Vietnam brings back a horrid past for the USA.  We lost the Vietnam War, our worst defeat in history.  Here is a  video attesting that the defeat was worse than you thought . The country is officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam with today a population of 102 million, ranking #15 in the world.  The capital is Hanoi, while the largest city is Ho Chi Minh City. Some history, Was inhabited by the Paleolithic age in the first millennium BC. Came under Chinese rule from 111 BC until 939 AD. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Vietnam had two domains. One of them surrendered to France in 1883, and was named French Indochina. In the immediate aftermath of World War II, the Viet Minh, led by Ho Chi Minh, launched the August Revolution, declaring Vietnam's independence in 1945. But France returned to reclaim colonial power, and the U.S. began to encroach in the early 50's. There was prolonged warfare until a treaty was signed in 1954 between the Viet Minh and France, wh...

This is the third and final part of our trip to France in 2019.  Part 1 was to  champagne country , Part 2  Bordeaux , and this Part 3 to Cognac, which is both a town ( 250 miles southwest of Paris ) and the highest form of brandy.  All bottles labeled Cognac are produced from grapes grown in this location.  The population of Cognac is around 19,000, but was as high at 22,000 in 1975. We only stayed two nights in Cognac, at what was then a new  Chais Monnet , one of the very finest hotels we have ever experienced.  Virtually adjacent are the grand four cognac companies, Martel, Hennessey, Courvoisier and Rémy Martin.  I picked this hotel because Rémy Martin is just across the street, where we had made a special appointment to get a private tour.  These four make 93% of all the cognac drunk.   We arrived by train.  Every major train station has a taxi stand, right?  Nope.  We waited for 15 minutes, and finally got some...

Last week I posted a two-part series on red wines.  On this nostalgic Tuesday, I will make it a five-part series with a visit I made in 2019 to France, where we tasted champagne and Bordeaux wine and cognac.  Parts 4 and 5 will be posted on subsequent Tuesdays. But first, a few newsworthy items. As my  blog expressed yesterday , President Donald Trump has transformed himself from dud to hero. Looks like that  fragile ceasefire for the Israel-USA vs Iran War is holding.   Lot of questions about where those 880 pounds of enriched uranium might be  to  future role on how the International Atomic Energy Agency can check on Iran  to  how long the ailing 85-year old Ayatollah can hang in there  to  a million others.  However, give Trump credit for solving this war in less than two weeks.  Israel still has that Gaza Strip problem, and there continues the Ukraine-Russia war, but the world today is in a safer place than yesterday. ...