Vietnam

Well up again at feckin 6am, despite the fact that I only got to sleep at 2.30 or so. Bah humbug. Up we got for our free breakfast of bread & huevos. We also got free tea with ‘milk’ – a gloopy sticky substance that you mix into your tea. It wasn’t too bad actually. For breakfast desert there was green banana. Every time I took a bite out of my sandwich, I had to lean my head forward over the table and into the sunlight. Couple that with the hot tea and within minutes I was sweltering. Vietnam is without a doubt the hottest country we have been in so far.

We were all herded into small buses and driven to the gas station. We thought we had stopped to get gas but actually we were walking the rest of the way. We got into our little boat of loveliness and tupatupatupatupatupped our way off down the river to see the fabulous floating markets of Caing Rai etc

Big floating boats stuffed to the gills with pineapples, jackfruits, watermelons, ginger, and tons of other vegetables, fruits & herbs & spices sell on their wares to the smaller business person in their smaller boats. The trip down the rivers to the markets was fantastic. The weather was scorching and the kids continued to wave and shout hello from the riverbanks. After a while, we donned our Vietnamese cone hats to shelter us from the sun. Between markets, we stopped at a rice noodle making factory to learn how rice noodles were made. Unfortunately I was so busy taking pigtures of the piglets out the back that we missed all the rice noodle pictures. Whoops.

After another trip to a different market and some more fantastic boating, twas back to the ranch for some noodle soup. We were in a group with some Israelis and an Ozzie girl. The tall Israeli guy had a mega beard and totally owned Jim with his beardiness. The other Israeli couple were a bit moany but the Ozzie girl was very nice and chatty.

Well after consuming the whole bottle of vodka between us last night, I had a bit of a sore head but nothing compared to the fighters on The Contender 2, which was on AXN. He he. We did intend on getting up for our free breakfast but we faffed about for way too long, so we packed up our stuff and headed out to Allez Boo for some huevoso. I had difficulty opening my boiled eggs and Jim had trouble with the ketchup but it wasn’t too bad. Then in an effort to sweat off the vodka, we strepped our way up to the War Remnants Museum, but it was closed for lunch so we tiptoed on over to the Reunification Palace. We headed off around the palace walls, each time we came to a gate, the guard there waved us around to the next gate. Sheesh.

Eventually we got in the gate. The palace itself was pretty cool. It was designed by a Vietnamese architect in the 1960’s and was very retro. It was built for General Diem, the president of the South Vietnam Republic. The building started in 1962, but the General himself never got to see the end product as he was shot by his own troops in 1963. After years of terrible fighting, the south finally fell to North Vietnamese & VC forces. On 30th April 1975, two tanks burst through the gates of the palace (then called Independence Palace), and a VC soldier entered the palace. He ran into the room where the president of SV who knew what was coming, was waiting for him. The president told him that he had been waiting all morning to hand over the power. The VC soldier replied by telling the president that he could not hand over what he didn’t have.
The palace interior was very lush and beautiful. See (some pics). (the stupid NEW camera broke!!! FECKIN HELL), and Boo.

So we continued around the palace feeling a lil bit sad about the camera (well I was anyway but I was trying to also take in some info) when we finally got to the top floor of the palace. Low and behold, there was our saviour, a lil ole lady selling water and ‘cameras’! was sitting awaiting our arrival. WOW, said I. I’ll have a camera and two waters please. So now feeling watered and with a camera to take a picture of the helicopter on the roof, we were much pleased. But we were just at the end of the tour. We took some pictures of Jim and the tank and headed off to the War Remnants Museum.

The war museum was very sad. It had lots of photos taken by journalists and photographers in the field. A lot of the photographers had been killed whilst taking pictures of the war e.g. Dicky Chapelle, Larry Burrows etc etc so it was sad to see their last pictures that they had taken, or the last pictures that had been taken by them.. the pictures themselves were saddening. Pictures of elderly Vietnamese just before they were shot, pictures of young American soldiers caught in traps and crying out for help, a picture of a young Vietnamese baby abandoned by it’s mother as soldiers came to town, pictures of many many children and babies disfigured and handicapped by Agent Orange. It was very sad. Jim was laughing as he had seen a Western woman outside crying so I tired very hard not to be one of those dorks but I found seeing the babies and children very sad and had enough after the Agent Orange exhibit. I couldnae take no more cap’n. So finally we headed off home. Jim wanted to buy a war movie to watch, as we were in Vietnam, but I couldn’t take any more war or war noises that day so we left it for the moment. We walked allllllll the way home, then headed out for some grub in a place with some girls with some hats on. The food was pretty lame but the ladies were very nice. We had a few beers and headed back to the gaff where we chilled out and worked on a track.

