Day 4 begun with a 30 km cycle to the Sea and a swim in a little coastal fishing village just outside My Lai where we had lunch! Was good to finally get some swimming! Then we had a further 4k before arriving at the site of the My Lai Massacre site. This was a very strange and 'eary' experience - basically on the morning of March 16th 1968 , the Americans were given orders to kill anyone who was in the village of My Lai - assuming that anyone in the village at this time would be NFL Sympathisers - As civilians would be away to the local markets. They took 504 lives, including women, children and babies. They raped, maimed laughed and tortured them. You can read more on this in the links.
While there, there was an old lady whom i managed to semi-communicate with, she was working in the garden of a ruin of one of the houses which had been torched (picture's to follow) - she lost her 3 children in the massacre, and she was one of the lucky survivors - she couldn't really talk English, but managed to communicate that it was her - it must be horrible for her to be at her house ruin everyday!
The rest of the day included a climb of 2 km up to the Thien An Pagoda - here a monk showed us around, showing us lots of sacred statues and Buddhists within the grounds - there was massive gold one in the gardens - not real gold, but impressive all the same!
Then there was a 12k cycle through the local traffic into Quang Ngia - that was manic! there are no strict road rules here - its every man for themselves!
Unfortunately, there is a mix of torrential rain and sunshine - so there's no sun tan yet!!! :(
70 km tomorrow - better get some sleep!
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