when it drops the hat will fall in here
and then after that they would bring the
hat and then put it in this
container
and as you can see there a lot of
prisoners have died of by this method
okay so now i'm at the law prison right
now so hoa means fury furnace and fun
fact this area used to be a village that
people produce and they sell the stoves
so that's why it's called like kuala and
especially during the french time people
call it my son central and today i'm
very very excited to learn more about
the vietnamese history all right let's
come inside to find out
hua la prison was built in 1896 and it
was used by the french colonialists for
political prisoners and later by north
vietnam for the us prisoners during the
american war
yep people call the american war here in
vietnam
many american planes were shot and the
soldiers were jailed here including
douglas peter patterson who later became
the first u.s ambassador to vietnam and
john mccain a former u.s senator
the american inmates gave this complex
an ironic name hanoi hilton in reference
to the well-known hilton hotel chain
hua la prison is located at number one
hua law street hanoi it's open from
monday to saturday from 8 am to 5 pm
sometimes they have a night show in
which people will reenact the historical
stories and whole live performances the
entrance ticket costs 30 000 vietnamese
which is less than a volvo if you can
pay for a golfer then you can pay to
learn the history of the country that
originates for right
there will be audio in different
languages that explain historical
stories i really like how real the
background music and inspiring the
narrator's voices are makes me feel like
i was living in that moment
the first room explains hoala's location
and its name the prison was built in
fukhang village the only place that
sells home appliances in tanglong
citadel so i was very sad and shocked to
learn that the
fujang village was a very nice and rich
village because people here make the la
which is the portable earthen stove and
people here just have a very good life
by selling those not until the 1896 when
the french columnist built this prison
and this prison is one of the largest
and 45 prisons in indochina at that time
and i can't believe that the peaceful
life just turned into like a frightening
war during this time just can't imagine
i would live in that time
i'm going to saldi which is one of the
largest cells of huay law prison where
the french colonialists jailed male
political prisoners
it had a tile roof no ceiling and solid
walls painted with black tar
due to poor quality food and poor
sanitary conditions many prisoners were
unable to cope with their illnesses and
many of them died before their prison
terms expired oh my gosh this door is so
big and so sturdy and i've just learned
that all the hinges and the locks here
were imported from friends and they
would change it regularly because they
want to prevent prisoners from escaping
that's very scary
for fear that prisoners use bowls
chopsticks and spoons as weapons guards
did not let them use those things and
force them to use wooden trays with pots
to contain rice and food so here are the
pots that they use to keep the rice in
for prisoners and i just learned that
the prisoners here had to eat like chewy
buffalo meat broken small fish and with
rotten vegetables very poor
food because they the french want to
minimize the ration of the prisoners
yeah and there was a time that 40
prisoners died in a month that is
terrible oh my gosh
the prisoners perform hard labor such as
repairing houses or roads building dikes
and cleaning toilets if they couldn't
finish the work they got no food from
1940 to 1945 prisoners held many classes
teaching about politics and established
the party in the prison this is cell e
and cell e was used to detain all the
male prisoners here and they would help
from 40 to 50 prisoners and sometimes it
went up to 100 people and i can't
believe this small area they can hold up
to
gosh 100 people
it's unbearable and in 1932 there were
seven prisoners successfully escaped
from the myson central so that's why
they sealed all the
windows over there and it was very
unbearable for people and as you can see
their legs were being changed the whole
time so people had to take turns to sit
up or lie down and people would take
turns to go to the bathroom there's no
bathroom they just utilize over there
and people would take turns to take out
the waste and it's super polluted here
that's why people were surrounded by
mosquitoes and insects and were there a
lot of people died because of diseases
okay so this is the hell of a hell this
is called kachot and no one wanted to be
in here because this place was used to
punish all the prisoners who violate the
regulations and the prisoners in here
they were only fat rice and salt and it
was terrible they lived in a terrible
condition guys and i'm just gonna go in
there to see how suppressing the
conditions were
dungeon is for prisoners who violated
rules and regulations prisoners detained
in the kachod were shackled all day that
bland food while eating and using the
toilet at the same place
they could not lie down because the
surface was on an incline that would
cause blood to rush to their heads
after one month of being detained in
kachot prisoners often suffered from eye
diseases and body swelling so i'm next
to the guillotine that the french
colonialist used to be had the
revolutionary patriotic soldiers this
room is definitely the scariest room
that i have seen
because i'm not sure if you guys can
hear it but the audio is just so real
it literally just gives me goosebumps
right now
the french considered this killing tool
more humane than other execution methods
used in the middle ages which included
hanging and cutting off different body
parts and using horses to tear the body
apart
the falling force of the guillotine
blade is equivalent to 60 kilograms when
it drops the head will fall in here and
then after that they would bring the hat
and then put it in this
container
and as you can see there a lot of
prisoners have died
by this method okay so they use this
barrel over here to torture the prisoner
so basically the prisoner will be forced
to sit in here and then they would put
the waste and the soapy water and then
they would close it with the lid and
then after that they would hit it really
really hard with hammer or sticks yeah
so whenever the prisoner came out he or
she would be deaf or
his or her ears or her nose will be
bleeding yeah so it is a terrible
torturing method right here
[Music]
reading the messages from former
prisoners my heart aches
i couldn't imagine people have to suffer
lose their families and sacrifice
themselves for independence and freedom
nowadays it's easy for us to see the tip
of the history iceberg based on what we
see and hear from the media
as a result we are quick to assume
judge and hate
the lack of sympathy causes war
it doesn't matter if people call it
american war or vietnam war
it's simply just war
and we need to understand it from both
sides of history
no matter where we go we should remember
our roots and always be willing to
understand each other's history
cultures and backgrounds
that way the world would be a better
place
[Music]
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