Hanging in Hanoi

Yes, sorry about the continuous silly titles, but I try to spice it up somehow. I am in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi, as you may well have guessed, at the moment. Whilst a few days I was sweating like crazy, today I am not. It is damned cold here - well around 15 degree maximums. 

What can I tell you about Hanoi? It's got more bikes that Ho Chi Minh City for a start - and that's a LOT! The pollution is really noticeable here. My hotel in centred in the 'historic' old town. Lots of narrow alleys and motorbikes blocking your way. 

Lovely lake (pipctured below) known as the 'Returned Sword Lake'. It's am Athurian style legend that Heaven gave the Emperor many centuries ago a sword that that helped him defeat the attacking Chinese. A giant turtle or tortoise took it back at some point. The lake has walking paths all around it and where lovers talk and tourists snap. Interesting little temple on the island too.

 But Hanoi isn't all lakes and swords. No sir. I was up in time to get to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum yesterday. A long line of people queue up and slowly shuffle into the mausoleum where Ho Chi Minh's preserved body lies for all to see. A very... different sort of tourist attraction. He doesn't look the best to be honest, then again he died in 1969. However, his beard is very well preserved.
Below pictured is his museum where you can learn about the man at the head of Vietnamese independence. Again a rather skewed look at history, but interesting none the less. The Hoa Lo Prison Museum also shows a pro-Vietnamese version of events. The French kept political prisoners here in horrible squaller, whilst when the Vietnamese used it to hold POWs they were the most humane of captors you can imagine. Yes well, you'd have to ask the American pilots kept there.

Below is a street from the Old Town

 

So just a few more days left in Vietnam, including a trip to the much heralded Halong Bay. Unfortunately the weather won't be as warm as I would like, but still, it should prove rather spectacular... more when I return!

Hoi An and the throngs....

So. You know when you say you are going to Vietnam, people think kinda that's a bit off the track? Well, they are so totally wrong. I am here in Hoi An, the touristy touristy town that it is. This place is swamped. Okay, it's kinda on an inlet, but the tourists are everywhere! Okay, to my shame I am a tourist. I take photos and see the sights. And in fairness, it's a nice little plce with cute streets.

Vietnam is a curious entity for sure. There are a lot of tourists here, there are a lot of hotels, restaurants and bars. Far too many still for the tourists. They are competing big time with each other for a few thousand dong (the local currency). Okay, the hotel numbers aren't so bad, many are booked out here and there, but the restaurants - I don't know how they survive.

Walking around the old town of Hoi An - wait no, I rented a ricketey old bike which was great - so riding around the old town I had to screech to a halt regularly to avoid ploughing into groups of French tourists numbering 25-30 who were taking up the entire road from left to right. What can I say? There are a limited number of sights here from historical homes to 'Assembly Halls' (looking curiously like temples/pagodas) so it's hard to escape.

This morning I went to My Son, a Unesco listed site dating back to the Eighth Century. Full of tourists (including me I am not hiding). Well, it is Angkor's poor poor cousin. Who was really poor, and then got bombed by Americans. The best of it is the third picture I have included today. Still, something to see hey. And MUCH cheaper than Angkor.

Tomorrow I start my fifteen hour journey by bus to Hanoi. I have around a week left in Vietnam and then will be mosying on over to Laos. So for now....

River at Hoi An, opposite side featuring fishing boats

Dragon at the Cantonese Assembly Hall, Hoi An.

The best presevered temple at My Son, 25km from Hoi An. And some throngs.

Hue... to go!

Hey folks, just arrived in Hoi An from Hue. It's a bit of a back track but the hotels here were full so I pushed on to Hue and then went south to Hoi An.

Looks like my blog is being difficult too! Well Hue is really a nice little place. I liked it a lot. I arrived over quite a daring train journey from Nha Trang. The line is elevated along cliffs and the coast and you look straight down out of the window to see the raging sea crashing on the rocks. It was really cold the day I arrived too, this weather is very unusual. I was rugged up in my thermals, and used my sleeping bag and two blankets the first night.

