This is part three of my motion trilogy in Vietnam: people in motion, things in motion, and now house in motion.
My friend carefully explained that builders would dig underneath the foundation, then seek to maneuver the multi-storied unit meters away.
Quite a herculean effort!
The long ride to District 7 to visit my friend reminded me of the outskirts of Manila, or even Tijuana.
District 7 is overcrowding, congested and filled with people moving about with a sense of urgency. After rush hour came time for evening classes to pour out on the streets. And right after that long-winding containers on truck beds would bumper-to-bumper on city streets.
I passed by the Harbor, where the fateful barge took me away from my childhood city, once for all (you can take a Texan our of Texas, but you cannot take Texas out of a Texan, kind of things).
The city is building new temples (not capitalized). These temples are well-lit, clean glasses so one can see mannequin and jewelry. One plaza tries to top the other right next door, in breakneck competition.
Like rice-porridge stalls next to each other to form a cluster, Lotte Plaza competes with Diamond, which competes with Parkson, which competes with Vincom which definitely displaces the old TAX shopping center.
I hope these new materialistic temples built on solid foundation.
It would be hard to “move” them (in FL, I live near a ghost mall. Quite a depressing sight).
I can’t help looking at the Buddhist Temple on the way from the airport.
The entrance gate did get moved a few meters back for road enlargement.
But the house in District 7 wasn’t that lucky. It injured two as it tilted forward, then collapsed, blocking the very street city was trying to clear and repair.
Change seems to be the only constant here in this city of 8 million (and counting, of course), since more young people from ROC are still pouring in,
first to settle at the outskirts, then to “move” up to upper echelon: District 1, where multitude of malls and mannequins are raking in their hard-earned money. Money moving in and out of pocket, fast. That’s for another blog.
Thang Nguyen 555 