HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam -- The sound of gunshots pierce the thick
jungle air. I'm on my hands and knees, crawling through the
subterranean darkness, sweating in places I didn't know I had sweat
glands.
"Keep on coming! Keep on coming!" urges a wiry Vietnamese man in
fatigues, waving me forward.
A Cu Chi tunnel worker demonstrates how villagers and Viet Cong would
enter the hidden tunnels during the war. The openings were incredibly
small and hidden by leaves. When tourists visit the tunnels today,
they go through segments that have been widened to accommodate
Westerners' bodies.
The claustrophobic tunnel system -- dug by hand -- at one time
measured more than 120 miles, stretching from the Cambodian border to
the outskirts of what was then Saigon. A virtual city, the web of
tunnels was home to local villagers seeking shelter from bomb raids,
plus thousands of Viet Cong, the North Vietnamese Army-backed
guerrillas who battled South Vietnamese and U.S. forces. Here, right
under the boots of American GIs, is where the Viet Cong ate, slept,
hid and launched deadly surprise attacks.
It's also where a select group of American soldiers -- a k a tunnel
rats -- engaged in what has to be the world's scariest game of hide
and seek. These tunnel rats inched their way through the cramped, dark
passageways, trying to find the enemy before the enemy found them.
Something to think about this Memorial Day.
For obvious reasons, not a lot of soldiers wanted to set foot in these
booby-trap-filled hell holes. But these days, the Cu Chi tunnels are
one of Vietnam's most popular tourist attractions. Some 1,000 visitors
flock daily to the site, located about 45 miles from downtown Ho Chi
Minh City (formerly Saigon).
Only a few short sections of the tunnels are accessible today. They've
been expanded a bit to accommodate Westerners' super-sized bodies, but
that didn't keep me from struggling to hunch low enough so my back
wouldn't sc. against the dirt ceiling.
"Are there snakes in here?" I ask my Vietnamese guide, who seems
almost comfortable in these ridiculously confined quarters.
"Not anymore," he answers with a big grin, followed by a few more
rounds of "Keep on coming!"
Tourists can make their way through three sections of tunnels ranging
from 150 to 650 feet in length. If you're claustrophobic or have a bad
back or knees, you're probably better off staying above ground -- at
least when it comes to the longer tunnels.
And don't worry: There's plenty to see above ground. A display of
horrific spiked contraptions once hidden under trap doors in the
jungle floor, craters left by bombs dropped from B-52s, abandoned U.S.
tanks you can climb in, mannequins of North Vietnamese soldiers and
Viet Cong guerrillas -- it's like the Disneyland of Death and
Destruction.
More at: http://www.suntimes.com/lifestyles/travel/asia/1581794,CST-FTR-tunnel0520.article |