I slept on shock and woke up do a 'beautiful' Hanoi day. The storm had passed and I was gifted with a cloudy yet blue sky. I've experienced humidity before but nothing prepared me for the combination of heat and humidity on this July day. My clothes would never be dry the whole day and it didn't rain! The night's rest prepared me well to jump in to the day. I knew if I was going to see anything in Hanoi I was going to have to hire a motorbike. I had only given myself one day in Hanoi and by the looks of things that was going to be plenty for me. I'm not that big on big cities. Yet, I'm in HANOI!! When I woke up and heard the whizzing and honking of motorbikes I wasn't the least bit annoyed. More so it was a reminder of this new place before me waiting to be explored. Any big city is better explored on a sunny day. The hotel receptionist called out the door for a motorbike. An older man came up to the door with a "helmet" for me. It was more like a bike helmet than a motorbike helmet. Everything in me was screaming, "don't do this". I remember being thrown from a motorbike on the sand dunes of S. Cal as a kid and at the moment the elder Vietnamese man snapped the loop across my chin I experienced an unwanted illtimed flash back. There I was rolling down sand again for the first time in over 20 years. My minds eye revealed my tumbling in fear and hoping the motorbike would not roll over me. At the same time there were screams of onlookers down below. I came back to reality as the man motioned for me to jump on. Here goes nothing. Only one problem...where do I put my hands? The only other times I've ridden a motorbike I knew exactly where to put my hands. Of course, you wrap them around the belly of the person in front of you. Until this day that person was either a relative or a close family friend. Yet, this man was far from a family friend and definitely not my long lost relative. I did it anyway. I clasped my hands without hesitation around his belly. Off we went. We were on our way to the Ho Chi Min Mausoleum. I felt like I was in my own video game. Motorbikes whizzed by us like any motorbike race game. The winner of this game was the one who arrived safely to his/her destination. In this game we also competed with the clyclo's, cars and pedestrians. What a maze. I held on but not to tight. I felt uncomfortable holding this native man. I began to wonder if he too was uncomfortable. I did notice him looking down at certain intervals. He could have been glancing at the bike controls. Or he didn't know how to tell me to LET GO! I noticed not one other passenger holding the belly of their driver. That is when I became even more uncomfortable and even a little embarrassed. Was I doing something wrong? "How in the world is one supposed to hold on then?" I noticed other ladies holding on to the back of the seat. Some people didn't even hold on with their hands. There was no way I wasn't going to hold on. Have they noticed how people drive around here? Probably not, since they live here and this way of weaving in and out and around is commonplace. So I did it. I let go of this native's belly and hoped and prayed I could make my hands find the metal hold behind me without falling off. I did it. Now the question ways, "Could I stay this way?" I did. It was almost at the exact moment that I released my hands that the driver let out this great sigh. That is when I knew his glancing down was not to see his speedometer. People don't seem to mind what speed they travel in Hanoi. He WAS uncomfortable with a foreigner hugging his middle. "OK, Mr. I get it now!" He was a nice man and got me to my destination without any problem. I was set for the rest of my day. Today I saw Ho Chi Min. The real man! Sure, he's been dead for 40 years or so but his body is preserved and on display for anyone to see. Well, it is on display for 9 months of the year. The other 3 months the body is in Russia to get his yearly makeover. How odd--viewing a real mummy who is the real Ho Chi Min. We were in perfect lines, hands down to our sides, no photos, and perfect silence as we walked through the cold, dark and I might add eerie viewing room. At least for guards watched our every move as we shuffled in and out of the room. There he was in his resting place. Yellow lights made his face and hands glow. So that is who I've been seeing all over the city. This bald man with a long slender beard is Ho Chi Min. He is revered in this city like I had not realized. What a different take on his story here in Vietnam than I remember hearing. Of course the story I'm a part of is different. I visited the HCM museum and continued to get a glimpse of a story I've never heard. The characters were the same-the French, the US and of course the N. and S. Vietnamese. Yet the tone, the expectations and the hopes were entirely different in the way the story was told. As expected colonialism was a great evil. And the bringers of colonialism were Satan-like. I've become sensitive to the great ills and abuses of colonialism. Such tragedy occured under the name of colonialism in the past and even in the present with new colonialism's--both western and eastern influenced colonialism. HCM's story in this museum was that of a messiah who freed the people--especially the south from bondage to foreign powers. Oh, what a different story. As I walked through the museum I'm sure I didn't catch everything. Yet I couldn't help ask the question, "What is true?" I've never been faced with the two tellings 'one history' before. It is like there are two different stories all together. The teller of history really means everything. A different teller makes the story the story. There is no story without a story teller. The power of the story really resides in the story of the teller. So many questions come to mind about the story and stories I'm a part of. I wouldn't mind hearing more of Vietnam's story from this different perspective. Yet what I'm really interested in through all of this is to look again at the stories I'm a part of and ask who is telling them? Who is telling the news I listen to and what are their intentions in telling the story? What stories in the history I've heard need to be heard from a new voice? Even if that voice has always been believed to be "evil"? What stories am I not hearing that I and others like me need to hear? What about the Christian story? I'm even more aware than ever at the importance of the original tellers of the story I've chosen to base my life from. To place myself in this Christian story without knowing something of the story tellers could make me miss the story completely! When I tell the story, from what place do I speak? What are my own expectations and hopes of the text? These certainly play a role in how hearers take in the story. I didn't expect to confront such questions. But I'm glad they confronted me.
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