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| Viet Nam |
| August 5 | Arrive in Ho Chi Mihn City on an evening flight |
| August 6 | Mekong Delta |
| August 7 | Ho Chi Mihn City-- Board train for Hue |
| Arrive in Hue | |
| August 9 | Hue |
| Train to Hanoi | |
| Hanoi | |
| HaLong Bay | |
| Flight to Hong Kong |
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06 August Mekong Delta We had kind of a restless night. The anti-malaria medications really disturb our sleep patterns and we have 5 weeks of them to go! Breakfast at the Rex was awesome- rice noodles with bean curd and rice noodles with pork- Really good. We went downstairs at 9 to meet our local guide- Her name was Quing. She's a very outgoing lady- exactly our age- same lunar year as me- "the pig." She has a very endearing habit of clicking her tongue with disapproval or shock- for instance she might ask, "How much would rent cost on an apartment in new York?" We tell her something like $1000/month and her tongue clicks, "Tch,tck,tck, tck..." Immediately we set out for the Mekong Delta- this required a 1 and a half hour drive on highway 1- the highway between Saigon and Hanoi- a two lane affair- filled to the gills with motorcycles, bicycles, big trucks and cars all honking their horns and swerving in both lanes of traffic. Quing pointed out the Highway Heroes to us- the local bus service where all the chickens and pigs and motorcycles are stuffed on top of the bus and all the people smush together. Quing herself had only traveled this way 1 time and felt that was enough for a lifetime. On the way to the delta we passed many farms with rice paddies- the farmers bury their ancestors in the backyard- to better devote themselves to ancestor worship and the graves rise above the flood line. In the town of the Mekong delta we boarded a small boat- like the one we'd ridden in Cambodia, except this one had 2 eyes painted on it to ward off evil spirits at the bottom of the river. A woman in a conical hat rowed us out through the muddy river. Shortly after we got moving she brought us some coconuts pierced with straws and we enjoyed the sweet refreshing milk while we glided over the water. Our destination was a small island filled with fruit orchards. We stopped at a restaurant and sampled fresh picked pineapple- dipped in a chili and salt mixture, dragon fruit- which tastes like Kiwi, guava, papaya and some fruit I can't remember the name of. As we ate the snack Quing told us a little about her life. Her brother had died of malaria in 1978 while her father was in a re-education camp. Quing is engaged to another tour guide who is 6 months her junior. Her family is from Saigon. After tea we wandered through the village. While it is clearly set up as a tourist attraction, it felt quite real too- because in the sample house the old woman really is cooking lunch for her entire extended family. They all live there and are happy to have you tramp through and take a look. It started to pour a real tropical Vietnam kind of rain and we ducked under a small roadside shelter with a group of villagers. One woman was making "moon cakes" another was selling sweet corn. I tried a moon cake - which is a rice pancake (shaped like a half moon) filled with pork and shrimp and sprouts while Jay ate the fresh steamy corn. We waited out the rain- cheesy music blared from the bar across the street. A little old woman came by and asked Quing many questions about us, "Were we married? Any children? Where were we from?" These are the basics any Vietnamese person will ask you upon meeting. The old woman smiled broadly at once a toothy and also toothless grin. The rain let up and we got into a small canoe where a woman passed out conical hats and rowed us through a tight canal back to our boat. The canal was a freaky experience because it really looked like all the Vietnam war images of a lush tropical environment, brown river, very enclosed, kind of scary. You can't hear anything but a kind of gentle thrum of rain and the occasional bird in addition to the gliding of the canoe. You can see how the guerrillas could completely surprise the soldiers and just how wet and scary the whole place must have been. We emerged from "flashback" canal and got back on the bigger boat. The big boat quickly returned us to the car. We stopped at a Buddhist temple and a dismal snake farm before returning to Saigon. The snake farm bred them for "medicinal purposes " and cobra wine- a bottle of rice wine with a cobra in it- it looks very manly and supposedly helps with virility. Jay felt manly enough with out needing to sample any. The snakes were kept in metal cages and you could barely see them. There were some other sad animals there as well (these evoked much tongue clucking from Quing). We were glad to leave the snake farm and head back to Saigon. Quing also gave us the company line about how safe it was to walk around before telling us to take only a very specific route to the suggested restaurant- unless we felt like hanging with the prostitutes and drug dealers, and also, by the way, please leave passports at the hotel. We're getting kicked out of the Internet cafe-we'll finish soon! 7 August - Saigon Ho Chi MInh City is not really known for its tourist sights. We spent the morning running around with Quing to various locales in Chinatown-hunting