Vietnam: take two

life lessons, tailor made clothes, and kind women in Hanoi and Hoi An

Vietnam was, as I expected, completely unexpected. Once we left Ho Chi Minh, eating remained a stressful point, but everything else drastically improved. The people we met were warm and kind, the cities and towns became more manageable, we had survived the initial culture shock, developed a new approach to feed ourselves and pushed back against the instinct to “other”. We were excited to see what else waited for us in Vietnam.

Two thousand years ago, Hoi An, a small port city on Vietnam's central coast, was born. Using the Thu Bon River, which splits the old town in two, Asian superpowers floated into town to trade their wares for centuries. In the 16th century, Hoi An exploded in importance as it ushered in trade with Europeans. Retaining much of the original architecture, yellow shophouses, pleasantly streaked with something akin to moss as a result of the constant humidity, line the cobbled streets. Paper lanterns of all colors-but mostly red-hang on every corner, in every shop window; they line the streets, guiding tourists and locals alike down their romantic alleyways shrouded in a mystical fog.

When we picked Hoi An as a destination, it was first and foremost for me to get tailor made clothing and secondly because it looked beautiful and inviting. As over-tourism becomes a global problem, there are many tourist activities we could do that should be questioned for how they benefit the people of the area. Are they actually helping or hurting the community in the long term? But getting tailor made clothing by the women of Hoi An seems like the clearest example of engaging with the locals responsibly; studies have shown it’s lifted hundreds of families from poverty while preserving the traditional values and culture of the region. Tailoring has been a key component of the local economy since the 16th century when traders on the Silk Road introduced the practice of creating silk to the region. All with the added benefit of me going home with affordable, high quality staples on rotation in my wardrobe for years to come.

With more than 700 tailors in Hoi An, it’s easy to get bogged down in choosing a tailor. I chose a shop with women who specialized in linen and went with my list and pictures of everything I wanted. The ladies measured me, explained how certain things I wanted would translate onto my shape, and offered recommendations and suggestions. In 36 hours, I had 2 skirts, a button down shirt, one pair of pants, one blouse, and one dress made for me. Grant had a pair of linen trousers and short sleeve button down made that he hasn’t taken off since we left the shop. The grand total was $220.

Even with the draw of the tailors lining the streets, the river is still the destination everyone is winding their way towards. The river overflows with brightly painted long boats made of bamboo, brightly colored lanterns hanging from them. We crossed the modern bridge connecting the two sides of town, passing an elderly Vietnamese woman with the biggest nearly toothless smile, selling paper lanterns to float down the river. She gestured to us to buy one, smoking and laughing, the smoke escaping through the spaces where her teeth once were. She was positively beaming with infectious joy. I asked if I could take her picture because I thought she had a beautiful smile and she struck a “eat your heart out” pose a moment too early for me to capture.

On the other side of the river lies bars and clubs, their music loudly pounding into the night, their promoters (for lack of a less professional word) trying their best to get you inside. Beyond the row of thrumming bass lies the nightmarket; constructed each night by the vendors as they haul their mobile carts out into the street to sell their goods to passing tourists. Looking for a good knock off of a Chanel bag? Fake platform Crocs? Grilled frog on a stick? Perhaps a string of pearls? You can find it there.

Hoi An, it rained every day; some days for hours on end. We traversed the slick streets in ponchos like when I was a kid at Disney World and a passing storm rolled through. By the second day there, parts of the river had broken over the bank and began to flood the first street parallel to it. By the third day, the river was three blocks into the old town and had flooded the first floor of many shops; they seemed accustomed to it and unfazed. We didn’t make it back to the night market again.

Throughout the trip, I’ve noticed a longing to surround myself with women. Raised by a single mother, with a sister, close to my aunts, always with women friends, I’ve been missing the comforting community of being at home, surrounded by women. Unexpectedly, I’ve hardly interacted with any women on this trip. In Europe, many of the professions where you have the opportunity to chat-taxi drivers, servers, restaurant hawkers, hostel staff-were held by men.

