The Coup
Saturday, Sept. 30, 2006--Bangkok
I haven't written about the coup since arriving here. Most of the outward signs of it were gone by the time I arrived. The tanks had been removed from major intersections. In fact, it is normal to see military police with machine guns at the airport in Bangkok, and this time I didn't see any! That's probably because they have been pulled from there to be at more strategic locations. Anyway, although life seems normal, there is the sense that it isn't. Although this is the 60th anniversary of the king's ascension to the throne, there have been no public appearances by him that I know about and no statements after the original one from the palace saying that he supported the coup. My guess is that he had little choice. He is very loved by the people though. If he had not supported the coup, the military would have had a mess on their hands--probably huge demonstrations leading to riots. One thing that has happened this week is that the military announced the forced retirement of high ranking members and the promotions of others; you can guess which side each took in terms of the coup. It's a little strange on TV. They talk ABOUT the coup and the steps that its leaders are taking on a daily, but there is never any question of whether it was good or bad. In other words, there is self-determined censorship from the media which probably means they have been given information about what will happen if they don't sensor themselves. There is plenty of discussion about how bad the administration was that was deposed by the coup, so I also wonder to what extent they have been "ordered" to discuss this. In other words, they are trying to put a face on the coup that says that everything is fine and that it had to happen. But looking at it honestly, it was unconstitutional, there were other means of dealing with the problems with the previous administration, and it proves that there is a problem here in Thailand with the military having too much power. Whatever negative consequences come from it in decreased tourism, withdrawn financial support, halted commercial projects, etc., the country deserves for letting this happen so easily. This is the 8th coup here in too short a period of time.
Last night, I went to a sidewalk restaurant again. This time, I had a dish over rice that consisted of small pieces of chicken cooked with vegetables and peppers. I added more peppers to spice it up. Ummm.
Today was a big walking day. I made a loop that took me 6 1/2 hours and took me to the Dusit area and by Victory Monument Circle (where I checked on the location for catching the 551 bus to the new airport tomorrow morning). Dusit is an area with broad boulevards, tall trees, and stately buildings. Many government agencies are housed in the area. I went there to tour Vimanmek Palace, a palace built in the early 1900s by King Rama V (who was the Prince Chulalongkorn in the story The King and I). It's a wonderful wooden building with 3 floors and a tile roof. It can be seen only via a guided tour, so I had to endure staying with a group and hearing everything the tour guide said. While there, I also toured two throne rooms--a European-style one that looks like St. Peters Church in the Vatican and an earlier wooden one that is much more appropriate for its setting in the Far East. The latter throne room housed examples of crafts throughout Thailand and the exhibit was excellent with the highest quality fabric weavings, basket weavings, carvings, metalwork, etc.
This is my last day in Bangkok. Tomorrow, I will catch a flight to Chennai in India. I have a route planned that will carry me through southern India allowing me to stop along the way to see how the kids have grown at the school where I was last year. Among my stops (which are in order and will show the itinerary I have planned if you look up a map of India) are Pondicherry, Thanjavur, Madurai, Tiruchirapalli, Kodaikkanal, Trivandrum, Varkala, Kollam, Alleppey, Cochin, Thrisur, Coimbatore, Canoor, Ooty, Mysore, Hospet (Hampi), Hyderabad, and Bangalore. I will leave Bangalore on Dec. 6 for Copenhagen, so each stop is from 2-8 days with most being 2-3 days. I'll be online from Chennai in a couple of days to update the blog.
Saturday, September 30, 2006
Friday, September 29, 2006
Weekend in Bangkok
Weekend in Bangkok
Friday, Sept. 29, 2006--Bangkok
The weekend has already started. I just came from the malls, and they are full of stylish teenages out to cruise and to shop. They are much more active places today than they have been all week. But to build up to that point....
Last night, I ate on the sidewalk after leaving here. I found a place with one of my favorite Thai dishes--one that I often order in Texas when I eat Thai food--Penang beef. It is slices of beef cooked in a curry sauce with coconut milk. It is rich and delicious. I had it over a bed of rice. The plate of food cost me 20 baht--about 55 cents. That's 1/10 of what I have to pay for it when I have it for lunch in Texas! And the people running the sidewalk restaurant were so happy to have me as a customer.
I had breakfast again today with Barbara, the lady I met yesterday at breakfast. She told me more about her travel agency. She provides guided tours to rather exotic places--Pakistan, Yemen, Bhutan, western Africa, etc. It's mostly women who go on the tours she said. The company is named Lost Frontiers, Inc., and I have linked the name to the website. Just click on it to go there. She suggested an itinerary for me to follow if I go to Pakistan next year (which is a good possibility).
I saw a final film today. It was another Japanese film. The story is an action fantasy about a young man who finds a notebook with directions that anyone whose name he writes into it will die either of a heart attack or of the method of death that he prescribes. He is a law student who is concerned about admitted criminals who never serve time for their crimes, so he begins to kill them. He becomes a hero in many peoples' eyes, and he is considered a killer by the police. The story follows the attempts to learn who he is and how he is causing the deaths. It also questions whether someone with such power can be good, or whether he will eventually become corrupted and bad. The English title was Death Notes.
Well, my time in Bangkok is coming to an end. I will leave on Sunday for Chennai. I stopped by the tourist office today to ask when the buses begin running on Sunday. They start at 5 a.m., so I should have no problem taking a bus to the airport. That will save a lot of money, since the airport is about 1 1/2 hours out of town and the train line going there won't be open for another year.
Will report on dinner tonight when I post tomorrow.
Friday, Sept. 29, 2006--Bangkok
The weekend has already started. I just came from the malls, and they are full of stylish teenages out to cruise and to shop. They are much more active places today than they have been all week. But to build up to that point....
Last night, I ate on the sidewalk after leaving here. I found a place with one of my favorite Thai dishes--one that I often order in Texas when I eat Thai food--Penang beef. It is slices of beef cooked in a curry sauce with coconut milk. It is rich and delicious. I had it over a bed of rice. The plate of food cost me 20 baht--about 55 cents. That's 1/10 of what I have to pay for it when I have it for lunch in Texas! And the people running the sidewalk restaurant were so happy to have me as a customer.
I had breakfast again today with Barbara, the lady I met yesterday at breakfast. She told me more about her travel agency. She provides guided tours to rather exotic places--Pakistan, Yemen, Bhutan, western Africa, etc. It's mostly women who go on the tours she said. The company is named Lost Frontiers, Inc., and I have linked the name to the website. Just click on it to go there. She suggested an itinerary for me to follow if I go to Pakistan next year (which is a good possibility).
I saw a final film today. It was another Japanese film. The story is an action fantasy about a young man who finds a notebook with directions that anyone whose name he writes into it will die either of a heart attack or of the method of death that he prescribes. He is a law student who is concerned about admitted criminals who never serve time for their crimes, so he begins to kill them. He becomes a hero in many peoples' eyes, and he is considered a killer by the police. The story follows the attempts to learn who he is and how he is causing the deaths. It also questions whether someone with such power can be good, or whether he will eventually become corrupted and bad. The English title was Death Notes.
Well, my time in Bangkok is coming to an end. I will leave on Sunday for Chennai. I stopped by the tourist office today to ask when the buses begin running on Sunday. They start at 5 a.m., so I should have no problem taking a bus to the airport. That will save a lot of money, since the airport is about 1 1/2 hours out of town and the train line going there won't be open for another year.
Will report on dinner tonight when I post tomorrow.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Another Movie Day
Another Movie Day
Thursday, Sept. 28, 2006--Bangkok
Last night when I left the cyber cafe, I passed a restaurant full of students. I am very near Chulalonghorn University, the most prestigious university in Thailand, and I am sure they were all from there. I figured it must have fairly good food at cheap prices to appeal so much to so many students. I went in to order. Someone had handwritten English translations of the menu, but not for all the words. I found green curry two times on the menu. So a student near me helped me by explaining that it was with vegetables only in one place and that there was a choice of meats (chicken, pork, beef, etc.) with it at the other place. I ordered green curry with chicken. It was good. But it wasn't very spicy. I ate bites of the two strips of red chile that were in it to help, but I could have used more peppers. It came with rice, and I ordered a lemon drink that turned out to be a Slushy-type drink. It was a nice meal to end the day. I returned to the room just before the rain started for the evening and watched The Terminal on either HBO or Star Movies.
I thought I got up at 7 a.m. this morning. I watched BBC news. Then I showered as they gave the business news during the next half hour. When I was dressed and ready to go out the door, I glanced at my watch and saw that it was 9:10--an hour later than I expected! I guess it had been 7:59 instead of 7:00 when I glanced at my watch upon awakening. I had to rush more at breakfast, since they stop serving at 10:00. But I sat with an interesting woman from San Francisco (but originally from Germany near Luxumborg). She has a travel agency that specializes in Middle Eastern and African travel. She's here for eye surgery--lens implants that will cost only about 40% of what it would cost her in the U.S. She took the number for my dentist, and planned to call for an appointment while she is here.
I stopped at the art gallery at Chulalonghorn University as I walked through there on my way to the cinema. There was an exhibit having its closing day. The artist herself was there and greeted me and talked to me about her work. He is a very elegant and sophisticated woman. Later, I learned from a friend of hers that her husband is a partner in one of the most pretigious law firms here in Bangkok. Anyway, her art is in a modern Chinese style. And she frames her work in homemade paper frames. Her art isn't that expensive and is well worth what she charges, I think. There are three price ranges--12 x 18 cm for 500 baht 35 cm x 35 cm for 4000 baht, and 35 cm x 45 cm for 5000 baht (about $125 U.S.). I would have bought one, but I didn't want the hassle of handling it while I travel. She took my e-mail address so that her son can send me the website address for her work. Her name is Chuan Chuen Yongvanich, so maybe it can be found through a Google search. Maybe I will write her later to tell her the style that I liked best and see if she would be willing to send one via mail to me if I wired her the money. They were busy taking down the exhibit today, so I didn't even think of asking about that while there.
I saw another film today. This was a new one that opened today. It's a Japanese film entitled Blue. It takes place in the upper grades of a high school. The main character has realized that she is a lesbian and is finding herself attracted to a particular student while realizing that it is difficult to continue interacting with her straight friends who are starting to go out with boys. It's slow-paced, and it is a long film at almost 2 hours. But it is a good film for someone who likes to think about what they are seeing.
I went back to Paragon Center today. I decided not to see the aquarium. It costs $13, and I am not sure I would get that much pleasure from it. I prefer zoos to aquariums. But I explored the food area this time with a wide range of restaurants and fast-food stalls. There is also a huge gourmet food store (which is nicer than Central Market or Whole Foods in Texas). It always frustrates me to find that people living somewhere like Bangkok have better selections of breads, types of meats, fruits, etc., than we have in our best supermarkets at home.
There was another film I wanted to see that was in a cinema much further out of town than where I am staying. But it was a nice day, so I decided to go there. It was about a 7-mile (12 km) walk to get there only to find out that the film had closed yesterday! There was a Ken Loach film showing that I could have seen, but I had read nothing about it and decided just to return to my part of town. At least now, I know not to try to go out there for a film again in the future; there is no easy way to get there. Even if I take the subway, I must walk about 1 mile further to get to the theater, and the only place to walk is beside an expressway and under a ramp through a rather bad looking district. That part of town is for cars rather than for pedestrians. It wasn't all a loss, however. All the walking must have burned off the calories I ate at breakfast this morning, and I got to see parts of the city I had read about but never passed through. Out that way, there are still some neighborhood canals; the ones here in the inner city have been paved over as roadways.
I took the subway back to my hotel area and am back at the same cyber cafe where I was last night. When I leave, it will be time for dinner again. I saw a place with barbecued duck this morning near here, so I may go there for dinner.
Thursday, Sept. 28, 2006--Bangkok
Last night when I left the cyber cafe, I passed a restaurant full of students. I am very near Chulalonghorn University, the most prestigious university in Thailand, and I am sure they were all from there. I figured it must have fairly good food at cheap prices to appeal so much to so many students. I went in to order. Someone had handwritten English translations of the menu, but not for all the words. I found green curry two times on the menu. So a student near me helped me by explaining that it was with vegetables only in one place and that there was a choice of meats (chicken, pork, beef, etc.) with it at the other place. I ordered green curry with chicken. It was good. But it wasn't very spicy. I ate bites of the two strips of red chile that were in it to help, but I could have used more peppers. It came with rice, and I ordered a lemon drink that turned out to be a Slushy-type drink. It was a nice meal to end the day. I returned to the room just before the rain started for the evening and watched The Terminal on either HBO or Star Movies.
I thought I got up at 7 a.m. this morning. I watched BBC news. Then I showered as they gave the business news during the next half hour. When I was dressed and ready to go out the door, I glanced at my watch and saw that it was 9:10--an hour later than I expected! I guess it had been 7:59 instead of 7:00 when I glanced at my watch upon awakening. I had to rush more at breakfast, since they stop serving at 10:00. But I sat with an interesting woman from San Francisco (but originally from Germany near Luxumborg). She has a travel agency that specializes in Middle Eastern and African travel. She's here for eye surgery--lens implants that will cost only about 40% of what it would cost her in the U.S. She took the number for my dentist, and planned to call for an appointment while she is here.
I stopped at the art gallery at Chulalonghorn University as I walked through there on my way to the cinema. There was an exhibit having its closing day. The artist herself was there and greeted me and talked to me about her work. He is a very elegant and sophisticated woman. Later, I learned from a friend of hers that her husband is a partner in one of the most pretigious law firms here in Bangkok. Anyway, her art is in a modern Chinese style. And she frames her work in homemade paper frames. Her art isn't that expensive and is well worth what she charges, I think. There are three price ranges--12 x 18 cm for 500 baht 35 cm x 35 cm for 4000 baht, and 35 cm x 45 cm for 5000 baht (about $125 U.S.). I would have bought one, but I didn't want the hassle of handling it while I travel. She took my e-mail address so that her son can send me the website address for her work. Her name is Chuan Chuen Yongvanich, so maybe it can be found through a Google search. Maybe I will write her later to tell her the style that I liked best and see if she would be willing to send one via mail to me if I wired her the money. They were busy taking down the exhibit today, so I didn't even think of asking about that while there.
I saw another film today. This was a new one that opened today. It's a Japanese film entitled Blue. It takes place in the upper grades of a high school. The main character has realized that she is a lesbian and is finding herself attracted to a particular student while realizing that it is difficult to continue interacting with her straight friends who are starting to go out with boys. It's slow-paced, and it is a long film at almost 2 hours. But it is a good film for someone who likes to think about what they are seeing.
I went back to Paragon Center today. I decided not to see the aquarium. It costs $13, and I am not sure I would get that much pleasure from it. I prefer zoos to aquariums. But I explored the food area this time with a wide range of restaurants and fast-food stalls. There is also a huge gourmet food store (which is nicer than Central Market or Whole Foods in Texas). It always frustrates me to find that people living somewhere like Bangkok have better selections of breads, types of meats, fruits, etc., than we have in our best supermarkets at home.
There was another film I wanted to see that was in a cinema much further out of town than where I am staying. But it was a nice day, so I decided to go there. It was about a 7-mile (12 km) walk to get there only to find out that the film had closed yesterday! There was a Ken Loach film showing that I could have seen, but I had read nothing about it and decided just to return to my part of town. At least now, I know not to try to go out there for a film again in the future; there is no easy way to get there. Even if I take the subway, I must walk about 1 mile further to get to the theater, and the only place to walk is beside an expressway and under a ramp through a rather bad looking district. That part of town is for cars rather than for pedestrians. It wasn't all a loss, however. All the walking must have burned off the calories I ate at breakfast this morning, and I got to see parts of the city I had read about but never passed through. Out that way, there are still some neighborhood canals; the ones here in the inner city have been paved over as roadways.
I took the subway back to my hotel area and am back at the same cyber cafe where I was last night. When I leave, it will be time for dinner again. I saw a place with barbecued duck this morning near here, so I may go there for dinner.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Business, Fun, and More Business
Business, Fun, and More Business
Wednesday, Sept. 27, 2006--Bangkok
I was up early again today. I have been leaving my curtains open so that the sun will wake me in the mornings. Today, that was at 6:30. I stayed in bed and watched BBC News for about an hour. Then I got up and cleaned up for breakfast. I sampled a little bit of a lot of things again. Most of what I ate was the same as yesterday. But I added a piece of a heavy chocolate cream cake to my plate of food this morning. I'm not used to sweets these days, so I ended up leaving part of the frosting; it was just too much sugar!! (I know some of my friends won't believe I would ever say such a thing.)
I had to deal with business first. My dental appointment with Siam Family Dental Clinic was at 11:00. I arrived there and waited. Then they told me that they had opened another office two blocks away and that my dentist was at that office. So they walked me over to it. It takes up two floors of a building that houses shops below. All the equipment is new. As usual, the first thing I did as I entered was take off my shoes and put then in a shoe closet, then I picked out a large pair of bagged cloth slippers and took them out and put them on. The dentist told me I am still brushing too hard even with my soft bristle brush. She cleaned my teeth and inspected them. There is a dark spot that could develop into a cavity she said, but she said we would wait; if I floss (and I do every night), it should be a while before it is big enough to need drilling and filling. She charged me about $18.50 U.S. and told me she would see me again in August of next year when I return.
I got out of the dental office at 11:55, so I rushed one block to the Lido Theater to see a film I knew was starting at 12:00. It was a French film with the title Flanders. It won the Grand Prix at Cannes. (I think that is the audience prize for the film they liked the most in the competition.) It was a slow-moving film, but it was very well made and was an interesting story. It begins in the countryside with three young farmers who are leaving for military service and two girls who are their girl friends. (Two men like the same girl.) Then it moves to northern Africa with war scenes that are really remarkably filmed. Interspersed are scenes back at home where one of the girls is pregnant and has been unofficially diagnosed as a nymphomaniac. Finally, it returns to the village with only one of the men returning.
Bangkok has such a good selection of foreign and independent films showing all the time. And almost all the foreign films have English subtitles. There are definitely more showing here than make it to San Antonio. It's frustrating to see the previews of upcoming features knowing that I will be gone and unable to see them. One of the previews today was of a Danish film. I believe the Danish title is Kaerlighed; in English, they have given it the title A Soap.
I walked across the street after the film to explore a new shopping center called Paragon that has opened since I was here last year. It was almost finished last year, so it has now been open for a while. It is an upscale mall with about 6 floors. The bottom floor is all the big names in jewelry, clothing, and other accessories: Mont Blanc, Rolex, Patek _______, Chanel, D&G, Hermes, etc. On the second floor are well known stores a little down the rungs on the ladder: Zara, MNG, La Coste, etc. Further up there are floors with furniture (with over half the space filled with contemporary designs), home accessories, entertainment, etc. A section of one floor even had auto sales rooms for fancy autos such as Maseratis, BMWs, etc. The top floor has 14 cinemas, an IMAX, a bowling alley, a gym, etc. The basement of the mall has the largest aquarium in Asia. I didn't get to cover the whole mall. I will go back to check it out more and to see the remodeled Siam Center Mall next door (where I went to the dermotologist last year when I was here). This area about 1/3 mile (less than 1 km) from my hotel has about 6 malls and a street area with shops. Two of the malls are upscale. Three are more normal. And one is like a huge mini-mall with space rented out to small independently-owned businesses. The street area consists of about 12 square blocks that have the trendy shops that appeal to teenagers. When I first came to Bangkok in the 1970s, the street shopping area was new and there was nothing else around. It was the new trendy shopping district. It has remained the trendy shopping area, but with MANY more shops now coming in all formats.
