Home!

I added that exclamation point in the title so it seems like I'm excited to be here. (I was excited to vote today. We got in line before the polls opened.)

So we made it. The flight from Tokyo to JFK was long, as expected, but we managed to amuse ourselves with movies. Jordo chose the girliest movies he could find, including, "Made of Honor" and "Sex and the City." I refused to watch either on the grounds they would annoy me so I watched a depressing British film about a woman abusing illegal immigrant workers and a Discovery Channel special on the Great Plains of the Earth. (Odd choices, true, but still better than his movies.)

At the airport in Saigon, Jordo had noticed how a lot of people were spending extra money to have their bags wrapped in tape and plastic. Probably precautions in case someone stuck something illegal in there? We didn't know. We chose not to follow suit and take our chances with Tony Montana. Then, while we were waiting for our baggage at JFK, one of the drug/food sniffing dogs became obsessed with my bag. The handler asked what I had in there and, besides from some foreign peanuts, there was nothing in there to set off the dog's nose. The handler kept pushing: Had I had meat in there at some point? Fruit? No and no. I offered to let him search, but he declined. Since he kept asking about food, we imagined that he could go through my bag, pull out a few kilos of heroin, then put it back, and say, "OK, looks like there isn't any illegal produce in here. You can go."

(The whole incident sent me back to the early 90s, when Jaqui came back from France with cheese and was chased through the airport by security dogs.)

So Saigon flew by. On one of our last days, we went to the War Remnants Museum. (It was apparently once called "The House for Displaying War Crimes of American Imperialism and the Puppet Government (of South Vietnam)" but the name was changed to be more tourist-friendly.) It was a wow. One whole room was devoted to all of the journalists who died covering the war, including Errol Flynn's son. We got to see some of the last photos these journalists had taken before their deaths, as well as some of the shots that then became iconic of the war. Some of those who died did so in combat. A few were on helicopters that crashed. A few just disappeared and are presumed dead. One journalist, who had no wife or kids, left everything he had to a fund to help Vietnamese orphans.

Another room was about war atrocities, and so you can imagine it wasn't too "Go, USA!" It was just plain stressful. They had a lot of pictures and accounts from My Lai, which were chilling. There's a section of former Sen. Bob Kerrey, who in 2001 admitted to his involvement in killing civilians while a SEAL leader in Vietnam. More than one wall was devoted to pictures of people killed or disfigured by Agent Orange or Napalm or other chemicals, be it first hand or because they were the children of soldiers or villagers affected by this chemical warfare. (They included some American children, too, including a boy who was one of the first poster children for the March of Dimes, whose father had been a soldier.) They had deformed fetuses in jars to further show what damage the chemicals had brought to following generations.

They had replicas of tiger cages, where Viet Cong prisoners were held, and a guillotine used by the French. (And yes, weird tourists in front of us posed with their heads leaning towards it like it was Disney World. And I thought it was bad for us to take smiling pictures in the Cu Chi tunnels.)

There was a statue made of metal collected from bombs and ammo that was called "Mother." It purported to show a woman in agony during the war. It was fitting, as so many of the pictures we saw were of women trying to protect their children, women wailing before they were to be shot.

The guestbook was filled with anti-American sentiment, including things like, "Americans are the real war criminals." A tank was parked outside the museum, and "Fuck" had been written in the dust before "USA Army."

Oh, reputation in tatters. Here's hoping all that changes in the years to come.

Heading home, Pt. 1: Note from Tokyo

Not too long of an update as we are using Japanese keyboards and the keys are different enough that every time I think I am hitting the space bar with my right thumb, I am actually hitting the 'Switch to Japanese' key, so I get　cらpぃ毛ティsウェンI目案と差y染めティンg故mpぇ手lyぢっふぇ連t。 (Translation-- crap like this when I mean something completely different) And the punctuation keys are different. And just typing that, I hit the SWITCH key 3 times. だっみｔ！

So we've left Vietnam and are pretty sad about it. I have lots of thoughts on the last days. I'll share them later. (Aside:　Who moved the quotation marks? I could kill this ｺｵmﾌﾟﾃr｡）（And no, I did not do that change on purpose.)

Another aside: An older guy just came in and is freaking out about the keyboard. He has the wireless attendant by his side. 'Every time I hit the space bar, it goes bad,' he said, not noticing how what he thinks is the space bar is really the evil 'Switch to Japanese' key. He will not last long, friends. This is not a task for the old and weary. John McCain gets confused by the computer as it is now. This would be the final blow.

