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The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, quispamsis nunc et nuismod consectetur adipiscing elit.

Unity in diversity
https://books.google.ca/books?id=-9I-C7zC_p0C https://archive.org/details/UnityInDiversityNundRishi_201710 https://archive.org/details/proteusorunityi00radcgoog https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.59311 http://bahai-library.com/bond_unity_diversity_strategies

Col des Nuages derailment
The Col des Nuages derailment was a train derailment that took place in eastern French Indochina along the Col des Nuages (Pass of the Clouds, now known as the Hai Van Pass), a mountain pass on the route between the ancient Vietnamese capital of Huế and the port of Tourane (Da Nang), on 24 June 1953, during the First Indochina War. Railway officials reported that around 100 people were killed when a passenger train plunged 50 feet through a sabotaged viaduct at the Col des Nuages. A strong explosive charge reportedly went off just as the train arrived at the viaduct, causing a 25-foot span to tumble into the ravine. Two locomotives and 18 cars plunged into the hole down into ravine. The pass had frequently been the scene of attacks by the Communist-led Viet Minh rebels.

Le 22 juin 1953, dans le col des Nuages, au PK761, une pile de béton du viaduc de "Baika" fut détruite par une forte charge télécommandée provoquant l'effondrement des deux voûtes encadrantes au passage d'un train allant de Tourane à Hué en double traction (20 morts, 46 blessés).

On peut signaler l'attaque du pont de Baica (Baika) le 22/06/1953 qui fit 20 morts et 46 blessés. Le grand pont, avec des arches de 10m d'ouverture a été saboté. Les rebelles ont fait une brèche de 26m qui fit basculer les deux machines Mikado dans la gorge profonde de plus de 20M. Les cinq wagons de munitions qui étaient sur les rails basculent heureusement sans exploser. Un bref combat est engagé et les rebelles laissent 24 morts sur le terrain. Une de ces machines sera emportée par le torrent quelque cent mètres plus loin, lors d'un typhon la même année.

22/6/1953, đèo Hải Vân:

Việt Minh tấn công đồn bảo vệ cầu Bãi Cá khiến 20 binh sĩ tử trận, 46 người khác bị thương. Việt Minh bỏ lại 24 xác chết. Hai đầu máy hơi nước Mikado [5] bị lật xuống sông sâu 20 m. Năm toa xe chở đạn bị trật đường rày nhưng không bị nổ



Hang Nga guest house
Hang Nga guesthouse (Biệt thự Hằng Nga), popularly known as The Crazy House (Ngôi nhà quái dị), is an unconventional building designed and constructed by Vietnamese architect Dang Viet Nga in Da Lat, Vietnam. Described as a "fairy tale house", the building's overall design resembles a giant tree, incorporating sculptured design elements representing natural forms such as animals, mushrooms, spider webs and caves. Its architecture, comprised of complex, organic, non-rectilinear shapes, has been described as expressionist. Nga has acknowledged the inspiration of Catalan Spanish architect Antoni Gaudí in the building's design, and visitors have variously drawn parallels between it and the works of artists such as Salvador Dali and Walt Disney. Since its opening in 1990, the building has gained recognition for its unique architecture, being highlighted in numerous guidebooks and listed as one of the world's ten most "bizarre" buildings in the Chinese People's Daily.

Architecture
Hang Nga guesthouse was originally built as a personal project by Vietnamese architect Dang Viet Nga, opening to the public in 1990. Nga, who received a PhD in architecture from the University of Moscow, has stated that her overall design was inspired by the natural environment surrounding of the city of Da Lat, along with the work of Catalan Spanish architect Antoni Gaudí. Rather than using standard architectural plans as blueprints, Nga produces paintings, and hires non-professional local craftsmen to transform these into structural elements. Few right angles are found throughout the building, which instead boasts a complex organic structure echoing natural forms. The building's exterior resembles a five-story-high banyan tree, with unevenly-shaped window openings and branch-like structures that "grow" along its walls and rise above the roof into the sky. Describing it as a "fairy tale house", observers have variously drawn comparisons between the building's architecture and the works of Salvador Dali and Walt Disney. In attempting to classify the building's architecture, the People's Committee of the city of Da Lat described it as "expressionist".