I had to get back to business related to my new air ticket. I walked to the Thai Airways office. They had completed my ticket. They printed it, stampled it together, gave me itinerary sheets, booked my seat for Sunday's flight, etc. The tickets continue to increase in costs. Part of that is due to the oil prices, but I don't think the price I paid reflected the drop that has occurred during the past few weeks. Another big factor in the increase is the fees charged by airports. They used to be about 1/8 of the cost of the ticket; now they are about 1/4. Anyway, I paid 125,375 baht for the ticket for this coming year. That's about $3,350. The price is up to the level that I paid from the U.S. for my first ticket. In the U.S., my guess is that the ticket price must be reaching $5000 now. Anyway, I am good to go now. I will no longer be required to go through London and will know longer have to worry about picking up my new ticket there while trying to transfer between flights. I can skip London completely unless I want to go there. For instance, when I leave Copenhagen on Dec. 11 this year, I will fly straight to Washington, DC, and then head for San Antonio from there. Each year now, I will buy my tickets during my break here in Bangkok. So next August, I will be back to see the same people at the Thai Airways office here near my hotel.
Now I need to worry about finding a hotel in Chennai. I fly there on Sunday and do not have any idea where I will be staying! I'll research some while I am here on the computer, then I will find a place nearby for dinner tonight.
Wednesday, Sept. 27, 2006--Bangkok
I was up early again today. I have been leaving my curtains open so that the sun will wake me in the mornings. Today, that was at 6:30. I stayed in bed and watched BBC News for about an hour. Then I got up and cleaned up for breakfast. I sampled a little bit of a lot of things again. Most of what I ate was the same as yesterday. But I added a piece of a heavy chocolate cream cake to my plate of food this morning. I'm not used to sweets these days, so I ended up leaving part of the frosting; it was just too much sugar!! (I know some of my friends won't believe I would ever say such a thing.)
I had to deal with business first. My dental appointment with Siam Family Dental Clinic was at 11:00. I arrived there and waited. Then they told me that they had opened another office two blocks away and that my dentist was at that office. So they walked me over to it. It takes up two floors of a building that houses shops below. All the equipment is new. As usual, the first thing I did as I entered was take off my shoes and put then in a shoe closet, then I picked out a large pair of bagged cloth slippers and took them out and put them on. The dentist told me I am still brushing too hard even with my soft bristle brush. She cleaned my teeth and inspected them. There is a dark spot that could develop into a cavity she said, but she said we would wait; if I floss (and I do every night), it should be a while before it is big enough to need drilling and filling. She charged me about $18.50 U.S. and told me she would see me again in August of next year when I return.
I got out of the dental office at 11:55, so I rushed one block to the Lido Theater to see a film I knew was starting at 12:00. It was a French film with the title Flanders. It won the Grand Prix at Cannes. (I think that is the audience prize for the film they liked the most in the competition.) It was a slow-moving film, but it was very well made and was an interesting story. It begins in the countryside with three young farmers who are leaving for military service and two girls who are their girl friends. (Two men like the same girl.) Then it moves to northern Africa with war scenes that are really remarkably filmed. Interspersed are scenes back at home where one of the girls is pregnant and has been unofficially diagnosed as a nymphomaniac. Finally, it returns to the village with only one of the men returning.
Bangkok has such a good selection of foreign and independent films showing all the time. And almost all the foreign films have English subtitles. There are definitely more showing here than make it to San Antonio. It's frustrating to see the previews of upcoming features knowing that I will be gone and unable to see them. One of the previews today was of a Danish film. I believe the Danish title is Kaerlighed; in English, they have given it the title A Soap.
I walked across the street after the film to explore a new shopping center called Paragon that has opened since I was here last year. It was almost finished last year, so it has now been open for a while. It is an upscale mall with about 6 floors. The bottom floor is all the big names in jewelry, clothing, and other accessories: Mont Blanc, Rolex, Patek _______, Chanel, D&G, Hermes, etc. On the second floor are well known stores a little down the rungs on the ladder: Zara, MNG, La Coste, etc. Further up there are floors with furniture (with over half the space filled with contemporary designs), home accessories, entertainment, etc. A section of one floor even had auto sales rooms for fancy autos such as Maseratis, BMWs, etc. The top floor has 14 cinemas, an IMAX, a bowling alley, a gym, etc. The basement of the mall has the largest aquarium in Asia. I didn't get to cover the whole mall. I will go back to check it out more and to see the remodeled Siam Center Mall next door (where I went to the dermotologist last year when I was here). This area about 1/3 mile (less than 1 km) from my hotel has about 6 malls and a street area with shops. Two of the malls are upscale. Three are more normal. And one is like a huge mini-mall with space rented out to small independently-owned businesses. The street area consists of about 12 square blocks that have the trendy shops that appeal to teenagers. When I first came to Bangkok in the 1970s, the street shopping area was new and there was nothing else around. It was the new trendy shopping district. It has remained the trendy shopping area, but with MANY more shops now coming in all formats.
I had to get back to business related to my new air ticket. I walked to the Thai Airways office. They had completed my ticket. They printed it, stampled it together, gave me itinerary sheets, booked my seat for Sunday's flight, etc. The tickets continue to increase in costs. Part of that is due to the oil prices, but I don't think the price I paid reflected the drop that has occurred during the past few weeks. Another big factor in the increase is the fees charged by airports. They used to be about 1/8 of the cost of the ticket; now they are about 1/4. Anyway, I paid 125,375 baht for the ticket for this coming year. That's about $3,350. The price is up to the level that I paid from the U.S. for my first ticket. In the U.S., my guess is that the ticket price must be reaching $5000 now. Anyway, I am good to go now. I will no longer be required to go through London and will know longer have to worry about picking up my new ticket there while trying to transfer between flights. I can skip London completely unless I want to go there. For instance, when I leave Copenhagen on Dec. 11 this year, I will fly straight to Washington, DC, and then head for San Antonio from there. Each year now, I will buy my tickets during my break here in Bangkok. So next August, I will be back to see the same people at the Thai Airways office here near my hotel.
Now I need to worry about finding a hotel in Chennai. I fly there on Sunday and do not have any idea where I will be staying! I'll research some while I am here on the computer, then I will find a place nearby for dinner tonight.
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Hassles, Problems, Fun, and a Rush
Hassles, Problems, Fun, and a Rush
Monday, Sept. 25, 2006--HCMC (Saigon) to Bangkok
While I was at the Internet cafe in the morning, I did a little more research on my Around-the-World VII ticket which I will buy in Bangkok. I had already planned the itinerary, but I wasn't sure how long I should spend in Taiwan and in Indonesia. I decided on 3 weeks in Taiwan and 6 weeks in Indonesia after reading online guidebooks. Hope I am not staying too long in the former and too short a time in the latter. Will see next year.
I took a motorcycle to the airport. It is so much cheaper than going by taxi. My hotel wanted to arrange a motorcycle for $4 or a taxi for $6. I went around the corner on the street and got a motorcycle for a little less than $2. It was a fast, easy ride. I got there 15 minutes before they opened the counters for check-in. I ate a pastry that consisted of rather sweet tasting dough and had a savory chicken filling. It was good.
After checking in, I went on upstairs to the gate area. After a while, I thought I heard them calling my name on the speaking. If so, they were saying Mr. Drum Randell. Anyway, I went to Gate 5 as requested and, sure enough, it was for me. They tried to tell me that my ticket wasn't valid. That is because the date the coupon was printed was in early September last year, and this was more than one year after that. As usual, I found myself having to explain to the airlines their rules on around-the-world tickets. ATW tickets are good for one year and one day (to get it back to the same date) from the DATE OF THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT. Since my first flight was January 5, 2006, my ticket is good until Jan. 5 of next year. They accepted that, but then I had to prove to them that my first flight was on Jan. 5. That flight was from London to Oporto with a continuing flight to Lisbon. Well, I had flown into London on my old ticket and had not gone through immigration there, since they were bringing my ticket to the gate making me an in-transit passenger. There was no stamp in my passport for London. But, fortunately, they stamped it in Oporto in Portugal. Since the first flight was London to Oporto and the date on the Oporto was Jan. 3, they accepted it and led me back through customs and immigration to the gate area. Whew!! That was a hassle, though.
It really isn't a long flight from Saigon to Bangkok. We barely finished eating when we were landing. We arrived at the "old" airport. I say that, because Sept. 27 is the last day it will be in operation. On Sept. 28, the "new" airport will open. I know my way around this airport well, so I quickly made it through customs and exited. I checked on the express buses, but as has been the case for the past three years, the bus that would go by my hotel was not operating. I knew, however, that the local bus 29 would go to my hotel, so I walked out to the street to catch it. Unfortunately, I got a 29 bus that would terminate at Victory Monument Circle which is quite a ways from my hotel. I was trying to decide what to do--try walking the distance from there or maybe transfer to the metro or the overhead trains. For some reason, I didn't even think about the possibility of getting off at the circle and catching the next 29 bus that would be going onward. As I was thinking about all of this, the bus stopped. I recognized the stop as one where the metro connected that would take me to the corner near my hotel. In the rush to grab my suitcase, I left my small backpack setting on the seat beside where I was. I didn't miss it because I had my shoulder bag I normally wear around my neck. It wasn't until I was in the station to buy my metro ticket that I noticed I was missing my backpack. That was a big problem.
I knew there was nothing I could do but take the metro to the hotel and check in. I did that, then I went to the nearest police station to seek help. I could tell nothing was going to happen, and I left the building dejected. But then the man called me back. I produced my bus ticket. From it, he could tell the company and called them. They told him to have me call them back at 6 p.m. to see if the bag had been returned. A man at the desk in the hotel called at 6. Then he called 15 minutes later. Then he had to call again about 30 minutes later. At that point, they said the bus wouldn't be back into the station until about 8 p.m. I went to the room and came back down at 8:30 and the man called again. They had found my bag! What a relief. Of course, I still didn't know if everything would be in it. Anyway, I could pick it up at their station. I said I would wait until morning to go there. It had been a frustrating 6 hours from when the bag was lost until I learned that I would get it back.
The bag contained: my sandals, my camera memory cards (including the 260 photos I had taken so far on the trip), my camera battery charger, my electrical plug adaptors, my travel literature (including the plans for the itinerary and the guidebook pages I would need in India), the itinerary plans (including the specific flights and dates) for my ATW VII ticket, the book I had just started reading, etc. All except the photos could be replaced, but what a problem. I went to bed without eating and didn't sleep well because of sinus drainage due to allergies.
Spending Update for Vietnam and the Trip Thus Far: I spent $509.14 over 29 days for an average of $17.57 per day or $528 per month in Vietnam. Since leaving Texas, I have spent $912.88 over 38 days for an average of $24.02 per day and a monthly rate of $721. It's cheaper to be gone from Texas than it is to be there!
Tuesday, Sept. 26, 2006--Bangkok
I was up early to have breakfast and head to the bus station. The hotel has a wonderful, huge buffet here. I sat at a table with a woman from Vietnam who has been here 5 days as a tourist. We visited as I first ate a plate with some pancit (rice noodles with cabbage and meat), scrambled eggs, creamed potatoes, ham, and hot sauce. Then I ate two pieces of French toast with lots of fried bacon. Finally, I had a fruit plate with watermelon, papaya, and pineapple. Ummm. What a good feast!
It took 3 1/2 hours to go to the edge of town and back to retrieve my bag. When I got there, I was immediately depressed to find that it was opened. The locked tabs had been cut so that someone could rifle through it. So I knew things would be missing. I found the sandals first. Although they are worn and will have to be replaced after this trip, it was nice to know I could wait until I am home to do so. Then I was surprised to find a bag that had my battery charger (minus the electrical cord) in it. I could tell the larger bag it had been in was missing. And so was the plastic container with my camera memory cards (about $150 replacement cost plus the loss of all the photos I had taken so far on the trip). My book I was reading was there. My India travel literature wasn't with the other literature, but then I found the India info in another compartment. Deep down inside, I found the electrical cord for the battery charger. Oh, and 3500 Vietnamese dong (less than 25 cents U.S.) was missing from the Vietnam folder.
I rode back to the hotel happy that I had found what I had but depressed about the camera memory cards and the photos. When I got to the hotel, I started to reorganize to put things where they belonged instead of where they were. When I did that, I felt a small hard object in the small compartment. It was my camera memory cards in their case!! Someone had looked at them and moved them to that compartment without taking them. So all I lost were the small bag (a free make-up kit bag) that had held things that were still in the bag, the Vietnamese currency worth less than 25 cents, and the cut-off tabs from the backpack. How lucky could I be?
In celebration, I ran off to the movies. I always go to see foreign and independent films in Bangkok. There are about 8 theaters showing them near my hotel. Today, I saw Queens, a new Spanish comedy done in the style of Almendovar. It is about the mothers of a group of gay men who are going to be in a group wedding as the first of the gay men to be married since Spain changed its laws to allow marriage between gays. (It must be a VERY NEW film, since that law just changed a few months ago, I think.) Anyway, the film follows the problems between the boys and their new mothers-in-laws and the problems that ends up causing between the boys. It's a fairly good film and was fun to watch. It was nice to have fun after the hassles and problems I had been having.
From the theater, I rushed to the Thai Airlines office to get my new Around-the-World VII air ticket. I arrived at the office just 20 minutes before closing time. But I had everything already so organized that they put my itinerary into their computer within that time frame. They were so impressed and complimented me on being such a good customer. Most airlines people HATE doing these tickets because they take so long to do, but this became a group effort at the end of the day with everyone enjoying it, I think. They asked me to return to their office tomorrow afternoon, because they have to get the ticket priced. So many airports with each having special fees that must be included make it a long process of pricing and printing the ticket correctly. What a rush it was (both literally and in terms of excitement) in getting the itinerary into the computer so fast at the end of the day today, however.
I returned to my hotel to use the toilet, then I went to one of the sidewalk stalls to eat across the street. I had chicken with rice. It was served with a nice sauce of soy sauce, chopped garlic, and chopped peppers. It also came with sliced cucumber and a bowl of broth. I was simple, but it was good. Tomorrow, I need to try to find something special such as green curry.
There are about 8 cyber cafes across the street from my hotel. All are cheap and have good connections (meaning good speed). Unfortunately, they are all very busy and it isn't easy to get to the computers in the evening. But I got one tonight by waiting until after dinner.
Now it is time to go to the room and relax. What a busy two days!
Monday, Sept. 25, 2006--HCMC (Saigon) to Bangkok
While I was at the Internet cafe in the morning, I did a little more research on my Around-the-World VII ticket which I will buy in Bangkok. I had already planned the itinerary, but I wasn't sure how long I should spend in Taiwan and in Indonesia. I decided on 3 weeks in Taiwan and 6 weeks in Indonesia after reading online guidebooks. Hope I am not staying too long in the former and too short a time in the latter. Will see next year.
I took a motorcycle to the airport. It is so much cheaper than going by taxi. My hotel wanted to arrange a motorcycle for $4 or a taxi for $6. I went around the corner on the street and got a motorcycle for a little less than $2. It was a fast, easy ride. I got there 15 minutes before they opened the counters for check-in. I ate a pastry that consisted of rather sweet tasting dough and had a savory chicken filling. It was good.
After checking in, I went on upstairs to the gate area. After a while, I thought I heard them calling my name on the speaking. If so, they were saying Mr. Drum Randell. Anyway, I went to Gate 5 as requested and, sure enough, it was for me. They tried to tell me that my ticket wasn't valid. That is because the date the coupon was printed was in early September last year, and this was more than one year after that. As usual, I found myself having to explain to the airlines their rules on around-the-world tickets. ATW tickets are good for one year and one day (to get it back to the same date) from the DATE OF THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT. Since my first flight was January 5, 2006, my ticket is good until Jan. 5 of next year. They accepted that, but then I had to prove to them that my first flight was on Jan. 5. That flight was from London to Oporto with a continuing flight to Lisbon. Well, I had flown into London on my old ticket and had not gone through immigration there, since they were bringing my ticket to the gate making me an in-transit passenger. There was no stamp in my passport for London. But, fortunately, they stamped it in Oporto in Portugal. Since the first flight was London to Oporto and the date on the Oporto was Jan. 3, they accepted it and led me back through customs and immigration to the gate area. Whew!! That was a hassle, though.
It really isn't a long flight from Saigon to Bangkok. We barely finished eating when we were landing. We arrived at the "old" airport. I say that, because Sept. 27 is the last day it will be in operation. On Sept. 28, the "new" airport will open. I know my way around this airport well, so I quickly made it through customs and exited. I checked on the express buses, but as has been the case for the past three years, the bus that would go by my hotel was not operating. I knew, however, that the local bus 29 would go to my hotel, so I walked out to the street to catch it. Unfortunately, I got a 29 bus that would terminate at Victory Monument Circle which is quite a ways from my hotel. I was trying to decide what to do--try walking the distance from there or maybe transfer to the metro or the overhead trains. For some reason, I didn't even think about the possibility of getting off at the circle and catching the next 29 bus that would be going onward. As I was thinking about all of this, the bus stopped. I recognized the stop as one where the metro connected that would take me to the corner near my hotel. In the rush to grab my suitcase, I left my small backpack setting on the seat beside where I was. I didn't miss it because I had my shoulder bag I normally wear around my neck. It wasn't until I was in the station to buy my metro ticket that I noticed I was missing my backpack. That was a big problem.
I knew there was nothing I could do but take the metro to the hotel and check in. I did that, then I went to the nearest police station to seek help. I could tell nothing was going to happen, and I left the building dejected. But then the man called me back. I produced my bus ticket. From it, he could tell the company and called them. They told him to have me call them back at 6 p.m. to see if the bag had been returned. A man at the desk in the hotel called at 6. Then he called 15 minutes later. Then he had to call again about 30 minutes later. At that point, they said the bus wouldn't be back into the station until about 8 p.m. I went to the room and came back down at 8:30 and the man called again. They had found my bag! What a relief. Of course, I still didn't know if everything would be in it. Anyway, I could pick it up at their station. I said I would wait until morning to go there. It had been a frustrating 6 hours from when the bag was lost until I learned that I would get it back.
The bag contained: my sandals, my camera memory cards (including the 260 photos I had taken so far on the trip), my camera battery charger, my electrical plug adaptors, my travel literature (including the plans for the itinerary and the guidebook pages I would need in India), the itinerary plans (including the specific flights and dates) for my ATW VII ticket, the book I had just started reading, etc. All except the photos could be replaced, but what a problem. I went to bed without eating and didn't sleep well because of sinus drainage due to allergies.
Spending Update for Vietnam and the Trip Thus Far: I spent $509.14 over 29 days for an average of $17.57 per day or $528 per month in Vietnam. Since leaving Texas, I have spent $912.88 over 38 days for an average of $24.02 per day and a monthly rate of $721. It's cheaper to be gone from Texas than it is to be there!
