I found these images online of abandoned spaces in Vietnam. I found these relics of the war particularly haunting. In the first picture, of the abandoned guard towers, I could easily picture the conversation between Jesse and Hong. The picture of the abandoned church is also particularly haunting and embodies what I picture as a “conventional” gothic space. The second set of photos are equally haunting because it is as if battle locations are frozen in time. The second image of the bunker is especially arresting. It really looks as if the soldiers who were hunkered in there could have left yesterday.

http://weburbanist.com/2008/08/06/15-haunting-ruins-of-war/

“Highway 1 is the backbone of Vietnam, and was along the primary axis of the 1975 Easter Offensive that reunified the Southeast Asian  nation under Northern leadership. The church visible here was clearly somebody’s last stand, and hasn’t been touched since 1975; the guard towers have been abandoned since the end of the war (Unknown).”

 Khe Sahn

“Khe Sahn is a remote mountaintop near the Cambodian border in Vietnam, and was a critical airstrip and supply base on what was called the “MacNamara Line” to prevent a larger NVA presence in South Vietnam. In addition to being a Marine Corps stronghold, Khe Sahn was a target for the North Vietnamese because they would soon after its fall be able to take the smaller firebases at Camp Fuller and Razorback; instead the Marines held out for three months before evacuating successfully. The North Vietnamese later claimed the base, and in honor of their “victory” shipped in wreckage from other battlefields for a display (Unknown”).

Works Cited

Unknown. “Ruins of War: 15 Places Abandoned Due to Military Turmoil.” 2007-2014. WebUrbanist.com. 18 March 2014.