Follow the example

Not only was Uncle Ho a great leader he was also a keen advocate for physical exercise. I once bought a set of postcards of him enjoying various physical activities such as badminton, billiards and martial arts, sometimes with a cigarette in hand.

This poster urges citizens to follow his example, though anyone who's been in a park in Vietnam between 5 and 8 am or  in the late afternoon will know that most Vietnamese need no encouragement. There is so much activity and so many people out getting their blood pumping that it feels almost festive. What is always a delight is to see the older generation executing various arm waving foot tapping sequences; they are also creative in incorporating park benches into their routines. This may involve some gentle form of press up, or I have seen someone lying face up, arms and legs straight up and just doing a bit of vigorous shaking of  appendages. 

Ho Chi Minh urges his citizens to exercise, I would urge any foreigner visiting this country to get up as early as you can and spend some time in a park. You will be entertained.

A coconut a day...

I very much enjoyed this coconut taken on the banks of the Dong Nai River, about an hour from central Saigon. Usually coconuts for drinking are stripped of their outer layer, and one end is cut flat so they don’t roll off the table, as these ones had a tendency to. Though a little wayward, they easily surpassed the sanitised version in terms of flavour. The juice was so sweet and ướp lạnh, freezing cold. 

I have been told coconut water is very healthy, a natural electrolyte drink full of potassium. I have also been told the stripped ones are bleached to look whiter and injected with sugar. What to believe?

Nhà Bè

The other day my friend Phuong took me to Nhà Bè, an outer southern district of Saigon. We went to visit a temple there. She wanted to take me to this temple because it’s well known amongst locals as very linh thiêng.  Phuong and I have had quite a bit of discussion about this word, for which I cannot think of an English equivalent. You can use it to describe a temple which is, to quote my dictionary, ‘ready to comply with the prayers of the living.’ Phuong tells me that beginning in 1997, people started spreading the word that this temple was very linh thieng, and thus the numbers of visitors grew and grew. In other words, it is believed that you have a good chance of getting what you pray for if you go there.

Phuong picked me up on her motorbike from Lottemart, a bright and shiny new shopping centre in District 7, and we headed to Nha Be from there.  The development never stops in this area. Saigon is reaching out to the Mekong Delta in the form of apartment blocks and residential estates. Most are in construction or at the just finished stage. It’s all very optimistic and somewhat unsettling, as you wonder who’s going to live in all these expensive places. But after about 10 minutes of driving through construction sites we slipped into a little pocket of sleepy countryside. It was very pleasant cruising these tree-lined, traffic free streets, though soon enough I was reminded we were still on the outskirts of the city, as we turned onto a bustling main road.  From this road we turned into a narrow alley that lead to the temple.

This alley was probably about a kilometre long. It wasn’t residential, rather it was lined with shops and restaurants, the shops selling incense, fruit for offering, and other colourful worshipping accessories. As we whizzed past these places were a blur of hot pink, gold and red shininess. On our way, we were also stopped by 3 or 4 enthusiastic young men, insisting that Phuong park her bike in their spaces. But she didn’t give in to their zeal and we pulled into the bike park closest to the Temple.

The whole experience of visiting this place, including the drive down the covered in alley, felt like something else than what I have come to know as a Vietnamese Temple or Pagoda. We stepped through the entrance way and to the left was a low ceiling space, supported by concrete pillars and full of tables and chairs in rows, which looked out on the Nha Be River. It reminded me of the waiting area for a ferry. On the right were a number of alcoves with colourful deity statues.  The temple area didn’t really have a complete external structure. It was a strange and colourful indoor/outdoor space that you wound around to visit about 20 different altars where people were praying. Some areas had a wall or two, some altars were covered with a corrugated iron roof. Among the intriguing objects and statues was a small (3-4 metres long) wooden boat. If I understood Phuong correctly, you prayed here so that all your troubles would be taken out to sea on this boat.

It was interesting to see this place after visiting some very different pagodas in Chinatown on the weekend, which were defined by their solid stone structure, symmetrical arrangement, and more sombre tone.

The Nha Be temple was busy, but not too crowded, just enough to create a lively atmosphere. Phuong said it was better to come in the morning, because as the day went on it did fill up and your eyes would be streaming from all the smoke of the worshippers' incense. This would not be good for me because as a temple visiting novice, mine already were.

