Saigon to Hue: The 18-hour journey

Cramped into a six-person sleeper, I embarked on an 18-hour express train ride from Saigon to Hue.

Easter in Saigon

With a loud bang, the service started. Large drums called people from around Le Lai Street in Ho Chi Minh City to worship.

South Vietnam hosts many Catholic churches, a remnant of French colonialism. I was the only foreigner in the church. The church looked more like the grand cathedrals of Europe rather than a church in the heart of one of Vietnam's largest cities.

Although Vietnam is run by a communist party, the Catholic population in South Vietnam still exists. I had wandered to this church on Easter eve with the hope of finding information about Easter services on Sunday.

I walked into the church and sat down, taking in the stained glass windows, the European looking saints and the white Jesus figure on the cross over the altar. I tried to ignore the strangeness of Vietnamese people bowing and praying before a white Jesus.

The drums sounded and people filed in. A young boy dressed in white robes handed me a candle. I was stuck. The lights went out, candles were lit. The entire church was filled with the songs of Vietnamese people mourning the death of Jesus.

The service was completely in Vietnamese. Yet, two of the songs held a familiar word: Hallelujah. I smiled and sang along when I could. The Vietnamese people around me smiled and began to relax. Some of the instruments seemed foreign to me, but mainly the service used an organ. The melodious sound of the Vietnamese tonal language coupled with the music filled the large dome.

The next day I went to two services. One in the west side of Ho Chi Minh and one in the Notre Dame Cathedral. The first service was also in Vietnamese. This time my friend Adelaide accompanied me. I decided to sit down and follow the service of standing, kneeling, praying, singing. I tried to mimic the Vietnamese liturgy, but it was very difficult.

Then we took a taxi across town to the Notre Dame Cathedral made as a replica of the famous French church. While the rose glass window was missing, the church was impressive. The service was surprisingly in English. This time many foreigners were there, more than the locals.

I followed the scripture readings, the sermon and felt the familiarity of the liturgy of the Vietnamese services. I was hearing the same readings in two different languages.

Suddenly, the choir chimed in with an organ singing Handel's Messiah. The chorus filled the entire church, echoing off the blond, brown and black haired people sitting all around me.

Check back for photos after I return to Hong Kong on Tuesday.

Befriending a Vietnam veteran

A grenade explosion during the Vietnam War cost him his hearing, but spared his life.

Thanh, now 51, sits on a street-side restaurant on Co Giang Street in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), a survivor of the bitter conflict around this city over thirty years ago. He sits just two blocks down from the main tourist drag, out of sight from foreign eyes.

I met Thanh while looking for dinner on the streets. He caught my attention by pointing to the food, smiling a large grin and pointing two thumbs up. I turned to my friends and we agreed to sit down and try the food.
The chicken and rice were delicious (and cheap).

We did not realize that Thanh was deaf, until he told his story. My friends and I sat and "talked" for several hours with a white board, a note pad and our hands.

I told him I was an American and to my surprise he gave a thumbs up. He mimed an airplane, two towers, the numbers 9-11 with his fingers. He put a finger down from eyes to show tears. Sadness. Then he mimiced a beard. Osama Bin Laden. He pointed two thumbs down.

He made the sign for America and pointed two thumbs up. Thanh, a veteran of a war against Americans, told me he supported America and felt bad about 9-11.

Seated across from Thanh were two women, an old woman named Hoang and a young girl named Hoa (flower). Hoa lost her hearing when she was a little girl after falling onto the floor. She now washes clothes to support her young daughter. Hoa is only one year younger than me, yet she already supports a child while studying sign language.

While I can not be one hundred percent sure that I completely understood, Thanh mimed to me that he is one of 20,000 or more deaf people in the city.

Thanh acts as uncle, father and brother to the deaf in Saigon. The community seems to revolve around him. As we sit and talk with our hands, at least 20 deaf people rode by, some stopped to join in on the conversation while others continued on.

He put his hands together after pointing to the other deaf people around him.

I understood. They were family. Thanh showed me that everyone supports each other. While Hoa and her daughter have a room to sleep in, Hoang, 62, does not always have a place to sleep or money to buy food.

Thanh works in construction, and by 10 p.m. he motioned that he had to sleep. He would be up at dawn to work for a very low wage. A wage that barely covers the cost of living in Saigon.

Although Ho Chi Minh has a growing economy, many people remain in deep poverty. Vietnam is a communist country, reunited after Southern Vietnam fell to North Vietnam in 1975. But capitalism is thriving and emerging in the south.

While traveling through the city I asked many of the peddlers where they were from. Most of them responded with Ha Noi. Many people are relocating to the south to find work. A large labor pool leaves many people open for exploitation, making it difficult for people like Hoang, Hoa and Thanh to survive.

