-^-for posterity-^-

Yesterday was a day for people to travel with Mennonite Central Committee and Church World Service to visit sites that have been funded by the two organizations.

We jumped into Land Cruisers. Land Cruisers, for those of you who do not know, are large vehicles, similar to a van, but much more agile. They have large bases and look as if they should be driving up riverbeds, or over sand dunes. I snickered as we drove along through Ha Noi's winding streets towards the countryside. Why would we need vehicles with suspensions that could handle just about everything in their path as we glided down paved roads that were so smooth one could hear the tread of the tire hum along the ground?

We drove out of Ha Noi, out of the hustle, and over the expansive bridge that heads northeast out of the city. The bridge is broad and long and does not arch in the middle. It remains flat throughout and the river, like glass below.

Out of the city, I fell asleep. I have learned to sleep well in small spaces and I curled up against the door of the car using my hand as a pillow. I slept for an hour.
When I awoke, I found myself in a different world. This was a world of rolling hills and masking stands of trees and bushes. I did not wake up because we had arrived at our destination, but rather lifted my head and opened my eyes because we were driving down a road that was seemingly designed for our Land Cruiser.

The road was made from pressed earth. The ground was packed and hard and potholes had long since formed and were well entrenched in the character of the path we were rumbling over. Patches of land were used for growing a variety of things, all at different elevations. These patches of land were no larger than the living room of my childhood home. They meet at all angles, like roughly cut pieces of a puzzle.

People were in the fields. The fields surrounding the road were full of people standing, harvesting and chatting. Any bit of scenery that we passed at a lazy but violently bumpy 30 km/hr was occupied by at least one person.

A typical scene is as follows:

The Land Cruiser lunges over a large rock and threatens to bottom-out as the left side of the car edges dangerously close to the adjacent field. We round a small bend and pass a stand of thick trees and bushes. Off to our right there are three people working in a small field picking tealeaves from long, straight bushes covered in waxy green growth. The three people have parked their bicycles next to the road in a large bush. The three workers look up as we pass. They see a giant Land Cruiser and one of the girls waves and the other two stand there silently. They are all wearing conical hats and loose fitting clothes. We pass in an air-conditioned Land Cruiser.

Finally our Land Cruiser arrives at its destination: a small village of 'San Diu' ethnic minority people in the middle of Thai Ngueyn province. We walked across a small bridge and up a dirt road past fields of tealeaves. We turned left and arrived at a small elementary school that was built with help from Christian World Service. They had built a row of classrooms and a bathroom with a mural on the side depicting happiness and warning people to, 'Wash your hands!'

We toured the building and were greeted by students and teachers as we stood in the hot afternoon sun.

The tour ended and we walked back to the vehicles stopping only to wash our faces in the warm, mountain river. We drove back down the dusty roads in our lumbering Land Cruisers and eventually arrived at the highway that lead us back to Ha Noi. Driving through the hills that sprawl out to the North of Ha Noi is a beautiful experience that makes one feel like an adventurer, a neo-colonizer and a special part of this rich history and culture.