Good Morning Vietnam! And Cambodia too!

I am getting so much experiences on this trip that I think far exceed the cost of Semester at Sea. Cambodia was definitely the highlight of my trip but I will highlight what I did by day.

Day 1 (Vietnam)

I went to the Cu Chi tunnels and learned so much about the Vietnam War, but through an entirely different perspective. It is weird, we are all used to hearing about the Vietnam War through the perspective of Americans but we never have heard about it through the perspective of the Vietnamese. They don't even call it the Vietnam War, they call it the American War! It was just weird hearing terms such as "American Killer Heroes," they celebrated this one female soldier who killed many Americans. Then we saw traps used to kill and injure Americans. We got to go through the tunnels which were really small, and it was surprising that about 20,000 people lived in there during the war. War is just a horrible thing, both sides have done horrible things it is just really weird listening to the other side and their perspective. I asked our tour guide if the Vietnamese people still were mad at Americans for what we did during the war, and he had some interesting things to say. He said something along the lines that if you leave bad things in the roots of a plant then the plant is going to grow bad. He said that war is a horrible thing and that we should instead forgive what happened in the past and instead grow the relationship between the USA and Vietnam.

I also got to shoot a fully automatic AK-47, baller!

At night we hit up the town. Crossing the street in Vietnam is probably one of the most fun things I have done. The streets are littered by thousands and thousands of mopeds. This society is built upon mopeds! When you cross the street you literally just walk into the street, walk straight and confidently and just walk into a street with thousands of mopeds. You don't dodge the mopeds, you are suppose to let them dodge you. Every time you cross the street your life flashes before your eyes! We went to a club with many other Semester at Sea students at night.

Day 2 (Cambodia)

We woke up extremely early to head to Cambodia. The resort we stayed at was amazing! I understand now why booking a trip through Semester at Sea is so expensive, they put you in the nicest hotels! We had some free time so we swam in the hotel pool. It was so relieving being in the hot Cambodian weather. We then went to Angkor Wat, it is the biggest Hindu temple out there. It is amazing what people can build! After exploring the temple we went off to a dinner show and saw some traditional Japanese Geisha dancing (why we went to a Japanese Geisha dance show in Cambodia is a good question, especially since we were just in Japan) and we saw a little bit of traditional Cambodian dance. At night, I got my first professional massage, it was extremely cheap at the resort so I figured why not? That massage was amazing, the massager cracked bones I didn't even know that I had!

Day 3 (Cambodia)

We saw more temples, including the one that was in Laura Croft: Tomb Raider! It was cool to see something that you could recognize in a movie! We also got to ride elephants around the temple! We also got to feed the elephants bananas!

At night we went to the markets and got our foots massaged by fish! Thats right, you heard me correctly, fish massaged our feet. You pay $2 (yes that is American dollars, Cambodians actually prefer American dollars to their own money) and you get a free beer when you do it. You put your feet in this water and fish come to you feet and eat all the dead skin off of it. I am extremely ticklish and was pretty much laughing the whole time! We then went to this bar called "Angkor What?" we have fun saying that name and has pretty much become an inside joke with everyone that traveled with us.

We also got to ride tuk tuks everywhere. Tuk Tuks are pretty much these small 4 person chariots attached to the back of mopeds. Erin should totally get one attached to her moped so she can take me to class when I get back to Gainesville.

Day 4 (Cambodia & Vietnam)

We got to visit a water village. This village was entirely built on boats, and not just normal boats, they were old looking boats. There was a school boat, basketball court boat, and store boats! Some villagers pulled up to the side of our boat, jumped into and and tried to sell us some sodas! Some other villagers pulled up to the side of our boat to show us a snake they had. We also visited some artisan village where they train mute and deaf rural villagers art so they can make things and sell it to provide an honest income to their families.

We then went back to Vietnam and went out again to the clubs. This time instead of taking taxis, we hired people to take us around on the back of their mopeds. I though walking across the street was insane, it is even crazier when you are on the back of the mopeds!

Day 5 (Vietnam)

I visited the Cao Dai temple, which is really a fascinating religion! It is the 2nd most popular religion in Vietnam. This religion believes that each religion has wisdom that you can learn from. The religion combines other religions to combine the wisdoms. Jesus Christ, Thomas Jefferson, and Nelson Mendela are some of their saints to name just a few of them. The religion is fairly new, it was founded around 1920 or so. The temple was extremely colorful and we got to watch a little bit of a service they have.

We then visited this mountain that is famous in Vietnamese folklore. Apparently there was this girl that loved this poor guy, but her parents arranged for her to get married to this rich man. She did not want to so she ran away and committed suicide on this mountain because she was so heart broken. I think that was the jist of the story of the Lady of the Black Mountain, their are many different versions. We then got to take alpine slides all the way down the mountains, it was so much fun!

Final thoughts on Cambodia

Cambodia was a huge eye opener for me! I was completely ignorant of the Cambodian genocide and how recent it was. Our tour guide's entire family was killed in the genocide, and the weird thing is that the genocide is so normal to them that when he talked about it it was like he was talking about anything else you would talk about in a normal conversation. The genocide killed 2 million people, and it was targeted at the intellectuals of society. Just wearing eye glasses could get you killed because that was a sign of intelligence. This genocide left millions orphaned and there was pretty much 2 generations that were completely wiped out.

Cambodians seem generally happier than any other country, even though they are much poorer. I was surprised to see very little beggars, there was many many vendors everywhere trying to sell you things, but at least they were trying to make an honest living and not trying to just beg for the money.

I want to go back to Cambodia once I finish my engineering degree and do some sort of project their in the Children's hospital or work with engineers without borders or something along those lines. One of the Semester at Sea students that I met on this trip got to visit the hospital and he was telling me how they need as much help as possible to provide healthcare for the millions of children. They are trying to start up a cardiology center as well, so maybe I could do something there. Or maybe helping provide clean water or something along those lines. This trip has really encouraged me to finish my degree so I can help the international community in some sort of way.