Interior design
The guesthouse has ten themed guest rooms, each one having an animal as its theme; examples include the tiger room, the eagle room, the ant room and the kangaroo room, each with decorations matching the theme. The walls of the tiger room, for instance, feature a large tiger with glowing red eyes; the kangaroo room incorporates a sculpted kangaroo with a fireplace in its belly; the fireplace in the eagle room is in the form of a giant eagle's egg. Many of the rooms incorporate an added level of symbolism, with the animal theme connected to a particular nationality. For instance, Nga describes the tiger room as representing "the strengths of the Chinese"; the eagle room as being "big and strong" like Americans; and the ant room as representing the "hard working Vietnamese".

Furniture inside the rooms is handcrafted—and sometimes even built into the rooms themselves—to match the rooms' nonlinear, organic shape. Stone decorations throughout the house depict animals such as bears, giraffes, frogs, spiders, and ants, along with natural elements such as mushrooms and spider webs. Stairways and hallways inside the building are designed to resemble tunnels and caves.

Tourism use
To help alleviate the financial burden associated with what was essentially a personal project—having accumulated upwards of VND 30 million in debt—Nga expanded the building into a guesthouse, and opened the house to paid visits by tourists in late 1990. As of 2008, fees for visits to the guesthouse were VND 10,000 per visit; room rates ranged from VND 290,000 to 630,000 per room per night for Vietnamese, and from $29–63 for foreigners.

Reception
The five-story-high guesthouse has generated a great deal of attention and controversy since its inception, with reactions ranging from criticism and derision to open admiration. The house was dubbed the "Crazy House" by early visitors, a name which Dang soon adopted for the house herself: ""When they first saw the house, people would exclaim that it was a 'crazy house'! So that's how it got its name, and now, it's one of Da Lat's leading tourist attractions.""

- Dang Viet Nga, Architect

Visitors have generally responded positively to the house, describing it as "brave", "brilliant", "quintessentially cosmic", and lauding Nga for her dedication to her work. One French tourist commented as follows: ""Thanks for showing me the meaning of life. The fairy tale house took me back to my childhood, to when things were pure and natural.""

Local authorities, including the People's Committee of the city of Da Lat, opposed Nga's work on the house for many years, rejecting her proposals while citing concerns about its ad-hoc character, its lack of formal aesthetic, and its structural integrity. With perseverance—and private funding from friends and family—Dang was nevertheless able to further develop and refine the house, and was eventually able to convince the national government in Hanoi to endorse her work, allowing her to continue building without restrictions.

The building has been highlighted in numerous travel guidebooks: the third edition of Frommer's Vietnam, for example, called the guesthouse "an interesting, evolving piece of pop art", and "a fun visit". In 2009, the building was listed by the Chinese People's Daily as one of the world's ten most "bizarre" buildings.

junk
It's an actual guesthouse, too, but it offers more theme than comfort. It's better just to visit than to stay.

Though locals may call her architectural wonder "Crazy House," Hang Nga prefers to describe her work thus: "With the voice of architecture, I wish to lead men to come back to nature and love it and not make full use of it or destroy it."

A cool hill station far from the bombing and guerrilla warfare in the southern part of the country, Da Lat was a resort during the Vietnam War and has remained a resort, with still-intact colonial villas designed at the turn of the last century by celebrated French architects. The Crazy House, built by the daughter of Ho Chi Minh's right-hand man, wriggles up amidst the surrounding architecture as a bizarre contrast. Bizarre for Vietnam. Bizarre for Southeast Asia. It is like a Disney animation of a Grimm's Brothers fairy tale sculpted by Salvador Dali on the grounds of a classic French colonial villa.

VietNamNet - Dalat, Vietnam’s “city of flowers,” is known as the country’s romantic honeymoon capital with its lovely French villas nestled among lush forests, beautiful waterfalls and gorgeous lakes, but one unique guesthouse adds a rare and eccentric take on natural beauty.

Dalat’s Hang Nga Guesthouse, deemed by locals “The Crazy House,” opened in 1990 and is indeed a strange and off the wall variation on natural aesthetics that began as one woman’s personal project and is now a tourist destination.

The house has few right angles with unexpected twists and turns at every corner. The misshapen windows make it look like a fairy tale house, as friendly stone animals—a bear, giraffe, and spider—linger around the premises. Small ponds and mushroom statues also adorn the outside of the house.

For a small fee the guesthouse can be visited like a museum.

The outside of the building looks like a tree with trunks and branches built to look like they are growing along the walls, making it more of a house-tree than a tree-house.

This is not something that most tourists, both foreign and domestic, expect to find in Vietnam.