The next day I visited the citadel, pictured above. It is huge, this is just the first section. It goes on and on and on! Some of it restored, some of it still in ruins, and if you go back far enough into the complex you hit something very unexpected - a tennis court!

By yesterday it had warmed up and was over 30 degrees again. I took a long day tour on boat and bus to see some places of interest. This was not our boat, this one carried, well, dirt. I caught a martial arts display which was very impressive (I entered with cycnicism too!). When a guy can crush mutliple ceramic tiles with his forehead, you have to be impressed right? Okay, so our tour guide spoke too fast and departed too much information to take in, but it was a good day.

This photo is of the first tomb we saw - that of Minh Mang. Similar to the citadel, it was still very impressive. More so as it rested on it's side.

It was tombs tombs tombs in the afternoon as my energy level fell. I was hacked! But at least I got to see the beautiful tomb of Tu Doc, its expansive gardens and grounds. Before I knew it it was today and I was on the bus to Hoi An. The journies continue! Vietnam is continuing to prove and amazing place to travel. Easy travel, beautiful, wonderful warm people. On the first of April I will be heading to Laos. So just ten days left in this amazing country.....



Photos of Dalat and Nha Trang

The Valley of Love, near Dalat.

Small train at Dalat station that took us up the hill and back.

Hills and greenhouses around Dalat.

Beach at Nha Trang.

Beach at Nha Trang - the weather is stormy now!

Na na na Nha Trang!

Yes folks it's time for another blog update.
I am now in Hue and I couldn't connect to blogger for some reason the other day but now I have!
I didn't do a lot in Nha Trang. I took it easy. It's the sort of place for doing that. Unfortunately the weather didn't want to help! Rain and cold for two of the four days. It's a pity because the beach is actually nice. There was some decent food there and a few nice bars and some really friendly people who kindly showed me around on the standard back of motorbikes. It's pretty touristy but I guess these days most of Vietnam is.
Next time I will try and fill my dear devoted readership in on Hue and provide some photos. Until then....

.... Different (?) Dalat

Getting away from the smoke and heat of HCMC was good. Dalat is up in the hills and is a fair bit cooler than HCMC, and with a comfortable room there there was little to complain about as I took in the footage of ravaged Japan and contemplated whether I will still be heading there. - answer, undecided.

Dalat has a lovely little narrow guage railway up to a pagoda which I enjoyed riding, and yesterday I did a city tour that took me on a cable car to yet another pagoda. Yes, there are a lot of pagodas here in Vietnam! After that there were other things of interest. A small 'roller coaster' went down a hill driven by gravity to the foot of a pretty little waterfall. Then it took me back up! Meeting some really friendly people, Vietnam is easy to travel around in and very friendly so I am giving it the thumbs up thus far, touch wood!

Then the tour took me to a palce called the 'Valley of Love'. Hard to explain... full of animal statues, swings, a lake, a chance to dress in traditional costume for photos.. quite a bizarre little place indeed. Still, the locals love it, it provides a cavalcade of photo opportunities.

I saw a few other things, but they were the more memorable ones. I have just arrived in Nha Trang, a beachside town where it's mid to high twenties and I plan to read and relax and write a bit even whilst I am here, and probably little else. See all you faithful readers in a few days!

Life, in Ho Chi Minh City

Tanks outside the Remnants of War Museum.
Bikes whizz pass as people play draughts in the street.

A form of hacky-sack played with shuttle cocks, played every evening in the parks.

Telecommunication madness.

Life in HCMC.

Ho Chi Minh City is a special sort of place really. Wide boulevards with trees and parks, life always on the go. More motorbikes than you can poke a stick at (which would be needlessly dangerous anyways), tourist hotels that bend over backwards for you... I heard some say they were bored by HCMC, others hated it. Not I, I found a certain affinity with the place in my four days there.

