Hue Imperial City

Saturday, March 16th, 2013 Hue Vietnam
After a fantastic buffet breakfast in our hotel, we set off for the Hue Citadel yesterday morning. On the south side of the Perfume River is the new city of Hue where all the businesses, restaurants and hotels, including ours, are located. On the north side is the old Hue Imperial City which is a big square about 2 km or 3 km on each side, surrounded by a moat. Inside that is the Imperial Citadel with another moat and 6m high walls, that is about 800 or 900 m on each side. Inside the Citadel is the Purple Forbidden City where the emperors of the Nguyen Dynasty lived with their family, concubines and eunuch servants.

 This is one of the four gates into the Citadel.

 Inside the Citadel, this is the reconstructed Throne Palace where the emperor would receive important political and military people (mandarins) to hear their reports and problems.

 Anita and a throne.

There are dozens of courtyards in between the buildings with lots of nice blossoms.

 Some of the courtyards have nice pools and even islands. The Imperial City was built from 1805 to 1833 and the last emperor lived here until 1925. In 1947 the city was damaged by the French during their war with Vietnamese nationalists and in 1968 the Americans bombed the Citadel very heavily. About half of the buildings are still standing or have been reconstructed.

There are lots of nice shade trees along the roads inside the Citadel.

 We wandered through courtyard after courtyard, looking through the buildings and smelling the blossoms. The grapefruit blossoms are particularly fragrant.

 This was a building used as a waiting room for people arriving to visit the emperor's mother at her palace. It was bombed by the Americans and is awaiting reconstruction.

 This is the west gate. The whole Citadel was built along straight lines with careful geometry and symmetry. It's hard to do justice to the Citadel because the buildings are comparatively low and there are lots of them and lots that have been bombed. Re-construction work will be underway for a long time.

 All of the buildings have big wood posts and ornate carved timber roof trusses all lacquered in red and gold.

This is the inside of the royal theater where the emperor and his family watched operas on the stage.

 This is a little ornate building, decorated with a colourful tile mosaic.

There are a few elephants here that are used for tourist rides. There was also a female elephant chained nearby.

 As we got back out onto the street, we witnessed a motorcycle accident. I think 2 motorcycles just swerved into each other. One drove on without damage but the young woman being helped to the curb slid with her left leg under the bike. Other people stopped and picked up her and the bike. She was shaken up and couldn't put any weight on her left leg. I don't know if she had broken anything or just got some road rash. There are quite a few minor accidents here which are usually harmless but not always. We were told today that 300 people sometimes die in traffic accidents over the Tet holiday in February.

This is our hotel. From our 7th floor room we have a great view of the river. Last night we went to a Vietnamese vegetarian restaurant called Lien Hoa, recommended in Lonely Planet. Once we found it, a few blocks from here, we were a little apprehensive as we went in because it looked a messy. Diners here, like in tapas bars in Spain, just throw their paper napkins on the floor. The restaurant was full of Vietnamese people and a couple of westerners. We sat at low wicker tables and our waitress, who spoke no English, helped us with the menu. In the end, we just let her pick out a number of dishes for us since we had no idea what we were ordering. About 6 different plates arrived. It looked like an awful lot of food but it was so good we managed to devour it all. Total cost, including beer was 140,000 VND ($7). We left the waitress a good tip for her efforts on our behalf.

 This morning after breakfast we walked through town and found another restaurant that we want to try tonight. After that we went for a walk along the river through the park. There are tourist boats and fishermen on the river.

 This is some old crumbling monument but we really have no idea why it's there. Because of all the war damage and lack of funds, it's very difficult for the Vietnamese people to reconstruct and maintain all of their heritage structures.

 The park along the river is very cool. It has big sculptures all over the place.

As we rested in the shade, a university student approached us and asked if he could speak with us to practice his English. We always like these chats so we talked with him for over an hour. He looks young but is 21 years old. Anita recognized that his teeth are bad from poor nutrition. He is studying public health and will graduate in 2 more years. He's from a small town where his parents are farmers and lives in Hue to go to school. As part of his training, he works part time in an orphanage. A drinks vendor on a bicycle came by so we asked this young guy if he'd like something to drink. I bought a beer for myself but he said that he had water and didn't need anything. As we got to know him, we were convinced of his sincerity (unlike some of the taxi drivers). All he wanted from us was a chance to improve his English.
When we were leaving we asked him if we could give him a small donation toward his studies or toward the orphanage where he worked. He was very shy but said okay. We gave him 400,000 VND ($20) which will probably feed him for a month or more. He thanked us profusely while he wiped away tears. He hugged us and in the end we were all getting a little misty. It's easy to get cynical about all the people trying to scam tourists but not everyone is like that. We try to keep an open mind about the people we meet and are often rewarded at the most unlikely times. And, as we discussed with Anita's brother Tim in Cambodia, we've learned that small gifts directly to worthy people we meet are the best way to help make at least a bit of difference in the world.