Hello everyone!
Well here I go again, another 2 weeks have gone by and Eva and I are off to another country: Cambodia. We are really excited to see Cambodia, in particular to see the spectular temples in Angkor. After that it will be back to Bangkok with the hopes of finding a cheap flight to Bali; if not it will mean a few days on the train and boat.
South Vietnam has been fantastic. In general we have found the people in the South to be much for friendly, helpful, and less aggressive than in the North. Also when we first arrived in the South, we were astounded by the number of women not only wearing masks, but using gloves that went up to their shoulders to protect their arms from the sun too. It is an obsession here for women to be as white as they can.
Vietnam on the whole has probably been my favorite country so far. Every town, every city, every part is so different from one another: the mountains in Sapa, the chaos and colonial architecture of Hanoi, the rocks in Halong Bay, the looks kind of like Europe streets of Hoi An, the beach in Nathrang, the countryside of Dalat, the Chinese influence of Saigon, and finally the cannals and tropical like environment of Mekong Delta. More than any country I have been to, no one place looks the same.
So to backtrack, after arriving back in Hanoi, we headed off that night for Hoi An. Our time in Hoi An was kind of dissapointing because I don't feel that we spent a lot of it getting to know the town. In Hoi An, you have the opportunity to get tailor made clothes done for really cheap using silk etc. We ended up spending 3 days choosing the clothes we wanted to make, trying them on, making changes, trying them on again etc. I definetely felt really spoilt in Hoi An, because here I was making tailor made silk clothes, and I found myself complaining because a couple pieces weren't perfect . At least I caught myself and started to laugh at myself for it though. If there were one thing I could change about myself, it would be that I gain the ability to take things more ligthly, to laught at myself more. Travelling does help you take things as they come, but I still don't laugh at myself nearly enough.
Anyway, like I said, we spent all of our time shopping for clothes and almost none of our time looking at Hoi An. Hoi An is a very old town with a lot of French colonial structures painted in pale yellow. You can walk down all these tiny streets like you would in Europe. I think there was an old bridge too that we didn't get the chance to see either. Oh well: different priorites I guess, whether they were misplaced ones is up to you to think or not.
We did however do 2 interesting things on our first day. The first was that we went to an orphanage (is this the same one that you went to Julie?) We were told that it is a good idea to bring some fruit so we bought some grapes, madarins and apples. We handed them out to the kids and the kids were all thrilled to have fruits! Imagine kids at home being exstatic because someone gave them an apple! It really affected us. What an experience! It's hard to tell how many kids there are because at different times there are different kids: perhaps in total there were 30. I would say that most of the kids are either mentally or physically handicapped. THee was one room of kids that were severally mentally and physically handicapped and it appears they lay in bed all day without any apparent stimulation. The workers there appear really overworked without a lot of support. Eva and I went to antoher room that I think serves as a playroom/school for thoes who are able to be there. TH ere, there were about 10 kids. A few beckoned to us to play with them. Later one child was doing his writing, and I came over to help. He was slightly mentally handicapped and drooled all over the place. He smiled at me an took my hand so that I would help him write the letters. WHen he finished, he smiled, and laughed, and clapped his hands. It was really moving. Later he showed me some music, and a little later I started playing badminton with a little girl. This little girl was so cute. She is really healthy and a little older. She helps the boys with their work (almost all of the kids were boys).She was really happy to have someone play with her. These poor kids are so straved for love and attention. They hardly ever get one on one and the people there seem so hard and disheartened. It's no surprise. Eva and I were there for 2 hours and those 2 hours were hard. I can't imagine being there being there all day everyday. However, going there and giving back t o the community, using our time and a little money for something other than for our own pleasure was really rewarding. The next day we went back to give them so more food, but we couldn't stay because we had to catch the bus to Nha Trang.
Later that night, we went back to one of the shops to try something on. The woman was so nice. She gave us some silk purses and wallets. Anyway, the next day that we were in Hoi An was the full moon so there was a full-moon festival. (Not like the crazy full moon festival in Thailand. There we saw some traditional dance andmusic and a martial arts competition.
