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US National Exchange to Vietnam
The Vietnam-U.S. Society coordinates the home-hosting and touring for Friendship Force groups. Ambassadors discovered many different types of homes and families but all were alike in terms of their hospitality and friendliness. Our host family was a retired psychiatrist, her married son, his wife, three year and six week old grandsons and single daughter who works for Ford Motor Company. Dr. Lan was forced by law to retire at age 55 but still felt she had something to offer, consequently she has started a non-profit school for mentally ill and mentally handicapped children, apparently a first for Hanoi. We toured old temples and citadels, shrines and tombs as well as museums and the Reunification Palace, which celebrates the union of the North and the South. Most of the people in Vietnam were born after the war and really like American visitors. They are making a real effort to learn English and the United States is now their number one trading partner. Hoang Cong Thuy, who was E.D. for an exchange to Lincoln in 1999, gave a beautiful speech welcoming the delegation emphasizing the Friendship Force motto “A World of Friends Is a World of Peace.” He gave us a Vietnam history lesson. Ho Chi Minh is revered by the people there. Toward the end of World War II, he assisted the United States in rescuing several O.S.S. agents from the jungle. He appreciated American democracy and wanted good relations. In fact, he adopted the ideals of the Declaration of Independence as his creed as to how a country should be governed. He learned to speak twelve different languages. He also tried to write both Presidents Roosevelt and Truman asking to have the best and brightest young people come to the U.S. to be educated. No one knows if those letters were ever in the hands of either president. But alas, HCM still favored Communism and this was right after China fell and the Domino Theory was in effect and many atrocities were being done to accomplish world domination by the Communists. Ho Chi Minh did not buy into the Stalinist form of Communism, only wanting it for his own nation. Of course the U.S. supported the French whom he was rebelling against and the rest is history. “Karma” as Mr. Thuy put it. The fifty year old Vietnam USA Society organized a reunion between O.S.S. veterans and Viet Minh veterans in 1995 in Vietnam and the next year in New York. If this history interests you, read Uncle Ho and Uncle Sam by Charles Fenn. Everyone enjoyed the Vietnamese cuisine, which is so artistically presented. We were served huge prawns at nearly every meal and a myriad of other fresh fish. Everything is very inexpensive and the capitalistic spirit is strong as vendors eagerly hawk their wares at every opportunity. We felt perfectly safe, except when crossing the moped-filled streets. You simply step off the curb and walk, allowing the mopeds and the few cars maneuver around you as you trudge steadily onward. It is always a relief to reach the opposite side unscathed, but we did, every time! We really traveled the whole length of Vietnam. We flew to Hue and bussed to DaNang via Hai Van Pass. We visited the marvelous ancient town of Hoi An which thrived from the 5th century until the 17th and has never been bombed. Here we had the opportunity to buy hand tailored clothing items for a song. Pat King’s full length lined cashmere coat was $35! We climbed to the top of Marble Mountain and took flashlights to maneuver our way into a cave that had been used as a hospital for the Viet Cong. We visited silk worm factories and watched the silk being extracted from a number of cocoons to form the slender threads and from there we saw young girls working very old looms to make the silk material. We did not eat dog, although Faux Dog (actually pork) was on the menu at one buffet. Many Vietnamese, Koreans, and Chinese enjoy dog meat, but of course they know that Westerners do not. Pet dogs are not sold for consumption. Dog is best at one or two years and black dogs are the very best of all, but also the most expensive! Next we flew to Saigon, now called Ho Chi Minh City, and boated and canoed through the Mekong Delta. There is a marked difference between Hanoi and HCM City, the latter appearing much more prosperous and modern. There were expensive designer stores near our hotel, as well as a modern air conditioned shopping center and super market. We left Vietnam to spend our last three days in Cambodia, flying in to Siem Reap. The Khmers are one of the oldest races, known to have been in existence since 5000 B.C., although the term Khmer Rouge was used to refer to the Communists who fought under Pol Pot. Our guide, Kwong, tells us that the Khmer Rouge were actually the victims of Communist ideology and theory. “It seemed good. But the results were the opposite. The theory is unique. The reality is bloody. You had to kill to make it work.” (Omission here!) He also said