A word of warning: if you’re visiting Vietnam to get a glimpse of its culture and history, let me tell you, IT IS NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART. If you’re thinking of having a vacation that’s all peach-and-roses and sunshine-and-rainbows, then you’ve come to the wrong place. You see, behind the rustic beauty and understated elegance, there’s like an air of heaviness surrounding the place. You can try to stick only to the glitzy and bright areas, but there’s always that shadow following you. So to get rid of that elephant in the room, you should just face it head-on and stare it in the face. Like we did, when we checked out Maison Centrale, also known as the Hoa Lo Prison.
Part of the reason why this follow-up post to my first Hanoi travel blog post (on the St. Joseph’s Cathedral) took soooo long is because I had to wade through a lot of photos I took during our visit to Maison Centrale. The subject was just too heavy, and I kept marveling at how many photos I took, even of the written accounts posted. And reading through them again somehow made my heart a bit heavy, that I had to put off curating what I should upload here.
But I can’t put it off any longer, so here it is.
What is Maison Centrale?
Doesn’t it sound like a really ritzy French hotel or establishment? In a way, it is. But not as glamorous as it sounds. “Maison” is French for “home”, but this place is another type of home for many of the revolutionaries patriotic soldiers during the French occupation of Vietnam, and again for the US prisoners of war during the Vietnam War.
The Vietnamese name for the place is “Hoa Lo”, the meaning of which is quite a far cry from the French name. Hoa Lo literally translates to “stove” or a “fiery furnace”, but the more contextual meaning for most is actually “Hell’s Hole”.
While we were planning our sightseeing itinerary weeks before the trip and I saw Hoa Lo Prison included on the list, I was expecting something like a tour around a prison primarily for its architectural design.
The actual visit far exceeded my expectations. And then some.
From the Cathedral, we walked to the outskirts of the French Quarter – aided by our map – and met only a couple of minor snags and runarounds until we spotted the exact street where Hoa Lo is located. I guess you can do it the easy way and get a cab to take you there, but we were already close, so that sounded like a waste of money.
It was already well past the lunch hour when we arrived at Hoa Lo Street. I think this is partly the reason why, except for several foreign couples and a group of Caucasian university students on a guided tour, we were the only ones there. Yay for not having to battle through a throng of people (inside a prison, no less!)!
The facade looks so pretty that, looking at it from across the street, I could only wonder about the atrocities that took place inside. To be honest, at that time, I didn’t have the faintest idea. I just loved how quaint yet stately it looked.
There is a ticket booth on the right side of the main entrance to Maison Centrale, and that’s where guests can secure their tickets. I suppose if you are visiting on an organized tour, the tour guide will take care of everything for you.
So we got our tickets, which cost 30,000 VND (Vietnam Dong) or USD 1.30 or Php65.00, and went in.
If you’re worried that you’d be lost if you don’t have a guide with you, then don’t be. Unless you have the wonkiest sense of direction and cannot read simple English words, that is.
There are signs that will indicate where you should start your own walking tour of the interior of Maison Centrale. (At this point, just after entering, it was still Maison Centrale for me.)
Maison Centrale has two parts: the first pertained to its being the place where the patriotic soldiers were detained during the revolution of Vietnam against the French from 1896 until the liberation in October 10, 1954.
If you have a lot of time to spare, and you feel like sitting through a lengthy documentary, there is a room on the second level where you can watch one, documenting the history of Vietnam, and centering around Maison Centrale. If you also have a lot of time to read, there are framed photos with long captions – written in three languages (English, Vietnamese, and French).
The room contained thematic displays of images, documents and memorabilia referring to the fight of the political prisoners for freedom even as they were held captive within the Maison Centrale. The title of the thematic display is “Political Prisoners in Hoa Lo Prison and Hanoi Capital”.
Here are some of the items on display. Aerial photos and the design of the prison, including other old photos of the various interrogation and torture cells of the Hanoi police at the time.
By the way, Hoa Lo Prison has a total land area of 12,908 square meters, making it one of the largest and fortified prisons in Indochina at that time.
Speaking of design, all the metals used (including the locks, hinges, nails and door corners) in the prison’s construction were imported from France, and “of the highest quality”. They even had displays of some of the bricks and tiles used by the French colonists in building the place.
There was an entire corner devoted to the revolutionary leaders and key players, central of which was Van Tien Dung, or Huan Chuong Ho Chi Minh. Of course, the world knows him more simply as Ho Chi Minh, the revolutionary leader who went on to become Prime Minister and President of the Democratic Country of Vietnam.
We went down shortly after to take a tour of the ground level of Maison Centrale.