Tuesday, Sept. 26, 2006--Bangkok
I was up early to have breakfast and head to the bus station. The hotel has a wonderful, huge buffet here. I sat at a table with a woman from Vietnam who has been here 5 days as a tourist. We visited as I first ate a plate with some pancit (rice noodles with cabbage and meat), scrambled eggs, creamed potatoes, ham, and hot sauce. Then I ate two pieces of French toast with lots of fried bacon. Finally, I had a fruit plate with watermelon, papaya, and pineapple. Ummm. What a good feast!
It took 3 1/2 hours to go to the edge of town and back to retrieve my bag. When I got there, I was immediately depressed to find that it was opened. The locked tabs had been cut so that someone could rifle through it. So I knew things would be missing. I found the sandals first. Although they are worn and will have to be replaced after this trip, it was nice to know I could wait until I am home to do so. Then I was surprised to find a bag that had my battery charger (minus the electrical cord) in it. I could tell the larger bag it had been in was missing. And so was the plastic container with my camera memory cards (about $150 replacement cost plus the loss of all the photos I had taken so far on the trip). My book I was reading was there. My India travel literature wasn't with the other literature, but then I found the India info in another compartment. Deep down inside, I found the electrical cord for the battery charger. Oh, and 3500 Vietnamese dong (less than 25 cents U.S.) was missing from the Vietnam folder.
I rode back to the hotel happy that I had found what I had but depressed about the camera memory cards and the photos. When I got to the hotel, I started to reorganize to put things where they belonged instead of where they were. When I did that, I felt a small hard object in the small compartment. It was my camera memory cards in their case!! Someone had looked at them and moved them to that compartment without taking them. So all I lost were the small bag (a free make-up kit bag) that had held things that were still in the bag, the Vietnamese currency worth less than 25 cents, and the cut-off tabs from the backpack. How lucky could I be?
In celebration, I ran off to the movies. I always go to see foreign and independent films in Bangkok. There are about 8 theaters showing them near my hotel. Today, I saw Queens, a new Spanish comedy done in the style of Almendovar. It is about the mothers of a group of gay men who are going to be in a group wedding as the first of the gay men to be married since Spain changed its laws to allow marriage between gays. (It must be a VERY NEW film, since that law just changed a few months ago, I think.) Anyway, the film follows the problems between the boys and their new mothers-in-laws and the problems that ends up causing between the boys. It's a fairly good film and was fun to watch. It was nice to have fun after the hassles and problems I had been having.
From the theater, I rushed to the Thai Airlines office to get my new Around-the-World VII air ticket. I arrived at the office just 20 minutes before closing time. But I had everything already so organized that they put my itinerary into their computer within that time frame. They were so impressed and complimented me on being such a good customer. Most airlines people HATE doing these tickets because they take so long to do, but this became a group effort at the end of the day with everyone enjoying it, I think. They asked me to return to their office tomorrow afternoon, because they have to get the ticket priced. So many airports with each having special fees that must be included make it a long process of pricing and printing the ticket correctly. What a rush it was (both literally and in terms of excitement) in getting the itinerary into the computer so fast at the end of the day today, however.
I returned to my hotel to use the toilet, then I went to one of the sidewalk stalls to eat across the street. I had chicken with rice. It was served with a nice sauce of soy sauce, chopped garlic, and chopped peppers. It also came with sliced cucumber and a bowl of broth. I was simple, but it was good. Tomorrow, I need to try to find something special such as green curry.
There are about 8 cyber cafes across the street from my hotel. All are cheap and have good connections (meaning good speed). Unfortunately, they are all very busy and it isn't easy to get to the computers in the evening. But I got one tonight by waiting until after dinner.
Now it is time to go to the room and relax. What a busy two days!
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Here's the Missing Post from Saturday
(I found this in another private blog a friend and I maintain; it got posted to the wrong blog!)
September is supposed to be the second rainiest month of the year in Vietnam. I've been very lucky that I have had such good weather while here. This week, however, the rains have started to arrive. They still aren't interrupting my plans much. If it rains during a given day, it usually is for a while in the afternoon or it starts in the early evening and continues past bedtime. I've only been caught out once so far. That was two days ago. I walked back to my hotel using my umbrella; that was the first time I have had to use it on the trip. Last night, it started raining around 7 p.m., so I got a little wet going out for dinner, but I didn't use the embrella; there are just so many nearby places to eat that it wasn't necessary.I have developed a rather slow-paced schedule to follow these remaining days in Vietnam. Each morning I go out to a museum or other place I want to visit. I try to find a restaurant in that area of town for eating. Then I return to my hotel. During the afternoon, I nap and/or read and/or watch a movie on TV. Then I go out to have dinner in my neighborhood in the evening. Every other day, I have been going to the sauna from about 4:30 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. It's also in my neighborhood.
Thursday, Sept. 21, HCMC (Saigon)
Spent the morning at the War Remembrance Museum. It was set up to display equipment, photos, and other exhibits of the war with America and is probably the most popular museum here in Saigon. It was interesting seeing all of the photos--both photos that had been taken locally and the professional ones that had been taken by photographers covering the war. Probably the best exhibit at the museum is a reconstruction of the cells that were used to house prisoners showing how small and hot they would have been, especially considering how many people were sometimes placed in one cell. I wasn't too interested in all of the equipment; military equipment such as airplanes, bombs, tanks, etc., don't age well anyway. A couple of observations: 1) I didn't see a photo of Jane Fonda in the part of the museum about the resistance movement within the U.S. I wonder if she has specifically requested that the government not include her in this section? 2) I couldn't help but relate the impossibility of trying to fight an enemy that really wasn't identifiable (Which Vietnamese were for and against the U.S. side and how would one pick them out from among the crowd during daily life?) here and the similar situations in Iraq and Afghanistan today. It seems that only good intelligence can really deal with such a situation and that trying to deal with it by fighting a war will only lead to problems due to killing innocents as "collateral damage."
I had a large, crispy pancake filled with shrimp, pork, and beansprouts for lunch. It was much like dosa in India--big enough to extend over the edges of the plate. It was very tasty.While I was out, I decided to go to two temples in the area near the restaurant. It was just after going to each of them that the heavy rains began. I was probably a 20-minute walk from my hotel, so I just opened the umbrella and headed that way.
I finished reading The Plot Against America by Philip Roth. It is a fictional story contemplating what could have happened if the Republicans had nominated Charles Lindberg for President in 1940 and he had won. Because of his Nazi sympathies, the story follows the citizens living in a Jewish neighborhood in Newark. It tells of their fears, the plans the government implements to dilute their culture, etc. It seems obvious that Roth also wants the reader to associate some of what is happening in the book to the present Bush presidency. I gave the book 3 stars out of 4.
Well, I had eaten nothing but Vietnamese food for 25 days, so I went out for pizza in the evening. It wasn't great pizza. And it was smaller than I expected, but I enjoyed it as a change in diet. There was a group of expatriots dining together at a table near me at the restaurant. I enjoyed listening to their conversations. It was obvious that they all are working here. My guess is that they have a regular date to meet for dinner on Thursdays of each week. It was also obvious that they are here in hopes of having an advantage that will make them wealthy. They talked with scorn about environmentalists. Of course, the label I applied to them was "opportunists."
Speaking of diet, I seldom have problems with my stomach when traveling. If I do, my problem is the opposite of most travels. This week, I suffered from constipation for about 4 days. I was ready to go to the drug store for a laxative when everything started moving again. It's strange that I have THAT problem when I am having drinks with the local ice, eating all those leaves and salads they serve here which the guidebooks say to avoid, etc.!
Friday, Sept. 22, 2006--HCMC (Saigon)
I chose the local history museum for my morning outing today. I arrived at a time when they were having the opening of a new exhibit on ceramics. There was a huge crowd there for the opening and a luncheon that went with it. But I was able to go through the normal exhibits without a problem. I always like seeing local museums, especially for the photos that show how the city has changed over the years. It's fun to see a photo of an intersection I know that shows what it was like in 1920 or some other time in the past. It wasn't a great museum, but it was better than most museums in Asia are.
I found a wonderful local place for lunch. They serve set lunches. You walk up to their counter where all the cooked food is in big trays and choose a main course. Then they bring a plate with it and side dishes. They were just finishing preparing everything and putting it out when I arrived. Choices included squid, fish, pork, etc. I chose the pork. Along with it, I got a helping of mixed greans, rice, a bowl of broth with squash, a banana, and a glass of iced green tea. I might go back there again!I think I am having allergic reactions again. My throat was a little sore from drainage today. (And it is still the same on Saturday morning except on the other side.) It hasn't developed into a cold, so I guess something in the air is causing it. It has made me feel a little sluggish, however. I spent all afternoon inside the room.
At 4:00, however, I went to the sauna. I met a very nice young Vietnamese man there who speaks English better than anyone else I have met here. We went back and forth between the sauna and the cool-down room talking all the time. He (Ban) is 32 years old and is an electrical engineer. He is from Hoi An where I visited a few weeks ago, but the work is here in Saigon. He shares a home here with 3 relatives and takes vacation twice a year to go back and visit his family. He would also like to teach English lessons privately, so I encouraged him to put an ad in a paper and see if he could just start by finding a couple of students he could teach on Saturday mornings, since he has a M-F job. I was enjoying his company so much that I invited him to dinner. He was hesitant thinking that we should do it American-style (sharing the costs). But I insisted that I wanted to pay. We stopped at a local place with pho (Vietnamese soup) and had the beef soup with noodles, bean sprouts, peppers, pepper sauce, and lots of leaves. He had a motorcycle, so he drove us in the rain to the restaurant and then dropped me off at my hotel. He said he was busy this morning, but he may come to my hotel and take me out for coffee this afternoon at some point.
One of the topics that Ban and I discussed was my interest in volunteer work. He suggested that I come back to Vietnam as a volunteer. He said that the government will give extended visas for something like that. Then he asked why I didn't just try to come back and work for pay. I told him I didn't want to work for pay. It took a long time to convince him that it was better for me to work for free so that I could have a say in the number of hours I worked and the type of work I did. Anyway, he said he would e-mail me the addressed of a couple of government agencies I could contact to try to make connections for maybe returning here as a volunteer at some point in the future.
(I found this in another private blog a friend and I maintain; it got posted to the wrong blog!)
September is supposed to be the second rainiest month of the year in Vietnam. I've been very lucky that I have had such good weather while here. This week, however, the rains have started to arrive. They still aren't interrupting my plans much. If it rains during a given day, it usually is for a while in the afternoon or it starts in the early evening and continues past bedtime. I've only been caught out once so far. That was two days ago. I walked back to my hotel using my umbrella; that was the first time I have had to use it on the trip. Last night, it started raining around 7 p.m., so I got a little wet going out for dinner, but I didn't use the embrella; there are just so many nearby places to eat that it wasn't necessary.I have developed a rather slow-paced schedule to follow these remaining days in Vietnam. Each morning I go out to a museum or other place I want to visit. I try to find a restaurant in that area of town for eating. Then I return to my hotel. During the afternoon, I nap and/or read and/or watch a movie on TV. Then I go out to have dinner in my neighborhood in the evening. Every other day, I have been going to the sauna from about 4:30 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. It's also in my neighborhood.
Thursday, Sept. 21, HCMC (Saigon)
Spent the morning at the War Remembrance Museum. It was set up to display equipment, photos, and other exhibits of the war with America and is probably the most popular museum here in Saigon. It was interesting seeing all of the photos--both photos that had been taken locally and the professional ones that had been taken by photographers covering the war. Probably the best exhibit at the museum is a reconstruction of the cells that were used to house prisoners showing how small and hot they would have been, especially considering how many people were sometimes placed in one cell. I wasn't too interested in all of the equipment; military equipment such as airplanes, bombs, tanks, etc., don't age well anyway. A couple of observations: 1) I didn't see a photo of Jane Fonda in the part of the museum about the resistance movement within the U.S. I wonder if she has specifically requested that the government not include her in this section? 2) I couldn't help but relate the impossibility of trying to fight an enemy that really wasn't identifiable (Which Vietnamese were for and against the U.S. side and how would one pick them out from among the crowd during daily life?) here and the similar situations in Iraq and Afghanistan today. It seems that only good intelligence can really deal with such a situation and that trying to deal with it by fighting a war will only lead to problems due to killing innocents as "collateral damage."
I had a large, crispy pancake filled with shrimp, pork, and beansprouts for lunch. It was much like dosa in India--big enough to extend over the edges of the plate. It was very tasty.While I was out, I decided to go to two temples in the area near the restaurant. It was just after going to each of them that the heavy rains began. I was probably a 20-minute walk from my hotel, so I just opened the umbrella and headed that way.
I finished reading The Plot Against America by Philip Roth. It is a fictional story contemplating what could have happened if the Republicans had nominated Charles Lindberg for President in 1940 and he had won. Because of his Nazi sympathies, the story follows the citizens living in a Jewish neighborhood in Newark. It tells of their fears, the plans the government implements to dilute their culture, etc. It seems obvious that Roth also wants the reader to associate some of what is happening in the book to the present Bush presidency. I gave the book 3 stars out of 4.
Well, I had eaten nothing but Vietnamese food for 25 days, so I went out for pizza in the evening. It wasn't great pizza. And it was smaller than I expected, but I enjoyed it as a change in diet. There was a group of expatriots dining together at a table near me at the restaurant. I enjoyed listening to their conversations. It was obvious that they all are working here. My guess is that they have a regular date to meet for dinner on Thursdays of each week. It was also obvious that they are here in hopes of having an advantage that will make them wealthy. They talked with scorn about environmentalists. Of course, the label I applied to them was "opportunists."
Speaking of diet, I seldom have problems with my stomach when traveling. If I do, my problem is the opposite of most travels. This week, I suffered from constipation for about 4 days. I was ready to go to the drug store for a laxative when everything started moving again. It's strange that I have THAT problem when I am having drinks with the local ice, eating all those leaves and salads they serve here which the guidebooks say to avoid, etc.!
Friday, Sept. 22, 2006--HCMC (Saigon)
I chose the local history museum for my morning outing today. I arrived at a time when they were having the opening of a new exhibit on ceramics. There was a huge crowd there for the opening and a luncheon that went with it. But I was able to go through the normal exhibits without a problem. I always like seeing local museums, especially for the photos that show how the city has changed over the years. It's fun to see a photo of an intersection I know that shows what it was like in 1920 or some other time in the past. It wasn't a great museum, but it was better than most museums in Asia are.
I found a wonderful local place for lunch. They serve set lunches. You walk up to their counter where all the cooked food is in big trays and choose a main course. Then they bring a plate with it and side dishes. They were just finishing preparing everything and putting it out when I arrived. Choices included squid, fish, pork, etc. I chose the pork. Along with it, I got a helping of mixed greans, rice, a bowl of broth with squash, a banana, and a glass of iced green tea. I might go back there again!I think I am having allergic reactions again. My throat was a little sore from drainage today. (And it is still the same on Saturday morning except on the other side.) It hasn't developed into a cold, so I guess something in the air is causing it. It has made me feel a little sluggish, however. I spent all afternoon inside the room.
At 4:00, however, I went to the sauna. I met a very nice young Vietnamese man there who speaks English better than anyone else I have met here. We went back and forth between the sauna and the cool-down room talking all the time. He (Ban) is 32 years old and is an electrical engineer. He is from Hoi An where I visited a few weeks ago, but the work is here in Saigon. He shares a home here with 3 relatives and takes vacation twice a year to go back and visit his family. He would also like to teach English lessons privately, so I encouraged him to put an ad in a paper and see if he could just start by finding a couple of students he could teach on Saturday mornings, since he has a M-F job. I was enjoying his company so much that I invited him to dinner. He was hesitant thinking that we should do it American-style (sharing the costs). But I insisted that I wanted to pay. We stopped at a local place with pho (Vietnamese soup) and had the beef soup with noodles, bean sprouts, peppers, pepper sauce, and lots of leaves. He had a motorcycle, so he drove us in the rain to the restaurant and then dropped me off at my hotel. He said he was busy this morning, but he may come to my hotel and take me out for coffee this afternoon at some point.
One of the topics that Ban and I discussed was my interest in volunteer work. He suggested that I come back to Vietnam as a volunteer. He said that the government will give extended visas for something like that. Then he asked why I didn't just try to come back and work for pay. I told him I didn't want to work for pay. It took a long time to convince him that it was better for me to work for free so that I could have a say in the number of hours I worked and the type of work I did. Anyway, he said he would e-mail me the addressed of a couple of government agencies I could contact to try to make connections for maybe returning here as a volunteer at some point in the future.
Bye-Bye Vietnam
I came to the computer center Friday night and posted an entry to the blog. The screen said that it had published 100%. Because computers here are so slow, I didn't check it. Now I see that it did NOT publish. I won't go back and do it in detail. Instead, I will just post of summary here of my last days in Vietnam. I fly out at noon today for Bangkok.
Thursday, Sept. 21, I went to the Remembrance Museum, a place that commemorates the war with America. The main thing I noticed is that the section about protests in the U.S. has nothing about Jane Fonda. Guess she has requested that they not include her. Finished reading The Plot Against America by Philip Roth--3 stars out of 4.
Friday, Sept. 22, I went to the City History Museum. Stayed in the hotel all afternoon, because I was starting to have sinus drainage that made my thoat somewhat sore. Went out in the late afternoon to the sauna, however, and met Ban, a 32-year-old electrical engineer. We talked and talked and talked. His English is excellent. I invited him to dinner, and we ate soup with beef and noodles near the sauna.
Saturday, Sept. 23, I went to the Museum of Art in the morning and enjoyed some of the paintings. I especially liked the works of Dang Cat Han. (There are special accent symbols over all those a's.) Ate fish for lunch at a sidewalk restaurant along with greens, rice, and squash soup. Ban came to the hotel to pick me up around 3:00 and took me to a fancy coffee shop to repay me for taking him to dinner. The two cups of coffee and parking cost as much as the two dinners. I gave him the Roth book and my Vietnam guidebook.
Sunday, Sept. 24, Ban came to the hotel around 8 a.m. Then he took me to the zoo/botanical gardens around 10 and dropped me off. It was Huggies Day with children admitted free with a Huggies wrapper and with lots of organized entertainment and activities. I enjoyed watching the families. Stayed almost all day there. The zoo was rather nice. I saw two rabbits playing in a big cage and wondered why they were there; then I saw there was a tiger on the other side of a tree trunk sleeping. Wonder how long they lasted before he found them! Also went to the Vietnam History Museum that was within the park.
Will spend my time in Bangkok organizing my new ticket, seeing my dentist, and relaxing. I've seen the sights there, so there won't be very exciting reports. I'll figure out my spending in Vietnam and give an update from there.
Thursday, Sept. 21, I went to the Remembrance Museum, a place that commemorates the war with America. The main thing I noticed is that the section about protests in the U.S. has nothing about Jane Fonda. Guess she has requested that they not include her. Finished reading The Plot Against America by Philip Roth--3 stars out of 4.
Friday, Sept. 22, I went to the City History Museum. Stayed in the hotel all afternoon, because I was starting to have sinus drainage that made my thoat somewhat sore. Went out in the late afternoon to the sauna, however, and met Ban, a 32-year-old electrical engineer. We talked and talked and talked. His English is excellent. I invited him to dinner, and we ate soup with beef and noodles near the sauna.
