Hue, June 10th

Rented a bicycle to explore some of the villages outside of town. Because Westerners stand out so much it is difficult to photograph unobtrusively in places off the beaten track. Immediately crowds of kids start gathering and play around for the camera.

A few blocks from my hotel I pass a used clothing market. It's on the street corner of a huge vacant lot filled with the kind of racks you'd expect to see in a department store. Apparently some of the clothes came from refugee organizations in Hong Kong. As I am shooting a few frames a man approaches me to ask if I have ever seen anything like this. He is a psychiatrist and after talking for a while he invites me to his home that evening. Since he has recently returned from a two year residency in France I'm particularly interested in hearing about his impressions of the West and how they might have impacted his work.

The psychiatrist thought that one of the benefits the Vietnamese have in living so close together is the support system that develops. People tend to talk more with each other and are naturally more sociable. He thinks for example that no matter how horrible the war was for the Vietnamese, that because of the closer ties between them, it was easier to get over the experience and go on with their lives, than say it might have been for us. Now he has noticed that since Vietnam is rapidly becoming westernized, more of the population is beginning to show signs of Western symptoms like stress. More people are going to psychiatrists.

Hue, June 11th

People are still asleep on the sidewalks as I walk by the central market. A women approaches with a tiny infant in her arms. She offers the baby for me to hold. I cradle it in my arms and when I hand the child back she insists that I keep it. She laughs. This goes on for a couple of minutes.

Blues in the afternoon. I am anxious to move on to Hanoi. I tried leaving today but getting a train reservation took a few days. I feel really drained by all of the attention out on the street. It didn't help that I just got off the phone with my wife and children. Just hearing their voices so clearly and then walking out of the post office was a strange sensation. Like walking out of a movie in the middle of the day and totally changing gears.

On the train to Hanoi, June 12th

Waiting inside the train at the station it gets unbearably hot. Luckily it cools off a little as we start moving through the night. I am stuck in an upper berth with only a few inches to move around in. My head is precariuosly close to the fan hanging from the ceiling. Not much sleep tonight.

In the morning I find an empty lower berth and try to sleep. Looking out the window, I fade in and out of dreamland. Lying down, the landscape is tilted the way a man who drank too much might see it. My thoughts drift from the rain falling outside to the sheer joy of being in my body at this moment.

The train arrives four hours late in Hanoi. All of the cyclo drivers waiting at the station claim to know the location of the hotel that I want to stay in. When it becomes apparent that my driver is lost after the sixth wrong turn I finally get out and walk the rest of the way. My room is on the top floor of the hotel and reminds me of a Parisian garret Considering its location in the heart of the old city, the most densely populated area of Hanoi, it's suprisingly quiet.

Starving from the train ride I go to an outdoor place called Bittek Resturant. The only dish on the menu is beef steak and french fries. Lots of young couples are sitting on the childsize stools, the kind found all over Asia. It feels as though I am eating the right food in the wrong place or visa versa.

Saigon
Dalat 1 | 2
Nha Trang
Hoi Ann
Hue
Hanoi 1 | 2
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