Impressions of Vietnam Tourism Industry

I'll caveat this post by quoting my friend, Sukie, "Vietnam sucks balls, dude!  Why do you want to go there?"  Touche, Suk, touche.  You can say, "I told you so anytime."  

I’d have to say that I have mixed emotions about Vietnam, particularly northern Vietnam, where we’ve spent our trip (Hanoi, Sapa to Dien Bien Phu, and Halong Bay).  On one hand, our motorcycle trip to Sapa was fantastic and our guide was a genuinely good guy.  However, every other experience here has left me feeling that Vietnam doesn’t get the service part of the service industry...and I think it’s cultural.  I have yet to venture to China, but I get the feeling that Vietnam is a lot like China thanks to Chairman Mao’s and Uncle Ho’s devaluing traditional culture and a razor-sharp focus on creating a utopian communist society.  Want to see traditional Chinese artifacts and culture?  Better to go Taiwan.  I believe that human compassion is lost when a people are forced to survive and deal with daily tragedy.

Case in point: tour guides during our Halong Bay trip.  In Thailand, the tour guides invariably talk about their clients, but it’s typically not so blatant as what we saw here.  The Thai culture emphasizes not wanting to make people feel bad- that’s something I really appreciate, by the way.  However, on our boat trip, we arrived and our friend, Jenna, was getting something from her bag while Shara and I sat down at a table.  We had the wonderful view of the table at which the guides were sitting.  We also had the view of all four of them checking out Jenna’s backside and beginning an animated discussion (granted, we don’t speak Vietnamese, so they ostensibly could have been talking about soccer).  I was struck, though.  Even the “win motosy” guys on the corner wait until the girl is out of sight until they start launching into Isan vulgarities.  It’s like we were at a construction site, but didn’t understand the language.  Part of me thinks it hilarious, the other part of me sees it as a failure of their managers to understand the service side of their industry and be solely focused on profit.   What this also tells me is that anybody with the managerial skills and language capacity in Vietnamese could make a killing in this market.  

I may sound like I’m complaining, but I’m not.  This has been an experience I truly value.  Understanding a bit about the Vietnamese culture and reading the history of Vietnam (it’s a uniquely lengthy one, by the way, thanks to the Chinese) helps me understand and appreciate the things they do.  

Would I suggest somebody come to a trip to Vietnam?  Again, mixed feelings.  One part of me says, “Yes, but only if you’re adventurous and truly want to experience the culture of another nation firsthand.”  The other side of me says, “Don’t waste your time, if you want to see beautiful beaches or spend quiet time on the ocean, go to Krabi or Koh Kood, Thailand.  If you want to motorcycle trek in the mountains, go to Laos, Nepal, or Burma.  If you want to see Buddhism, go to Thailand or Burma, because it doesn't exist anymore in Vietnam... and anyway, it wasn't every Theravada Buddhism, which is, in my opinion, the most artistic and beautiful form of Buddhism.