5/17/02 Hoi An, Vietnam (Phillip)
Once again I forgot to bring my journal so I'll have to wing this entry. Okay, so after we left Hanoi we took the overnight bus down to Hue. Everyone had said Hue was the place for culture; the place for Vietnam. The bus journey was pretty insanely long, overnight with not much sleep. The four of us were playing a word game where you have to name a famous person and then you take the first letter of the last name and you have to find another famous person who's first name starts with that letter. We managed to make it last 4 hours and even had two independent 'judges' from New Zealand helping. It passed the time though.
Hue was a bit of a letdown. The Citadel is a massive collection of buildings built in 10km fort and surrounded by a moat. However, it's really expensive to get in and we didn't see it as being worth it. I did find some nice souvenirs though so if you're really nice to me you might get one. The other big thing to do at Hue is to tour the DMZ. Our group had grown to 10 now and we managed to charter our own tour! Got our own bus and guide and off we went at 6am. The DMZ is the area that was set aside to keep the North Vietnamese and the South Vietnamese (US) away from each other. The area is littered with burnt out tanks and other war scars. The tour itself was okay, our guide was cool, but the highlight had to be the Vihn Moc Tunnels. During the war the Americans dropped millions of tons of bombs and so many Vietnamese dug an elaborate tunnel system under the ground. The VM tunnels are unique in that they were dug for living in, rather than fighting. So within the tunnels 3-400 people lived their day-to-day lives.
The tunnels were very small. In Saigon there are other tunnels, which are more popular and have been enlarged for tourists. However, the VM tunnels are pretty similar to how they were. The conditions that people lived in were horrendous, 1 toilet for 300 people! (I think the line in the morning must have been long.) Anyway, I was totally impressed with the tunnels, but not enough to stay in Hue for another day!
Another bus this morning and we're now in Hoi An. Hoi An is famous for clothing (at least in the backpacker world) and you can get a suit, 3 shirts, a tie and custom made shoes for US$200. I was planning on doing this but I've opted not to. I'm not quite sure if it's worth the hassle of adding MORE weight to my backpack. Really I don't need it and that $200 will buy me a lot of opium in cambodia.... :)
The hotel we're staying in actually has a swimming pool. We've become masters at negotiating prices and are staying in a nice room for less than the dorm prices. It's still myself, Alex, Amy and Ernie and the other 6 people should be showing up tonight! There's a cool Irish couple traveling with us too. I definitely think I need to move to Ireland, I've only met great kids from there.
Right now in the other window I'm emailing STA Travel and trying to book a flight into Hong Kong. It's hard to do because connections are difficult, and ironically the cheapest way to go is to fly Bangkok to Hong Kong return, and then fly back through Hong Kong to London. You can't do a stop over in Hong Kong though. A complete waste of my time to return to Bangkok but it's $400 cheaper! Looking at leaving Vietnam before the end of this month and getting to Hong Kong on the 7th and to London a couple of weeks after. From there I'll book my South Africa
flight (found some great deals already).
Anyway, I'm leaving here tomorrow (after another swim in the pool) and off to Nha Trang for scuba Diving. Did I mention that my camera is crap? The film actually cost more than the camera, which sounded great. Except it keeps messing up the film half way through the roll and I have to rewind it! Quite frustrating... Plus I'm eating insane amounts of food here, really, 3 dinners etc. I think I might be pregnant! :)
It seems like everyone here is on the same circuit. Perhaps that's the problem with Vietnam is that everything is too easy. There are backpacker buses shuttling the same people to the same sights. I'm a bit disappointed with that since it makes it hard to meet local Vietnamese. I suppose that's why I'm cutting Vietnam short, the people I'm traveling with are great but I can meet Western people in the West and I'd rather get dirty. It's quite difficult to leave the beaten path since foreigners pay 4-500% more than locals for the same tickets and the mini-bus is cheaper and easier anyway. My Vietnamese vocab is getting bigger (willy you'd be proud!) and it's nice to shock the people selling at the market by bargaining in their language. Plus I reckon that would get a better price anyway. If anyone wants a full size poster of Ho Chi Minh, let me know! ;)
Posted by Admin at May 17, 2002 03:00 AM