Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum; In Death ‘Til We Do Path

It was very quiet and a little dead inside. 

I have to prefix this blog post by stating that I am nothing akin to resembling a morning person and I had had 3 hours of sleep before heading out to experience the wonders of the mausoleum and its accompanying museum. The Mausoleum houses the preserved corpse of Ho Chi Minh, a leader who founded the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. During weekdays, the Mausoleum is only open until 12pm and I had currently avoided seeing it until recently from sheer laziness. Having passed the site numerous times, I was confident in my ability to rock up without so much of plan and blitz the grounds from 10am, with a mouth full of gritted determination and a decisive shutter finger. Apparently, reality had other plans for my arrival. Finding motorbike parking next to a roundabout close to the Mausoleum that cost me a whole 5,000 VND (<$0.25 US), I confidently dismounted my scooter only to end up becoming a bird at the window of a bakery. Despite seeing lines of visitors walking across the grounds and an uninterrupted line of sight to the building, I couldn’t discern where this mystical portal allowing entry could possibly be. After asking a security guard and following signs for a few blocks, I eventually found the road to petrification.

Courtesy of Google Maps. The red route is the ‘son-of-a-bitch walkway.’

As a general description of the route from the entrance of the grounds to the exit of the Mausoleum – it was a fairly linear path with just a slight semblance of freedom of choice along the way. I couldn’t help feel that it was a rather apt representation of what the building itself championed.

After a seemingly pointless security check, where not a single pat-down of a patron was given after a conspicuously loud metal scanner alarm, I received a rather fetching temporary handbag and parted ways with my backpack as it chilled in the bag check area.

Although the route through the site was scenic enough from the decoration of foliage and glimpses of the Ho Chi Minh Museum, it was another chore en route to the main event and the images of singing elderly men playing on television screens along the way were of little interest. Once upon the route to the Mausoleum proper, it was now time to say goodbye to the fleeting love that adorned my arm and part ways with the camera that we had supported, together. Strangely enough, it was requested that any professional cameras were checked into the holding shack, but we were allowed to keep hold of any phones. Seemingly, security guards shouting at anyone who tried to use their phones were deemed a suitable deterrent (to my annoyance after trying to contact a friend.)

When you finally reach the foot of the monolithic building, it is hard to feel anything other than distaste at such an unapologetically hideous looking creature of stone. Once inside, the plastic red carpet leads you through the bowels of the building and into the chamber of Ho Chi Minh’s death-slumber, with nought but solemn stares and silence to fill the air. Whilst I am no stranger to preserved body parts and specimens, the perversion behind this setup was a little disturbing, like the Victorian death portraits, but a live-action peepshow of which we were all perverts vying for a fix of the dire. Shuffling along the edges of the chamber, my eyes alternated between the orange-lit, domed head of Ho Chi Minh and the numerous guards in white, serving their master in his afterlife.

Exiting the spying booth, the daylight had a hard, judging light to it, but once reunited and reconciled with my departed camera it was onto the next – for the first time in my visit to the site I was given an actual option on how to advance onwards: ‘left to the museum and One Pillar Pagoda’ or ‘right to the Presidential Palace.’ I’d hate to ruin a surprise, but both paths take you back to the exit of the grounds; the choice leading right, however, lets you pay 40,000 VND (under $2 US) to see the housing buildings of the deceased president before reaching the exit.

Fully saturated in the vat of lucidity that comes with sleep deprivation, a lot of the photographs and information dotted about the presidential grounds held little attention or interest, but once pointed straight towards the One-Pillar Pagoda and Ho Chi Minh Museum, spirits were greatly lifted – not only freedom to wander and to photograph, but to also mill about and observe the different, and often colourful, groups of tourists.

With only 20 minutes to view the museum and make it back to the original bag check before 12pm, there was 0 to none opportunity to take in the information on display inside the museum and with a brisk pace and discerning eye for photographs, it was a whistlestop affair. To my shock and surprise, the museum was full of art displays and alternative pieces inspired by the history of Vietnam – it was a welcome contrast to the grey and gothic scenes that had come just before.

Accidentally exiting via the car park and not the front of the building, I managed to dodge a motorbike tour salesmen, load up with my bag again and trek back to my scooter for a ride straight to land of dreams before I had to start work in the evening. Thankfully, it wasn’t a nightmare making my way there.

Overall?

Living here, in Vietnam, it is pretty imperative that I discover and learn about the local culture and history that I am clearly benefitting from, but learning from the Mausoleum itself may need only be a one-shot deal to that end; the Ho Chi Minh Museum itself was really intriguing and it was such a shame that I had to the former, only to be briefly introduced to the latter. The museum is also open in the afternoons and I’d be perfectly happy to frequent it again with my camera and a head filled with rest and patience. Considering the fact that the only part of touring the grounds paid for was the Presidential Palace, it isn’t the worst attraction I have ever encountered, but as far as unintentionally creepy opportunities to experience local culture go: you are a great ruler, Ho Chi Minh.

London; Eye On You.

Eyes Are a Window to the Soul.

