13 January 2008; Hoi An
Last night at our cooking class we learned there should be 5 textures and 5 flavors for each meal: crispy, crunchy, chewy, silky, soft, and sweet, sour, spicy, bitter, salty. It's tempting to blog by these guidelines, but I'll resist. It was fun to hear them flow off the instructor's tongue and then later feel and taste them as we ate the results of our efforts. There were fresh spring rolls wrapped in rice paper (thin for uncooked, softened by wiping with a damp washcloth and translucent to show off the shrimp halves, greens and pork slices tucked inside; there are also several varieties of thicknesses for deep frying as well), chicken thighs marinated in oils and spices and skewered with an identifying vegetable or fruit on the end of the stick (that's 18 different identifiers from a shallot to a lime to a slice of zucchini for our group), crispy pancake/omelets which are opened and filled by the diner with greens and rolled in rice paper to be dipped in fish sauce and sliced chilis, and so many other delights we asked them to stop bringing food because we were so satiated we could not manage another bite.
I began writing down notes for this letter as we were packed in a small bus flying down the highway from Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) as our bus driver used an intricate system of hand signals to learn of, and warn other drivers of, speed traps along the route to the Mekong Delta. Three different horn sounds were employed: a generic honk in the city, and a falling off honk and a warbling honk in the towns and rural areas. The latter seemed to mean “I'm really serious – get out of my way!!” He knew the width of his bus within an inch on either side, passing by and between other vehicles with a very small margin of error even at 50 or 60 mph – the roads are packed with a plethora of motorbikes, many trucks and buses, and a few personal cars and bicycles. Pedestrians and dogs cross the street as they can, counting on the traffic stream to split around them and allow them to reach the other side successfully. In the city, the traffic does eventually stop for red lights which helps crossing, but motorbikes get impatient and often hop onto the sidewalks to get around a crowd building at the light, go up the opposite side of the street than the intended, and cut across corner parking lots and driveways to move through traffic. It makes for lively travel.
In the Delta we transferred to boats, and once, to bicycles, for our travel touring the many streams and canals that interlace this region. We slept over at Mr. Mui's house, a large open building on the side of a canal. Mosquito nets covered our cots and long narrow boats carried produce and gear up and down the water beside us during the night when the tide was sufficiently high to navigate. We toured tiny factories which produced rice paper for spring rolls, coconut candy, popped rice, fish sauce and bricks. At least in this area sustainability is important and rice bran and dried longren husks (a fruit) served as fuel for cooking all of the above, including the bricks. We took a boat to a floating market, but unlike Thailand where the floating market seems as much for the benefit of tourists as an actual working market, this market was a bustle of wholesale and retail produce sales not at all aimed at tourists. Each boat had a long bamboo pole in the prow from which hung the type of fruit or vegetable available. Some boats displayed a turnip or a pineapple, and some had a long string in order of size from longrens to tomatoes to cabbages. Goods were being transferred from larger wooden boat to smaller, hand to hand. Families generally live on these boats full time in very tiny spaces. School children live with relatives or friends on land and join their families on weekends. The last day in the Mekong we went to a university research center specializing in sustainable agriculture and were taken on a nature walk through a eucalyptus forest which is an intermediate stage in restoring the original vegetation in a formerly hard-as-rock grazing area for water buffalo. Like Wolf Ridge, the people at the center are actively teaching local teachers about habitat and inviting them to bring their students to experience a bit of forest. And there were birds singing even at midday (although high up in the trees so not visible).
Consumer goods seem to be readily available wherever we travel but very little money seems to be invested in showrooms and displays outside the wealthy areas of the cities. People live in “shop-houses,” with stores below and homes above or behind. Hats and motorcycle helmets, pots and pans, clothing, school supplies, hardware and plumbing supplies all vie for space and attention as one passes by on the way down the street. Tucked in between and spreading out onto the sidewalk are many tiny restaurants where pho (rice noodles in broth with vegetables) and “Vietnamese sandwiches” of baguettes and ground meat can be purchased and eaten. Many women carry baskets of cooking supplies and a burner balanced on the ends of a pole over their shoulders, and set down in a likely spot to see who will buy. One needs to pay attention as one walks down the sidewalk – HCMC has determined to move such eateries off the sidewalks to make space for walking, but given the use of sidewalks for motorbike parking, it's my humble opinion that it will be even harder to walk since it's easier to weave though people hunkering on stools with a bowl of noodles in their hands than a bank of motorbikes.
