Home Safe

Up at 5 am Saturday morning in Singapore, breakfast at 6 am, off to he airport at 7 am and in the air at 10 am for a 13 hour flight to San Francisco. The pilot said we had a smooth flight ahead with a tail wind that would cut an hour off our flying time ( it was originally supposed to be 14 hours). It wasn't too smooth but he kept it at 13 hours so we landed at 8:25 am on Saturday - about 2 hours earlier than when we took off.

We then had a 4 hour layover so we had time for some good ole American hamburger and fries!! Man that was good!! A 3 hour flight to Kansas City and a 2 hour drive home!

We've had a great adventure while learning about counties from the Far East and finding the people to be delightful, the land to be lush and beautiful, and the history fascinating. I was afraid that we Americans would not be welcomed but that was far from true. This was a trip we will long remember and love to share again and again.

More Gardens in the Green City

Why a zoo tour was on our itinerary we do not know but we tried (and failed) to make the best of it. We convinced our guide to leave early and we went to the Marina Bay Sands Hotel where we had a Chinese lunch.

Next door to the hotel is the Garden by the Bay. It is comprised of two glass domed buildings filled with gardens and surrounded by a green park with Super Trees. These are artificial trees made with a hollow concrete core and covered with mesh so that plants can be grown all the way up to the umbrella tops, eventually they will look and act like real trees. Some of the trees are vents for the underground buildings and others hold solar panels.

Each of the domes contains different gardens. The first was bigger and holds a 'mountain' of plants and the tallest indoor waterfall in the world. We rode an elevator to the top of the 'mountain' and enjoyed plants, flowers, ferns, trees, and bushes from around the world and from various climates. The artwork added to the visual delights.

The second dome held gardens one might find in the Mediterranean area, Africa or Asia as well as the Dalhia Flower show.

I won't bore you with a lot of info about the city but one thing is very unique. In trying to keep people from using cars for transportation the government has placed a 300% tax on all imported cars and all cars are imported. So if you can afford to own a car, when that car is 10 years old you have to scrap it and buy a new one. There are no used cars in Singapore! And to further limit cars you have to buy a permit to own one & only a few are sold each year.

A Tour of Singapore

A Malaysian king who came here decided to stay after he saw an animal he declared to be a lion (there are no lions in Malaysia) so he named the village Singa for lion and pora for city hence Singapore. In 1899 the East India Company landed on this island thus began a period of British rule. The city grew but during WWII it was bombed and invaded by Japan. The city had to rise up from the ashes and has done a remarkable job of becoming one of the top financial cities in the world, having the busiest sea port and some of the tallest buildings in Asia.

We learned all this and more as we traveled to the Singapore Botanical Gardens where we walked through a world famous Orchid Garden with more than 1000 different species of orchids.

We had a brief stop on the bay to see the national symbol of Singapore, the Lion headed fish. Across the bay (which is man made and filled with fresh water) is the Marina Bay Sands Hotel. The three towers hold 2561 rooms and support the 'ship' on top where you can dine or swim. The lotus shaped building is the Arts and Science Museum.

In China Town we visited the Temple of Heavenly Peace (Takong Thian Hock Keng). Its main diety is the Hindu god, Matu, Goddess of the Sea and the other smaller temples hold the Buddhist god and a Taoist god.

A short walk took us to the neighboring area of Little India. They were celebrating their new year call Thaipusam. It is a time to make wishes come true and to receive blessings. Men carrying metal milk cans on their heads were taking blessing from one temple to another. The oddest site were men carrying torture like decorations on their heads or pulling one behind them but the common theme was arrows or needles piercing the body. How they could do that we do not know! And why they were doing that we do not understand!

Following a restful afternoon, we had dinner in the Swissotel Hotel at the Equinox Restaurant located on the 70th floor. The restaurant was beautiful, the views from the top were stunning and the food was elegant and wonderfully prepared. It was a delightful way to wind down this vacation.

Singapore!

Since we had a late flight to Singapore John and I walked around Saigon for an hour and found a couple of interesting buildings to photograph. One is the Opera House and the other is Ho Chi Minh City Hall. Then off to the airport.

Singapore is a city, a country and an island. It is 31 miles wide and 16 miles long and holds 5.5 million people. We are only 85 miles north of the equator.

We landed here late afternoon but by the time we got settled in the hotel it was after 7 pm. Everybody was cranky with hunger so we ended up going our separate ways for dinner. John and I did stop at the Long Bar in the Raffles Hotel where the Singapore Sling was invented. Back in the early 1900's it was unseemly for a woman to be seen drinking spirits so the bartender created this fruity drink with rum to look like just a fruit drink.

Bicycling and Tunnels

We convinced our guide, Tan, that 7 am was too early for a pick up so he agreed to come by at 7:30 am!!