for patches. We've purchased patches (in the shapes of flags or with the country name on them) from each country we've visited thus far- and on long journeys we sew them onto our bags. Well Viet Nam was a tricky one. Quing led us through the wholesale market- which was a lot of fun. Each vendor shook their head no and pointed us further into the market. We didn't find any patches there, but I did buy some cool wooden sandals for $3 which were mix and match- you pick the bottom part and then you select a strap set- which they rivet in place while you wait. We crisscrossed Chinatown- with Quing pulling us across the busy streets with one hand outstretched to stop traffic and another on my arm -as if to say- stop please don't hit my tourist- to the cars and motorbikes. While in Chinatown we stopped at an old pagoda. In this temple- dedicated to the " heavenly Lady of the Sea" There were several opportunities to participate in the activities of the temple. They have special incense that you burn -after giving a donation and attaching a note to the spiral cone with what your wish is - they also will pray for you for a donation. We left the pagoda and went back out in search of the patches. We were next in the leather label district. We could have bought any number of labels to make our patches- fake Kipling logos, Honda logos, pokemon- basically a lot of logos but no iron-on patches. Also a lot of pointing just a little bit down the road. Lunch was at a simple local restaurant- pork balls with vermicelli- very good. We moved on to the silk flags and signs district- here we were successful and found some nice cloth patches that said Vie Nam. We also bought a thimble. Patches in hand we headed off to the War Remnants Museum. Quing later told us that this used to be called the War Crimes museum - but for some reason no one ever wanted to visit when it was called that and they felt remnants was a less divisive term. Well History is written by the winners and the museum has a distinctly commie point of view. They show American soldiers engaged in varying degrees in horrendous activities. They also have a lot of pictures of victims of napalm and agent orange. There is a new exhibit, donated by the state of Kentucky, which is dedicated to the members of the press corps who perished in the war. It has a lot of last rolls of film which are quite powerful. Slightly subdued by the war museum we ventured back out into the city. We went to the top of the tallest building in Saigon- about 30 stories high. We also looked at the French colonial post office which looks like a train station and the Notre Dame cathedral -which isn't as glorious as it might sound. At this point we'd evidently exhausted the sight seeing possibilities of Saigon and Quing dropped us off at the hotel to take care of some errands before our check out time. We decided to ship home some goodies at Fedex- which was next to the hotel. This was a bit more of an adventure than we'd expected. 5 employees examined each item to determine if it passed Vietnamese customs requirements. One woman would pick up the item- for example- one of Jay's shirts which he decided he didn't need any more- she says "shirt" holds it up and then 3 guys smile and nod and maybe pick it up to feel the fabric- maybe they repeat , "shirt-" then one laughs mysteriously " hahhahahaha" Basically they found all our Cambodian souvenirs very funny and wouldn't let us send out any film or incense. (its a religious item) We checked out of the hotel. Quing picked us up and took us to a bakery to stock up on supplies for the train ride and then it was off to the station. We got to the train station about 2 and a half hours early and of course we couldn't board the train yet. We hung out in the waiting room with Quing and her fiancé. The train station is very sleepy- especially for a city of 8 million- but there is only 1 train line - so not so many trains. They had a helpful English sign in the station which requested passengers "Please don't bend your head or lean your elbows out the window." Quing set us up in our cabin- a 4 person sleeper compartment and we said our goodbyes. We'd expected to be alone in the compartment but soon an older gentleman and his granddaughter arrived and sat on our bunks with us. We had the 2 bottom bunks. They had the top ones which meant they had to stand on our beds to reach theirs. They did not speak any English and seemed a little annoyed at sharing a cabin with foreigners. Before we left the station I went out to the market stalls alongside the train and picked up a few more supplies. I learned rather quickly that there is no such thing as change at the trackside stalls- especially for people who don't speak Vietnamese. One vendor was so happy I bought some pringles from her she did a little happy dance with her fists tapping on my back. She gave me "Le Vache qui rie" cheese instead of change. That was okay too. Finally at 9 PM the train rumbled out of the station. Lights were out by 10:30. The grandfather and daughter switched bunks a few times over our heads, finally all quieted down and we slept. 