Facing the Dragon - Chapter 3

My eyes are open and my mind is telling me that I should feel drowsy, but for some reason I don’t. My body is still adjusting to the time change and I didn’t sleep much last evening. There was lots of tossing and turning. It almost feels like my body is so excited to wake up and see what kinds of interesting options will be available for breakfast that it makes me forget the fact that I didn’t sleep much the night before and I should be tired.

I have never been a person who can lie my head down and shut my eyes for 7 or 8 hours of uninterrupted, sound sleep. Anyone who has slept in the same bed or room with me can attest to the constant creaking noise coming from my bed that is the result of continuous tossing and turning. When you add 2 additional variables to an already troubling situation, things can quickly go from bad to worse. In addition to my jet lag, Nick, my roommate, snores like an animal. Nick is a 40 year old teacher from Melbourne, Australia who is traveling through Southeast Asia on one year of government leave. He is part of the independent travel group I joined which includes a driver and guide who arrange transportation, accommodations and a few activities. There are 12 people in my travel group and I am the only one who is not Australian. Nick is an enormous man and I have never heard louder noises come from a human being during their so-called resting period. Over the coming weeks, the following early morning ritual seemed to repeat itself without exception:

With my bladder rumbling, I wake up at 2 or 3 AM in the morning. After using the bathroom, I lie back down hoping to get back to sleep. However, I know that I am fighting an uphill battle to once again lose consciousness. After about 20 minutes of listening to Nick snore and trying to jam pieces of rolled up toilet paper into my ear that is not lying on my pillow, I accept the fact that I’m fucked and will have no choice but to drink lots of coffee and coca cola the next day. Eventually, I do fall asleep again but it takes a long time to get to that point. I finally buy ear plugs but they are useless against the sounds coming from big Nick.

The breakfast display this morning has American and British standbys including rashers, pancakes, omelets, baked beans and assorted meats and cheeses. However, I walk right past the Western fare and head straight for the rice gruel, braised pork and chili sauce. Even at 8 AM, the garlicky taste of the pork and the spiciness of the chili taste delicious. After devouring the rice gruel, I head back to the buffet line and fill my plate with fruit. A few pork and shrimp dumplings also find their way onto my plate next to a gorgeous and colorful cornucopia of papaya, dragon fruit, pineapple, lychee and rambutan. Many of these fruits are new to me since they are endemic to this region of the world.

Feeling satisfied and full, I hop aboard our bus and am pleasantly surprised to find out that it is air-conditioned. Today, we are traveling to the Cao Dai Pagoda and the infamous Cu Chi tunnels. This journey is my first of many long and interesting jaunts into what feels to me to be a very naked and very real Vietnam. My interest in seeing the chaos and disorganization of a typical Vietnamese road and road side has been piqued by my experiences of the last couple of days.

Driving along, I am amazed by the seemingly endless small markets, one after the other, lining both sides of the road. Everything, from steel doors and windows for those making home renovations to ducks, geese and French bread for those making home-cooked meals, is for sale. The roads are basic and require serious renovations, but this only makes our trip all the more interesting. We are on what I would describe as a highway but this highway is like no other. Each side of the main road is one endless market that is only broken by some intermittent homes and the occasional apartment building. In the intense heat, it is strange to see women driving around with long pants and sleeves on in addition to masks covering every part of their face beneath their eyes. I presume that they are covering their skin to protect it from the harmful effects of the sun. I find out how foolish, naïve and completely out of touch I am with the environment around me when I bring up this point to some of my fellow travelers.

In actuality, the reason so many women cover their skin has nothing to do with UV rays and skin cancer and everything to do with society and perception. Dark skin is associated with poverty. In Vietnamese culture, the perception is that dark skinned peasants farm the land and work in street markets hawking food and consumer goods where their skin is constantly exposed to the sun. As with all societies, a caste system does exist and dark-skinned peasants are on one of the lower rungs. On the other hand, lighter skin and preferably white skin, is associated with beauty and affluence. This point was driven home many days later when I had a drink with a Vietnamese woman I met in a silk shop.

As we enjoyed our drink over some casual conversation, the subject turned to skin color and beauty. I was interested to get Twuy’s perspective on this topic. At the same time, an overweight Caucasian Australian woman walked into the bar. Twuy motioned in the women’s direction and said, “She is beautiful.” I was shocked as the last term I would use to describe the women who just entered the bar is beauty. She is considerably overweight and average looking. While I can understand why the stereotype exists, it doesn’t make it any less disheartening for me to see an attractive woman like Twuy and realize that she considers herself to be physically inferior to another woman based strictly on the color of her skin.

