Overall thoughts

Well it's been a couple of weeks since we got back and everything is back to normal. We've had time to decompress and to gather our thoughts. Being away from Vietnam again gives us a chance to really reflect...

We went to a lot of cities, learned about many cultures and experienced wonderful things. What are some of the favorite things? Visiting family in Nha Trang and Saigon, drinking soybean drink on the street, eating rau muong (water spinach)... and countless many other things.

What would we do different? Spend more time in each city... at least 2-3 days more in each city. The next time we go back I'd like to visit some of these places again and just wander.

What have I gained from this trip? Here are some things that I can think of offhand:

- I have gained confidence in my spoken Vietnamese. I know that I can communicate well enough to get what I want and to understand what people are saying around me. I know that I need to improve my reading/writing before my next trip back bccause it will make me a better prepared traveler.

- I got the chance to meet many members of my family that I have only heard about.
This strengthens the family bond that we have and connects me back to my roots. We've actually called over to Vietnam numerous times since we got back to the states.

- I understand where some of my personality traits and thinking processes come from. I feel that being flexible and being able to cope with things is a part of all Vietnamese people. Being able to see the good things in the bad, being able to adapt to ever-changing conditions. Not giving up and finding a way to get what you want. I see these traits in the people that we met throughout the trip.

- I've learned to appreciate historic things more. People know me to be a tech guy who is always looking at the latest and greatest... but being in a country with so much history made me look at the ancient and appreciate it. Seeing ruins that have lasted thousands of years is just amazing.

- The sea is huge and beautiful. The last time that I've seen it was when I was 4 and leaving Vietnam.

- Lastly, I've realized that I'm a simple person. Tina called me a "country-bumpkin" because I like some of the simple foods and the countryside more than the city :). There's nothing wrong with being a bumpkin... ah yes, how sweet it sounds.

Hrm, I should write my blog entries out before I just sit and type. Well it's late so off to bed! I'll try to write about swallow's nest tomorrow and get some pictures up of that.

We're alive and new photos

Well we're back home safe and sound. We both are sick, we both have some sort of a cold. On top of that, coming back to 30 degree weather sucks.

I've uploaded more photos. There is one more set that I haven't sorted out yet but everything is up there for the final few cities. You should see lots of traffic shots from Saigon.

I'll write up more thoughts when I wake up from my next nap :)

Narita Airport

Well we're sitting here in Tokyo, looks like our flight is delayed till 5:45pm instead of the 4:10pm. They were having maintenance problems and are changing out planes.

That's about all the fun that we have for updates.

More photos are up

Yay, I'm finally uploading. Hopefully I'll have photos through all of Vietnam up today. I want to get in some of the traffic photos of Saigon. Click on the photo on the right for updates!

Bangkok Again

Well we're in Bangkok... and we have great net access. So I'll do some photo uploads. We fly out at 6am so we check out 3am.

Photos, costs, and traffic

Yes I know, I'm behind on photos. I'm sorting them right now... I'll get them posted soon.

So tired, we've been on a whirlwind tour of places. I want to get photos up of Nha Trang and the family... and also family in Saigon.

Well we went on a shopping spree today. Lotsa toys and lotsa clothes. It's still hard to think about conversions.

Here are some sample costs:

$1 USD = 16,050 dong (VND)

- 2 km taxi ride: 15,000 dong
- 1 steamed bun (banh bao): 10,000 dong
- 3 bowls of pho and 3 drinks in a restaurant: 60,000 dong
- 10 course meal, 16 beers, 12 pops for 10 people: 100,000 dong
- t-shirts in the shopping area: 30,000 dong
- bottle of pop or beer anywhere: 15,000 dong or $1US
- A Honda Civic: $60-70,000 USD because of the taxes

Vietnam is like Vegas. There's a cab everywhere, you can't cross the street, and in the big cities, there are lights everywhere. There are between 6-7 million people living in Saigon. The city is amazingly packed... wait, not even packed, it's SUPER packed. Since everyone rides around in a motorcycle, scooter, moped, or bike... you get more people on the road at once then you would in cars! I've got photos that would make you sick. During rush hours... 6-9 am and 3-7 pm, you can't cross the street. From 9-10 pm the trucks start rolling through, this brings on more traffic. I can't wait to get these photos up...

Well time for bed, I'll write more. As I said, I'll put up pictures and even after we get back, we'll keep posting till you see a post that says, "That's it!". It's the best way to share the photos with everyone.

Long-awaited update

Well it's been a while since we've been able to get a decent connection. I hope to be able to upload tons of photos at some point, guess I'll have to spend some time sorting them.

