Faces from Vietnam and some tiny tales…

One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society… shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

I see the eyes that still have the courage to dream, I see the tired smile that still hopes for a better tomorrow….

‘She’, Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #1: While the World was busy making gun powder, she was trying to make rice wafers for the widows of martyrs who will consume the bullets!

Cai Be Island, Mekong

The object of my relationship with Vietnam has been to heal the wounds that exist, particularly among our veterans, and to move forward with a positive relationship,… Apparently some in the Vietnamese government don’t want to do that and that’s their decision.
-Ho Chi Minh

On the way to Tian Giang

Tiny tales from Vietnam #2: When hunger begged mercy, friends promised fruits for foes…

Mobile fruit seller, Cai Be Island, Mekong

I was proud of the youths who opposed the war in Vietnam because they were my babies.
– Benjamin Spock

Gondolas, Ho Chi Minh City canal

Tiny tales from Vietnam #3:  He will rather buy a guitar and not a gun for his son…

Father and son, Cai Be Island, Mekong

Now we have a problem in making our power credible, and Vietnam is the place.
– John F. Kennedy, 1961

6 Strings and 1 string, Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #4: When they decided to sit and smile with love, peace threatened war! At the Walking street of Ho Chi Minh City.

Late night lovers, Ho Chi Minh City

I see light at the end of the tunnel.
– Walt W. Rostow, National Security Adviser, Dec. 1967

The boss and her staff – Tian Giang

Tiny tales from Vietnam #5: A fruit seller of the floating market on the Mekong River; coconut water is free if you buy a dozen of bananas from her!

Floating market, Mekong River

We believe that peace is at hand.
– Henry Kissinger, Oct. 1972

Postcards please. $1 – Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #6: She knew the value of education, she comes to teach the kids in the Cai Be Island (Mekong Delta) all the way from Ho Chi Minh City; everyday…

The Teacher, Cai Be Island, Mekong

I think Operation Smile is in more than 22 countries, mostly Third World. It just happened that my schedule opened up at the time they were heading to Vietnam.
– Roma Downey

Coconut Roof makers of Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #7: She played to the audience, she didn’t listen to their remarks, she played to music lovers – just now she opens her eyes…

A musician in Ho Chi Minh City

Television brought the brutality of war into the comfort of the living room. Vietnam was lost in the living rooms of America–not on the battlefields of Vietnam.
– Marshall McLuhan, 1975

Frank, the Guide in Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #8: They want to touch the sky as well; like your son and daughters do. They demand a better living!

Siblings from the Cai Be Island, Mekong

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
– IF, Rudyard Kipling

Two sisters, Ho Chi Minh City

Tiny tales from Vietnam #9: His wife asked him to paint for food, he asked his wife to be the model for love!

A street painter at Ho Chi Minh City…

Vietnam was what we had instead of happy childhoods.
– Michael Herr, 1977

Poppy rice and honey tea joint, Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #10: When the world slept, she would pack chocolates for living and read Tintin comics; the only thing that makes her laugh in solitude!

Chocolate seller, Cai Be Island, Mekong

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.

– The Road Not Taken, Robert Frost

A local house in Cai Be Island, Mekong

Tiny tales from Vietnam #11: He said, “Red means so much more than blood and communism…”

Cai Be Island, Mekong

A humble attempt to capture some of the faces from Vietnam while I spent a week in Ho Chi Minh City and travelled to the Tian Giang and the Cai Be Island of the Mekong Delta! There are stories behind all those faces and the stories gave me a simultaneous rush of hope and depression… Sharing a few with fellow bloggers and readers!

Signing off from the desk of mymotionpicture, bidding a fond adieu to this mystic land of ‘endless charm’…