As we continue our journey, it becomes clear that the real adventure is in the journey, not the destination. I get an in depth view of life in rural Vietnam when we stop to visit a family whose livelihood is making rice paper that is used for making spring rolls and other items. The woman of the house is hard at work making sticky rice gruel, which forms the basis of rice paper. As her kids run around playing with dogs and chickens, she graciously allows us to watch as she labors away over an intense fire using a medieval looking tool to assist with the rice cooking and smoothing process. The end result is displayed outside the hut she works in as lines of bamboo racks are draped with sheets of rice paper that are drying in the sun. This is hard, manual labor and this woman works 10 hours a day, 7 days a week to support her family. She makes approximately $2 a day.

As we continue to drive across the countryside, I notice farmers working in the massive rice paddies that surround us under the protective shield of their conical hats. Every time we make a stop, the farmers look up from their tools and greet us with wide smiles and friendly waves. Much like the woman making rice paper, these men and women labor 10-12 hours a day, spending much of that time behind a manual till that is attached to a water buffalo. The water buffalo is sacred to Vietnamese culture and is still the primary means for harvesting rice in many parts of Vietnam. I feel fortunate that I am able to see these farmers up close at work. It helps me to understand how important farming is as a livelihood and means of survival for so many. The Vietnamese are truly people of the land. It is no surprise that Vietnam is the 2nd largest exporter of rice products in the world.

We hop back aboard the bus and continue on towards the Cao Dai Cathedral. This cathedral, situated on the outskirts of Ho Chi Mihn City in the Tay Ninh District, is the Holy See of the Cao Daism religion. Cao Daism purports the concept of a universal God. Its roots are based in Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism to which elements of Christianity and Mohammedanism have been added. It sounds like a soup but it is actually a religion. By following the 5 canons of Cao Daism, parishioners avoid killing living beings, high living, covetousness, verbal deceit and temptations of the flesh. Adherents of this religion look to hasten the evolution of the soul through reincarnation. Today, this religion thrives in its twin power bases of Tay Ninh and the Mekong.

Religious history aside, the cathedral is aesthetically remarkable. When English writer Graham Greene saw this dazzling cathedral, he described it as a ‘Walt Disney fantasia of the East’. Looking inside the church at the dragons, technicolor snakes, Divine Eye’s, and garments of the priests and church’s zealots, I am a bit awestruck. The Divine Eye is omniscient and penetrating as it stares directly through the chest, into the heart and further into the soul of the person bold enough to look it in the eye. My description may sound exaggerated, but the Divine Eye is ever present as it is the most recurrent motif in the cathedral. It is supposed to symbolize a mental state that allows beings to see what others are doing from far away. In the symbol, an eye is surrounded by a triangle, much like the American one-dollar bill. As I walk throughout the cathedral, I find it almost impossible to avoid its powerful gaze.

A service begins during our visit and we are able to witness, from the balcony above, 20 minutes of a fascinating ceremony. It is captivating to see so many worshippers packed into this cathedral at one time. They are dressed in blue, red and yellow gowns and are sitting on the ground while interesting and exotic music is being created. I am most enchanted by the amazing colors and artwork that are used so brilliantly to represent the various faiths that are interwoven throughout this cathedral, mosque and pagoda hybrid. Given all the religious conflicts, past and present, Cao Daism’s concept of bringing the best of all religions together is refreshing and logical.

After leaving the cathedral, we have a short ride to a small and basic roadside restaurant situated immediately off of the highway. Run by a hard working Cambodian family who doesn’t seem to be too appreciative of my constant peering into their kitchen, we sit down and hungrily wait for our lunch to arrive. I am so curious about everything that I want to see how they are making the food, what kind of ingredients they are using, the cooking utensils used and the kitchen dynamics. Unfortunately, I think the people working in the kitchen think that I am trying to send a signal to them that it is taking too long for the food to come to our table. This is understandable on their part but all I really want is to have the opportunity to get a little bit closer to the action.

