Gretchen in Vietnam | March, 2008

Halong Bay on March 15 This is the final report from Vietnam - the last five days before my flight back to Germany.  Busy days, the closing of a compelling episode in my life, wondering if I'd ever come back, or even would want to.  Back in Hanoi after my China trip, I had ordered a hotel room over the internet and went to find it.  This was a bit complicated by the fact that the bus from China although it drove only a couple blocks from Old Town, did not stop there, but went to a bus station at the other end of Hanoi.  This was annoying.  There was a couple from Sweden on the bus who'd never been in Vietnam before and who also wanted to find their hotel.  I looked on my map and saw it was no more than 1 or 2 blocks from my hotel so we decided to take a taxi together.  Now, I knew how taxis wildly cheat foreigners, but Mai Linh was usually OK, so I looked for a Mai Linh taxi and finally to my relief found one after a bit of a search with the Swedes getting rather nervous.  The taxi driver put on the meter, so I thought it's OK.  I also looked at the map to make sure he was going where we wanted to go.  He was.  We decided to go to their hotel first, dump all the luggage and find an ATM so they could pay me back since they had no Vietnamese currency.  Then they'd carry my luggage to my hotel.  When we got there I looked at the taxi meter and saw 45,000 Dong which is about what I'd expected it would be.  The taxi driver, however said it would cost $10.  That is 160,000 Dong.  I said, no it's 45,000 Dong.  I had a 50,000 bill, so I took it out.  He said more, more, $10.  I said, 45,000.  It's on the meter.  He began to get very aggressive, yelling for dollars and the Swedes were getting scared.  I screamed back and said I'll report you.  Give me my 5,000 back.  Now the taxi driver was scared.  I was amazed in fact, how well this threat worked.  He gave me my 5,000 and disappeared quickly.  It was a bit difficult to find a functioning ATM, but eventually succeeded and the Swedes carried my luggage to my hotel.  It was in a narrow street in the old town, noisy, and smelly.  There were bed bugs in the bed which I squashed, leaving nasty blood streaks on the bed, but it had a nice bathroom which on the second day presented me with a huge dead cockroach.  The hotels wash the floors with some kind of insecticide which does kill the bugs, but who knows what it does to your feet.  I SMSed Jennifer and we met for supper at Gecko, the restaurant where we'd often gone to eat.  The next day, I set out to do my tasks.  I wanted to empty my bank account and change most of the money to Euros.  It turned out to be impossible to empty it without closing it down, but the fee for closing it down, was about as much as just leaving the money.  So there's still about 83,000 Dong sitting in a bank account in Hanoi for me.  I also had to pick up the clothes I'd had made of silk at the tailor.  Jennifer also had clothes there so we went together.  I got my clothes and was happy enough with them, so I paid for them.  Then Jennifer began to describe some new clothes she wanted.  She loves silk and all her clothes are tailor made of silk.  She'd bought the silk in Hoi An, an amount they'd told her there was sufficient, but this tailor said it was not enough.  Jennifer felt she was being cheated, so after a crescendo of anger she finally grabbed her fabric and left in a huff.  I followed her and was glad I'd completed my purchase.  I also had to collect my luggage which I'd left at Jennifer's and then buy a few souvenirs. The weather in Hanoi had completely changed from when I'd left.  It was now warm and humid, sweat weather with a frequent off and on drizzle which was actually somewhat of a relief.  I thought, I'm glad I'm leaving.  The weather in Hanoi is generally unpleasant, winters cold, dark and dank, spring wet and humid, summer very hot and very humid (they say - and I'm glad I didn't have to experience it).  Only the fall is beautiful.

Our boat

View of the harbor at Halong Bay

The dragon head on our boat

Jennifer - Gretchen

Many tour boats

Fishing village in Halong Bay - These fishermen either catch or raise the fish used for the many tour boats visible in these pictures.

