This is described as a personal essay. Marc Steiner is part of a group that returns to Vietnam. An hour long programme is a long time to keep the listener engrossed. I feel it lies uncomfortably between two stools. There's the predominant studio based essay interspersed sporadically with some sound and an occasional interview from the trip. The two never quite come together leaving a sense of detachment. However personal the story may be somehow it just doesn't give a sense of the atmosphere of what that return journey was really like. It just doesn't come alive and I was never drawn in to their world.
There are of course some interesting moments such as when the culture police become involved and try to prevent an interview. Once it is sorted out the interviewee says to them not to worry - that it's comedy and not tragedy. For me though it can't resurrect the uncomfortable marriage of essay and inadequate sound.