Anyway, we made it safely from Saigon to Tokyo and get on our next plane in about two hours. We hit JFK around noon, clear customs/get arrested for smuggling, then either take a car to my parents' house/get an attorney, get the car/see if we can post bond, and then head home/stay in jail once bail is denied.

Oh no. More oldsters just came in and are freaking out about the keyboard. I have to watch them now in case someone has a stroke/heart attack. This could add a whole new level of drama to this trip.

Later.　不c金g果てティsこｍぷてｒ！

Done and Done

We're now sitting in an internet cafe down the street from the hotel we just checked out of, waiting to get a ride to the airport to start the Bataan Death March of flights home. Depressing indeed.

The last couple of days have flown by and we did our last bit of touring this morning, going to Reunification House (basically the old south vietnamese government house where they surrendered) and a museum that was built chronicling the american war. Umm, not a whole lot to feel good about our country there. The oddest part was watching the swiss tourists pose happily in front of a guillotine used by the southt to behead spies and guerillas during the war. I mean, they were smiling!! It's not Disneyland . . .

So not sure what else to say right now so let's hand out awards.

Nicest Guide - Sa, the guy who showed us the Cu Chi tunnels, talked about Ho Chi Minh sleeping around and despite his love for McCain said he thought Obama should win. Thanks.

Worst Guide - Hai from our little DMZ trip. Too many jokes that fell flat, fascist in her desire to keep it moving and then lied to us when she said it was only 90 minutes home. You stink Hai.

Best Restaraunt - The little lady selling chicken satay sticks on the streets in Bangkok for 30 cents. You were the best,

Worst Restaraunt - Temple Garden in Hue. Never, ever go there. Lukewarm vegetables in some kind of goulash (important to note we didn't order veg goulash), crappy fried noodles that were like smaller tougher ramen and overpriced drinks.

Worst Named Areas - Thailand. Listen, I am a fourth grade boy at heart so when you have a placed named Bangkok, another named Phuk-et and a place you call Pee - Pee island you now I am going to have to giggle a fair amount. For shame Thailand, for shame.

Worst Place Most Like America - Bangla Road on Patong Beach, Bourbon street with more hookers.

Best Place most like America - Ban Thahn market. Italian market with more random meat to buy.

Section of Lonely Planet most in need of an update - Saigon, Vietnam. Not a single restaraunt listed in the four block radius of our hotel was still there.

Best Locals Trying to Rip you off - Saigon. Very respectful, not too intrusive, a brief no and they went on their way.

Worst Locals Trying to Rip you off - Paton and Karon Noi. More arm grabbing, aussie catch phrase using and outright lying than needed to sell me $2 sunglasses for $15 bucks.

Picture Show

Since we finally got internet in our hotel, we can upload pictures and such please come and enjoy our magic picture show

Heyyyyyy! Ho-ooooo!

So our Saigon guide rocks. He tells good stories, he's friendly and he's honest about what he thinks. We love him.

I asked him if it was true that all Vietnamese people have a shrine to Ho Chi Minh in their houses. He snorted and said, "Maybe in the North. If they're stupid."

I asked him the same "Was Ho a 'ho?" question I'd asked our guide in Hanoi. There, I got discomfort. Here, I got a very different answer.

Apparently, there's a politician who has risen very quickly through the party and some say he is Ho's son. His mother was once one of Ho's servants, so our bit comparing Ho to Jefferson wasn't that far off. When asked directly if he was Ho's son, the man replied with one of those standard, "All Vietnamese are Ho's children" bits.

I knew it!

Here's a link to a story about Ho's kid: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/1291000.stm

Other news from Saigon:

1) Before coming here, other people on our travels told us how the traffic was a nightmare and the guidebook even gave a list of places were to go to watch the madness from the safety of a non-moving chair. Anne, a Dutch girl we met, told me that when she was in Saigon, she saw three accidents, including one that involved a girl and blood. She said she was freaked out, especially at rush hour when people avoid the traffic in the streets by jumping on the sidewalk, pedestrians be damned.

We haven't seen that part yet, but when we asked how long it would take to get from the airport to our hotel, we were told anywhere from 30 minutes to three hours, depending on traffic. It was somewhere in between that.

