Cu Chi Tunnels

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More war tourism today. I'm not sure how to feel about going to these places. I feel slightly uncomfortable being a voyeur of such violent events yet I feel i need to see and pay my respects. I don't think it's a bad thing to remind ourselves how awful war is.

The Cu Chi tunnels are 60 k away from Saigon, a region around the village of Cu Chi where the Viet Cong lived and fought from tunnels underground to keep control of the area. Whatever people think of the war and of the Viet Cong it can't be denied that it's an incredible feat of engineering and determination to live in such conditions. They dug the tunnels by hand, sometimes three levels deep, some tunnels large enough to walk crouched through but most too small for a western person to navigate and many booby trapped. The size of the original entrance holes are tiny. Some had been enlarged to enable tourists to descend and experience what it would be like to live underground.

What I found difficult to understand was the shooting range. Tourists can pay to fire an assortment of guns, from pistols to M-16's. I don't see any attraction of firing such weapons but many people did. The sound of gun fire was in the background as we walked around Cu Chi.

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Photos

Cu Chi Tunnels
Jungle

Cu Chi Tunnels
The entrance to our underground experience

Cu Chi Tunnels
4 meters underground, only enough room to crouch