of Pol Pot, “We hate him. He should have died when he was born.” He told us that young men were drafted and would be forced to serve either in the government or in the Khmer Rouge. He was drafted to serve the government but his brother was drafted into the Khmer Rouge. It was not unusual to find brother fighting against brother as a result. Kyong’s brother-in-law and father were killed in the war. We came here specifically to visit the Angkor Archaeological Park. It covers 402 square kilometers and has 480 temples, all built in the early part of the Angkor period, 802 to 1482. (Another omission) From the first century to the end of the twelfth, Cambodia was most influenced by India and the Hindu religion. From that point until now, it has become Buddhist. The temples we saw were built to honor the Hindu religion with intricate carvings and bas reliefs that told modern man the history of the area. It was an honor to be a temple sculptor and the work was done from the heart, consequently the results were spectacular. Our guide pushed a broom straw through a tiny opening the size of a pinhead, and it proceeded all the way through the six inch wall and out the other side, such was the attention to detail. It must be seen to be believed. All of these temples had been overgrown with around thirty-five feet of vegetation preserving them from discovery until the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In one temple the banyan trees continue to crawl over the walls and gateways. Another temple involves a smaller but nevertheless strenuous climb to be able to wander among the 46 remaining towers, each featuring an expressive face and each one a different expression! Angkor Wat, which means “city monastery”, is the largest and most famous temple, encompassing a square mile of space. Like Inca, Aztec, and Mayan temples, the architects of Angkor Wat demonstrated their knowledge of astronomy as the sun appears directly over the highest tower at the dawn of each solstice. We were allowed to climb uneven stairs that were ladder steep with no railings to upper towers. As we left along a jungle path just before sunset, the noise of the local cicadas was deafening! A two hour drive and a 45 minute hike brought us to Kbal Spean where we saw beautiful waterfalls and the source of the river which flows through Siem Reap. 10th-12th century sculptures are chiseled from the rocky riverbed including a thousand carvings of fertility symbols. An effort was made to make this river similar to the Ganges. After our hike, we learned that a large tiger was caught in a small animal snare a few months back very near the trail. Our return drive along the very bumpy road was a National Geographic adventure. We emptied the bus and walked over the plank bridge crossing a ravine. It had evidently cracked on our ride in! We saw a family driving their oxcart, and stopped to take their picture. We saw beautiful children coming out to wave at us as we passed. We stopped to take a picture of a house, built on stilts (protection against snakes and the rainy season) where the young mother was making fish emulsion soup, a staple, and was surrounded by two young children in the house, the naked baby in the yard, bananas hanging up to ripen, and the husband appearing to see what on earth was going on! The spectacular sunset left us in the dark quite quickly and then we saw only cooking fires or the occasional lantern as we bumped along looking at life in a very primitive area. According to Kwong, it costs practically nothing to live here. Cattle and poultry are cheap. People weave baskets. They eat fish and rice, make the popular fish paste which can be bartered for other things. Our last day included a boat ride along the floating fishing village where people continue to fish in the same way they have since medieval times. The water was quite brown and murky although Tonle Sap (the name of the large body of water) means “Fresh River”. Grass huts perched precariously on high stilts lined the shore and many small (house)boats with grass shacks on them plied the waters. The occasional TV antenna perched incongruously on top of a few. We saw children drinking the water, swimming in it, and using it as a toilet... The plane ride home seemed endless, but everyone had many sights and scenes to remember this interesting and varied experience that surpassed all expectations. |
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e were simply overwhelmed! Everything about this trip surpassed our expectations!” This is the feedback of twenty-seven ambassadors from all over the U.S. and Canada who went to Vietnam and Cambodia last November on a national exchange. The group left from Los Angeles following The Friendship Force International Conference. There was home hosting in Hanoi, interspersed with an overnight at a resort on beautiful Ha Long Bay. The scenery there is breath-taking with huge, picturesque limestone formations jutting out of the water for miles.