-^-for posterity-^-

being in hanoi, one is obligated to travel to ha long bay and lazily float through the historic and legendary islands. islands is not the right word. one word could never capture the islands. they are white limestone rocks that jut out from the water and shoot up violently and are spaced so that they give one the idea that they are large scales on a dragon's back which are covered with black film and a spattering of green plants that seems to flow from the top. they are spaced closely together. they are ominous and beautiful. they look alien and uninhabitable. there is no space for life. ha long means descending dragon and that is probably the best way to describe it.

we eventually made it to our boat. it was made from a deep red wood and had three stories. the boat was filled with red, wooden benches and tables and we were going to sleep the night there. we were going to sleep in the historic ha long bay.

we had a tour guide. he was a small boy of a man that spoke entirely with his hands because words barely made it between his teeth. he was wiry. he was powered entirely by rice.

our first stop was to move slowly towards the rock formations that surrounded the bay. the rocks poured around us as we pushed through the water. we slowly headed towards an island and were promised caves.

the caves were incredible in every way possible. we followed our wiry tour guide up the hand-made stone stairs. we followed groups of koreans and chinese who were following very experienced tour guides that held up signs and bullhorns and pointed with tiny lasers. they spoke quickly and knew the caves inside and out. our tour guide was a novice; he would amble ahead through the large groups and stop in odd places telling us stories that were of little significance. he tried hard and we loved him for it.

the caves were pale and smooth on top and filled with dripping rocks that had long frozen.. they looked like caramel and marshmallow’s oozing from the walls. they looked hard but fragile. they had a character that was not entirely familiar.

things were made more unfamiliar by the additional features of the cave. someone had dug a wide path through the cave and paved it with concrete. someone else had placed different colored lights all over the walls which made the dripping rocks light up in odd formations. there was pink and blue and green and purple. it looked like disneyland spelunking. then there were the voices of the surrounding tour groups. they were korean and japanese and chinese and the voices of the tour guides bellowed and echoed off of the pastel lights.

more importantly there were trashcans throughout. they were shaped like dolphins and penguins. their mouths were where you put food and they only added to the 'it's a smallworld' theme. there were also fountains in the middle. the fountains were powered by the gentle hum of generators. i was looking for something more natural.

we stumbled out of the cave recovering from an odd, disney-like hallucination and emerged to the beauty of nature. humans can do nothing to improve nature and that's a lesson we really need to learn. the stairs striped down the side of the island towards the boat. we rolled onto the boat and rumbled off.

we sat on benches and behind tables and talked about reality. black rock sporadically jumped all around us. they were all too real, more real than television even is. they rocks surrounded us and we tried to take pictures of the water and the gigantic fence the rocks made. we tried to put it into words, pictures but no one could replicate it; no one could really explain the randomness and majesty of simple rock formations jutting out of emerald green water.
and then...

the night comes and the boat continues to hum through the greenish-blue plasma. the thin film that covers the plasma seems to be thick, but fragile.

night comes. it doesn't come all at once but slowly creeps up on us. the moon appeared all at once as we passed by a low formation of rocks. it was pale and innocent. it was not dramatic, but swiftly grew. as we passed by incredible rock formation after rock formation, the moon increased in power and strength. the formations grew bolder too, but the intensity of their presence did not change at all.

as the sun retreated and the boat rocked, the moon grew and soon was at a perfect height above the rocks. the red-wood boat was invincible and chugged through the waves as we moved out into the ocean. the moon hung and lit our path as random, wispy clouds tried to shield it.

night fell on ha long bay. the dragon fell asleep and we stared wide-eyed at the beauty. moments like this will never be erased from our minds because of our revolting world.

and then...

ha long bay is the site of many historic battles and important military victories and losses.

back when the huns were trying to take over the world, ha long bay was the site of an important battle. the leaders of the huns came through ha long bay and tried to attack the vietnamese troops through the rock formations. the leader of the vietnamese, tran hung dao would not lose this battle and asked his troops to install large, wooden sticks between the rock formations. therefore, when the hun ships entered and stopped, the tide would lower and the ships would be stuck. the vietnamese attacked after the ships were stuck on teh wooden poles and many ships were simply sunk by the poles. the natural beauty of ha long bay and the cunning of tran hung dao were the reasons for the vietnamese victory.

another important military event with very different results: most americans are aware of the gulf of tonkin event and how that lead to the us' involvement in vietnam.

in the mid sixties, the us patrolled the waters off of northern vietnam regularly listening for radio frequencies and other things that would be militarily interesting. also, they would use the us boats to launch strikes on important military installations throughout the north. the strikes would be carried out by south vietnamese soldiers trained by the us using us equipment.

one of these strikes turned into a larger debacle when north vietnamese boats attacked the us ships waiting off shore. the boats that attacked were small and caused little damage (in the pentagon papers, they claimed that only one bullet actually struck an american ship). the us destroyed the northern ships. the whole event was repeated and used as an excuse by LBJ to get more support for a wider war in southern vietnam.

i now float through the waters of ha long bay. through spaces in the rock formations i can see well lit shipping lanes, boats sitting miles off of shore. only a few miles behind me sits the peaceful town of ha long and only thirty odd years ago an event happened a few miles from my boat that changed the shape of the world.

and then...

i sat on the side of the boat while people finished their meal and chatting. i was not a participant and wanted to see what there was to see at night.

