Hue
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| Perfume River |
One thing I remembered to do, reluctantly I add, was to wear my Levi’s today. You have to keep your legs covered up in these religious zones - I was informed beforehand. Didn’t ask why, but this is the Far East and you have to follow the rules. No problem. Except that the heat was unbearable and there’s a certain pleasure in having a bit of wind wafting up your trouser leg. And to top that, when we arrived at our first port of call, a pagoda of which I didn’t catch the name, where thirteen emperors are immortalised, virtually everyone was wearing shorts! Translation may have been lost somewhere along the line was my only explanation.
It was a nice pleasant journey sitting in the back of my air conditioned cab to the outskirts of Hue. Ying explained that all thirteen emperors here have their own significance for different reasons, which I fail to recall. Well it is hard work! The pagoda is impressive but they do like their steps here I noticed. Just as well I’m pretty fit and I’m pleased to say I managed the three flights of stone steps into the clouds without having a heart attack or gasping for breath. The views were lovely though when you reached the top. Statues are in abundance as well as artefacts and paintings which Michelangelo would have been proud of. All very good and it was here, I think, may be getting mixed up because they are all similar, that the figure of Confucius sits proudly. Showing my ignorance here but the only time I had heard of this chap was in the Kung Fu films in the 70s. So, to enlighten us all I had to check him out.
Turns out Confucius was a Chinese philosopher who emphasised personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and sincerity.
‘His followers competed successfully with other schools only to be suppressed in favour of the Legalists during the Qin dynasty. Following the victory of Han over Chu after the collapse of Qin, Confucius's thoughts received official sanction and were further developed into a system known in the West as Neo-Confucianism, and later New Confucianism.’
There you are; Learn something every day.
“Confucius is credited with having authored or edited many of the Chinese classic texts. He championed strong family loyalty, ancestor veneration, and respect of elders by their children and of husbands by their wives, recommending family as a basis for ideal government. He espoused "Do not do unto others what you do not want done to yourself”.
Confucius is widely considered as one of the most important and influential individuals in shaping human history. His teaching and philosophy greatly impacted people around the world and remains influential today.’
Though I appreciated the time, trouble and enthusiasm of Ying, as we moved on I told him I was more interested in visiting the railway station at Hue than another pagoda. Which sounds a bit lame but I have a fascination for railways. Threw him a bit as he does have the Trailfinders itinerary and timetable to follow but he accepted my request and said we would make a detour which wasn’t too far out of the way as it happened, and it was on the way back towards the city. Fine.
You never know what you’re going to come across in Vietnam and all of a sudden we were held up in a traffic jam, mainly of scooters, which were waiting patiently by some crossing gates. Taking advantage, I jumped out of the taxi with my iPad in time to catch the train, the Hanoi to Saigon Express, exploding through on the single track. Amazing it was, the power and speed, and people hanging around yards from the railway line without a care in the world about their health and safety.
The station was literally around the corner and I was quite surprised to find an almost western looking complex. Not on the scale of Euston or Marylebone but one that would compete with any branch line station back home. I managed to snap a few photographs while Long waited patiently in his cab, engine running and being pursued by a traffic warden. Yes, that surprised me too. Westernisation is infiltrating into these Far South Eastern countries I realised.
After this slight diversion we travelled on to the Imperial Citadel, opposite the Thein Mu Pagoda with the War museum alongside. This was more what I had come to see.
A tour of the temple and the grounds revealed damage to buildings that had remained from the Tet offensive of 1968. Standing there taking this in was thought provoking. How many lives were lost, the terror of the campaign. Nothing you can imagine unless you'd been there. Made me think, the images we saw on the news all those years ago, made it seem as if it was just another war film. A tour of the museum which was laden with American tanks, guns, helicopters and aircraft only emphasised this.
The destruction and terror these inflicted you can’t imagine though obviously you can say the same about the weapons of every war. Nonetheless we are here in Vietnam and this is the war that was on the news every night through our adolescence. Graphic newsreel of the horrors and later with the films seared the images into your brain. So much to take in over here and talking to Ying brings it home even more. His dad fought for the South Vietnamese, his uncle, his dad’s brother, for the Vietcong. Families split in two by their beliefs. Fortunately for Ying they both survived though whether they ever re-united I don’t know. Ying told me that the military used to enter villages and children from the age of 13 were all taken away for military training. No choice. No Option. Mostly they were used to rebuild and re-camouflage the Ho Chin Minh Trail which ran from North Vietnam all the way through Laos and Cambodia to Saigon after the American B-52 Bombers had done their best to eradicate the trail.
In 2019 its hard to imagine what was occurring here 50 years previously.