Now I am in Dalat, seven and a half hours by bus to the north-east, where last night I was greeted by horrible sights from Japan where I am due to visit next month. Will have to keep an eye on that situation. But for now let's talk HCMC.

As the photos testify it is quite a place. Craziness mixed in with a sort of calm, and a very chique and well air conditioned mall that I stumbled upon the other day! The wiring leaves a bit to be desired, that's he telecomunications that you can see in the picture. The power seems to be much safer, and indeed no black outs whilst I was in HCMC.

I braved the buses, the backs of motorbikes. I saw temples/pagodas, the reunification palace and the Church of Notre Dame. I spoke to a lot of locals, and partook in karaoke. The Daddy of them all though was the War Remnants Museum.

A somewhat biased account of the war that ravaged Vietnam from the early fifties through to 1975, it just goes to show the victors write the history. Some very confronting things in this museum too, a whole exhibit on the victims of agent Orange. Not for those with a weak stomach, there a photos of those affected both at the time and those born later. Why such a thing would be used (primarily to clear jungle) defies understanding. Anyone who says 'they didn't know the affects'.... that's a poor excuse for an excuse.

A moving exhibit as well to photographers/journalists who covered the conflict but didn't survive it. Whilst I was there a dignitary from Paraguay was also being shown the exhibits. Wonder what he made of it all. Outside the building stood planes and tanks, all American. Inside were the occasional bomb shells, all American. Interesting that all the remnants were American. It suggested the North Vietnamese didn't drop a bomb or do anything wrong...

But still. There you have it. I walked around HCMC and even did a Cu Chi tour without really thinking about the fact that 36 years ago this place was ending a horrible war that is burned into the memories of anyone involved and many more on that.

Yesterday I took a bus up to the highlands here - a place called Dalat. I have an extremely comfortable room and was last night transfixed to BBC World watching a disaster I can still on guess at the scale of. What a world we live in.

Venturing to Vietnam!

So here I am in Vietnam - Ho Chi Minh City, sometimes still known as Saigon.

I should start a couple of days back. On Sunday, still in Singapore, I ventured to the Changi Museum, remembering the second world war as it was in Singapore, and the prison that was used by the Japanese to intern anyone they thought might cause them trouble. In short, a nice little museum, small, but effective. I was expecting to see a few more grizzly sights, but thankfully it was more contained. Interesting but I felt I wanted to learn more about the occupation which seemed to occur extremely swiftly on the back of people not believing the Japanese would actually come to Singapore.

Onwards and upwards. I found myself on a Tiger Airways flight after very little sleep from Singapore to Ho Chi Minh City (hereafter referred to as HCMC) early Monday morning. Before I knew it it were we down in HCMC, an airport built right next to houses. I am looking down seeing the residential area thinking we are awfully close to them, a fence and we are down on the tarmac.

HCMC is quite a place. Unique in its own special way, it is certainly set up for backpackers. I have a lovely room on the sixth floor of this hotel, and the only thing missing is a lift! Aircon, double bed, fridge, TV... all I need. All the tours, buses and trains can be booked through here too, not to mention Visas for onward travel if needed. Outside it is backpacker central. Is that a good thing? Possibly... restaurants are overpriced for sure. But then I spent 8 dollars on burger chips and two drinks and thats not outrageous is it?

It's an area where people walk down the street and ply their wares. Sunglasses, photocopied Lonely Planets for very cheap prices and massages in the evening in your chair.

Yesterday I journied out on a tour to the Cu Chi tunnels and a strange temple in Tay Ninh. The 'Great Cao Dai Holy See' is dedicated to the mostly unknown religion 'Cao Dai' formed over 100 years ago recogizing an alliance between Victor Hugo, a Vietnamese poet and a Chinese revolutionary. It is a Christian sect. As a service took place the tourists, including a shameful me, piled in and watched and took photos. Many climbed up to the balconies to get a better view of the chanting and bowing. I tried to stand back at the back and justify this intrusion. How would one feel in a church in Australia if people came in and took photos? Hmmm.....

