This guy, Thomas Huang, went searching for a chocolate eclaire in Saigon, and ended up having his article in the Dallas Morning News
I sat next to a business man from Dallas on my recent trip to Vietnam.
He and his partners were into real estate.
And the amazing thing was, while his partner and he flew separately, Korean and Japan Airlines respectively, they both arrived at the same time.
(The Polish government could have taken a page from this playbook).
I wasn’t sure they went hunting for French bakery or not. Not everyone from Dallas craves for the dough.
But I must admit, my upper class men were into French cinema (Bonjour Tristesse), French music (Et Pourtant) and French cuisine (cafe au lait).
I, however, just barely missed the tail end of French colonial influence, and the emergence of R&R (Oh Susie Q).
Everything came back to me a bit fuzzy: like on a super 8mm reel. Back then, life was on the fast lane. Fashion and fad, fun and fear. Ballroom dancing anyone?. Male riders in the back of scooters must sit cross-legged like girls, for security reason. Occasionally, when a waltz number was up, I saw couples wearing white shirts (reflect the psychedelic purple) and tight jeans, twirling and turning, both long-hair and skinny. Way to go the late 60’s.
My upper class men adopted foreign music but selectively: Santana was OK, since it fit into their ballroom dance cycle. Christophe was OK, but only for listening. And , out on the left field, came Lobo, with You and Me and the dog named Boo (Lobo and Procol Harum were both one-hit wonders).
Public school got ample supplies of French bread and powdered milk. Up to their ears. And to change menu, they went for US army rations sold on the black market: those crackers and small peanut butter in army-green tin cans (reminded me of Kiwi shoe polish).
Anyway, we grew up in a hurry, pulled all-night study to avoid the draft (had there been a Canada North, many would have gone. In fact, our generations’ Canada was Colombo scholarship to study in Melbourne).
And of course, the ubiquitous French bread for study break. They poured the sauce and their hearts into it, and tell you the truth, I am going to join Thomas Huang of Dallas in his hunt for a perfect French baguette. It makes me hungry all of a sudden. I must give it to them, the French, who came up with everything long: Eiffel tower, baguette and Tour De France.
Le jour le plus longue. No wonder they drink coffee all day long. Their days are even longer than ours (but they work only 35 hours per week). I realize just now why I enjoyed Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans. I was “Thomas Huang” but in the opposite direction. He went from Dallas to Saigon, and I, Saigon to New Orleans, both in search of “un temp perdu”.
Those were the times, of war and peace, love and hate, loyalty and betrayal. Of fast life on fast lane and sudden losses.
Regime change and revolution upheaval. Of romance and regret. Life-defining moments. It’s not just an eclaire.
It’s an era, forever gone, yet stuck in memory. Now the street behind yesterday’s Independence Palace lay dimly, leaving the glowing stage for capitalist-like District One, Vietnam’s shopping show case. We’ve got it too! Yet we didn’t get it. Maybe just an eclaire. Stuffs that are consumable. Everything else is left to fate. When one gave up free will, fate takes over, by default.
Former colonial mentality follows its master’s fate into oblivion. Bonjour Tristesse! How I wish for the young to dance, to dream and to make it happen again: to build bridges instead of jumping out from one.
Thang Nguyen 555 