IN YOUR FACE-the bad and the ugly

Saigon is not all glamour and glitz. Sometimes the tourist industry Viet Nam pushes more clearly reveals, rather than masks, the poverty of the people.

Fellow Robertson and Duke student Kevin celebrated his birthday recently with our gang. We opted to head to the Vietnamese Chinatown in his honor and our curiosity. A nail-biting motorbike ride later, we found the Chinese restaurant we sought.

We parked our motorbikes and immediately out of the shadows appeared emaciated, deeply-tanned children bent over from carrying a limp baby brother or sister on their hip. The children hardly had to speak a word; the desperate scene explained everything. My Vietnamese friends saw my evident anguish and explained that some street kids are required by their parents to take their sleeping baby sibling and beg for money. The parents usually demand that the kids make a certain quota before they can come home and rest. These kids were dirtied with the muck of the streets, and I've seen toothpicks thicker than their wiry brown legs and arms.

The most frightening image, however, was the silent, limp baby. Arms hanging back awkwardly with fingers splayed instead of curled, the babies gave no indication of response to their surroundings or even of being alive. Their heads lay back into the air, and they didn't make a sound as the kids shifted them roughly or scampered across lanes of traffic to approach cafes. I've no idea if these babies are so malnourished that they do not respond, if they are drugged, if they are absolutely exhausted or what; all I know is that it was one of the most nauseating scenes to silently, unabashedly continue before my eyes.

We traveled up a flight of stairs to chow down family-style from hotpots (lau) steaming with shrimp (tom), rice (com), chicken (ga) and pork (heo). The food was delicious, but for me was tainted by the stares we received. We sat and a woman pointed me out to her daughter, then held up a cell phone to me and took a photo, smiling hugely all the while.

Weeeeeiiiiird, I thought. My friend DiDi let me know that most likely my sun-reddened cheeks signified beauty to them. I think they were just staring because I look different. But really, I'm the gal in the group with brown eyes, brown hair. Why not gather the paparazzi around the blonde blue-eyed bunch?

Anyhow, poor Kevin is now feeling ill. Theories of the origin of his discomfort are the eggs (trung), chicken (ga), and ice (da) that he might've taken in. Please pray for him/send your best.

In the evening, some of our gang went out to a bar. The bars here are divided very clearly into two categories: those frequented by wealthy tourists and those of a more local nature.

We visited a bar called "The Underground," in which the English flowed as freely as the Amber Stout. Poverty slunk out of the shadows here, too: a gaggle of beautiful, scantily-clad Vietnamese women distributed themselves throughout the room, flirting with ease. I looked to my left and saw an American war veteran still sporting a crew-cut interacting without speaking to three of the prostitutes. Oy vey, oy vey, oy vey. Thoughts are welcome on this subject, but my friends and I launched into a discussion of the alternatives, if any, for these women, and the lecherous activity of the man near to us.

The next bar, Alley Boo, had an unusual attraction beyond bamboo-roofing and Vietnamese vodka. A young Vietnamese boy, possibly five to seven years old, began to dance enthusiastically around the tables. I've honestly never seen someone that size exhibit as much coordination and dance flair as this little guy possessed. He scooted up a chair to a pool table and danced around the lights, bobbing and gyrating to the music in a very adult way.

To finish off my IN YOUR FACE entry, the veteran barhopper reminded me of the War Museum our group visited earlier in the week. The museum (once called the American War Crimes Museum and now politically softened in name) had a devastating selection of photos. The deformities of dioxin and Agent Orange were photographed exhaustively, and the scenes of battle burned everyone's eyes. Similar monstrosities are begging on the streets and are presumably disabled from such herbicide-induced injuries. Also horrific were the countless epitaphs to the international wartime journalists who lost their lives--made me really rethink journalism as a major.






Why should I document a war rather than doing something more direct to stop it? That's a segue into a longer debate, no doubt.





At any rate, it was strange to think, as I read the English captions beneath the Vietnamese words, that not only am I reading an imperfect translation, but I am reading with an utterly different cultural context than the man from Ha Noi, Viet Nam. We might read with the same aghast horror, but I first see American soldiers bleeding from the same American heart I've got. It's only recently, now that I am learning to understand the Vietnamese, that I see their corpses too in the pictures and wonder about the families forever aching.

I'm very thankful I do not live during the time of the war and that Viet Nam and the United States are working with one another. Despite the French/Indian War we work with the French, despite the Revolution we count the British among friends, despite WWII the Germans and Japanese trade with us, despite the Viet Nam War I am allowed and even welcomed here.

Still, if you say "Viet Nam" to the average American, images of the war flash by first. Despite Americans' perceived image of enviable wealth, why shouldn't the the Vietnamese vendors I pass think of the war first when they see me?

Will we one day trade and vacation in the Middle East as this war fades into history as well?