So on the third night we were off ot Nha Trang and spent the day sleeping, going to beach, ate, had some beers and relized. Nha Trang isn't particularly beautiful. THe beach is right beside high rises, but we wanted to be near the water. We have later heard that it is really worth it to go on a boat trip around the islands and then to go to Mamasan's boat where there is some crazy partying, but we didn't know at the time so we didn't get a chance to go. By the time we got to Nha Trang we were starting to feel pressed for time because we have to be out of the country by the 18th, so we might not have gone anyway. The next day, we decided to go to some hotsprings. There, there was a swimming pool, a hot tub, and a mud tub. All came from a mineral source. We decided to go for the whole experience, so we went and sat in mineral mud. It stank. Eva and I took turn giving each other massages so the mud would sink into our skin. Then we went to the mineral hot tub and sat i n there for awhile. It was so relaxing. We wanted to take picture with ourselves all covered in mud, but we forgot to bring our cameras with us where there was the mud. THen we ate and went into the swimming pool. The swimming pool was 38 degrees celcius. We kept getting stared at by all the Vietnamese (it's actually not a tourist spot) because we hadn't shaved, I have tatoos, and we were wearing bathing suits. Most Vietnamese women wear their clothing to go swimming with the odd exception of course. So we spent the day just lounging around. We had 2 nice motorcycle drivers take us there and back, and on the way back brought us to 2 places. One of them was were there were some old ruins. The other one was a pagoda that had this huge white seated Buddha. IT was on the top of the mountain so it gave us a nice view of Nha Trang. Nha Trang is filled with palm trees and some of it's by the water so it was really nice. My driver reminded me that it was Inter national Women's Day the next day and said that he would get his girl-friend flowers. He said that this day and Valentine's Day are the only 2 days that women get celebrated. Men have many days. How astute! Later that night, we walked kind of far to a restaurant that actually made me kind of miss Korea! I never would have believed it. In this restaurant you picked the food you wanted and then you grilled it ar your table. We picked some huge prawns and squid and it was delicious. It was so like Korea with the busyness, the dirtiness, and the food. Then we found who we thought was a nice cyclo driver until he pulled the usual trick of saying one price at first, and then saying that that price was for each of us so double to price. We should have known by now!!
After Nha Trang we headed off for Dalat. On the way there we stopped at anothe ruined pagoda. It had all these Buddhas carved into the walls of the ruins. Right away, when we got there, we had the Easy Riders approach us offering motorcycle rides. We heard that they are excellent so we booked a day tour. From there we went walking around and went through the crazy, smelly, vegetable fish and garbage market. THen we found the most incredible place. It was called the Way to the Moon, created by Lu Truc Phuong. He designed the 100 roof house, but later it was destroyed so he started building this place. This place was beyong belief. It is a coffee shop that is in a town house with 5 stories. However, the coffe shop has been turned into a jungle maze like imitation. Everywhere you look there are branches and trees and plants (most in cement) with wooden tables. In every nook and cranny thee is some sort of artwork. It was probably the most intersting place that I have ever been in (for bars or coffee shops).
The next day we were off on our motorcycle ride. It was a fantastic time. He was a good driver and knew a lot about Vietnam. On a lot of the other tours that we have been on, the guides haven't been altogether talkative. This one was different. The frist place that we went to was called The Crazy House. IT was built by a woman who was the daughter of one of the presidents. If any of you know Gaudi's work, then you can picture what this building was like. This house used to be a hotel, and there were 10 rooms.. All of them were themed by an animal or object. There was a honeymoon room, bear, ant, tiger, kangaroo, gourd, eagle, and other ones we didn't see. Inside each respective room was the shape of the animal or object somewhere in the room. The outside of the room was all twisted and odd-shaped. It was really interesting to see. Then we went to an agricultureal farm. IT was interesting to see because it wasn't touristic at all, and since farming is such an important part of Vietnamese life, it allowed us to see naother aspect of VIetnam. They cultivate lots of cabbage, onions, chives, spices, coffee (3 types), tomatoes, strawberries, etc. On the way back we saw this 80 year old woman drying coffee. (The guide asked her how old she was). We couldn't believe it. People work their whole lives here, and they work SO hard! Yet, we are the ones who complain that we don't have enough time to do this, or that...While we were walking along, our guides told us that since the war people have migrated a lot to the South and that farming is thriving. After the agricultural farm we went to Paradise Lake and the Buddhist Medidation Monastery. On the way, the guide pointed out 2 mountains that look like breasts! Tee hee! After that it was off to the Datanla Waterfalls. They were quite powerful, which was surprising because it is not the rainy season. They had many levels and at the end the water ended between this cliff. You could look out at see how deep the cliff was. It was a sight! It was really high and narrow.