2) Another thing about driving in Vietnam: You must not only have a vehicle, like a car, bicycle or moped. You must have a horn. Because you must honk that horn all the time, not in a "Hey, jerk! Get out of the way!" way but in a "I'm here, driving past you. Beware." way. And since you must learn to pass a lot here, you must honk a lot. We were on a bus trip and the blaring horn was soooo getting on my nerves. Between it and a man I called "Typhoid Tyrone"-- he could not stop coughing -- I was completely on edge.

3) Jordo is like Magellan. He gets to a new place, pulls out the map, and immediately starts figuring his way around. He knows street names and, perhaps more impressively, north, south, east and west wherever he is. (He says it's from the sun. He also says he can tell the time of day from the sun. I say that when the sun is shining, I know a liar when I see one.) It's very impressive, especially since I get to a new place and start walking in circles. He's good to travel with. I was thinking the other day how much fun this trip has been and how we haven't had any of those disagreements that people who travel together have. I mean, Jesus Christ and Buddha could go on vacation together and even they're going to disagree about something. Or maybe not. Maybe we're just like them. I guess Jordan can be Buddha, since he was compared to that diety earlier. I'll be Jesus. We have a lot in common: We're both Capricorns. And don't forget our self-sacrificing natures.

4) Re: The tunnels again. Jordo and I were marvelling how, at the first series of tunnels we visited, all the townspeople had worked together to dig them out in such a short time period. We tried to imagine what would have happened if the people of Philadelphia had to work together to do such a project, and we had Johnny Doc complaining that non-Union labor was doing the work, Rendell wanting to make sure there was room for the casinos, Street saying things were racially biased. We also couldn't imagine living in caves with some of our neighbors, like the guy we call "RDD", short for "Republican Drug Dealer," since 1) he is a drug dealer and 2) he told me he's a Republican. He hangs at the corner near our house. I could live with the fact that he's a drug dealer, but the Republican thing would get old quick.

5) Earlier in our trip, we noticed quite a few couples -- usually Japanese -- who wore matching outfits. Even matching bathing suits. Of course, the day we noticed it we looked down and noted we were both wearing green khaki shorts and black t-shirts. I was like, "Oh no, do you think we're becoming one of THOSE couples?" Jordo said, "Come on. You know us. We just threw on whatever was on the floor." True.

War just f'ing sucks

How's that for a profound title? Thank you. I am a professional writer.

We've done a few tunnel trips in the last few days and they've left me chilled. Let me explain.

When we were in Hue, we took a day trip to the DMZ to see a series of tunnels that basically housed an entire village as well as fighters for years during the war. These tunnels had been carved by hand, handfuls of dirt at a time, over about 20 months. There were multiple entrances, some to the sea and others in the forest. Families had tiny carve outs, like caves, but teeny tiny caves where you barely fit even when sitting down. (We were imagining if we had to share a cave with another couple -- our thoughts went to the tallest couple we know, Chris and Don -- and we were like, "No way. We'd all be suffocated. Don's legs would take up most of our space.")

There was a maternity ward, and 17 babies were born there during the war. (16 survived and still live in the area.) There was a community gathering room and a cooking area. There were photos of kids having lessons and nurses at work. There were different levels, steps, and as I tried to get down one set without falling, I commented to Jordo, "They can build these complex tunnel system and no one thought to put in hand rails?"

The whole thing was a complex maze going off in all directions. Most of the time, I could walk upright. (So while my stature works against me when we play pool volleyball in Duck, it worked for me here. Except at one point I got too cocky and smacked my head.) Still, I felt like the walls were closing in.

And those, my friends, were the big tunnels.

Here in Saigon, we went to the Cu Chi tunnels. These are famous because the network is HUGE and were very effectively used by guerillas during the Vietnam/American War.

The first thing Sa, our rocking local guide, showed us was a piece of wood on the ground in a wooded area. I'd say it was smaller than a newspaper front page. That, he said, was one of the entrances. Jordo and I was dumbstruck. If I had to get down that tunnel, it would be like Winnie the Pooh in the honey tree and I'd just be stuck midway until I starved enough to fit in. One of Sa's pals showed us how to get down the tunnel, and when his hips and shoulders cleared the sides, I almost applauded. "Vietnamese people small," Sa said. (I wanted to say, "Um, we noticed." Lots of salespeople here seem to relish telling us how freakin' huge we are. "We have free size," they tell me when I'm looking at clothes. In one mall, this crazy woman kept rubbing Jordan's belly and calling him "Buddha." Meanwhile, her male compatriot was touching Jordan's arm hair and comparing his own hairless arm to Jordo's.)

