Gucci Glasses and a Rolex Watch

We are still in Saigon. We were planning on heading North after a couple of days but the comfort of a hot shower and a tv in our room has kept us here longer than planned. We have been eating pizza, drinking cappucinos and channel surfing for days.. what a novelty!

We did an organised tour of the city a couple of days ago which consisted of a visit to the ‘War Remnants Museum’ and the Unification Palace.. stupid us. After our experience in Phnom Penh we should have known to stay away! It was pretty tough, the photographs were much more graphic than the ones at S21 and taken by ‘photojournalists’. One in particular was pretty horrifying.. it was of an american soldier holding the remains of a vietnamese man. Remains is a good word because he wasnt all there. The soldier was holding the man by his hair, there was a head, and arm and skin trailing on the ground behind him. The soldier was smiling for the camera, holding the man like he’d won a trophy. Very disturbing. In another photo there were four soldiers squatting in a semicircle around the heads of three vietnamese men, their headless bodies lay in the background of the picture and each of the soldiers had one of their hands resting on the heads of the men – like hunters posing with their kill – again all four men were smiling for the camera.

There were countless photos like this, and stories of men killing women and children. There was even a story about a US Senator who had come to visit the troops and had hunted down a bunch of kids hiding in a sewer and killed all but one of them. There were also photos of people melted by Napalm, features clumped together like chewed gum. Children black and patchy, women scarred even 3 decades later. And then the deformities of the next generation. A man with an extra arm, one without legs and another with legs that didnt work, his upper body strong and muscled and his legs nothing but skin and bone.

We didn’t see it all, I moved onto the childrens paintings, rainbows and flowers, the peace paintings, then we sat outside in the shade and waited for everyone else to be done. I feel guilty. About not wanting to look, I just want to hide from it all, I have had enough of war and it seems so unfair that I should walk away and close my eyes to it when so many people had to see it and live it. And its hard to be so angry and not know who to be angry with. Surely not all the men sent out here did such horrible things? Surely not everyone enjoyed slaughtering people, when we ‘pay our respects’ to our soldiers are we respecting men who gave their lives for us or those who took the lives of others so horribly? Men who came against their will, or those who wanted to be involved?

I’m so angry and so sickened, and I want to believe so much that the world has changed but when I truly think about it, I dont think it has. We do, once again, have our troops in another country killing for something that has nothing to do with us…

The war remnants museum and the unification palace (where we watched a video in which a man was executed) were the first stops in our tour and the rest of the day wasnt so gruesome. We visited some temples and some markets, we visited china town, but its hard to be excited about these things with those images in your head.

The next day we did some shopping Luke bought himself a *Rolex* watch (for only $27 – what a bargain!) and I got my eyes retested.. something that should have been done a long time ago! My right eye is in much worse shape than the other so I am lopsided now with one lense thicker than the other. My glasses are Gucci apparently (aren’t we trendy?!?) and I am still getting used to them. I feel a little seasick most of the time but its getting better.

Yesterday we went on a tour of the Mekong Delta. It wasnt the best day for it, it was raining on and off most of the day but it was still alot of fun. We went to Can Tho by bus and caught a boat for our cruise of the Mekong. We visited four different islands, went to a coconut candy factory (although factory isn’t really the right word, it was really just a wooden hut with four women making candy) where we tasted (and bought) some delicious treats, we tasted banana, honey and rice wine (all of which tasted foul and ranged from 20% – 40% alcohol) the rest of our group got photos taken with a python.. but we had already done this in Thailand and besides our snake was much bigger!!! We watched some old men playing traditional music with some great instruments and listened to some beautiful Vietnamese girls sing traditional songs (although their rendition of ‘if your happy and you know it’ in Vietnamese kind of ruined the traditional feeling). We boated through little canals in a row boat wearing plastic raincoats and pointy hats and we tasted all kinds of weird and wonderful traditional fruits (none of which I liked!). We ate fresh honey from tiny little bees and drank honey and lemon tea (which reminded me of my mum!). All in all it was a nice day, nothing too strenuous which was good.

We were planning on going to the Chu Chi Tunnels but have decided to give it a miss – no more war related visits for us! At 2pm today we are meeting Mr Nga, an old cyclo driver, who is going to take us around town this afternoon. He is a lovely (and persistent) man so that should be fun. Tomorrow we visit the water park (lets hope it doesnt rain) and for Christmas we have booked a table at a restaurant near our guesthouse that is serving roast turkey (among other things) for lunch.

We are buying an open bus ticket for the rest of our journey that will take us North through various towns. We are planning on leaving Boxing day for Mui Ne Beach for a week of sand sledding on the sand dunes and maybe some windsurfing.. Hopefully we will be able to find a nice little (or not so little) beach party to celebrate New Years Eve..

Have to run.. our cyclo driver will be waiting!

xx