Imperial Palace & Forbidden Purple City

In addition to building an impressive tomb and temple, Ming Mang built a fabulous palace in the center of Hue. Like the tomb and temple, this structure is immense, and is surrounded by multiple walls and moats. Unlike the tomb, most of the palace was destroyed either during the war with France, or during the American/Vietnam war. Indeed, because the palace was used by the Viet Cong for hiding during the Vietnam war, it suffered heavy bombing, so very, very little of what was once a beautiful structure remains.

The general outline of the palace is roughly visible, and there has been some reconstruction. However, all that really remains of the 19th century palace is the noon gate (through which people entered the palace), some of the corridors, and the rooms and the gardens of the King’s mother and grandmother. There are photos of the palace that were taken in the very early 1900s, and it is clear that the structure was stunning! Looking at the remains, and the photos, gives you some sense of what the palace must have looked like in its glory — a relatively western structure, that was decorated with traditional Vietnamese carvings and decorations. The overwhelming feeling that I had was one of sadness for the destruction.

In the afternoon, we took a much needed rest at the hotel, as it was sweltering outside. Our guide, Quy, offered to take us to old Hue for dinner. He said that he knew local places, and that dinner for the 3 of us would cost $5 — TOTAL. We were game, and agreed to meet around 6. He asked us if we ate everything, and we said we did. . .

For dinner, we walked from our hotel to old Hue. On the way, we got to see some new lights that were installed on the main street by a company run by our pal Doug Lee. The lights are very modern, and employ some amazing technology that Doug developed. It was fun to see something created by someone we know. .. makes the world seem oddly small.

We had three stops for dinner.

The first stop was a “shop” that was in an empty room that opened onto the street. Again — no refrigeration, no running water. Just two women and a burner, some small tables and stools for chairs. The dish we ate was a noodle soup with fish. The noodles were hand-made by one of the women, who literally made the rice dough in her hands, rolled it out on a small board, and then cut it into thin strips. The freshly made noodles were dropped into a pot of fish stock, and then scooped into our bowls with some fish. Quite tasty. I also liked the hard boiled pigeon eggs that we ate while we waited for our soup. Arie liked the soup, but his verdict on the eggs — meh.

Our second stop was literally a corner, where a woman sat with a metal box and some baskets. She knew Quy, and he told us that this was one of his favorite places. She put 5 small stools on the corner — 2 for a tables, and 3 for us to sit on. She gave us three duck eggs. We cracked them open and scooped out a bite. When we realized that inside was. . . .well, I’ll spare you. Suffice it to say that we ate a polite bite or two, and said we had eaten too much soup.

Last stop was another “shop” that was run by a mother/daughter team. We were served three bowls of turmeric noodles (good part) with intestines (not so good part). Again, we politely ate around the not so good part.

Total cost for three people — $5.50. But, in retrospect, we should have stopped after the soup, and saved ourselves $3!Read more