Okay -- last Vietnam post. This one will cover my brief 2-night stay in the Mekong Delta, as well information about an entire religion that I just found out about and already really admire: Caodaism.
I was in My Tho for a very brief time, but it was packed with activity. On the first day, I walked around the neighborhood and was approached by a travel agent guy who hooked me up with a Mekong Delta boat tour, which needed to start almost immediately after I spoke with him, due to the tides. (Evidently, once the tides get low, some parts of the river tour can't be navigated.) The tour was awesome, and the next day I rented a scooter for the first time (there was no way I'd drive a scooter for the first in Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City, but the Mekong area was much more relaxed traffic-wise). In any case, here are some highlights from My Tho!
A French-American War memorial in the city of My Tho in the Mekong Delta area. In the middle of it stood several tall panels with individuals' names written on them.
Another memorial (or a different part of the same memorial, rather), on the other side of the park
The swastika, being used in its original Buddhist context as a symbol of auspiciousness. What a shame its Nazi associations prevent it from being used in a positive way in the West. Although, you never know... I suppose I should clarify from now on, with each person with a swastika tattoo, whether they meant it to represent auspiciousness or white supremacy, because I would LOVE to be wrong about the assumptions I make about those people.
This was my favorite part of the Mekong Delta tour -- I love floating down rivers!
Just holding a thing with a bunch of bees on it, as tourists do. The guide said not to worry about being stung, because the bees had been flying around all day and were tired now... kinda like when you take your dog or child to the park so they can run around and expend all their energy so they are too tired to bug you later. I didn't think bees operated that same way, but I didn't get stung at all, so I was happy to accept that explanation.
The bees make this stuff called "royal jelly," which is served to the queen bee, and helps to make her larger and longer-lived than the other bees (up to four times as long, I think). And apparently, it also has a bunch of awesome health benefits for humans -- such as antioxidant, antibacterial, and anti-inflammatory effects -- and it may help lower cholesterol and blood pressure levels according to articles from the Journal of Functional Foods (2012) and the Journal of Nutritional Science and Vitaminology (2007). Are you sold yet?! I was. I got a jar of it. You can use it two ways: applying it directly to your skin, or ingesting a small amount (like a 1/2 tsp). It's supposed to be pretty bitter, but the guide served it to me on a spoon with a drop of honey, so it tasted fine to me. I could make that part of my morning routine for a while if it meant getting pretty much any of the benefits listed below.
Guide: "This is a python."
Me: "Nice! What's his name?"
Guide: "Python."
Me: "Right... so what does he do? Why do they have him here?"
Guide: "For looking."
Me: "Right..."
Looking back on this conversation, I see that 1) it was silly to assume they'd give the python a name like a pet; I don't even know if they name the dogs that wander around, and 2) it was also silly to assume they were keeping the python for something other than "for looking"; what did I expect, that they used it to patrol the house and keep mice at bay? It's a freakin' python. Makes more sense that it would just be there as a one-creature zoo for tourists passing through. Still... it was an amusing conversation at the time.
Vroom vroom!
Exploring New Spiritual Territory
When I left My Tho and returned to Ho Chi Minh City for my last few nights in Vietnam, I stayed in a less touristic neighborhood than before, in District 5, which is full of temples. On my second-to-last day in Vietnam, I temple-hopped for a bit. At the second temple, I decided I wanted to try praying with incense the way I saw others doing it. Is that tacky or a form of cultural appropriation? I don't know, but I was willing to take the risk that it might be off-putting to some of the locals to have a random white lady participating in the local prayer routine. I had recently come across a really difficult situation in my personal life and I needed to pray, dammit. So I bought a packet of 40 sticks of incense (cost about 5 cents), and then had to ask the incense vendor where the right place was to light them (I really had no idea what I was doing). I walked slowly around the temple to each shrine with a sand-filled incense bowl for submitting one's prayers (I know saying "submitting one's prayers" makes prayers sound like comment cards that get piled up in God's inbox, but I'm just not sure how to better phrase it at the moment). At each shrine, I asked God for the following:
self-awareness
honesty
strength
courage
peace
I really enjoyed the use of incense during prayer; I liked gently waving the incense sticks, watching the smoke curl up into the air, placing the incense carefully into the sand with intention, and imagining my prayers were getting sent up to the heavens with the smoke. Physical symbols of non-physical truths are helpful tools for feeling more connected to those truths.
Here's the third or fourth temple I went to. I didn't go inside this one, but I wanted to take a photo because I liked the juxtaposition between the ancient (and very Chinese-influenced) architecture and all the modern transportation vehicles surrounding it. Maybe at some point this temple will be surrounded with self-driving cars or hovercrafts.
Later that same day, I went to a local Cao Dai temple to observe one of their four daily ceremonies/prayer services.
Caodaism: The Neapolitan Ice-cream of Religions
Caodaism is pronounced "cow-die-ism." And that is humorous for us English speakers, because followers of Caodaism also practice vegetarianism, so....irony.
