Hanoi: City for Peace, V25, #04

Hanoi moves to a rhythm all its own. The people seem to live in a kind of shared awareness. Even the scooters—hundreds of them weaving through the streets—move like a school of fish, sensing and adjusting to one another with barely a pause. I was told there are no accidents.

I was near the curb one day when a scooter entered my space. I hadn’t seen him, but I felt him. His presence came into my awareness like a quiet request: please give way. I stepped aside without thought—a movement in cooperation with what had been asked. A simple moment of presence, of attunement.

Later that day, our guide Nang took us to the Hoa Lo Prison Museum. Built by the French in the 1890s to detain Vietnamese political prisoners, it was later used during the American War, as it’s called in Vietnam, to hold captured U.S. soldiers, including Senator John McCain. Americans came to know it as the “Hanoi Hilton.”

One exhibit documented the 11-day bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong. Entire families lost. Tears streamed down my face as I began to fathom what had occurred.

More than 2 million Vietnamese civilians died during the war, and hundreds of thousands are still unaccounted for.

Up to 4 million people were exposed to Agent Orange—its toxic effects still present in the environment and passed down through generations.

Over 7.5 million tons of bombs were dropped on Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia—more than in all of World War II combined.

Millions of unexploded bombs and mines remain, especially in rural areas. Some zones have been sealed off; others are still hazardous due to lingering contamination. In many places, the earth hides them still—waiting.

At the exit of the Prison Museum is a quiet courtyard honoring Hanoi’s designation as a UNESCO “City for Peace.” A sign there reads: It’s never too late for peace. Benches invite reflection.

Nang was already sitting on one when I arrived. I sat down beside him, tears still fresh on my face. He felt like a grandfather—steady, warm, and full of grace. I asked how he could be so kind to us, knowing what he had lived through.

He smiled and said simply, “Vietnam is fundamentally a Buddhist country. And the Buddha teaches us to let go of the past… and to cultivate peace in the present.

When Nang was eight years old, his village was bombed during that same 11-day campaign. A photo in the museum showed sandbags stacked along streets, offering only the barest protection. He walked those paths to go to school. 

Yet here we were—two people, from once-opposing sides, sitting side by side in silence. We were in the stillness beneath all ideas of each other. It felt like the field Rumi speaks of—beyond the limitation of words, beyond the mind’s chatter about who did what to whom, beyond ideas of rightdoing and wrongdoing.

The sadness lifted, and my heart opened as I grasped the profound choice that peace is. The shift from the ego’s story of blame and division to the presence of this moment—of simply being. And in presence, there is peace.

To forgive.

To listen.
To give space.
To choose love over history.
To live the teachings.

Peace is not a destination. It’s a practice.

And as Nang demonstrates to us all, peace is not something we find once. Peace is a rising up—a choice we make again and again.

May all beings know peace.
May all beings live in joy.
May all beings love one another.

Artist: Phillip Jones Griffiths, 1968,  on display in the Hanoi Cafe, Saigon, Vietnam