After that, we went to the Chicken Village. It is a minority village. That was super rewarding because we learnt a lot. When you enter the minority village you see a statue of this humungous chicken. It's really funny. IT's called the Chicken Village because of something that happened long ago. The people in the Chicken Village follow a matriarchal system so when a man gets married he must pay a dowry to the wife's family and he moves in with her family. So, a long time ago, a man wanted to marry this woman so he and his family went looking for some really good chickens for his dowry. When they couldn't find any, they were so ashamed that they killed themselves. Our guide told us that the people there still live the same as many years ago. Last year they got electricty and clean water however many of them don't use it because they don't want to. (Even the clean water: they would rather use the water from the well). The village is extremely poor, in Sapa, t he minorities are doing relatively well because of the tourism. Here there is a lot less. There was a small run-down school that most of the kids went to. There is only an elementary school so they have to go walk far to go the highschool. However, from what I gather from the guide, most do go to highschool which is rare in Sapa. After showing us the town, we went to talk to a couple locals. This older couple lived in a small mud-house and had children and 18 grand-children. Not all of them live in the same house. They practice a religion but I didn't understand what the guide said. I think it was a mix of Buddhism and something else. The main income of the village is rice and coffee. The men work in the fields and the women pound the rice, clean, cook, and take care of the children. After that we walked to the village pagoda and a monk showed us how they make incense. They split bamboo and roll it on the bark of a gum tree (and from what you can probably tell by the name , it is sticky) then they roll the stick in cinammon or sandalwood and let it dry out in the sun for an hour.
After that it was lunch and then we went to a mushroom farm. I never caught the name fo the mushroom, but the way they mushrooms are grown is very unusual. They take the bark if a tree (tapioca or other) and fill it in white bags. These bags are left to hang and are put in a damp, humid area. Water gets dipped into the bag and voila! One week later you have huge mushrooms. They re-used the bags for 2 months and then they get burned. Depending on the bark they used, the mushroom will taste different.
After that we were shown more of the country side and more mountains that looked like 2 elephants. Then we went to Linh Ph'o'c pagoda which was a really amazing site. (By the way, I learnt that the difference betwen a pagoda and a temple is that a pagoda is Buddhist, and a temple will be with some other god or goddesses.) On the outside of the pagoda were dragons everywhere: on the stairs, on the pillars, and it was 3 stories high. The dragons, believe it or not, were decorated by pieces of beer, sprite bottles, and cups. It took 3 years to make. It was truly remarkable: I haven't seen anything like it. On dragon on the outside of the pagoda needed 12 000 bottles. The pagoda was 50 years old. At the pagoda the guide told me that ther are 4 sacrad animals in Vietnam: the dragon for health; the unicorn for heroism and courage; the turtle of longevity; and the pheonix for the beauty of life.
Then it was off to an old train station that was built in 1919 and that was the end.
That night we went back to the cool coffee shop and left for Ho Chi Minh City. It was an extremely unpleasant expreince. I went and tried to sleep in the back. Near me was a mad who was kind of drunk. He wanted me to sit with him, but I said no. Then he pointed to his lips and I figured that he wanted me to kiss him. I refused of course and changed seats. Unfortunately, I couldn't move very far because the bus was almost full. I still didn't think much of it and shrugged it off as a harmless drunk. But then when I was trying to sleep, he started poling me and I kpet trying to tell him that I wanted to sleep. And that that repulsive, slimy, ass-hole grabbed my ass! (I had laid myself down on the two seats.) I jumped up and started yelling at thim much to the surprise of everyone on the bus. I then moved and sat next to Eva. I was so mad. I also know that if I had been Vietnamese, he wouldn't have dared, but since there is the unfortunate perception that white women are easy...Ugh! I don't ahve neough words to describe how digusting, repulsive, and hideous that man was. What made it worse was the surprise and the palce. I was trying to sleep on the bus! It appears that I can't go a month without having something like that happen. FIrst the monk, and then him! Would I sound totally ungrateful for being on this wonderful trip if I said "Why me?"
