BALIK KAMPUNG: HO CHI MINH CITY

MEMORIES FROM VIETNAM

It was only 5.48 am yet the intense sunlight was trying to penetrate its way forcibly through my hotel room window pane. My five hour slumber had been interupted by it. I tugged the blanket away and dragged myself at the glass panel. It had been a warm night and the air conditoner had disappointed me. Peeking through the parted brown coloured toffee curtains, I discovered that HCMC had woken up so early. Too early for me in fact.

Room 506 faced a busy road. The motorists and cyclists had made the black tarred potholed roads alive already with their honking and incessant roaring of engines. The shrieking announcements and singing from a school nearby slicing through the crisp morning air did not help much in reducing the din that greeted me when I opened the windows.

I leaned over the window frame and scanned the surroundings. Street vendors had taken their usual spots, stationing themselves to earn a meagre sum from their morning customers. Various coloured roofs dotted the skyline as far as my droopy eyes could see. I told myself that I would not want to miss anything while in Vietnam. The adrenalin pumped more and gushed faster through my system. Feeling rejuvenated after the cold shower, I got ready for another day of getting to know more on HCMC.

My first breakfast in HCMC was a simple affair. A bowl of cereal and slices of baguette thickly slapped with butter. Sinful eating of salted butter no doubt - but that is one of my weaknesses which is difficult to resist. The baguette is a descendant from the French colonial masters. The crisp crust deceived what welcomed me when I dugged my fingers into it. The white crumb inside was pitted with holes, very light and fluffy. I could finish ten slices of it easily and yet would still be able to devour a horse after that.

Back home, I would soak the baguette with the bloody red coloured 'soup tulang' or make Roti John out of it. I tried Vietnam Caphe coffee for the first time. Bitter to my liking but I was willing to give myself more time to begin this caffeine love affair with the dark- browned aromatic stranger. Knowing that our next journey would take three hours, I stuffed myself with monkey bananas and wedges of pomelo.

While waiting for the others to assemble at the lobbly, I ventured out of the hotel door. Lining parallel along the school gate, women whose faces had been aged by the harsh element of the weather hawked their wares selling noodle, spring rolls and bread. Women involving in bringing home income to the family is no common sight in many Asean countries.

Scooterists and workers would stop by to order food, taking time to eat and drink by the roadside. Back in Singapore, office workers would eat along the way or wolved their food down in a minute at the office. What a contrast it makes to life when one is not a slave of time but a master of one's journey.

Fishing out my Samsung camera, I wasted no time immortalising these street women with it. I love capturing images of people for they make up the heartbeat of a country and add colour to it. I even had the chance of carrying the shoulder basket when a gentle smiling lady approached and asked me to buy bananas. I had enough potassium for the day. Winning her over with my my two dollar Singapore note, I posed for some pictures with her, balancing the baskets of bananas precariously on my thin framed shoulder. My awkward and clumsly poses brought laughter from the passing motorists.

The morning itinerary brought us around the city tour. The streets were cleaned and there were policemen and guards everywhere. Our first stop was at the Notre Dame Cathederal which is situated in the heart of HCMC. Its neo-Romanesque archicture and the two 40 metres square tower painted an incredible masterpiece on the clear trishaw blue sky. As we entered the cathedral, I was mesmerised by the melachonly strain of a woman singing a hymn. She was oblivious to her surrounding. I wondered what she had prayed for. The decor is relatively austere but the palette of colours from the stained glass glinting with light and the dancing reflection deserved mentioning. This peaceful place is perfect for quiet contemplation, for broken and wrecked souls searching for solace, inner peace and uplifting of directionless and hapless spirit.

We hopped over to the grand old building next door - the Saigon Post Office next. No sighted person would miss out on the collosal potrait of Uncle Ho Chi Minh . The General Post Office, adjacent to the Notre Dame Cathedral, was built from 1886 to 1891 by Gustave Eiffel. The architecture style is french colonial. The immense ceilings seemed to reach the white fleece clouds above and it gave me the feeling of being in Singapore's Tanjung Pagar Railway Station. The Opera House was another grand old dame. It's white facade and stature standing pompously reminded me so much of our City Hall.

Mr Bien our tour guide prepared us for the visit to War Remnants Museum by detailing the wars that took place in Vietnam. The experience left me feeling sombre and detached of emotions. All of my emotions had been bottled in the formalin chemical that had deformed babies preserved. The visit left me full of anger, disgust and worrying for the future of the human race. Wars and strife are still raging in many countries. Aren't there enough sufferings for us to endure? Pulitzer-prize winning photos of the war crime scenes and other gory relics were too much to be stomached. I shook my head in disbelief as I watched photographs of orange agent victims, villagers with fear written on their faces, charcoal burnt bodies, mutilated and minced corpses, civilians already dead before their death and innocent children who got nothing to do with the war crumpling like rag dolls along roadsides.

One particular picture disturbs me till now. It is the picture of two boys in which the elder brother offering his body as a human shield to his younger brother against the bullets with no eyes. I was utterly disgusted too by another picture of an American soldier laughing historically at the charred remains of a VC soldier who was torched to death by a Napalm bomb.

Wars rob you of your souls even before you die. You live a life of uncertainity, not knowing when death will knock at your door. How true that is. The books and war movies I have read and watched are nothing compared to the hard core evidences on the walls and those being displayed, barking at you the stark truth of the cruel war from every angle you looked at. The two tourists who were there with us shook thier heads in disbelief at how the Americans had abused their technology - not to help mankind but to wipe out a human race.

