Since we didn't have rooms yet, we were taking a trip to the Cu Chu Tunnels, used by the North Vietnamese (aka Viet Cong, however this is apparently an American nickname, meaning Vietnamese communists) to fight the Americans to a standstill for the duration of the war, despite the fact that so many bombs were dropped on the area that each square meter on average had about 3 kilos of shrapnel.
The tunnels were an hour and a half's drive away, so I went for another nap on the way, when the local guide wasn't giving us background on the area. I should note that the amount of traffic in Ho Chi Minh City is insane. Apparently there are 8 million people here, and it looks like all of them have scooters!
We arrived in Cu Chi, went through the entrance, and got a little sticker like you used to get from the dentists, before going through into what just looked like a jungle to me. Then a man lept up out of a tiny hatch in the ground, which was pretty much invisible before (nobody noticed it). We then had a chance to have a go in there, before moving on.
Next up we saw some basic fortifications they had (camouflaged dirt piles to be used like sand bags, trenches, and fake termite mounds to conceal ventilation for the tunnel system), and a dead tank that had been killed by a delay mine, before a quite comprehensive selection of traps. All of the traps went in pits, but hurt you in various ways, which we had explained to us. All the while, sporadic gunfire was echoing through the jungle.
Our next stop was the source of the gunfire, a shooting range where you could shoot real guns with real bullets! Super exciting to the inhabitant of a peaceful, no gun country like me. Both Dave and I got the same after a little discussion (as there were various guns to choose from, and you just payed for the bullets), we had 10 AK47 rounds, and 10 M30 rounds. I think probably everyone knows what an AK is, but the M30 is a heavier gun, which they had mounted on a jeep. We picked it because the bullets were a much larger caliber, and it seemed like a good choice. We had to wear ear defenders, but even still guns are super loud (especially the M30), and it was a great experience, even if the casing of Dave's first round flew out and hit me (it didn't hurt much, don't worry mum).
Next up was a crawl through some tunnels. They had to build a special 'Elephant tunnel' for foreigners to try out, since the average Vietnamese fighter was only 40kg, and short to boot, so a lot of foreigners wouldn't fit. You could go 20 meters at a time, up to 120m (which only Steve and I managed, everyone else wimped out before that point). Despite my dramatised description above, we only had to crawl at one point, near the end (it was downhill, and quite hard actually), otherwise it was walking hunched over and crouched. It was super hot/humid down there too.
Finally, we saw how they used to disperse the smoke from cooking underground, before enjoying some traditional Cu Chi fair as a snack, tapioca (which in this case tasted very like a potato). Then it was back to the bus, and back to Ho Chi Minh City. Our rooms still weren't ready when we arrived at ~1pm, so we went for lunch (pho, aka Vietnamese noodle soup), and for a city walk.
We went to the French quarter, to see a couple of grand old buildings from the colonial days. The first was a cathedral, which was apparently a copy of Notre Dame, though I could swear the towers were a different shape. It was build entirely from stone imported from France, and had a big statue of the Virgin Mary outside. Inside the ceiling was very high, and some sort of chanting gave it a good atmosphere. The other was a post office built to look like a railway station, which was the first public building built by the French, and had a couple of very nice maps on it's interior walls.
Finally, we visited the war museum. Outside it was pretty cool, a lot of tanks, planes, artillery etc. Inside though, it was pretty grim, on a level with the atomic bomb museum in Nagasaki if not a little worst. They had a whole gallery dedicated to deformities which people had got from agent orange in the war, which I basically skipped over, along with a lot of stuff about Vietnamese being tortured. At least there was a good (not super depressing) war photography exhibit with a lot of interesting facts about the war mixed in, and an exhibit chronicling Vietnam's friendship with India, in which I found a photo of Ho Chi Minh being eaten by a dog.
Finally we had a couple of hours to relax in our rooms after we got back. We then nipped out for dinner, at a restaurant which pretty much did every type of food possible. I went for a Mexican, as you never know when you will get western food again.
I thought I told you never to play with guns
ReplyDeleteI've led a sheltered life so I don't know what an AK is apart from presumably a gun. I should check your bags when you return home just in case 'the puppet' has sneaked in there.
ReplyDelete