All that being said, lately Eva and I have been feeling particularly grateful for being able to make this trip. Really fortunate. We arrived in Saigon at 5 in the morning and found a hotel room. We spent the rest of the day running errands.
Our second day in Saigon was kind of frustrating. We ran some more errands which took longer than we expected, and found it hard to find a tour going to the Mekong Delta that we were interested in. Then, we rented bicycles to see a couple of temples. It was super hot and because we didn't have a good map, we had a lot of trouble finding anything. We kept going around in circles. We would have enjoyed getting lost, but with the heat and the uncomfortableness of the bicycles, it was a generally long and tiring day. However, it was neat to go around. Ho Chi Mihn City is divided into several districts: the more interesting ones are District 1 (called Saigon) and District 5(Cholon the Chinese district). The temples we were seeing were in Cholon so we headed of to Chinatown. Right away, the colors, smells, and decorations made you feel that you were in China. We ended up seing 4 temples: 3 of them worth mentioning. The first one we don't know the name: we thought it was a diff erent temple. IT was really beautiful. IT had all these carvings on the roofs of the daily life of people. IT was really colorful and detailed with lots of people in robs, houses, food, doors, apartments. It's been one of the best temples we have seen. Then we went to the 2nd temple called Thien Han which was dedicated to the Chinese Goddess of the sea. THen we went to a temple that we also don't know the name. It's Taoist. This one ended up being very interesting because an old man came up to us to show us the temple. This temple was built during the Min Dynasty in the 1300 and from 1700s to 1900s was a private building of this man's ancestors. This important ancestors' tombs were in the temple with statues of them for all to see (all looking similar witht he long beards). Then he tool us to another room that had the Goddess of Mercy. From this goddess, you touch her hand which gives you longetvity, and you drink from her bottle which gives you happiness. It was really interestin g because the elderly man was hilarious: very animated, and wanted to describe everything.
Then we rode our bikes to the Giam Lam Pagoda, which is considered one of the oldest pagodas in Vietnam. It was really large and the Chinese influence was really evident. There were Buddhass but the sculptures of the Buddhas were very Chinese looking with harder looking faces.
Although our day was long we were animated by many friendly people who helped us find the many sites we were looking for. One couple even told us to follow them on their motorcycle to on of the temples. You wouldn't find that in Hanoi, that's for sure. However, it's kind of odd: although people in Saigon are much friendlier, and although Saigon is more laid back, I preferred Hanoi. Maybe becaues it was where we first arrived, or just the sheer craziness, but there is something about Hanoi that I really enjoyed (save all the agressive cyclo and moto drivers, and cheating hotel owners).However, if I had to choose between living in Ho Chi Minh City or living in Hanoi, I would rather live in Ho Chi Minh City.
The next day was an extremely fascinating day! We started off by going to the Cu Chi tunnels, the famous tunnels that span over 200km that ultimately gave North Vietnam the edge in winning the Vietnam War. We almost didn't make it because our hotel forgot to wake us up. We had to run out of the room and catch a cab to the bus stop. Anyway, to give a little bit of history in case of some you don't know or don't remember, after the communist Viet Minh forces freed Vietnam from French opressive rule in 1954, the Geneva Accords of mid 1954 created a temporary division of the country in 2 zones, which later became permanant after the leader in the South refused to hold elections. The South was led by an anti-communist named Ngo Dinh Diem. In 1960, North Vietnam started to aggresively fight again Diem. Diem was such an oppressive leader that he was killed by his own troops. In 1960 the Viet Cong was formed to liberate the South. In 1965, the U.S. joined the South and fought ag aist the North. In 1975, the South lost to the North and the whole country became communist. According to the lonely planet, the reunification of Vietnam first meant liberation from the opressive colonial regime, but later the communist government proceeded to repress its own people as well.
It's hard to get an idea of what the Vietnamese think. Some tell us that most are happy with communism because there has ben less crime and less poverty...however, common sense tells us that any communist regime will involve repression of people's freedom.