An impressive fresh cooked feast of omelets, rice noodle filled pancakes, spring rolls, pork, tofu and rice arrives on our table. There is no reason to eat a lunch so large but everything is so tasty that we keep filling our plates until nearly all the dishes are empty. I conclude the meal by drinking some snake wine with Claire and Sebastian, 2 Aussies in their 70’s who seem to share my outlook that you should eat and drink pretty much anything that looks decent which is placed in front of you. The fermentation of a dead, coiled snake, some hay and a few dead birds with some rice wine surprisingly enough tastes like a cross between tequila and brandy. That was my first impression but I needed to make sure and took another swig before leaving the restaurant. Feeling full and satisfied, I hop back aboard the bus. Our next destination is the Cu Chi tunnels.

The Cu Chi Tunnels are one of the wonders of the world and I do not use that term lightly. These tunnels were used by Viet Cong guerrillas as hiding spots during combat. They were much more than just hiding spots though. They served as communication and supply routes, hospitals, food and weapon caches and living quarters for numerous guerrilla fighters during numerous wars. This included the Vietnam War.

The tunnels were initially developed in response to a number of different circumstances, most importantly the military tactics of the French and U.S. They were first used by the Viet Minh in 1948 to hide from French air and ground sweeps. By 1965, the war was different but there were now 250 kilometers (110 miles) of tunnels that covered Cu Chi and the surrounding areas. These tunnels made it possible for the Viet Cong to link up with their colleague’s and infiltrate Saigon at will. The evolution and use of these tunnels during the Vietnam War was a significant, direct contributing factor to the U.S. pullout from Vietnam and the North Vietnamese Army’s resulting victory. The compact, hard red clay in the area was well suited to digging which was important because there was a tremendous amount of digging that took place over many years. The tunnels could be as small as 80 cm wide and 80 cm high. Even the tiniest Vietnamese soldier would have trouble squeezing into some of these holes. Equipped with vent shafts, hospitals, and kitchens, these tunnels are startling. They are a testament to the will and perseverance of the Vietnamese people. In order to survive against a much larger power, they were willing to live like rodents in deplorable conditions underground. Some people were actually blinded by the light, permanently, when they came out of the tunnels because they were underground for so long. I think I would rather take my chances above ground, even if it meant death, rather than live for months at a time underground for years on end. I am very fortunate and pray that I will never have to find out.

The medical procedures used in these tunnels are good examples of the famous Vietnamese ingenuity in overcoming a lack of basic resources.
Stolen motorcycle engines created light and electricity and scrap metal from downed aircraft were fashioned into surgical tools. Doctors even came up with new ways of performing surgery. Faced with large amounts of casualties and a considerable lack of available blood, one man, Dr. Vo Hoang Le invented a resourceful solution. "We managed to do blood transfusion", Vo said, "by returning his own blood to the patient. If a comrade had a belly wound and was bleeding, but his intestines were not punctured, we collected his blood, filtered it, put it in a bottle and returned it to his veins.”

Even though the size of the tunnels open to tourists have been greatly increased from their original dimensions, getting on my hands and knees and crawling through the tunnels gives me some sense of perspective as to what it was like to live in this environment. As I crawl from one tunnel to the next, I encounter a bat less that a foot away from my face. Later, I sample a typical meal a VC soldier in the tunnels might have had which consisted of tea and tapioca root. Sustenance was minimal for these soldiers and nutritious roots like these were available and therefore very popular. I crawl into another room that opens up into a larger area. There is room for me to stand and there are some items in the corner of the room. I walk over and look at some of the torture instruments that are on display which were used against the South Vietnamese and American soldiers who tried to enter the tunnels. After viewing these instruments, I realize where the term tunnel rat came from. Whenever a tunnel was uncovered, tunnel rats were sent in to kill any buried enemies and plant explosives to destroy the tunnels. The tunnels were very dangerous, with numerous booby traps and enemies lying in wait. A tunnel rat trying to infiltrate one of the Cu Chi tunnels might encounter bamboo spikes or trip a wire that was primed to detonate a grenade or release a box of scorpions onto them. The prospect of being a tunnel rat doesn’t sound too exciting to me.

On the drive back to Saigon, my face is pasted to the bus window as I gaze outward at the life that is unfolding before my eyes. There are women still hard at work carrying pots of food attached to the 2 ends of bamboo poles that stretch across their backs. Others stand in the still scorching sun peddling bottles of water and coca cola. Barefoot children play soccer on the side of the road. I cannot get enough of the pictures of daily life that a typical rode in Vietnam offers. I am tired after such a long day and as I continue to stare, my attention begins to wane and my eyes eventually shut.