Wednesday,
September 21, 2011
The Toum Teave
chugs all night, her engines alternately purring and puffing, a steady,
soothing lullaby. A long, black-green night offers no clues about tomorrow,
save the occasional passage of other boats – some large and well-lit, others
small, appearing briefly in Captain Serge Prunier’s searchlight before disappearing in
our wake.
A gray dawn breaks
as we cruise the Cho Gao Canal, a gift from the 19-th Century French, who conceived it, and their
Vietnamese prisoners, who did the work. Small freighters and fishing boats drift westward along
with us; silt barges and produce boats race by as they head east. Everybody
waves and smiles as we pass.
Later, the Mekong
spreads before us, wide and sliver-tan in the morning sun. We turn north,
hugging the eastern shore, until we arrive at My Tho, a thriving, sprawling
city of low buildings that looks like what we imagined Saigon would be. The
Temple of the Cao Dai religion, which worships the Gods of all major religions,
is a riot of color and detail, including Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, and
Confucius, along with dragons, chalices, egrets, and banners.
The Buddhist Vinh
Tran Temple is slightly more reserved inside, but opens to beautiful gardens
and oversized statues, some under construction, as everything seems to be in
Vietnam.
Which brings us
back to the silt barges. A spirited debate on board the Toum Teave posits
whether the Vietnamese people are simply clearing the river for navigation and
commerce, or bringing raw material for the construction of Saigon and the
Mekong’s many other cities.
It turns out both sides are correct. One man’s silt
is another man’s cinderblock.
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