The architect of the flower city’s small wonder is Ms Dang Viet Nga. “I am an adventurous person, I do what I want,” said Ms. Viet Nga. She began building the house on her own but saw opportunity when the house received local attention.

“Many visitors came after the pools and statues were built,” she said. “So I stated collecting fees to visit the house and continued building. Now, my 5-story “tree house” is more popular than the 5-level hotel next door."

Her creative ideas have distinguished the house from all others in Dalat. She notes that the natural surrounding inspired the design. “Living in the Da Lat, the surrounding wilderness inspired me to focus on nature,” she said, adding that in the past, people lived closer to nature, and as a result, closer and more harmoniously with each other.

Visitors too have been inspired by Mrs. Nga’s creation, such as one French tourist who left a rather moving note in the guesthouse’s visitor’s log: “Thanks for showing me the meaning of life. The fairy tale house returned me to my childhood, to when things were pure and natural.”

Dang Viet Nga, born in 1940, architect and owner of The Hang Nga Guesthouse & Art Gallery, is truly a woman of vision and unconventional thinking.

She renamed herself Hang Nga - Sister of the Moon. Her fantasy emporium in the middle of Da Lat's elegant French architectural buildings was soon nicknamed Crazy House by the locals, and it stuck.

She doesn't advertise nor are there any signs leading to Hang Nga Guesthouse & Art Gallery, but every child on the street can give you directions - with a smirk behind the hand covered mouth.

I entered Mme Nga's fantasy world through an enormous front door and found myself transplanted into a jungle scene, an amusingly bizarre world. A noisy bunch of hens, doves, and a colourful array of singing birds in huge wire cages greeted me.

Small trails and little bent bridges lead through the garden. Outsized spider web work their way from tree branch to tree branch. Huge mushrooms grow out of the ground or meander up tree trunks. Strange frog-faces, enormous ants, birds, and no-name mythical creatures are nesting under native flora and fauna. Gigantic mushrooms do double duty as umbrellas and streetlights and a monster Babushka, obviously a reminder of her Russian days, sits smack dab in the middle of a walkway.

Born into privilege and status - she's the daughter of the late Truong Chinh, Vietnams second President - gave her a lead in education and useful relationships. Newspaper clippings in her family shrine claim that she sat on 'uncle Ho Chi Minh's and Fidel Castro's' knees. She was educated in China and received her PhD in Architecture from the University of Moscow. "I like art and technique, and architecture is art combined with technique," she says.

We met over breakfast in her French colonial Villa. She arrived in her pink morning dress and a little knitted white cap over her muddled jet-black hair. A little hippy, a little Alice in Wonderland - the petite woman in bohemian chic has a soft voice and gentle manners. Her gestures are sparse but poignant. It would be easy to underestimate her will power. She left her husband and father of her two grown children "because" she says, "Vietnamese husbands are preventing us from success."

Perseverance brought her to where she is now. Her project didn't sit well with the people of DaLat and was rejected numerous times. Oddities don't fit into socialist realism. "Doi moi" - the rebuilding period of Vietnam - did help her unconventional architectural philosophy as did the Government in Hanoi, that overpowered the People's Government in Da Lat and let her build her dream without restrictions - a privilege seldom granted and consequently brought on more envy.

Nonetheless, it took the People's Government in Da Lat 18 years to really approve her crazy counter cultural construction - probably the only one of its kind in Vietnam to this date - and grant her ownership. Her interpretation of free hand curved architecture didn't fit in any traditional description and they didn't know what to do with it. Finally, they found a term to approve the house: "The People's committee have now acknowledged Crazy House belongs to "expressionism".

Her Crazy House is a work in progress and strenuous. Eight local workers between 20 and 60 transform her blueprints - paintings not architectural plans - into her work of art. None of the workers are professionals, but all of them are enthusiastic and gifted craftsmen. Everything is sculpted by hand, even the furniture, because it has to fit into the nooks of the rooms without a strait line.

Since her passion is a huge financial burden, and she is not getting any architectural work from Da Lat residents, she had to look for a different source of income. She expanded her art gallery into a guesthouse for tourists and opened her dream world to gawker's for a fee.

Between the legs of a giant giraffe one enters one gnarly tree trunk that resembles more a "scary-tale" castle than a tree.

The building complex towers five stories high above neighbourhood buildings. Artificial tree trunk bits stick out into the sky. All windows are uneven shaped openings and there is hardly a right angle on the whole structure.

