By: Atty. Marlo T. Cristobal
As my wife approaches her senior age on May 8, we decided to take a trip to Vietnam in keeping with some Filipino customs she wants carried out that breaching the boundary of middle adulthood and spilling into the life of late adulthood necessitates a celebration as a matter of superstitious or religious ritual, something that l must frown upon as a sheer idolatry to a sheer Christian like me. But honor to her belief l must yield at least in its pure secular sense as a matter of practical necessity to a conjugal vibrant story. There is a constraint in me to make a fuzz out of this universal birthday ritual. It projects my uncommon contrast. At my advance age, my many birthdays have come and slipped away consistently like a thief in the night without noise, as it were. I have always preferred it that way. Maybe because l am a simple guy, but, definitely, not a simpleton.
But why Hanoi, or North Vietnam (NV) of all countries? Aside from the world famous allure and wonder of Vietnam’s unique coffee flavor and distinctive taste that l wanted to savor in its very source, NV has been something mystifying to me since its war with South Vietnam (SV), a war that it eventually won, despite a stronger SV, considering the open and full support to it of US military men and armaments. I remember this well because this war took the center stage of world political controversy, and, at its height, an intense opposition to the intervention of the US government to this domestic issue of Vietnam and, locally, of our own government through its military unit then Philippine Civic Action Group (Philcag).
I was in my second or third year of my undergraduate Economics course preparatory to my law proper course in UP Diliman when UP student activism took a fierce stand against the US and our own Philcag intervention in the Vietnam War. I was part of that activism.
Despite the super odds against NV in its war with SV, NV won the war but suffered heavy destruction. Its recovery though from its war-torn state was incredibly fast and furious, outpacing even our country’s progress. And it is in this very scenario that l held a mystic for NV. Thereupon, l have always that nagging desire to visit NV early back when l was just a newly minted lawyer to relieve myself of those whys and wherefores of the NV nagging enigma.
Vietnam came as a timely and perfect choice of country for my wife’s superstitious romanticizing. So off, we took the flight today to NV, particularly Hanoi, a once viciously war ravaged that quickly sprung back phenomenaly to bustling progress.
We were checked in at a hotel at the very center of Hanoi, and lucky to have been assigned a room overlooking Hanoi’s famous park and lake (Hoan Kiem Lake).
No more than 2 hours thereafter, we excitingly left the hotel to explore the soul of Hanoi. Hanoi exemplifies the proverbial story of “rising from the phoenix”—from the ashes of war. Now it is bristling with buildings, modern designed and old French designed (an influence of its former French colonizer for about 120 years), all over Hanoi’s streets and spaces. Its restaurants, big and small, are all strewn in its every nook and cranny, whose customers, local and foreign tourists from all over the world, come in droves and gorge on their offered food. We were a minor part of this “droves” and “gorging on.” Their restaurant spaces irreverently occupy or spill over side walks and part of the streets but at night more irreverence takes place as they occupy the entire streets.
The blabbering of customers, especially the Caucasians dominate the night sanctity as they drown themselves in overflowing beer and hard beverages. Carnival mood dominates as noises envelop the sidewalks and streets. Our own Manila Malate nightlife on streets poses a poor challenge to Hanoi’s. The reputed absence of criminality ensured by an unsparing police (ala Japan police) amplifies the sense of freedom of these night revellers and their merrymaking. Try to visit Han Tien street of Hanoi and you will appreciate more my recital of its night revelry and business.
The countless business establishments that pepper Hanoi all over bespeaks of its robust economy that directly benefit its people in the form of much lower prices, for one. A lavish food dinner for two that filled our stomach to the max with leftover aplenty still, cost us only, in peso conversion, P700, that could have cost us about P3000 here in the Philippines. A giant banh mi bread in Hanoi cost, in peso conversion, about P100 at the exchange rate of P1 to 470 VND. Take note of this despicable high price level in the Philippines, compounded by low wages and atrociously high unemployment rate, that makes a life of hell for the masses.
More anecdotes to come on our brief visit of (North) Vietnam.