I refer to Caodaism as the "neapolitan ice-cream" of religions because its founder decided to combine three classic religious flavors into one faith practice so people need not choose between them: Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism (as well as Christianity and Islam, but in a less official capacity, I guess. Think of those as the ice cream toppings). It is also a monotheistic religion... kind of. They believe in a Supreme Creator Father, but they also believe in a Mother Goddess who provides the yin to God Supreme's yang. (I know this is crude, but if you ever have a hard time remembering which one is masculine vs. feminine with yin and yang, just think "yang = wang". You're welcome.) Below the Supreme God Creator and the Mother Goddess, there are many levels of deity within Caodaism -- angels, saints, immortals, and Buddhas -- who can be further divided into subcategories of "heavenly," "humanly," or "earthly," which creates a 12-fold hierarchy of spiritual beings. One of the people worshipped in the Cao Dai pantheon is Joan of Arc (I'm guessing she's categorized as "humanly saint"), who is believed to have guided the faith at its inception and promote full equality for women. (Right on, Joan! Thanks for fighting the good fight even from The Beyond).
A basic principle of Caodaism is "All Religions are One". The whole thing really reminds me of the book Life of Pi, because in the beginning, the protagonist boy, who lives in India, wants to join all the different churches -- to be Hindu, Christian, and Muslim -- and he gets really confused when the leaders of each church all start fighting over him and pressuring him to choose one. He's like, "My uncle has citizenship in more than one country; why can't I practice more than one religion? I just want to love God every way I can." That idea -- just wanting to love God any way you can -- has stuck with me since I read Life of Pi in Colombia. (Oh Colombia.... I can still remember it pretty vividly but it does feel like ages ago now...) It seems so obvious that these traditions and rituals we come up with are all arbitrary, but meaningful nonetheless. The important thing is to just find a way to connect with the great unifying love force of existence and all its wisdom. However you do that, you have my blessing. I think I will forever be curious about how people throughout the world achieve that sense of divine growth and connection in different ways. I wish that, instead of fighting over which ways are most "right" or "wrong", we could all just trade notes on what we find most helpful and provide support to one another in our unique spiritual journeys.
I first heard about Cao Dai inside the tourist agency in Ho Chi Minh City that I used to book all my excursions. They offered a day trip to the Cu Chi tunnels, OR a combined Cu Chi Tunnels + Cao Dai Holy See temple trip. At the time, I had no idea what Cao Dai was, and I figured I've seen enough temples, so I did the Cu Chi-only option. Why bother paying more for both? Then, when I was in the Mekong Delta town, I saw a building and recognized the design of it (see photo of temple below) as being the same as the Cao Dai temple from the tour agency's pamphlet. I realized, "OH - this isn't just a singular temple thing, this is an actual religion with followers throughout Vietnam," and that changed things. I asked around at different tour agencies to see if they offered special trips to the Cao Dai Holy See temple without the Cu Chi tunnels, but no one wanted to drive 2 hours out for a half hour ceremony and drive two hours back. Fair enough. They did, however, mention that there are several Cao Dai temples in Ho Chi Minh City, used by local followers, and maybe I could attend and observe a ceremony at one of those. It took some time to track one down, but I did, and I was able to witness the 6:00pm service from the observation deck. (They hold services every six hours: 6am, noon, 6pm, and midnight, each lasting about half an hour).
I don't really have time to dig into the details of this incredibly fascinating religion, but here's a New York Times article about Caodaism for anyone interested in learning a bit more. Wikipedia is also helpful, as always. Here's a general summary from a different website that I also found helpful:
"Cao Daism began in 1919 as an indigenous Vietnamese religion composed of "spiritism" or "spirit mediums" and a "ouija-board" type device called corbeille a bec (beaked-bag). It sought to form a synthesis of the fundamental doctrines of Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism, Christianity and a Roman Catholic type church organization. It was formed in an attempt to create a universally acceptable religion in an area of the world where there is an intermingling of many religious beliefs often found in the same individual. A corollary goal was the promotion of harmonious human relationships by means of a common spiritual life devoid of any religious discrimination. Some Vietnamese religious leaders, who are not adherents of this faith, call it a "salad-religion" because of the bits of many religions which are blended together in it."
I like it. Now for some photos!
The Cao Dai temple in My Tho (the Mekong Delta) -- I love how colorful they are! The "left eye of God" thing is a defining feature of these temples.
This excerpt from the Cao Dai Wikipedia page provides a helpful caption for the photo below:
"To highlight [the] objective of unity, there is a representation of the Divine covenant of The Third Amnesty (The Third Alliance) inside every Cao Dai Temple. This Covenant between Heaven and Earth is written and presented to humanity by the Venerable Saints -- Victor Hugo, Sun Yat Sen, and Trang Trinh Nguyen Binh Khiem. Their mission is said to guide humanity into the way of the Third Amnesty. The Covenant is written in French: "Dieu et Humanite Amour et Justice; and in Chinese: Tian Shang Tian Xia Bo Ai Gong Ping. This translates into English as:
"God and Humanity [for] Love and Justice."