A peach-coloured spiral staircase leads up to the rooms and rooftop, unexpected twists and turns everywhere. Animals crawl along walls, branches wrap themselves around railings, and balconies are sculpted like goblets.

It's a surreal place - Gaudi-inspired according to her, but I think it resembles more a Dali-esque invention. It's controversial in the world of architecture, but I don't think she is looking for their approval. After all, this is a work of art and has more to do with an outsider art environment than architecture per se.

She creates her dream world with a twinkle in her eyes and nature in her mind: "I have dreamt for years of having a house resembling a jungle with flowers, trees, birds and beasts. With such a place, I want to bring people back to nature" she says.

All rooms are themed and the interiors quite eccentric. The tiger room represents the strengths of the Chinese; the eagle room "the big and strong" American's. The ant room is a synonym for the hard working Vietnamese who know how to hold their own.

Every room is unique, with fireplace and their own bathrooms. Furniture is handcrafted and fitted to uneven surfaces or even built in. The rooftop room offers an unobstructed view from the bed into the night sky. If you can't fall a sleep, count stars.

The Bee's room was still a work in progress while I was there - it will feature two bathrooms with a massage bathtub and a waterfall. I stayed in the Kangaroo room, even though I am not an Aussie.

Light sources are hidden in bird nests, and, lying on the bed, I stared at myself through the leaf shaped mirror on the ceiling. The Kangaroo's belly is a fireplace and its eyes are red and glowing. Hopefully you sleep well all through the night and don't wake up from a nightmare or you think you've died and gone to hell.

More of an outlandish sculpture than a villa, the Hang Nga House is the work-in-progress of architect Hang Viet Nga.

Called "Crazy House" by locals, the swirl of building/sculptures is part Gaudi with slices of Disney, Steiner and sprayed with hippie whimsy.

Soaring above the terrace, a giant concrete banyan tree with twisted roots extend every which way. Giant wire spider webs are suspended from branches. Stairways are made to resemble tunnels and caves.

Part sightseeing spot and part hotel, the Hang Nga House captivates you with its menagerie of rooms.

Nooks and crannies serve as sitting rooms.

The Tiger Room and the Kangaroo Room mean just that – they are decorated with animal sculptures after their namesakes.

Clearly, Hang Nga House was designed to remind you of the integration of nature within a living, breathing environment.

Though locals may call her architectural wonder "Crazy House," Hang Nga prefers to describe her work thus: "With the voice of architecture, I wish to lead men to come back to nature and love it and not make full use of it or destroy it."

A uniquely odd architectural work in the Central Highlands city of Da Lat, has been shortlisted by the Chinese People’s Daily as one of the world’s ten most bizarre buildings.

French travel guide Hachette has also highlighted the “Crazy House” as a not-to-be missed hotel stay on any trip to Vietnam.

The house, occupying nearly 1,600 sq.m on Huynh Thuc Khang Street, was completed in 1990 as a personal project by architect Dang Viet Nga. The controversial building once dismissed as “crazy” has now become a regular feature on tourist visits to the city.

The free-form undulating structure is quite unlike anything else in Da Lat, let alone Vietnam. The house is constructed on a numerous levels with a naturalistic theme interpreted through concrete curves, twists and bends, giving it the appearance of an out-grown tree.

The interior is equally unorthodox, with almost every surface twisting, curving and running fluidly along the internal corridors, stairwells and rooms.

Mismatched windows give the impression of a fairytale house straight from Little Red Riding Hood, while stone tigers, bears, eagles, kangaroos and pheasants decorate the environs adding to the surreal environment.

The building has been dogged by controversy since conception with arguments centering on the structure’s insufficient architectural integrity, ad-hoc character and lack of formal aesthetic.

Nga shrugs off criticism, “Many people have criticised me, even my colleagues. I don’t blame those whose don’t understand me.” Instead she believes that the controversial character of the house has won her more attention.

“When they first saw the house, people would exclaim that it was a “crazy house”! So that’s how it got its name, and now, it’s one of Da Lat’s leading tourist attractions,” Nga says.

Nga is more concerned with conveying history and myth through the structural and decorative styling of the house rather than conforming to strict architectural rules. The house for her is interconnected by “a cobweb, which can be conceived as a bridge linking reality and the spiritual world, linking the self and the infinite universe,” she says.

