The anxious mother
"I lived in Hanoi with my three children when the war started. The news came and one day, my husband was called up. Nobody could tell me when I will see him again. I was anxious all the time, first because of him, later, when Hanoi was bombed, I worried about my children and myself as well."
The war only gave misery and penury for the North Vietnamese, who stayed home. "My son was four years old, my daughter was two. They were sent to a camp for the offsprings of the soldiers. Children were collected and were educated there. My seven-month-old daughter was at the relatives in the country. I worked in Hanoi as a distributor in the rationing, on which everything was based. The maximum that we could ask for was prescribed. The ration per head was 13 kg rice, half a kilo meat etc. There was shortage of basic goods, such as soap or towel several times. The wood for heating was also limited and we had to pick more if it was necessary. Some goods were the monopoly of the state, such as oil. Its trading was illegal. We gathered rainwater for drinking. If we didn't use it for having a wash or watering plants, but only for drinking, the water collected during the rainy season was enough for all the year."
"We lived in a small flat with our relatives, on 18 square meter. There were seven of us and that was normal. We squatted on a hole as toilet and if it was full, we used it up for manuring. Water had to be brought from a public well since most of people couldn't afford digging one. There was a single bike in the family as mean of transport. I got it since my workplace was six km far and I had small children. One of them had to be suckled. The children were far as well and I couldn't always meet all of them. I brought food and other necessary things. I departed as soon as the sun had set down and I arrived in the middle of the night in bombings. If I was unlucky and the bombings were heavy, I had to sleep on half way and I arrived at dawn. I spent a night with them and then I went to work again. The journey was 45 km long."
"The bombs didn't avoid Hanoi. The escape was well-organized. If the sirens sounded that informed about the approach of enemy aircraft, everyone ran to the hiding-place. Every house had to have one that was built from cane and was covered with earth. That wasn't an appropriate defense against bombs, only against shrapnels. There were concrete public hiding-place on the street. Who actually was on the way, escaped there. That wasn't a secure protection either. Pestering Hanoi brought hatred against the Americans about. The adult generation of that time was just freed from the French colonizers and didn't want to be slave again. The consciousness of independence and the patriotism resulted such a collaboration that was a factor of the victory.