Death of a Passport

It was only 10 years old

Im sure looking

at the picture

I hadnt changed

Still the same person I was

10 years ago

Not the first passport

I have had to put down

But the nature of the passport

like life

is changing

the passport of the future will be more electronic

less stamps

no ornate visas pasted in

but with a wave of scissors it was dead

barcode cut off

chip card snipped

Dead

no longer able to see me safely across borders

Many borders there have been

So let me reveal some of the adventures in those old ornate visas and stamps

Singapore, and India

Singapore the bustling humid city state.

Centre of trade between the hemispheres for centuries

The city a mix of colonial and bustling modern edifaces

India the ancient history

Sights and smells that are almost overwhelming

Colour vibrancy and activity everywhere.

Ethiopia, Thailand and New Caledonia

Ethiopia the cradle of civilisation

An ancient culture

Home of coffee

Dramatic landscape from high mountains to desert planes,

Many tribes, and diverse wildlife.

Thailand- the kingdom in Asia

long held traditions

New Caledonia the French called it the Riviera of the South Pacific

A place of beauty

But with the tense undercurrent of colonisation bubbling beneath the surface

Vietnam baring the scars of the American war

An ancient culture its capital a city over 1000 years old

Bustling streets markets and waterways

The last stamps on the page are Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam. The start of my recent European adventures but they have been documented in my recent posts.

Ten years of travel outside Australia, my home country recorded on the pages.

Vale passport!!!!

Impressions of Vietnam 3 at a market

At a Market

Cheap meal

Cheap clothes

Cheap lives

Lives lost too early

Lost cheaply

Cheap as chips

but only a few

Cheap beer

“keep the liquids up”

Good for you sir

Cheap

Cheep Cheep

says the duck

the chicken

The market seller

Cheap for you sir

Buy 3,4,5

Cheap, cheap

There is a similarity in markets around the world but the markets of South East Asia, especially those along the Mekong and other big rivers are special. A mixture of floating and land based markets, vibrant bustling and load. At this market in Can Tho in the heart of the Mekong Delta all those aspects were present.

Floating market - CanTho — Floating market – CanTho

Impressions of Vietnam 2 – West Lake, Hanoi

In Hanoi

Hotel California

Plays loud

In Hanoi

As Ho hugs the Statue of Liberty

Traders trade and

Young locals dance to American Music

but in the temple by West Lake

All is serene

It was a cool January day in Hanoi and I decided to take a walk around West Lake. This is the largest of the many lakes that are in Hanoi. Being mid January the preparations for Tet were beginning and there was activity all around the lake. The 17km walk took most of the day as I took in the sites and indulged the culture and Vietnamese coffee along the way.

Impressions of Vietnam – in the Mekong Delta

Vietnam is a mixture of teeming cities, beautiful coast and intensive agriculture in a hot fertile land.

For Australians there is a special link through our involvement in the Vietnam war (or the American War as the Vietnamese call it) and the settlement of thousands of Vietnamese in Australia post the war.

So many Australians have been directly touched by Vietnam’s fight for independence for me there was one degree of separation but an impact still, which coloured my thoughts and attitude to travelling in Vietnam.

The Mekong Delta

The Delta was hot and humid even though it was January and the Vietnamese winter. I had traveled by bus up from the south of Vietnam where I had spent some time on the beautiful island of Phu Quoc.

But more than the Chu Ci tunnels just out of Hi Chi Min city is was the Mekong Delta that let me to reflect on my brother in law and his tour of duty in Vietnam, his conscription and the impact it had on him and his family. He went away and like so many like him came back another. He could not stop running and left his kids, his wife, his family and moved to the tropics of Australia because the hot sticky humidity of the tropics had sucked him in.

So I sat in a bar on the banks of the Mekong looking at the huge bridge built with the help of Australian aid and wrote while swilling cold beer

In the Mekong Delta

Stranger in the country

Delta country

Once a war zone

Once a battlefield

What did it prove?

What did it lose?

A lot

Lost identity

Lost family

Lost trust in what he knew

Sticky, hot, humid

The sweat clings to the skin

No place for a white man

Why was he here

Why did they send him?

Didn’t they know he had kids at home?

But he lost it all in the Mekong Delta

Lost in drugs and despair

Fighting those who should not have been fought