Then we actually went down into the tunnels, which, we were told had been expanded by 40 percent to accomodate tourists. Oh my God. It was like being a giant in Liliput. I had to bend almost in half most of the time, and at one point found it easier to crawl. Sa told us that when the tunnels were in use, people learned to run without panting, communicate without speaking and cook without smoke. I don't know how they did the running/no panting thing. Negotiating those tunnels left me with a raised heart rate. (They did the communication thing with notes passed via children and the smokeless cooking by cooking around dawn when the air was heavy.)

Sa told us that during the start of the conflict, Americans soldiers were surprised because it seemed no one was in the area. When they figured out the tunnel system, they tried to get people out by doing things like 1) pouring water in or 2) pouring gasoline to set aflame or 3) using tear gas. Those things didn't work, Sa said. The people in the tunnels were actually thrilled by the fresh water, the gas was soaked up by the ground and didn't catch fire, and the tear gas was able to be isolated since the tunnels had different ventilation systems. (Please note: I have no idea how historically accurate any of this is. It's just what we were told that I'm retelling here.)

He told us how a group of men were specially trained as "tunnel rats." (I read something else that described these guys as "the smallest guys with the biggest cojones.") No way that's my job. The tunnels are creepy enough now and there's no one down there except guides and tourists; I can't imagine going into the darkness not knowing if someone was possibly waiting inside kill me by knife or gun, or if bamboo booby trap death was headed my way.

Because there were bamboo death traps, and Sa showed them to us. Some were formerly tiger traps, updated with spikes on the bottom to impale soldiers. He estimated that about 10 percent of American casualties were caused by this sort of warfare. Not that everyone of those people stepped on a spike or dropped in a spinning spike hole. Instead, one soldier would fall and the others would try to rescue him, leaving themselves open to ambush. We saw the many different bamboo spike based traps, including the ones that went into the water. A man in a military uniform demonstrated how each one worked - basically, someone would step on the trap and either fall into a hole or get caught by spinning sticks or something else horrible.

Horrifying. Simply horrifying. Someone, I think it was Sa, jokingly said to Jordo, "You want to try?" as we watched one trap and I was like, "Wow. That is so not funny and I have the most macabre sense of humor on earth." I didn't even like being near the traps.

On our way out, we heard an English language video playing in one of the huts and asked Sa if we should see it. He hesitated, saying, "Well, it's anti-American. Propaganda." That did not deter us. Indeed, the video spoke of the "American Imperialists" and the "brave (Vietnamese) martyrs, but it was to be expected. Still, I did find it It disturbing to see smiling women sharpen bamboo poles that would be used in one of those awful traps. (I understand the why, but I don't fully ever understand the internal 'how.' Sa had told us how women soldiers had so confused the Americans, making them extra lethal.) The video also had this boppy little song to accompany it, so you're seeing people hauling munitions and running and hiding underground with a merry tune playing.

After the video ended, Sa told us he normally doesn't recommend his tourists see it, particularly the older ones. "They start crying," he said. "They say, 'My son died here.'" Or, if they're younger, their friends or brothers or uncles or cousins.

I keep forgetting to bring my ipod on these long car trips so I'm stuck singing in my head while we cruise through the countryside. After this visit, stereotypically, I kept humming, "War! Good God, y'all. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing. Say it again...." for about an hour. Which was better than the other day, when I couldn't get Ricky Martin's "Livin' la Vida Loca" out of my brain. (Other featured songs on "Natalie's head's Vietnam playlist": "The Consort" -- Rufus Wainwright, "Wherever whenever" -- Shakira and "Blasphemous Rumors" -- Depeche Mode. The last one isn't one of my fave DM songs, not even close, but I think it popped into my brain because of the lines, "And I don't want to start any blasphemous rumors/ But I think that God's got a sick sense of humor/And when I die/I expect to find him/Laughing.")

In our next installment of "Hammers and Scales" --- "Ho IS a 'ho: Natalie and Jordan's South Vietnamese guide tells it like it is...."　We gotta lighten this up a bit!

Fairness Doctrine

Here's our girl, second before getting out of the Cu Chi tunnels.