Visitors have been responded to Nga’s creation, one French visitor noted in the guest book: “Thanks for showing me the meaning of life. The fairy tale house took me back to my childhood, to when things were pure and natural.”

The Lam Dong Provincial People’s Committee has designated the house as a serious architectural work and its owner, Nga, has had the architectural plans and style of the house copyrighted, becoming the first of its kind to receive such recognition in the province. With the new certificate from the city administration, she now can expand and plans to build another house in 2010.

The nine other buildings selected by China’s People’s Daily include the Forest Spiral – Hunder swasser Building in Germany, the Ideal Palace in France, the Basket Building, the Public Library building and the upside down Wonderworks in the US, and the Cubic houses in the Netherlands. (VNA)

Otherwise known as the "Crazy House," this Gaudí-meets-Sesame Street theme park is one not to miss. It's a wild mass of wood and wire fashioned into the shape of a giant treehouse and smoothed over in concrete. It sounds simple, but there's a vision to this chaos; just ask the eccentric owner/proprietor and chief architect, Ms. Dang Viet Nga. Daughter of aristocracy, Ms. Nga is well-heeled after early schooling in China and has a degree in architecture from the university in Moscow. In Dalat she has been inspired to undertake this shrine to the curved line, what she calls an essential mingling of nature and people. The locals deem her eccentric for some reason, but she's just misunderstood; don't pass up any opportunity to have a chat with the architect herself. On a visit here, you'll follow a helpful guide and are sure to have fun clambering around the concrete ladders, tunnels, hollowed-out nooks, and in the unique "theme" rooms of this huge fantasy tree trunk. It's an actual guesthouse, too, but it offers more theme than comfort. It's better just to visit than to stay. There's a small family shrine in a large common area at the back. It all spoke to me about Vietnam's refreshingly lax zoning laws, but to many it's an interesting, evolving piece of pop art. This is a fun visit.

A cool hill station far from the bombing and guerrilla warfare in the southern part of the country, Da Lat was a resort during the Vietnam War and has remained a resort, with still-intact colonial villas designed at the turn of the last century by celebrated French architects. The Crazy House, built by the daughter of Ho Chi Minh's right-hand man, wriggles up amidst the surrounding architecture as a bizarre contrast. Bizarre for Vietnam. Bizarre for Southeast Asia. It is like a Disney animation of a Grimm's Brothers fairy tale sculpted by Salvador Dali on the grounds of a classic French colonial villa.

The modest villa serves as restaurant and reception area. The décor is unchanged in the half century since the tentacles of the French Empire lost their grip on Southeast Asia. The floors are dark varnished hardwood planks of uneven widths and the furniture is simple French colonial stock: heavy wood with aged red leatherette cushions. The woodwork is layered with chocolate enamel paint, high-lighting the tiny hairline cracks of age. "It's a tad creepy," said a Canadian guest, running her finger through the grime on a scalloped parchment lampshade.

The walls are covered with magazine clippings of articles and patchwork collages of photographs in large wooden frames: photographs of Madame Hang Nga -- born Dang Viêt Nga -- as one face in a children's classroom portrait; seated at a piano in a traditional Vietnamese ao doi;wearing a lacey white Bo Peep dress under a red parasol; and as an adolescent with her father and other famous politicians.

A faded Cosmopolitan clipping claims Hang Nga was bounced on the knees of Ho Chi Minh, Fidel Castro, and other famous revolutionaries. Born in 1940, she was probably too old for knee bouncing when she first met Uncle Ho and Fidel, but she knew them. As Ho Chi Minh's right-hand man and the first president of Vietnam after reunification, her father, Truong Chinh, was a revolutionary in his own right.

Children sometimes dream of becoming characters in fairy tales. Dang Viêt Nga made that dream and now lives in a concrete, revolutionary fairy tale -- she even made up a name for herself: Hang Nga (Sister of the Moon).

"My father is political man," she said, speaking slowly in English, "but he understands poetry and literature." After completing her primary education in China, Hang Nga eventually completed a PhD in architecture in Russia. "I like art and technique," she explained, "and architecture is art and technique together."

Like most Vietnamese professionals, she worked for the state. "I am very sad," she said, describing her relationship with the Da Lat People's Committee. "After working in government offices, I decide to do something for myself." That something was the Crazy House. "Now they see all the foreigners come here, and they ask: 'Why do all the foreigners come here? They are crazy. Madame Hang Nga is crazy.' But now some of them understand."