We went through Nha Trang and saw the family. Man that is great... we had the 80th birthday for my aunt and visited the old family home. There's too much to write about but I'll be sure to write more and more when I get a chance.

Now we're in Da Lat. What a cool town. It's in the mountains about a mile up from where we were. It's terrific,, the views are wonderful. The weather is dry and cool... well a nice 60 degrees or so.

Just got back to the hotel, had some fresh soybean drink on the street, nice and boiling hot! Whoa!

Talk to you all later, time to work on photos.

Haircut

Hey! I got a haircut in Hoi An! Mohahah! It rocks, no more great clips for me, barbers only.

Cost me 50,000 dong so about $3 USD. He cut my hair, shaved the hairline with a straightedge razor, and gave me a shave with a straightedge as well. Then I got a head massage with a machine... and back too. Wow, great service!

Pictures to come!

Charles

Hue Hotel

We FINALLY have net access. I'm uploading more photos and after dinner I'll try to caption them. I think Tina's going to do some writing too :)

See you all in a bit!

In Hue!

Well we got a chance to go out on our junk and visit Halong Bay yesterday. It was terrific! The islands look beautiful and we walked through one of the caves that was all lit up. That is definately some of the most beautiful scenery that I’ve seen... we also saw some of the fishing boat villages and boat vendors. Lunch was amazing, fresh prawns, fresh whole crab, fresh fried fish... all great! Nothing like this is available in Minnesota.

While I’m at it, Vietnam is sure technologically advanced for such a small country. Their cell phone coverage is next to none. You can use your cell phone from the most remote village that is only accessible via ferry to inside the caves in Halong Bay and out in the middle of the bay. I have never seen such amazing cell phone coverage. That’s what you get though when you have only one standard and everyone has to use that technology... peering on other antennas.

We left for the airport and Hue, getting there a bit early. Hue was hit hard with flooding, we had heard that they had up to 2 meters of water on the streets at some points! Highway 1 was flooded out and we could see the damage in the trees that had been knocked over and even a billboard that the water shot through. It was dark so I didn’t get a photo of that but hope to today as we tour. After a storm, the city becomes extremely humid... so badly that I had to change out of pants into shorts immediately.

There is a peculiar accent in Hue that surprised me when I first heard it. I heard Quang talking to the tour group in Hue on his cell and he asked if I understood any of it. It was so hard! Their way of speaking is very sing-song! They place accents in odd places and it makes it really hard to understand. I speak with a southern accent and in the north I had a decent time (only ordering the wrong item once... instead of tea, I got a certain brand of beer). i’ve been told that the Hoi An accent will also be hard.

We brought our laundry out to drop off and get it washed the next day. We then went out to find dinner... Quang, Tina, and I. Everyone else was too tired. Most of the shops were closed due to power outages from the storm. We found a little hole-in-the-wall shop and he ordered Hue specialities for us. After we ate, we had some tea and then the power shut off in the city. We finished up our meal and walked home by cell phone light... the hotels all had generators going so they were lit up.

Let’s hope that I can get some internet access in the room at some point. They can’t seem to activate my network. I’m typing this and will look for a network jack somewhere to plug in. I need to upload my photos home :)

My thoughts so far

Vietnam is definately an adventure.

I realized that I'm pretty bored of the city, especially on a vacation. The countryside and small towns are what I'm interested in. Maybe it's my roots showing or just simply the way that I was brought up. I'm really glad we got a chance to see the Halong area so far, waiting to go to the center region of the country. That should be beautiful.

I love food here, we're not eating enough authenic food/larger shared portion type of home-cooked meals yet though. I think the tour company is shooting for some comfort for the guests. The food in the north is amazingly bland and boring. I'm really anxious to eat more from the coast.

Americans don't eat much compared to the Viet people who are here. Put some food out and the Americans will pick at it and eat small amounts of things, the Viet people will not leave any waste. I think that the Vietnamese mindset is still that of famine and hunger. It's closer in history than the US depression. Americans are also kind of put off by the thought of eating dog meat but people around here just don't care.

Speaking of the people, it's very interesting to be able to understand people. Let me give you a few examples:

• While walking the markets and taking photos, the ladies running the dog meat stand said, "Why are you taking photos?" She told the group to get out and not take photos. The rest of the group didn't understand this but I did. It hurts because some of these people are embarassed by the situation that they are in and don't want others to see it. They don't want tourists walking through their country and taking photos of their poor lives... their pride is hurt.
• I've been confused as not a tourist because people are surprised that a Vietnamese person would take the tour. At our home dinner, the whole group was greeted and they kind of overlooked me. I sat down and they were surprised. I spoke Vietnamese to the hosts on my end of the table and had a discussion with them and forced the group to speak English and figure it out on their own. Tina listened in and talked a little as well. That's definately a surprise for most people.
• We ran into some kids and one of them dropped their bike. I helped pick it and and told them to be careful in Vietnamese, the little girl said, "Are you Viet?"

