Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Vietnam Revisited – I Love Vietnam - Chapter 7

Good Eye!

When the master chef was teaching us how to cook, he attributed good health to many of the ingredients that were used commonly in Vietnamese cuisine.  One of the health benefits was good eye sight. He made the observation that very few Vietnamese wear glasses as compared to people in Western countries.  At the time, I wondered whether this was because many Vietnamese could not afford glasses if they were indeed needed, but I really did want to believe what he was saying.

Good eye sight is essential to surviving the streets! To be sure, no one can have the 360 degree peripheral vision necessary to avoid an inevitable collision in the making while attempting to navigate the streets of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh.  How citizens manage to stay alive passing through these treacherous paths is beyond my comprehension.

Last night I was returning to my hotel after visiting a dedicated Vietnamese HIV researcher who I knew was  affiliated with the University of Hawaii. We met at the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in Ho Chi Minh. The cab ride to the hospital took about 20 minutes and cost $2.50.  The maze of people on motor cycles and bikes, cars, pedestrians, and cyclos was just too much to believe. It was a total blur and my eyes went from hysterical nystagmoid back and forth movements to shutting down.  As dusk settled in and the humans and machines dissolved into the twilight, I closed my eyes in disbelief and hoped for the best.  How do these people know when to go, when to stop, or when to slow down? I imagined myself blind – finding my way across the street with a walking stick reaching toward the masses of flesh and metal, searching for the slightest opening, and fearing that my life depended upon the good graces and navigating skills of hundreds of nearly colliding strangers.  This reminded me of the physical principle:  “No two objects can occupy the same space at the same time.” 

Everyone is Young

The masses of tourist have shown their faces to me, and hardly anyone from any western country is as old as I am.  The overwhelming demographic is 20’s and 30’s young attractive couples traveling lightly, fit and adventuresome and eager to experience life. Questions come to mind: Why them and not more of the cruise ship geriatric variety?  Who pays the bills?  How do young people needing to make their way in the world have the time and energy to travel?.

But the real lesson is this: DON’T WAIT ANOTHER SECOND TO TRAVEL TO PLACES ON THE EARTH THAT YOU WANT TO SEE BEFORE YOU ARE LONG GONE, or before the countries you are visiting are unrecognizably different a decade later.  I only wish I had visited China a few decades before I did to see the contrast and appreciate the incredible transformation into a thriving capitalist economic monster. Vietnam is currently undergoing the same transformation and will be unrecognizable in 10-20 years.

I Love Vietnam

I truly love this country and I’m not sure why.  I have already fallen for Hanoi and while I didn’t think Ho Chi Minh would interest me all that much, I explored a totally different city than I did on my first trip.  I love this city as well.  But Hoi An is where I would live, in a cute sea side city with history, charm and with lots of places to make clothes at a reasonable price!

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