Beyond the curtain of shell necklaces covering the panes of the front window in Hang Nga's villa, a giant concrete "root" has grown up out of the porch. This is the beginning of one of the complex of "tree houses" she has sculpted in her garden. The tree to the East holds five rooms and seems to be complete. If anything here is complete. The entire complex is a work in progress, a cluttered tangle, remarkably organic in every sense.

In addition to stunningly executed spider-web skylights and sculpted doors, hallways and balconies, the Crazy House is spiced with garish decorative details such as the thin cotton curtains of pastel blue and pink, intended to imitate blue sky and clouds but utterly failing to do so. This is the kitsch that makes it so camp -- the sixties word that is rarely heard now. In addition to overnight guests, small busloads of visitors arrive at regular intervals allowing a tribe of varied ethnicity and nationality to spill out over the walkways between the trees and gawk. They are part of the kitsch.

Most foreigners adore Hang Nga and her Crazy House. A typed letter from France rants about fonctionnaires borné (narrow-minded bureaucrats) who claim that artists pervert society. "Quintessentially cosmic," wrote one fan from California. "I admire your ability to turn imagination into architecture" wrote another from New Zealand. "Very brave, brilliant," wrote a Singaporean guest. An Australian has sketched a portrait of Madame Hang Nga, looking like an impish pixie. Other guests have left pastel watercolours and hand-written music for the "Queen of the Moon."

Each of the five rooms, explains Hang Nga, has its own theme. The tiger room is for the Chinese. A large tiger with eyes burning bright with red Christmas tree lights, descends down the wall toward the fireplace. The Eagle Room, with a giant eagle's egg as a fireplace, is "big and strong" for the Americans. The Ant Room is for the Vietnamese. "They are always trying to do hard work," says Hang Nga, "and, like red ants, they can fight back."

The concrete tree to the west contains these three rooms. Its upper level has a framework of the slim tree trunks used in construction in most developing countries, draped with blue plastic sacking. Using the existing roofs of the Tiger Room, the Eagle Room, and the Ant Room for its foundations, this is where Hang Nga will build her dream room: the Bee Room. It will be a two-storey suite, with two bathrooms, a waterfall and a massage bathtub. "All countries have bees," Hang Nga explains. Bees have "unity." They are "organic" and have "technique character." "They," she searches for the English word, "collaborate." This room, with no more than a few branches in the skeleton of its walls, is mostly still in Hang Nga's imagination.

"You share with the world your love of the unconventional, no nationality," wrote one fan of unidentified nationality. "Hang Nga is blessed with a rare quality called belief," writes another guest from Israel, "believing in one's dreams."

Ho Chi Minh City Metro
Possible outline.

* 1 The Metro network * 2 History * 3 Map and stations * 4 Station facilities, amenities, and services o 4.1 Station layout and accessibility o 4.2 Shops and services * 5 Safety o 5.1 Incidents and accidents o 5.2 Rules o 5.3 Security * 6 Fares and Ticketing o 6.1 Fare structure o 6.2 Types of tickets o 6.4 Passes * 7 Rolling stock o 7.1 Depot * 8 Future expansion * 9 References * 10 See also * 11 External links

Latest resources:
 * Ben Thanh – Suoi Tien metro in Ho Chi Minh City: obstacles in ground clearance
 * The work begins: HCM City to have first subway in 2015
 * Government agrees financing plan for city's first metro
 * HCM City goes ahead with subway projects
 * Metro section 2 costs $1.247b
 * City sets to start construction of metro route No.2

Names of Ho Chi Minh City / History of Ho Chi Minh City
Source for history of city.

For centuries, the present day central and South Vietnam were populated by the Chams and Khmers respectively. From the twelfth century onward, Prey Nokor was a small and secondary fishing village on the Khmer kingdom's eastern seaboard. As their southern and main port of Mang Kham (Ha Tien) became threatened by bandits and the Siamese, the Khmers turned their eyes to Prey Nokor that in time grew into their most important trading post and commercial port.

A Vietnamese princess by marrying the Khmer king Chey Chettha II in 1618 gave the chua Nguyen a reason to establish a tax collecting office in Prey Nokor in 1623. The town grew in wealth and size as it attracted many more Vietnamese settlers who gradually displaced the Khmers from their lands. They came in as individuals, isolated families, or as part of a military don dien. There were also civilian don dien where inhabitants did not have to do military duty. Khmers, Chams were enrolled into the program because of shortage of manpower.