Saturday, Sept. 23, I went to the Museum of Art in the morning and enjoyed some of the paintings. I especially liked the works of Dang Cat Han. (There are special accent symbols over all those a's.) Ate fish for lunch at a sidewalk restaurant along with greens, rice, and squash soup. Ban came to the hotel to pick me up around 3:00 and took me to a fancy coffee shop to repay me for taking him to dinner. The two cups of coffee and parking cost as much as the two dinners. I gave him the Roth book and my Vietnam guidebook.
Sunday, Sept. 24, Ban came to the hotel around 8 a.m. Then he took me to the zoo/botanical gardens around 10 and dropped me off. It was Huggies Day with children admitted free with a Huggies wrapper and with lots of organized entertainment and activities. I enjoyed watching the families. Stayed almost all day there. The zoo was rather nice. I saw two rabbits playing in a big cage and wondered why they were there; then I saw there was a tiger on the other side of a tree trunk sleeping. Wonder how long they lasted before he found them! Also went to the Vietnam History Museum that was within the park.
Will spend my time in Bangkok organizing my new ticket, seeing my dentist, and relaxing. I've seen the sights there, so there won't be very exciting reports. I'll figure out my spending in Vietnam and give an update from there.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
The Mekong Delta
Monday, Sept. 18, 2006--Vinh Long (Cont.)
I had spent 3 hours at the cyber cafe last time by the time I re-typed my entries in my blog after losing them. While there, there is a big storm, but it had passed by the time I left. The evening was still cloudy with some sprinkles, however, so there was no sunset to watch tonight.
I went back to the same restaurant where I had lunch and ate rice with beef and mushrooms for dinner. It was so good. It's obvious that restaurants use fresh ingredients here.
As I left the restaurant, I saw a tourist walking along and talked to him. He was a Frenchman, about 30, and an elementary school teacher. He is bicycling his way through Vietnam over a period of 4 months after having done the same for a month in Cambodia. We talked for almost an hour about my elementary school teaching days, his bum knee from playing volleyball, etc. He was a nice guy.
Since my room had only local TV, I spent the evening planning my route through southern India. I had already decided on places I wanted to visit, but I hadn't planned a routing to connect all of them. I have a good plan, I think, that only has me backtracking twice for very short distances. In general, I will make a big circle.
Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2006--Vinh Long to Ben Tre
I observed some excitement as I sat on the steps of my hotel waiting for the bus to pick me up this morning. The ladies had set up their spots on the sidewalk for selling fruits and vegetables for the day. Suddenly, there was a buzz of activity. They were quickly bagging up their things and moving them. At first, I just thought maybe they had found a better location and were moving to it. But then a truck pulled up with military men in it. They started confiscating all the fruits, vegetables and the bags they were in and pushing the women away and arguing with them. Apparently, it is illegal to set up sales spots where they were. I felt sorry for the women who had their things confiscated, because these are poor people who will miss the money from the sales and who cannot afford to buy new, large woven bags to carry their items. But the same women had set back up in the same spots within 10 minutes after the truck was gone. I guess it is a regular part of their lives.
To get to Ben Tre, I took a bus, a motorcycle, a ferry, and another bus. It wasn't that far, but it wasn't easy to get there. Then I had trouble finding a hotel. My guidebook had pointed out that there were no budget offerings there. The first place I went wanted twice what I have paid anywhere else for a room, so I declined. The second place I went had a room for about $7, but it was VERY small, and it had no air conditioning and no fan. There was only one small, high window. So I passed on it. The third place had one room. It did not match the quality of where I have been staying, yet it was about 1/4 more in price than I have been paying. I took the room anyway and decided to stay only one night instead of two.
I went to the market for lunch and had a wonderful noodle soup with chicken. The woman and man operating the stall were so excited about having me there. And their food was so delicious! They brought me a plate of limes and peppers for seasoning, and I probably surprised them by eating all the peppers.
I spent the afternoon doing almost the same thing that I had done across the river from Vinh Long. I walked across the rickety old wooden walking crossing the river in Ben Tre and wandered the back trails in that area. People weren't as friendly there, however, as they had been in Vinh Long. A few people smiled and talked to me, but many just ignored me. And there weren't as many children on my route today to stop and visit with. But I walked along some nice canals lined with coconut palm trees. I passed a rice wine factory. And I passed a place where they were fermenting what looked like beans for some purpose. I walked long enough to drink an entire 1.5 liter bottle of water while on the trails. I had to backtrack a couple of times, because there were yard dogs that seems too likely to possibly attack. There were some wonderful butterflies and dragonflies on the trail. My favorite of the former were really huge ones with black and irridescent blue wings. The gragonflies had clear wings with a giant black spot on each.
My watch quit working sometime during the day, so I tried to get it repaired. It didn't seem to be the battery, however. I just bought a new one--a cheap Casio like the old one for about $6.
The hotel was so boring that I decided to get a massage in the evening. That was a mistake, however. Apparently, the main purpose is prostitution. I just wanted a normal massage. The woman who gave it thought that my 25% tip was only about 1/3 of what it should be. I left her with it and nothing more.
Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2006--Ben Tre to HCMC (Saigon)
It took all morning to get back to Saigon. I sat on an old bus with my suitcase between my seat and the back of the seat in front of me. My feet were up on top of my suitcase. Both my rear and my legs were sore and aching by the time we got to town.
I spent the afternoon napping and relaxing in the room. Then I went back to the sauna at the Center for the Blind for a couple of hours late in the afternoon. After that, I stopped at a vegetarian restaurant near my hotel and had an interesting soup. It was coconut milk and milk as a base and had chunks of banana, sweet potato, carrots, and a starchy root in it. It also had soft croutons that tasted like cubic doughnuts. There were also some round dumplings in it. It was sweet and almost too rich. I ate a loaf of French bread with it.
I'll go back to the hotel now and just relax tonight. I have planned a trip to see a couple of museums tomorrow.
I had spent 3 hours at the cyber cafe last time by the time I re-typed my entries in my blog after losing them. While there, there is a big storm, but it had passed by the time I left. The evening was still cloudy with some sprinkles, however, so there was no sunset to watch tonight.
I went back to the same restaurant where I had lunch and ate rice with beef and mushrooms for dinner. It was so good. It's obvious that restaurants use fresh ingredients here.
As I left the restaurant, I saw a tourist walking along and talked to him. He was a Frenchman, about 30, and an elementary school teacher. He is bicycling his way through Vietnam over a period of 4 months after having done the same for a month in Cambodia. We talked for almost an hour about my elementary school teaching days, his bum knee from playing volleyball, etc. He was a nice guy.
Since my room had only local TV, I spent the evening planning my route through southern India. I had already decided on places I wanted to visit, but I hadn't planned a routing to connect all of them. I have a good plan, I think, that only has me backtracking twice for very short distances. In general, I will make a big circle.
Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2006--Vinh Long to Ben Tre
I observed some excitement as I sat on the steps of my hotel waiting for the bus to pick me up this morning. The ladies had set up their spots on the sidewalk for selling fruits and vegetables for the day. Suddenly, there was a buzz of activity. They were quickly bagging up their things and moving them. At first, I just thought maybe they had found a better location and were moving to it. But then a truck pulled up with military men in it. They started confiscating all the fruits, vegetables and the bags they were in and pushing the women away and arguing with them. Apparently, it is illegal to set up sales spots where they were. I felt sorry for the women who had their things confiscated, because these are poor people who will miss the money from the sales and who cannot afford to buy new, large woven bags to carry their items. But the same women had set back up in the same spots within 10 minutes after the truck was gone. I guess it is a regular part of their lives.
To get to Ben Tre, I took a bus, a motorcycle, a ferry, and another bus. It wasn't that far, but it wasn't easy to get there. Then I had trouble finding a hotel. My guidebook had pointed out that there were no budget offerings there. The first place I went wanted twice what I have paid anywhere else for a room, so I declined. The second place I went had a room for about $7, but it was VERY small, and it had no air conditioning and no fan. There was only one small, high window. So I passed on it. The third place had one room. It did not match the quality of where I have been staying, yet it was about 1/4 more in price than I have been paying. I took the room anyway and decided to stay only one night instead of two.
I went to the market for lunch and had a wonderful noodle soup with chicken. The woman and man operating the stall were so excited about having me there. And their food was so delicious! They brought me a plate of limes and peppers for seasoning, and I probably surprised them by eating all the peppers.
I spent the afternoon doing almost the same thing that I had done across the river from Vinh Long. I walked across the rickety old wooden walking crossing the river in Ben Tre and wandered the back trails in that area. People weren't as friendly there, however, as they had been in Vinh Long. A few people smiled and talked to me, but many just ignored me. And there weren't as many children on my route today to stop and visit with. But I walked along some nice canals lined with coconut palm trees. I passed a rice wine factory. And I passed a place where they were fermenting what looked like beans for some purpose. I walked long enough to drink an entire 1.5 liter bottle of water while on the trails. I had to backtrack a couple of times, because there were yard dogs that seems too likely to possibly attack. There were some wonderful butterflies and dragonflies on the trail. My favorite of the former were really huge ones with black and irridescent blue wings. The gragonflies had clear wings with a giant black spot on each.
My watch quit working sometime during the day, so I tried to get it repaired. It didn't seem to be the battery, however. I just bought a new one--a cheap Casio like the old one for about $6.
The hotel was so boring that I decided to get a massage in the evening. That was a mistake, however. Apparently, the main purpose is prostitution. I just wanted a normal massage. The woman who gave it thought that my 25% tip was only about 1/3 of what it should be. I left her with it and nothing more.
Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2006--Ben Tre to HCMC (Saigon)
It took all morning to get back to Saigon. I sat on an old bus with my suitcase between my seat and the back of the seat in front of me. My feet were up on top of my suitcase. Both my rear and my legs were sore and aching by the time we got to town.
I spent the afternoon napping and relaxing in the room. Then I went back to the sauna at the Center for the Blind for a couple of hours late in the afternoon. After that, I stopped at a vegetarian restaurant near my hotel and had an interesting soup. It was coconut milk and milk as a base and had chunks of banana, sweet potato, carrots, and a starchy root in it. It also had soft croutons that tasted like cubic doughnuts. There were also some round dumplings in it. It was sweet and almost too rich. I ate a loaf of French bread with it.
I'll go back to the hotel now and just relax tonight. I have planned a trip to see a couple of museums tomorrow.
Monday, September 18, 2006
Home Visits on a Pleasant Island
Wow, I have been typing for 30 minutes and lost it all!! I am so upset. It was a good entry. The screen froze, and I hit "escape." All the print disappeared. What a catastrophe!!! I'll re-type it and and hope that I do almost as good a job as I did the first time around.
Sunday, Sept. 17, 2006--Saigon to Vinh Long
It took two taxis for me to get to the bus station this morning. One picked me up at the local travel agency beside my hotel and took me to a local bus station. Then another taxi took me from there to the regional bus station out on the edge of town. From there, we took a mini-bus to Vinh Long. I sat beside a Japanese tourist who is only here for 5 days and was going to another town beyond Vinh Long. We visited together, and we ate lunch together (steamed bun with ground meat and a boiled bird egg inside) when the bus stopped.
We were passed on the highway by an interesting funeral truck. The bed of it had a carved wooden structure. The wood was painted gold, red, green, etc. From the top of each of the four corners hung long strips of colorful fabric which had been tied into knots every few feet and were dangling in the air. In the center of the bed was a casket. And on each side of the casket were 3 men sitting in attendance, I guess.
The bus arrived at the station about 3 km (2 miles) outside the center of Vinh Long. I walked to town rather than deal with a motorcycle driver who wanted too much money. Besides, walking allowed me to get my orientation and to see the sights along the way. It was a hot day, however, and my shirt was wet with perspiration by the time I got into town. Later in the day, a motorcycle driver who had apparently seen me earlier asked if I wanted a ride. When I declined, he said I was cheap. That didn't bother me. Why should I let the drivers take advantage of me because I am a westerner. I really do see more when walking, interact with people more, and get more exercise (resulting in my losing more wieght).
My third-floor room overlooks the Co Chien River, one of the tributaries that the Mekong River breaks into within its delta. The Co Chien is a wide river, however, on its own. It's not nearly as wide as the Mekong was when I crossed it to Vientienne or when I boated up it from Vang Viang in Laos a few years ago. It has the same murky orangish-red color, however, and a rather strong current. The market is just behind my hotel, and it overspills onto the area streets. Just below my window are many women selling fruits and vegetables on the sidewalks. So the overall view is quite interesting to watch.
After taking a nap, I went out around 3 p.m. I was hungry, so I bought a sandwich at the market. It was filled with nice, crispy pieces of pork (including the skin sometimes) and wonderful pickled vegetables. This is the first area of Vietnam I have visited where everyone has big pots outside their homes like in Korea for pickling vegetables. I've seen them everywhere here.
Around 4 p.m., I ended up at a covered sidewalk cafe beside the river. I ordered iced tea, and the waiter misunderstood and brought Pepsi. Of course, the reason for the misunderstanding is that westerners do not normally have drinks with ice here. But I have been served them so many times without any consequences, that I have given into just having them anytime I want. When he understood the error, he brought the right drink--a tasty glass of iced green tea for me to drink as I watched the river and its traffic. I could see the ferry that crosses back and forth between here and An Binh Island. There were sampans going up and down the river transporting goods. There were boats going along the shore with fishermen trying to net fish. Only one other westerner (who looked as if he could be a former American soldier) was at the cafe. A Japanese tourist came in later. Most, however, were Vietnamese people enjoying the river themselves.
Just before 6 p.m., I left the cafe to walk along the riverside promenade. I had noticed a large crowd had come out to observe the sunset, so I thought I would walk among them and be friendly with them while watching it myself. It's nice that so many people still come out for such a natural event. Of course, the cool breeze coming across the river is probably a factor in bringing them out, too. I said hello to many people, but I really visited with only one--a young guy dressed as if he may work at a hotel. He didn't speak much English, however. We stood together and watched as the sky turned pinkish-orange with blue clouds on the sides. He suggested when he thought I should take a photo--when a pair of sampans were crossing the river just ahead. I had already taken a couple of good photos. Unfortunately, it was too late for this one. Maybe, however, I can correct it with my computer when I get home.
Monday, Sept. 18, 2006--Vinh Long
It's now been one month since I left Texas, and it is 2 2/3 months before I will return. I have adjusted to the routine of traveling by now; at first, I wasn't that motivated. Now, I find each day interesting and look forward to it. I have also lost almost all the weight I had gained in Texas--probably 15 lbs (7 kg). I feel much better because of it. Besides the exercise I have been getting, the loss is due to having no sodas and eating well.
Today, I crossed the river on the ferry. An Binh Island is an interesting place. It has no roads. Instead, there are trails and canals. Some of the trails are paved with concrete, and others are just raised dirt tracks. The paved trails, however, are only the size of sidewalks--just wide enough to let two motorcycles pass at once. The trails are lined with houses, and almost every house backs up to one of the canals. There are also lots of fruit orchards on the islands. So the canals allow the boats to enter to pick up the fruits and take them out to the river to go to the markets.
I stopped first at a temple recommended by my guidebook. It had an interesting mural showing what hell would be like. There are drawings of people being tortured in various ways--boiling water being poured down throats, people being placed in pots of boiling water, a man having his tongue cut off, a woman having a stake driver through her middle, a man being sawn in half, etc. It was quite exciting!
I took a side trail for my explorations so that I would not be going where other tourists normally go. But most tourists don't walk anyway, so probably anywhere I would go would be a novelty. Most tourists either take a boat tour down the canals or they ride either a bicycle or a motorcycle. Either of the latter two ways, they pass too fast for people to interact with them. And the former way, they are too distant to the people to interact. Everyone was friendly with me, however. They would say hello and wave. They would giggle in excitement.
Two women asked me to take their photo. They were nice looking women--more prosperous looking than most on the island. I obliged them and walked a ways with them. One quickly left the trail to enter her home. Just a little ways further, the other went off on a dirt trail indicating that her home was there. I went just a little further on the trail I was following until it came to an end at the river. Lots of houseboats were in the area. I turned around and decided to take the dirt trail the woman took. Just a few houses down, she was there and motioned for me to come to her home. I took off my shoes outside where all the shoes of the family members rested. She indicated I should sit at the table. It was a simple home. There was no ceiling; I could look directly up to the metal roof which rested on the stuccoed brick walls. In the front room was a dining table with 4 chairs, an entertainment center with a TV and a stereo, and a big wooden platform in one corner which is the combination lounging area and sleeping area (according to the time of the day). I imagine the back room was only the kitchen, and that was probably all the house. She brought out a pot of tea and some small glasses and served it. We drank it and she showed me the photos of her children. Instead of pouring more tea from the pitcher, she went to the kitchen and came back with everything to make coffee. It is a unique drip system for making one glass at a time. There is a metal saucer with holes which fits over the top of the glass. On the saucer sets a small up with holes in its bottom. She spooned the coffee into the cup (3 scoops for me and only 2 for her). Then there is an insert for the cup which she used to press the coffee down (as is done for making expresso). She left the insert in the cup and poured boiling water into the cup. She placed another fitted lid on top of the cup and let it stand as the water drained through the coffee into the glass below. Eventually, the fitted lid, when turned over, became the base for placing the cup and all the other parts on the table leaving the glasses uncovered for us to drink the coffee from. It was a nice, strong coffee and an interesting experience having it in a personal home and watching it being made. Her husband and another man arrived and shook my hand. I excused myself, thanking her profusely, and continued my walking.
I passed the school for the island just as it was lunchtime for the kids. They were all lined up at stalls across the street buying snack foods to eat--banana fritters, ice cream bars, egg rolls, etc. All of them were excited to see me and wanted to say hello and ask my name. I slowly made I way through the crowd saying hello to those who wanted to talk.
Just past the school was a crossroads. I knew that going right would take me back to the ferry, so I went left to explore further away. This trail took me into older, and poorer areas of the island. I passed a small village with a few shops. There was a barber shop where the barber was working wearing no shirt--only pants. There was a butcher shop which was really just a covered outdoor table with slabs of meat placed on it. There was a small market with 4-5 women selling various fruits and vegetables. Continuing onward, the houses became shacks make of old discarded wood or of woven bamboo. Eventually, a young girl who spoke English well asked me where I was going. I told her I was just walking. I asked what was ahead, and she said I would get lost if I kept going that way. I knew I wouldn't, but I was ready to turn around anyway. The only way out was to go back the same way to the crossroads, so I did. A little ways down the path, a man motioned for me to come to his home. I removed my shoes again and stepped inside. He handed me a twig with many small, hard fruits on it. I didn't know what to do. He took a fruit and used his fingernail to split it open. The hard hull was thin and covered a grape-like fruit with one large seed in the middle. I used my teeth to extract the fruit and bite it off the seed, then I discarded the seed. I ate several of the fruits while I tried to visit with the men and women who were standing around by now. But no one really spoke more than a few words of English. The man who brought me the fruits also brought me a glass of water 3 small bananas. I knew I had to be careful with the water; I took one sip and never went back to it. But he insisted that I eat the fruits. Finally, I thanked them and excused myself to continue on the trail. It had been another good experience, however, except that I left with the feeling that maybe these people had wanted me to give them money for entertaining me.
