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| Women in ao dai, the traditional
Vietnamese dress. |
| Courtesy Danao International
Holdings |
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| The Horison Hotel, one of
Hanoi’s top establishments. |
| Courtesy Horison Hotel |
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| Phan Thiet: One of Asia’s
top-rated golf courses. |
| Courtesy Danao International
Holdings |
For the visitor, Vietnam is still divided in North
and South.
The North is Hanoi, a serene beauty, a lady ambling
through the narrow streets of the 36 square blocks
of the Old Quarter in the tight-fitting national costume
who offers her elegance and a feeling of eternity
to an appreciative, patient onlooker.
The South is Ho Chi Minh City, the former Saigon,
a place of a million battles fought by hurried people
in business suits rushing through crowded streets
between high-rise glass towers with names like Saigon
Center or Diamond Plaza, a city that offers entertainment,
international cuisine, hot nightlife and a good time
to the thrill seeker.
In between is a lot of lush, green country, mountains
and jungle, a country that at its narrowest point
is not even 40 miles wide, a country scarred, yet
not indelibly marked by its war-torn history; in between
is a land that must be explored, as it cannot be visited
in a hurry, cannot be seen from the window of a tour
bus.
Between Saigon and Hanoi, there is the mile-high city
of Dalat, a French resort town visited by tens of
thousands of Vietnamese honeymooners eager to take
a look at the last emperor’s palace, today the
Dalat Palace luxury hotel.
Between, there is Nha Trang, with mountains held back
from the sea by just a sliver of golden beach. There
is Hai Van pass, a spectacular stretch of highway
where the mountains breach the beach and touch the
ocean. There is Hoi An, a picturesque ancient trading
town. There is Hue, the old imperial city. There is
Tam Coc with its breathtaking scenery of mushroom-like
rock formations emerging from endless rice paddies.
And then, north of Hanoi, there is Halong Bay (‘where
the dragon descends to the sea’ in Vietnamese),
hundreds of limestone islands jutting out of the emerald-colored
water with such elegance and beauty that the entire
region has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage
Site.
Every one of these places has a history – many
histories – attached to it, allowing the visitor
to remain spellbound by the natural beauty of the
place or the imagination of the people who grew up
in this beauty’s spell.
There are dragons everywhere; all of them –
according to the tales – created parts of this
land, and many held the Chinese at bay. There are
myths and tales, there is folklore and there is
history. There are 80 million people, and it is
hard to find one who is not friendly, or does not
have a tale to tell to a foreigner.
Not all of the country is easy traveling, much is
still best seen with a backpack, and for many, that
is how it should remain. But Vietnam has so much more
to offer, it is a country on the move, and its economic
progress is reflected in what it now offers to the
visitor as well as what the increasingly wealthy Vietnamese
demand.
Hotels have sprung up everywhere. The adventure traveler
can still spend a night for $6 – and have a TV
in the room. But that is the Vietnam that many guide
books describe, the rough and tumble Vietnam that
still exists; that lives alongside the new, the up-and-coming
destination, the Vietnam of palatial hotels and conference
tourism, the Vietnam of golf courses and all-inclusive
resorts.
Nick Faldo designed the Ocean Dunes course in Phan
Thiet, a course that runs alongside the tropical beach
and which has been rated as one of the world’s
best; the last emperor, Bao Dai, gave Vietnam the
course a mile up in the air where the green of Vietnam
touches the white of the clouds and the blue of the
skies, whiling away the boredom of a life as a puppet
ruler under the French colonial masters. (No reports
on his handicap.)
As backpacker guides rave about the central highlands,
so do golf magazines about the latest resorts, on
the beach or on the mountain. Both received an A+
rating, a sign of affluence, a sign that Vietnam is
cashing in on its reputation as one of the world’s
safest travel destinations with up-and-coming luxury
infrastructure, as sign that Vietnam is beginning
to offer something for everyone, even the well-heeled
five-star tourist.
This high-end tourist still has to hop from place
to place; from Saigon to Phan Thiet to Dalat to Nha
Trang to Hoi An to Hue to Hanoi, with lots of empty
spots in between. This high-end tourist still needs
a little patience to get that flight that may not
be offered every day, but these are the days to sit
down and listen to the tale of the mother dragon who
came from the mountains to crush the Chinese and create
Halong Bay in the process, or simply hit the green.
The old splendor is still there, the remnants of a
colonial France that conquered to feel good about
itself – colonialism never really made the French
any money. The Dalat Palace with one of Asia’s
most beautiful golf courses.
The Continental in Saigon, where you can stay fit,
because the rooms are so big you can take your morning
jog without venturing into the deadly traffic. The
Rex with its rooftop terrace restaurant where war
correspondents exchanged frontline stories. All restored
to the glory of old for the benefit of the Vietnam
of today.
But the new Vietnam also has the genuinely new, the
business hotel, the shiny five-stars built since Vietnam
became a five-star itself among development agencies.
These hotels, the New World or the Caravelle in Saigon,
the Metropole, the Daewoo or the Horison in Hanoi
offer meeting facilities, international cuisine, exquisite
service and of course top-of-the-line business centers.
These hotels are where you can meet the famous and
the powerful while you sip tea and look at the greens
in Dalat from the same veranda where the emperor used
to sit; where you wait for the opera in the Hanoi
Hilton, architecturally adapted to the adjacent French
opera house; where you talk business in the lobby
café. Not coincidentally, the Horison even
has a permanently reserved parking spot for diplomats
out front by the Marble Court Lobby Lounge, where
ASEAN Summit leaders exchanged views, as did the attendees
of the Vietnam Trade Expo 2003.
Rated one of the world’s safest destinations,
Vietnam is building its infrastructure at breakneck
speed. The backpacker from the budget trip right after
graduation can come back now on business and find
a totally different Vietnam, just next door from the
one he saw last time – both with their own charm.
The SE Asia Games this December – the regional
Olympics – will give another boost to the country’s
infrastructure, and add serious sports facilities
to the activity-minded.
But whether you want to sip tea or Tee off, whether
you want scenery or serenity, Vietnam has it all,
at all prices, all year round. |