When Thanh finished telling about the difficulty of living on the street, I made a tear motion with my finger. He smiled and put his hands together. Friends. I put my hands together. An American and a deaf Vietnamese veteran soldier, friends.

Grapefruit, tea and conversation in rural Hue

Vi wakes up before dawn every morning to make sure she can ride her bike 30 minutes to school.

School starts at 7 a.m. for Vi, a student at the main university in Hue, Central Vietnam.

For her parents, the day starts even earlier. Vi's parents are farmers, working hard day after day to send their second oldest daughter to college.

In Vietnam, the cost of going to school is about $50 U.S. per month. The average salary for a family in rural Hue is the same -- about $50 U.S.

The Vietnamese government does not tax its people -- 70 percent of which are involved in agriculture. Not many scholarships or grants are available to help students with their fees.

Vi explained that her parents sacrifice a lot to make sure she can fulfill her dream of becoming a translator.

"I respect my parents very much," Vi said. For her, family is the most important part of life.

"Without family, a person cannot survive," she said.

Vi studies linguistics, and has hopes to be a translator.

My friends and I found Vi during a bike ride through the countryside.

Surrounded by green of rice fields, I pedaled my bike as slowly as I could. The quiet rice fields penetrate all other noise, including the occasional motto bike that goes by.

The Perfume River flows, families sit in their homes, men and women work in the fields.

My friend Adelaide had been leading Sunny and I on a pagoda tour of the countryside outside of Hue when a local approached her -- Vi's mother.

She offered to take us to the ruins of a temple and then to her home for food, tea and to meet her family.

I was sweaty, hot and tired from the long bike ride. We agreed to follow her.

Their home was typical of most Vietnamese homes -- a bright color on the walls, wooden doors, song birds in cages on the porch.

Vi's mother served us grapefruit and tea, all grown from their garden.

Vi is thin -- too thin. I was thankful for the grapefruit, realizing how much that one fruit meant to this family.

Over tea we discussed Vietnam. I realized that Vi is a very special person.

Her English was absolutely perfect. She had no detectable accent. She understood every word I said. She was engaging, intelligent and thoughtful.

She works hard in school, realizing that one day she will have to go and work in Saigon. With sadness she admits that she will have to leave her family one day.

She motions around. "I would rather be here, at home."

Like many Vietnamese, she will most likely move to Ho Chi Minh city in the south for a job. The economy there has been growing rapidly over the past few years generating many jobs.

But Vi says she will not stay in the city.

"I want to come back," she said.

I told her that I want to be a journalist when I finish school. I told her that journalists need translators. We agreed that maybe one day we would work together.

I hope that one day I will return to the countryside of Hue, to Vi's beautiful home.

Any questions about Vietnam? Send me a comment or an e-mail and I will do my best to find an answer while I am traveling.

Surviving the streets in Ho Chi Minh

Slowly and steady. The secret to surviving the streets of Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) is to walk at a steady pace no matter what.

At rush hour hundreds of Vietnamese men and women hit the streets on little motor bikes called cyclos. For foreigners, the instinct to run across the street or avoid oncoming traffic can mean a horrendous accident.

Against all reason, the key to making it safely through the mangled mess of cars, cyclos and bicycles in Vietnam's busiest city is to let the Vietnamese avoid you.

A taxi lifted up on top of a cement median served as a reminder to me of what could happen if I did not pay close attention to my surroundings.

Failing to look both ways can be fatal. I had to learn the hard way that lanes for traffic mean almost nothing here. Cyclos will take the easiest way through traffic, even if that means riding against it.

The other key to surviving is to simply ask a local. Finding anything in Ho Chi Minh can be difficult. The streets are well marked, but the alley ways where all the cheap food and accommodation are located can be very hard to find.

When looking for a guest house to stay in over Easter, I became hopelessly lost. It was dark and the streets were jammed packed with people. My friends and I decided to ask a local for directions. I showed two women the name of the place and the address. All of a sudden, two men came over, looked at the directions, got on motorbikes and drove away.

I thought, okay, well apparently they could not help us. I could not have been more wrong.

Fifteen minutes later, the men circled back and lead us to the guest house. One of the men took us directly to the doorstep.

He circled around, gave us a wave and drove away.

Look for more on traveling by train for 18 hours to Hue near the DMZ zone soon.

Out of Tibet, an eerie silence

An eerie silence seems to be coming out of Tibet. A silence I have heard before.

All the news reports I've read have been inconclusive, unsure, unclear about what has been going on in the Tibetan capitol of Lhasa the last few days.

On Monday, Tibetan monks began protesting in the middle of Lhasa. Some reports claim civilians joined in the riots after Chinese police began beating the monks. According to reports, as many as 10 to 100 people have been killed in the riots.

Some reports claim the Tibetan monks started the violence, others claim it was the Chinese.

