Whay. That’s how locals in this lovely provincial city say it. Just an hour 25 minute flight from Ho Chi Minh. We knew it can be hotter and more humid here but Hue welcomed us with pleasant, breezy weather on the day of our arrival. Not so the following morning, when we explored the Citadel or Forbidden City, royal tombs and the Thien Mu pagoda. We only got a respite when we took a small boat from the pagoda back to the city center, helped along by refreshments on board.

The Citadel is right in the heart of the ancient city of Hue. It occupies a wide area, counting 520 hectares on the Perfume River’s left bank. Our guide made us walk the first half hour till we insisted on taking the electric buggy around the “Forbidden City”. Long, our guide, advised that the walk would take 2 1/2 hours. We promptly took the buggy without much thought. No walking at high noon 🙄 please.

The Citadel run may have taken shortcuts but our bodies still took and absorbed all the heat and humidity. Buckets of sweat and hardly a wind to blow dry our wet clothes. We dripped till it was over. The Imperial City within the Citadel reminded me of the Forbidden City in Beijing. For sure, the first 2 monarchs from the Nguyen Dynasty chose the site very well. And just like it, geomancy played a part in its architectural design to invite harmony as well as guarantee protection from harmful elements.

As the sun sizzled, we moved around as quickly as we could. We could have lingered longer in the theatre, or in the house of the king’s grandmother’s, but migraine was threatening to cut our Citadel tour short. It was more pleasant when we explored the royal tombs earlier. More than beating the crowd, the heat was more bearable then. Still hot and humid, but bearable. We may have done more justice visiting the Mausoleum of King Minh Mang than the walled palace of the Imperial City.

You can thus imagine how we felt by the time we reached Thien Mu or the Pagoda of the Heavenly Lady. Here you find the best view of the Huong or Perfume River from the Ha Khe hill, but one needs to scale steep steps to reach the scenic viewpoint. Mercifully, we climbed safely while sweating profusely. Our eyes hurt as beads of sweat ran down from our foreheads. Not even it’s iconic 7-storey pagoda nor the displayed car of the “protesting/burning monk” who immolated himself in 1963 Saigon helped unsettle our restless, sweating bods. We were just too eager to finish the tour in this high and dry temp. Our bods protested, just like the monk Thich Quang Duc burned himself to death in June 1963 in a busy Saigon intersection as an act of protest to South Vietnam’s persecution of Buddhist monks back then. We should have been thrilled to watch a couple of the 10 or so monks living within the pagoda grounds. But we’ve lost the enthusiasm, just as we found the young monks doing exercises by lifting weights. How could they…. in this heat?

From this pagoda, we took a wooden boat along the river. Just a short boat ride where we replenished our potassium levels with coconut juice and water. Tour’s over, and our late lunch is ready. The nourishment was another Vietnamese feast but we were just craving for the showers in our spacious, air conditioned, well-appointed hotel room. A day well-spent in Hue. Enough history lessons for my grandson. No more long walks and climbs for us. Phew!