It put me in mind of the DrsC's visits to Vietnam, and our agreement that it was one of the most capitalist places we'd ever seen, in spite of the crimson banners everywhere celebrating how Communist it was supposed to be. Here are some quick vignettes.
Every new home is 2-3 stories with the street front downstairs a shop to either use as owner-merchant or rent to someone who wants to be a merchant. I think of Vietnam as a nation of shopkeepers and merchants.
Everybody who can scrape up the money has a light motorcycle and they'll transport their entire family on it. I think maybe the most people we saw on a single light motorbike was five, mom, dad, and 3 kids including an infant.
It's never cold but rain is an issue. There are thousands of these put-putting around Ho Chi Minh City and Da Nang, literally swarms of them. They also get used to transport goods in very creative but unsafe ways.
Strange as the assertion may seem to you, I believe a good argument can be made that in the long run the U.S. won the battle for the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese. What we saw was the urban Vietnamese trying their darnedest to live as much like Americans as possible.
Afterthought ... living well isn't just the best revenge, though it truly is that. It is also the best possible way to induce others to want to emulate you. It is a fact of our life we Americans tend to overlook.