No one seems to know exactly what is going on in Lhasa (or if they do, they are not letting the news out). The pending Olympics seem to be protecting the protesters from an overly harsh crackdown by the central Chinese government.

But I've heard this silence before. Not in Asia, but in Washington.

I was sitting in my school cafeteria with a friend -- a friend who told me a story and forbid me from sharing it. He was afraid the Chinese government would arrest him when he returned to China.

My friend, a Tibetan, was studying in the United States. His name I will not share. He told me, at length, of his struggle to keep his identity as a Tibetan. Of the unfair way the Chinese took advantage of his country.

He mourned over the loss of friends. He spoke angrily against the Chinese government, the Chinese people for squashing his culture.

I asked him if I could write an article about what he had shared with me. He forbade me.

"I told my story to you, so you know what is happening to the Tibetan people," he told me. I have not forgotten those words.

My friend's silence speaks louder to me now as the Tibetan people cry out to the world through protest. A protest muffled by exaggerated accounts, unknown numbers and denial.

The Tim Tam Slam

One evening I sat down with three friends in the International House at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

In front of us stood four mugs and a plastic container full of "naughty" biscuits, also known as Tim Tams.

Tim Tams, a biscuit with chocolate cream coated in more chocolate, alone are not impressive. With a hot drink, they transform into the Tim Tam Slam.

Studying in Hong Kong, an international city, has opened doors to new cultures. Australians Sunny and Adelaide showed a Canadian and myself how to eat dessert Aussie style:




*Dancing and singing: Adelaide. Washing dishes: Rebecca. Around the table: Adelaide (Australian instructor/mad dancer), Rebecca (Canadian), Jessica (me), and Sunny (Australian).

**Produced by Sunny Ho.

Inside a rural school

Missing Kakwang

I miss Kakwang. The rural school made quite an impression on me.

One week after my trip to Shantou and I can't get the place out of my mind. (Read more here.)

Most of my other posts have been strictly stories or anecdotes about my travels. Every time I sit down to write about my three-day trip to mainland China, words will simply not come to me. (See a slide show here.)

One girl named Shirley asked me on my first night, "What do you do on holiday?"

I listed a litany of responses, reading, going to the beach, writing, swimming. I asked what she did.

She looked down.

"I work."

I gulped. For these students, work is part of their life. Although they are poor, I would not say they are unhappy. With each interaction I saw that these students were generally happy and content with their lives.

Yet I could not get over how poor this school appeared.

At Kakwang I experienced the disparity of wealth in China. Standing on the balcony of my room at the school, I could see the city of Shantou across the harbor. The night lights of the high rises reminded me of Hong Kong.

Turning around to go back into my room, a stark disparity stared me right in the face. The room was very clean, yet some effort had been made to make it look that way. The walls were white washed (meaning if I happened to brush by the wall white chalk would blanket my clothes). A closer looks showed the white wash covered up a layer of grime.

The toilette ... well I've uploaded a picture so you can understand how basic the amenities were. That bucket in the picture is for manual flushing.

The dirt did not bother me. I found the bed comfortable (even though there was mildew on the bottom of the pillow).

Grime covered most of Kakwang and other buildings around Shantou. I believe the black layer on most buildings comes from soot. (Most of China's power comes from burning coal.)

The classrooms were just as stark as the bedrooms. Sheets hanging over the windows kept the sun from overheating the room. The windows did not close well, creating a nice draft of air into the room. The desks look banged up, but they work nicely.

The chalk boards seemed new and worked well. Buckets of chalk were available for use. Most of the students had a Chinese-English dictionary or at least they shared.

What most surprised me was the mid-afternoon nap each student took after lunch. I had a full two hours to explore around the school (I'll write more on that later).

Outside of class, I was surprised at how well our hosts fed us. I felt a little guilty when I asked one of the students what they usually ate. Congee (rice porridge), bread and fish -- a very different meal from the shrimp, fish, spinach, bean curd, squid, fish ball soup, and other dishes I was served three times a day.

*Photos from top to bottom: 1) A student sits in a classroom at Kakwang Professional Academy in Shantou, China. 2) A typical squat toilette.

And the winner is ...

In spite of the majority of voters wanting me to go to Manilla, I had to let my wallet guide my decision.

Vietnam will host my next set of adventures from March 17-25. Because I will be traveling for only eight days, I will not be bringing my laptop. Instead I will be hunting out Internet cafes to type out and publish my blogs.

Vietnam holds a special place in my heart. In my extended family, the Babcocks, adopted a Vietnamese boy several years ago. Henry is a wonderful son to them, cousin to me and friend to all. I don't think of him as anything other than family. Now I will be exploring his birthplace with two Australians (both Anthropology students).

The trip will begin in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon). I will hopefully explore the Delta and other parts of the city.

