Hanoi (again)

I'm hungover again.

Just been for breakfast at le Pub so beginning to recover my sanity. Had an interesting night last night with two Brits I met at Hanoi Backpackers. Their approach to travelling - heavily influenced by The Dice Man (Luke Rheinhart) - is to make key decisions by throwing dice...actually a good way to order drinks...as a result of this system they're now off riding around on motorbikes in giant Mexican hats ('rented' from this Irish joint we ended up in last night)...

I'm heading to the army museum this afternoon then (inevitably) more beer and a chance to watch England beat the French. In Paris...and hopefulyl find time to read my brand new photocopied Laos guidebook 9a snip at 70,000D)...

Good times.

Halong Bay

I'm not a massive fan of organised tours, especially with a bus involved. So I was a bit disappointed when I read that you pretty much have to do one to see Halong Bay...at about 8pm on Tues night after a few beers I decided to book one with the hostel for the following day...

In the end, I was pleasantly surprised...after the inevitable roadside shop stop (these companies have to earn their kickbacks after all) we got to Halong City around lunchtime and then spent the afternoon on the boat cruising among the limestone kasts and doing a bit of kayaking which was awesome fun (although was totally knackered after about an hour). We also got taken to the wonderfully named 'surprising cave' which was kindof cool except the number of people walking through was more reminiscent of Oxford Street on a Saturday afternoon than the tranquility I had expected. Fortunately there were a bunch of Irish guys on the boat who nearly managed to smuggle 2 bottles of Hanoi vodka (my Oxford friends will recognise the taste as being simillar to the stuff served at PT) aboard - in the end the people on the boat found it and levied a 'service charge' of 10USD...anyway we stayed up until around 1 drinking this stuff while our guide sang karaoke in the bar below !

The next day the group split up and myself, another English guy (Rob), some Malasian girls and a German family headed to Cat Ba island...Cat Ba was actually really nice; much less tourists and a beautful sunset drinking beer with the locals by the dock. Then went to a bar with Rob and watched a woman on a nearby table literally fall over flat on her faceafter inhaling 'shisha' (although the evidence points to something stronger).

The next day we all headed back to Hanoi; spent some of the boat ride back chatting to a boat surveyor from Alaska with very strong anti-Communist views (she referred to everyone in the North of Vietnam as 'viet cong') who then began to attack the 'liberally biased media' for portraying America and Americans in a bad light - in particular the New York Times. Oh dear.

Hanoi (cont)

OK, so I've now passed that oh so important milestone that was my 24th birthday...was a bit weird (I think the word I'd use is 'bittersweet') to spend it in Hanoi away from all my friends but met up with a couple of guys I know from London and found a pretty nice chilled bar so not too bad in the end...couldn't get water puppet tickets though !

Since then, spent a couple of days in Hanoi checking out the Temple of Literature (built in honour of Confucius) and John McCain's old pad (the French built prison later used to house captured US pilots after they had been rescued by the peace loving Vietnamese people from the burning wreckage of their aircraft (yep, more government propaganda)...you do end up feeling that the French treated their prisoners a lot worse than the North Vietnamese not that this is any meaningful comparison... also spent much time in roadside cafes drinking ca phe sua nong (Vietnamese coffee) and bia hoi (oh so cheap draught beer - 2000D a glass) while watching the crazy spectacle that is Vietnam.

The bit of sad news is my camera (veteran of many trips and a bit like a boomerang - I've lost it 3 times and always got it back) passed away after water from Tropical Storm Lekima somehow got inside the memory slot...so spent most of Tuesday afternoon looking at cameras on the net and trying (ultimately unsuccessfully) to get an international warranty...eventually found a shop where I got a good cash price (hey, counting out 6 million dong is fun)...now the proud owner of a Sony Cybershot T100 which (so far) I've been very pleased with...

Then I deicded it was time to hit up Halong Bay...

Hanoi

Hey ! Sorry for lack of posting but for some reason have found it really hard to access Blogger from some internet cafes in Vietnam (probably more due to painfully slow connections tan benevalent censorship a la China)...

Spent an enjoyable few days in Hoi An generally sitting around drinking coffee and beer, while getting clothes made (finally tally is 1 suit, 1 coat, 3 shirts, 1 jacket and 1 pair of shoes)...plus some really nice old houses (with a lot of random architectural styles - Hoi An historically had large Japanese and Chinese expat populations)...a decent beach too (and dangerously long happy hours - some f them start at 4pm !)...