The outer room had this furnace, which I presumed was symbolic of the literal meaning of Hoa Lo. The mural represented the trade village of Phu Khanh, which used to be what was standing in the area before the French colonists decided to build what became known as Hell’s Hole, or Hoa Lo Prison.
Phu Khanh village was also known as Hoa Lo Village, and was where earthenware home tools were crafted. It was most famous for crafting portable stoves. When the village was “moved” to make way for the construction of the prison, it was forever lost. And so was the age-old art form of creating earthenware appliances and portable stoves, in particular.
They did, however, manage to salvage some old ceramic products of the Village, and they were on display as well.
When we walked further inside, the place ceased to become Maison Centrale, and the reality of it being Hoa Lo Prison became all too real, at least for me.
This is Cell D, everyone.
Cell D was one of the largest cells in Hoa Lo, and it was where the male prisoners were kept. It has a capacity of up to 40 prisoners, but it could reach up to 100 at a time, resulting to overcrowding and several illnesses throughout the year, whether it is summer or winter.
It’s visibly reworked now, for “museum” purposes, but at the time, it was supposedly built to have no walls, with only tiny holes near the roof for minimal ventilation. It had a tiled roof, but no ceiling, and the walls were made of black tar.
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There’s a panorama of Hoa Lo Prison presented in 1/70 scale. You can use the provided headphones, press buttons on a dashboard, with each button representing an area within the compound, and listen to a voice (in English or French, take your pick) explaining about that area.
This is the Main Gate of Hoa Lo. Which reminded me of those horror movies involving castles and fortresses where, at some point, someone will die. 🙂
No matter where you look, you’ll find something of interest, whether they are old artifacts or photographs or some other item about the prison, or the cell in particular. They even have some of the rocks or stones used to build the place in a corner!
There was a huge board listing down the list of causes of death and number of deaths inside the Hoa Lo Prison for the period June 1920 to June 1921. In just a year, there were 87 deaths, and the top 3 causes of death were identified as “persistent fever”, “cholera”, and “flu”.
I dunno. In this day and age, it does sound a bit sad to hear someone dying because of a fever.
Oh, and here’s a display of the clothes and blankets that the male prisoners were made to wear and use.
Friends, welcome to Cell E.
Cell E is the stockade which, in the words of the panel inside the cell, “witnessed the draconian policies of the French against male political prisoners, attempting, little by little, to kill their will to fight”.
It was where the prisoners were subjected to some of the harshest treatments, but the will of the Vietnamese communist inmates/prisoners to fight was strong, and they held political training courses inside this cell, hiding reading and study materials on the walls and even on the wall.
To be honest, I entered the cell and I felt all stuffy, like it was so hard to breathe. And it was also very depressing. The model figures of prisoners shackled didn’t help any. But it did provide a glimpse of what they went through, although I’m pretty sure this was the “mild” and sugarcoated version.
If you’re wondering what that stair-like thing is at the end of the room, it’s their toilet. So if they have to do their business, it’s with everyone watching.
I dunno, just….. *sigh*
After this stockade is the Cachot Area, or the Dungeon.
In Hoa Lo, the dungeon is the “hell of the hell”, since it is used to confine the prisoners who somehow broke any of the prison regulations.
It’s dark, it’s narrow, and separated into even narrower stocks. Inside the stocks, the prisoner will be shackled on the floor, where they will do everything – eat, sleep and relieve themselves.
Some of the stocks were open, but were not allowed for entry. Not that I’d want to step inside, but… yeah.
If you thought stepping out into the courtyard will give you relief, it’s another form of assault to the senses altogether. Although it’s definitely worse back then, because the courtyard is where public baths were situated, along with guillotines. It’s toned down today, however, because there were only some vestiges remaining.
Like an old almond tree that served as a shield and protector of sorts of the prisoners. It is by the almond tree that they convened to talk about how to fight against oppression. And they also used its bark and leaves to cure certain ailments such as diarrhea, dysentery, and even to clean and treat wounds.
In the Death Cells (we’ll get to that later) yard, there is this portion of the underground sewer mounted for display. It was through this underground sewer that 16 political prisoners who were sentenced to death attempted to escape. 5 of them made it, and I don’t think we have to talk about what happened to the 11 who didn’t.
Several concrete etchings were also on display along the walls. This was one of them, entitled “Struggle Against Enemy’s Terrorism”.
Now we come to the Female Prisoners’ Stockade. The entire cell has a floor area of 270 square meters, with 4 smaller stockades and a stockade for those who had babies. There is also a bathhouse and a garden.
The smaller stockades had no shackles, thankfully, but I could not stay long inside, too.
This is the Salle des brutalités carcérales, or the cell where brutalities were committed against prisoners. The signboard even read “crime of the French colonialist committed on revolutionary patriotic soldiers”.