Then I will travel up toward Hue and the DMZ zone. There I hope to explore tunnels created by the Viet Minh and North Vietnamese Army during the Vietnam War (also known as the Second Indochina War and the American War). Around Hue, I also hope to see how local villages have rebuilt themselves thirty years after the end of the war.

Not all of my adventures will center on America's involvement in Vietnam. On Easter Sunday, I will most likely attend a Catholic Church since most Christians in Vietnam are Catholic.

E-mail or post comments on any questions you want me to explore while I am in Vietnam. I am only there for eight days, but I will do my best to find answers.

Happy Angel

Looking up words in the dictionary was her quiet response.

A young girl with a round face, glasses and slumped shoulders responded differently to my question about hobbies than any other student in the class.

Her English name is Happy Angel. Her Chinese name I never could quite understand. When I asked her to write it down, she wrote it in Chinese, making it unintelligible to me.

Happy Angel taught me so much while I taught English for one day at the Kakwang Professional Academy in Shantou March 1.

Happy Angel and many of her friends are the sons and daughters of farm laborers and house workers.

She explained to me that she only sees her family once a year during Chinese New Year. Her job is to do well in school and find a good job after graduation.

The English teacher, known by the students as Mr. Ho at Kakwang, explained that many students will not go on to the university. Most will land a job in business.

"It is hard for college graduates to find a job," he said.

I pressed him to explain.

"Their expectations are too high," he said. I understood.

These graduates expected high pay, a nice office, prestige for labor that could easily be replaced by someone due to the competitive job market in China's growing economy. The simple fact is these graduates have a hard time finding a job because so many other people are willing to work the same job for much less money, at least in Shantou. (Read more about Shantou here.)

But Happy Angel seemed different than the other students I spoke with over the three days I spent at her school.

She had an insatiable curiosity about the world outside her rural school. She hungrily ate up the vocabulary I fed to her. She willing taught me Mandarin words as well. (She was far better at memorization of new words.)

Happy Angel wants to study English in the United States one day. Like most of the students who graduate from the professional academy, she will most likely work in China's business sector. A large part of me hopes she is able to fulfill her dream.

Part of me can't help but be sadly skeptical. Kakwang is a very rural school. There will not be any money for her to continue her education. All of these factors are merely reality.

On my way to the bus station, I was surprised when Happy Angel and another student grabbed my hand. Chinese girls are often affectionate with one another. I was happy to be considered such a friend.

*Students at the Kakwang Professional Academy play a game to learn English words. Happy Angel sits in the second row on the right side looking up a word in the dictionary.

Snake soup

As printed in The Whitworthian:

A bucket of guts stood in front of the shop. Long snake skins were strung above the bucket. Two freshly chopped snake heads held open with toothpicks lay on a table.

I was standing in front of a Hong Kong specialty. Translated into English the restaurant’s name is “Sin, King of the Snakes.”

Taking a seat at a communal table, my friends and I looked at the menu. The items were all in Chinese. The local student who had taken me here, Anny Hung, pointed to some characters explaining soup was the traditional way of eating the snake. We all ordered the smallest bowl possible.

From Anny I learned snake is a common meal for people in Hong Kong during the winter.

“The snake makes you warm,” Anny said.

I did not understand. Hong Kong had been cold for the past month, but not as cold as mainland China. China just emerged from a flurry of snow storms that put the country in land-lock for several weeks. (Click here to read more.)

From the way she spoke, it seemed as if snake had magical powers.

“What do you mean?” I asked. She looked embarrassed to tell me, but eventually she explained.

In Chinese culture if a person has numb hands or feet that person is considered a cold person, Anny said. If a person sweats, has a red face or acne, that person is considered hot.

Certain foods are considered helpful for different types of people. Snake is considered a warm animal. Cold people eat warm animals in order to become, well, warmer.

During the last two months in Hong Kong, I have noticed an almost mystical belief in the power of Chinese medicine. The Chinese use every part of the animal for eating and Chinese medicine.
Walking through the markets in Mong Kok, I found intestines, brains and other unidentifiable animal parts on sale as street food. Close by are Chinese medicine shops, which are always full of customers.

I took a spoonful of the soup. I chewed the bits, taking in the flavor.

Chicken? Pork? Mushroom? I realized that had just bitten into the mushroom in the soup, not the actual snake. Like most Chinese soups, the broth seemed to be made of with corn starch.

Gathering courage I put a spoonful into my mouth. I’d say it tasted pretty close to chicken.
Across the restaurant, a glass case full of snakes was in plain view. I looked down at my soup and back up again, willing myself to take another bite.

Then I noticed these snakes had their mouths sewn shut. I shuddered, tried to forget the bucket of snake guts sitting outside and took another bite.

The cool air from outside blew in. Maybe I was feeling a little warmer.

Contact Jessica Davis at jessica.davis@whitworthian.com.