WINE DINE AND TRAVEL SUMMER 2020 -- SOUTH AFRICA

LOOKING FORWARD
Dear Ron,
In our last postcard, we didn’t mention that the
Vietnamese New Year holiday is called Tet.
We didn’t forget. But to many Americans the
word “Tet” is synonymous with “Vietnam War.”
The Tet Offensive was a country-wide surprise attack
during the 1968 Lunar New
Year holiday. It was the war’s biggest
battle -- more than 1,000 GIs
died.
But Tet casts no such shadow
here. In Vietnam it’s just a time for
joy and celebration. Grudge
doesn’t seem to be a Vietnamese
concept. War? What war? During
our trip we must have brought up
the subject a dozen times. Each
time – in the north, south, coast,
inland -- the answer was the same:
“That’s the past, we look ahead.”
That’s Vietnam in a single sentence.
The people we met were industrious, optimistic
and happy. Laughter was everywhere.
A boat dock gate didn’t open – the gate man
struggled with it, laughed, struggled some more,
laughed, then let us around another side. A fruit
seller thought it hilarious when we asked her to
write out the Vietnamese name for dragon fruit
(“thranh long”). When our tour Jeep stalled in a
busy highway outside Hanoi, the pretty young tour
guide just shrugged, laughed and sat back, putting
her feet up on the dash.
ven the Cu Chi tunnels, a war site outside
HCMC, felt more like a theme park than a memorial.
The extensive tunnels, used by the Viet Cong
to evade U.S. troops and napalm attacks, vie with
gift shops, documentaries with jaunty soundtracks,
booby trap displays, a shooting range and
outdoor restaurants for the attention of tourists.
When we visited the place was packed. People
sticking their heads out of a tunnel entrance was
the main photo op.
Even our Cu Chi guide, “Mr. Chi,” was ultimately
dismissive of it all. “We can’t be Hobbits all our
lives,” he said as we left for our boat
ride back to the city.
Then there’s HCMC’s war museum.
It’s grim. The third floor “agent orange”
exhibit has gut-wrenching photos.
But even here the Vietnamese
downplay the past. An earlier version
of the museum, opened in 1975, was
called “The Exhibition House for US
and Puppet Crimes.” In 1990 the
name was changed to “Exhibition
House for Crimes of War and Aggression.”
When diplomatic relations with
the U.S. were resumed in 1995, the
name was changed again. Now it’s called the “War
Remnants Museum.”
At our hotel in Da Lat we kept asking Huynh
Nghia, the friendly guy who welcomed us, what his
job title was. Each day he’d laugh and give us a different
title.
Finally, on our last day, as we were leaving, he
said, “I’m manager, door man, waiter, bellhop,
president! There are no titles here, we’re now just
family.” And then he laughed and gave us both a
hug.
Love,
John and Jody
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