Spare Us Your Judeo Christianity

[South Korean tourist at Củ Chi Tunnel, 10/10/18]

Leaving my room at 3:25AM, I saw my homestay cleaning lady, Hà, with a small bag and an umbrella. She had just come downstairs from her room in the main building. Built by the French over a century ago, it’s high ceilinged and stately, with a steep roof. Before air conditioning, you couldn’t just pack people into boxes.

“You’re going to your home village?”

“No, Saigon,” she smiled. It’s clear she’s glad to have a day off. Sister Hà is always cheerful, however.

The Viet word for home village is quê. The Mường and Chứt minorities also use a similar word, so we’re clearly related. This is reassuring. In modern times, quê started to accrue negative connotations. To be quê mùa or nhà quê is to be a hick, meaning you’re less likely to dress like a Westerner, or know how to enjoy cheese, butter, fresh milk or, now, a cheeseburger, hot dog, pizza or fried chicken. Most tellingly, you never got into Édith Piaf, Juliette Gréco, Beatles, Bee Gees or just “Moscow Nights,” as sung by Vietnamese singers.

There’s a transcendent version on YouTube by Anna Netrebko and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. Watch it, weep, then sell that 20-year-old car you’ve been sleeping in. You’re moving to Moscow! At Sheremetyevo International, just sobbingly apologize for having voted for any American politician. “Just let me in! I’ll gladly be a toilet cleaner in the Moscow Metro! At least my soul will be free!”

Sister Hà’s quê is Củ Chi. Its miraculous system of wartime tunnels inspired the Mujahideen in Afghanistan and Hezbollah in Lebanon and Palestine. At Beirut’s Captain Cabin in 2020, I was shown a video of a Hezbollah motorcyclist driving forever inside a tunnel. The bar owner, Andre, claimed much of it was inside Israel. Grungy Captain Cabin was founded in 1964. I hope it’s still open. A dream scenario has me and Taxi sitting in there, before we head south to a liberated Jerusalem. European colonizers need to get the hell out.

From Poland, Germany, France, the UK, Russia and Ukraine they descended. Backed by the white world, they’ve brought nothing but mass death and sorrow. At this late stage, only whites cheer these genocidal invaders. Baring Satanic fangs, whites calmly execute a Holocaust in plain view. They won’t stop until all Semites are gone from the Holy Land. That’s your Judeo Christian legacy. Pseudo Christians are also helping Jews to massacre real Christians in Lebanon.

Jewjabbed and boostered, Sister Hà has probably forgotten there are tunnels at her quê. To save her work, I told her I needed no blanket, and my sheet could be changed just once a week. The blanket part she’s remembered but not the sheet. She has reverted to replacing it twice weekly.

In Winhoek in 2022, I’d pick up a fresh sheet from the housekeeper, then changed it myself. That lovely chick was a trip. Several times I caught her sleeping on the storeroom’s floor. Remembering her now, I think of Pelagea in Chekov’s “Gooseberries.” There’s so much space in Namibia, my room was vast. On the wall was a button, though, just in case an intruder had broken in.

There’s a downpour. Its loudness is forcing Tank Top to increase his volume, just to be heard. Even more than most men, his mind is embedded in the crotch. Spitting genitals, he’s howling, as usual.

Note that Sister Hà said Saigon and not Ho Chi Minh City. Yesterday I noticed a toilet paper called “Care,” in English, with “Saigon” as its brand. On its plastic packaging was a sweet, smiling white girl with daisies in her hair. She held sprigs of daisies. Behind her was some European meadow. Whiteness can be used to sell even bombs and missiles.

Cashing in on whiteness doesn’t always mean its endorsement. Paradoxically, this is most blatant in Whitelandia. Those so far away can’t understand. Vietnam doesn’t have the equivalents of Howard Stern, Jerry Springer, Susan Sontag, Noam Chomsky or Ron Unz, so its native culture isn’t presented in the worst light possible. There’s no Honey Boo Boo or Andrew Anglin here.

Two days ago, I photographed a man in a Trump cap. Dark, bony and in a tacky polyester shirt, he wasn’t likely to be Vietnamese-American. Still, you can never be sure. A close look at his hat would have proven he was a local. Instead of “MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN,” it said, “MAKE AMERICAN GREAT AGAIN.” It’s probably made in China.

Stepping back from all this, what do you see? Nothing alarming if you’re watching CNN or Fox. Ukraine is still kicking Russia’s ass, Israel will defeat all terrorists and Americans are so spoiled, they’re turning down great jobs sprouting up everywhere. The only drama is the MLB playoffs. Dodgers vs. Yankees would make a dream World Series.

Football has started again and, soon, so will basketball. With endless sport and porn to entertain those who still have electrical outlets, life can’t be better. Now, there are even AI lovers so ideal, you’ll never have to deal with another diseased body again. None but your own, with its rubbery clots you can almost see or hear, they’re so insistent.

So adverse to reality, many are choosing anime lovers. Even cartoons must find geeks tiresome, so don’t hope for more than a quarter night stand. With widest eyes and tiniest mouth, she’ll blurt, “OK, I must go. It was good. Don’t call me. I’ll call you.”

Finishing this at Cóc Cóc, I’m surrounded by cheerful chatterers. I can feel my soursop smoothies undoing, slurp by slurp, decades of reckless eating and boozing. Riding by, Matthew Rossman quickly waves. He’s stopped asking me to trek up a hill with him. When not writing, I think about it. Hunched, a tiny old woman wanders in to sell lottery tickets. Staring at the ground, she must keep moving. A terrier who’s always barked at me is sniffing the back of my hand. Vietnamese dogs can’t be too trusting.

Last night, I paid just $5.63 for six large shrimps, a heap of oysters, lightly boiled okras and a bottle of water. Since Hào Né has no English menu, it’s strictly a Vietnamese joint. Though aliens are welcomed, they would need a local to translate. I’m doing that with my articles.

[$5.63 dinner at Hào Né, a three minute walk from my room in Vung Tau, 10/14/24]

[enjoying a Lebanese beer, Almaza, with Ali in Sarba, a Christain village in Hezbollah controlled territory, 10/30/20]

[Maghdouché, a village of Melkite Christians in Hezbollah controlled territory, 12/22/20]

[Leeba, a Christan village in Hezbollah controlled territory, 11/8/20]