Time Warp in Vietnam

In 1991, I traveled abroad for the first time. I was a very young 20 year-old college student who had just completed my sophomore year at St. Olaf College.  I knew I was naïve but figured I had experienced an unusual life up to this point and had acquired a vast amount of knowledge about the world and it’s people. I was wrong. I was more naive than I thought.

After all, I did not know anyone else who had six siblings, five who were black, adopted and I am white. I only knew one other person who had worn a back brace.   At the time, I was fluent in three languages, English, French and Mandarin Chinese.  I also knew bits and pieces of Russian and Japanese. I had had a job since the second grade.  We had a paper route, the old fashioned kind which we delivered on foot and collected the monthly fees in person. 

I got my first real job at fifteen, as a bus girl and hostess, and eventually began waitressing at age 16.  In the summer, I had a minimum of three jobs on top of swimming 4 hours a day – two hours at 6 am and two hours at 6 pm.  I rode my bike everywhere or took the city bus.  With seven kids and being the second youngest, getting my hands on the car keys was slim to none.   I never had my own room until I was a senior in college and renting my second apartment.   I was well acquainted with manual labor and chores.  My parents had a knack for finding ‘projects’ during the summer months and we had Saturday chores from a young age.  In addition to my real jobs, I mowed lawns, shoveled snow-covered driveways, babysat, and cleaned houses for the elderly residents in our neighborhood.  I had hiked in the Big Horn Mountains in Montana for 4 weeks and paddled the Boundary Waters canoe area for 4 weeks.  I had survived the wilderness and the hustle and bustle of the city.  I thought I was ‘seasoned’.

So, I felt I had experienced a great deal by the ripe old age of 20. I had two years of college underneath my belt.  I definitely knew everything there was to know.  Or so I thought.

During the summer of 1991, I traveled to Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, China and Hong Kong. I was an Asian Studies Major at the time and had been given the opportunity to go see the world.  After enduring an 18-hour flight with a group of strangers I barely knew, I embarked on an experience that left this naïve young city girl with a new perspective on life and life as an American.

Kuala Lumpar, Malaysia was much like any other major metropolitan area. I was only impressed, due to my ignorance, that other countries were actually as developed as the Western World more so than I had originally thought.  Malaysia was a stopover for us.  We traveled onto Bangkok, Thailand and I was equally surprised by the hustle and bustle of the city. So many people, all packed in like sardines.  It would be comparable to the feeling of New York’s crowded streets but multiply it by ten.  I remember the tuk-tuk’s, they were open-air mobile taxi type vehicles, skirting through traffic like a bicycle messenger.  You’d think it would be pleasant to experience the city this way, but unfortunately the pollution was so horrendous that you prayed for a short road trip.  The red-light district at night was an eye opening experience for me and one that has stuck with me for over 20 years.  The day market transformed into a seedy nightlife strip complete with strip clubs showcasing exceptionally young girls as ‘dancers’, so young, it would be a crime in the United States.  I was horrified.  I never knew such atrocities existed.  I was much older than these girls and I felt uncomfortable when I saw them in their scantily clad outfits.  I didn’t understand. It was wrong. They were so young.  Didn’t they know about all of the other opportunities out there for them?

Our stay in Thailand was brief before we headed to Vietnam.  Vietnam was unlike any other place I could have ever imagined.  I felt as though I had traveled back in time.  It was my favorite part of the trip.  We were not technically supposed to be ‘touring’ Vietnam, as Americans, at this time, yet we were. Our group was small, only six of us.  We tried to ‘blend in’.  We did not talk about where we were from – if asked, we were European.

My first indication that this place was stuck in a time warp was the airplane.  We boarded and mixed in with the passengers were crates of chickens – yes, live chickens.  This was a small plane, which transported locals, not foreigners.  Our guide had connections, which enabled us to really experience Vietnam, not as a tourist, but as a local. Boxes of food were stacked in big piles and shoved against the wall, not strapped down or secured in any fashion.  The seats did not have seat belts.  There were no flight attendants reviewing the safety features of the aircraft.  I wasn’t entirely convinced that masks would descend if oxygen were needed. 

We, the Americans, were an oddity.  We were the only white people on the entire plane.  I finally understood what it felt like to be a minority.  I was one of two gals in our group with blond hair and green eyes.  Plus, I was a giant standing at 5’ 7” tall.  Every pair of eyes on the plane was set on us because everyone else had black hair and brown eyes.  We were all split up and not able to sit together as assigned seats did not exist.  Sit where you could find one.   As I looked around the plane, I remember seeing duct tape on the ceiling holding seams together and duct tape on the wing outside the window.  No joke.  I was genuinely frightened for my life for the first time.  It obviously turned out as I’m still around!  But I developed a new respect for duct tape!

