during the war itself at least in northern vietnam the state's downplayed religion, discouraged people from more traditional religious practices. today religion is all over the place. you know got to give you a little bit of a sense, i first went to vietnam in 1989. the first time that question to get back again. and there is a huge french built catholic cathedral. beautiful cathedral. and i went to mass one morning. i'm not catholic, but i was curious to goes. nobody is cecil went. very, very sparse. i was not annoyed in march. latin masses. i was at one. and then catholicism. only 10 percent catholic. most of buddhist. this is a ploy to up proliferation. and then a lineage, family lineage and worshiping family lineage was an important part of the tradition. this is it. and the war, family altars. if you live after the war and you have a relative, maybe a son who had fought for the national liberation front, south vietnam, maybe even of vietnam, you could not honor the relative who had fought from the south. the south was defeated. they had to pretend that south had not been there. in

first a look at the tropical storm that has now made landfall in northern vietnam and it has shown signs of weakening rapidly. wind now at 65 kilometers an hour. the windy area getting much smaller but it will continue to pack flenty of moisture over the next couple of days as it heads in toward the northern dr through the northern end of the indo-china peninsula, i should say. we're going to expect lots more rain. a wide area. we'll pick up more than 100 meters or more. we will continue to see a heightened risk of flooding as well as landslides with this. now, over toward taiwan, we have severe tropical storm remaining strong and large starting to produce a very strong winds near its core as well. it's going to head northward and aim for the korean peninsula likely about monday here. but right now it's bringing very stormy conditions to its taiwan as well as the souern islands of japan. here we're expecting rainfall amounts of about to 300 millimeters in the next 24 hours. a lot of rainfall. very strong winds and high waves, too, that you want to watch out for as well. now, ahead of thi

moving into northern vietnam. china drawing out. the next one is tropical storm meari.n to coastal parts china. >>> senators are close to voting on a bill to allow same-sex marriage. talk about timing. u.s. president barack obama attended a gay and lesbian gathering. he was less vocal on the issue of gay marriage. >> i believe that discrimination because of somebody's sexual orientation or gender identity ran counter to who we are as a people. it's a violation of the basic tenets on which this nation was founded. i believe that gay couples deserve the same legal rights as every other couple in this country. >> does that extend to legalizing gay marriage right across the country? fellow democrat bill clinton didn't think so when he was president. back in 1996 president clinton banned federal recognition of same-sex marriage. so it became a state issue. the first legal gay wedding in the u.s. was performed in massachusetts. that was in 2004. connecticut, iowa, vermont, new hampshire and the district of columbia now also allow them. let's move to outside the u.s. and see w

it looks like it's going to ring out across southeastern china and then into northern sections of vietnam's the latest information. the position at 21.3 degrees north, 112 degrees east. moving to the west, northwest with jogs here and there. winds right now barely hanging in there at 65 kilometers per hour. most of the heaviest bands are to the southern quadrant of this weather system and it will slide in across vietnam and for there we might see enhanced precipitation as we go through time. also we're watching another area that lies just to the east of the philippines. but over the next 48 hours, we'll concentrate that to wet weather from hong kong, into ho chi minh city or saigon. the center of circulation not really a wind event. although in the past few hours i did see a peak wind gust in hong kong of 50 kilometers were hour. it's substantially lower than that right now as we continue to monitor this. then our other tropical system, our tropical storm, 7w, lies well to the east of the philippines, will move towards the east china sea and then into the yellow sea, perhaps at its peak i

chris jansing went to vietnam recently for that series of special reports with colonel jack jacobs of our staff. while she was there, she also followed one woman's journey to a northerntnamese orphanage to see the difference she is making for those kids. >> reporter: tracey foster laughingly calls her fundraising skills a work in process, but she's gained and in a bustling church basement she's organized friends to help pack gifts for needy children with her own children pitching in. >> one of the things that got us started is wanting our children to be connected to their birth country, wanting them to know that there is another side to what life could be. >> reporter: it's a commitment that now takes her to the other side of the world. to a remote orphanage in vietnam. two years ago she made what she thought would be a one-time visit here, but her heart keeps bringing her back. >> it's just overwhelming to see all the children and, you know, you want to take them home with you and you know you can't. >> reporter: so she founded project "being there," to help the nuns running the orphanage who have lots of love but not lots of money. on this afternoon, children who w