After 46 Years...a Trip Back in Time, Part 5

by Glenn N. Holliman

Ha Noi and Ha Long, March 8, 2015
Continuing a trip back to my War and Youth

In Ha Noi we walked in the Old Quarter, after a massive breakfast with choices that included mango bread, banana bread, spring rolls and fried (lightly) rice noodles, passion fruit and dragon fruit.  And mango juice. Very delightful, different tastes.  I am back in Asia after 46 years....

Sights in the old quarter of Ha Noi.... 
My daughter Grace with the back pack 
and her father in the blue shirt standing.

  Below a shrine in a pagoda. Above, outdoors food and a funeral procession.

The congested electrical wires of Ha Noi 

Below, Glenn and Grace and war memorial. 

Be sure to see the monument at the end of this posting.

Another colorful shrine

 

Drizzle and 71f for the next few days...but not heavy rain and not all the time.  Humid however.  We walked this morning, visiting sites and shops; basically just looking and absorbing. Street scenes overwhelming with life and confusion, beauty, dirt and humanity.  Some areas struggling into 21^st century, especially where there is investment in commerce and government buildings.

Below, street scene and Karen Holliman in Vietnamese hat and basket carry

Food preparation in Old Quarter of Ha Noi

 

Back at hotel at noon, and then we board a shuttle to Ha Long.  

The hotel was filled with American tour groups...generally older,  well-mannered and, well, like me. Like the young fellow below who never thought of growing old when he took photographs in 1969.

 

Market scenes in 1969 outside of Saigon.



In 1969, and that well-mannered, now senior American, then age 22, standing beside another monument, not in Hanoi, but in Lai Khe, South Vietnam, a marker in honor the American soldiers who served in my 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, U.S. Army.  Our camp in the background.  Now in 2015, a business park!

 

Above, a memorial service for a fallen young lieutenant of the 2nd of the 28th, 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, Fire Support Base Oran, near Ben Cat, South Vietnam, February 1969

Below, the sun sets on the same artillery battery and infantry company in a war almost a half century ago.  A great sadness.

Next posting, more on the Vietnam of 2015 and memories of 1969.  In the meantime, consider the invitation below that will create some happy memories!

THE CHRISTOPHER HOLLYMAN, SR.

 HISTORICAL SOCIETY

Executive Committee

Tina Peddie (California) Jeanette Holiman Stewart (Texas), Allen Holleman (North Carolina), Glenn N. Holliman (Pennsylvania), Lynn Holliman (Texas) Glenda Norris (Alabama), Sue Jones (Wyoming), Joseph Parker (Texas), Denise Goff (Virginia) and Sandra Torbert French (Florida)

CORDIALLY INVITE YOU

TO

The Inaugural Meeting of the Society

at

SMITHFIELD

ISLE OF WIGHT COUNTY

VIRGINIA

MARCH 31- APRIL 2, 2016

FOR

A ONCE IN A LIFETIME TOUR TO THE CHRISTOPHER HOLLYMAN'S PLANTATION CA 1682

AND

OTHER HISTORIC HOLLYMAN SITES

AND

TWO DAYS OF SEMINARS

and Round Table Discussions

ON

THE HOLLYMANS of ENGLAND

AND

SUBSEQUENT MIGRATIONS

THROUGH OUT THE USA

PLUS

SESSIONS ON HOW TO TRACE YOUR HOLLYMAN DNA, THE MASSIVE FAMILY TREE (at www.Ancestry.com), HOLLYMAN WEB SITES, THE JAMESTOWN SOCIETY AND THE NEW HOLLIMAN ARCHIVES FOR HOLLYMANS (ALL SPELLINGS) AND ASSOCIATED FAMILIES!

For information and a complete schedule of the program and times, email Allen Holleman, Program Reservations, at jallen.holleman2@gmail.com or call (919-210-6862).

  

After 46 Years...a Trip Back in Time, Part 4

by Glenn N. Holliman

This is the 4th in a series of a Old Soldier returning to Vietnam....

Hanoi, the capital of North Vietnam....
March 7, 2015

The flight from Tokyo to Ha Noi was six hours, and the time changed, advancing two hours.  Hanoi airport 20 or so miles north of the city. Modern, clean, well organized, no problem clearing passport control and then to baggage.  No police visible in the airport, no guns, no swagger.  

Driver met us, and we swept down a six lane highway with traffic going every-which way.  For a socialist country, their traffic habits are ungovernable! Swirling, crowding, dodging each other mainly scooters carrying one, two, three, even four persons.  No one obeying any rules except red lights.  New York City is tame compared to this derby.

Rice and vegetable fields mingle with industry and homes.  It is March 7, maybe 55f, drizzly and overcast.  We approach the city and three to four floor houses appear, narrow, sometimes just gray cinder block, many time painted with open verandas.  There is evidence of French influence in the architecture.

To the old city (population of Hanoi is over 6 million), and we are soon in a maze of narrow streets, teeming with little open air shops, motorcycles parked on sidewalks, people selling all sorts of things in open shops, cooking on the street, preparing foods, live frogs, birds, fish, vegetables and noodles.  Very entrepreneur.  Our driver pulls up on what I thought was a slum street and three bell men run up to our car, open the doors and welcome us to the Tirant Hotel.  Modern, clean, plumbing western.  $80 a night for a deluxe room.  T.V., computer, wi fi, etc. 

  Grace, cousin Karen and Glenn Holliman

Later dinner on the 11^th floor overlooking the city, looking well-worn and yet high rise banks popping up among the mainly four story apartments and businesses, an amazing cacophony of shapes, sizes and movement. 

The ultramodern mixed with the old....that is Ha Noi in 2015.

Dinner was Asian by choice – excellent calamari, a red wine Da Lat from Viet Nam, tasting like a shiraz, and my fatigue slipped away.  Beef and pork with rice. 

 Da Lat Viet Nam wine shared with the chicken in Hanoi.

Conversation with the receptionist in the tastefully decorated bar - perhaps all of 25, thin, attractive, excellent English.  Asked where we were from.  Told her I stationed near Ho Chi Mien City (Saigon) in 1969 and was there animosity due to the American War as they call it?  She smiled sweetly, no, that was the past.  And the war was because of leaders, not the young soldiers. 

We walked the streets for an hour, overwhelmed and intrigued by the street life, trying to absorb the sights and sounds of ‘ancient’ Asia. 

To a lake, somewhat like the one in Central Park, NY….a pagoda, a temple if you will, Buddhist, swarming with tourists, almost all Asian.  Took many photos.

Somewhat like visiting St. Patrick’s in NYC only much smaller.  

Below, the turtle 'arising' from the lake with a sword in its mouth somehow saving the city from Chinese domination in centuries past.  China, the elephant to the north, has often and for long times dominated Vietnam.  Wish our country's leaders in the 1960s had paused a bit to reflect on that important bit of Asian history.

To bed by 9 pm, trying to let nature reset our body clocks.  So far, so good….thanks in large part to our tour guides Jim and Karen Holliman who took many of the great photographs you are seeing.

 

Next post of my trip back in time, more on Hanoi, the enemy capital of the United States in the 1960s.