The first thing we did when we arrived at the tunnels was to be given information about them. The tunnels started being built in 1955 and continued to be built day and night starting in 1960. The tunnels had 3 levels with bunkers and wells. One end ended in a river so people could jump into the river and enter the tunnel if they were being chased. Thanks to a special bomb tha waited a bit after hitting the ground to explode, many of the first levels were destroyed. From what I can gather, the tunnels are in the former South Vietnam. Most of the tunnels were built by local communists who were pretending not to be communists. They used bamboo shovels and homemade picks to build the tunnels. The whole area of Cu Chi was heavily bombed, but most of the tunnels stayed intact. Later we saw a highly inflammmatory video about the war. Of course, the point of view was from the North Vietnamese side. Then it was off to the tunnels. They were amazing! People would stay in these tun nels day and night: eating, studying, fighting, of course, and yet the tunnels were less than a meter high! We got the chance to enter the tunnels at places that are still the originals and not expanded for "bigger people" as we were called. You had to squeeze through to get in. Then we entered another part of the tunnel that was 150m long. By the end of climbing through those pitch black tunnels that had bats in them, we were all sweating from the heat and our legs were exhausted! And that was only 150m We weren't building the tunnels or having to crawl for kms. It was amazing! It's incredible what some people can endure! You can't imagine it! During the war of course, all the exits, bunkers, and air holes were extremely well camouflaged. Then we went to a bunker where he had tapioca potato and this rice thing. Both of them could be made in advance so if they didn't have time to cook they could still eat. However, from eating the tapioca potato, many men have impotence problem s. The tapioca plant has 3 layers: a hard outer layer, a liquid, and the tapioca. The liquid is poisonous and so the tapioca plant should be soaked in water for 2 hours. Since this wasn't known at the time (or not done) some problems resulted from it.
After that we were taken and shown the traps used by the Viet Cong. All of them involved spikes of some sort and would either maim or kill you. The worst I think was this one was this one where if you stepped on the trap, those wheels that had spikes started to turn propelling you into the hole while ripping out your skin poking your organs. Hard to imagine! All of the other traps were similar.
Then we were off again and Eva and I were dropped off at the War Remnants Museum, which is by far the most sickening, depressing, and shocking museum I have ever been to. It depicts photographs of all the atrocities of the war. It's absolutely digusting, and disheartening to see what humans to do each other, and equally disturbing how governments justify, condone and advocate these acts. The pictures depicted atrocities commited by the Americans such as dragons bodies behind tanks, pretending to kill family members of children to get information, different forms of torture, smiling while holding decapitated heads in their hands etc. I am sure you get the picture. THen we saw the effects of Napalm, Agent Orange, Phosporous bombs in the population and many generations that followed: it cannot even be described, the types of deformities I have never seen. We saw photos of the country side being destroyed by bombs and samples of jail cells. Did you know that the Marican s and the South Vietnamese used the guillotine too? And all of this does not even begin to to truly describe the pictures we saw, and the picture can only offer us a small glimpse of how horrific it must have been. Obviously this museum was one sided, and for sure the other side commited the same types of horrors, however it's pathetiec how the U.S. government is so self-righteous than the rest about human rights. It's revolting, adnmot of all it's so devasting to see what humans will od to each other! How do people stop seing others as other human beings who have a right to live peacefully?
Well after that heaviness we decided to visit the Emperor of Jade Pagoda which has been our favorite in Vietnam so far. The temple is full of these grotesquesly huge figures. You start by seeing the 2 guardians on either side, and then behind 3 figures and in a row on either side of the 3 figures, are more figures. They look like a row of people waiting for someone important to come. It was really unique. And then it has been off to the Mekong Delta, which is where we are now in a small town called Chau Doc.
The Mekong Delta has been really beautiful though not quite what we had expected. It's very luscious and tropical in feeling with the humidity, cannals, and palm trees where the branches are really low to the ground. In some parts you feel that you are in the jungle, and in other parts you feel that you are in any small town. A long time ago, one of the of the kings built the cannals from freshwater. Building the cannals cost a lot of lives, but now the people of the Mekong are really happy because without this king they could not cultivate anything. The first day we took to bus to Mytho and then from there we took a boat that took us to turtle Island where we tried some tropical fruits and listened to some live traditonal Vietnamese music. From there, we took a small row-boat through a tiny little part of the river rowed by 2 elderly women! It felt like we were in the middle of the jungle: totally peaceful and hot, and unfortunately short. Then we took the boat to a dif ferent island that specializes in making coconut candy. I really liked them: they taste like coconut toffee. They start by using an old coconut (the brown ones that we are used to buying), they crack it open and mash the coconut into mush. This they cook and add sugar. After a while it is put on a board and left to harden. Once it cools down a litte bit, it is cut into pieces. After that we had lunch, and then we went to Pheonix island where it specializes in honey production. We had some delicious honey tea and I got the chance to wrap a snake around my neck. It was a baby snake that doesn't have any fangs yet, it could still strangle you though. It was a neat experience actually because the snake kind of shapes to fit your body. It wraps around you (without wanting to strangle you I should add). Then we spent a bit more time in the boat and then Eva and I switched groups (that was a one day group) and headed to Cantho.
