This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2007, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
SECOND IN A SERIES: In the second installment of a three-part package detailing his trip to Southeast Asia, Tribune reporter Christopher Smart visits Hanoi, Vietnam, where a market economy helps blend the old and the new.
When I was 18, Uncle Sam gave me a choice: I could go to Vietnam or I could go to college.
When Ko Khac Nang was 18, his Uncle Ho gave him no such choice. Like everyone else in then-North Vietnam, he went into the military to fight for his country's unity and independence.
Some 37 years later, I finally made it to Vietnam and was struck not only by its beauty but also by the warmth and good humor of its people.
Hanoi - a city of 3.5 million people - is simply stunning. Its lush parks and shimmering lakes frame a metropolis where Oriental architecture pushes up against French influences in an intoxicating mélange.
Modern high rises signal a new day in bright, bustling Hanoi. Now embracing a market economy, it's open for business - a paradigm shift punctuated by Western tourists sporting T-shirts proclaiming, "Good Morning, Vietnam."
As it turns out, Vietnamese embrace the 1987 Barry Levinson film based on the tour of duty of A1C Adrian Cronauer in Saigon (renamed Ho Chi Minh City). Even my hip, self-appointed guide, Hung Do, conceded, "Yeah, it's OK."
Hung, who is 28 and wants to join his country's new army of tourist guides, came to my rescue in the park surrounding Hoan Kiem Lake near Hanoi's Old Quarter.
I had purchased a map from a vendor and was in the middle of complicated bilingual negotiations for correct change in Vietnamese dong, on a U.S. $50 bill. At 1,600 dong per dollar, it was no easy matter.
Hung - who, like many young Vietnamese, is fluent in English - swung into action and secured the right change from a nearby café. Then, with a broad smile, he offered to show me around Hanoi.
We were soon zipping through teeming traffic on his Honda motor scooter - the vehicle of choice for young Vietnamese. Very few traffic lights impede Hanoi's avenues and boulevards. And apparently motor bikes don't have to obey the signals that do operate at busy intersections. Amazingly, schools of scooters weave in and out of oncoming traffic in a display of fantastic timing, maneuverability and magic.
There are never any accidents - or so it seems. For a Utah driver, it's almost unimaginable.
We took in Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, the grand French parliament building - now the Hanoi Opera House - and visited a pond in an out-of-the-way neighborhood where the wreckage from an American B-52 bomber sat rusting.
The monument - shot out of the air in 1972 - is a reminder to young people, like Hung, who were born after the war, that Vietnam's independence was hard-won.
Hung's parents are veterans of what they called the "American War." At my request, Hung said he would arrange a meeting.
But first, there was the challenge of finding my hotel.
"I'm staying at The Prince Hotel in the Old Quarter," I told him.
Hung gave me that big smile, almost embarrassed for me. There are a half-dozen Prince Hotels in Hanoi. But "no problem," Hung assured me, we would find it. And we did, eventually. The Vietnamese are patient - very patient.
Strolling the streets of the Old Quarter in Hanoi is, by itself, worth the price of the trip. Like stumbling onto the set of a Richard Attenborough movie, everyday Asian life spills out in a crazy but somehow well-orchestrated symphony of ancient commerce, half-naked toddlers, sidewalk haircuts, noodle-soup breakfast, tiny women balancing heavy baskets and shops exploding with fragrant flowers and items you've never seen before.
It's all set off by young Vietnamese in hip Western clothes strutting the pop culture that swings down from the United States via China. Our movies and music set the trends here, too. Call it the Domino Theory.
From this vantage point, it's hard to tell who won the war - or why we fought it in the first place.
There is no fear here, even on dark side streets. Violent crime is practically nonexistent in Hanoi. Visitors can relax.
And, if you avoid the tourist cafés - they are the ones with chairs - you can find lunch or dinner for practically nothing. Vietnamese prefer sitting on little milk stools, and in the north, their food is decidedly less spicy than that found in Thailand or Laos.
There is no industrial farming in Vietnam, so everything is quite fresh. But many of the dishes in the north are pungent to this American tongue. The goat soup should be reserved for the adventurous.
Fortunately, the Vietnamese love their beer. The beverage of choice is Bia Ha Noi - a 4.8 percent locally brewed lager that sells for 15 to 25 cents a glass on practically every corner. On a steamy day, cold Bia Ha Noi is a life-saver. Pull up a stool and drink in the marvels of Hanoi as they scurry by.
The Vietnamese countryside provides a restful contrast to the city, with palm-lined roads and rice paddies and fruit trees everywhere. Bicycles and motor bikes haul huge loads of ducks and pigs and produce of all kinds to markets in villages along the Red River - the major waterway that slices through northern Vietnam to picturesque Halong Bay on the Gulf of Tonkin.
It was in this verdant countryside about 50 kilometers from Hanoi that I met Ko Khac Nang and his wife, Do Thi Hoa, at their simple but comfortable country cottage. They were relaxed and gracious and had little need to talk about the war.
Uncle Ho stared down at us from his place of honor on the wall and, with Hung as interpreter, I politely prodded for information.
By the time he was 18, Nang was stationed in a munitions plant near Hanoi. Everybody worked extremely long days and there was little food to go around, he explained matter-of-factly.
U.S. war planes bombed relentlessly. During one period, bombs fell 24 hours a day for 12 days straight. Nang was injured. Eventually, he recovered from the shrapnel wounds, but chemical exposure in the munitions plant left him weak and sick.
After the war, he nursed himself back to health with traditional Chinese herbal medicine. Today, he's a health practitioner in his village dispensing medicinal herbs.
Nang's older brother, Do Khac Tai, who lives next door, was a teacher who joined the North Vietnamese Army at the height of the war in the mid-1960s. As an infantryman, he took part in the Tet Offensive in January 1968 - believed to be the turning point in the armed conflict.
Because there was practically no communication system, Nang believed for years that his brother, like most who went south to fight, was dead. Tai is honored as a bona fide war hero, Hung told me.
During the discussion, Hoa set the table and laid out before us a large banquet, a feast of chicken, fish, star fruit, soup, rice and other things I couldn't name. As is the Vietnamese custom, we ate slowly and talked and laughed for several hours.
It's hard to visit Vietnam and not feel a sense of the history of these resilient people. They are industrious, hard workers. But they also love to laugh. And Vietnamese are nothing if not forgiving.
As the meal was ending, Nang reached across the table and took my hand.
"What's past is past," he said. "We are brothers now and you are welcome here."
Hanoi, Vietnam
* WHY GO? Hanoi is a beautiful city, where the old meets the new.
* HOW TO GET THERE: Direct flights are available from San Francisco. Or fly to Bangkok, Thailand, and on to Hanoi. A visa is needed to enter Vietnam. They are available in Bangkok, but require three days to process.
* WHAT IT WILL COST: Round-trip airfare will cost at least $1,300. Once in Hanoi, however, food and lodging will cost about $60 a day. Go big for $100 per day, per person.
* NOT TO MISS: Hanoi's Old Quarter is marvelous. Don't leave without a visit.
* WEATHER: Moderate in winter. Hot and steamy in fall and spring.
* WHAT TO EAT: Everything that is cooked but nothing that's not.