08 August, Train to Hue At 6:30 AM the train began blaring music over the PA system, the conductor started knocking on doors and generally rousing occurred. This seemed odd to me because we weren't expected to arrive until 4:30 in the afternoon- so it seemed a little early for starting the whole wake up thing, but they were awfully insistent. Jay persevered and slept until 9 ish. We rumbled through lush lush lush countryside. More bunk switching above us- combined with prolonged naps for everyone but me. The train staff brought by a lunch service- we'd been warned against eating it. We watched water buffalo bathing in streams and all kinds of farm activity. Viet Nam seems very clean and orderly; despite the fact that they still plow with teams of oxen instead of tractors it feels like a much more developed nation than Cambodia. Basically we spent the day reading, writing and playing a little backgammon. When we arrived in Hue the grandfather warmly shook both of our hands goodbye- I guess he wasn't as bothered by us as he'd seemed. 11 August 2001 Hanoi, Vietnam After a night of "train sleep" we were a little groggy when twangy Vietnamese music started playing in our cabin at 6:00am. Our train was late (arrived at 7:30am) and our guide who was meeting us at the station had been waiting since 4:30am. We couldn't check in to our hotel until 9:30am, so we went out for one of the delights of Vietnamese cuisine, "pho". Almost every street in Vietnam has a pho restaurant. BTW, "pho" means "noodle", and to spell it correctly you need an accent mark over the "o". Most shops sell a big bowl of pho ga (chicken noodle soup) for about $.50 - $1.00. And better yet, it's the real McCoy - freshly prepared with real vegetables and chicken - this ain't your American factory processed kind of soup. And even better still, you can eat pho at any time of the day. A nice hot bowl of soup woke us right up and fortified us for some heavy-duty sight-seeing. After brekkie, we visited a 1000 year old pagoda/complex that was Vietnam's first university - where mandarins were given tests by the Emperor. I made some friends here, university students that wanted to practice their English. I chatted with them for a while about the usual, such as "What's your name?" etc. They asked what my impressions of Vietnam were and I said, "Good soup." I think they were amused. Later that morning we took our first "cyclo" ride. A cyclo is a tricycle (two wheels in front) with a seat for two (well, two small Asian people) in front, while the driver sit on the back and pedals. Besides being a little crowded with the two of us in the tiny seat, it was OK. We were dropped off at Cha Ca La Vong, a cool little restaurant with just one dish - grilled fish. You get a little coal stove on your table in which fresh ingredients are cooked up right in front of you. Basically it was fish, noodles, greens, fish sauce, and peanuts. After lunch we had our daily shower walking back to the hotel. In the afternoon we visited the Museum of Ethnology which had exhibits from all 54 ethnic minorities in Vietnam. We also went to see the "Hanoi Hilton" where POWs were held during the Vietnam War. We did some shopping in the old part of town and looked at beautiful enormous lacquer paintings. Then we had a 1 hour cyclo ride through the city. This time we had separate bikes, which was much more comfortable. We just relaxed and took pictures as we narrowly avoiding being smashed by passing cars, trucks and motorbikes every 5 seconds or so. That evening we ate at "Indochine" one of the nicer restaurants in Hanoi. The bill was a whopping US$12. We had crispy fried shrimp, beef in honey sauce, crab spring rolls and of course rice. After dinner the long day and restless night caught up with us and we went to bed early. |
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12 August 2001 Hanoi, Vietnam After our 5 minute buffet this morning we rushed off to see "Uncle Ho." I'm talking about Ho Chi Minh of course, who is preserved in wax (and as a corpse, but you can't see that except once a year) in an imposing Soviet-style mausoleum. There were thousands of people lined up to see him this morning, standing in the blazing sun and waiting for goofy looking American tourists to walk by so they could point and giggle. We stood in line and did some giggling ourselves, especially at the army guards who, while in full dress uniform still carried umbrellas with pictures of cartoon cats on them. No joke. After paying our respects to Uncle Ho's wax doppelganger, we visited the presidential estate. Ho was a simple country boy, so when he became president he didn't live in the presidential palace but in the gardener's house near the fishpond, where he trained the fish come to him when he clapped three times. Many little boys tried to emulate this, but I think the fish had grown wise to this. Next stop was the Fine Arts Museum. Nothing too special here - a lot of fine craftsmanship but not a lot of what our western eyes could recognize as "fine art." Still enjoying a fine (well, actually deathly hot) morning we went next to the Turtle Pagoda. There's a lake in town where once upon a time a 250 kg turtle lived. The Hanoians have built a house(pagoda) on an island in the lake for the turtle. There's also some legend about how the turtle had something to do with a heavenly sword and defeating Vietnam's foes, but we were too hot to comprehend all that - you can look it up on your own. In the afternoon, our guide Lieng told us we would visit a ceramic making factory. We