How'd the Chicken cross the road to get to the other side?

Nam's the word

Hoi An

I have to say that this trip to VietNam has been quite enjoyable.  I'm not sure if it's the ideal place to live long term but for a vacation, you cannot be disappointed here.  Ten days in the north followed by a month down the coast yielded some fantastic destinations of a most interesting sort.  Hanoi is 1000 years old.  Hue is 1000 years old. Hoi An is 1000 years old.  Excellent beaches and ancient cities, relics and ruins, mixed with wild history and exotic foods, VietNam offers the best value for your dollar as you may find anywhere in the world.

Maybe I just like waking up when I want, eating out breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and paying five dollars a night for a private hotel room. Or maybe it's all the sightseeing, the beach time, the motorbike excursions, the trips through the countryside, or the lakes, mountains and waterfalls that inspire me.  I do know that I very much enjoy the iced coffees, the fresh fruits and all the delicious seafoods; they are well-good. I find the crispy-fried whole fish is always a delightful treat, especially when it's plated in a nice sauce.  Occasionally I find myself taking pleasure in an early evening stroll through the nightmarkets, and I find it pleasant to sample all the local beers while making story time with other travelers and locals alike.  But I have to admit that every now and again, I do require some personal time to read my book or reflect.

Chillin' with the Weasel

For all of you coffee fanatics out there, Vietnam offers a Kopi Luwak they affectionately call "Weasel Coffee." Weasel coffee comes from a bean that has been eaten up and shit out by Vietnamese weasels, at which time the bean is collected by eagle-eye villagers who bring it to market.  Weasel coffee is great for serving at dinner-parties and makes for good conversation at the office water cooler. I tried it and must say, it was stronger, smoother, richer and headier than your average cup from Dunkin' Donuts. (No weasels were harmed in the making of this coffee).

The U.S. opens a 6-pack of "Whoop-Ass!"

The Old NVA VC Boys

Khe Sahn Firebase

They had a body-count in VietNam.  It's true.  They used to keep count of all the dead and wounded because it was the only way to keep score.  Each week, someone over here would tally up the casualties and send that number to some beaurocrat on the other side of the world so they could determine how much closer to victory we were.  Today they count dollars like they used to count bodies.  We should do with the dollars what they did with the bodies;  bury and forget them.

The VietNam War is referred to by the Vietnamese as "The American War."  They do this in an attempt to keep track of all their wars.  Be it the Chinese, the Russians, the Japanese, the French, or the Americans, the Vietnamese have been on the short end of the stick for a long, long time.

Here's a little FUN FACT for all the kids at home: From 1965-1972, the US deployed 29 types of high-explosive bombs, 13 types of fragmentation bombs, and released 5,382,000 tons of ordinance in the South and North of VietNam.  The US spread 76 million litres of Orange Dioxin Defoliation Agent into 607,500 hectares of forest and 89,500 tons of Napalm Incindiary resulting in 2,000,000 casualties dead or disabled, 70,000 orphaned, 200,000 children maimed or deformed, and more than 300,000 missing.  Today there are more than 20 million bomb craters in VietNam, while unexploded cluster bombs and undetonated land mines fill the countryside.  Many parts of Central VietNam are just the way we left it; the vegetation hasn't yet grown back, but at least the earth is still scorched.

Vinh Moc Tunnel System

At 3 million dead Vietnamese to our 60 thousand, we outscored them 50 to 1.  But after meeting with and talking to some North Vietnamese War Veterans, I'm thinking we probably shouldn't have done all that.  But then on the other hand, there is something very luscious about the smell of victory in the morning!