[kearnyirish2]

Maybe; I won’t even pretend to be open-minded, but several stories arise here on FR where FReepers wonder what ever led someone to travel to totalitarian states with no individual rights.

[ThanhPhero]

I have been going back and forth to Việt Nam since 2003. In that year I faced an attempted extortion by local authorities in HCM. It cost me 40 USD. I left the area, got out of Sài Gòn. Now I stay out of the major cities and everything is cool. I have had interactions with police and local authorities but they end end with the official asking me to pose with him and maybe his wife for a photograph so he can prove he "has an American friend." These people are Vietnamese, not Chinese, not Latino. They are much more individualistic in culture than those cultures surrounding them and they are very practical.