Gettin' Chiggae With It: Cu Chi Cu Chi Coo!

After spending a few days in Saigon, I wanted to venture out into the country to find some water buffalo and also to check out the Cu Chi Tunnels and the Cao De Temples. I didn't know too much about either but hoped to become culturally enlightened by the end of the day.

Liz mentioned these in her travels through Vietnam. She had likened the Cu Chi Tunnel segment as a Viet Cong Disneyland. Wasn't quite sure what she meant until I arrived in the village. We walked through a big white tunnel and on the other side we saw a few grass huts scattered around the grounds. I followed the crowd to a hut on the left and carefully walked down the dirt steps into a very primal ditch. The walls were dirt, the roof was thatched and sitting in the front was a very modern, hi-tech flat screen. We sat down and watched a propagandist video of the Cu Chi Tunnels history.

"The tunnels of Củ Chi are an immense network of connecting underground tunnels located in the Củ Chi district of Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam, and are part of a much larger network of tunnels that underlie much of the country. The Củ Chi tunnels were the location of several military campaigns during the Vietnam War, and were the Viet Cong's base of operations for the Tết Offensive in 1968.

The tunnels were used by Viet Cong guerrillas as hiding spots during combat, as well as serving as communication and supply routes, hospitals, food and weapon caches and living quarters for numerous guerrilla fighters. The role of the tunnel systems should not be underestimated in its importance to the Viet Cong in resisting American operations and protracting the war, eventually culminating in an American withdrawal." -wikipedia

I had spoken to some of the people on the tour during lunch and had come to the realization that I was the only American in the group. So as we were watching the video, I looked around and realized everyone had begun to slowly inch away from me. I was sitting by myself and it felt like I either had really B.O. (impossible!) or they were afraid any left over guerillas would single me out and they didn't want to get in the crossfire. The movie went on to showcase several child soldiers who won prestigious awards of killing the most Americans in their battalion. A little girl no more than 12 had shot down 32 American GIs in her village. Moving on.

We left the hut and walked onto the rest of the tour. We saw booty traps (you mean booby traps? that's what I said! booby traps!) like the one below. I would not like a pleasant stroll through the bamboo forests to end quite suddenly in this pit below.

Then our guide demonstrated his skinny-ness by hopping into this hole completely. No way the fat Americans could do this. But there were a few Italians who gave it a whirl. Note to Italian girl in the white skirt who jumped in to try to get some cute facebook profile pictures: what were you thinking?!