the moon hung directly in front of me. behind me there was a large, wooden statue on the front of the boat of a dragon. it provided protection. the moon was above a valley created by the two large stone mounds in the near distance. the mound on the right was gigantic and stark. it rose directly out of the water and didn't stop for a good fifty feet. it banked sharply to the right and was flat at the top. the moon cast a straight shadow that engulfed half of our boat. the moon was to the left of the shadow. the other rock formation was a gentle banking rock formation that started directly behind the larger, more ominous rock. it rolled up from the sea and crested some distance to the left. it reached behind the angry rock as if trying to console it. the moon rested above, as if patrolling a valley.

the reflection of the moon was gentle in the rippling water. the rumble of the boat's engine shook the ripples and made the reflection jump sporadically. the reflection was vibrantly white. it reflected perfectly up to the bottom of my feet. the soles of my feet basked in the reflected glory of the moon off of the now pitch black water of ha long bay.

earlier tonight we had gone swimming. four or five people blindly jumped into the mysterious water that was now murky dark and almost black. the moon hung between two rock formations, the same ones, except lower.

my plunge into the depths was full of bravery. i pretended not to fear what was below and jumped. the water was as warm as bath water and saltier than expected. as i sunk to the bottom, i kicked as violently as possible. i had no idea what was lying under the pristine surface of the water and wasn't interested in finding out. images of mysterious eels and bands of sharks plagued my imagination. sharp rocks right below the surface was another irrational concern.

on the surface, i spent as much time as possible basking in the moon and the surrounding scenery. the rocks seemed more real as i treaded water. i was a part of the scenery. the lower half of my body that was hidden by the dark waters now belonged to the bay. the moon shone above and comforted. clouds passed by quickly and played tricks on it's complexion.

while reveling in my surroundings, i also spent much time trying to keep my legs near the surface of the water in an effort to fend off any mysterious beasts that may be roaming around looking for a night time snack. should i kick my legs quickly or should i tread softly? would they be more attracted to movement or stillness? i couldn't decided an oscillated between the two: sometimes i would kick and other times i would float.

at the given moment, male hormones began to take over. people decided that it would be a wonderful thing to jump from the top of the boat into the bay. people would climb up to the third story of the boat, about twenty some feet up, yell and jump. the beauty was all disrupted by a tribal mating ritual.

after the four men who were also in the water with me went, i felt it was my duty to fulfill my tribal rite. i too would climb to the top and plunge over into the abyss. i too would throw caution to the wind and be one of the guys. of course i didn't pretend to be so coy about it. i simply climbed to the top and, with teh aid of carl, one of the new mcc volunteers in hanoi, i climbed to the edge. i made sure we all knew it was a mating ritual (i yelled, 'and this will secure my masculinity?' after an affirmation, i jumped). carl jumped first and made it look easy. i edged out onto the slippery, tin roof, judged the landing and jumped. i made sure to jump away from the bottom of the boat which jutted out a good five feet. i did cheat by lowering myself to the ground.

all the male testing clouded my earlier fears about what lived beneath in the dark waters. i hit the water awkwardly, my ears nose and filled with water and i was miserable but proud. i casually swam around in a bit of a daze and happily exited when everyone else did.

i swam around in the mysterious waters that hold so much history. if i could see what these rocks have seen, i would be wise. if we all could learn the lessons that these rocks have learned, the world would be infinitely better.

and then...

the night passed without incident. we slept in rooms that resembled the coffin cinderella was held in: the bed was positioned between two large pieces of glass that were thin and stretched the length of the bed. the room had nothing else except a showcased bed. there were fans at the bottoms of the beds and those fans provided some cool air as the night passed. the generators of the boat were periodically turned off and on as the night went. sometimes the rooms were stifling saunas, and other times the rooms were cool caves best suited for hibernation.

we woke up in the sauna with the sheet wrapped around you and sweat soaked through your pillow. nothing will make you get out of bed faster than finding yourself in a damp, sweltering oven wrapped in a moist, foreign blanket..

we rose and the day began with more beauty and more moments that are indescribable.

the small, limestone hills that have been eroded over time still stood around us. the growth on these hills still arched towards the sun. the water was still emerald, except maybe more so in the morning sun.

the sun passed behind clouds and the rest of the day was overcast, but not depressingly so.. the clouds would play tricks with the different hills as they moved further away. the hills closer to me would be clear, even if covered by a thin layer of mist. the hills behind them were drastically lighter adn the hills in the back were ghosts. the entire scene, with our boat moving through the rocks and the rocks in the foreground moving faster than the rocks in the mid ground and the rocks in the mid ground moving faster than the ghostly rocks in the background, was beautiful, ghastly and magnificent.

we swam again and the natural came alive. we became part of the surroundings that seem so sterile from the deck of our boat. the water was green and, when someone took a picture from the top deck, it looked like we were floating in green space, suspended oddly on our backs with arms and legs contorted as a fetus must stretch in the womb.

the boat left and we somberly sliced through the green water. we left the rocks, a monument built by god who, bored one day, threw pebbles down from heaven, to remind us that we were nothing and that beauty could sometimes be impossible to comprehend. beauty could be too much for our simple brains that worked only with 0's and 1's. sometimes, things could be more powerful than ever expected, but only if we give ourselves the opportunity. we humbly and solemnly marched away. they stared at us the whole time, watching us and asking us not to forget everything they had seen.