Everyone seems to be greatly enjoying this smaller, ocean-side town of Hoi An, about midway through the length of Vietnam, near DaNang. We've biked to the beach for an afternoon's relaxation and many are taking advantage of the town's reputation for affordable fabric and tailoring to have their interview suits and other types of fancy clothing made. The more prosaic amongst us were happy for jeans and shoes that actually fit, and there's at least one whimsical choice of cowboy boots. That there's no more limit to 44 pounds for flights (JAL allows two 50 pound bags) has not helped us restrict our temptations.
But there's an academic side to our experiences as well and what a variety of emotions and experiences are being encountered on this leg of the trip, especially for someone of my generation. We're taking a course on the American War, with readings and lectures primarily from the Vietnamese perspective. We started in Ho Chi Minh City, which most locals still refer to as Saigon. At the War Remnants museum there were so many familiar photos – monks burning themselves in protest and American student s burning draft cards, napalm and its horrific effects, an American student poking a flower in the end of a rifle at a war protest in the US, Jane Fonda visiting North Vietnam, helicopter gun ships and airplanes dropping bombs, “Uncle Ho” and other well-known faces – the list goes on and on. Every picture of war protests had me wondering if it might reveal a face I knew from my Quaker college days (no). We have crawled through the tunnels in Cu Chi and been horrified at the simple and deadly traps laid through the jungle for American troops. We have been to My Lai, or more accurately, the village of Son My, or even more accurately, the museum built on the location of the former Son My. [My lai actually means Ameraisian children born during the war.] And, we've watched two films, “The Quiet American” and “Daughter from Danang.”
As I travel, I have asked our guides about their families' experiences. Han, an outgoing young man in the Mekong Delta, told of his father meeting his mother when he went to her village as a Viet Cong recruiter. They had two children before he went north to fight, was captured and spent 7 years in prison. He was able to return home and they had 6 more children, the youngest of whom speaks excellent English and guides French and American tourists through the waterways of the Mekong. The family of Phoung, the young man who works for CET (the group who runs university programs in Vietnam for us and many other universities), is from Cu Chi. His parents were in their early teens during the war and his grandmother had an entrance to the tunnel systems in a room in the house so they could escape when fighting occurred around their home. Phoung now leads groups of American students throughout Vietnam and will be heading to Australia in February to pursue a master's in communication. And a third guide, Mr. Ang, was born in 1961 in Hanoi. He was evacuated to the countryside twice as a child for a total of about 2 years. He said his parents would bring food by bicycle each weekend, a 40 kilometer journey each way on a highway that was bombed regularly. He now leads groups of Americans and Australian war veterans around the central Vietnam area as well as students.
So it makes me think of what I did and didn't do during the war (I was in college 1970-1975), and about what I am doing or not doing during our current conflicts – and to ask myself if I have the opportunity to look back on the first decade of the 2000s in thirty years how will I feel about my memories of my actions during this time? No answers yet, but plenty on which to ruminate over time.
Well, it's 6:30 am and I've been writing since 4:30. I have been hearing the bustle of early morning since about 4:45 – boats chugging up and down river, roosters crowing, hotel workers outside my door having conversations, the piping voices of school children at about 6 on their way to school in the road on the other side of my room [wait, it's Sunday – what are they doing?], and right now, official sounding [martial?] music from the tv in the breakfast room up the way. We're off to My Son today, an historic site of a kingdom as civilized as, and older than, the kingdom that produced Angor Wat. Free time this afternoon for final fittings (it is fun to watch everyone helping each other with color and fit and style), and an optional boat ride to the river's mouth for birding (oh bliss). Hope all is well with you and yours.
Kris
PS (after the birding trip)… There are birds in Vietnam but except for the ever prolific sparrow, not in great numbers yet, I think. In the city (Saigon/HCMC) I did see tiny swifts in the evenings (as well as dragonflies and bats) and some type of parrot/parakeet flying around the War Remnants museum. In the Mekong, I heard birds off and on but very rarely saw them. However, driving through the countryside one can see many egrets in the rice fields, which I have termed “bigger, smaller, and great big,” given that with the speed of the bus I can barely see beak and leg color, no less estimate size with any realism. At My Son, I saw my first perching bird that stood still long enough for me to really see it. It might have been a rufous-capped babbler although the one I saw had a white throat and black on the side of the throat which the book doesn't show. The rufous cap and the olive back were lovely. And one misty morning as we left town (actually yesterday!), I think I saw a hornbill hop into the top of a coconut palm – the knot on a heavy beak and turned up tail certainly seemed to indicate one, but we whizzed by and my foggy view was gone. Today from the boat I saw gray herons, shorebirds (shapes were familiar, but it's winter, they're gray and white…), cattle egrets standing with cattle, a common kestrel which flew down from a bush to the ground, and a black-capped kingfisher flew across the water. So, they're here – but I think one needs to have time and opportunity for finding them.