In Cantho we started off by going to the floating market. This floating market isn't at all as impressive as the one near Bangkok. They are big ships who hang up the food they sell on bamboo. It was noisy and polluted. It was still interesting to see, but after seeing the one in Bangkok, it's not the same thing. Then we took the boat to the elephant bridge. That area was really nice as well because once again we were on a smaller boat and going through a smaller cannal. From there we went to an island that specializes in rice paper and noodles. They mix rice and potato and cook it for a while, then they lay it out and steam the mixture, then they lay it out in the sun for about 4 hours, and then they roll it through a machine to make the noodles. The noodles are really rubbery. Then from there we went back to Cantho and joined another group that was doing the 3 day tour.
With this group we stopped at a crocodile farm. In this farm there are over 10 000 crocodiles (or maybe they were alligators). Most of the crocodiles are exported to China where they are used for medicinal elexirs, food, and clothes. Some of the crocodiles are being conserved since apparently (and it's no surprise) there are no alligators left in the Mekong. It was interesting to see though: we saw babies to adults. When they are sunning themselves, they are totally immobile: they look like they are dead. The only time they moved was when a man came in to distribute some water. Then they all tried to bite him and he taps them lightly on the head and then they go away (these were smaller ones). I don't imagine they did that with the adult ones since they were kind of big. From there, we grabbed our bags and headed off to the pier to catch a 4 hour boat ride to Chau Doc. There were ran into the cutest kids that held Eva's hand and played with my hand fan. Later, when we to ok a picture, they all started to make these funky, kung-fu poses. They were adorable. Then it was the boat ride, and so we got the chance to see the villages from the water. Our guide told us that they are quite happy right now because the harvest season is over so now they can relax a bit. Vietnam is the second biggest exporter of rice in the world. Thailand is number one apparently. I thought it would be China. Our guide also told us that every year there are huge floods. Last year 300 people died, many children. Now they have built floating schools, which might reduce the number of deaths for the children. When the parents work, the kids were left by themselves so when the flood came they didn't know what to do. Now the government has put in money for these schools. I am not sure if that makes a whole lot of sense, but that's what I understood.
Finally, we are at this morning in Chau Doc. Chau Doc is considered a holy place in Vietnam because there are over 200 pagodas a little bit everywhere. This morning we went up Sam Mountain to see the Cavern Pagoda. It is a pagoda in a cave, if you didn't guess. It wasn't very special, but the legend behind it was kind of neat. Apparently, the founders in Vietnam of Buddhism were women. This one woman came to this cave, and lived in it. Later, 2 cobras came to her and told her that they wanted to learn Buddhism. She taught them and later died, and the cobras were never seen again. So now, at the entrance of the cave are 2 cobras that act as protectors of the cave. Our guide also told us that the reason why Buddhas sit on lotus flowers is because the lotus flower symbolizes the heart and mind. The root and the seed, which are dirty (the body) are not important. What is beautiful is the flower (the heart). The rest of the day we have free because the co mpany which we bought our tickets didn't let us know that if we were going to Cambodia that we didn't have to come for 3 days. It's kind of annoying since we are starting to feel pressed for time.
Chau Doc is very close to the border of Cambodia which is where we are off to next. We are taking a boat and going to Phom Phen (I know the spelling isn't right). Very close to here are one of the 2 killing fields of the Kmer Rouge. We are going to see the ones in Cambodia. In a few days, it will be 2 months that we have been travelling and we have another 2 months left so we are half way through our trip. The time in Vietnam FLEW by. We can't believe it, and the time will only fly by more quickly as we come to an end.
I hope everyone, wherever you are, is doing well. Good luck with school exams for those of you going to school. Take care everyone, and if you get the chance, I'd like to know how you are doing.
Lots of hugs,
Carolyn.