I had been walking for 3 1/2 hours and it was already 1:30, so I took the ferry back across the river to town. I went to a restaurant my guidebook recommended, and the menu was all in Vietnamese. I asked the lady what was good. She suggested rolled chicken. So I had that. It was chicken which had been compressed into a sausage-like roll and battered and fried. It was cut into small rounds. Along with it came lettuce and slices of tomatoes and a small dish of sauce. I took a round of chicken in my chopsticks, dipped it in the sauce, and placed it in my mouth. Then I took a lettuce leaf and a slice of tomato to go with it and chewed. They served me iced green tea to go with the meal. I was so thirsty that I drank the first glass almost before the food arrived. On the third refill of my glass, they brought a pot to the table! The meal was good, and the tea was so refreshing.
I will probably remain here in Vinh Long for another day. If so, I will go back to the island and take another route tomorrow, I think. It is such a quiet, pleasant place. It's like a jungle over there. And the narrow trails really give it a nice atmosphere. It would be a good place for someone who wants total peace and quiet to stay.
Sunday, Sept. 17, 2006--Saigon to Vinh Long
It took two taxis for me to get to the bus station this morning. One picked me up at the local travel agency beside my hotel and took me to a local bus station. Then another taxi took me from there to the regional bus station out on the edge of town. From there, we took a mini-bus to Vinh Long. I sat beside a Japanese tourist who is only here for 5 days and was going to another town beyond Vinh Long. We visited together, and we ate lunch together (steamed bun with ground meat and a boiled bird egg inside) when the bus stopped.
We were passed on the highway by an interesting funeral truck. The bed of it had a carved wooden structure. The wood was painted gold, red, green, etc. From the top of each of the four corners hung long strips of colorful fabric which had been tied into knots every few feet and were dangling in the air. In the center of the bed was a casket. And on each side of the casket were 3 men sitting in attendance, I guess.
The bus arrived at the station about 3 km (2 miles) outside the center of Vinh Long. I walked to town rather than deal with a motorcycle driver who wanted too much money. Besides, walking allowed me to get my orientation and to see the sights along the way. It was a hot day, however, and my shirt was wet with perspiration by the time I got into town. Later in the day, a motorcycle driver who had apparently seen me earlier asked if I wanted a ride. When I declined, he said I was cheap. That didn't bother me. Why should I let the drivers take advantage of me because I am a westerner. I really do see more when walking, interact with people more, and get more exercise (resulting in my losing more wieght).
My third-floor room overlooks the Co Chien River, one of the tributaries that the Mekong River breaks into within its delta. The Co Chien is a wide river, however, on its own. It's not nearly as wide as the Mekong was when I crossed it to Vientienne or when I boated up it from Vang Viang in Laos a few years ago. It has the same murky orangish-red color, however, and a rather strong current. The market is just behind my hotel, and it overspills onto the area streets. Just below my window are many women selling fruits and vegetables on the sidewalks. So the overall view is quite interesting to watch.
After taking a nap, I went out around 3 p.m. I was hungry, so I bought a sandwich at the market. It was filled with nice, crispy pieces of pork (including the skin sometimes) and wonderful pickled vegetables. This is the first area of Vietnam I have visited where everyone has big pots outside their homes like in Korea for pickling vegetables. I've seen them everywhere here.
Around 4 p.m., I ended up at a covered sidewalk cafe beside the river. I ordered iced tea, and the waiter misunderstood and brought Pepsi. Of course, the reason for the misunderstanding is that westerners do not normally have drinks with ice here. But I have been served them so many times without any consequences, that I have given into just having them anytime I want. When he understood the error, he brought the right drink--a tasty glass of iced green tea for me to drink as I watched the river and its traffic. I could see the ferry that crosses back and forth between here and An Binh Island. There were sampans going up and down the river transporting goods. There were boats going along the shore with fishermen trying to net fish. Only one other westerner (who looked as if he could be a former American soldier) was at the cafe. A Japanese tourist came in later. Most, however, were Vietnamese people enjoying the river themselves.
Just before 6 p.m., I left the cafe to walk along the riverside promenade. I had noticed a large crowd had come out to observe the sunset, so I thought I would walk among them and be friendly with them while watching it myself. It's nice that so many people still come out for such a natural event. Of course, the cool breeze coming across the river is probably a factor in bringing them out, too. I said hello to many people, but I really visited with only one--a young guy dressed as if he may work at a hotel. He didn't speak much English, however. We stood together and watched as the sky turned pinkish-orange with blue clouds on the sides. He suggested when he thought I should take a photo--when a pair of sampans were crossing the river just ahead. I had already taken a couple of good photos. Unfortunately, it was too late for this one. Maybe, however, I can correct it with my computer when I get home.
Monday, Sept. 18, 2006--Vinh Long
It's now been one month since I left Texas, and it is 2 2/3 months before I will return. I have adjusted to the routine of traveling by now; at first, I wasn't that motivated. Now, I find each day interesting and look forward to it. I have also lost almost all the weight I had gained in Texas--probably 15 lbs (7 kg). I feel much better because of it. Besides the exercise I have been getting, the loss is due to having no sodas and eating well.
Today, I crossed the river on the ferry. An Binh Island is an interesting place. It has no roads. Instead, there are trails and canals. Some of the trails are paved with concrete, and others are just raised dirt tracks. The paved trails, however, are only the size of sidewalks--just wide enough to let two motorcycles pass at once. The trails are lined with houses, and almost every house backs up to one of the canals. There are also lots of fruit orchards on the islands. So the canals allow the boats to enter to pick up the fruits and take them out to the river to go to the markets.
I stopped first at a temple recommended by my guidebook. It had an interesting mural showing what hell would be like. There are drawings of people being tortured in various ways--boiling water being poured down throats, people being placed in pots of boiling water, a man having his tongue cut off, a woman having a stake driver through her middle, a man being sawn in half, etc. It was quite exciting!
I took a side trail for my explorations so that I would not be going where other tourists normally go. But most tourists don't walk anyway, so probably anywhere I would go would be a novelty. Most tourists either take a boat tour down the canals or they ride either a bicycle or a motorcycle. Either of the latter two ways, they pass too fast for people to interact with them. And the former way, they are too distant to the people to interact. Everyone was friendly with me, however. They would say hello and wave. They would giggle in excitement.
Two women asked me to take their photo. They were nice looking women--more prosperous looking than most on the island. I obliged them and walked a ways with them. One quickly left the trail to enter her home. Just a little ways further, the other went off on a dirt trail indicating that her home was there. I went just a little further on the trail I was following until it came to an end at the river. Lots of houseboats were in the area. I turned around and decided to take the dirt trail the woman took. Just a few houses down, she was there and motioned for me to come to her home. I took off my shoes outside where all the shoes of the family members rested. She indicated I should sit at the table. It was a simple home. There was no ceiling; I could look directly up to the metal roof which rested on the stuccoed brick walls. In the front room was a dining table with 4 chairs, an entertainment center with a TV and a stereo, and a big wooden platform in one corner which is the combination lounging area and sleeping area (according to the time of the day). I imagine the back room was only the kitchen, and that was probably all the house. She brought out a pot of tea and some small glasses and served it. We drank it and she showed me the photos of her children. Instead of pouring more tea from the pitcher, she went to the kitchen and came back with everything to make coffee. It is a unique drip system for making one glass at a time. There is a metal saucer with holes which fits over the top of the glass. On the saucer sets a small up with holes in its bottom. She spooned the coffee into the cup (3 scoops for me and only 2 for her). Then there is an insert for the cup which she used to press the coffee down (as is done for making expresso). She left the insert in the cup and poured boiling water into the cup. She placed another fitted lid on top of the cup and let it stand as the water drained through the coffee into the glass below. Eventually, the fitted lid, when turned over, became the base for placing the cup and all the other parts on the table leaving the glasses uncovered for us to drink the coffee from. It was a nice, strong coffee and an interesting experience having it in a personal home and watching it being made. Her husband and another man arrived and shook my hand. I excused myself, thanking her profusely, and continued my walking.
I passed the school for the island just as it was lunchtime for the kids. They were all lined up at stalls across the street buying snack foods to eat--banana fritters, ice cream bars, egg rolls, etc. All of them were excited to see me and wanted to say hello and ask my name. I slowly made I way through the crowd saying hello to those who wanted to talk.
Just past the school was a crossroads. I knew that going right would take me back to the ferry, so I went left to explore further away. This trail took me into older, and poorer areas of the island. I passed a small village with a few shops. There was a barber shop where the barber was working wearing no shirt--only pants. There was a butcher shop which was really just a covered outdoor table with slabs of meat placed on it. There was a small market with 4-5 women selling various fruits and vegetables. Continuing onward, the houses became shacks make of old discarded wood or of woven bamboo. Eventually, a young girl who spoke English well asked me where I was going. I told her I was just walking. I asked what was ahead, and she said I would get lost if I kept going that way. I knew I wouldn't, but I was ready to turn around anyway. The only way out was to go back the same way to the crossroads, so I did. A little ways down the path, a man motioned for me to come to his home. I removed my shoes again and stepped inside. He handed me a twig with many small, hard fruits on it. I didn't know what to do. He took a fruit and used his fingernail to split it open. The hard hull was thin and covered a grape-like fruit with one large seed in the middle. I used my teeth to extract the fruit and bite it off the seed, then I discarded the seed. I ate several of the fruits while I tried to visit with the men and women who were standing around by now. But no one really spoke more than a few words of English. The man who brought me the fruits also brought me a glass of water 3 small bananas. I knew I had to be careful with the water; I took one sip and never went back to it. But he insisted that I eat the fruits. Finally, I thanked them and excused myself to continue on the trail. It had been another good experience, however, except that I left with the feeling that maybe these people had wanted me to give them money for entertaining me.
I had been walking for 3 1/2 hours and it was already 1:30, so I took the ferry back across the river to town. I went to a restaurant my guidebook recommended, and the menu was all in Vietnamese. I asked the lady what was good. She suggested rolled chicken. So I had that. It was chicken which had been compressed into a sausage-like roll and battered and fried. It was cut into small rounds. Along with it came lettuce and slices of tomatoes and a small dish of sauce. I took a round of chicken in my chopsticks, dipped it in the sauce, and placed it in my mouth. Then I took a lettuce leaf and a slice of tomato to go with it and chewed. They served me iced green tea to go with the meal. I was so thirsty that I drank the first glass almost before the food arrived. On the third refill of my glass, they brought a pot to the table! The meal was good, and the tea was so refreshing.
I will probably remain here in Vinh Long for another day. If so, I will go back to the island and take another route tomorrow, I think. It is such a quiet, pleasant place. It's like a jungle over there. And the narrow trails really give it a nice atmosphere. It would be a good place for someone who wants total peace and quiet to stay.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Walking around Saigon
Friday, Sept. 15, 2006--HCMC (Saigon)
I made another BIG walking day of it today. I left the hotel early and went towards Cholon, the old Chinese section of town known for its big market. There are pagodas in that area, too. It was a longer walk than I had expected. I don't have a good map, so I kept going and going and when I thought I should be there, I saw a street that was on my map and was still only about 2/3 of the way there! I saw 3-4 temples. I never did find the BIG market, but I passed several small markets scattered through the area. At the last temple, a man was talking to himself in response to an English lesson on tape. It dealt with conversing about a patient in a coma. I asked if he was a doctor. and he said he was. We visited for a while. Then he took me to the side to meet the abbott of the temple. He seemed to be a nice man and took me around turning on lights and showing me special features. Twice, he lit three sticks of insense for me to place in the sand pots in front of Buddhas. Then he wanted me to take our photo together, so I got out my camera and did so. That last temple was near a park that my guidebook also mentioned. It was a Tivoli-style amusement park with restaurants, stages, rides, a small zoo, a water park, etc. It only cost $1.10 to enter, so I spent a little over an hour there. It was quite large and had many special sections such as a dinosaur park, an orchid park, etc.
When I left, I decided to walk back to a street near my hotel that has a Center for the Blind where they train blind people to give massage. I didn't know it from the guidebook, but they also have a sauna. So I bought a ticket for the sauna and a ticket for an hour of massage. Together, it came to about $3.25! It was a very small sauna, but there were quite a few people there. One of them started talking to me. Then all of them did. The first one explained that they were all shy about speaking up to me first. I spent at least 1 1/2 hours there going into the sauna and coming out to cool down before going to the massage. All the guys I met were nice. I could tell they were fascinated about having a westerner there. Unfortunately, the massage was not a very good one. First, it was done by a lady who was a little too delicate. She needed to put more umphhhh into it. And second, too much time was spend on the back and the head. I had been walking all day and would have enjoyed her putting more time in on my legs.
I had eaten only a snack all day--5 mini spring rolls at the amusement park--but I still was not hungry when I came out of the sauna/massage. I knew I should eat, so I finally went into a vegetarian place near my hotel. I had a plate of sweet and sour tofu over rice. It had lots of pineapple and other vegetables, and there was a nice chile sauce to add some spice to it.
Saturday, Sept. 16, 2006--HCMC (Saigon)
Well, I spent all day yesterday thinking it was Saturday. When I checked today, I was surprised to see that TODAY is Saturday. That explains why there weren't too many people at the amusement park in the afternoon yesterday and why some of the sections like the water park were not open when I was there. It also meant that I had to tell my hotel I would be leaving on Sunday instead of Monday; earlier Friday morning I had said Monday because I was thinking it was already Saturday!
Today, I headed the opposite direction toward downtown for my walk. I went up and down streets looking at the businesses, the architecture, etc. Central Saigon is really very nice. The streets are clean, the businesses are rather stylishly done in terms of signage and decor, there are nice parks, and there are enough old colonial buildings to make it interesting exploring.
Every city I have visited in Vietnam has had nice parks. That's usual in Asia. In many cities, it is possible to find maybe one or two small parks that are in bad condition and that have government buildings encroaching on the edges. But here, the parks are well manicured. And they are free, whereas there are charges for parks in many parts of Asia.
As I wandered downtown, I wondered how much of it would be familiar to soldiers who return here for a visit. There are some old hotels, a nice theater, a wonderful post office, a nice church, etc., that would be familiar. But this has been a boomtown for the past 15 years or so, and there are many modern buildings--shops, department stores, shopping malls, hotels, etc.
I stopped at a sidewalk restaurant to have lunch. I had a plate of rice with cooked (but still crispy) shredded cabbage and chicken. It came with a bowl of soup with lots of greens in it and a plate of sliced cucumber. It also came with lots of iced green tea which I needed, since I had been walking for about 3 hours. Total cost: 50 cents!
I bought my bus ticket to leave Saigon for the Mekong Delta tomorrow. I hope the weather will continue to be good. This should be the rainy season with September being only second to October in terms of amount of rainfall within any given month. The rains have held off so far. Will they hold for another week? I hope so.
After spending about 3 hours in my room during the afternoon, I headed back to the Center for the Blind. This time, I asked if I could get a masseur, and the answer was positive. The man who had talked to me yesterday was there again. He told me he goes every Friday and Saturday. All the other men were different. Again, however, they were very friendly. After almost 2 hours at the sauna, I got a much better massage from the man than the one I got yesterday. Still, however, it was limited. For instance, he never did the upper legs in front. That would have been so nice, since I had been walking so much. If I go back when I return here next weekend, I will either skip the massage, or I will tell the one I get that I need him to concentrate more on my legs.
My dinner was another simple dish from a small restaurant. This time, it was a grilled pork chop and slices of an egg cake (like an omelette, but think like a cake) over the rice. The soup was the same type of soup with greens that I had for lunch. And, oh, the green tea was so refreshing after having been in the sauna for so long. Total cost: about 60 cents.
I will go back to the hotel when I quite here at the cyber cafe. There is the last part of a mini-series called The Triangle that I have been watching on Star Movies that I will watch. (Last night when I thought it was Saturday, I wondered what had happened when I found a movie instead of my mini-series playing. But it still didn't register until this morning.)
Tomorrow, I am off to Vinh Long. I'll spend 2-3 days there. Then I will probably go to Ben Tre. After that, I will return to Saigon for my last weekend. My flight to Bangkok is a week from Monday.
I made another BIG walking day of it today. I left the hotel early and went towards Cholon, the old Chinese section of town known for its big market. There are pagodas in that area, too. It was a longer walk than I had expected. I don't have a good map, so I kept going and going and when I thought I should be there, I saw a street that was on my map and was still only about 2/3 of the way there! I saw 3-4 temples. I never did find the BIG market, but I passed several small markets scattered through the area. At the last temple, a man was talking to himself in response to an English lesson on tape. It dealt with conversing about a patient in a coma. I asked if he was a doctor. and he said he was. We visited for a while. Then he took me to the side to meet the abbott of the temple. He seemed to be a nice man and took me around turning on lights and showing me special features. Twice, he lit three sticks of insense for me to place in the sand pots in front of Buddhas. Then he wanted me to take our photo together, so I got out my camera and did so. That last temple was near a park that my guidebook also mentioned. It was a Tivoli-style amusement park with restaurants, stages, rides, a small zoo, a water park, etc. It only cost $1.10 to enter, so I spent a little over an hour there. It was quite large and had many special sections such as a dinosaur park, an orchid park, etc.
When I left, I decided to walk back to a street near my hotel that has a Center for the Blind where they train blind people to give massage. I didn't know it from the guidebook, but they also have a sauna. So I bought a ticket for the sauna and a ticket for an hour of massage. Together, it came to about $3.25! It was a very small sauna, but there were quite a few people there. One of them started talking to me. Then all of them did. The first one explained that they were all shy about speaking up to me first. I spent at least 1 1/2 hours there going into the sauna and coming out to cool down before going to the massage. All the guys I met were nice. I could tell they were fascinated about having a westerner there. Unfortunately, the massage was not a very good one. First, it was done by a lady who was a little too delicate. She needed to put more umphhhh into it. And second, too much time was spend on the back and the head. I had been walking all day and would have enjoyed her putting more time in on my legs.
I had eaten only a snack all day--5 mini spring rolls at the amusement park--but I still was not hungry when I came out of the sauna/massage. I knew I should eat, so I finally went into a vegetarian place near my hotel. I had a plate of sweet and sour tofu over rice. It had lots of pineapple and other vegetables, and there was a nice chile sauce to add some spice to it.
Saturday, Sept. 16, 2006--HCMC (Saigon)
Well, I spent all day yesterday thinking it was Saturday. When I checked today, I was surprised to see that TODAY is Saturday. That explains why there weren't too many people at the amusement park in the afternoon yesterday and why some of the sections like the water park were not open when I was there. It also meant that I had to tell my hotel I would be leaving on Sunday instead of Monday; earlier Friday morning I had said Monday because I was thinking it was already Saturday!
Today, I headed the opposite direction toward downtown for my walk. I went up and down streets looking at the businesses, the architecture, etc. Central Saigon is really very nice. The streets are clean, the businesses are rather stylishly done in terms of signage and decor, there are nice parks, and there are enough old colonial buildings to make it interesting exploring.
Every city I have visited in Vietnam has had nice parks. That's usual in Asia. In many cities, it is possible to find maybe one or two small parks that are in bad condition and that have government buildings encroaching on the edges. But here, the parks are well manicured. And they are free, whereas there are charges for parks in many parts of Asia.