The implementation of the don dien or military settlements allowed the anchoring as well as the expansion of Vietnamese communities in the Mekong delta. Troops would settle in a certain area where they worked part-time as soldiers and the rest of the day on their fields as pioneer farmers. The community would then receive an influx of settlers-mostly poor people, convicts, or prisoners of war-who were sent in to populate the region. The presence of Vietnamese soldiers formed a protective and stabilizing force in the building of the new South as the Chua Nguyen vied to become a steady power broker in the volatile and anarchic region. From 1500 to 1800, as the influence of the Cham and Khmer kingdoms waned, there was no major power center from Nha Trang (central Vietnam) to Ligor (Malaysia). It was a fluidly region with constantly shifting political allegiances.

Two emerging powers-Vietnam and Siam-stepped up to fill the void in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Confrontations between these two forces increased with time resulting in major battles and territory gains at the expense of the Khmers. Each Vietnamese intervention into the Khmer empire usually at the Khmer King's request increased the power and reach of Saigon's local generals since Hue-the central power-located 600 miles away-could not immediately intervene.

The Saigon-Gia Dinh area thus became the melting pot between natives (Chams, Khmers) and non native people (Vietnamese, Chinese, Siamese), between political entities (Vietnam, Khmer, Ha Tien, Siam), religious (Catholicism, Buddhism, Hinduism), and ethnic forces (Vietnamese, Khmer, Chams, Chinese). All these forces ended up clashing and fighting against each other for a role and an influence in the area. They affected the status quo of the region as well as the building of Saigon, the new power center of the Mekong delta and an important commercial, political, and military city. The fact that whoever held Saigon basically controlled the whole new South further polarized all these forces. "The Women of Vietnam" By Nghia M. Vo, Chat V. Dang, Hien V. Ho
 * http://www.sacei07.org/women10.jsp

Buu Son Ky Huong
Source for movement's origin.

According to this interpretation, the cosmos evolved in series of cycles. Each of these cycles included a phase of prosperity, decay and ruin. At the end of each cycle, when ruin, disasters and wickedness had taken over, there would be an apocalyptic event, a flood perhaps, or a cosmic conflagration, or a huge typhoon. It would engulf the world and cleanse it of evil. All wickedness would disappear, and only what was good and virtuous would remain. The forces of the cosmos would rearrange themselves in a new "creation of Heaven and establishment of Earth" (tao thien lap dia), and a new era of peace, prosperity and virtue would begin. It was believed that our present era, ruled over by the historic Buddha Gautama, was about to end, and that it would be replaced by the era of Maitreya, the Future Buddha.

Maitreya was a popular figure of worship throughout the history of Vietnamese Buddhism. In the Temple of the Heavenly Mother in Hue stands a huge statue of him. Until the 19th century, he embodied hope rather than despair. He symbolized the aspirations of Vietnamese Buddhists for salvation and rebirth in his Pure Land. Even though predictions of an impending apocalypse had surfaced many times over the centuries, the Maitreya ideal was not linked to the fear of apocalypse. In the 1850s, however, a new religious movement was founded on the claim that the apocalypse was about to come, and that all wickedness was to be destroyed. Then, the Buddha Maitreya would descend to usher in a new millennium of peace and prosperity. The exact location of his descent was to be a desolate hilly area near the Cambodian border in southwestern Vietnam. Those who wished to strive for salvation and rebirth in the reign of Maitreya were to gather there to cultivate themselves and lead a good life. The new religious movement became known as Buu Son Ky Huong or Strange Fragrance from the Precious Mountain. The name of the movement was meant to refer to the fact that Maitreya was expected to appear in the Seven Mountains of Chau Doc province (hence the idea of a Precious Mountain) and that he would preach a new Buddhist doctrine, likened by the believers to a strange fragrance.

Southwestern Vietnam in the 1850s was pioneer territory with a sparse, but mixed population. The Vietnamese there were in the minority against both Cambodian natives and Chinese immigrants who had poured into the area in a steady stream since the turn of the century. Among the Vietnamese were people who had come in search of a better future. But there were also many defrocked monks from other regions, as well as people who were considered undesirable by the authorities of their native places and had been sent into exile to this frontier. The Vietnamese population in this region was thus adrift from its cultural moorings, for traditional village structures had not yet acquired solid foundations, and few representatives of the state were in evidence.

