished with beautiful plaster work, tile and fancy metal trimmings. The most memorable is the old Hanoi Bridge over the Red River built and designed by Eiffel, of Tower and Statue of Liberty fame. You're unlikely to use it since it is no longer the major river crossing. The new crossing will be on the two-mile-long bridge being built across the Mekong River not far from Saigon.
You will not see the prideful skyscrapers of the Asian tigers here, but the direction of construction is up, and the value of land in the central cities is climbing faster. New suburbs are being built on the outskirts of every city. These suburbs are virtually new towns with malls, towers, fancy houses that look like everywhere else, but not quite.
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| What is striking is the domestic architecture, which is almost completely concrete and brick. The Viet house usually has an entry colonnade and a symmetrical arrangement of doors and windows which can go up on a surprisingly narrow lot to three and four floors. The top floor usually will have a terrace and is the area with the most ornate design. The color schemes are in bright and varied ice cream tints. In the countryside, neat gardens of flowers and vegetable beds both adorn and feed the household. There is little that looks ramshackle and temporary. It is not what you might expect in this climate. |
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WHAT YOU WILL BE TAKEN TO SEE:
In HANOI
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It is virtually mandatory to visit the tomb of the nation's founding hero, Ho Chi Minh, or as he is fondly called, Uncle Ho. The poor man wanted to be cremated and scattered around the country in order to encourage the abandonment of cemeteries. They are everywhere, and he saw them as a waste of land. As with collectivization, this idea was doomed to fail in the hearts and minds of his people. He ended up embalmed as did Lenin and Mao.
Ho Chi Minh's blocky tomb is pure Sovie; and there is a periodic changing of a high stepping guard. Close by is the old French governors palace in which Uncle Ho refused to live. He built a small, and modest house in its expansive park with an attached bomb shelter, fishing lake, and a garage holding a Mosca limo given him by the USSR and, unexpectedly, an Austin.
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| In Hanoi, Classic Vietnam is represented by the Mandarin examination center. The Confucian system by which the highest of functionaries were selected is fully expressed in the buildings and their arrangement. It is a very popular place for Viets on vacation and holiday, and one sees students rubbing the old inscriptions for luck. They need it in a society where only 10 percent of the students make it into universities, and a surprising 60 percent or more of the students that do are women. |
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In HA LON
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| The Bay, with its steep limestone islands, is where you will spend a night on a junk feasting on sea food and boarding small boats to visit caves and lagoons. This jaunt is becoming increasingly popular, but the Bay is large, and the reported 600 junks (from an increase of about 20, not too long ago) are easily accommodated. The Bay will remind you of a Chinese classical landscape set in water as you enter a dream state |
In HUE
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Hue is the the old dynastic capital, centrally located where the country narrows between the northern and southern river deltas.You will visit multistoried pagodas and the Citadel, a scaled down re-creation of the Forbidden City in Beijing. Complete with moat and walls and a dynastic palace, it expresses the ideals of feng shue at its purest. Its ornate structures are easy to take in, spread about with trees and gardens. It is also remarkably intact and restored from the damage suffered in the war in which it was the first urban battleground.
The city is nicely scaled, and the tourist center along the river bank is walkable and convenient. The river park has a number of docks where you can board or charter a boat for a pleasant cruise. You'll think: this is lovely. |
In HOI AN
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Hoi An is a small town that long ago lost its trade to bigger, more modern cities north and south of it. The town is not far from the Champa ruins, Hindu temples from the fourth century that look like a set for Kipling's "The Jungle Book" on a small scale. You go to the site on ancient jeeps ( if you miss the vans) which are still tagged with U.S. Army property labels and inventory numbers. They're uncomfortable but a kick to ride. You may find flocks of primary school kids on an outing; and they will remind you of kids anywhere on an organized escape for a few hours from classes.
Hoi An is where you will feast on what some consider to be the finest food in Vietnam. Restaurants are highly competitive, and the best cater to tourists and have excellent chefs.
The local authorities are carefully preserving relics of the city; and you will be taken to visit a Chinese merchant's house and what is called the Japanese Bridge. It is rather like the Ponte Vecchio in Florence but much smaller. On another morning, you can do another river cruise toward to sea to visit fishing villages.
While, Vietnam cities have many tailors offering to make you a suit, shirt or whatever overnight, Hoi An seems to have become particularly adept at it. They will even do satisfactory adjustments to clothes you bring with you.
Hoi An's entrepreneurs are out for the tourist buck, but they give good value for your money.
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In NHA TRANG
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It's a new looking city, a big beach resort with aspirations that echo Florida. Hotels are going up fast for the mostly Asian tourists, and there are island resorts off the mainland which you reach by boat or a miles long cable ride over the bay. A resort south of town is the site for an international beauty contest. Na Trang's shoreline boulevard is the tourist center. It has crowded beachside restaurants and promenades whose benches fill with courting couples as evening approaches.
Hotels located inland from the beach are cheaper and smaller, and they send daily throngs of vacationers to and from the beach. You can see a large pagoda with its 30-foot statue of the Buddha on a hill on the west side of the city and an intact Hindu temple along an estuary that runs into the bay. It's a town on the hustle, lively and hopping far into the night.
You get to Nha Trang by flying to nearby DANANG, the former American base and port town where all kinds of facilities were developed and left to the Viets by the departing American military. It has the feel of a boom town. Viet Nam ranks fifth in the world as a ship building nation; and it has expanding shipyards. It also has new areas of business and residential developments that stretch out over the flat coastal plane. Grandiose plans are afoot for the beaches that line this central coast area. With warm water and wide sands, it's a winner for those cold Asian northerners and affluent Viets wanting a beach vacation. Everyone, into the water! If you take the plunge, keep your bathing suit on, both top and bottom; the Viets are a modest people.
