Michael McCormick’s Reviews > Vietnam: A New History > Status Update

I'm on chapter eight (8): "States of War." I had a lot of foreboding insofar as the author suggested that there was a particular event on a particular day after the end of WWII in that could be understood as the beginning of what would be 30 years of civil war in the country. The immense suffering of this nation is almost unfathomable to me. I read about 10 pages an hour; that's 25 more hours of reading about pain...

I keep thinking about Katherine Deneuve in "Indochine" the movie as I read this book. I really like this book. It is truly fascinating. I wonder what would have been all these colonizing countries motivations, including ours, if they had known before colonizing how things would end. I think of Bill Morneau, the Canadian, writing, "Where To From Here," about Canadian prosperity. What about for Vietnam's? And by who?

I have begun this wonderful journey finally, after so many years. I can remember looking at HSBC banking jobs in Danang and in Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) and thinking how incredible it would be to work in such a magnificent place with such incredible people, learn such an amazing language and live such an extraordinary life. I have met such incredible people, like Michel Tuan Pham and now Cindy Trieu.