The following morning we had a tour booked with Happy Tours to take us to the Cu Chi Tunnels at Ben Dinh. During the Vietnam war, the VC lived and organised attacks on the US troops from approx 200km of underground tunnels around the Cu Chi area. These became known as the Cu Chi tunnels. The tunnels enabled the VC to evade American troops and pop up above ground in hamlets or small towns or wherever they needed to be, yet still remain uncaught. These tunnels were amazing. The VC used these tunnels for travelling, living in, organising attacks etc. The tunnels themselves were very small and there were a few levels of them underground. The first level was the living area for many VC. Many ate, drank and slept in the first level which was about 3 metres underground. The second level was perhaps 6 metres underground and the third level was nearly 10 metres underground. The VC could not afford to be claustrophobic, plus there were very few airholes leading to these lower tunnels. These tunnels were a triumph for the VC as no matter how hard the Americans tried to locate them they always failed and the tunnels were a source of safety for living and transport for the VC.
The Us troops tried many ways to ‘pacify’ the area around Cu Chi which came to be known as the Iron Triangle. Tens of thousands of troops were sent in to locate the tunnels but they failed. In order to decrease the cover of the VC, the American troops then used plenty of chemiucals on the area from the air and then later used napalm to clear the foliage and expose the VC and their tunnels. But to no avail. The tunnels were too far underground to be seriously effected. When the Americans started using dogs to sniff out the tunnels and the VC, the VC started to wash with American Soap to put the dogs off the scent. Many dogs were killed during this war. The US then declared it a free-strike zone which meant anyone and everyone We were up at the crack of dawn for our free breakfast of huevos & bread and tea. Then we headed out to our miniature bus with only 3 others to head to the Cu chi area. On the way we picked up another guide and another 5 people and off we went. Me & Jim were doing the dance of the sleepy heads all the way out on the bus. We stopped off at a lacquer ware factory to see how the lacquer pictures & goods were made. Then it was back on the bus and off to the tunnels.

We were brought in to watch a really really old video of what seemed to be some type of propaganda for the Cu Chi tunnels. It was interesting but slightly hilarious as they had put the video to some type of clown/circus happy/goofy stylee music. It all seemed a bit surreal imo. After the video we were led off down the beaten path to some old original tunnel entrances. It was very interesting to see the tunnels. We were led around the Cu Chi Ben Dinh area and shown various original tunnel entrances – which were tiny, and plenty of ‘tourist’ entrances – which were a lot bigger. We were shown rooms which were used for dining, cooking, making weapons and we got to climb into a tunnel and make our way 10 metres or so down the road. It was very hot down there and very tight. Not the kind of place an Irishman would like to spend a lot of time. The two other girls in our group wouldn’t even go down into them. Me, Jim & a Japanese guy, (who owned a Toyota company) all went down and scoocheed through the tunnel. We had no torch so Jim shouted to me to warn me when the tunnel went a bit awry, and in turn I shouted to the Japanese guy and together we all got through a little bit dirtier than when we started. It was great fun though. Although I can’t imagine having to live down there. No sirree bob. :/

Anywho after much tunnel exploration, rubber shoe observing, rice-paper-making-watching and souvenir perusing, we made it back to the comfort of the air con bus. HAW LAY LUU YAH. Air con, as pretty krap as it is in south east Asia, is still an air con bus and still slightly more impressive than a non air con bus. J

So we headed back to Ho Chi Minh City for our free lunch at Happy tours. Once again, twas only the three of us for lunch. The two weird girls just disappeared! DISAPPEARED _ WITHOUT THEIR FREE LUNCH>>>>????? He he, they are obviously not schooled in the backpacker ways. Lunch was great – free noodles, rice & spring rolls.

We bid adieu to the Japanese guy (we did learn his name but I’m fucked if I can pronounce it) and headed off to the War Surplus Market, where there are stalls selling old army & war surplus items. We hovered around admiring the gas masks & ponchos, before heading off to the normal market to splurge out on some presents.