‘The Battle of Hue was one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the Vietnam War. Between 30 January and 3 March 1968, eleven battalions of the ARVN, the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, four U.S. Army battalions and three U.S. Marine Corps battalions defeated 10 battalions of the People's Army of Vietnam and the Viet Cong.
By the beginning of the North Vietnamese Tet Offensive on January 30, 1968 – coinciding with the Vietnamese lunar New Year – large U.S. forces had been committed to combat operations on Vietnamese soil for almost three years.
Highway 1, passing through the city of Huế, was an important supply line for ARVN, US, and Allied Forces from the coastal city of Da Nang to the Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). It also provided access to the Perfume River at the point where the river ran through Huế, dividing the city into northern and southern parts. Huế was also a base for United States Navy supply boats.
Considering its logistical value and its proximity to the DMZ only 50 kilometres away Huế should have been well-defended, fortified, and prepared for any communist attack. However, the city had few fortifications and was poorly defended.
While the ARVN 1st Division had cancelled all Tet leave and was attempting to recall its troops, the South Vietnamese and U.S. forces in the city were unprepared when the Viet Cong and the PAVN launched the Tet Offensive, attacking hundreds of military targets and population centers across the country, including Huế.
The PAVN/Vietcong forces rapidly occupied most of the city. Over the next month, they were gradually driven out during intense house-to-house fighting led by the Marines and ARVN. In the end, although the Allies declared a military victory, the city of Huế was virtually destroyed, and more than 5,000 civilians were killed (2,800 of them executed by the PAVN and Viet Cong, according to the South Vietnamese government). The communist forces lost an estimated 2,400 to 8,000 killed, while Allied forces lost 668 dead and 3,707 wounded. The losses negatively affected the American public's perception of the war, and political support for the war began to wane.’
Nearby the Citadel is the Perfume River, the scene of much activity described in the paragraph and I informed Ying that rather than spend an hour walking around looking at more statues and religious artefacts I’d rather take a ride down river. On board the Junk, as I took in the views including several water buffalo wallowing in the cool of the river, the captain, a Vietnamese lady, was quick to impress on me she had a family of five to feed, she had little money and survived by selling her wares on the boat to people like me! Enjoying the steady cruise she pestered me, in a polite way with a lovely smile and demeanour and I eventually succumbed to her tale of strife and she managed to extract a couple hundred thousand Dong out of me for a fridge magnet and a short sleeved shirt. It was only around a tenner in English money.
Did have a crack with her though and she was well pleased she could feed her family again. Ying sat there impassive, with a knowing smile on his face. Seen it all before!
Back at base, I freshened up before heading out for a drink and something to eat. After wandering around for a while taking in the buzz of Hue I came across a bar that intrigued me called The DMZ. The De-Militarized Zone Bar. Someone with enterprise over here I thought. It was busy and I perched myself on a stool with a good view of the street which was rowdy, noisy, music blaring from all the bars, people everywhere, scooters, bikes, cars blaring their horns. Whilst sitting here I looked up and discovered a map that covered the whole ceiling, a map of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Wow. Painted in green to depict the jungle it looked amazing. Taking this in an old guy suddenly appeared from outside, stood staring at the ceiling before making his way towards me and the toilet just beyond. I noticed his cap and shirt adorning the badges ‘California Vietnam Veterans Association’.
As he walked past me I couldn’t resist asking if he had been stationed here during the war. Obvious I know with the badge broadcasting it but how else do you start a conversation! He was very obliging, Paul his name was. ‘I was based at Da Nang in 1965 until 1968. First time I’ve been back. After 54 years.’ I could tell he was emotional and proud. ‘There’s a group of us sitting outside, why don’t you come over and I’ll introduce you.’ Well, I felt honoured and shook their hands, listened to these old guys, yes they were older than me! I felt quite humble. Felt sort of poignant. I was trying to imagine how they were feeling, returning back to their past where they witnessed so many horrors. They told me they had visited some of the sites, said prayers for their comrades. I guess they wanted to exorcise some demons but they were enjoying themselves. And they had survived.
The experience meeting these G.I's felt like a bonus for me. I had wanted to come to this country for years, to learn more about Vietnam and the war, visit places I'd only heard or read about, seen in the documentaries. I was enjoying every minute of it.
Next trip was to the more leisurely paced resort of Hoi An, ‘where I could rest and have the whole of Friday to myself to relax by the Hotel pool or the beach’ - Trailfinders.
Well I wasn’t sure about that. Friday seemed like a wasted day to me…
What was more exciting was the four hour drive over the Hai Van Pass to Da Nang en route to Hoi An.