And what else should we see but…. an actual guillotine.
This is where prisoners who were sentenced to death got their sentence carried out. There’s even a list on the side of the people who were beheaded on specific dates. Like, there were 3 on July 6, 1908, 4 on August 3, 1908, and another 3 on August 25, 1908. My, my, this room appeared to have been busy in just those two months, huh.
See that basket on the right side? That’s where the heads were “stored”, and they will be taken out later on to be displayed to the public for a time.
I saw a couple of tourists standing beside the guillotine to have their photo taken, and they were all smiles, and… I don’t mean to sound judgmental, and maybe it’s just me, but… why? Why?
(Yeah, I think it’s just me. Maybe they had completely innocent and valid reasons to want to have that kind of photo, with that pose and smile taken, and I decide to respect that. ‘Nuff said.)
And since we’re in a room of brutalities, there are bound to be torture materials and tools lying around. And there are.
The displays inclluded iron shackles and blankets. The round wooden thingies beside the gloves (in the pic below) were the prisoners’ numbers. Nope, no names, just numbers. That’s so Jean Valjean~
The boxing glove is used to torture the prisoners, by the way. The other torture devices were walking sticks, electrical wire and electrical engine. There was even a bottle, which I don’t really want to contemplate the application.
Right beside this area are the Death Cells, or the Death Row Cells.
Basically, this is the area where cells for prisoners sentenced to death – and awaiting their turn at the guillotine – are located.
These cells were completely isolated from the other cells, for one reason: to keep the death row inmates from communicating with anyone else. Prison regulations hold that, once the prisoner has been sentenced by the Court to death, he will be detained for at least 10 months inside a death row cell. During that time, they could lodge or file an appeal.
But prison regulations were not followed most of the time, since the prisoners usually just spend 2 to 3 days inside these death cells before they are beheaded.
If the previous cells were depressing, then this area is downright painful to just contemplate staying in. It’s stark and… deathly.
The walls are 0.4 meters thick and the rooms have an area of 5 square meters. So there really is no room to move around. Not that they can move around, because they’ll be shackled all day long anyway.
The doors are opened only twice a day, for the soldiers to bring them food and water. The walls are painted with black tar, adding to the gloomy and depressive mood.
They even had model human sculptures placed inside, for greater effect, I suppose.
Right outside, there was a memorial of sorts, with incense and candles being burned in offering. It was quite a solemn place, and the wide and airy design was in stark contrast to the cells that we just walked around in.
All in all, a total of 1,651 Vietnamese revolutionaries were kept inside Hoa Lo by the French colonists from 1899 to 1954. That’s quite a long time, and so many people, and no doubt even a lot of stories that will not be completely forgotten, ever.
The second part and area of Hoa Lo referred to how the Prison was also used during the US-Vietnam War from 1946 to 1973.
The prison was where many of the US pilots who were arrested were temporarily detained. Unlike the French regime, however, the US pilots had a relatively easier time, with the Vietnamese government supposedly creating the “best living conditions that they could” for the US pilots.
There were two exhibition halls detailing the lives of the US pilots during their stay at Hoa Lo. Like this bed that was used by the pilots.
This was the flight suit of then Lieutenant-Commander John McCain when his warplane was shot down by the Hanoi army and militia. It’s on full display inside one of the exhibition halls.
And this, right here, is just one of the many drawings of the US pilots during their stay in Hoa Lo. They were displayed for everyone to see.
Will I recommend a visit to Hoa Lo Prison?
For all the heavy and depressive feelings it will evoke, I’d say go for it. It’s quite enlightening, actually. And very humbling, too.
Born in a generation where wars are read only in books, or seen in movies, or watched as news happening clear across the globe, I sometimes take for granted how the present is shaped by decisions made by key figures in the past. As I was walking around, I could not help but think about how my own country had its share of “unpretty things”, shaping it to what it is today.
At several points, we came across other guests to Hoa Lo who were obviously French, and I wondered how they felt or what they were thinking as they were walking around the place, especially since they were obviously not around when all those things they are reading about and seeing displayed took place.
Visiting this place will give you a whole new appreciation for Vietnam, and how strong it is as a country and as a people. I am personally touched by how this place was preserved. Sure, it was in-your-face and straightforward and brutal in many places, but how do you make something ugly pretty anyway? How do you dull something cutting and painful?
Most importantly, though, WHY WOULD YOU? Tell it like it is, document it. (I’m sure the French have their side of the story, but that’s beside the point.)
I think this is one of the reasons why you can sense how much the Vietnamese love their country. We can all learn a thing or two from them. In fact, we should.
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