Then we headed off back home with a few beers to chill out and work on a track. J

The following day we decided to head to Dalat. Upon awakening, we had to wait for some lady to sew Jim’s pants. Now we knew darn well that she had forgotten to do it, but we still hoped for the best. Alas, twas not to be. Upon discovering we were leaving and not coming back, and eh yeah we’re leaving now, the reception girl made a call and asked for the pants (we reckon). She said it would be another ten minutes, but to be honest, we didn’t have ten minutes. So one of us decided to stay and another to go and hold the bus. I said I wasn’t going to hold the bus as I am ALWAYS waiting on Jim whilst other people ask me where he is, so for once I thought twould be good to be the one who was making other people wait. So I decided to stay. Well it wasn’t as much fun as I thought as I was waiting for yonkers and I hate when people are waiting on me. But finally, after putting on my backpack and nearly sitting on the reception girls lip waiting for some attention, she made another call and the young one with the pants arrived. J yeehaa. So off I went trotting down the road.

I caught up with Jim and we headed off to the bus. I was slightly embarrassed as I thought the whole bus would have been waiting on me, but I was wrong to be worried. There was no body else on the bus except me, Jim, the two drivers and some kid. Which was cool in one way as noone was waiting on me and bad in another way, as the young dude insisted on slowing down at every half-assed town, hanging out the door and shouting ‘Dalat?’, ‘Dalat?’ all the way down the road. Which makes for a very slow journey indeed.

After stopping for lunch, picking up pukesy o tool and wombling our way to Dalat, we finally arrived there at about 5pm. 2 hours later than planned. But the day was beautiful, the colours of the area were amazing and all our arses were numb. Twas a golden echo of a day. ….

As soon as the bus landed in Dalat, trunty million people launched themselves onto the bus, obviously looking for our business. Although I think they were hoping for more people than just me & Jim on this 48 odd seater bus. Lol. Anyway, me & Jim being the non-fussy types, followed yer woman to have a look at her rooms and picked this really nice room with two huge beds, a bathroom and a window with a view of some vegetable gardens. I love windows. J we chucked our stuff down, arsed around for a bit, then went out to grab some grub. I was trying to push ‘Larry’s bar’ on Jim, but he was having none of it, as it was nearly a kilometre out of town (ten mins walk). He is getting lazier as we go along!! So we settled for eating in some place that was literally 2 mins from our gaff and was recommended by the LP. So off we went and there was very few veggie options for me so I asked for a veggie taco. I got lettuce in a tortilla. WOW. Sheesh. This is the land of vegetables and fruit, I should not be getting lettuce in a tortilla for a vegetarian option!!!! Anywho I ate it and it wasn’t too bad when it was washed down with two glasses of wine. Fnar.

Well up and atom at 6am for our free bread and jam, that wasn’t really free because I had to pay ten thousand dong for it. Hey you, don’t tell me I’m getting a free breakfast, make me choose between bread & jam or bread and cheese and then make me pay for it!! Jaysus.

Anywho, a big load of us were shambled down the road to the pier. Most of the heads were going to Cambodia (back the way we had just came) so they were on a different boat. Us two were on our own little boat with three weird ladies. We headed off to visit a fish farm on the Hau Giang River.

There are around 1000 fish farms around the river in Chau Doc. The fish farmers live on wooden houses that float on the river on big barrels. The fishermen collect fish eggs and breed up to 400 tonnes of fish a year underneath their gaffs. The eggs grow into small fish, which are fed lots of fish food until they are 6 months old. Once they’re bigger, they’re moved into a different tub underneath the gaff and fed fresh food (spinach and stuff) every day until they’re big enough to sell to the market. They usually breed two types of fish, a pinky one which sells for 4 dollars per kilo in the market and another white fish, which sells for 2 dollars per kilo. Because the river is so polluted, (within three minutes I saw one girl washing her hair in the water and around the corner a young fellow was doing a turd in the water) quite a few of the fish die. Twice a day, the fisher dude has to sweep the tubs to remove the dead fish before they start to float on the top of the water. It was quite interesting. (Lisa)

After the fish farm, it was back to the boat and onto a Cham minority village. To be honest, I didn’t really understand much of what the guide was saying, and her upper lip was very sweaty but she was very friendly. We docked at a small area of land at the side of the river an were immediately set upon by aboot 10 little kids. They were all selling pastry cake things and asking us for money or a pen or failing that a piece of gum. We bought one little waffley cake that was as dry as a nuns knickers but we chomped it down approvingly. The main focal point was this house on stilts under which a girl was weaving silk scarfs and had many on display for purchase or funny photos. She was a Cham girl, Chams are muslims but they don’t have to wear the head scarf and are educated with normal Vietnamese but have their own lil traditions. The house on stilts had a water line measure along the side of it showing the water lever of the Mekong from previous years. In 2003 it was about 6ft higher than normal and people lost a lot of crops.