Bad news is my camera broke (think water from Tropical Storm Lekima might be to blame)...so decided to leapfrog to Hanoi to try and get it repaired and/or buy another one. On the upside, today is my birhday so nothing can go wrong today -famous last words. Looks like being a pretty random birthday - going to see a water puppet show with 2 guys I know from London (Fabio and Francesco); after that they're heading down to Hoi An (the same fun 17 hour trip I've just completed in reverse)...given Hanoi has it's own Le Pub (see posts passim) think that'll certainly feature !

Monsoon Blues

OK, so I may have mentioned in the last post that it rained...well yesterday's rain was nothing compared with today. It has literally been PISSING it down in Hoi An as far as I can tell from when I got home from the pub last night...and shopws no signs of stopping.

Just said goodbye to Happy (he took me to the village where he grew up and I had tea and bananas with his uncle...also visited a village where they make really cool pottery - I bought two fish-shaped ceramic whistles - definitely going to be of great use to me back home !)...now contemplating sitting in a bar until it stops raining - which could be several days !

Central Highlands/Ho Chi Minh Trail

OK, so from Pleiku, we drove north to Kom Tum, described in LP as "the friendliest city in Vietnam" - actually the whole region is really friendly, with people talking to you because they're genuinely interested rather than simply seeing you as a walking/talking ATM...we drove through lots of cool minority villages (the houses in each looked different despite being only a few hundred yards apart)...also saw a beautiful wooden church built by the French in Kom Tum itself...later, we stopped at the disused runway of the old airstrip at Dak To...it was from here that the US launched bombing raids into Laos (as well as inserting special forces on the ground) while publically giving assurances that they fully respected Laotian neutrality...walking down the runway (now partially planted with crops and used by water-buffalo for grazing) was a erie experience...later I looked on the net and actually pulled up pictures of the base as it was in the 1960s...

After Dak To we stopped briefly at a shop where locals made knives out of rusty bomb fragments and then spent the night in a small town (don't actually know the name) around 30km from the Laos border...

The next day (Monday) after a delicious breakfast of pho (delicious noodle soup) we headed north along what was once the Ho Chi Minh trail - a nextwork of well concealed pathways used by the VC to obtain weapons and supplies from the horth. After 'reunification', the government decided to build a road along the route so it looks very different today, although you can still see the original path in some places...the scenery on the route was beautiful (hills, valleys, waterfalls, low cloud) but the weather (heavy driving rain) kindof spoiled it...because of the weather we decided to continue straight on to Hoi An. On the way - perhaps the best pitstop of the journey - I met what Happy assured me was a 100 year old woman...who was calmly stood outside the hut smoking a cigarette ! The whole family were really friendly (including their pet monkey)...the final hour consisted of driving through what I'm sure is now a flooded road, in the puring rain. When we finally got to Hoi An I had to empty the water out of my hiking boots (which I'd worn in the anticipation of trekking) before I could go in the hotel ! Needless to say cold beer tasted good last night...

Motorcycle Diaries

OK, so I'm not in Nha Trang as originally planned....actually in Pleiku, a small non-descript town definitely not on the tourist trail in the Central Highlands. Decided to retain the services of 'Happy', my driver and guide for an extra three days to explore a bit of the Ho Chi Minh Trail and see some minority villages around Kon Tum, then head direct to Hoi An - plenty of time for alcohol fueled beach fun later in the trip...

Two wheels is definitely THE way to see Vietnam...on day 1, drove from Dalat to Lak Lake (an unbelievably beautiful ride across the lush, green Central Highlands; saw rice wine being made (as well as trying it - and to my disappointment realised its avaliable in a bar in Oxford called the PT where I used to drink under the label 'Vodka'), tried some of the local tobacco in a long wooden pipe (vile)...also had 2 delicious meals (which needless to say cost virtually nothing). The next day went back to Lak (it was pissing down with rain the previous day) and did an elephant ride (100,000d, 'special price') which was cool (the elephant actually waded back across the lake !)...then headed north across the Yok Don national park (stopping to see some amazing waterfalls) to Buon Ma Thuot.

Dalat

Wow, nearly got this up to date after my prior laziness.

Now my last night in Dalat...there's not much to do in the town itself ( a cable car with some pretty good views, some nice French-Alpine chalet architecture, a large lake and a pretty accurate replica of the Effiel Tower (its a radio mast). The highlight of Dalat has been 2 motorcycle rides out of town with the Easyriders. This loose collection of - mostly quite elderly - tourguides has been in business for over a decade. Day trips allow you to see plenty of villages and farms as well as a cool waterfall (Elephant Falls) - of course, the idea is you should then opt for a longer tour.