As I wandered downtown, I wondered how much of it would be familiar to soldiers who return here for a visit. There are some old hotels, a nice theater, a wonderful post office, a nice church, etc., that would be familiar. But this has been a boomtown for the past 15 years or so, and there are many modern buildings--shops, department stores, shopping malls, hotels, etc.
I stopped at a sidewalk restaurant to have lunch. I had a plate of rice with cooked (but still crispy) shredded cabbage and chicken. It came with a bowl of soup with lots of greens in it and a plate of sliced cucumber. It also came with lots of iced green tea which I needed, since I had been walking for about 3 hours. Total cost: 50 cents!
I bought my bus ticket to leave Saigon for the Mekong Delta tomorrow. I hope the weather will continue to be good. This should be the rainy season with September being only second to October in terms of amount of rainfall within any given month. The rains have held off so far. Will they hold for another week? I hope so.
After spending about 3 hours in my room during the afternoon, I headed back to the Center for the Blind. This time, I asked if I could get a masseur, and the answer was positive. The man who had talked to me yesterday was there again. He told me he goes every Friday and Saturday. All the other men were different. Again, however, they were very friendly. After almost 2 hours at the sauna, I got a much better massage from the man than the one I got yesterday. Still, however, it was limited. For instance, he never did the upper legs in front. That would have been so nice, since I had been walking so much. If I go back when I return here next weekend, I will either skip the massage, or I will tell the one I get that I need him to concentrate more on my legs.
My dinner was another simple dish from a small restaurant. This time, it was a grilled pork chop and slices of an egg cake (like an omelette, but think like a cake) over the rice. The soup was the same type of soup with greens that I had for lunch. And, oh, the green tea was so refreshing after having been in the sauna for so long. Total cost: about 60 cents.
I will go back to the hotel when I quite here at the cyber cafe. There is the last part of a mini-series called The Triangle that I have been watching on Star Movies that I will watch. (Last night when I thought it was Saturday, I wondered what had happened when I found a movie instead of my mini-series playing. But it still didn't register until this morning.)
Tomorrow, I am off to Vinh Long. I'll spend 2-3 days there. Then I will probably go to Ben Tre. After that, I will return to Saigon for my last weekend. My flight to Bangkok is a week from Monday.
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Back in Hot Weather Again
Well, I am in Saigon after a LONG bus trip today. In other words, I am out of the mountains and back into HOT territory. To catch you up to date:
Wednesday, Sept. 13, 2006--Da Lat (Cont.)
I stopped and bought a sandwich and ate it as I walked home from the cyber cafe. On the way, I ran into 7-Up on the sidewalk. He had just been to my hotel to see me, so it was a nice coincidence that we ran into each other. He was with a friend of his he was visiting--a student at the university. They had been to town shopping and were on their way back to the university. They had stopped at the hotel both to see me and to buy his ticket to traveling tomorrow, since my hotel is the home of the travel agency with the bus service we used to come here. We only visited briefly on the sidewalk, and they were on their way.
I got a little sunburned, since the sun was out all day. I had been walking maybe 4 1/2 hours when I got back to the room. It's my nose that always gives me problems. It feels sensitive right now.
I went back out in the evening to a local place just down the street from my hotel. It was full of local people and no tourists. I stopped and ordered "stewed crushed pork and eggplant in casserole"--ground pork, chunks of eggplant, 2-3 kinds of wonderful mushrooms, green onions, etc., in a thick sauce. It was served in a clay pot placed over a burner to keep it boiling until I served all of it. There was a big plate of rice on the side. I stuffed myself eating all of it!!!
Thursday, Sept. 14, 2006--Da Lat to HCMC (Saigon)
The mosquitoes have been out for the past two days (since the night we had heavy rain). Apparently a couple got into my room, because I have had some bites mostly around the waistband of my shorts. They itch a little, but I am lucky for two reasons: 1) I cannot hear any of them buzzing while I sleep, and 2) They don't seem to bite me elsewhere.
7-Up was at the hotel this morning to catch his bus. We were on different ones, because he is going to a beach resort for a few days before returning home. Too bad we weren't traveling together. Instead, however, I made friend with three people going my way--an Israeli guy who sat in front of me on the bus coming to Da Lat, and a Dutch couple. We were all sold to the highest bidder today. With only 4 of us, it wasn't practical for our company to run a bus to Saigon, so they called another agency which picked us up and took us to go meet their bus at their office.
It was a fairly good trip, but a LONG one. We left Da Lat at 8 a.m. and didn't get to Saigon until after 4 p.m. We stopped 3 times for toilet breaks and to eat. The Dutch couple and the guy from Isreal and I sat together and visited during the stops. The Dutch couple are on an 11-month around the world trip that includes 32 countries! She got a leave of absence from her work with her job guaranteed when she returns. He owns his own IT business and just shut it down for the time they are traveling. They said they spent 1 1/2 years planning their trip and that the planning process was as much fun as taking the trip. I've always found that to be true, too. They said they are going quickly in some countries, but that this is only their introduction to the world. They will return to places they like and want to visit further. They have only been in Asia so far, but they will go to Australia, New Zealand, the South Pacific (Fiji, Easter Island, and elsewhere), Gallapagos Island, the entire west coast of South America, and South Africa and about 5-6 nearby African countries. The Israeli just finished 3 years of military service and is traveling before starting back to university next month. He just came on the spur of the moment without a specific plan. Everyone has his/her own way of doing it.
We hit a massive traffic jam coming into Saigon. It's a much bigger city than Hanoi. And the traffic is so much heavier. After getting my hotel room, I went out exploring just the neighborhood which is mainly a tourist area. Here, it is possible to see the thousands of bicycles and motorbikes at intersections that I have seen in photos before. I'm glad I didn't arrive here first. I might have been intimidated by the traffic. After having learned to handle it in the smaller cities, I think I can deal with it here now.
I've written a song for you readers to sing about my situation today. It is to the tune of the cowboy song, I'm Back in the Saddle Again:
I'm back in hot weather again,
Back where my shirt sticks to my skin;
What a miserable way to spend a long, hard day,
I'm back in hot weather again!
Wednesday, Sept. 13, 2006--Da Lat (Cont.)
I stopped and bought a sandwich and ate it as I walked home from the cyber cafe. On the way, I ran into 7-Up on the sidewalk. He had just been to my hotel to see me, so it was a nice coincidence that we ran into each other. He was with a friend of his he was visiting--a student at the university. They had been to town shopping and were on their way back to the university. They had stopped at the hotel both to see me and to buy his ticket to traveling tomorrow, since my hotel is the home of the travel agency with the bus service we used to come here. We only visited briefly on the sidewalk, and they were on their way.
I got a little sunburned, since the sun was out all day. I had been walking maybe 4 1/2 hours when I got back to the room. It's my nose that always gives me problems. It feels sensitive right now.
I went back out in the evening to a local place just down the street from my hotel. It was full of local people and no tourists. I stopped and ordered "stewed crushed pork and eggplant in casserole"--ground pork, chunks of eggplant, 2-3 kinds of wonderful mushrooms, green onions, etc., in a thick sauce. It was served in a clay pot placed over a burner to keep it boiling until I served all of it. There was a big plate of rice on the side. I stuffed myself eating all of it!!!
Thursday, Sept. 14, 2006--Da Lat to HCMC (Saigon)
The mosquitoes have been out for the past two days (since the night we had heavy rain). Apparently a couple got into my room, because I have had some bites mostly around the waistband of my shorts. They itch a little, but I am lucky for two reasons: 1) I cannot hear any of them buzzing while I sleep, and 2) They don't seem to bite me elsewhere.
7-Up was at the hotel this morning to catch his bus. We were on different ones, because he is going to a beach resort for a few days before returning home. Too bad we weren't traveling together. Instead, however, I made friend with three people going my way--an Israeli guy who sat in front of me on the bus coming to Da Lat, and a Dutch couple. We were all sold to the highest bidder today. With only 4 of us, it wasn't practical for our company to run a bus to Saigon, so they called another agency which picked us up and took us to go meet their bus at their office.
It was a fairly good trip, but a LONG one. We left Da Lat at 8 a.m. and didn't get to Saigon until after 4 p.m. We stopped 3 times for toilet breaks and to eat. The Dutch couple and the guy from Isreal and I sat together and visited during the stops. The Dutch couple are on an 11-month around the world trip that includes 32 countries! She got a leave of absence from her work with her job guaranteed when she returns. He owns his own IT business and just shut it down for the time they are traveling. They said they spent 1 1/2 years planning their trip and that the planning process was as much fun as taking the trip. I've always found that to be true, too. They said they are going quickly in some countries, but that this is only their introduction to the world. They will return to places they like and want to visit further. They have only been in Asia so far, but they will go to Australia, New Zealand, the South Pacific (Fiji, Easter Island, and elsewhere), Gallapagos Island, the entire west coast of South America, and South Africa and about 5-6 nearby African countries. The Israeli just finished 3 years of military service and is traveling before starting back to university next month. He just came on the spur of the moment without a specific plan. Everyone has his/her own way of doing it.
We hit a massive traffic jam coming into Saigon. It's a much bigger city than Hanoi. And the traffic is so much heavier. After getting my hotel room, I went out exploring just the neighborhood which is mainly a tourist area. Here, it is possible to see the thousands of bicycles and motorbikes at intersections that I have seen in photos before. I'm glad I didn't arrive here first. I might have been intimidated by the traffic. After having learned to handle it in the smaller cities, I think I can deal with it here now.
I've written a song for you readers to sing about my situation today. It is to the tune of the cowboy song, I'm Back in the Saddle Again:
I'm back in hot weather again,
Back where my shirt sticks to my skin;
What a miserable way to spend a long, hard day,
I'm back in hot weather again!
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Another Nice Day in the Hills
Wednesday, Sept. 13, 2006--Da Lat
Vietnam is so much nicer and pretttier than I expected it to be. It's more developed. Much of it even seems nicer than Thailand. The new construction, unlike that in many poorer Asian countries, seems to be of a high quality with better materials. Arne and I were supposed to come here two years ago. Of course, that got canceled when Arne had his stroke and died. But I had put Vietnam on our itinerary as his chance to be a little adventurous. It's not as rugged an experience as I had expected it to be, though. Arne would have loved it here. There are free toilets everywhere! And he would have had the best time visiting with all the sweet people. Dining would have been a great adventure for him. I'm sorry he died before he got to experience this.
Today, I walked to anouther area of town to see the sights. I went by the cathedral which is a very nice building on the outside. It was closed, so I didn't get to see the inside of it. Then I continued further into the countryside until I got to what is called the Dinh III Palace. It was the summer house of the last king of Vietnam. The palace was built in the 1930s and is a VERY well-designed art deco-style home. Although it looks rather small from the outside, it is quite roomy inside and was designed specifically for that one family with special bedrooms for each of the parents and the children. The light fixtures, the furniture, etc., were all of art deco design. I arrived when almost no one else was there, so I had a long time to wander through the rooms alone enjoying both exploring the home and imagining what it would have been like to have lived in it. They led a very luxurious life.
On the way back into town, I took a quick detour to see the Crazy House. It's actually a hotel where I could have stayed. A man has used molded concrete to create a complex that looks like the roots of trees with windows in them. I didn't go inside, but each room is said to be decorated in an Alice in Wonderland style. It's a folk art type of creation similar to the Orange House or the Bottle House in Houston. Actually, it seems to work as an interesting, but qwerky creation.
One thing I've been intending to mention and keep forgetting is how much ear cleaning goes on here in Vietnam. It's big business for barbers. Every time I pass a barber shop, one of the barbers is working on someone's ears. The barbers wear lights on their foreheads like miners use. They bend forward with a long stick (form of a Q-Tip?) and work meticulously. I bet there aren't any plugged ears in Vietnam! Maybe they also clean the ears of hairs at the same time.
I have bought a bus ticket to go to Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC or Saigon) tomorrow. I've now seen all the major sights here in Da Lat. I will spend the afternoon and evening just wandering and looking or resting in my room. I'm going to miss the cool air here, but there is no reason for staying longer. Nothing in the area really appeals to me that I haven't already seen. It's been a good stop, however. Although Vietnam is more developed than I expected, it also has fewer important tourist sites than I expected. Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and even Malaysia have more to offer the tourist who wants to see temples, palaces, ruins, etc. But if someone wants to observe the culture, interact with the people, and enjoy the food, then Vietnam is a place where one can have a good time!
Vietnam is so much nicer and pretttier than I expected it to be. It's more developed. Much of it even seems nicer than Thailand. The new construction, unlike that in many poorer Asian countries, seems to be of a high quality with better materials. Arne and I were supposed to come here two years ago. Of course, that got canceled when Arne had his stroke and died. But I had put Vietnam on our itinerary as his chance to be a little adventurous. It's not as rugged an experience as I had expected it to be, though. Arne would have loved it here. There are free toilets everywhere! And he would have had the best time visiting with all the sweet people. Dining would have been a great adventure for him. I'm sorry he died before he got to experience this.
Today, I walked to anouther area of town to see the sights. I went by the cathedral which is a very nice building on the outside. It was closed, so I didn't get to see the inside of it. Then I continued further into the countryside until I got to what is called the Dinh III Palace. It was the summer house of the last king of Vietnam. The palace was built in the 1930s and is a VERY well-designed art deco-style home. Although it looks rather small from the outside, it is quite roomy inside and was designed specifically for that one family with special bedrooms for each of the parents and the children. The light fixtures, the furniture, etc., were all of art deco design. I arrived when almost no one else was there, so I had a long time to wander through the rooms alone enjoying both exploring the home and imagining what it would have been like to have lived in it. They led a very luxurious life.
On the way back into town, I took a quick detour to see the Crazy House. It's actually a hotel where I could have stayed. A man has used molded concrete to create a complex that looks like the roots of trees with windows in them. I didn't go inside, but each room is said to be decorated in an Alice in Wonderland style. It's a folk art type of creation similar to the Orange House or the Bottle House in Houston. Actually, it seems to work as an interesting, but qwerky creation.
One thing I've been intending to mention and keep forgetting is how much ear cleaning goes on here in Vietnam. It's big business for barbers. Every time I pass a barber shop, one of the barbers is working on someone's ears. The barbers wear lights on their foreheads like miners use. They bend forward with a long stick (form of a Q-Tip?) and work meticulously. I bet there aren't any plugged ears in Vietnam! Maybe they also clean the ears of hairs at the same time.
I have bought a bus ticket to go to Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC or Saigon) tomorrow. I've now seen all the major sights here in Da Lat. I will spend the afternoon and evening just wandering and looking or resting in my room. I'm going to miss the cool air here, but there is no reason for staying longer. Nothing in the area really appeals to me that I haven't already seen. It's been a good stop, however. Although Vietnam is more developed than I expected, it also has fewer important tourist sites than I expected. Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and even Malaysia have more to offer the tourist who wants to see temples, palaces, ruins, etc. But if someone wants to observe the culture, interact with the people, and enjoy the food, then Vietnam is a place where one can have a good time!
Monday, September 11, 2006
Cool in the Mountains
Sunday, Sept. 10, 2006--Nha Trang (Cont.)
I went back to the same restaurant in the evening. The lady was so nice. I got even bigger portions this time around, and she varied the meal slightly. There was the basic rice plate. This time, the meats were beef, bacon, and pate. There was also a chunk of tofu and half a boiled egg. There were lots of bamboo shoots this time, and they edible in comparison to those hard things I was served at the place yesterday that charged 3.5 times what she charges.
Monday, Sept. 11, 2006, Nha Trang to Da Lat
Well, I had to set my alarm to get up early. Because of my anti-malaria medication (mefloquine), I was having lots of weird dreams when it went off. I had been dreaming about King Kong and about a creature who looked like a man but was really half an ape. Somehow, Christmas was tied into all of it, too. If you really want to spice up your dream life, go visit somewhere that has malaria and ask your doctor to prescribe mefloquine for you!
I tried a pineapple shake at breakfast today. It was okay, but the banana shake yesterday was better. I had the same omelette with bacon. Then I waited for my bus which came at 7:30.
The trip was great for the first 2 1/2 hours. The bus was so empty that everyone had two seats. But we made a stop before turning off the main highway and waited for another bus from somewhere else. When it arrived, every seat on our bus became full. A couple took the two aisle seats where I and a young Vietnamese man had the window seats.
We stopped about 1 hour later to have lunch. I sat at a big table by myself and ordered a plate of rice with beef, pineapple, tomato, green bell pepper, etc., and a freshly made limeade. A moment later, the Vietnamese man who had been at the window opposite me came and sat at my table with me. He took the seat closer to me. Even though his English was VERY limited, he started a conversation. I still do not know his exact name; he said, "Seven-Up." I don't know if his name sounds like that or if a direct translation of it into Vietnamese would be his name. Anyway, we apparently bonded. After we both had eaten, I went to the toilet. When I returned, he had left and gone to a pond outside. He motioned for me to come where he was and pointed to an alligator in the pond. Then he and I walked around exploring the rest of the area.
There was a lotus pond in front. He picked a lotus bud and handed it to me. I didn't know what to do with it. I started peeling away the layers. When they became white, I put one to my nose, and the fragrance was wonderful. I pulled another to give to him. Just about that time, it started to sprinkle and we went back inside the restaurant. I peeled off the other leaves and gave them to various women who had been on the bus. Then 7-Up and I sat down and waited with everyone else for the rain, which had become heavy by that time, to end. It started blowing in on us, so we had to move twice to get back far enough. No one wanted to get on the bus in that rain, so we waited an extra 15 minutes for it to die down before loading up and departing.
When we reloaded, I sat by 7-Up and let the couple sit together on the other side of the aisle. We visited a little (limited by language). We pointed out nice sights to each other as we saw them--fruit trees, a dam, views of the clouds below us, etc. For another 2 1/2 hours we climbed into the mountains and entered a huge valley and crossed it before getting to Dalat. In the valley, they grow tomatoes, cabbage, grapes, strawberries and other crops.
The bus company pulled into a hotel that they operate themselves. They asked us to look at their rooms and then go elsewhere if we wanted. I had already picked out a hotel where I thought I would stay, but I decided to look at their room. 7-Up came with me. They took me to a front room with a curved glass window in front and a side balcony. It is big and has a huge TV with cable. And they only wanted $5 per night. (No a/c is needed here because we are in the mountains, so that is one reason it is a little cheaper than I have been paying, but not enough justify such a discount.) Anyway, I liked it. 7-Up thought I should take it, too, and negotiated with the woman in Vietnamese. So I don't know, I may have gotten it for $4!! I got my luggage from the bus and went back to the room. Then 7-Up said good-bye and went up the same street to where he was already expected. He told me, however, that he will see me tomorrow. I don't know what that means. I want to explore the countryside, so I hope he comes by before I am ready to head out.
I am amazed at the size of Dalat. I have been to hill stations in the mountains in Myanmar, India, Malaysia and other places, and they have always been like small villages with some old homes and maybe a golf course or two along with a botanical garden. Well, Dalat is a BIG city. There is a wonderful lake that is about 7 km (4 miles) around. And the market is one of the major attractions. Fresh strawberries and strawberries that have been candied are among the special treats that tourists should buy. If 7-Up comes tomorrow and we go out together, I will get him to do the purchasing of things like that so that I can get them at a good price.
