Ho, Ho , Ho Chi Minh

Ok, so my latest tactic for finishing this baby is, instead of scrolling back and forth spending hours trying to work out where the new bits fit in, to sweep through from beginning to end, filling in all the bits I've left, that say FIX, REWRITE, CHECK, MORE,???

So this is where I'm up to...

A segment from around page 50 of My Mother Duras, my last day in Hanoi...

My flight to Ho Chi Minh City has been moved to the afternoon so I have the morning to kill. I’d heard that the body of Ho Chi Minh is lying in state in a grand mausoleum not too far away, so I ask Mr TF to call me a cab. He tries to talk me out of it...

“Oh you really want to?” he asks me. “you have to wait in a long line in the hot sun. Ok for us, but no good for you…” When I insist it’s something I’d really like to do he says, “ok hurry hurry, it close early, you will see our great leader, I am so proud.”

 I’m not sure if he is proud of me, Uncle Ho (as he is affectionately known here), or himself, but it already feels like a good thing to do. My strongest connection with Uncle Ho, apart from historic curiosity, is the chant we kept going in the anti Vietnam War demonstrations in Melbourne of the beginning of the 70s. Ho, Ho, Ho, Chi Minh, dare to struggle, dare to win! we shouted,  until our throats were dry and croaky. I was part of a white face, black pyjama clad, street theatre group who led the marches, playing out scenes of war and torture as we performed our way down Bourke St ahead of the speakers and leftie dignitaries. We mimed  bayonetting and violent death, napalm bombing and fear and formed and reformed a tunnel offering the hope of light at the end.

A still from the vid above, me, centre of pic, running to join a tableau illustrating the effects of war.

With my mind filled with images from that time, the taxi drops me off at the entrance and I see what Mr TF means—  huge crowds, overwhelmingly Vietnamese with a smattering of tourists, are milling about.  Officials herd us into an orderly line and signs inform us to behave respectfully — no cameras, no bare arms or legs, no talking, no hands in pockets. 

Further on, guards in dazzling white uniforms with gold braid and red trim, patrol the line making sure we obey. People do talk occasionally, but in low voices, making jokes and comments to pass the time, as we inch forward beneath a blue awning that has been erected part of the way to shield us from the sun. It doesn’t help with the humidity and I am glad I have brought my fan which may be on the banned list too for all I know. Mr TF told me I would be in the queue for around an hour, and while it is indeed as hot and uncomfortable as he predicted, I don’t mind. It feels good to be to be standing among Vietnamese people from all walks of life, taking part in something so quintessentially Vietnamese. I am able to communicate in smiles and gestures with people closest to me in the line: a daughter and her middle- aged mother, a group of high school students, and for these few moments I feel less of a tourist and more of a visitor, accompanying them to pay respects to their revered leader. 

A photo showing the length of the line on a cooler day

Our line finally comes out into a large parade ground at the front of the imposing granite stone mausoleum building.  The captain hatted, uniformed guards become more vigilant, directing us to keep strictly two abreast. Out on the parade ground a small group of guards hi-step their way from one point to another in precise formation. Soon there is red carpet underfoot, guards in sparkling white uniforms stand at attention either side of a large doorway and we are in.

Everyone is totally silent now as we ascend the granite stairs to the inner chamber where Uncle Ho has lain in state since 1975.  We are in single file now, entering from one side of the dimly lit room and continuing around in a semi circle with the glass casket always on our left. We have to keep moving so there is no time to stop and share a moment and we are not close enough to press our noses to the glass for a really intimate viewing, still I can make out the wispy beard and thin face, his body dressed in his plain fawn coloured comrade uniform, hands resting on his lower abdomen and his large black shoes. His feet seem gigantic and I remember thinking the same of my father's hands as he lay in his coffin, as if I had never before noticed how large they were,  and how like a working man’s hands they seemed.  Others ahead of me were bobbing their head, muttering some kind of under the breath prayer, but is so little time it is hard to know what to do. At my final glimpse before the exit door I give a last minute nod before being ushered out into the light. 