The most common route is up through the central Highlands and then up the Ho Chi Minh trail (originally a set of narrow jungle paths used by the VC to transport weapons and supplies to the separate-South) - now most of the paths have been turned into roads...

I'm leaving with one of these Easyriders (the fantastically named Mr Happy) tomorrow for a 2 day trip up through the Highlands, staying (I think) in a minority village and visiting a national park. After that I'm probably heading to Nha Trang for some beachside RnR but may go on all the way up to Hoi An (if I decide I can foord the 50USD a day)...from what I've seen of the Central Highlands so far, the scenery is spectacular and it'll be nice to be away from the herd for a few days.

Should be awesome...

Anti-Japanese sentiment in Asia

OK so this one's a bit off-topic but I've become aware of a disturbing trend in Asia, particularly in China, most worryingly among the younger generation. It started when we (I was still travelling with Mr Reid at the time) met these teachers in Yangshuo (southern China)...one of them, had asked his students which country they wanted to visit and why...the usual platitudes followed until one girl stood up and announced, "I want to go to Japan so I can kill them"...I can't remember how the discussion continued from there. Later a girl I met in Le Pub in Saigon told me of a friend of hers whose class was interrupted by a kid standing up and exclaiming, "teacher, teacher, the Japanese are dogs"; a comment which apparently received unanimous applause from the class. Finally, a Japanese girl who went to school in Korea told me a kid used his intro (tell me about yourself) speech to denounce Japanese sovereignty over some disputed islands, pointed at the girl and exclaimed, "those are OUR islands". Having toured the Changi Museum in Singapore (as well as the HK History Museum) I'm fully aware of the horrors committed by the Japanese and I think there is some truth in the POV that these often receive less historical and political , say, the Holocaust. But that such hatred seems to still exist within the younger generation is, to my mind, very worrying.

Mui Ne

Finally decided it was time to leave Saigon and move on. So quite optimistically, I booked a bus to Mui Ne beach leaving at 8am. So having spent until 3am at le Pub and then getting in at 4.30, I awoke at 8 (having not packed or set my alarm) to a woman saying the bus was downstairs waiting. I simply looked blank (not difficult) shook my head and said, 'tomorrow, ok ?'...and went back to sleep. Several hours later I discovered I could leave at 7.30pm to do the same trip so I did this...after hanging out at Le Pub (where I bumped into Emily, the girl I'd been talking to until 3 the night before) and drinking 4 cups of coffee. So duly rolled into Mui Ne at midnight on Saturday...luckily the bus dropped me right outside the hotel so passed out pretty much immediately (felt a bi run down from the previous couple of days). The next day I checked into a pricey (30USD) resort with a pool and spent a culturally exciting day hanging out and watching West Ham lose to Newcastle...and met a Dutch couple in a bar (their team, Utrectht, won so they were on good form); funnily enough two of the Vietnamese girls working in the bar had boyfriends living in Belgium and Holland so had quite a good Benelux banter... The next day, time to head for Dalat...

The Mekong Delta and more Saigon

The Mekong Delta (where I was from Monday 17th - Wednesday 19th) was cool...saw a floating village (at Chau Doc near the Cambodian border - most of the people living in boats fled there to escape slaughter at the hands of the Khmer Rouge), a couple of floating markets at Cai Be and Cai Rang (basically wholesale vegetables, sugar cane and stuff are sold to smaller shop-keepers/restaurants etc from huge barges), a crocodile farm (Vietnam apparently exports thousands every year, both for meat and leather...and other assorted sights. However, something in me hates being bussed around (even if this was absurdly cheap at 30 odd USD including accomodation) and I've now made a concious decision to try and avoid tourist buses. In fact I've taken one other tour (this one only 1 day) - to the CaoDai temple and Cu Chi Tunnels. The former is a wierd religion (given it was founded in 1920 I'm not sure whether it is ne w enough to merit the word 'cult'...at their height they were a major religious force in South Vietnam with their own private 'army' of 26,000...a Caodai religious festival features in Graham Greene's A Quiet American...I got to see a lot of chanting by people in strange robes but that was about it. The building on the other hand weas truly impressive - half Catholic cathedral, half Chinese temple... The Cu Chi tunnels were tunnels originally built by the Viet Minh for use against the French (curiously the French - an Imperial power - received billions of dollars in US aid to fight against the Viet Minh - freedom fighters allbeit under a Communist flag. One wonders what the likes of Washington, Franklin, Adams etc would have made of this.). The tunnels were later en;larged and used to infiltrate Saigon (and the US 25th Infantry base built right on top of them - it apparently took the US army several months to work out why they kept getting shot at...predictable displays of hideous man-traps laid by the 'heroic' VC agnets and more government propoganda accompanied the tunnels which were not remotely comfortable to crawl in - everyone exited at the first opportunity.