Once we escaped the clutches of city traffic, Tan got us all set up on Trek mountain bikes and we rode some lovely back country roads and lanes as we headed to Cu Chi Tunnels Park. The back roads weren't too busy, mostly scooters going past. The children and parents were friendly, shouting "Hello" as we rode by. We stopped to look at rubber trees and slowed down going thru villages and past cemeteries to admire homes and gardens, cows and chickens.

Rubber Trees

As we neared the park, the traffic picked up so we loaded up the bikes onto a truck and drove to the Cu Chi Tunnels Memorial Park. We experienced first hand how the Viet Cong would use these tunnels to attack and run, escape the bombings and the sprayed poisons. Some of the tunnels were 10 feet deep and others went down 25 feet. The shallow tunnels were used to attack and hide but the deeper ones held rooms for cooking, sleeping, healing and storage. Over 16,000 people lived in the tunnels at the end of the Ho Chi Menh Trail. They began building these tunnels during the French war in 1948.

We went into a few of the tunnels and a park guide showed us how the VC could disappear into them. They also displayed the pits lined with bamboo spikes and nails designed to maim the soldiers who inadvertently walked into them. It was pretty sobering.

Following lunch we decided we had had enough of the heat so we headed back early. It was a 2 hour drive to go about 22 miles!

The Worst and The Best of Saigon

Ho Chi Menh City is the official name for Saigon. The young urbanites use Saigon to refer to the old parts of the city while the rest of the metropolitan area and the district are HCMC. Over 9 million people live in Saigon and 4.5 million ride scooters everywhere they go.

Catholic Church

New Years decorations

We transfered off of the ship today and are staying in the Sofitel Saigon in the center of town. We didn't get our room until 15 minutes before our tour of The War Remnants Museum so John stayed behind while the rest of us got the communist view of the American War in Vietnam. It was explained to us that there have been many wars in Vietnam - the French War, the Russian war and the American war - so the Vietnamese don't call it the Vietnam War.

Most of the War Remnants Museum are rooms full of photographs taken by the war correspondents and journalists from 1954 to 1975 when Saigon fell. It is a slanted view of the horrors we inflicted upon the women and children and the after effects of Agent Orange and all the other chemicals we sprayed on the country. One room of photos did depict the war our soldiers experienced. Outside the museum were war machines left behind by the Americans like Chinooks, tanks, and B-52 bombers.

The best part of the day began at 6 pm when we were picked up on 6 motor scooters and given a tour of Saigon at night. Our journey host, Jason, proceeded to try and get us drunk, took us to two wonderful local restaurants then to two totally different nightclubs. It was exciting to ride with all the traffic and see Saigon at night, still lit up from celebrating the New Year. This is a young, growing and vibrant city any young person would love.

Mekong Delta

The AmaDara dropped anchor in the middle of the Mekong River near Sa Dac, a "small" town of 160,000 in the heart of the Mekong Delta. This part of Vietnam has some of the richest farmland in the country as evidenced by the huge market we walked thru this morning. We recognized the basic fruits and vegetables but ur guide had to tell us about a lot of them like Durian, milk apples, snake fruit, tamarind,dragon fruit and Jack fruit. They eat all parts of the lotus plant from roots to flowers and buds. We saw live eels escaping from their pan, live fish and shrimp swimming in their buckets, skinned rats, all parts from a pig including the tail, chickens - live and dead, feet & head, and lots of flowers. Very lively place!

We also visited a 120 year old house that was the home to French author Margarite Duras who wrote "L'amant". (I'm not familiar with the author or the book). It was a beautiful place.

We then took an hour long bus ride to Xeo Quit (prounced 'Sao whit') where the Viet Cong had a secret encampment during the Vietnam War (in Vietnam it is called the American War). The Mekong Delta was bombed extensively and hit with Agent Orange and several other exfoliants and set on fire. Xeo Quit was a Viet Cong communications base. The narrow path took us through the jungle past bunkers, spider holes that used bamboo tubes for air, bomb craters, reconstructed huts and fields of cleared boobie traps and land mines. We got a feel for what it may have been like for our soldiers during that conflict.

Because its the end of the Tet holiday, the traffic was horrendous and it took over 1-1/2 hours to get back. We enjoyed an afternoon of cool A/C.

Good Morning Vietnam!

We are in Vietnam again only this time in the south, nearing the Mekong Delta region. We are anchored at Tan Chau but our tour took us to a small village up a tributary so we can get a feel for how the farming community lives.

Local "grocery store". This 67 year old woman sells about everything including live fish as she pushes her cart down the paths.

The Mekong Delta is the rice basket of the world, producing 59% of the worlds rice. Vietnam is the third largest exporter of rice behind Thailand and India. 70% of the country's fruits, vegetables and fish come from this region. We saw fields of rice (of course), chili peppers, corn and all types of beans.