Once we landed in Hanoi, we took a local bus to our hotel. We were in local territory and most of the people were not well acquainted with foreigners.  More stares, gawking, pointing, chatter in Vietnamese.  It was unnerving.  Clearly, we did not belong.

Vietnam is only a few degrees from the equator and extremely hot and humid.  We were not allowed to wear shorts so I had made myself several dresses to wear during our travels – had to be long, not short. Still, it was unbearably hot.  We could only drink bottled water for obvious reasons and no ice.  No air conditioning in the hotel and mosquito nets covered the beds to keep the insects and tiny lizards off us while we slept.  I had never missed my room with three of my sisters more. But it all intrigued me and I never once had the desire to go home early.

We met up with a group of Vietnamese students during our stay and they were well versed in American culture and the language.  In fact, their grammar and penmanship was much better than all of ours - perfectly spoken and written. I was in awe at how well they had mastered the English language.  I was astonished at how they only wanted to speak English and hear our accents to perfect their own skills.  They wanted to know everything American – TV shows, clothes, places like NY and LA, movie stars, etc.  It seemed strange to me at the time because these were every day ordinary things to me.  Yet to them, it was never enough. They yearned for as much information as they could absorb.  I couldn’t believe how excited they were about ‘everything American’ but looking around at what was available to them paled in comparison.

Disco was a big hit in Vietnam in the early 90’s. They loved to go ‘clubbing’ complete with the big silver disco ball.  They dressed up and danced late into the night decked out in sequins, tight dresses and high heels that resembled stilts.  I don’t recall there being a drinking age. I remember thinking how differently the boys treated the girls.  There was never any physical contact of any kind.  Boundaries were well respected.  The girls walked around holding hands just because they were such good friends.  No judgment was passed unlike in the US where people would automatically assume you were gay if you held hands with the same sex. They gathered in groups and hung out together but there was never any indication of dating or romance.

One day, we decided to take in the beach.  As I mentioned, Vietnam is just off the equator, which means the sun is a teeny tiny bit more intense. Holy crap!  We only lasted an hour due to the scorching heat and intense rays.  One member of group, who had worn 40+ sunscreen, looked like she had been placed under a broiler oven. She was as red as lobster.  I now understand why most Asian women, even in the US, are hidden under parasols or large brim hats.  Even my olive skin was a bit crispy that day.

Our visit to a local hospital was almost unfathomable.  Only the surgery rooms had a small air conditioning unit, if it worked.  Patient rooms often held up to four people due to overcrowding and lack of available resources elsewhere.  Some patients were left in the hallways on makeshift beds.  Medical supplies were in such a high demand and short supply that supplies were used over and over again – rubber gloves, needles, surgical masks, etc.  If I didn’t see it I wouldn’t have believed it.  The needles were sharpened over and over again until they were so dull they could no longer be used.  Soap and antiseptic cleaner were not generally available to sterilize and clean the medical instruments and supplies so they just used water, which was not exactly always clean.  Bicycle parts, such as spokes and rubber tire tubing, were used for splints.  Other homemade remedies were used to stabilize patient’s necks and torn sheets were used as slings.  I prayed I did not get sick while in Vietnam.  I was thankful for the multiple series of shots I had to endure prior to my travels. I thought of my back brace and how such technology was non-existent in Vietnam.

Given our guide’s connections, we boarded a local train from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City, also know as Saigon. Once again, foreigners were not frequent travelers on this train as it was far from luxurious and we were, once again, an oddity. We were split up into multiple cabin cars. More isolation.  More stares. More uncomfortableness displayed by the locals.

 It was an old American train from the 1970’s.  It didn’t go faster than about 40 mph.  The windows did not have any glass because it was too hot. No air conditioning.  The seats were hard wood benches with no cushion. I was lucky enough to be in the car next to the on-board bathroom - downwind.  Did I mention the temperature reaches a 100 + degrees daily?   The windows had steel accordion shades, which could be pulled down at night.  However, it was far too hot to not have that ‘refreshing’ warm breeze blowing over you while you tried to sleep.  This was the least of our worries since we were told that bandits jumped on top of the train at night from over passes and attempted to crawl into the windows to steal occupant’s goods.  We slept with they window shade up and took our chances.  Die of heat or fighting with a bandit.  The bandits made for a better story.