Lunch was set around a tranquil and placid surrounding of the Saigon River. By now the students were hungry and thirsty. Fresh vegetables, prawns and fish were in the menu. None of them wasted any minute satisfying thier pangs of hunger. Prawns were shredded and torn apart, the fish scraped and dug out while the morning glory vegetable which I mistakingly thought was kangkong, was left miserably untouched. Vietnamese food is known for its common use of fish sauce,soy sauce, rice, fresh herbs, fruits and vegetables.The emphasis is always on serving fresh vegetables and herbs as side dishes along with sauce. As for me, I was still in deep thought over what I had seen earlier on.

We would be heading for the famous or infamous to some people, for another legacy of the Vietnam war; The Cu Chi Tunnel next. The name alone conjured images of fear and notoriety, looming with death and scenes of torture of Vietcongs and GIs during the hostilities. The closest I ever had of this place was from watching the television series - The Combat. Only people of my era would know the series I am talking about. I cringed at the thought of another sombre experience for me again ahead about the cruel war.

We were fortunate to have Mr Bien as our tour guide. He was a teacher turned tour guide who is passionate about Vietnam's history and its people. In his unassuming manner, he brought us through Vietnam's struggle till its modern state. His eyes would shine with pride everytime he talked about his beloved country. The students loved him and lapped at his explanation about the war and his anecdotes during his younger days.

He briefed us on the network of tunnels and how they served their purpose during the war. The tunnels played a critical role in North Vietnam’s war effort to shake off the GIs. I think that the tunnels and the bunkers built from rudimentary tools displayed the VC's determination and and fiery spirit to stand undauted and fight for what they firmly believe in. It is so horrendous to be living your life under such conditions in the rat tunnel unless you truly suscribed to the objectives behind it.

Together, with the students' encouragment and Chin Wee leading the way, I crawled along the tunnel, imagining how anyone could survive and tolerate such environment for years and years. I steeled myself through the maze of tunnel, at times with my head scraping the ceiling of the tunnel and my body bending low like branches of longan trees heavily pregnanted with the matured fuits. My eyes were ridiculously scrutinsing for bloodstains or remnants of war victims on the hardened clay walls of the tunnel. Sherlock Holmes and his magnifying glass would be a perfect partner for me at that moment. How stupid and foolish could I be to ever envisage those images? Blame it on the overfertilised and wild imagination I possess.

The evening light at the end of the tunnel erased my thoughts and doubts as soon as I took hold of Freda's outstretched hand out of the tiny constraint space of the opening. I was perspiring with beads of sweat looking like pearls embedded on my flushed face and neck. For someone who is taking glucasamine and chronditin daily, it had been a back-breaking and knee-bending experience 'ratting' through the 70m historical tunnel My students interpreted it as an achievement for their teacher and applauded loudly the minute my head peered out of the exit hole. The visit ended with us sampling boiled cassava served with crunchy sweetened crushed peanut. Something different yet delectable and palatable when your digestive system had been laid off for a few hours.

In the coach, I was rocked to sleep like a a baby until Mr Bien mentioned that we would be on a cruise after dinner. We were dropped off at Ali Baba Restaurant for dinner. By then I was voracious, having had a light lunch earlier. I dipped my naan into the dhal and shoved it down my throat. The mutton massala and the cottage cheese sambal melted in my mouth. I polished three peices of the bread and completed the meal with a sweet desert that tasted like sugee-cum-sumai. My late father was a Pakistani, so I am quite familiar with Nothern Indian food. We waited by the street kerb immediately after dinner, not wanting to be delayed for the Saigon River boat cruise. Another new experience awaited us.

The cruise was an hour long. We were entertained by singers, fire eaters and a band. The three-storey vessel was packed to the seam with local diners and tourists. The serving crew were balancing trays of shellfish, vegetatables, prawns and even a whole roasted suckling piglet non-stop. Hidayat took centre stage when he sang two Beatles song. How he loved the limelight showered upon him and the flickering lightbulbs flashing away solely aiming at him that night. In contrast, a couple made a fool of themselves. They were screaming their heart out at decibels that were dangerous for my hearing. Their lack of talent forced me to take refuge at the upper deck of the boat.

Congregating themselves on the upper deck and letting the wind finger through their hair, I joined my students in silence as we drifted further away from the mouth of the Saigon river. The other passing cruise boats caused the water to ripple and sway our boat. As we cruised along Saigon River, I could not help notice how important the rivers in Vietnam have on the life of its people. The people basically depend on the rivers for everything - livelihood, transport, home and the country's economy. Settlements formed a linear pattern along the river banks, containers pile up tax zone areas, the giraffe cranes worked overnight, fishing boats bobbed up and down along the course of the water, vehicles ply along the edge of the bank and roads snaked their way following the natural course of the water route.

Clusters of water hyacinth were floating on the murky and yellow water of the river. The darkness of the night camouflaged other unmentionable pollutants that floated on it. The river flowed swiftly, at times dangerously, carrying the pollutants from its original source to many miles away. My mind travelled back home, wondering how my sons, husband and mum were. The crooning of the female singer in the maroon gown floated away in the night. It was gradually drowned by the chugging engine of the cruise boat. The engine coughed and sputtered as we neared the ramp. As the boat lost its speed and power, I too descended in my own world as the second night in HCMC drew to an end.

Bye, bye skipper!

Let me adjourn for a fitful sleep with John Lennon's 'Imagine' at the back of my mind;

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one I hope

Someday you'll join us

And the world will be as one

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Breakfast for my sustenance