Fish pens for raising fish

Fishing village

A cave in one of the karst mountains in Halong Bay

Colored lights in the cave

Jennifer

Originally, Jennifer and I had planned to take a trip to Halong Bay for two days, as I wanted to see it before leaving.  But now Jennifer said the lofties had invited her to a day long party at a retreat on Sunday and she'd asked if she could bring me.  They said, yes.  The lofties are the government officials and ministers to whom she teaches English.  Do you want to come? she asked.  It sounded interesting to me, first to meet the people who run the country, and then to see what they do in their free time.  So I said, yes.  That meant we couldn't go to Halong Bay for two days.  But maybe a one day tour was possible.  We went back to my hotel where they sold tours.  It was about 10 PM, but the desk person said there were one day tours and we could still order one for tomorrow. It began with a farce.  They had told us we'd be picked up at our hotels by a tour bus.  But first of all, a Xe Om (motor bike taxi) came to get Jennifer.  She freaked out.  Jennifer is quite overweight and could not manage to get on a Xe Om.  She refused the Xe Om and said they had to come with a bus, as promised when we bought the tickets.  Meanwhile I and a few others from my hotel who were going on tours waited a long time (partly caused by the bus having to go out of its way to pick up Jennifer, but we didn't know this), were finally picked up by a woman who said she'd take us to the bus.  This turned out to be a walk of about 3 blocks.  OK.  You never believe anything they say.  The bus finally did come with Jennifer on it.  It was about a two hour ride to Halong Bay through rice fields, being irrigated, plowed and planted.  The whole peasant population seemed to be out in the fields.  It was a gray day which was probably nice for them.  At Halong Bay we were brought to our boat.  It was a good solid boat, with a dragon head in front, and comfortable seats inside as well as a few deck chairs outside, not enough for everyone.  Jennifer fortuately changed her mood from peeved to ecstatic.  She was delighted with the boat, with the harbor, full of tourist boats of the same type as ours and the karst peaks visible in the distance.  I was relieved that she wasn't going to complain any more.  Although it was gray weather and a bit foggy, it was also warm and not raining all of which gives a mysterious hue to this fascinating scenery.  Our boat chugged out toward the peaks which became clearer as we got closer.  It was very beautiful. There was a gentle wind, the aggrevating noises of cities disappeared and an amazing calm engulfed us.  We chugged on up to the peaks, and there lunch was served on the boat.  It turned out to be an excellent lunch of various kinds of seafood and fish, as always with rice.  The rather thick population of tour boats thinned out somewhat and at times we saw only the peaks and the sea.  Halong Bay is at the edge of Tonkin Bay where the famous incident occurred which we know today was all a fabrication and which the US used to start the war in Vietnam.  We went past a fishing village, houses on floating devices in the sea, which also had fish pens for raising fish.  Here, we were told, is where the seafood comes from which we ate for lunch.  At few times in the afternoon the sun even managed to peek out for a few minutes, everyone on the boat stopped talking and peace and quiet settled over us. But then we were taken to a peak with several big caves.  That's were all the tour boats had gone.  The place was packed with boats.  Somehow our boat bumped its way between them to a landing platform where we got out and walked to the cave entrance.  The cave was halfway up the mountain so we had to climb.  Jennifer was having difficult, so she said, go ahead, I'll stay here.  But our tour guide saw she was missing.  I told him she was behind and having difficulty so he went to get her.  She was happy enough as the cave turned out to be another of these fantastic productions of bizarre formations and colored lights.  It was like the caves in China, but Jennifer had not seen one before.  After that cave we were led to another cave, but it was also a climb upwards and Jennifer decided this time she couldn't make it.  I'd stayed behind with her, so everyone else was way ahead.  I hurried to the cave, but when I got there no one was around, so I went through this cave with almost no tourists around me.  That was actually kind of nice.  This cave had a huge opening, so at least half of it was lit by natural light and thus was different from the other caves.  A wooden walk wound through the huge room. I was thus the last person to arrive back at the boat, but it didn't seem to matter as the others were looking at souvenirs.  Our boat was no longer at the pier and we had to climb across several other boats to reach ours.  Then  the boat ride back to shore.  However, when we got there, our bus was gone.  There was in fact no bus.  The tour guide seemed a bit discombobulated and desparately made all sorts of calls.  Finally a bus came that had 4 empty seats, but we didn't get them.  We waited there about an hour until another bus that had some empty seats arrived.  It was packed full though and some people had to stand.  On the way back to Hanoi we saw two accidents, one in which I saw a motorbike drive right into a bicycle rider, the other was merely a motorbike wreck.  Vietnam has one of the highest rates of road accidents in the world.  No wonder since no one follows the road rules.

