Travel Writing | Pant Hoot | Online Travel Magazine

November 2005 – Vietnam
 
The “American War” is in your face constantly in Vietnam. It can creep up on you and send a shiver down your spine when you least expect it. The limbless beggars on street corners, the deformities of the Agent Orange children who are now marginalised adults, and in Viet Minh the kids born into a nightmare.

Vinh Minh is a coastal village right in the heart of what was once a Cold War Fault line.  The Demilitarised Zone had marked the boundary between the Communist North and the Capitalist South and naturally enough was the scene of some of the heaviest fighting of the Vietnam War. The DMZ itself is a 10 kilometre strip of flood plains overlooked by a small ridge of hills. A no mans name then and now. At Vinh Minh the attraction is not the village itself but what lay beneath it.

Back down south at Cu Chi the Viet Cong had used tunnels to hide and slip through the lines. Shoot a few GI’s then disappear underground and bob up somewhere else. The Cu Chi jobs were rabbit warrens. Places to hide and run for temporary shelter or escape. Vinh Minh was a bit more permanent. The whole village had been moved underground into an amazing series of interconnecting tunnels and rooms on three levels. People lived here, people we born here and undoubtedly, people died here.
Over fifty babies were born in the tunnels over the three years that they were occupied. Breathed the stale air, caught the occasional glimpse of sunlight through the tunnel openings and tried to shut out the constant high explosive thunder claps that shook dirt from the ceilings and caked them in filth. We met two of them. Both in their forties yet the size of ten year old children. They acted as unofficial guides but in reality were contextual anchors. This was the environment that had stunted their development - Just metres from beautiful surf beaches lined with palm trees. When one took my hand to lead me back to the tunnel entrance he smiled at me with the sort of teeth that orthodontists in rich countries fund sports cars with. I slipped him some notes when he asked. If anyone in Vietnam deserved my spare Dong it was him.

The border itself was at the 17th parallel where a river served as the physical demarcation line. A bridge was the designated stop for photos. It was a reconstruction of the original bridge, book ended on each bank by huge monuments to socialism - A gigantic mother and kids longingly waiting for her husband to return on the south bank, a memorial cairn on the North.

The drive up to Khe Sahn took a couple of hours. It is located up in the mountains towards the Cambodian border.  On the way we passed a rocky crag where the Yanks had set up an R & R resort. Called the “Rock Pile” it was accessible only by chopper and the soldiers could kick back there whilst all forms of entertainment ranging from grog to hookers were flown in. Our guide told us that a friend of his had climbed up there and the only relics that remained were empty beer cans and condoms. I wondered whether the beer cans had been melted down and turned into fake dog tags and other “relics” that were being flogged off on every street corner.

Given the iconic Cold Chisel reverence and the mythology surrounding the battle itself, the reality of Khe Sahn circa 2005 is anti climactic. The grounds were overgrown with weeds and a couple of rusting helicopters, a Huey and a huge Chinook troop carrier, stood near a burned out tank as trophies. The place is certainly eerie though. Misty clouds hid the mountain peaks from where the shells had rained down, disconnecting the immediate surrounds from the rest of the world. You could almost imagine ghostly soldiers still at their posts beyond the tree line silently watching us. The most significant item in the small museum building however is the guest book. Inside returning veterans had written moving requiems for lost mates, visiting tourists had penned odes to the futility of war and a few idiots had scrawled ill considered political tirades against 21st Century America. Dead soldiers shouldn’t have to apologise. They have paid their debts in full.

On the way back down the mountain the bus roared past beautiful bamboo villages overlooking raging rivers running through gorges carpeted with green jungle. We did not stop there. Instead the scheduled stop was at a concrete bridge that Fidel Castro had apparently donated to the country. It was like bypassing Sovereign Hill and stopping at one of the freeway overpasses on the way back to Melbourne. As we walked onto the suitably uninspiring structure our guide informed us that if we kept walking along this road for another thirty kilometres we would reach Hamburger Hill. By this time we just wanted to get back to our hotel that was another two hours away.

A couple of local kids of primary school age descended on our group as we shuffled back to the bus. They practised their English on us and posed for photos and displayed the cheeky bravado of ten year olds the world over. Then, as seems to be the norm in this part of the world, they put out their hands for money for their performance and created an awkward scene. I reached into my backpack and brought out some peanut brittle that I had bought from a vender in Hoi An a few days earlier. It seems in the mind of ten year olds the world over candy trumps cash every time. We left them with huge grins tucking into the sugary treat wondering at our impact on their dental futures.

Part 1 - Saigon

Part 2 - Cu Chi
Part 3 - The Reunification Express
Part 4 - Nha Trang
Part 5 - Hoi An
Part 6 - My Son
Part 7 - Hue
Part 8 - The Dee Em Zee
Part 9 - Hanoi
Part 10 - Ha Long Bay