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“ After all, it was my generation and my
country that shredded and incinerated

their country...”

Aside from the Gothic and Romanesque around abstractions like “communism”, “so- allowed trade between the U.S. and Viet-
architecture, some of the remaining cialism” and “planned economy”, I obsessed nam). There was still a pavilion devoted to
vestiges of the French occupation include a bit on the war and what thoughts the American war crimes, that included dozens
hundreds of little open-air coffee shops, Vietnamese people harbored when con- of enlarged photos of the aftermath of the
family owned and operated, along with fronting American tourists. After all, it was My Lai massacre and the effects of agent
lots of food stalls selling ham-and-cheese my generation and my country that shred- orange. While viewing the depressing ex-
baguette sandwiches, known locally as ded and incinerated their country, while hibits, the Dylan song A Hard Rains Gonna
bánh mì . Yes, there is also Pho. I did dispatching 2 million souls in the process. Fall kept looping in my brain. It was, to say
not sample it. I would prefer to imagine I did visit the War Remnants Museum, the least, a sobering experience.
it better than the chicken soup version originally called the The Exhibition House The only conversation about the war I had
available in the states.
For Crimes of War and Aggression ( the in Vietnam was with a Mekong Delta tour
Aside from trying to wrap my mind name altered as part of the 1995 deal that guide who spoke decent English. He took

108 WDT MAGAZINE SPRING 2017