Four religious leaders of faiths that influence Caodaism (from inside a Cao Dai temple in District 5 of Ho Chi Minh City):
Buddha, ____?, Jesus, _____?
(The second or fourth one has to be Confucius)
Below are some people performing the Cao Dai ceremony rituals together. From what I could tell, there's no priest of spiritual leader present, other than the person ringing the bell, which guides the ceremony. I was really amused by the one child who was in attendance (the only person sitting up in the photo below), because she did not seem to enjoy Cao Dai church any more than any other little kid enjoys religious services.
Video of the Cao Dai ceremony, which consisted primarily of songs sung in unison like this:
One of the primary reasons I wanted to come to Southeast Asia and Japan was to experience places spiritually dominated by non-Christian religious traditions. In Thailand, I saw a lot of Buddhas and Buddhist iconography mixed in with bits of Hinduism, and Cambodia was very similar but incorporated more elements of animism. In Vietnam, the Hindu elements got dropped, and the images of the classic Buddha became secondary to images of the "female Buddha," who is actually the bodhisattva (bodhisattva = a Buddhist saint, more or less) of compassion, named Quan Am (also known as Kuan Yin, Kuan Shih Yin, Guanine, or Kannon). She is often called upon in times when guidance, fertility or protection are desired. Someone I know was telling me that a Vietnamese friend of his -- who had carried a small Quan Am statue with him when he was fighting in Vietnam for protection -- gave my friend his Quan Am statue to help protect him while he was fighting in Iraq and Iran. They both survived, so I'm inclined to give at least partial credit to her.
Now, in Islam-dominated Indonesia, I am surrounded by women in hijab head scarves, which I think are actually quite lovely. They seem to be more a fashion statement than a method of oppression, but it certainly helps that their entire faces remain visible. I've only encountered one woman in a full-blown niqab (that's the one where everything is covered except her eyes), and that did make me a bit sad and a bit on edge, to be honest. Sad because I assume she'd be more comfortable if she could live life and interact with the world with her whole face, and on-edge because of all the connotations of oppression and violence toward women that I automatically associate with that "look." Niqabs just signal to my brain that, as a woman, I'm not in safe territory.
(A note re: religious/cultural tolerance and women's oppression: I know that it isn't right to tell a woman she shouldn't wear the hijab or niqab, etc.; many women truly feel more empowered when they are covered in those ways, because it takes minimizes the risk of being sexually objectified and puts the focus of others on who they are, rather than their bodies. Plus, people just get accustomed to the way their culture does things, and even something that seems objectively oppressive to an outsider may provide a sense of community and familiarity to the insider, so we need to be careful about how we judge these things. However, I also think t's wrong TO FORCE women to wear head scarves or niqabs. Basically, women are human individuals, so we're complex, and we're going to experience empowerment in different ways. I think it's a universal truth that it is right and good to make sure people have the individual freedom to choose how to honor their autonomy over their bodies and show themselves self-respect -- however that may be accomplished -- without fear for their safety. And that's as far as my insight on this matter goes for now )
Anyway, here's the point I want to make about religion: it's really hard to try to describe the religion of any given place, because every area puts its own spin on things. For example, the Dalai Lama describes Tibetan Buddhism as non-theist, but the Buddhism in Thailand appeared to include lots of gods or deities. Islam in Southeast Asia appears to have a really different energy than it does in the Middle East, and in Vietnam, people seem to embrace elements from all kinds of different faith traditions with no internal conflict over it. Moreover, the history of religious evolution shows us that religions emerge in very specific cultural contexts, and that they never pop up as a totally fresh new thing -- they always introduce some new concept or revelation, but they also have to integrate elements of familiar spiritual practices. No one likes putting their faith in something that is 100% foreign; The Great Unknown needs to feel safe and familiar on some level, ya know? For example, one of the main selling points of Catholicism was having a bunch of saints in addition to the One All Powerful God, because that helped the pagans ease into the concept of just one "main" God.
In any case, it's very difficult to provide an accurate description of any religion as far as how it is lived, practice, and experienced, because there are too many variations and it continues to evolve constantly. I don't think that detracts from its "realness" at all, by the way; I think that's just a sign that we're all grasping at something so big and real that we can approach it from many different paths and reach a multitude of truths. Not contradictory truths, just different pieces of the same essential truth, like that story of all the blind men feeling different parts of an elephant and arguing about what it "really" is; they're all feeling equally real parts of the same elephant whole, they just need to start collaborating and considering how all their experiences fit together to better understand the entire reality.
I like thinking of religion like this: say each religion is represented by a color. If the Abrahamic religions/monotheism are red, paganism/Hinduism is yellow, and nontheist/philosophical spirituality/Buddhism is blue, then we start to see how the convergence and influence of different faiths just creates different shades, gradients, and rainbows in different areas of the world. Isn't it pretty?? It all comes from the same spectrum of light. And by "light" I mean eternal love and truth and goodness.
That's it for Vietnam! Next up: Indonesia...