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In DALAT
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Dalat is a real change of pace. It is a mountain town built by the French in imitation of the British hill stations of southern India. Dalat is springlike all year round, cold enough for sweaters and blankets in the evenings. You may stay in a wonderful colonial hotel with a cage elevator and wooden floors, all very 1930's. Breakfast is Paris with perfect croissants, pain au chocolat, and cafe au lait. You feel like speaking French.
A lake formed by damming a river is surrounded by parks and flowers, but a stroll around it will take you an hour, if you march a la Napoleon, longer if you stroll. Remember you're about a mile high.
There is a beautiful golf course, the first in the country. Built in the twenties and expanded by an American to a full 18 holes. If you elect to play it, you will find the caddies and maintenance super, although the rented clubs are not up to snuff.
Dalat produces strawberries and asparagus, and the central market specializes in dried fruit of every kind. But its main industry is flowers, and greenhouses are all over the area. It is also a university town, and the campus has over 20,000 students. They are happy to escort you around their piney campus as they practice their English.
You will also see indigenous people of the Lat tribe. They put on a modest show for visitors. They prove to be highly musical, and their playing and singing is of a high caliber. You may be invited to join in a few of their dances and to drink their home brewed rice wine through a two foot straw. Suck up, it's not half bad.
Their tribal weavings are also a source of revenue. The Lat people are among the ten percent of Viets who are Catholic. They farm their lands and the women weave the cloth from which they make both their garments and goods for sale to tourists. Visiting their unpainted,wooden church in the late afternoon you may find a rosary being recited and the parish priest hearing confessions. The impression these gentle people give is one of piety and humble circumstances.
The most impressive religious site is a spanking new Buddhist pagoda complex set on a high hill. It is possible to visit the site via a cable ride over a forested mountain valley. The pagoda is a riot of flowers, and Viets and foreign tourists crowd the place.
With its mountain air, fine food and classic hotels, Dalat in mid journey is a pure pleasure.
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In SAIGON
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Saigon is a big city in a big rush. There are a couple of old hotels, such as the Continental where author Graham Greene stayed, but many are towering new international brand hotels. Little remains of the antique about Saigon, and what remains that is notable is mostly French. The central market is large, the stall holders are aggressive sellers of what you have already seen everywhere, and prices generally are higher here. There is a wide selection of restaurants, including those of an international persuasion. As a pedestrian, navigating in the city, with its intense traffic, is a real problem, and to add to the stress, it is humid and hot a good deal of the year. The air pollution level is higher here than elsewhere, but so is the energy level. But Saigon is at the cutting edge of what is happening in the country and is an essential experience.
The American Imperialist War Crimes Museum has had a name change. It is now simply the War Museum in deference to American sensibilities. But don't kid yourself. It's all there: agent orange, napalm, land minds, bombing, village concentration camps, My Lai and other such. Outside there are trophy tanks, planes, helicopters. An exhibit of photographs by American photographers who died in the war is full of images of American death and struggle. This is a grim reminder, but just about everyone goes there on their Saigon rounds. It's your choice, if you are up to it.
Out of town you can go on a tour to Chu Chi, the Viet Cong tunnels preserved as a tourist attraction. Those that go report it feels like a reconstruction crowded with Vietnamese on a history tour. The remaining tunnel, if you want to try it, is claustrophobic. There also is the opportunity to fire an AK47 at a U.S. dollar per bullet. It adds up quickly, but a shooter says its a hoot and a bargain, and the irony seems to bother no one.
You will enjoy an excursion to the Mekong River, if only to get out of town for a day. The river is massive. It feeds the ever-expanding delta country where a myriad of canals weave through the land past the rice fields that yield three crops a year. Born in the distant Himalayas, it is a major channel of transport. It feeds the city. Farm goods of every sort, fisheries, factories, boat yards, sand extraction and more are all found in the busy towns that line its banks. It is the Mississippi, Amazon, and Rhine combined. Its islands have channels you can visit in sampans; and being paddled about in these quiet backwaters feels primitive and remote.
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A Final Note:
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Vietnam is a nation where only tourists walk. This is an absolute fact. Everyone is on motor scooters, which have replaced almost all the bicycles. People ride singly, in pairs and up to an illegal four on a scooter. They go to school, to work, to shop, to eat, to entertainment, everywhere, and they go on scooters. At rush hour in the cities, each corner will see scooters in the hundreds surging in huge waves in every direction. In crush zones, scooters sneak on the sidewalks to get around. The sidewalks are lined with parked scooters.
You will be lectured about how to cross the streets. The social contract is simple: step out and only go forward, look right and left constantly and proceed. The dodge'em game depends on everyone understanding and following the unwritten rules. Watching the Viets step out into this maelstrom of movement is to admire their skill and daring.
Scooters haul everything: pigs, household goods, plants, crates, chickens, fish, vegetables, cement sacks, bricks and, unbelievably, live water buffalo. There are not so many cars and taxis or buses or trucks as to jam the roads. What will happen when cars take over?
Never mind. The Kawasaki store is lined with new and bigger scooters and motor bikes. The sales slogan seems to be about much more than scooters and bikes. It leaves one gasping: "Ride the Wind of Change!"
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Asian Continent