We spent three days and two nights on the train.  We traveled through some of the most beautiful landscape I had ever seen.  We saw miles and miles of lush rice paddy fields complete with water buffalo and very young children hunched over picking the rice.  The rain rattled along slowly and gave us the opportunity to take in all the wonders of the countryside.  It’s people, animals, crops, and the simplicity of uninhabited territory.  The train pulled into small villages and we bought fruit, bottled water and food thru the window.  By the time the train had pulled away from the station, you knew exactly which cars the Americans were in.  A line of Vietnamese villagers stood outside those cars staring in at the strange white people with blond hair and green eyes. We were in the depths of rural Vietnam and most likely the first foreigners the villagers had ever seen. By the end of the train excursion, I sat back against the wall of my car because it made me feel so uncomfortable.  Again, I experienced first hand what it felt like to be a minority and under constant scrutiny. 

Ho Chi Minh City was another city, which seemed to be lost in a time machine. The villagers rode bicycles and carried baskets of fresh meat and produce from the market. They wore large brim cone shaped hats.  We visited a local market and it gave an entirely new meaning to the word fresh. Live chickens strutted around in pens alongside all the fresh produce.  Villagers simply picked their chicken out and the head was chopped off right then and there by the farmer.  Other types of animal carcasses were strung up on ropes overhead waiting to be purchased.  As hungry as I had been from the train ride, I remember my appetite had diminished.  This was a bit too fresh for me.

My most memorable part of Vietnam was the Cu Chi Tunnels.  These were the tunnels the Vietnamese hid in during the war.  We ventured into the forest one day and took a tour of the ‘museum’ of the Cu Chi Tunnels. I was amazed at how well hidden they were in the dense forest and how small they were.  We crawled down into them and worked our way through the maze.  They had been dug out to deeper widths to accommodate tourists.  The open pits, which contained spears in case an intruder was able to stumble upon them, were deep and deadly.  The tunnels wound up and down several levels beneath the ground and contained sleeping areas, tactical rooms, and a variety of other rooms.  It was like an underground ant colony with it’s sophisticated design.  It was eerie to be an American crawling around in the very same tunnels that Vietnamese soldiers had sprung from to capture and kill American soldiers.

We visited the war museum.  It was very different to be in a war museum with your own country being the enemy.  It was presented from the Vietnamese perspective.  I saw graphic photographs of war and the effects of Agent Orange on the Vietnamese people.  I saw large glass jars full of liquid containing unborn fetuses affected by Agent Orange.  I saw Americans through the Vietnamese perspective, most of which was not favorable towards Americans.  It was uncomfortable.  It was scary.  I had a new appreciation for American soldiers and the wars and battles they fought to maintain our freedom.

I left Vietnam a bit shaken but appreciative of my experience in a true third world country.  I began to appreciate America more and more every day.

This concluded my trip with my group and I traveled to Hong Kong, on my own, to meet my great aunt.  She and I traveled through China, Macau and Hong Kong for two weeks.  Hong Kong was a booming metropolitan place.  I was amazed at how ‘American’ it seemed.   There were skyscrapers, high-end fashion shops, expensive cars and fancy restaurants.  It seemed as if I was back in the US.

China was much more interesting than Hong Kong.  We traveled through several small villages and again saw the local villagers working their crops.  The open markets were similar to Vietnam and the countryside seemed pure and unpolluted.  Life was simple.  Limited technology, little or no cars, children played in the street and life moved at a leisurely pace.   Villagers were eager to meet us and try to communicate with us.  They wanted to trade goods for American items and American money.  We got more with US dollars than if we presented them with their own currency.  I purchased a beautiful Jade pendent, which I still have today.  It is a lovely reminder of an unforgettable trip to the other side of the world.

We visited Tiananmen Square. The vastness of the open space and the intricate design of all the stonework was breathtaking.  It seemed impossible for a country that always appeared to be in turmoil and stuck in a time warp.  The Terra Cotta Soldiers were beautiful and also appeared delicate yet fierce in their appearance.  Each one carved different from the next in the smallest way protecting their countrymen.

The Great Wall of China – it must be experienced.  It is so massive and unbelievable.  I could not understand how such a structure of that magnitude could have been built so many hundreds of years ago.  It was larger than I could have ever imagined.  At points, it was so steep; I was crawling, like a bear, on all fours.  I could see it for miles and miles stretching out into the desolate land.  I felt like an ant crawling on cliff.  I realized just how small and sometimes insignificant we are in this world.

I have never forgotten my travels overseas and I hope to return to Vietnam someday.  I’d like to see it through my adult eyes now that I have truly experienced more ‘life’.  It is the luck of the draw that I was born in America.  I truly appreciate this country and all that it has to offer but feel fortunate to have experienced, albeit brief, life on the ‘other side’ of the world.   Sometimes we never really appreciate what we have until it’s gone.