The Cu Chi tunnels are a group of tunnels stretching up to 200km, based around the area of Cu Chi, a little way out of HCMC. They were used in the.... "American War" as it's known here. I mean, the Vietnamese can hardly call it the Vietnam war can they?

Well, there are a range of things to see in the complex. I walked along the tunnel for about 15 metres but it's very cramped. Only about 1.2 metres high so very hunched over. They are at least twice the size now that they were in the 60s, as the VietCong used them to escape the opposition, or to pop out and suprise them. We also were shown a series of deadly traps used involving spikes. Amazing how many ways spikes can be used in a hidden hole in the ground. We also saw what life was like underground. Bomb shells from the Americans, and if you were keen, which I wasn't, you could fire off a few rounds from various guns. Shoulders optional, afterwards that is...

So more to follow. About to venture out into HCMC and see a few places today. So far I have only good things to say about Vietnam. Friendly, easy to get about, fairly clean streets too which I admit to not expecting! Very different from Singapore.... Photos when I get a chance, doesn't appear to be an attachment on this computer.

Singapore & the Future

So I am now into my fourth big day of the big trip.

It has already gone too fast for my liking!

Singapore has always been a strange entity to me. I never felt I understood it and I still don't. Where as Dubai and cities like it are built up from the influx of oil money, Singapore, a thriving metropolis with efficient public transport and many many more malls than Dubai, has always been a centre of commerce, built up over less than 200 years.

It's business that has made the city grow over time, and location has helped too. Riding the public transport here, the MRT, I saw first hand that technology is king. Everyone has some sort of device - or two - on their person, and they are incredibly absorbed in it. Getting a smile from someone on the MRT is like getting lemon juice from a nuclear reactor. Hmmm, I am king of the pointless analogies!

Still, I've been trying to spread the love and smiles with little success here. Apparently the mobile phone saturation is 140% in Singapore. That's more than 1 per person, and when you take into account the very young and the very old don't have one... yes well. Then there are the DVD and video file players, and little things to play games on... if technology went down tomorrow, so would everyone in Singapore.

Nevertheless, despite my constant musings on life in Singapore I have done a few little things since I have been here. There is some sort of resort island here called Sentosa. I took a ridiculously high cable car ride to get there. It passed over a giant cruise ship with well over 100 metres to spare. The island has many things of interest. A giant lion, Universal Studios things like that espeically built for the tourist.

I've seen many a mall, Clarke Quay, the hip entertainment district, found an old karaoke bar I visited in 2006 only to find it now full of hookers much to my chagrin. Marina Bay is nice, I decided to lie down there for a quick relax and was told by security that was strictly vorboden. Orchard road and its many underpasses left me giddy because of the number of people. All in their little digital worlds.

Please understand, Singaporeans are not rude or unfriendly. They just seem locked into their own little worlds.

Perhaps this is the future. And me travelling without a mobile...

This is all very familiar!

Hello folks hello folks!
The next big trip has begun! I am down safely in Singapore!
I have been having those pangs of worry (not mention an absoultely crazy lead-up week that I wasn't sure I would survive) about whether, at 35 I could still do this. Perhaps now I was the sort of traveller who could only stay in comfortable air conditioned digs with cable tv and room service. Hmmmm that sounds good right now...
but I digress!

Here I am in Ali's Nest, basically a homestay in a home.... ok that was obvious.... behind a sign that denotes some sort of trading company. Yes, no actual sign pointing out that this is the place. I have a cupboard with a fan and a padlock to keep the door closed. But this is just about the cheapest single room in all of Singapore, the boss is a nice guy and really friendly, and really it's all you need! The only thing that irks me is that I have to unplug the fan to charge my batteries!

So this is the first stop, we are under way! Vietnam beckons on Monday, there's some Laos, Japan, China... a lot of Asia as you can see!
so
to let you in on the preview - such as it is, around five and a half months of travel ahead, then to the Republic of Georgia, all going well, fingers crossed and touch wood, to teach English for three months.
Suppose I should learn to speak and write English first.......