Later in the day, I told my Vietnamese teacher about my experience, and he clarified a few things for me. I already knew that as a temple, this is a different place of worship from the more common Pagodas. Essentially, when you go to a Pagoda, you go to pray to Buddha, whereas at a Temple you pray to other deities. However, by showing Thay my picture of the entrance to the Nha Be temple, he was also able to explain that the name means shrine (Mieu) of the 5 ‘misses’ (Ngu Hanh) as he called them; the 5 grandmothers or Năm bà in Vietnamese.  The name Miếu Ngũ Hành is actually derived from Chinese words. Many Vietnamese words have a Chinese equivalent, often used for the formal naming of things/places/people in Vietnam. The 5 ‘misses’ are actually the elements of metal, wood, water, fire and earth, and are intrinsic to fundamental aspects of Chinese culture, so this is one of the many customs that Vietnam has absorbed from its imposing northern neighbour. He said you will see them depicted as 5 women statues in a row when you enter a temple like this. However as I was quite disoriented by what we entered in Nha Be, I don’t remember seeing this.

Buddhism, like a lot of aspects of Vietnamese culture, is still a big puzzle to me. I get pieces of information from various sources, sometimes they are consistent with the bigger picture, and I can build upon my knowledge, other times they will contradict something someone else has told me or I’ve read, so then I don’t know what to do with them. I suppose why I’m saying this is to make a disclaimer of sorts. I like to write about what about people have told me but it’s not necessarily true for all the people all the time.

Thay, my Vietnamese Teacher, supplied some more vocabulary related to this experience. We talked about the word linh thieng, which his dictionary translated as ‘having supernatural powers.’ He also provided words for the three actions that you do when you visit the temple, first you light incense, then you worship, then you pray, or as he put it, say good things. He told me the word for saying good things, and imitated the way people whisper prayers in a rushed voice. He asked if I had done this while I was there. I said I hadn’t done it in this way, but had thought of good things that I wished for my family, friends and me.

‘Did you think in English, or Vietnamese?’ He inquired in a serious tone.

Of course he knew the answer to this question.

‘Ah, it’s no good then,’ when I replied that it had been English, ‘The Gods only know Vietnamese, they can’t understand you.’

I pointed to the dictionary on the table between us and suggested maybe they had one of these.

We laughed at our nói chơi, meaning ‘say play’. It was a good joke but as always Thay was ready to pick up on my lack of diligence in practising Vietnamese.

Artful Construction

This is the central post office of HCMC. It’s well frequented by tourists, who often stop for a rest on the semi-circular wooden benches near the entrance; some of them looking a little dazed by their travels, which is how I feel after the form filling and queuing rigmarole of sending a parcel here. As can be seen, it’s an impressive piece of architecture, built by the French in the early 20th century. Though as someone who visits regularly for practical purposes, I can be too distracted by the tourist mobs and preoccupied with form filling to appreciate it.

I have always been impressed by the people doing the packaging though. I know this word gets thrown around a lot these days, but some of them (eg. the fine featured balding gentlemen with a moustache) I would go so far as to call artisans. While other foreigners are rubber necking the domed ceiling I’m over at the counter admiring an original sculpture of packaging tape, cardboard and inspiration that has just been created before my eyes. They love a challenge too, you can see the gleam in their eyes as you present them with an odd shaped bundle. Often the final piece may involve some experimentation, as today when 2 boxes were  trialed before the ideal strip of cardboard was found. The lack of jiffy bags or other standardised postal bags in this country is what makes them masters of their craft . They have to improvise with 2nd hand boxes, off cuts and bubble wrap. And everything is perfectly, well some may say overly, sealed with the electric blue VN post office branded tape. I love this tape, it really sets off the buff cardboard colour.

And today I visited at 8am, before the mobs arrived, so I also had more of an opportunity to appreciate the building and the special atmosphere of the place in general. Dozens of overhead fans make it breezy and fresh, especially in the morning, and the sound of unfurling tape and receipts being printed bounces around the high vaulted ceiling. There are two rows of wooden benches and tables at the back, where people sit preparing their parcels, though some have not come on postal business. One man is reading the newspaper and a woman has English text books and a note book in front of her. I can definitely see the attraction of coming here to read or study. There used to be an elderly gentleman who would sit at the end of one of these benches with a couple of thick, well thumbed dictionaries at his side. He was a self-appointed reader and writer of correspondence. I think he did some translation, but also helped locals who couldn’t read or write Vietnamese well. Though I have not seen him for a while now.

Happy Woman Day!

Some Government posters for  International Women's Day that are currently on display around Saigon. Today there were flowers for sale on many street corners, the restaurants in the centre of town were packed with workers celebrating at lunch time, and the city was pumping tonight. If only every country was as enthusiastic about this day!