I asked Quang if I 'look' Viet enough. He said that I'm too clean cut and the way that I dress would make me stick out. People here are impressed that I can speak and understand, as am I. I can understand quite a bit... was afraid that I couldn't. Speaking is pretty good, there are words that I don't know but it's working out. I'll have to let Tina tell you how she feels about the language so far.

Traffic is intense. The rule of law is pedestrians have right of way over motorcycles and cars have right of way over everything. People pass on the right and the left with no hesitation and pull U turns everywhere. They drive in the wrong lane of the one ways and really don't care. Speed limits are suggestions. You'd never get anywhere if you did it. If people say that Bangkok is noisy, Vietnam is worse. The only thing that you hear are car and bike horns everywhere. That and everyone flashing their lights at each other. I rode in the front seat of a small bus two nights ago... I couldn't believe the driving! The bus also pulls over for photo stops anywhere it wants. We've blocked roads and nobody cares.

The only good thing about the traffic is that it is all motorbike traffic. 90% of the veichles on the road are motorbikes. Regular bikes you don't see in the city much. I heard that the government charges 100% tax on a car built in Vietnam and 200% on an imported car. Toyota, Hyundai and BMW have local plants so they are considered built locally. This sort of a tax keeps the number of cars down to the very rich and diplomats. We saw a Ford Explorer with Virginia plates. Gas is about as cheap as it is at home.

Employment. Everyone works. You either work for someone or you're self employed. We are constantly followed by solicitors on the street selling T-shirts or post cards. This is non-stop but they only target the tourists. If you don't have skills to get a white collar job, you'll sell something. Everyone works, young and old.

Pride. The Vietnamese people are very proud. As I said earlier, people don't want to be caught doing something that others would think lowly of them. People will run away from someone taking photos... well from me, not necessarily the American tourists in the group. The fronts of their houses are painted beautiful colors while the sides and back are still concrete gray. This is because it's not visible and as important. They are proud of their families and of their elders. We always get introduced to others in the family when you talk to them and their family is nearby.

The people are strong... hard workers and healthy. The old are still as witty and spry as the young. The morning tai chi around Hoan Kiem lake was really cool. The people live in a world of being with others and find reasons to congregrate with others. This is just a natural feeling.
Machinery is not found much here. Most agriculture is still human powered. This adds to the strength that you see. The tour group asked if they use tractors for harvest. A tractor would be like going to the moon for these people. They couldn't afford mechanized agriculture ever in their lives.

Back to my original thought, the countryside is beautiful. I'm sitting in the hotel room and looking outside. The mist is rolling in and I can see outlines of the islands in the bay and also of the ships. The sun is slowly breaking through the clouds... every minute is another photo shot. This is beautiful. Yes! I can see more islands! The mist is lifting!

I'm a simple man, give me some rolling hills or some mountains and I'll be happy.

That's it for now. Time to pack.

Xangsane typhoon and other event updates

Well we're not outta here yet. We are going to see if we can go out on the boats today or at least down a river to see if we can get to some islands. Then we'll see if we can fly to Hue, our next city, which was where the storm was pretty strong. We hear that there is waist-high water in some areas. We will have to go back to Hanoi either way and all the hotels there are booked.

We heard that the skybox level of our hotel in Hoi An, the top floor, was blown clean off the building. Da Nang is devastated and our guide said that the one of the cities in the storm's path looked as if it was just totally bombed by B-52s.

All travel to the central region is stopped. Trains are told to stop on the tracks because they don't want people to go through the flooded areas. Planes are landing everywhere and waiting. Our hotel is full of tourists, we've maxed out the capacity of the hotel. They couldn't even serve food properly since there were so many guests.

This is the worst storm this year... 6 named storms. We've had some deaths but we're not sure yet. Power is being restored everywhere.

Here's an article from CBSNews.

We picked up Vonage service and made some calls home. So we've checked in a little bit. Sound quality is pretty good even though we're going over hotel wireless and I can only get about 5k/s downloads. I made the front desk move their wireless antenna closer to our room because we didn't get a signal. I needed to upload photos and blog. Oh dog photos in Hanoi folder. we put everything in folders, makes for easier viewing for everyone. Halong bay is the newest folder and I'll put more in later after today.

Time to do some repacking, distributing the weight between suitcases.