Last night at our cooking class we learned there should be 5 textures and 5 flavors for each meal: crispy, crunchy, chewy, silky, soft, and sweet, sour, spicy, bitter, salty. It's tempting to blog by these guidelines, but I'll resist. It was fun to hear them flow off the instructor's tongue and then later feel and taste them as we ate the results of our efforts. There were fresh spring rolls wrapped in rice paper (thin for uncooked, softened by wiping with a damp washcloth and translucent to show off the shrimp halves, greens and pork slices tucked inside; there are also several varieties of thicknesses for deep frying as well), chicken thighs marinated in oils and spices and skewered with an identifying vegetable or fruit on the end of the stick (that's 18 different identifiers from a shallot to a lime to a slice of zucchini for our group), crispy pancake/omelets which are opened and filled by the diner with greens and rolled in rice paper to be dipped in fish sauce and sliced chilis, and so many other delights we asked them to stop bringing food because we were so satiated we could not manage another bite.
I began writing down notes for this letter as we were packed in a small bus flying down the highway from Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) as our bus driver used an intricate system of hand signals to learn of, and warn other drivers of, speed traps along the route to the Mekong Delta. Three different horn sounds were employed: a generic honk in the city, and a falling off honk and a warbling honk in the towns and rural areas. The latter seemed to mean “I'm really serious – get out of my way!!” He knew the width of his bus within an inch on either side, passing by and between other vehicles with a very small margin of error even at 50 or 60 mph – the roads are packed with a plethora of motorbikes, many trucks and buses, and a few personal cars and bicycles. Pedestrians and dogs cross the street as they can, counting on the traffic stream to split around them and allow them to reach the other side successfully. In the city, the traffic does eventually stop for red lights which helps crossing, but motorbikes get impatient and often hop onto the sidewalks to get around a crowd building at the light, go up the opposite side of the street than the intended, and cut across corner parking lots and driveways to move through traffic. It makes for lively travel.
In the Delta we transferred to boats, and once, to bicycles, for our travel touring the many streams and canals that interlace this region. We slept over at Mr. Mui's house, a large open building on the side of a canal. Mosquito nets covered our cots and long narrow boats carried produce and gear up and down the water beside us during the night when the tide was sufficiently high to navigate. We toured tiny factories which produced rice paper for spring rolls, coconut candy, popped rice, fish sauce and bricks. At least in this area sustainability is important and rice bran and dried longren husks (a fruit) served as fuel for cooking all of the above, including the bricks. We took a boat to a floating market, but unlike Thailand where the floating market seems as much for the benefit of tourists as an actual working market, this market was a bustle of wholesale and retail produce sales not at all aimed at tourists. Each boat had a long bamboo pole in the prow from which hung the type of fruit or vegetable available. Some boats displayed a turnip or a pineapple, and some had a long string in order of size from longrens to tomatoes to cabbages. Goods were being transferred from larger wooden boat to smaller, hand to hand. Families generally live on these boats full time in very tiny spaces. School children live with relatives or friends on land and join their families on weekends. The last day in the Mekong we went to a university research center specializing in sustainable agriculture and were taken on a nature walk through a eucalyptus forest which is an intermediate stage in restoring the original vegetation in a formerly hard-as-rock grazing area for water buffalo. Like Wolf Ridge, the people at the center are actively teaching local teachers about habitat and inviting them to bring their students to experience a bit of forest. And there were birds singing even at midday (although high up in the trees so not visible).
Consumer goods seem to be readily available wherever we travel but very little money seems to be invested in showrooms and displays outside the wealthy areas of the cities. People live in “shop-houses,” with stores below and homes above or behind. Hats and motorcycle helmets, pots and pans, clothing, school supplies, hardware and plumbing supplies all vie for space and attention as one passes by on the way down the street. Tucked in between and spreading out onto the sidewalk are many tiny restaurants where pho (rice noodles in broth with vegetables) and “Vietnamese sandwiches” of baguettes and ground meat can be purchased and eaten. Many women carry baskets of cooking supplies and a burner balanced on the ends of a pole over their shoulders, and set down in a likely spot to see who will buy. One needs to pay attention as one walks down the sidewalk – HCMC has determined to move such eateries off the sidewalks to make space for walking, but given the use of sidewalks for motorbike parking, it's my humble opinion that it will be even harder to walk since it's easier to weave though people hunkering on stools with a bowl of noodles in their hands than a bank of motorbikes.