Saigon Bars

I did spend a long time in Saigon (6 days excluding the three day trip down into the Mekong Delta)...awesome though the place was, there is a reason...I was FUCKING hungover.

Most worthy of mention is Le Pub (www.le-pub.org). As Saigon was the first place I'd really travelled to solo, I was a bit nervous about not having anyone to talk to...pretty much every time I went to this place - and I went pretty much every day - I met funny/interesting/cool people, both expats and fellow travellers. Not only that, the staff were super friendly - a lot of them are ex-street kids that were taken on and Le Pub apparently still donates money to variuous local charities, and the cocktaisl excellent (Wednesday was half-price G&T night)...would really recommend this place to you if you make it to Saigon...Also cool is Tam Tams - just up the street; not quite got the Le Pub vibe but good for watching sport and cheaper beer...also went to Q-Bar but don't really remember that one...

Also AWESOME is the roof-top bar at the Rex Hotel - delicious (but pricey) cocktails and great views...

Saigon

I liked Saigon.



No that's not true, I loved Saigon.



Its a crazy city, population 6 million, 5.9 million of which are - at any one time - hurtling around the city on motor-bikes. The traffic system in Vietnam, it would be fair to say, makes Chinese roads look like ze autobahn. Crossing the road is not the simple process we take for granted in the UK but rather a unique art form (almost a dance) where one crosses slowly as the bikes swarm around you (unless a car comes along which really fucks things up, forcing a retreat).



There aren't actually that many "sights" per se in Saigon...the War Remanants Museum, formerly the Museum of American and Chinese Atrocities remains true to its old name; while the propaganda is predictable, the images - especially of My Lai - are truly shocking, especially as simillar stories are beginning to filter through from Iraq. The oft-quoted line from Robert Macnamara (on prominent display),

yet we were wrong, terribly wrong. We owe it to future generations to explain
why...

is particularly apt; in any event, there is nothing to suggest that the Blairs and Wolfowitzes, Cheneys and Pearles of this world would be receptive to explanation, such is their belief in the merits of their case, and of their own infallability (neither of the above four has, to my knowledge any extensive military experience)


The Reunification Palace used to be the home of the President of the Republic of Vietnam until his country ceased to exist one bright April day in 1975 - unnervingly, the whole place is preserved exactly as it was oin the day the sotuh surrendered)...

These big two aside, the great joys of Saigon - at least for me - were walking around, through the streets and crowded markets and hanging out in cafes and bars - of which more later - (Vietnam is perhaps the best place on earth I've been so far to people-watch - there's always something interesting, amusing or just damn wierd going on.

Finally got my arse in gear

Thank you to all those who've nagged me at the end of emails to start doing a blog (especially those whose blogs are perpetually "coming soon"). Anyway figured it sort-of made sense so here goes.

I'm now in Dalat, a town of about 180,000 located in the Central Highlands of Vietnam; it was essentially set-up by the French colonists so they could have somewhere to grow traditional European vegetables, grow grapes for wine-making (haven't actually tried Dalat wine yet but I'm guessing it's a hell of a lot better than the picked-snake-flavoured wine I tried the other day (a few well wrapped bottles of which may be slipping through UK/US/Canadian customs to carefully selected Christmas stockings around the world), and generally hang out. During the American War (as its known here), apparently top Soutyh Vietnamese generals and their VC cadre counterparts planned their military campaigns from (apparently quite grand) bungalows on opposite sides of Dalat (in any military, your life expectancy increases with rank in pretty much direct proportion)...the wtown itself saw no bombing.

By the way, as I'm sure most of you reading this will know, Vietnam wasn't the first stop on this trip...so far travelled from Beijing, down to Xi'an, across to Chengdu...and flew into Tibet . From Tibet went travelling down through Yunnan and Guilin to Hong Kong (where my good friend Charlie Reid left me for the glamour of photocopying for UNESCO in Paris), and from HK took a quick 2 day stopover in Singapore. Can't go back over the whole trip so going to have to make do with Saigon (aka Ho Chi Minh City)...