Party with Lofties (officials of Vietnam's government)

The resort in Tay Son where the party was held March 16

Jennifer and I sat there and drank the superb Vietnamese coffee until we went to play Badminton - Some of the government officials are playing tennis

Binh in the back - Man on the left is Jennifer's darling Hao. Binh and Hao both work in the Inspectorat which I guess is somewhat comparable to the State Department.

Hao's son - Binh

Madame Thuy or something like that is the Minister of Justice. I don't know who the others are.

Hao - Binh

Girl works for Language Link and me - Madame Thuy

Eating lunch

Relaxing after lunch and a few vodka cheers

Karaoke

Binh loved singing the karaoke songs - some were old songs the Viet Cong sang on the trail, sad songs about the beautiful Vietnamese girls in their ao dai's they left behind. Most of the present government officials were Viet Cong as teenagers, including Madame Thuy

Fast asleep, Hao, little Binh and someone else

Minister of Justice and Minister of Economics

Little Binh is Chief of the Inspectorat which is comparable to Secretary of State.

Me talking to Hao in German; he studied in Dresden

The next day was the party with the lofties.  I wasn't sure what kind of a party it would be, so I wore my new silk clothes, but also took my tennis shoes.  We had to have an early start as the bus was leaving at 8 AM.  Jennifer and I took a taxi to the government headquarters where a tour bus was waiting for us.  Again there was a ride of about two hours through the countryside to a resort in Tay Son where the party took place.  The bus was full, Jennifer and I the only Westerners.  There were people from Jennifer's Language School which I think were paying for this trip, then there were the government officials and ministers who were learning English in Jennifer's class as well as some of their children. When we got there Jennifer and I sat on the terrace and drank coffee while she pointed out who the people were.  There was the man she had a mad crush on, Hao, who was a high official in the Inspectorat (Ministry of the Interior or State Department).  Hao had gone straight to the tennis courts and was playing tennis.  Also playing tennis was Binh.  He also worked in the Inspectorat and Jennifer said, he's probably going to be the next prime minister of Vietnam.  He is a tall and handsome man, very charming.  Jennifer said he's the only one of the group who hadn't been Viet Cong.  What was he then?  Jennifer didn't know.  Most of these officials were in their late 40's or 50's so they were very young when they joined the Viet Cong and went down the Ho Chi Minh trail to capture Saigon in 1975.  Hao had been shot in the stomach and still suffered from his wounds.  Some of the other people went to the swimming pool to swim, but Jennifer and I ended up playing badminton with two people from Language Link (Jennifer's school).  The badminton court was next to the tennis court, so Jennifer could keep on eye on her beloved (who is married and his son, 18 years old, was also there and also playing tennis). For lunch we were brought to a room with tables only maybe a foot high or so and we had to sit on the floor.  The lunch was excellent though.  As always, the rice basis, then one after the other they brought different dishes with meat, tofu, and vegetables, rabbit, chicken, beef and who knows what else, also salad.  After everyone ate their fill, the vodka came out.  This is the custom.  The vodka glasses are filled and everyone drinks to each other and says Cam Bey.  And that goes on until the vodka bottles are empty.  After that we went to the karaoke room.  It was rather dark but with a TV with the words of the songs and the microphones.  Some people immediately stretched out on the bench with pillows to relax and fall asleep, others sang.  That is there weren't many who sang.  Binh, the possible next prime minister sang the most.  He could keep a tune and was pretty good.   The songs were mostly Vietnamese, one rather plaintive song that went on and on was about a beautiful Vietnames girl in her Ao dai, which the Viet Cong sang on lonely nights on the Ho Chi Minh trail when they thought of their girl friends back home.  There were also a few popular Western songs. There are photos of all of this which Jennifer took because my camera ceased to work.  Jennifer told me the names and positions of most of the people, and though I wrote them down, I managed to lose that piece of paper, so I'm not sure.   The ministers were Thuy (or something like that) the minister of justice, Little Binh, head of the Inspectorat which would be the State Department, the minister of the economy whose name I've forgotten, Big Binh (who is not related to little Binh) and Hao are also high officials in the State Department.  Hao is in charge of getting rid of corruption.  I don't know who the rest of them are, although Jennifer did tell me some of them. They all seemed very nice, especially Hao, who studied in Dresden and wanted to speak German with me and big Binh and Thuy, the justice minister who is a woman.  