1984?

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I am tempted to write that we travelled through the length and breadth of Viet Nam, but it would be as much of a terminological inexactitude (President Richard Nixon’s euphemism for a plain and simple ‘bluff’) as saying that someone travelled through the length and breadth of Kerala. Look at the map of Viet Nam: like my home-state, Viet Nam too is like a shoelace and has no breadth – only length!

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We spent most of the past forty days South and Central Viet Nam where we covered Sai Gon (Ho Chi Minh City), Buon Me Thuot, Da Lat, Plei ku, Phu yen etc. We will be spending a few of our remaining Viet Nam days in Sa Pa, Ha Noi, Ha Long – all in the North. This whirlwind tour was possible only because Hari’s job takes him all over the country. He does most of his travel by his Innova driven by his trusted driver Dung (Pronounced ‘yung’ with the ‘u’ as in ‘put’).

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Like the Mary’s little lamb of the nursery rhyme, we too tagged along. During all this criss-crossing, we had come across hardly any cops. The only posse of policemen we saw was at Ho Chi Minh City Airport. There was, of course, the odd sergeant on the highway with a speed-gun nab a car clipping over the prescribed maximum.

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This was very different from what I had read and heard. The newspapers and the periodicals I had read spoke of the ‘big brother’ keeping a constant watch over you in communist countries. Be careful of what you utter in public, even walls have ears, I was cautioned. ‘You know I am discreet, Hari; and even if I do open my mouth, nobody would know what I said because none of them know the languages I know,’ I had joked.

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We were in a town called Plei ku in the north of Gia Lai Province in the Central Highlands area. The place is a plateau at am altitude of 800 meters able mean sea level. It tends to get very hot during the day, but is very windy in the evenings and therefore pleasant. There is nothing much to see there, but we had to stay because Hari’s work there stretched for three days.

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On the second day there, we had dinner with Amaresh, a friend of Hari’s. The spring in his stride, the speed at which words issued forth from his mouth, the way he moved about, all reminded me of the phrase ‘livewire’. ‘I have a maid who cooks sambar and rasam of the type you get in Chennai,’ he said. (In fact he said ‘Madras’, not Chennai, pronouncing it as MeD-ROss).

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It was 9.30 pm, late by Viet Namese standards, when we finished dinner. We were well into the last course when our host suggested that asked us if we had seen the lake in Plei ku. We hadn’t.

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Amaresh said, ‘Good. We’ll go now.’

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Bhawani asked him, ‘Would there be lights?

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‘That’s the best part. It’s dark. In the early morning when the sun is still low in the sky the sun beams reflect like a silver band on the lake. It is the untouched charm of Viet Nam. In dark nights, it’s even more beautiful.’

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Dung having been dismissed for the day, Hari took the wheel and off we went. Taking a left turn from the main road, we drove through what seemed to be an endless forest, guided by Amaresh who knew the route. The pitch dark was punctured only by the beam of the car.

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Suddenly, the road ended. In front, there was a raised platform and to the left was something that resembled a watchman’s kiosk. There was no light outside, but a solitary bulb lit the inside and there were voices from within. It was a television. The door creaked and a head peeped out. He must have heard the doors of the car. It was not possible to take a good look at us in the dim light. The head withdrew and the door creaked again.

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A flight of stairs led to the roofed platform. True to Amaresh’s words, the view was breathtaking. The mountains and the pine trees cast a reflection on the still waters which could be seen only if you strained your eyes. One could sit there for any length of time and consider the riddles of nature.

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Located about seven kilometers from the town, T’nung Lake, also known as Ia Nueng, Amaresh said, is surrounded by pine forests and mountains. It covers 230 hectares, expanding up to 400 hectares in the rainy season, and about 30 meters deep and serves as the city’s reservoir.

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It wasn’t really a lake, it was actually a huge crater caused by a volcano which erupted millions of years back. Geologists believe that there is a dormant volcano underneath the lake. Rainwater had flowed into the crater, making it a huge water-body.

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According to local folklore, a fierce quake erupted and destroyed the ethnic village named T’nung where everyone lived happily together, turning it into ash. When the fire was finally doused all that remained was a deep hole. The survivors stood besides the deep hole and cried, filling the hole with their tears and turning it into a lake.

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After spending less than half an hour, we decided to return. We had barely got into the car when we saw a pair of headlights speeding towards us. ‘Visitors to the lake at 10.30 in the night?’ I wondered.

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It was not a car; it was two motorbikes carrying two cops each. The door of the kiosk creaked again and the head emerged. The cops asked us in Viet Namese, ‘Who are you? What are you doing here at this time?’ Hari responded, ‘Du lich’, which is Viet Namese for ‘tourists’. They saw we were foreigners and wanted to see our passports.

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They seemed to be satisfied. As all of us were already in the car and about to leave, they allowed us to go without further questioning, but followed us for all the five kilometers till we reached the main road, and ensuring that we were indeed headed in the direction of the hotel we had said we were staying in.

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How did the cops know that five foreign nationals had entered the city reservoir area on a dark night at 10 pm? Did the watchman in the kiosk report to them? Were we under surveillance? We shall never know.