Cu Chi Coup

Inspired by my tour of Ho Chi Minh City, I handed over a further $14 and went on another trip the following day. This time to the Cao Dai Pagoda and the infamous Cu Chi Tunnels where the Viet Cong hid from the “Evil Americans” as our tour guide phrased it.

The bus was rammed full yet again with mainly Aussies, including my mate from yesterday’s tour Trevor. Every seat was taken and to be honest it wasn’t comfortable for anyone. Some poor guy who was a good 6’5” spent a couple of hours with his knees under his chin!

The Tay Ninh temple was our first stop. This is a relatively new religion, it was founded in 1926 and combines the best bits of just about every other religion including Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism. Blimey the Sunday services must go on forever! It was an amazing place, and felt very Chinese to me, even though they have “Mass” and there are Priests, Bishops and Nuns. We were permitted to watch the midday Mass and while I have no real idea of what was being said or sung, it gave me a sense of peace to listen and watch.

From there it was a mercifully short drive to the Cu Chi Tunnels. What an amazing place. It was hot and humid and as we stood in the middle of the forest, I got a real sense of what it must’ve been like for those young men shipped out to fight a war they had no real knowledge of. I also was full of admiration for the VC guerillas’ whose ingenuity and determination. There’s a whole Wikipedia page about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Củ_Chi_tunnels - check it out.

I have to admit that I bottled it when the others were getting their photos taken climbing into and out of one of the tunnels. It wasn’t even that the entrance looked tiny, the 6’5” guy did it, but it was all a bit ‘buried alive’ for my tastes. To think that those people lived in them is just breathtaking!