In Vietnam, I talked to so many women. There was the woman selling fruit: carrying shoulder crushingly heavy trays hanging off a measure of bamboo, she jumped in front of my picture at a temple and struck a pose. Before we knew it, she handed us the fruit tray, put her iconic conical hat on Grant and asked me if she could be his second wife. Laughing and hugging him; she praised him for picking a beauty for a wife (Who? Me?) and wished for us to have a strong baby boy (l o l) before selling us her fruit. Even if it was a salesman tactic to sell her delicious fruit at incredibly reasonable prices, she was funny and we got far more out of the exchange than she did. There was the woman at the museum who demonstrated the practice of Vietnamese embroidery. We shared very few common words but I tried my best to tell her I also embroider and sat with her, basking in the warmth that radiated off her without any words at all, watching as she stitched my name onto a traditionally embroidered hanky. There were the tailors: talented and efficient, chatting with me about her husband and mine as she measured me for my clothes; the woman on the street who made her dog dance for another dog nearby; the woman smoking on the bridge selling paper lanterns. The Vietnamese women I chatted with gave me a sense of comfort and home and a clearer glimpse into what the locals are like than in most places we’ve gotten, something I’ve been searching for for months.

Get this woman an agent! She’s a star!

After a bizarre, foggy day spent at nearby Ba Na Hills, the Vietnamese French themed amusement park, we headed to Hanoi, our final destination. Hanoi, the northern capital of Vietnam sits between Halong bay, an emerald bay dotted with limestone cliffs rising above the water, and the Sa Pa region, the mountainous north known for its picturesque terraced rice paddies.

Driving into Hanoi, the city was shrouded in a thick haze. The layers of smog peeled back as we drove closer; first a jungle, thick palms, canopy brush so dense you couldn’t see to the bottom; then small plots of land, mini farms growing vegetables, chickens running loose; next, the first layer of buildings: three and four story shop houses, tall and skinny-the width of a one-car garage-butting up at the foot of modern condo buildings ten times as large. The deeper we drove into the city, the more the haze ebbed and flowed around us, revealing pockets at a time.

Hanoi was similar to Ho Chi Minh in some ways, mainly the chaos of motorbikes weaving around us, but different-and in my opinion probably better-in many others. Colder and with a quaint charm and warm winter light, Hanoi was a mix of trendy cafes, street food stalls, an abundance of shopping, and cultural spots, all the while being tree lined and home to several small lakes in the heart of the city. I couldn’t help but think if we started in Hanoi, we may have had a different trip.

We visited the Vietnamese Women’s museum and learned about the lives of women belonging to some of the 54 ethnic groups in Vietnam. Some highlights were: the matriarchal societies in the north where the women are head of the family, select their own spouse, manage the finances, keep their last names, and lead religious ceremonies. Knowing that much of life outside the cities in Vietnam has remained the same for generations made the museum that much more interesting. It’s not often that we go to a country and get a full picture of current daily life and it’s such a strong contrast to what we’re accustomed to. The stories I read in the museum aligned with the experiences I had been having with the local women in Vietnam; they’re strong, warm, resilient and funny (which I’d say is true of women everywhere-but these women that I was meeting were extra outgoing perhaps).

Unlike most western museums I’ve visited with a section on war, the Vietnamese women’s contributions in the Vietnam war wasn’t relegated to a small poster tucked away somewhere but an entire floor. Did you know that women made up 40% of the militias in the south during the Vietnam War? The Vietnamese women were deeply involved in, not only organizational, nursing, and support roles, but actual combat in many of their wars.

I was born in 1993, long after the Vietnam war ended, but it seems to me that Vietnam has one of the most complicated relationships with the American perception. I’m curious what you all think of Vietnam and what influences that view. Before we began researching our visit, I only knew about it in the context of the war-the war that they call The American War there. I knew it as a humid nation with devastating jungles and resourceful people who bested the strongest military in the world (and before that, the French military multiple times), whether we wanted to admit it or not. And I knew that, in both nations, there was a lot of disdain for our presence there. I didn’t know that Vietnam has been fighting occupation by many, the Chinese, the Japanese and the French to name a few, for millennia and, often despite the odds, coming out on top.

