Vietnam

Up early to catch the bus taking us from Siem Reap to Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), Vietnam (aka Saigon). The bus ride was pretty standard for SE Asia. The driver would turn the A/C on to full blast until you start shivering (75+ degrees F outside) and then turn it off until you were sweating. Meanwhile, he would honk at every change occurring (cars coming, cars turning, animals, clouds, etc.) and sometimes just to test the horn. Some of the honks were followed by a sharp swerving of this Greyhound-ish size bus to rapidly pass some poor vehicle who was slower, and ended up dangerously close to being in the ditch. Usually, mid-pass, he received a cell phone call which he had to take, and, fortunately for the passengers, this forced him to slow down his honking hand a little bit. At some point, he invariably popped in a DVD of popular Thai music karaoke, and turned the sound up till it hurt. Shortly after, the bus broke down, so the driver pulled over, removed his white button down, and (judging by the smell as he walked past later) bathed in diesel oil to somehow repair the engine. We got back to Phnom Penh, waited for 1.5 hours for the next bus taking us to HCMC. At the Cambodia-Vietnam border, the driver motioned for us to get out, dropped all of the bags on the ground and took off somewhere with our passports. Apparently, this is standard procedure but he never said a word to us. We grabbed our bags, wandered around lost for a while and then went back outside in search of our driver. We finally found him after 30 minutes and got across the border. Some more bussing, and changing to another mini-bus in HCMC at the bus company office, and we were finally dropped into the heart of backpackerland (cheap guesthouses, hotels) at 10 pm. After checking at about 15 guesthouses that were all full (with the help of a local who spoke not a word of English, just motioned for us to keep following her to the next place where she'd ask for us), a scooter (moto) driver told us he knew of one, and would charge us $2 to drive us there. We got on, he drove 50 feet, and dropped us at an overpriced hotel. Pretty sweet deal.

The next day, we took a cyclo (a 3-wheeled bicycle with a chair on the front, pictures in album) to see a Hindu temple, probably the only type of religious building we haven't seen yet. We walked to the Reunification Palace (the site of South Vietnam's Royal Palace) and the gardens surrounding it. After lunch was the War Remnants Museum. Some of the articles and exhibits were understandably a bit one-sided, but overall, the museum was well done and incredibly interesting/saddening. There were several captured U.S. tanks, howitzers, planes, and flame-throwers on the grounds outside, photos from journalists who were killed in the war, a MAG exhibit detailing the UXO (Unexploded Ordinances) problems in Vietnam, examples of the prison cells (Tiger Cages) used during the war, and an exhibit documenting the atrocities during and stemming from the war. The last was very powerful, with some of the photos of the inhumanity demonstrated during the war (burned victims of phosphorous bombs, DDT-induced birth defects, decapitated enemy soldiers) being hard to look at and comprehend. Dinner that evening was at a place that employs disadvantaged kids as cooks and wait-staff. A bit expensive (relatively speaking), but delicious and for a good cause.

Photos from HCMC (beware, some of the photos of the war museum are a bit graphic)

After having breakfast at the same sidewalk-vendor cart we'd gotten it from the day before, we were off on an 11-hour bus ride north to the beach town of Nha Trang. We saw the South China Sea for some of it, and rolled into a nice hotel for $8 that evening.

With the sun shining, Em was itching to go hit the beach the next morning. As we walking along the beach we noticed a Vietnamese guy running around, tossing his long hair back or laying in the surf posing for a camera, which another guy was taking pictures of the first guy with. It was very strange, like watching an 80's music video. It got even weirder when the guy being photographed came over and grabbed both of us and tossed his arms around our shoulders and the camera man continued shooting. We laughed because it was so weird but every time we tried to walk away, the guy would grab us and force us into a new pose, speaking only Vietnamese. We finally broke free after he threw himself on his stomach and started patting either side of him. We shook our heads no and damn near broke into a run to get away. So, if anyone finds naked pictures of us on the internet or in some travel pamphlet somewhere, know that it is not really us and we did not agree to whatever situation we may have been photoshopped into. We then grabbed a chunk of sand and sat soaking in the warmth. The bad news is that since Emily and I have never been outside in sunny weather before, we were a bit slow at getting the sunscreen on. After playing in the ocean, and losing Emily's sunglasses in said ocean (poor, poor sunglasses. I will miss you!), we noticed that we were a little pink. Back at the hotel, we saw that we were more of a reddish-purple, rather than pink! Stupid white people. We bought lotion and water, and have been dutifully using both ever since, trying to chase the skin cancer away with moisture. Dinner that evening was at a Mexican restaurant that, although not quite like the US, was far better than our Mexican food attempt in Rome