were a bit surprised to find that the "factory" was a two rooms with about 20 kids (age 15-25) making pottery. Apparently over 50% of the population in Vietnam is under 30. Everything was hand cast and painted. It was very impressive. We bought a bunch of beautiful stuff, including many wonderful gifts for all of you. (We just found out most of the pottery was broken when it arrived in New York. Sorry, I guess you get nothing.) That evening we went to see a water-puppet show. It was really magical. The puppets are made of wood and controlled with bamboo poles which stay underwater. The puppets sort of glide on top of the water. Some spit water out of their mouths (dragons and fish). The puppeteers hide behind a bamboo screen. The stories describe all aspects of Vietnamese life, such as tilling fields and planting rice, getting married and of course fighting dragons. We ate another delicious meal at Le Tonkin that evening. Le Tonkin is owned by the folks who own Indochine and is much the same. We had clay-pot pork, fried squid, shrimp and pho ga. After dinner we got a cab back to our hotel which turned out to be around the corner. 13 August 2001 Hanoi - Halong Bay  We set out on Highway 5 to Halong Bay this morning, passing about 30 "Thit Cho" restaurants on the way out of town. "Thit Cho" is the much talked about DOG. I'm sure the Vietnamese will appreciate it if I dispel the myth: No one in Vietnam will try to trick you into eating dog. Thit Cho is considered a special meal which is only eaten during the second half on the month (it's considered unlucky in the first half) and is a delicacy. This means that is more expensive than just about any other meat in Vietnam except maybe King Cobra. You're much more likely to be tricked into eating beef thinking it's dog than the other way around. Carolyn tells me that the drive to Halong was pretty terrifying. Vietnam is one of those countries that practice the "pass anytime" policy. This means anytime you have to pass a slow moving pig-hauling motorbike or a bicycle with 800 fish nets on it you just whip right out into the oncoming traffic lane and hope everybody gets out of your way. This morning was apparently extra scary because of the blinding sheets of rain pouring from the sky. I didn't notice as I have a policy of sleeping anytime I'm in a moving vehicle that I'm not piloting. We stopped for a long lunch on the outskirts of Halong - long because we were put in a room with three tables and the wait staff promptly forgot which order went to which table. I think about half of our food went to a French couple at the next table who happily ate everything. We managed to get the fried crab that we ordered, which was messy and delicious. We arrived at our hotel during a power outage and climbed 7 flights of stairs to our room. After catching our breath we hit the town. We strolled out on the boardwalk much to the amusement of the locals. Being Monday, it seemed the town was recovering from the weekend a little and also most of the other tourists were Vietnamese or Chinese, so we got the pointing and giggling treatment again. Lieng had suggested a restaurant for dinner which we walked to after a little e-mail session. The power was still out, so we ate by candlelight. This might have been very romantic but for the slight breeze which kept blowing out our candles. We spent more time trying to keep the candles lit than holding hands and smooching. Carolyn finally came up with the brilliant idea of putting a candle inside of a glass and we finished our dinner in peace, after which we called it a day. 14 August 2001 Halong City/Bay - Hanoi More pointing and laughing this morning as we headed to our boat to tour the Bay. Halong Bay is a stunning collection of islands best described by the locals as a dragon's back curving in and out of the water. 
Think of the dragons painted on those old maps that say "Here Be Dragons". Ha Long means "dragon landing" in fact. The scenery from the boat is fantastic enough; but wait, there's more! After drifting among the islands for over an hour, we came to an island that was filled not with rock but caves. This particular cave had special lighting so you could see the "tigers" and "dragons" formed by the calcification. It was especially fun when the lights flickered out when we were in the middle of the cave. I think maybe they did this on purpose to give us a thrill... We toured a couple caves or maybe they were grottos - we couldn't come up with an accurate definition of either - and then got back on the boat. The boat crew prepared us lunch on the way back. We had fresh crab, giant prawns, spring rolls, a whole butterfish, rice, lemongrass and french fries. I don't know why they thought french fries would go with an otherwise traditional Vietnamese meal. We got back in the car for our (I'm told) death- defying drive back to Hanoi and re-checked into our hotel. We had another fantastic under-$10 meal at Nam Phong. Pork wrapped in bamboo, chicken satay, and crispy fried scallops. Yum! After dinner we rushed of to see the circus which was inexplicably closed. After searching in vain for a duffel bag in which to pack some of our extra loot, we headed back to the hotel to pack our bags for Hong Kong. |
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CIA World Factbook entry for Viet Nam |