We left the bustling city of Hanoi behind for a day, seeking some of the stunning nature Vietnam is known for in Ninh Binh. Our first stop was Bai Dinh Pagoda, one of the largest Buddhist temple complexes in the world and home to a slew of other accolades. We wandered up the hills, through the wooden pagodas and to the temple with one of the largest gilded Buddhas in Asia. The Buddha stared down at us, rounded and gleaming in gold, gobsmackingly huge, serene. Oranges were piled up in front of the beautiful, blue China vases as offerings. The more we looked the more we saw; the details were intricate and painstaking, each one holding deep meaning for people in the know. I was struck by the human need for ritual and exaltation, no matter the faith.

We headed to the Ngo Dong river, the iconic image of the Ninh Binh region, once an important farming region turned tourist destination. Millions of years ago, this part of Vietnam was under the sea. Similarly to Ha Long bay, karst hills break through the flat landscape and flank the winding Ngo Dong river. We, carefully joined another couple on a small bamboo and metal boat, cautioned that if we got on too quickly we could all end up in the river. An older man with a kind, age-lined face, swiftly rowed all 5 of us down the river. We passed through limestone caves, so narrow in parts that we had to fold flat, past floating temples and lotus ponds, alongside the karst rock breaking through on land, two hours later we got off the boat as cautiously as we got on, hundreds of carp gulping at the surface like one living mass.

After a steep, sweaty hike up some 500 slippery stairs to a temple with a view of sprawling Ninh Binh (and crawling with other tourists), we got back on our tour bus and began the journey back to Hanoi. With two hours on the van, I had plenty of time to consider our day, what I learned on this leg of the journey, and to anxiously dwell on the mosquito bite I had gotten a couple days earlier-what are the symptoms of dengue again? I have had a nagging headache...but it’s probably just the pollution…

For whatever reason, be it the nature, the people, the completely foreign to me culture and Buddhist elements, Vietnam has been living in my head as the life-changing destination on the trip. Had I had that experience here? In some ways it felt like I had failed on this leg of the trip. Where was my revelation? My rebirth?! I am not a brand new person after my two weeks in the country! The audacity!

After some time to think about it here in Singapore, I think Vietnam did teach me a life changing lesson after all-and keeping in true Vietnam fashion, it was an unexpected one.

After being sick in Ho Chi Minh, I wanted to distance myself from Vietnam and the challenges of traveling in a less developed nation. I wanted to make it black and white and say “it sucks here” and “look at these places that are better!”. Thankfully, I knew better, and I resisted the urge to “other” an entire country. But I could feel it in my body, the inching towards comfort, the desire to reduce a complex place to a simple place that I could write off without wading into the gray areas. I used to think it was impossible to travel and still come back home arrogant, clinging more tightly than ever to an American superiority complex. I’ve always thought travel should make you appreciate the good about your home and be critical of the bad. It should open up a pathway in our brains to see things with more nuance and understanding, more compassion, and give us the experience to know there could be a different way. It should give us hope. I didn’t understand how it was possible to expand your view of the world but close your mind to it before I felt so deeply uncomfortable and scared in Vietnam; but now I’ve developed some compassion for that point of view too. It takes courage to resist that temptation and to question the narratives we’ve been told by our society about other cultures. It takes effort.

I don’t consider myself a black and white person. We all exist in a world with a thousand shades of gray. Vietnam was a test of my ability to be nuanced and question what I’ve been told, to question the superiority I inherently feel as a westerner and how I should interact with the world, and especially a world that’s so much bigger than the west. I don’t have any answers to that, just questions and thoughtful meditations on how our worlds are different. But I think that’s the point of traveling, not to have answers but to have more questions than I started with. To expand. And I’d say I expanded in Vietnam. I’m a little less afraid than I was before, a little more understanding, and that’s all we can hope for in this world.

We’ve been in Singapore since the 19th, pet sitting a rabbit for the holidays. It’s been soothing to play house in someone else's life at a time of year where we long for the comforts of home. I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and a Happy first day of Hanukkah and are resting, surrounded with warmth and love this holiday season.

-Amelia

See ya in the new year! (English is an official language in Singapore and used by everyone!)

Miles I walked this week: 35.9 (taxis cost less than $2 here sooo…)

Check out more pictures from Vietnam below!