The next day was a touristy island-hopping tour by boat, a staple of visiting Nha Trang. At the first island, you could jump in the water and snorkel or swim. But our sunburns and the chilly wind had Em and I sitting in the covered boat drinking a beer and watching others. Lunch was served on the boat near the next island, a communal affair that was delicious with 11 different Vietnamese dishes. After lunch (and a game created by Joe, the tour guide, which entailed singing, dancing, and joke telling), it was back into the water for a free drink at Joe's "floating bar" (a 1-person inner tube with a board laid across it). We couldn't pass it up, so after slathering on the sunscreen, we swam out for 4 oz. of something that tasted like cheap Mexican vodka and a little kool-aid. The third island had a white sandy beach that Em and I sat on (underneath the shade of palm tree) and napped. The final island had an aquarium, with some interesting sharks, coral reef, sea anemones, and the like. That evening, we got on our first "sleeper bus" (think Greyhound with 3 wide, 2 high bunk beds instead of seats). Besides the pain of lying on the sunburn, the noise from the road, the bumps and lurches from the turns, and the annoying Australian girl yelling the whole length of the bus at the driver about how she was going to wet herself unless we stopped at a bathroom with real toilets instead of just the ditch at the roadside (prissy thing isn't going to enjoy the rest of SE Asia very much), it was a good night on the bus.

Photos from Nha Trang

At 7 am, we pulled into Hoi An. We tried to nap at the hotel, but since we couldn't sleep, we got breakfast. It was raining, so under an umbrella we walked the UNESCO certified old town. It was nice with a lot of little yellow shops selling all kinds of souvenirs and such. After some cafe time, watching the rain come down outside, we attended a Vietnamese cooking class at a local restaurant. It was a lot of fun, and the food we made was quite delicious (we plan on cooking it up at home in Seattle, so maybe you can join us... ). They didn't give us any kind of recipe book and they kind of hurried us through the steps, so we scribbled down recipes when we could and then revised them after the class at a bar over a beer. After a few more beers to help with our pool-playing, we got on the internet, where I discovered that my father had had a small heart attack and was, right then, already in surgery for a quadruple bypass. We searched all over town (much to the dismay of the huge, jumping rats searching through garbage) for an internet cafe or call center that would be open late enough for me to get alerted when he came out of surgery, but couldn't find a thing.

After a long night, I checked the internet as early as I could in the AM and discovered that everything had gone well, obviously a huge relief. We spent the rainy day talking to family on the phone, emailing back and forth about what had happened and such, and looking around the town a bit more.

Photos from Hoi An

In the morning, we took a bus for about 4 hours further north, past Danang, to Hue. We signed up for a bus that stopped at the Marble Mountains for some pictures but apparently the bus drivers didn't feel the need to stop. Once we got to Hue, we found a hotel run by an adorable older couple who didn't speak a word of English. It was still raining but we decided to brave it and checked out the Citadel, where the emperor lived and government was headquartered for hundreds of years (up until the 1940's).

Next day, we went on a moto bike tour of the city and country side. Of course, it was still raining out so we had on our most water proof clothes and wore plastic rain slickers from the tour company. Our tour guides were a married couple and were very nice and informative. They took us to see another old Japanese covered bridge, passing a few weddings parties along the way. We then went to a Pagoda where we got to watch the monks chant and pray for more than 30 minutes. We stopped at a roadside place and watched how the locals made incense. Em was forced to give it a whirl and had ridiculously short-looking arms in her rain slicker. After this, we drove up to an old bunker built by the U.S. and then onto one of the many tombs of emperors in the area. Last, they took us to another Pagoda in a beautiful spot near the river. The car which carried Quang Duc, the monk who, in 1963, burned himself to death to protest the persecution of Buddhists by South Vietnam's Ngo Dinh Diem's administration, is located here. That night, we tried to book a bus out of Hue for the next morning and found that the bus companies only run night buses. So, stuck we were for another day in rainy Hue. The next morning, we tried to take showers in the hotel room and found that we had no hot water. We went to the owners and explained to them with hand gestures that the water was cold. After several trips to our room in attempt to fix it, the owner changed out the entire outlet and we got two minutes hot water each. The owner's wife must have thought I (Em writing now) was cold because every time she came in and out of the room, she would rub my shoulders and my back in a motherly sort of way. The day was spent hanging out in coffee shops and reading. We were back to the hotel by 5:30 pm to be picked up by the night bus. The owners were there and were so nice and helpful, calling the bus company because it was late and the lady helping me zip up my pack and still practically hugging me the whole time. They also had a friend sitting with them and we saw the lady explain to her friend our dilemma of the morning, using the same hand gestures that I had used earlier and laughing at our crude sign language. As we were setting off for the bus, the lady tossed my small backpack onto her front (like all the backpackers wear them when carrying two packs) and took off towards the bus. It was so funny and a great way to remember these wonderful people. These two were some of the nicest people we met in Vietnam, even though we spoke not one word of each other's language. As we were getting on the bus, the driver asked us where we were from and we said the U.S. His friend then made an X sign toward us and said he didn't like Americans. One of the worst people we've met in Vietnam. We continued on, keeping our eyes peeled for the American hater and ended up getting no sleep on the night bus.

