We’ve arrived at Hanoi’s century old Dong Xuan wholesale market on a dreary sodden Sunday afternoon. But the smile on Master Chef Mai beams like South China Sea sunshine. She picks up a handful of rice, rubs it between her fingers then pours it into mine. ThenRead More
We’re here, in country. Back in Vietnam after almost 50 years. Starting in Hanoi, I figured would be an easy transition from the World. After all, I have no real stuff about what was formerly North Vietnam. Indeed, the BW and I had a fun firstRead More
During a typical 365-day tour of Vietnam, every GI had the opportunity to take about a one week break from the war. Rest & Recuperation—“R&R”—it was called. Kind of bizarre, when you think on it, especially for the grunts out in the thick. They’d leave theRead More
I’m on my 2nd Johnnie Walker Gold Reserve (with a Perrier chaser), thinking business class service is pretty darn fine on this Cathay Pacific flight from JFK to Hong Kong, my first stop before going “in country” a few days from now. As soon as IRead More
This is the travelogue of my return to Vietnam, 47 years after my Army tour there. I was drafted in 1969 and served in Vietnam at the end of my 2-year hitch: 1970-71. Vietnam was one of the most beautiful places I’d ever seen–then or since.Read More
