A new respect for the vietcong

Prior to this trip, I tried to educate myself on the goings-on of the war in vietnam. Shamefully, at first I didn't get much further than the wikiworldorder article but as time passed, i managed to pick up a few other snippets here and there from various USMC veteran blogs and other websites

Funny thing, war, the stories always seem to be told by the winners. This case was a bit different because the americans have labeled it a stalemate, but I'm pretty sure I only saw red flags on the poles when I was there.

Anyhow, the military history bit started when we took a generic guided tour to the cu chi tunnels, where we were at first fed the run-of-the-mill nva tapes with many references to 'those american devils' (lol), then things started to get a bit more serious

Misc. shenanigans with the Vietnamese

As it turns out, I have a new found love for the red countries. Granted it's from my point of view as an outsider looking in and I'm sure it'd be a different story if the roles were reversed, but, I digress. Vietnam is the raddest f*cking country ever!. No nanny-state smoking restrictions, good food, shitloads of history, a population that "don't take crap from no team america world police" the icing on the cake for me though, is the ability to step into a field and fire off 20 rounds with an AK-47 for the price of a small lunch at Chefette *tear*.

Furthermore, club life has seen some of the best partying since fantastic Fukuoka. (see below)

FYI - that's not me in the photo, that's my travel buddy after one helluva party at club america where we had a run-in with a man in black named Johnnie Walker.




Definitely on my return list.