Photos from Hue

At 7 am, the bus stopped and we were told that the bus was broke down and all tourists were to get off here and they would provide taxis to our hotels. Lying, cheating shits, may all the scammers burn in hell. We retrieved our bags from under the bus only to find that mine was soaking wet with stinky water. We found a taxi, which was not free, and it was then I realized that my camera and cell phone were soaked too. After some time, we found a hotel and grabbed some breakfast. Back at the hotel an hour later, I emptied my bag and scrubbed it in the bathtub to get rid of the stench. Mike hung up the clothes line and we turned on both the fan and AC in hopes that my bag would be dry before I had to pack it up again. My shoes were wet from the moto ride in the rain a few days prior and I had had them on the outside of my pack under the bus, so they were also soaked. I pulled out the insole of the first shoe and went to pull out the second when I saw something was in my shoe. I jumped back, screaming and scared Mike. He immediately thought it was a spider and went towards my shoe to take care of it; aww...how sweet. I yelled at him to stop because whatever was in my shoe was large and had a shell or something on its back. This thought freaked both of us out for a minute and we stood back wondering what to do. We finally bucked up and took the shoe into the bathroom where Mike tried to dump whatever "it" was into the toilet. However, "it" held on for an extra few seconds and landed outside of the toilet. After much shrieking by both of us, we realized it was a crab. What to do with a crab, when the toilets and plumbing can't even handle toilet paper? Mike finally decided to toss it of the balcony; sorry crab, but it was already missing 3-4 legs. This crab travelled in my shoe swinging outside my pack from the bus, on a taxi, a 25 minutes walk through town and then into the hotel room! Thus ends the mysterious shoe monster story. We deducted that the stupid bus people must have stored freshly caught sea creatures along with all of the tourist's backpacks, hence how I ended up with a crab in my shoe and the stench of my bag.

(Mike typing again). After the crab fiasco and an attempt at a nap after the long, no sleep night bus, we went out. We walked to a nearby lake, upon which there was an island with a museum. The lake is named after a turtle that supposedly took a powerful sword from a victorious Vietnamese warrior and took it to the bottom of the lake, where it supposedly still lies. Not that exciting, surprisingly. Next up, a walk through the Old Quarter (near where we were staying and in the backpacker district). Street after street, block after block of shops, bustling scooters and people everywhere and always the incessant honking! The shops were interesting in that you had one block dedicated to shoes, then the next would be jewelry, then belts, etc. We ate that evening at a sidewalk beer/food cafe with a bunch of locals sitting on 1 foot high plastic stools at short plastic tables. Back at the hotel, we took advantage of a TV and cable and watched "Flatliners" on Cinemax. Not a good show, but nice to watch a movie.

On our walk to the Temple of Literature, we stopped at a locals pho (noodle) shop. It was good, but since we never saw a menu and never asked the price, we were a little disheartened when the 12 year old boy there ripped us off and charged us at least 50% more than he should have for it. What do you do, beat him up? The Temple of Literature was a Confucius university in Vietnam for hundreds of years. Behind the walls lie some beautiful old Vietnamese architecture, landscaping, fountains, statues, and stone stella engraved with the names of all PhD recipients since the 1400's. On the walk back, we grabbed orange juice (I was starting to feel a cold come on) and then walked to the water puppetry theater we planned to attend that night, just to find that it was sold out for the next 2 days. We were bummed, as this "unique-to-Vietnam" theater was something we'd both been looking forward to, but hadn't thought to book tickets ahead for. After a bite of food, we went back to the hotel. Feeling miserable by this point (4pm), I crawled into bed with all of my clothes on and a case of the chills, and slept intermittently until the next morning. I think that Em puttered around the room, watching TV and such, but you'd have to ask her. The next morning, we got up early to catch our taxi to the Hanoi International Airport to fly to Phuket, in southern Thailand.

Photos from Hanoi