As we were leaving, the tour woman pointed out what looked like a pink licourice allsort attached to a leaf in the water and told us it was a SLUG in its cocoon. When we got back to the port we were the only ones to get the bus onto Cantho. Not understanding the ladies instructions from earlier, and she was no longer around, we presumed we should make our way back to the hotel were our bags were left and get the bus from there. We decided to jump on one of those little carriages pulled by an old man on a bike. LOL he was about 70 and the carriage was only big enough for one and a half western ass. Soooo I (Jim) sat in the back Lisa threw her legs off the front bit and on we went…. huffing and phuffing to the hotel. But once we got there, we were told we “get bus from port”. Ah Jaysus. (our cycle guy rubbed his hands together) so a 5 minute cycle later we were on our way on a lil bus with some grumpy guide.(Jim)

Aboot half an hour later the bus was stopping for ‘five’ mins. Yahahaha right. The bus tyre needed to be changed, so we sat out in the sun for a half an hour, dangling our legs over the river in an effort to tempt some crocs up to the surface but to no avail.

After the tyre was fixed, it was back to snoozing in the bus on our way to Cantho. We were supposed to stop at an incense stick factory but we didn’t. Upon arrival at Cantho, the ‘guide’ just ran out of the bus. Not a word! Weird. So we checked in to quite a nice hotel actually. (clean, toilet paper, mozzie net, bish, bosh, bang).

We grabbed our brolly and head out to face the pouring rain. Along the way we got stopped by some lunatic named Malcolm who was selling bric-a-brac. He was speaking very fast and I dunno what the hell he was on aboot. Something about ‘white rice being poison’, ‘tomatoes are good’, ‘you don’t have this in your country’, ‘I don’t like being in Vietnam, my son is in California, with four degrees ‘(Aren't they a band??) .. etc etc.. We bought something off him and did a legger once the rain was gone. Then we set about getting lost in the streets of Cantho.

Eventually, after much hair wringing and flipping the map aboot, we found our way to a restaurant that served some western cuisine (woohoo) and promptly ordered Vietnamese food. (lol)

After lunch we crossed the road to take a picture of the Ho Chi Minh statue. The statue is a silver colour and likened to the Tin Man (from the wizard of oz) by westerners. Vietnamese, obviously, don’t like this comparison.
Then we headed up to take a look at the Ho Chi Minh Museum, but alas it was closed.

So we strolled back to our gaf to get out of the heat (I didn’t feel too well. I attributed my pains in my stomach to the fact that I had crispy noodles for lunch and beer. I reckon the beer soaked the noodles inside my belly and made them balloon. No more crispy noodles says I)
I fell asleep again! (eek) and later we went out for ‘a snack’. We ended up at this restaurant that served cow, pork, mouse, snake, mudfish, gobyfish, cuttlefish, squid, crab and basically everything else that I didn’t really want to eat. I ordered some fried rice and Jim got some beef. We also ordered some spring rolls as we hadn’t tried them yet. They were quite delicious. (although I suspect there was pork in them)

After dinner, we sauntered back to the gaff and started to get out of our sweaty clothes when I realised I had lost my Buddha Beads!!!! NOOOOOO
So we trekked back to the restaurant and there they were sitting on the floor. Phewf! They must have dropped out of my pocket when I was peering at the snakes in the glass box!

So back again and off with the sweaty t shirts. It was time for showers and cold coca cola. (Lisa)yum

The next day we got up relatively early! (lol) And went off to explore the market where we had great fun with some of the Vietnamese ladies. One of them wanted to run off with James. I was tempted to trade him in for a kilo of Lychees but decided against it. After all, he does have a smashing beard.

