Why is there a Skeleton on Top of a Tree?

What we learned in Vietnam and Cambodia

I’ve written before about why we travel. Our curious minds were offered many opportunities during our recent trip to say, “Hmmm?” Today I’ll share just a few.

The Ramen Noodle Billionaire

If you visit Hanoi, you will see many signs for Vingroup. The company builds huge planned communities with apartment towers and luxury resorts. It also manufactures and sells cell phones and owns a supermarket chain. It also built Vietnam’s first and most popular electric vehicle. Everywhere I looked, I saw another Vin company… I had to learn more.

Vingroup’s founder and CEO is Phạm Nhật Vượng, Vietnam’s richest man and its first billionaire. According to Forbes, he has a net worth of $4.2billion.¹ (That’s 105,336,021,840,000.00 in the local currency.)² Born in Hanoi in 1968, he completed his college studies in the Soviet Union. After graduation, he migrated to Ukraine and started an instant noodle company. It was a hit with the locals during the lean post-communist years of the 1990s. He sold the company to Nestlé in 2009 for $150 million, then returned to Vietnam and built Vingroup.

A billionaire capitalist in a communist country who made his first fortune on ramen noodles. Fascinating. His company’s annual revenue represents 1.1% of the country’s GDP. I asked our Vietnamese tour guide if Vượng was recognized as a member of the Communist party. He said, “No. He doesn’t need to be. He just provides opportunities for them to launder their money.” Hmmm…

She Survived and Exposed the Khmer Rouge

You probably don’t recognize the woman above. Her name is Elizabeth Becket, she is a writer and at one time worked for the Washington Post. In 1978, she and two others were invited to tour Cambodia and interview Pol Pot. She had been a war reporter and had visited Cambodia many times. She noticed that the cities were nearly empty during her orchestrated visit. She saw the condition of the few people she was permitted to interview. After interviewing Pol Pot, her two colleagues immediately sent back reports of what they found. Her colleagues were killed that night … and their reports were destroyed.

She waited to send her report until she crossed the border. The atrocities were exposed. She was later called to report on what she found at the Khmer Rouge Tribunal.

Taken during our 2014 trip to Thailand.

Too Many Temples

I had mentioned to our Cambodian guide, Nin, that Angkor Wat reminded me of Ayutthaya, Thailand. He responded, “That part of Thailand used to be Cambodia.” I blushed, wishing I knew more about … well, just about everything. So we attended all the “lectures” offered when we sailed. They were about the countries’ history, culture, food, etc. One evening, our Vietnamese guide provided his perspective on why the Khmer Empire fell. ³ “They were temple crazy”, he said. “They spent all their time and money on building temples.”

Our morning view.

Dams and the Mekong River

Cambodian life revolves around the Mekong River. Its fish farms provide protein. In addition, 50% of Vietnam’s rice production relies on water from the Mekong Delta. (Note: Vietnam is the second largest rice exporter in the world. )

However, the river originates 5000 km north in China. China needs power, so it builds hydroelectric dams.

…Chinese dams blocking the Mekong River as Beijing moves to meet power demands means one of the world's mightiest rivers is likely to face severe water shortages this summer.

This will directly create food insecurity with lower crop yields due to irrigation problems and a reduction in nutrient-rich sediment delivered by the Mekong.

Indirectly, the reduced water flow will impact the economies of downstream Southeast Asian nations, according to experts who say the loss of food sourced from the Mekong will drive up prices and cause increased hunger, reducing worker productivity. — VOAnews.com

Cambodian fish farms are now towed dozens of kilometers upstream each year as water levels fall and the water becomes brackish. Some stilted communities now begin kilometers from the water’s edge. The impact of Chinese dams has caused unease in downstream countries for nearly twenty years. As climate change impacts the intensity of rainfall and droughts impact farming and fishing, what can we expect over the next twenty years?⁴

The Skeleton and the Tree

We know that the horrors of war don’t end when a cease-fire is called. Forty years after the “American” War, skeletons fell from or could be found in treetops in the jungle. Why? It was determined that injured soldiers sometimes climbed partway up a tree, or their dead bodies were encircled by vines that grew in the jungle. Over time, the bodies decayed … and the trees grew. Skeletons were found on top of trees, and sometimes they fell. Hmmm…

Na próxima semana, voltamos a falar da vida em Portugal,

Nanc

1. There are now six Vietnamese billionaires on the Forbes list. Some are looking abroad to invest their wealth.

2. The average monthly salary in Vietnam is 8.5m vnd, or $339.

3. “Several major factors have been cited as contributors to the demise of Angkor: war with the neighboring polity of Ayutthaya; conversion of the society to Theravada Buddhism; increasing maritime trade which removed Angkor's strategic lock on the region; over-population of its cities; climate change bringing an extended drought to the region. The difficulty in determining the precise reasons for Angkor's collapse lies in the lack of historical documentation.” — ThoughtCo.com

4. If you would like to learn more.