What the Buu Son Ky Huong movement had to offer to these pioneers, dissidents and rebels was an ideology of moral, social and cultural integration, an ideology that made sense of their hardship and of their experiences, and provided them with hope for the future. This ideology was presented as a return to the original purity and simplicity of Buddhism. Observing the teachings of the Buddha in one's daily life would be the only path to salvation, not the mindless utterance of prayers, not costly offerings and elaborate ceremonies. It was thus a reaction to the rigid monasticism of 19th century Buddhism. It was an ideology that celebrated hard work and frugality, that did not distinguish between rich and poor, that was family-oriented rather than congregational or monastic. It was thus tailor-made for its pioneer following.

Despite the sect members' self-image as orthodox Buddhists, their leaders tended to be practitioners of popular religion -- faith-healers, soothsayers, and Taoist priests whose occupation gave them power over the world of spirits and put them in contact with a wide variety of people. Even the Buddhist monks among them did not belong to mainstream Buddhism. The leaders spearheaded the creation of new villages where the sectaries would be able to live according to the beliefs and practices of their sect while waiting for Maitreya's descent. They believed that all the hardships they suffered, battling wild beasts and inclement nature and enduring the ravages of unrest and periodic wars between Vietnam and Cambodia, prepared them for rebirth into the perfect world of Maitreya. All else would perish. The myth of the millennium was thus a powerful incentive to attract pioneers and to give them the courage to remain in this inhospitable region. At the same time, the religious teachings of the sect fostered a sense of community that overcame the absence of long-standing village institutions and kinship ties.

No more than the Catholics of the north did these unorthodox pioneers openly challenge the authority of the emperor. They sought above all to remain in the margin of mainstream society, free of official interference. But even as they believed themselves to be loyal subjects of the emperor, they put Maitreya -- and the prophets who claimed to be the reincarnation of Maitreya -- above him. That in itself made them vulnerable to suppression as heretics. But while the Catholics, linked in the minds of the officials with the Westerners, came under increasing persecution, the sectaries of the southwest were valuable allies of the state as settlers of the disputed frontier area. The state thus chose to leave them alone.

The sectaries became involved in the anticolonial movement soon after French conquest. It was the first time that their apocalyptic vision had led them into political militancy. In their calculations, the apocalypse loomed nearer, and the need to use violence against the established order as a prelude to the birth of the new millennium became more urgent. Not surprisingly, the French banned the sect, but were unable to eradicate it completely. Its roots were established firmly among the population of the southwest, and were able to survive into the 20th century.

One reason why the Buu Son Ky Huong sect was able to outlive repeated persecution was its essentially family oriented nature. It had a minimum of organizational structure. It was a way of life more than an organized movement. Only when they rebelled did the sect members join together, for congregational worship was rare. Partly because of this characteristic, partly because of earlier suppression, the survival of this millenarian tradition went largely unnoticed in the first few decades of the 20th century, a time when secular political parties made their first appearance in Vietnam. Of these the Communist party was the most successful and visible, as well as the chief target of repression by the colonial state.

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The Seaboard World Airlines landing at Marble Mountain was an incident that took place in Vietnam in summer 1969 (most likely in April). A transoceanic Douglas DC-8 Super 63 full of Vietnam-bound troops erroneously landed at Marble Mountain Air Facility, a helicopter support base with a 1.4 km (4300 ft) asphalt runway. Confused by the nighttime illumination, the aircrew had mistaken it for Da Nang Air Base, which had a 3.0 km (10,000 ft) runway. The aircrew made a full-stop landing with no damage or blown tires.

There were 217 American troops on the aircraft, which had originated at March Air Force Base via Honolulu and Guam. The aircraft landed at about 0300 hours, thus causing the entire base to go on alert. Several enterprising Marine officers put a ladder up to the door of the airplane and escorted the crew to their officer club. When daylight came fuel was drained from the tanks prior to backing the plane down the runway to make it light enough for a short-obstacle takeoff the next day. The plane was then ferried to Da Nang.

The marines brought school buses up to the plane doors and the 217 troops jumped onto their tops and then down the hood and onto the PCP runway. They were then all loaded aboard the buses for a trip to Danang Main. The commotion woke everyone at our Army OV-1 SAC camp, which shared the strip with the marines. We had a few beers, watched the confusion, and then went back to bed. We looked at the skid marks the next day, and the plane had set down about 800 ft. from the start of the runway. There were 4 black streaks till it stopped, but the nose gear never hit sand.

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