Nguyễn Trãi to Chinatown

Between the hours of 5 and 6 every morning, the woman in the house opposite us prays and chants. Mostly what drifts across our narrow alley is a soft tapping, interspersed with the clean strike of a gong. Today this hypnotic sound gently pulled me from slumber. Our plan for this Sunday was to rise early and walk out to Cholon, Chinatown, and visit some pagodas there. Last night's plan didn't seem so great at 5.30 in the morning, but inspired by my neighbour's disciplined devotion, I made myself get out of bed.

Our route was simple, straight down Nguyen Trai street, which would take us directly to the places we wanted to see. This street is always, always busy, I thought as the passing motorbikes kept up a steady stream. It was 6.30 on a Sunday morning. Where were all these people going? I doubted many would be going to work. Although a lot of people in this city have a hectic working schedule, Sunday is still fairly well respected as a day of rest. The word for it is ‘Chủ nhật’ which translates as owner day, your day to do what you please. I suppose I underestimate the fact that what pleases a lot of people in this city of 8 million plus is getting up and out of the house early.

 

We walked down Nguyen Trai for an hour, stopping only to buy a coconut to drink and then a roast pork roll. At first we passed many fashion shops, as Nguyen Trai is famous for, and why hoards of young people cruise this street in the evenings. Then this stretch gave way to a more diverse range of shops, and I’m sure we passed every kind of soup for sale, most of the vendors being just wagons set on the street, surrounded by a handful of low to the ground plastic tables and chairs, and full of heads down, knees up, noodle slurping customers. We also passed an intriguing number of hospitals, three or four, which with their solid concrete style and details suggested early communist era construction.

Our Pagoda tour began just beyond the Cholon Mosque. We visited four of them, all within a couple of minutes walking distance of each other, built by different (Cantonese, Fujian, Chaozhou) Chinese communities in or around the 19th century. I’m reluctant to go into names and details because honestly, for better or worse, visiting these places is mostly an aesthetic experience for me. I wouldn’t want to sound like I have anything more than a basic understanding of Buddhism and ways of worship.

What I can say is that it was a very pleasant way to spend an hour or so on a Sunday morning, strolling from one charming pagoda to the other, passing intriguing shops selling calligraphy materials, incense, paper, dragon masks and colourful Chinese costumes. This area does have a certain atmosphere. There is still a strong Chinese community living here and that does make it feel a little different from the rest of Saigon. It’s busier, for one thing, denser in buildings and people. And you will see the occasional old chinese shophouse, though they have usually been modernised on the street level, so you need to look up to see the interesting details and character.

The pagodas themselves also need to be looked at for a while to appreciate the rich details. They actually feel older than they are, maybe it’s the smoky atmosphere generated by the hundreds of incense sticks burning at one time. There wasn’t a great number of worshippers visiting today, possibly because many people have been to pagodas recently, during the first few days of the lunar year, and on Ngay Ram, which I wrote about last week. At one pagoda, I saw a well groomed and dressed woman purposefully striding past me, her arms weighed down with offerings of fruit, flowers and paper. I thought of the time I’d visited Chinatown with a Xe Om driver and he’d told me that he’s too busy to visit the pagoda and too poor to buy expensive offerings. His opinion was that a lot of rich people are not doing particularly virtuous things in their every day lives but go to the pagoda with generous offerings to make up for it.

Well, I wouldn’t want to imply that was the situation this woman or the other worshippers I saw today, most looked humble and carried only a few sticks of incense from altar to altar. It was just something I thought of at the time, probably because that Xe Om driver is a character and a story in himself, for another day.

No to noise, yes to sounds

Though it may seem like an obvious thing to say, some days in HCMC you have a sensory overload. I remember especially my first few months here, often being overwhelmed by it all. There are the smells, of rotting rubbish and sewerage, of steaming concrete after the rain, of simmering broths, durian, fried foods, smoky grilled pork, incense, exhaust fumes, urine at certain (seemingly designated) corners I try to avoid. Then there is the heat. Some days, when you are on the street, wading through throbbing humidity or withering under the fierce sun, it’s all pervasive. And then there is the visual feast which can turn into frenzy, the streets a hotchpotch of tall, narrow buildings squeezed up against each other, the footpaths a mess of street vendors, motorbikes and people spilling out of their cramped houses.

After a while, you don’t get used to it so much as have good days and bad days. I try not to get bothered too much but when I do it’s the relentless noisiness of this place that rankles me the most. I can manage the heat and I mostly enjoy the spectacle. The worst smells are momentary and the others are now familiar enough to be comforting. But the noise of construction, or the constant rumble of the traffic gets inside me. I recently found something I’d written a while ago that said the noises of this city were eating away at my soul (!) That must have been a bad day. Are natives of this city immune to this form of pollution? I sometimes think so as I see someone sitting on the street looking unperturbed while a jackhammer plows through a nearby building, the passing stream of motorbikes keeps up its constant drone, and a clothes shop opposite blasts out thumping techno. Or are they just more tolerant and resigned?