She was also a Viet Cong soldier, but didn't go to Saigon on the Ho Chi Minh trail.  The economy minister who is Thuy's partner (Jennifer thinks they aren't married, but they live together) is also very nice.  Jennifer says, I love them, but I do not like to think about what they might have done in the course of their lives.  Well, it was a war, and then a divided country that had to be pacified.  But they probably didn't do it gently.  It's better not to think about it.  One hopes though that they now do not use violent methods to bring wealth and happiness to their country which is what their goal is.  That's what they say, and it seems believable, especially after meeting them.  (People say things like even GW Bush might be a nice person if you knew him personally, but I've heard many people who've met him say, he's very unpleasant, so maybe these things go together - decent people decent policies, ikky people ikky policies.  The secret service  Bocum Anh people whom Jennifer also taught and whom I met are also very nice personally and they even told Jennifer after I left that they hoped I'd come back to Vietnam.  Their main task is to stop drug smuggling and kidnapping of women and children for prostitution, so we can have no objection to that. The next day, my last full day in Vietnam, Jennifer said she had her English class teaching the lofties and wondered if I'd like to come and talk about Rudi and the student movement in Germany.  It has to be at the simplest level, as they are English language beginners.  I wasn't sure if I could do it, but I agreed.  The classroom was in the government building and was rather elegant for a class room, compared to the schools.  There were big plush chairs and plenty of bottles of water to drink and sweet and salty snacks.  Hao, Big Binh, and the economy minister were there, as well as another man, an older man who Jennifer says is the senior party man whom everyone defers to, and there was another woman who works in the Inspectorat.  Jennifer warned me not to say anything negative about Vietnam and when discussing Rudi not to mention his critique of Lenin and the conservative form of communism which they believe in.  She did not want to be expelled from the country for having me there.  There is a bit of a problem in explaining why Rudi left the GDR without being critical of the communist government, but on the other hand when you have to make it simple, it's not so hard to leave these things out and they didn't ask.  None of them had ever heard of Rudi and didn't know about the student movement, although they did have a notion that there had been lots of protests against the war in the west.  They wondered very much why anyone in the west would be part of or lead a protest movement at all and since I had to make it simple, I explained it partly as a result of the young German students reaction at that time to Hitler and Nazism, which the Vietnamese also didn't know much about, (though they did know Ulbricht, and especially Honnecker.  I kept my mouth shut about them.)  Also, the desire of people in the west for peace, opposition to war altogether, and especially the US war against Vietnam.  I think they found it all very interesting, since the class went over time and they didn't leave. That evening we met Jeff (a teacher at Apollo who I'd known there and introduced to Jennifer) and had our last dinner together at Gecko.  Then we went to another place which had excellent Ginger tea, different and far better than any Ginger tea I'd had beofore.  Odd how their coffee, cocoa and ginger tea is so much better than anywhere else. The next morning I gathered my luggage which was way too heavy for me and got a taxi to the airport.  That was my last view of Hanoi, of course, a bit of a sad feeling about leaving, and nervousness too about the long trip ahead.  I flew first to Ho Chi Minh City with Vietnam Airlines which has both large comfortable seats as compared to Lufthansa f.ex. and for an airline, unbelievably excellent coffee.  I had given myself way too much time to wait in Ho Chi Minh City, fearing that if something went wrong, I might miss my flight to Frankfurt.  But there wasn't enough time to go into the city and anyway, there was no place to put  my hopelessly heavy luggage, so I just went outside at the airport.  At first it was very hot, so I went back in to the air-conditioned restaurant and got another, my last Vietnamese coffee.  When I went out again, it was afternoon and a breeze had come up.  It was pleasant, warm but not too hot and not terribly humid so I stayed there and watched the sun go down over Ho Chi Minh city. By the time the plane left it was dark.  It remained night for the entire 16 or so hour flight and when we arrived in Frankfurt it was still night.  The longest night of my life.  In Frankfurt it was snowing. And thus my tale ends.