Due to an imminent departure from England looming and a friend from abroad visiting the country, I decided that it was high-time I took a look at the landmark that is the London Eye. Since its construction in 2000 I’ve always wanted to ride on the Eye and see out across the scapes of London and I was a little surprised, yet lacking in shock, to now see that Coca-Cola had plastered their branding across it. Checking out the website, it was nice to see that even in the logo, the name of the landmark was physically smaller than the company making money from it. Yes, money makes the world go round, but this wheel was literally a cog in the works of some hefty profit-making.

Fortunately for me, ticket booking wasn’t nearly as wallet-raiding as I had expected it to be; after looking up the prices for online booking: 1 adult ticket for a midday slot and entry to a 4DX Experience was £20.70 – or the equivalent of a meal and drinks after a day at the British Museum, or Tate Britain Gallery. With a journey time of 30 minutes, this definitely wasn’t the best cost-to-time ratio of a good thrill, but didn’t quite have the shame of more loin-based services. The purchasing experience was pretty painless and I chose to have my receipt e-mailed to me so I could grab a ticket on arrival, the same day. To collect my ticket, I was told that I would require my card used for payment; the e-mail receipt of purchase and a photo ID. I also wondered if they would want my National Insurance Number, fingerprints, blood sample and favourite colour. Yes, this was of course probably for security reasons, but by being just a little bit of evidence short of a background check, it was a little annoying; gee, thanks, terrorism.

Arriving at Waterloo Station on a Friday before a bank holiday weekend and whilst in the midst of the school summer holidays, I used the tourist information maps en-route to find my way towards the waterfront of the Thames. Wading through the crowds of families, tourists and young people I eventually found my way to the ticket building that lay opposite the Eye itself and, accessing the array of queues for ticket booking/collection/payment, chose the lane that corralled me to the collection counter. I was offered a map of the skyscape for £1 and thought: ‘Yeah, that sounds useful.’ Essentially, I paid for a physically disabled frisbee. At least one small light in the darkness helped to add some cheer – the toilets in the building were free and I felt obliged to go and receive my money’s worth.

So pretty and yet, so disappointing. The reverse side shows the sky at night.

The time slot for my friend and I was 12pm, which we managed to make, even with the inflated queue size and to be honest, regardless of the time on the ticket, it seemed that the slots were more of a crowd staggering device than a hard-and-fast binding.

The queue started in the background and crossed a walkway to the foreground of the picture. School holidays can be hell for an introvert.

The website stated that being on-site at least 30 minutes before your allotted time would be required and it actually was pretty spot-on. Waiting in the shadow of the Eye gave us time to admire the flags that appeared underneath the belly of each capsule – adding plenty of colour to the otherwise monotone structure.

Before we could taste the air inside a capsule, there was a bag check and my friend had the pleasure of getting her backpack x-rayed before having to collect it back herself so that we could move on with the queue. A small shack provided last-minute snacks for the journey and then it was onto the loading platform to ride the great wheel of marketing.

Loading into the capsule was the easiest part of the preliminary process and sure as hell gave the London Underground platforms something to aspire to. The capsule had about 20 people inside when the doors shut and we began the circuitous journey back to the starting position.

The gradual incline of the pod is slight for the most part and unless you catch a breeze, your feet aren’t too troubled by the movement of the floor beneath you. Inside the capsule, you have a 360 degree view to the outside; an oval bench in the middle of the floor; a metal rail around the sides; computer terminal displays and air conditioning which actually make the whole experience quite comfortable as long as you aren’t afraid of heights, or claustrophobic,

 

 

 

 

The London Eye gives you great views across the city and especially of Westminster and Elizabeth Tower (Big Ben) but for the most part I found the view a little lacklustre compared to some of the cityscapes I’ve experienced from abroad. It may just be the envy of having the Shard looking down at me even at the peak of the capsule’s rotation, but I was underwhelmed from the variety of buildings and found trying to shuffle between tourists a little tiresome after the first few attempts to photograph through the glass of our enclosure. The curved glass makes for a great look but when trying to photograph through it, the level of reflection is infuriating, unless of course you can get a camera lens to smooch the window.

The Houses of Parliament with the Elizabeth Tower clockface on the right.

Profile of the wheel.

Once down from the wheel, the fill of tourists and crowded places had been had and the 4DX experience was skipped for the less-travelled path towards the Tate Britain, to see free exhibits and to have something to explore and marvel at.

Overall…?

If I had been new to England and unaware of the delights that lay in far-flung cities, I’d have loved to be riding on a giant carousel wheel in the middle of London, however, I wasn’t an attraction-craving, temporary tourist to the city and I’ve seen a handful of capitals in various corners of the globe. Despite the costs of the tickets, the crowds that swarmed its base and the lack of intrigue when reaching its apex, the wheel was worth seeing. Not for the ride, or air-conditioned chambers, but for the sheer fact that the London Eye itself is a beautiful structure that makes for some great photographs and at least has green areas where you could sit – enjoying a picnic to the sight of its rotation during a sunny day is a rather calming prospect. So what can the Eye tell you about the soul of London? It is overpriced, tourist-filled and has a questionable effectiveness to its functionality; however, deeply ingrained in its core is a sense of astounding beauty, that cannot be denied or diminished.