I thought that Bangkok or Hanoi's traffic was bad until I reached Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon). There were so many cars and motorbikes going every which direction. There seemed to be a few traffic lights, but I don't know why they bothered because it didn't appear as if anyone was following them! And just when I thought I was safe on the sidewalks....the motorbikes would zoom up on the sidewalks! It's like I was facing life and death and I would get a huge adrenaline rush every time I would cross the street!
First things first in HCMC; buy a new camera! CHECK!
That night we decided to go to a movie in the big city. They had a few English movies, in which there were Vietnamese subtitles. Something I found quite interesting, was that when Cailin and I were going to share some popcorn and pop, and asked about sizes, they said they only served one size and it's not a very big size. Maybe another reason why you don't see alot of overweight people here! The rest of my evening I spent doing laundry in the sink! Fun times!
The next day we went to the Imperial Palace, which is where Ho Chi Minh finally took over and drove his tanks through the front gates. We learned some more history of Vietnam. We watched this video there that made the Americans look quite bad. I was shocked when it said that 80% of colleges and universities in America closed at one point in protest of the war. I feel that is pretty significant.
Here is a before and after from the front gates of the palace.
We went to another war museum. This one was quite graphic in its stories and pictures. It talked about the effects of this chemical orange that the Americans bombed with and sprayed in Vietnam. It had numerous stories and pictures of people in American, Vietnam and many other parts of the world that lit themselves on fire and burned to death in protest of the war.
The next picture I found interesting because of the name the man who is burning his draft card; David Miller. I don't know about you but that sounds pretty Mennonite to me!
These next two pictures are of a few of the numerous plaques they had throughout the museum, that I found quite interesting.
There were alot of references and examples about how the effects of the war are still being felt, through those still born with birth defects and deformation. In any war fought I don't think it is possible to understand or comprehend what the full repercussions of actions are. That evening we met for supper with a friend from Holland, one from Germany, and a girl from Israel. I don't know too much about the culture of Israel, so it was nice to talk to her to learn a bit. She told me that every person, man or woman, must do 2 years of military service after service. I wondered if there has ever been someone to oppose that rule or if they are just raised in such a way that they don't question it. She said there are alot of good self-disciplinary things that they teach you. Dikla and I talked a bit about religion as well. Dean, from Holland then got involved and he said that there really isn't alot, if any, religion in Holland. So his thoughts were that religion is stupid and doesn't understand how people can believe in it, or believe in a higher being. It was quite a neat experience when I wasn't the only one who got excited about Dean's comments. Dikla was also quite defensive and brought forth her thoughts and opinions of why religion isn't stupid. We all agreed and understood that we obviously all came from different backgrounds, thus why we don't all think quite the same way. This is yet another reason why it is so important to get to know people and not judge them right away. Even if you don't share some things in common and think that you could never agree about anything with this person because of one major difference (like being pro-military)....you might just find that if you continue to talk and get to know them, that you share things in common! I feel I've said this before, but we need to work on finding our common ground and similarities with people, versus focusing on our differences.
The last experience I had in Vietnam was taking Cailin to the emergency room! She was throwing up alot and felt terrible. This was quite the experience. After finally finding our way to the ER my eyes couldn't open wide enough to take all of it in. There were about 30-35 beds in this big open room, all with bodies on them. People were constantly coming in and out. There were doctors and nurses around, but none of them actually seemed to be tending to patients, it appeared as though it was family and friends tending to the patients, wheeling them in and out, etc. There was one man laying on a bed with a bandage on his head who looked to be bleeding pretty good...but again, no one was tending to him. No one seemed to be overly friendly or helpful. At one point I was almost so overwhelmed and in such a daze that I thought I was going to pass out! It was a bizarre couple hours.
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