We went looking for a place for lunch and finally found some type of noodle bar. There was tres little on the menu again for me (yesterday I had to put my pork in Jim’s bowl) (ooh er missus). So I decided to order the one thing that had “(no meats)” written after it. Jim ordered some porky dish (they’re mad about pork). Boy did I look a right tit, when out came a small plate of chips for me!!! I had ordered chips. LOL. I tried to pretend like I had meant to order chips as the waitress lady looked at me with amusement. We hung onto them though and Jim shared his pork around. (fnar)

After more marketeering and wandering aboot, we headed back to the ranch. We booked one of the Mekong Tours at reception. There are plenty of tours around the Mekong Delta. We weren’t sure whether or not we would do one or not, but the tours we were looking at were covering the exact areas that we had planned to hit and apparently it is a lot cheaper to do the tours than to do it yourself.
After reading that some of the private boat hires can cost up to $25 an hour, we decided to do a 3 day tour. It cost $28 each and basically included all accommodation, bus transfers, entrance fees etc from Chau Doc to Ho Chi Minh City. It brings us on a tour of Chau Doc, then on to Cantho (120km)and includes tours of Cantho, Mytho, trips to a coconut candy mill, floating markets etc etc and the bus fare to HCMC. Wowsers. Bargaintown. I can’t comment on the rest of the tour as we have only gotten to Cantho today. (as I write this I mean).

So with our tour booked, we went up, showered and I promptly fell asleep! So Jimbob worked away on a track and when Queen Talulah woke up, we went out for some more grub. Jim was disappointed with his hot pot.
I found ten thousand dong on the street (about 60c). woohoo!
Lol
It’s the simple things right.. ?

Well finally we made it out of Feckin Cambodia!
Up at the crack of dawn, we got a bus to another big bus. This drove us through some lovely Cambodian countryside and then dropped us at the ‘ferry’! (A house with a wooden walkway out the back. The ferry itself was a small boat with seats for maybe 20 people. It was hella cool!)

So after stocking up on bread and cheese rolls, we piled and we were off. It was a really relaxing journey down the Bassac river (a tributary of the Mekong). The river is very wide and quite brown and very busy with fishing boats, passenger boats and tiddly boats. There were wooden houses on stilts and houses made from corrugated iron all the way along the riverside. Young chaps were chest high in water doing some fishing and small children waved at us all the way down the river.

The boat stopped briefly to drop off about 20 bicycles that had been stashed up on the roof! Then on we went to the next stop where we were all signed out of Cambodia. Then it was back into the boat for another ten minutes. Our next stop was Vietnam immigration. We had a half hour for lunch on the Vietnam side. We were led down to a small restaurant where we had some noodle soup with pork. We chatted to these two South African ladies beside us. They were on a three week holiday through Cambodia & Nam. They said they immediately noticed the difference upon crossing the border. Thinking they meant that the Nam side was a lot brighter and smilier, I totally agreed! But they meant the opposite. They thought the Cambodian people were a bit smilier. Even though it was way too earlier for me or them to make such a judgement, I knew I was right. Nam was indeed brighter.

So we got back our passports and headed to another boat, that took us all the way down the Bassac River into Chau Doc. Along the way there were plenty more young chappies in the water fishing and tons more small children and adults waved and shouted ‘hello’ at us. The shouting ‘hello’ was to become a regular thing. Everyone does it! Gringos are celebs here.

Our tour guide on the boat was a rather lovely but sweaty young Vietnamese lady. She changed our dosh into dong for us and basically divided us into two groups – those who wanted to stay in the hotel in town she was recommending, or those who wanted to stay in the hotel out of town that she was also recommending. He he. Since we had already planned to go to the one in town that she was selling, we got a free lift to the Vinh Phuoc Hotel. She also gave us lots of bumpf on Mekong tours that we happily perused.

The hotel room itself was huge. In Nam there is some type of confusion between getting a single room (a room with one large bed in it) or a double room (a room with two large beds in it). We got to look at them first though and seeing as how the big room with the two beds had a WINDOW!!!, a TV (that didn’t work) and was only 2 dollars extra, we splashed out on the $8 room. We dumped our stuff and had showers, whereupon Jim promptly fell asleep. Oops. Anywho, I worked away on a track and later on when Queen Talulah woke up, we went out for some grub. We were well lubed up with mosquito juice and good enough for us, there was tons of ‘em around.

Vietnamese food is not as delicious as Thai food imo (not much is) and there isn’t as much veggie options for me. I ordered some rice, shrimps & veg and Jimbob had some pork in fish sauce cooked in a clay pot (one of their star dishes no less). We washed it all down with the best tasting beer in the land – Saigon Lager Beer. Wow. It’s my new favourite beer.

After dinner we went in search of more beers and as we were walking down the street, we heard an almighty crash. One guy on a motorbike had crashed into a moped carrying two ladies and a little girl. It all happened in slow mo really. The second lady fell off and so did her bag of spuds. Then the little girl seemed to roll off too. Noone was hurt luckily but everyone in the street ran over to see what was going on, and there was tons of monosyllabic loud talking.