It seems that it got dark earlier here than it has been getting dark elsewhere that I have been. Maybe it was the cloudy skies that made the difference, and maybe having mountains to the west was a factor, too. Anyway, I walked downtown, went through the market, and was walking back out another street that should eventually connect to the street of my hotel when I found this cyber cafe. When I close this entry, I will continue walking until I get back to the hotel. It's very dark outside now. Somewhere along the way, I need to stop and find something to eat.
I went back to the same restaurant in the evening. The lady was so nice. I got even bigger portions this time around, and she varied the meal slightly. There was the basic rice plate. This time, the meats were beef, bacon, and pate. There was also a chunk of tofu and half a boiled egg. There were lots of bamboo shoots this time, and they edible in comparison to those hard things I was served at the place yesterday that charged 3.5 times what she charges.
Monday, Sept. 11, 2006, Nha Trang to Da Lat
Well, I had to set my alarm to get up early. Because of my anti-malaria medication (mefloquine), I was having lots of weird dreams when it went off. I had been dreaming about King Kong and about a creature who looked like a man but was really half an ape. Somehow, Christmas was tied into all of it, too. If you really want to spice up your dream life, go visit somewhere that has malaria and ask your doctor to prescribe mefloquine for you!
I tried a pineapple shake at breakfast today. It was okay, but the banana shake yesterday was better. I had the same omelette with bacon. Then I waited for my bus which came at 7:30.
The trip was great for the first 2 1/2 hours. The bus was so empty that everyone had two seats. But we made a stop before turning off the main highway and waited for another bus from somewhere else. When it arrived, every seat on our bus became full. A couple took the two aisle seats where I and a young Vietnamese man had the window seats.
We stopped about 1 hour later to have lunch. I sat at a big table by myself and ordered a plate of rice with beef, pineapple, tomato, green bell pepper, etc., and a freshly made limeade. A moment later, the Vietnamese man who had been at the window opposite me came and sat at my table with me. He took the seat closer to me. Even though his English was VERY limited, he started a conversation. I still do not know his exact name; he said, "Seven-Up." I don't know if his name sounds like that or if a direct translation of it into Vietnamese would be his name. Anyway, we apparently bonded. After we both had eaten, I went to the toilet. When I returned, he had left and gone to a pond outside. He motioned for me to come where he was and pointed to an alligator in the pond. Then he and I walked around exploring the rest of the area.
There was a lotus pond in front. He picked a lotus bud and handed it to me. I didn't know what to do with it. I started peeling away the layers. When they became white, I put one to my nose, and the fragrance was wonderful. I pulled another to give to him. Just about that time, it started to sprinkle and we went back inside the restaurant. I peeled off the other leaves and gave them to various women who had been on the bus. Then 7-Up and I sat down and waited with everyone else for the rain, which had become heavy by that time, to end. It started blowing in on us, so we had to move twice to get back far enough. No one wanted to get on the bus in that rain, so we waited an extra 15 minutes for it to die down before loading up and departing.
When we reloaded, I sat by 7-Up and let the couple sit together on the other side of the aisle. We visited a little (limited by language). We pointed out nice sights to each other as we saw them--fruit trees, a dam, views of the clouds below us, etc. For another 2 1/2 hours we climbed into the mountains and entered a huge valley and crossed it before getting to Dalat. In the valley, they grow tomatoes, cabbage, grapes, strawberries and other crops.
The bus company pulled into a hotel that they operate themselves. They asked us to look at their rooms and then go elsewhere if we wanted. I had already picked out a hotel where I thought I would stay, but I decided to look at their room. 7-Up came with me. They took me to a front room with a curved glass window in front and a side balcony. It is big and has a huge TV with cable. And they only wanted $5 per night. (No a/c is needed here because we are in the mountains, so that is one reason it is a little cheaper than I have been paying, but not enough justify such a discount.) Anyway, I liked it. 7-Up thought I should take it, too, and negotiated with the woman in Vietnamese. So I don't know, I may have gotten it for $4!! I got my luggage from the bus and went back to the room. Then 7-Up said good-bye and went up the same street to where he was already expected. He told me, however, that he will see me tomorrow. I don't know what that means. I want to explore the countryside, so I hope he comes by before I am ready to head out.
I am amazed at the size of Dalat. I have been to hill stations in the mountains in Myanmar, India, Malaysia and other places, and they have always been like small villages with some old homes and maybe a golf course or two along with a botanical garden. Well, Dalat is a BIG city. There is a wonderful lake that is about 7 km (4 miles) around. And the market is one of the major attractions. Fresh strawberries and strawberries that have been candied are among the special treats that tourists should buy. If 7-Up comes tomorrow and we go out together, I will get him to do the purchasing of things like that so that I can get them at a good price.
It seems that it got dark earlier here than it has been getting dark elsewhere that I have been. Maybe it was the cloudy skies that made the difference, and maybe having mountains to the west was a factor, too. Anyway, I walked downtown, went through the market, and was walking back out another street that should eventually connect to the street of my hotel when I found this cyber cafe. When I close this entry, I will continue walking until I get back to the hotel. It's very dark outside now. Somewhere along the way, I need to stop and find something to eat.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Good Food
Saturday, Sept. 9, 2006--Nha Trang (Cont.)
For dinner, I wasn't very hungry. I had eaten some peanuts as a snack in the late afternoon, so I went to a local sidewalk stand and bought two steamed buns with meat patties inside. I ate them in my room.
Sunday, Sept. 10, 2006--Nha Trang
Breakfast is included with my hotel here. I had a banana shake and a bacon omelete with a French baguette of bread. It was tasty and fine. Then I walked to the beach and spent all morning there. I took the book I am reading. I sat on a bench in the shade and read. I had to move at one point because I was within the line of sight for a TV program they were filming. But it was nice relaxing there. The seabreeze felt good and kept me from getting too sticky and hot. The book I am reading is Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond. It is an academic book which became a best seller. Because it is an academic book, it is a slower read than a novel. It's frustrating at times, because he repeats information he has already given, especially when summarizing a section. And some of the stories are too long. But it is interesting for the most part. As far as a rating for the level of writing and the interest it develops for the reader, I would give it 2 1/2 stars out of 4 now that I am 2/3 of the way through the book. I hope to finish it within the next 2-3 days and move on to a more interesting novel.
Clouds starting developing around 11:30. I may have heard thunder. Anyway, I left the beach. I wasn't too hungry, but I walked around a block looking for a place for lunch. My guidebook frustrates me sometimes with its recommendations. It can be very good, but I can tell that it isn't for Nha Trang. Some places, including Nha Trang, develop a tourist ghetto of hotels and restuarants. In the case of Nha Trang, my guidebook only lists the restaurants that are a part of the tourist ghetto. I prefer local places. Yesterday, I ate at the place that sounded the most like a local place of all the listings in the guidebook, and it was over-priced and probably hasn't seen a local diner in years. Today, I found a place FULL of local diners only. And the plates looked so good. So I went in. It was so crowded that I had to share a table with a local man who tried to look after me, making sure I had a napkin and knew what to do with the sauces. I got a plate of rice with pieces of pork, a small omelete, and green beans. It came with a small bowl of chile sauce and a small bowl of meat juices. I poured both over it all and began eating. It was so tasty. It had much more flavor than what I ate yesterday. And the green beans were so much fresher than the vegetables seemed to be yesterday. And yet the meal today cost 10,000 dong (about 60 cents) vs. 35,000 dong for yesterday. They also brought me a big mug of iced green tea which was so refreshing to drink with the meal (and was included in the cost of the meal).
I have been taking photos of some of my more impressive meals while traveling. I got one of lunch today. It always makes the owners of the restaurant so proud when I take a photo. If they can understand English, I always tell them that it is to show my family and friends what good food I have been eating while traveling.
I'm probably going to leave Nha Trang tomorrow for Da Lat. I'll stay inside this afternoon and relax. Then I'll go out for one last visit among the people at the beach tonight. I may go back to the same restaurant for dinner.
For dinner, I wasn't very hungry. I had eaten some peanuts as a snack in the late afternoon, so I went to a local sidewalk stand and bought two steamed buns with meat patties inside. I ate them in my room.
Sunday, Sept. 10, 2006--Nha Trang
Breakfast is included with my hotel here. I had a banana shake and a bacon omelete with a French baguette of bread. It was tasty and fine. Then I walked to the beach and spent all morning there. I took the book I am reading. I sat on a bench in the shade and read. I had to move at one point because I was within the line of sight for a TV program they were filming. But it was nice relaxing there. The seabreeze felt good and kept me from getting too sticky and hot. The book I am reading is Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond. It is an academic book which became a best seller. Because it is an academic book, it is a slower read than a novel. It's frustrating at times, because he repeats information he has already given, especially when summarizing a section. And some of the stories are too long. But it is interesting for the most part. As far as a rating for the level of writing and the interest it develops for the reader, I would give it 2 1/2 stars out of 4 now that I am 2/3 of the way through the book. I hope to finish it within the next 2-3 days and move on to a more interesting novel.
Clouds starting developing around 11:30. I may have heard thunder. Anyway, I left the beach. I wasn't too hungry, but I walked around a block looking for a place for lunch. My guidebook frustrates me sometimes with its recommendations. It can be very good, but I can tell that it isn't for Nha Trang. Some places, including Nha Trang, develop a tourist ghetto of hotels and restuarants. In the case of Nha Trang, my guidebook only lists the restaurants that are a part of the tourist ghetto. I prefer local places. Yesterday, I ate at the place that sounded the most like a local place of all the listings in the guidebook, and it was over-priced and probably hasn't seen a local diner in years. Today, I found a place FULL of local diners only. And the plates looked so good. So I went in. It was so crowded that I had to share a table with a local man who tried to look after me, making sure I had a napkin and knew what to do with the sauces. I got a plate of rice with pieces of pork, a small omelete, and green beans. It came with a small bowl of chile sauce and a small bowl of meat juices. I poured both over it all and began eating. It was so tasty. It had much more flavor than what I ate yesterday. And the green beans were so much fresher than the vegetables seemed to be yesterday. And yet the meal today cost 10,000 dong (about 60 cents) vs. 35,000 dong for yesterday. They also brought me a big mug of iced green tea which was so refreshing to drink with the meal (and was included in the cost of the meal).
I have been taking photos of some of my more impressive meals while traveling. I got one of lunch today. It always makes the owners of the restaurant so proud when I take a photo. If they can understand English, I always tell them that it is to show my family and friends what good food I have been eating while traveling.
I'm probably going to leave Nha Trang tomorrow for Da Lat. I'll stay inside this afternoon and relax. Then I'll go out for one last visit among the people at the beach tonight. I may go back to the same restaurant for dinner.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Nha Trang
Friday, Sept. 8, 2006--Bus to Nha Trang
The bus picked me up at the hotel. I was their first pickup, so I had my choice of seats. We stopped at a few more hotels and picked up 6-8 more tourists. Then we went to the bus agency station. There was a huge crowd of Vietnamese waiting there--more than there were enough seats. So there was a big push for people to get onto the bus. Finally, all the seats were filled and we took off. I was sitting beside a 28-year-old Japanese man who has been touring here for a couple of months. He spoke English well, so we visited some. The bus stopped at 10:30 and again around 12:30. Then we rode through the rest of the night. I tried to sleep and did some, but it was difficult. I was tired when we arrived in Nha Trang around 6 a.m.
Saturday, Sept. 9, 2006--Nha Trang
The bus stopped just around the corner from the hotel I had chosen. I got my luggage and walked there quickly and had a room and was in it by 6:30. It's the same kind of room as usual with a/c. mini-fridge, cable TV, etc. I got it for $11 including free Internet and free breakfast. I immediately climbed into bed and slept until 10:30.
I decided to do some laundry since the room is one where the a/c runs all the time. Many hotels here have the a/c attached to a system that operates only when the room key is inserted in a slot on the wall. With a/c all the time, clothes are more likely to dry. So I filled the sink with soap and water and washed a shirt, a pair of shorts, and a pair of underwear.
Nha Trang is a beach community. I should say city instead of community. It's a big place with a long beach. Hotels line the roadway across the street from the beach. There are islands out in the bay and mountains at each end of the beach to give it a dramatic setting like many beaches in Brazil. There is a promonade along the beach, then there is a grassy area between the promonade and the street. (It's the kind of design that Corpus Christi wanted to implement by moving the wide unused median from between the traffic lanes so that it would be next to the sidewalk and provide grassy areas for games and sitting.)
When we arrived this morning, the beach was full of local people. Others were exercising in the grassy areas. And still others were jogging along the street. That was at 5:30!! It was rather deserted during the day except for a few tourists trying to turn themselves red. Then it was busy with local people again in the late afternoon. Many boys were playing soccer in various locations on the beach. Lots of people were in the water. And all the benches were full of people just sitting and relaxing.
It seems cooler here in Nha Trang. That's because of the seabreeze coming off the water. Actually, it isn't really cooler. I can tell, because my face becomes oily within 30 minutes of going out and my shirt starts sticking to me. I never realized I had oily skin until being here in Vietnam. My face stays shiny all the time here.
I had lunch in a restaurant recommended by the guidebook. I had wild pork with lemongrass and chile. It was a lot of meat and not enough rice. But it was delicious. There were bamboo shoots in the dish, however, that were just too tough to be edible. I moved them to the side and ate every bite of the rest of it--pork, onions, green onions, green bell pepper, red hot peppers, and sauce.
I read for a while at the beach. But I became tired again. I went back to the room and fell into a deep sleep. Now I wonder if I will be able to sleep tonight. Anyway, it is nighttime now. I've wandered along the beaches and explored some of the streets inland. It's a little after 7, and I will go to find a place for dinner when I post this entry.
One more comment: They are running an interesting ad on TV here that I have seen several times. It stars a Chinese martial arts film star (Jackie Chu?). He is talking to children who are playing with paper birds (Japanese origami). He talks about the fact that children should not play with live birds or parts of birds that have been killed because it can cause them to get a disease (bird flu). But he assures them it is fine to play with paper birds. It seems like a rather effective ad campaign. I hope they are showing it on local television as well as the cable channels I am watching.
The bus picked me up at the hotel. I was their first pickup, so I had my choice of seats. We stopped at a few more hotels and picked up 6-8 more tourists. Then we went to the bus agency station. There was a huge crowd of Vietnamese waiting there--more than there were enough seats. So there was a big push for people to get onto the bus. Finally, all the seats were filled and we took off. I was sitting beside a 28-year-old Japanese man who has been touring here for a couple of months. He spoke English well, so we visited some. The bus stopped at 10:30 and again around 12:30. Then we rode through the rest of the night. I tried to sleep and did some, but it was difficult. I was tired when we arrived in Nha Trang around 6 a.m.
Saturday, Sept. 9, 2006--Nha Trang
The bus stopped just around the corner from the hotel I had chosen. I got my luggage and walked there quickly and had a room and was in it by 6:30. It's the same kind of room as usual with a/c. mini-fridge, cable TV, etc. I got it for $11 including free Internet and free breakfast. I immediately climbed into bed and slept until 10:30.
I decided to do some laundry since the room is one where the a/c runs all the time. Many hotels here have the a/c attached to a system that operates only when the room key is inserted in a slot on the wall. With a/c all the time, clothes are more likely to dry. So I filled the sink with soap and water and washed a shirt, a pair of shorts, and a pair of underwear.
Nha Trang is a beach community. I should say city instead of community. It's a big place with a long beach. Hotels line the roadway across the street from the beach. There are islands out in the bay and mountains at each end of the beach to give it a dramatic setting like many beaches in Brazil. There is a promonade along the beach, then there is a grassy area between the promonade and the street. (It's the kind of design that Corpus Christi wanted to implement by moving the wide unused median from between the traffic lanes so that it would be next to the sidewalk and provide grassy areas for games and sitting.)
When we arrived this morning, the beach was full of local people. Others were exercising in the grassy areas. And still others were jogging along the street. That was at 5:30!! It was rather deserted during the day except for a few tourists trying to turn themselves red. Then it was busy with local people again in the late afternoon. Many boys were playing soccer in various locations on the beach. Lots of people were in the water. And all the benches were full of people just sitting and relaxing.
It seems cooler here in Nha Trang. That's because of the seabreeze coming off the water. Actually, it isn't really cooler. I can tell, because my face becomes oily within 30 minutes of going out and my shirt starts sticking to me. I never realized I had oily skin until being here in Vietnam. My face stays shiny all the time here.
I had lunch in a restaurant recommended by the guidebook. I had wild pork with lemongrass and chile. It was a lot of meat and not enough rice. But it was delicious. There were bamboo shoots in the dish, however, that were just too tough to be edible. I moved them to the side and ate every bite of the rest of it--pork, onions, green onions, green bell pepper, red hot peppers, and sauce.
I read for a while at the beach. But I became tired again. I went back to the room and fell into a deep sleep. Now I wonder if I will be able to sleep tonight. Anyway, it is nighttime now. I've wandered along the beaches and explored some of the streets inland. It's a little after 7, and I will go to find a place for dinner when I post this entry.
One more comment: They are running an interesting ad on TV here that I have seen several times. It stars a Chinese martial arts film star (Jackie Chu?). He is talking to children who are playing with paper birds (Japanese origami). He talks about the fact that children should not play with live birds or parts of birds that have been killed because it can cause them to get a disease (bird flu). But he assures them it is fine to play with paper birds. It seems like a rather effective ad campaign. I hope they are showing it on local television as well as the cable channels I am watching.
Friday, September 08, 2006
Leaving Hoi An
Thursday, Sept. 7, 2006--Hoi An (Cont.)
I went out in the evening to find the family and their sidewalk restaurant and no one was there! I was so surprised and disappointed. Maybe they are only open during the daytime except during the Full Moon Festival night.
I went to a nearby restaurant recommended by my guidebook. I had visited with their hostess a couple of times and was feeling guilty that I hadn't eaten there yet. I ordered pork satay. I was surprised when it proved to be nothing like satay in Thailand. The only thing it had in common was the peanuts. Here, she bought me a bowl of rice and a plate with a banana leaf pocket on it. She removed the parts of the banana leaf except for the base. Inside was a big, retangular-shaped patty made from ground pork, peanuts, onions, and other ingredients. I was given a small bowl, so I knew to put a little rice in the bowl and put part of the satay on top of it. I then flavoried it with a little soy sauce and a little chile sauce. It was very tasty.
Friday, Sept. 8, 2006--Hoi Ann, My Son, and the bus to Nha Trang
I was up at 6 this morning, since I needed to catch a bus at 8. I had to bathe, pack, and checkout in advance of leaving on the bus, because I will be traveling tonight to another city.
They picked me up right on time at the hotel and took me to the tour bus office. But there, I was told I had been sold! Actually, what had happened is that they had overbooked by two people more than their buses could handle, and two people were not enough to pay for another bus and guide. So they called another travel agency who had empty seats on an almost-full bus and let them have our business. So I was off on a motorcycle to be delivered to the other agency for departure from there.
