Saigon

Saigon would qualify as one of the most interesting places we have been. If you get a chance to visit, take it, for lots of reasons. First and foremost is the amazing traffic. Apparently there are about 4 million motorbikes in the city of about 8 million people, and believe me they are all on the street at once. Far fewer cars, buses, bicycles, pedestrians. We decided that all forms of traffic control are merely suggestions in Saigon – traffic lights (VERY few), lanes, directional orientations and one-way streets, even sidewalks. Crossing any street is surreal. You literally just go for it at any time, and literally the motorbikes will serpentine around you as you walk a steady pace. It’s not a habit you can import to any other country, but it was WILD there. I loved it!

I felt very comfortable there. Part of me was thinking/wondering if my father had in fact walked the same streets or had gone to the same places 35-40 years ago. A place we hit more than once was the Rex Hotel, which was famous for having been appropriated during the war by journalists as sort of a headquarters. Interesting, I took a picture of it before I even knew what it was – perhaps I intuited that it had relevant history, one that I may even be tied in to. Who knows.

The first day we had a city tour. Those are always good because they give you the lay of the land and highlight things and places one may wish to return to later. Also, they are popular with staff and faculty. So we toured; allow me to mention touring in Asian countries. These guides brook no lollygagging. One must STEP LIVELY to keep up, or get left behind. In fact, at one point some of us (including Merna) climbed a set of stairs from the basement of a building we were touring, and our group was nowhere in sight. We went in to a film showing in another room, thinking that’s where they went – no. So we were lost, but fortunately here comes the guide saying the rest of the group was already on the bus (!) Well, how mortifying. I had to enter the bus and announce that I was giving myself dock time for being late (the students loved that). Fortunately, I was also able to hear my own appeal, and I was relieved to find that I had in fact granted my appeal and canceled my punishment.

We got a 5-minute history of Vietnam since the 1000s (I tell you, these Asian tours move fast) and a water puppet show, which was actually very charming. The puppets do their show atop a small pond. They are operated by sticks under the water which lead to puppeteers behind a curtain in the water themselves. We also visited a temple with these giant incense coils, probably 3 feet across, which burn for a month.

A highlight was the visit to the Presidential Palace, which in 1975 had the tanks of the North Vietnamese crash through the front gates, go up the steps and into the building to overthrow the South Vietnamese government. It’s still largely intact, and very interesting. In one of the rooms was a stuffed leopard or some such; one of our darling faculty members was there with her children, and one of them was a little distressed about this animal. Toni (now she’s famous!), replied, “I think he died of natural causes, honey.” Again, thought I would bust a gut. I hear some of the greatest one-liners on this trip, funny largely because they are not meant to be. I can’t even print one of Merna’s…..

So on one little leg of this trip, as we were scurrying back to the bus (!), I passed a hotel with a sign out front. Imagine my surprise when I saw, “WELCOME SEATTLE CENTRAL COMMUNITY COLLEGE.” Didn’t have time to explore that right then, but what a weird thing! Some of us walked back up to that area from the ship (about a 10-15 minute walk, felt totally safe, perhaps because I was a TOWERING GIANT among the Vietnamese) to go to dinner at the Rex. Incidentally, Merna did not walk with us. I believe walking is against her religion. God created taxis, after all. So she met us there. Anyway, I went back to this other hotel, and in fact what was happening was a recruiting meeting held by Dr. Andrea Insley from Seattle Central. What are the odds? Well, I met her and we chatted for a while, got her card. How about that?

I’ll back up for a little perspective on the city. It was renamed Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) by the communist government in ’75, I think. However, Saigon is still in common usage. One of the reasons is that the city is divided into districts, and District 1, which houses much of the central city including many landmarks, gov’t buildings, etc., is still referred to as Saigon. So you can really get away with using that name, and of course many of us grew up hearing that, some more than others, me since that’s where my father lived for most of a decade, so it’s difficult to think of it any other way.

There’s lots of English, on signs and spoken. People were very receptive to us; one of the explanations is that so many Vietnamese are young, born after ’75, that for them the war is history, literally. Even the older folks look at U.S. folks more as welcome tourists (with money) than as symbols of the war. More on the war in the next installment, as well as the rest of my visit.