Before this turns into an ugly and predictable expat rant, let me say that I do not have a problem, in fact find comfort in a lot of the sounds I hear in this city. As I sit hear typing I can hear the distant calls of some children who are playing in my alley. An occasional itinerant vendor will pass, and advertise their wares in a sing song cry. Then there are the jangling bells of the massage guy or the noodle boy. I hear a few beeps and motorbikes passing, which is fine, as an isolated occasional sound. There are the entertaining sounds too, like the ice cream wagons. Their 5 second tune is like a cross between synthesized 80s pop music and a muted car alarm.  There is also the sticky rice vendor. Whenever we used to hear his cry of ‘Banh Chung Banh Gio’ , we used to follow it with ‘Who banged the door?’ as that’s what it sounded like he was saying. So there are many sounds that make me happy about living in this buzzing, vibrant city.

And what also consoles me, in the midst of the noise, is that sometimes you can see things that radiate quietness, and can transport you for a moment out of the beeping and the droning.  I noticed this first when I watched an elderly man serenely peddling his bicycle though the traffic. He looked so dignified, making his way on this most humble mode of transport.

It is the extremes of frenzy and calm that you often experience within the same minute that keep me wondering and wandering around this city.

Motorbike you!

What would HCMC be without motorbikes? And what would motorbikes in HCMC be without Xe Om drivers? You see them on every corner, artfully reclining on their vehicles, always in a waiting game. And as a foreigner, they see you from a mile off, ‘Madame!’ or ‘Motorbike you!’ they will cry.

The name for these motorbike taxi drivers means vehicle (Xe), and hug (Om), ie. the action of holding on to someone when they’re giving you a ride, though I tend not to get that friendly with these fellows.

I’ve had all types of Xe Om drivers, happy ones, surly ones, hunchbacked ones. I’ve ridden with them in the rain, when I’ve had to hide under their ponchos so as not to get wet, and in the hot sun, when the chivalrous ones will find a shady spot to wait if you have to stop at the lights. I’ve ridden with them Vietnamese family style, 3 of us on the bike, when my driver also had to drop his grandson at kindergarten. I’ve laughed with Xe Om drivers and argued with them, and endured many a near miss with them. I even sat under a tree in some temple grounds discussing the meaning of life with one once.

I wrote this last year, about one of my favourite drivers from our old house. 

Ngày Rằm

Yesterday was Ngày Rằm, the 15th day of the lunar month, which also means it’s the night of the full moon. It’s a day when many Buddhist Vietnamese go the Pagoda, and also for some a day to abstain from eating meat. The Hindu Mariamman Temple, just near our house, is always very busy on Ngày Rằm. We went down there to take in the atmosphere. It was too much of a crush to enter, so we just stood around the front for a while, looking in the narrow door at the swarms of people in the foggy cloud of incense.  Outside a number of colourful stalls were set up selling coconuts, candles, incense, bracelets of jasmine flowers and other shiny votives. Across the road from the temple, a temporary food stall sold only vegetarian dishes for the evening, while the usually very popular Hu Tieu (pork noodle soup) restaurant was closed.

It is intriguing that this originally Hindu Temple now seems to be a harmonious meeting of the two religions. Although the deities inside are Hindu, apparently many Vietnamese come to worship and be blessed with its “miraculous powers.”

After this, we walked through the park to go to a restaurant specialising in a crab flavoured rice porridge, served with duck embryos – Chao Cua dong hoi vit lon. A Vietnamese friend introduced this dish to me recently. On that occasion, a pot arrived at the table and I had a look inside to see a lumpy soup with some withered brown blobs. It was weird to fish one of these little creatures out of my bowl with my chopsticks, and contemplate its consumption. Though upon eating, I was kind of underwhelmed. If I’m going to put tiny feathers, spindly bones and little beaks in my mouth, I think there needs to be an amazing flavour upside. But it didn’t really taste like much at all. Apparently they are nutrient rich, which would make sense. Maybe I should give these 'half hatched eggs' another try at one of the many street stalls where they serve them more simply, just boiled and still in the shell, to be eaten with various condiments. Maybe.

Anyway, I had enjoyed the Crab rice porridge (Chao Cua) part of this meal, a cleansing flavour with a pleasant green leafed vegetable that I’m yet to identify, so we ordered the dish but asked them to hold the baby ducks.