Part of the village is floating on the river but 95% of the homes sat on stilts. The Mekong is a tidal river and rises several meters during the rainy season, flooding the fields.

Just 10 years ago this village received fresh, potable water and electricity. Travel is by scooter, bicycle and sampans on the river.

The afternoon was spent cruising down the river while we played bridge or read books. I learned some napkin folds and turning bath towels into animal shapes. I also ate fruit like dragon fruit, jack fruit, tamirand, leechee nuts, and passion fruit.

Cruising the Mekong

Today we departed Phenom Penh, Cambodia and crossed into the Mekong River for our journey into South Vietnam. We knew exactly when we hit the Mekong River as the Tonle Sap is much muddier than the Mekong. We didn't reach the Vietnamese border until around 4 pm so it was a very pleasant day of doing not much of anything.

Our Cruise director, Son, told us about growing up in Hanoi under communist rule in the 1980s and 1990s. It reminded me of stories of the depression in the US - no food, no jobs, coupons for every thing you needed. Any income under communism had to be shared with the community. If you killed a chicken for dinner, you had to share or pay a penalty. Lard was a delicacy, no toys, no car, no electricity, no TV. Hand-me-down clothes or if the government gave fabric to the community then everyone wore the same pattern. And yet they have overcome all that, have embraced capitalism while still calling themselves communist and are growing.

We we had an ice cream social, learned how to make egg rolls and laughed our heads off at the crew talent show. A good day!

The Killing Fields

The memorial building contains thousands of skulls.

Today has been a disturbing but educational day. Our first stop was at one of the 388 killing fields in Cambodia, this one called Choeung Elk is near Phenom Penh. It held 129 mass graves but only 86 have been uncovered. They estimate that 126,000 people died here but only 9000 have been uncovered. Enough evidence to stop looking for more. In all of Cambodia over 2 million people were murdered. The graves were 15-20 feet deep and would hold 150-450 bodies. One grave held only children and women's bodies, another had bodies but no heads. The Khmer Rouge would come to the huts in the middle of the night, blindfold the victims, line them up along the edge of the grave and quietly kill them with clubs or knives.

Just a little history (I'm pulling this from an hour long lecture). Khmer is the name used for all Cambodians, Rouge is French for Red and red is the color of communism. Pol Pot developed his ideas on communism from the time he lived in Europe and China then he quietly came back to Cambodia and recruited men to his organization from the poor and farmers in small villages. In 1975 he began his genocide to eliminate the politicians and the educated peoples. Anyone who wore glasses, were old or infirm, white skin, artists, engineers, teachers - anyone who thought for themselves were a threat to him and his party and, even towards the end, his own officers. This lasted 3 years 8 months and 20 days! Eventually the king returned, regained control and the UN peacekeepers set things right. Cambodia today is growing and thriving as a country.

S21 prison previously a school.

Another aspect of the killing was the 'security prisons' where political prisoners and dissidents were tortured and killed. Our visit to S21 (only one of 196 such prisons) was very sobering, especially when one of 7 survivors of S21 spoke to us about his experience.

On to more pleasant touring - in the afternoon we visited the Royal Palace complex with its Coronation Hall, museums, dance pavilion and temples. One pagoda held was called the Silver Pagoda because it had silver floors, and Emerald Buddha and a gold Buddha encrusted with gems. No photos allowed inside. One courtyard was surrounded by a wall covered with murals telling the history of Cambodia.

We risked our lives trying to walk back to the boat from the center of town. Scooters and cars lined all the sidewalks and crossing the streets meant we had to stop traffic ourselves because no one would do so voluntarily!

Oudong and Phnom Penh

We are back to where we started our cruise on the Tonle Sap. This time we travel inland to Oudon, the former capital of Cambodia. We visited the largest Buddhist Temple complex in Cambodia so that we could receive a Buddhist blessing and give back to the monks by giving them alms of rice. They blessed us with a long life, prosperity, health and strength. This temple is a teaching and training facility for monks.

Following the blessing we rode in 2-man ox carts pulled by cows and enjoyed looking at the farms and homes of the local people.

This afternoon we cruised for a couple of hours down to the capital city Phnom Penh. This is a city of about 2.4 million that was established in 1372. The main mode of transportation is the motor scooter or 4-person tuk tuk. Most of the tall skyscrapers are less than 10 years old while the colonial area built by the French in the mid-1900 is unchanged. Our tuk tuk ride took us to the shrine for King Norodon Sihanouk, the father of Cambodian Independence. He was duped into joining the Khmer Rouge in 1970 to rid the country of Vietnam incursions but that only empowered Pol Pot. Then in 1991 the king was instrumental in bringing an end to the war.

The Independence Monument is decorated with 90 snake heads. We also stopped at the monument to the grandmother for whom the city is named, Wat Phat Phenom which is across the street from the temple in her honor. In front of the temple is a garden clock given by the Chinese 10 years ago.