The day I went to see my father’s body in the funeral home, a huge thunder storm erupted on an otherwise fine afternoon and rain pelted down. The expression on my father’s face as he lay in the coffin in his golfing clothes, matched the angry weather. Rather than the peaceful death mask I was expecting, his lips wore a slight snarl. I wondered if this was the expression that fixed itself on his face when he was struck down by a heart attack on his local golf course, or the inexperience of a funeral home makeup artist.

That Easter Saturday morning, he had been down to the shops, said his cheery greetings to the butcher, the baker, the publican, the fishing tackle guy, and in the early afternoon driven over to the golf club. He may have had a beer with some mates at the clubhouse before setting out on his round, but by the seventh hole he knew something was up. At the edge of the green, he sat down, telling his golfing buddy he was in trouble. Then he lay down and asked his mate to raise his head. These were the last words he spoke. Was he on a downward slope, did he want his last moment to be a view of rolling greens? The mate called out to other golfers who came to help with CPR, and sent a runner back to the clubhouse to call the ambo. It was about half an hour before it arrived and of course it was too late.

I don’t know who went to tell Marj — the local constable I guess. She had been anticipating this moment for years. There had been car accidents, serious illnesses and other incidents but until now Chas had escaped them all.  When I received the news by phone later in the day it seemed that all the love that I’d felt for this man and never managed to express, flew out of my body in a rush to find him.  That night in a half dream state,  I saw a vision of him waving to me across a barrier of green — maybe it did find him after all.

The next day I drove the eight hundred kilometres to Victoria, picking up my sister on the way, who had driven in from the coast. Marj was in an ok state, relieved that we were there to organize all the post death business. She had found a note left by Chas on the sideboard some weeks before saying that in the event of his death there should be no funeral of any kind. Did he sense his death was imminent or was it a coincidence?  He wasn’t in any position to argue his case and for once we could refuse to follow his orders. How could we send him off without a whisper? He was a well known figure in the local community: former high school principal, and at various times, president of all the country town organisations be could possibly be the leader of including: Lions, Rotary, the Golf Club as well as long serving chairman of the Victorian Hospitals Board for which he received an OAM. He was a regular drinker at the local pub, and despite a few detractors, a friend to all and sundry — there were many people who would need to mark his passing.

We set a date for a memorial service to be held in the Golf Club a few days hence and meanwhile arranged for the cremation to be attended by close friends and family at a  crematorium on the outskirts of Melbourne, not far from airport. This was handy for my brother flying in from the US and easy for Melbourne and country people to get to.

I don’t remember too much about the proceedings, but what happened afterwards is crystal clear. At the end of the service the curtains closed on the coffin as it descended from view. Every one began filing out as a Beatles song played ( Chas was great fan) and I wondered what would happen next. Where did that coffin disappear to?  Curious about all things unseen, I asked Wayne the undertaker (who both my mother and father had taught at high school) —so what happens now?

Wayne motioned to a side door and asked me if I wanted to go backstage. I nodded  enthusiastically and before I knew it he was leading me into a tall factory-like room right behind the chapel. Chas’s coffin was continuing along its merry way on a conveyer belt, before coming to a stop at a wall of oven doors, not unlike a three high line up of dryers at the laundromat. A couple of workmen in grey overalls and grey gloves were standing casually by. Was their hair grey and powdery too, or is that just my mind’s embellishment? At the ovens they transferred Chas’s coffin to a gurney, raising it by hydraulics to an oven at about head height. Opening the oven door revealed a bare rectangular space a bit bigger than the average sized coffin. They slid the coffin in. The temperature so high, its edges burst into flame instantly before being completely engulfed in the brightest orange flames I have ever seen. For a few long seconds I stood and watched, sadness gone, replaced by the euphoria of truth. Death was no longer wrapped in sanitary satin and shiny metal handles — this was the real thing. I was witness to the moment when most influential person in my life ( both positively and negatively) was undergoing the great transferrence. From physical body into fire and smoke, ash and bone, his particles already flying up the chimneys into the sky above.

Jan Cornall began writing in the 70s. She has written plays, musicals, screenplays, a novel, short stories, and three CDs of songs.  Since 2004 she has led writer's retreats in inspirational international locations including Bali, Laos, Burma, Cambodia, Morocco and Fiji. This is part of a memoir in progress,  My Mother Duras.