"The endemic post-war hardship"

Yesterday (Thurs 10/18), after a fascinating day along the upper Mekong stopping by an island nursery of young saplings (mango, coconut, plums, jackfruit, etc) and a brick factory (more in another post), we had the long bus ride back to Saigon.  En route, Huy spoke to us at length about that dark period of post-reunification in Viet Nam between 1975 and 1986.

Born in 1976, Huy's memories are that of a young child, but he remembers the long lines for food, and the morning he went to the place where he heard there would be fish (a rare treat) only to finally get a piece as big as two fingers in a huge block of ice, hardly enough to feed a meal to this family of five.  They were allocated one chicken a month; to get a second by way of the black market was to risk jail if a neighbor exposed you.  His parents worked for the government in Hanoi, but still had to engage (with "negotiable skills") in the black market, saving what money they could to purchase gold ( the only secure investment).

The government controlled everything.  There was no such thing as private enterprise. All farming was communal.  Regardless of how good your skills at farming, all proceeds went to the government and were reallocated in a way the government thought would ensure equality.  If the commune met or exceeded production goals, it would be credited to good communist leadership.  Coming in below expectations was blamed in the weather.  Because there was no incentive for individual initiative, all motivation to excel was killed, said Huy.  The economy began to flounder.

Huy then shared the following story:  Three prisoners were talking.  One said he was in jail because he arrived at the factory too early and was accused of being a spy.  The second said he was arrested because he arrived too late and was accused of not supporting the communal  system.  The third arrived on time; he was accused of purchasing a foreign watch.

(Always using humor to lighten a difficult subject.)

Viet Nam was like an island, said Huy.  One needed permission to visit atmosphere town. The only foreigners were Soviets, and people were told not to speak with them. There was only one radio station, and the television broadcast just two hours a night, primarily Soviet content.

Liberal members inside the communist party realized although the country was united, things were getting worse.  Some said, we are running the country the wrong way. So following an election when more liberal members were elected to the party, they decided to open up Viet Nam to the outside world.  They allowed private enterprise.  Factories were privatized.  They redistributed the communal agricultural land among families, according to how many workers there were in each family.  In only two years, from 1986 to 1988, Viet Nam went from importing rice aid from India to again exporting rice.  Now Viet Nam is the second largest rice exporter in the world.

In 1995, the US lifted its embargo of Viet Nam.  The economic gains made in just 25 years are astonishing.  The television in our hotel room carries CNN, BBC, HBO, ESPN, National Geographic, CNBC, Australia network, Cinemax, Discovery, and another 45 channels... For better or worse!

And although the Internet is somewhat controlled by the state (Facebook is blocked, for example), there are always ways to get around it, according to Huy.