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Published: December 15th 2006
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In our second part of our day trip 70km out of HCMC we had a little nose around the Vietcong tunnel complexes of Cu Chi. War is a serious and horrible thing, and a visit to the War Remnants Museum the previous day highlighted that fact (hardship, the slaughter of innocent people, agent orange and birth defects ect.), but I can without shame say that running around underground tunnels and checking out gruesome man traps was good fun. Unlike Cambodia, the war in Vietnam ended 30 years ago and its people are very much prepared to forgive and forget and instead concentrate on making money and being happy. You only had to be in the company of our guide Huong to appreciate this. Extremely camp, he liked nothing better than jumping around, laughing, singing and playing practical jokes on us.
The tour started with a five minute video explaining the war and the success of the tunnels and its brave people against the 'dirty imperialist invaders' (i.e. Americans). It was a cracking video, a full on propaganda thing. Black and white, filmed in the 1960s and using stirring music, Americans wore frowns while the VC smiled receiving hospital treatment. Next
to the TV was a large glass encased model providing an action packed cross section of a typical tunnel complex. There were three levels of tunnels. The first, a couple of metres below the surface had all the living quarters such as kitchens, hospitals and bedrooms. In times of bombing or fighting the VC would then move down to the second level, and if it got really bad the guys would slip down 12 metres into the third. Within all of this there would be booby traps to discourage the enemy. The construction of tunnels began in the 1950s to fight the French. By the end of the war in 1975, the tunnel complex was over 210km long, reaching both into Cambodia and the suburbs of Saigon (HCMC). Ingenious methods were used to confuse the enemy. Smoke from underground kitchens were dispersed through tunnels stuffed with cotton, filtering the smoke and letting what remained surface many km away from the cooking, limiting the success of airstrikes. The VC often used US soap, wore captured uniforms and lined the entrance of airholes with pepper in order to discourage and confuse sniffer dogs. Many of the VC were born and lived in
these tunnels for years at a time (including the current HCMC mayor), often suffering from strange skin conditions.
So with all this info swimming in our heads and the many films of 'nam whirring in our minds, it was time to hit the battlefield. The experience was a bit like a normal walk in the woods but every so often you would stumble across a discarded tank or some manikin dressed up in army fatigues recreating how they saw up and recycle unexploded bombs. Plus as we went our guide Huong would gleefully describe in some gruesome detail how the man traps worked or why the VC snipers shot the enemy in the ankles. As an act of bravery and to show how slim he was Tom 'jumped' into an original sized tunnel entrance and sat in complete darkness while the lid covered him and the snakes and rats inside the endless dark and dingy tunnel system said hello. A little while later it was everyone's turn to have a go at walking through the tunnels. The entrance was much larger this time and we followed this guide in VC gear with a torch who scuttled along at some
speed often leaving the group behind. Every 20 or so metres there was an exit, he would stop, and those that were chicken were given the chance to surface. The 3 of us who remained to the bitter end (including Tom - ha ha!), carried on, walking further, getting deeper, down steps in the near darkness, the walls closing in to the point that we were 12 metres below the surface on our hands and knees, sweating buckets in the heat. We went along the tunnel in a straightish line, but worryingly at least a couple of times there were entrances to other tunnels which darted off our tunnel at right angles, probably on their way to Cambodia and lined with explosives and man traps.
To cap all this excitement after coming out of the tunnels feeling a little fragile and claustrophobic Huong our guide jumped out of the bushes and scared the hell out of us!
After that we caught the night train from HCMC to the little town of Hoi An. Like Malacca in Malaysia, Hoi An is an old Portuguese/Dutch sea merchants town. Another UNESCO site, this pretty little place has loads of old Chinese
style buildings and bags of atmosphere. Plus it was a pretty good place to get some dirty cheap tailor made clothes. A quick look at The Next Catalogue, and 24 hours later Liz had a new pair of shorts, a skirt, a dress and a full on suit. Tom squeezed in an order for a long suit coat. Cleverly for us we posted this stuff it is now as we speak on a slow boat to the UK and probably won't reach us until March (when we've hopefully been successful in job interviews and the cold winter is over). Oh well 'tis a good investment.
Other than that Hoi An has a lovely beach...the end!
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