It's about an hour or more to get from Hoi An to My Son. My Son is a small village around the ruins of an old Cham religious site. It's the Vietnamese version of the ruins I have visited before in places like Sukothai in Thailand, Bagan in Myanmar, etc. But it is a much smaller area of ruins. I don't like tours, but this one wasn't too bad. We went directly there. They had us wait at a shop while the guide showed us where we would be walking on a map and then went to get out entry tickets. Then we had to go as a group into the ruins taking jeeps provided by the site to get us up in the hills. A dance and music performance had just started when we arrived, so we all sat under the thatched roof and watched it before entering the ruins. The dances and music are supposed to represent those of the Cham people. The customes were very nice, and the performers were good. It was much like watching Ballet Folklorio from Mexico City or the Filipino dance troup that tours the world all the time. (In other words, the dances were creative, but I'm not sure how authentic they are to what used to happen in the Cham culture.) We all walked up to the ruins as a group. After a few minutes of talking, the guide told us it was free time for us to roam on our own and that we should meet back at the bus at noon. I was very relieved. I just do not like being trapped with a group. I took some photos and looked around, but there really wasn't that much to see.
I was the first back at the restaurant where the bus was waiting. Two different guides who were waiting there for their tourists they had brought on motorcycles talked to me trying to convince me to hire them to take me around Vietnam for the remainder of my time here. I declined both. Then a woman in our group walked up and sat at the table in the restaurant with me. She layed her Rough Guide guidebook on the table, so I thought I would tease her. I said, "You're not in step with everyone else with that guidebook!" meaning that 90-95% of all tourists carry Lonely Planet guidebooks today. Then I smiled as I pulled my torn-out pages on the table and said, "I'm using Rough Guide, too." I asked her where she was from and was totally surprised when she said, "Denmark." I hadn't detected a Danish accent (but boy did she have a good one as we talked longer). I surprised her by asking her in Danish where she was from in Denmark. It had been totally unexpected since she had heard my American accent. She and I visited the rest of the time there and on the bus all the way back into town.
Her name is Frederica. She's a lawyer for the government, having finished law school about 3 years ago. I told her about my friend Helle to see if she might know her, but she didn't. As time passed, I gave her Helle's name and phone number, because I thought they might enjoy meeting. My guess is that they are near the same age. She wants to change her job in some way, so we talked about that. She said she had been thinking of taking some time off and working at a children's home, and I told her about St. Joseph's International Academy in India where I was last year. Then we spent most of the rest of our time talking about the around-the-world tickets. I get the impression she will work for a year or two saving money and then will buy an ATW ticket and travel for 6 months or a year with a stop in India to volunteer at the school.
When we got back to town, I went looking for the sidewalk restaurant operated by the family, and it still wasn't there. It was already 1:30 p.m., so maybe they close it by 1 or even earlier. I needed to eat, however, and I wanted to stop by the cyber cafe, so I walked down the street toward it. I came to a restaurant I had seen before and stopped to look at the menu. That reminded me that there is a local dish called cau lau that I still hadn't tried, so I ordered it. It is made with thick white noodles. When it came, I couldn't see the noodles. They were in the bottom of the bowl. Covering them on top were slices of beef, pieces of green lettuce, slices of onions, slices of garlic, and small pieces of very crispy croutons. The lady pointed to the soy sauce and the chile sauce to let me know that I should use them when eating it. Psquirted both sauces on top and then mixed everything in the bowl with my chopsticks. Then I started eating. UMMMM! It was such a good dish. In the bottom of the bowl there had been some of the juices from the meat to also flavor it all. Afterwards, she brought me a glass mug of hot tea and a small plate with sliced banana. After enjoying all of that, I got the bill: 55 cents U.S. This is a good place to eat. Why do Vietnamese restaurants always cost so much in the U.S.? I understand that they can't charge 55 cents, but they always seem to be at least $2-3 more than Mexican restaurants for lunch. It doesn't seem to make sense, since their dishes are so simple (but good).
Well, now I have to wait. It is 3 p.m. My bus for Nha Trang, a beach resort south of here, doesn't leave until 8 p.m. So I have 5 hours to pass. I will stay here in the cyber cafe for a while. And then I will sit in the lobby of my hotel until the bus comes tonight. I am reading a book, so I can pass the time with lots of reading, I guess.
By the way, here are two links to hotels so you can see where I am staying:
Hai Au Hotel, Hoi An (Where I have been staying this week here in Hoi An)
Perfume Grass Inn, Nha Trang (Where I will be staying for the next 3 nights)
I hope those links work.
I went out in the evening to find the family and their sidewalk restaurant and no one was there! I was so surprised and disappointed. Maybe they are only open during the daytime except during the Full Moon Festival night.
I went to a nearby restaurant recommended by my guidebook. I had visited with their hostess a couple of times and was feeling guilty that I hadn't eaten there yet. I ordered pork satay. I was surprised when it proved to be nothing like satay in Thailand. The only thing it had in common was the peanuts. Here, she bought me a bowl of rice and a plate with a banana leaf pocket on it. She removed the parts of the banana leaf except for the base. Inside was a big, retangular-shaped patty made from ground pork, peanuts, onions, and other ingredients. I was given a small bowl, so I knew to put a little rice in the bowl and put part of the satay on top of it. I then flavoried it with a little soy sauce and a little chile sauce. It was very tasty.
Friday, Sept. 8, 2006--Hoi Ann, My Son, and the bus to Nha Trang
I was up at 6 this morning, since I needed to catch a bus at 8. I had to bathe, pack, and checkout in advance of leaving on the bus, because I will be traveling tonight to another city.
They picked me up right on time at the hotel and took me to the tour bus office. But there, I was told I had been sold! Actually, what had happened is that they had overbooked by two people more than their buses could handle, and two people were not enough to pay for another bus and guide. So they called another travel agency who had empty seats on an almost-full bus and let them have our business. So I was off on a motorcycle to be delivered to the other agency for departure from there.
It's about an hour or more to get from Hoi An to My Son. My Son is a small village around the ruins of an old Cham religious site. It's the Vietnamese version of the ruins I have visited before in places like Sukothai in Thailand, Bagan in Myanmar, etc. But it is a much smaller area of ruins. I don't like tours, but this one wasn't too bad. We went directly there. They had us wait at a shop while the guide showed us where we would be walking on a map and then went to get out entry tickets. Then we had to go as a group into the ruins taking jeeps provided by the site to get us up in the hills. A dance and music performance had just started when we arrived, so we all sat under the thatched roof and watched it before entering the ruins. The dances and music are supposed to represent those of the Cham people. The customes were very nice, and the performers were good. It was much like watching Ballet Folklorio from Mexico City or the Filipino dance troup that tours the world all the time. (In other words, the dances were creative, but I'm not sure how authentic they are to what used to happen in the Cham culture.) We all walked up to the ruins as a group. After a few minutes of talking, the guide told us it was free time for us to roam on our own and that we should meet back at the bus at noon. I was very relieved. I just do not like being trapped with a group. I took some photos and looked around, but there really wasn't that much to see.
I was the first back at the restaurant where the bus was waiting. Two different guides who were waiting there for their tourists they had brought on motorcycles talked to me trying to convince me to hire them to take me around Vietnam for the remainder of my time here. I declined both. Then a woman in our group walked up and sat at the table in the restaurant with me. She layed her Rough Guide guidebook on the table, so I thought I would tease her. I said, "You're not in step with everyone else with that guidebook!" meaning that 90-95% of all tourists carry Lonely Planet guidebooks today. Then I smiled as I pulled my torn-out pages on the table and said, "I'm using Rough Guide, too." I asked her where she was from and was totally surprised when she said, "Denmark." I hadn't detected a Danish accent (but boy did she have a good one as we talked longer). I surprised her by asking her in Danish where she was from in Denmark. It had been totally unexpected since she had heard my American accent. She and I visited the rest of the time there and on the bus all the way back into town.
Her name is Frederica. She's a lawyer for the government, having finished law school about 3 years ago. I told her about my friend Helle to see if she might know her, but she didn't. As time passed, I gave her Helle's name and phone number, because I thought they might enjoy meeting. My guess is that they are near the same age. She wants to change her job in some way, so we talked about that. She said she had been thinking of taking some time off and working at a children's home, and I told her about St. Joseph's International Academy in India where I was last year. Then we spent most of the rest of our time talking about the around-the-world tickets. I get the impression she will work for a year or two saving money and then will buy an ATW ticket and travel for 6 months or a year with a stop in India to volunteer at the school.
When we got back to town, I went looking for the sidewalk restaurant operated by the family, and it still wasn't there. It was already 1:30 p.m., so maybe they close it by 1 or even earlier. I needed to eat, however, and I wanted to stop by the cyber cafe, so I walked down the street toward it. I came to a restaurant I had seen before and stopped to look at the menu. That reminded me that there is a local dish called cau lau that I still hadn't tried, so I ordered it. It is made with thick white noodles. When it came, I couldn't see the noodles. They were in the bottom of the bowl. Covering them on top were slices of beef, pieces of green lettuce, slices of onions, slices of garlic, and small pieces of very crispy croutons. The lady pointed to the soy sauce and the chile sauce to let me know that I should use them when eating it. Psquirted both sauces on top and then mixed everything in the bowl with my chopsticks. Then I started eating. UMMMM! It was such a good dish. In the bottom of the bowl there had been some of the juices from the meat to also flavor it all. Afterwards, she brought me a glass mug of hot tea and a small plate with sliced banana. After enjoying all of that, I got the bill: 55 cents U.S. This is a good place to eat. Why do Vietnamese restaurants always cost so much in the U.S.? I understand that they can't charge 55 cents, but they always seem to be at least $2-3 more than Mexican restaurants for lunch. It doesn't seem to make sense, since their dishes are so simple (but good).
Well, now I have to wait. It is 3 p.m. My bus for Nha Trang, a beach resort south of here, doesn't leave until 8 p.m. So I have 5 hours to pass. I will stay here in the cyber cafe for a while. And then I will sit in the lobby of my hotel until the bus comes tonight. I am reading a book, so I can pass the time with lots of reading, I guess.
By the way, here are two links to hotels so you can see where I am staying:
Hai Au Hotel, Hoi An (Where I have been staying this week here in Hoi An)
Perfume Grass Inn, Nha Trang (Where I will be staying for the next 3 nights)
I hope those links work.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Meeting the Locals
Wednesday, Sept. 6, 2006--Hoi An (Continued)
As soon as the sun was hidden behing a cloud bank in the west, I went out for the evening. That was about 5:30. I walked up and down the streets taking some photos of the more interesting buildings until it got too dark. All along the way, shopkeepers were getting ready for the evening's celebrations. Mainly they were hanging lanterns and setting up small shrines with insense and food offerings in front.
When it finally got dark, the city was beautiful. Most of the shop owners kept their interior lighting to a low level except when customers entered. So it was much like traveling back in time to walk down the dark streets with only the light of the golden, red, green, etc., lanterns. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood. And it makes such a difference to have the streets blocked to bicycle and motorcycle traffic.
Stages were set up in various locations. A couple were on vacant lots. One was at a triangular corner that normally serves as outdoor seating for a restaurant. The most unique was on an old boat in the river. From 7 p.m. until 10 p.m., entertainers performed on each of these stages with local music and playing native instruments. One stage, however, was for the young people to demonstrate their martial arts expertise. Also in the river were huge floating plastic sculptures that were lighted--a turtle, a dragon, etc. People were crusing back and forth on the river in dug0ut canoes, and there were floating paper baskets containing lighted candles floating along among them.
As I was walking along the riverfront, a young man and a boy were sitting on a bench and invited me to join them. The little boy was precious. Named Sien, he looked to be about 6, but I later learned he is 8. He was so excited about the evening and was running back and forth from one thing that excited him near the bench to another. He especially liked the floating candle lanterns in the river. As the night progressed, I stayed with these two people and met more of their family. I learned that the young man was 25 and named Tien. He is a carpenter building homes. He spoke very little English. It was his sister, Thieu, who came and joined us who explained everything. The little boy was not Tien's son; he is his nephew. Tien takes care of Sien during the evenings while the women (his two sisters and his mother) run a sidewalk restaurant. The father died about 4 years ago at the age of 58. I imagine they live in rather dire straights without the father's income. Thieu told me that she was the only one who was given an education and that she would have continued in school to become an English teacher if her father hadn't died.
Tien, Sien, and I walked around the town seeing the lights and taking some photos. Sien would hold onto my arm during the process except when he would flutter away to see something close that had excited him. He has very active facial expressions and is obviously excited about life. He's really an 8-year-old social butterfly. Tien was also very mindful about taking care of me as we walked; he would grab my hand and make sure I was safe in instances such as awkward steps we passed on a rather decrepid pedestrian bridge that crossed the river.
We went to the restaurant and I ate a dessert the mother makes. It was a custard made of egg and soy with a syrupy topping. It was good--a Vietnamese version of flan.
Later, we returned to the bench and sat and visited until everything came to a close around 9:45. Sien got Tien to reach down to the water level of the river and pick up one of the floating candles and set it on the sidewalk in front of us. He sat in my lap, Tien sat beside me, and Thieu sat on the other side of her brother. They made me promise that I would return to the restaurant on Thursday which I plan to do. I promised them also that I would send them copies of the photos we took when I get home.
Thursday, Sept. 7, 2006--Hoi An
It's another hot day. The sun burns so hot on the skin that it is like being unprotected at a white sandy beach. I really cannot enjoy being outside for long. I walked into the city and quickly decided to come to the cyber cafe. Later, I will go to have lunch. Then I will spend the afternoon in the hotel room. I'll go back and have dinner at the sidewalk restaurant of the family I met after it gets dark tonight.
I had the hotel reserve me a seat on a tour to My Son tomorrow. It's an old cham religious site in the moutains. I had a choice of leaving at 5 a.m. and seeing the sunrise over the ruins or leaving at 8, and I chose to take the later departure. Then I had a choice of coming back via the bus or on a boat in the river. I chose the bus. The river return would include having lunch on the boat. I've gotten into those hassles before where it takes them forever to catch the fish and cook it. Then there is no set price and everyone feels trapped into paying too much for the meal. Then they want tips on top of all of that. And all of that would be on a boat in the hot sunshine! I would rather come back on an a/c bus and find a lunch on my own somewhere.
I also had the hotel reserve me a bus seat to leave Hoi An. My next stop will be Nha Trang, a beach resort. I'm not really that excited about going to a beach resort, but I still have lots of time here and will run out of places to visit if I pass up the stops tourists usually make. I'll decide when I get there how long I want to stay. But I was disappointed to find that the day bus trip to there isn't operating right now. I must go by overnight bus. That should prove to be a rather miserable experience! Anyway, since I have to go at night, I decided to go tomorrow night. I'll be in My Son until 1 p.m., have the afternoon (without the benefit of my air conditioned room) here in town, and depart at 8 p.m. for Nha Trang. I'll probably be back here at the cyber cafe writing all about it during those afternoon hours.
As soon as the sun was hidden behing a cloud bank in the west, I went out for the evening. That was about 5:30. I walked up and down the streets taking some photos of the more interesting buildings until it got too dark. All along the way, shopkeepers were getting ready for the evening's celebrations. Mainly they were hanging lanterns and setting up small shrines with insense and food offerings in front.
When it finally got dark, the city was beautiful. Most of the shop owners kept their interior lighting to a low level except when customers entered. So it was much like traveling back in time to walk down the dark streets with only the light of the golden, red, green, etc., lanterns. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood. And it makes such a difference to have the streets blocked to bicycle and motorcycle traffic.
Stages were set up in various locations. A couple were on vacant lots. One was at a triangular corner that normally serves as outdoor seating for a restaurant. The most unique was on an old boat in the river. From 7 p.m. until 10 p.m., entertainers performed on each of these stages with local music and playing native instruments. One stage, however, was for the young people to demonstrate their martial arts expertise. Also in the river were huge floating plastic sculptures that were lighted--a turtle, a dragon, etc. People were crusing back and forth on the river in dug0ut canoes, and there were floating paper baskets containing lighted candles floating along among them.
As I was walking along the riverfront, a young man and a boy were sitting on a bench and invited me to join them. The little boy was precious. Named Sien, he looked to be about 6, but I later learned he is 8. He was so excited about the evening and was running back and forth from one thing that excited him near the bench to another. He especially liked the floating candle lanterns in the river. As the night progressed, I stayed with these two people and met more of their family. I learned that the young man was 25 and named Tien. He is a carpenter building homes. He spoke very little English. It was his sister, Thieu, who came and joined us who explained everything. The little boy was not Tien's son; he is his nephew. Tien takes care of Sien during the evenings while the women (his two sisters and his mother) run a sidewalk restaurant. The father died about 4 years ago at the age of 58. I imagine they live in rather dire straights without the father's income. Thieu told me that she was the only one who was given an education and that she would have continued in school to become an English teacher if her father hadn't died.
Tien, Sien, and I walked around the town seeing the lights and taking some photos. Sien would hold onto my arm during the process except when he would flutter away to see something close that had excited him. He has very active facial expressions and is obviously excited about life. He's really an 8-year-old social butterfly. Tien was also very mindful about taking care of me as we walked; he would grab my hand and make sure I was safe in instances such as awkward steps we passed on a rather decrepid pedestrian bridge that crossed the river.
We went to the restaurant and I ate a dessert the mother makes. It was a custard made of egg and soy with a syrupy topping. It was good--a Vietnamese version of flan.
Later, we returned to the bench and sat and visited until everything came to a close around 9:45. Sien got Tien to reach down to the water level of the river and pick up one of the floating candles and set it on the sidewalk in front of us. He sat in my lap, Tien sat beside me, and Thieu sat on the other side of her brother. They made me promise that I would return to the restaurant on Thursday which I plan to do. I promised them also that I would send them copies of the photos we took when I get home.
Thursday, Sept. 7, 2006--Hoi An
It's another hot day. The sun burns so hot on the skin that it is like being unprotected at a white sandy beach. I really cannot enjoy being outside for long. I walked into the city and quickly decided to come to the cyber cafe. Later, I will go to have lunch. Then I will spend the afternoon in the hotel room. I'll go back and have dinner at the sidewalk restaurant of the family I met after it gets dark tonight.
I had the hotel reserve me a seat on a tour to My Son tomorrow. It's an old cham religious site in the moutains. I had a choice of leaving at 5 a.m. and seeing the sunrise over the ruins or leaving at 8, and I chose to take the later departure. Then I had a choice of coming back via the bus or on a boat in the river. I chose the bus. The river return would include having lunch on the boat. I've gotten into those hassles before where it takes them forever to catch the fish and cook it. Then there is no set price and everyone feels trapped into paying too much for the meal. Then they want tips on top of all of that. And all of that would be on a boat in the hot sunshine! I would rather come back on an a/c bus and find a lunch on my own somewhere.
I also had the hotel reserve me a bus seat to leave Hoi An. My next stop will be Nha Trang, a beach resort. I'm not really that excited about going to a beach resort, but I still have lots of time here and will run out of places to visit if I pass up the stops tourists usually make. I'll decide when I get there how long I want to stay. But I was disappointed to find that the day bus trip to there isn't operating right now. I must go by overnight bus. That should prove to be a rather miserable experience! Anyway, since I have to go at night, I decided to go tomorrow night. I'll be in My Son until 1 p.m., have the afternoon (without the benefit of my air conditioned room) here in town, and depart at 8 p.m. for Nha Trang. I'll probably be back here at the cyber cafe writing all about it during those afternoon hours.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
