20 December, Hanoi
Old Quarter Cyclo Hotel
275,000VND
Ho Chi
Minh, revolutionary, nationalist, communist... Affectionately known as Uncle
Ho, Ho Chi Minh played a key role in ending French rule in Vietnam and in the
battle to unite north and south Vietnam thereafter. He was President of the
Democratic Republic of (northern) Vietnam from 1945, but died in 1969, six
years before Vietnam was united. In his will he asked to be cremated. His
successors ignored his wishes and today his embalmed body lies in state in an
enormous mausoleum modelled after Lenin’s, a pilgrimage site for the Vietnamese.
Ho lies on his back in a glass sarcophagus guarded by four soldiers in white
uniforms trimmed with red and gold. He was a small man with a wispy beard. The soft
lighting casts an almost eerie glow on his wax-like face and hands while in reverential
silence the visitors file past his corpse. Ho’s body is sent to Russia each
year for maintenance. Inside the mausoleum is Vietnamese text citing one of
Ho’s favourite phrases: “Nothing is more precious than independence and
liberty”. In the square outside fly several red flags, half with the yellow
star of Vietnam, half with a yellow hammer and sickle.
Ho Chi Minh mausoleum
Ho Chi Minh mausoleum
Ho Chi Minh mausoleum
Ho Chi Minh mausoleum
Hanoi Old Quarter - street breakfast