Everyone seems to be greatly enjoying this smaller, ocean-side town of Hoi An, about midway through the length of Vietnam, near DaNang. We've biked to the beach for an afternoon's relaxation and many are taking advantage of the town's reputation for affordable fabric and tailoring to have their interview suits and other types of fancy clothing made. The more prosaic amongst us were happy for jeans and shoes that actually fit, and there's at least one whimsical choice of cowboy boots. That there's no more limit to 44 pounds for flights (JAL allows two 50 pound bags) has not helped us restrict our temptations.
But there's an academic side to our experiences as well and what a variety of emotions and experiences are being encountered on this leg of the trip, especially for someone of my generation. We're taking a course on the American War, with readings and lectures primarily from the Vietnamese perspective. We started in Ho Chi Minh City, which most locals still refer to as Saigon. At the War Remnants museum there were so many familiar photos – monks burning themselves in protest and American student s burning draft cards, napalm and its horrific effects, an American student poking a flower in the end of a rifle at a war protest in the US, Jane Fonda visiting North Vietnam, helicopter gun ships and airplanes dropping bombs, “Uncle Ho” and other well-known faces – the list goes on and on. Every picture of war protests had me wondering if it might reveal a face I knew from my Quaker college days (no). We have crawled through the tunnels in Cu Chi and been horrified at the simple and deadly traps laid through the jungle for American troops. We have been to My Lai, or more accurately, the village of Son My, or even more accurately, the museum built on the location of the former Son My. [My lai actually means Ameraisian children born during the war.] And, we've watched two films, “The Quiet American” and “Daughter from Danang.”
As I travel, I have asked our guides about their families' experiences. Han, an outgoing young man in the Mekong Delta, told of his father meeting his mother when he went to her village as a Viet Cong recruiter. They had two children before he went north to fight, was captured and spent 7 years in prison. He was able to return home and they had 6 more children, the youngest of whom speaks excellent English and guides French and American tourists through the waterways of the Mekong. The family of Phoung, the young man who works for CET (the group who runs university programs in Vietnam for us and many other universities), is from Cu Chi. His parents were in their early teens during the war and his grandmother had an entrance to the tunnel systems in a room in the house so they could escape when fighting occurred around their home. Phoung now leads groups of American students throughout Vietnam and will be heading to Australia in February to pursue a master's in communication. And a third guide, Mr. Ang, was born in 1961 in Hanoi. He was evacuated to the countryside twice as a child for a total of about 2 years. He said his parents would bring food by bicycle each weekend, a 40 kilometer journey each way on a highway that was bombed regularly. He now leads groups of Americans and Australian war veterans around the central Vietnam area as well as students.
So it makes me think of what I did and didn't do during the war (I was in college 1970-1975), and about what I am doing or not doing during our current conflicts – and to ask myself if I have the opportunity to look back on the first decade of the 2000s in thirty years how will I feel about my memories of my actions during this time? No answers yet, but plenty on which to ruminate over time.
Well, it's 6:30 am and I've been writing since 4:30. I have been hearing the bustle of early morning since about 4:45 – boats chugging up and down river, roosters crowing, hotel workers outside my door having conversations, the piping voices of school children at about 6 on their way to school in the road on the other side of my room [wait, it's Sunday – what are they doing?], and right now, official sounding [martial?] music from the tv in the breakfast room up the way. We're off to My Son today, an historic site of a kingdom as civilized as, and older than, the kingdom that produced Angor Wat. Free time this afternoon for final fittings (it is fun to watch everyone helping each other with color and fit and style), and an optional boat ride to the river's mouth for birding (oh bliss). Hope all is well with you and yours.
Kris
PS (after the birding trip)… There are birds in Vietnam but except for the ever prolific sparrow, not in great numbers yet, I think. In the city (Saigon/HCMC) I did see tiny swifts in the evenings (as well as dragonflies and bats) and some type of parrot/parakeet flying around the War Remnants museum. In the Mekong, I heard birds off and on but very rarely saw them. However, driving through the countryside one can see many egrets in the rice fields, which I have termed “bigger, smaller, and great big,” given that with the speed of the bus I can barely see beak and leg color, no less estimate size with any realism. At My Son, I saw my first perching bird that stood still long enough for me to really see it. It might have been a rufous-capped babbler although the one I saw had a white throat and black on the side of the throat which the book doesn't show. The rufous cap and the olive back were lovely. And one misty morning as we left town (actually yesterday!), I think I saw a hornbill hop into the top of a coconut palm – the knot on a heavy beak and turned up tail certainly seemed to indicate one, but we whizzed by and my foggy view was gone. Today from the boat I saw gray herons, shorebirds (shapes were familiar, but it's winter, they're gray and white…), cattle egrets standing with cattle, a common kestrel which flew down from a bush to the ground, and a black-capped kingfisher flew across the water. So, they're here – but I think one needs to have time and opportunity for finding them.