Well, its about 9:30 pm and we're a few minutes into an overnight train ride from Lao Cai on the Chinese border back to Ha Noi. Today marks one week passed in Vietnam, and two weeks in total since we've taken off from San Francisco, and it already seems like much longer than that. My impressions of Vietnam thus far have been skewed to both ends of the spectrum - the people have been very warm, friendly, helpful and eager, as well as pushy, intrusive, and generally annoying. The land, culture and towns have been both beautiful, industrious, proud, corrupted, inefficent, and destroyed.. Maybe that's getting a bit harsh already - but then again I was never one to pass judgement slowly. Anyways, as Ashley sleeps on the top bunk, I'll try and recap the past week.

The plane flight over from Hong Kong to Hanoi was only an hour and a half, which was a welcome change. I had picked up a bad head cold in Hong Kong, and was having a terrible time with my ears while decending, until a nice Vietnamese lady gave me a bottle of menthol oil to help out, and that's come in handy quite often. We took a cab from the airport into Hanoi at about 6pm, which proved to be our first introduction to what we like to call the Hanoi 'worth a shot' attitude. The cab driver actually stopped in the middle of the highway to take a look at the hostel name and address I had written down in my notebook to see where we were going. When we got down to the old quarter of Hanoi, he didn't take us there, but instead took us to his 'friend's' hostel. But, after telling those guys we weren't interested, he took us where we wanted to go. So, while slightly annoying, it seems to be the way everyone there operates - The moto guys will watch you tell one moto across the road that you don't want a ride, but when you cross the road, they'll ask you as well, because hey, 'its worth a shot'.

Anyways, Hanoi is wonderfully chaotic. It took a day to get used to crossing roads when hundreds of motorbikes are coming at you from every way possible. Walking is also problematic because the sidewalks become massive parking lots and food stalls during the day. I read somewhere that 70something million people live in Vietnam, and almost everyone of them owns a motorbike or a bicycle. We stayed at the Little Hanoi Hostel where the owner Nam was quite good to us. Helped us out getting tickets up and back to Sa Pa, with an upgrade thrown in for free. Rooms ran 20$ a night, and Ash was very pleased when she saw that the Hotel name was embroidered on the blanket. I was a little slowed down in Hanoi because of that Hong Kong cold, but we managed to do quite a bit in Hanoi.We got a good feel of the old quarter, and got to really enjoy it. You can get cups of Vietnamese coffee from street vendors for about a dollar a cup, and its very very strong. Bia Hoi is another Ha Noi tradition, where fresh beer is brewed daily and delivered to many shops around town, that then sell it for about .50 cents a glass. You see a lot of men sitting around on plastic chairs at all times of day drinking the stuff, and we've had a few, and they are quite good too.

We also got to see Ho Chi Minh, alive and in person. Well, not actually alive, but embalmed and surrounded by a lot of pomp and cirumstance, but non the less, very very cool. It's quite funny to think that while communism teaches cremation as a way to preserve land, and that Ho Chi Minh actually reqested it, all of this was built. Also, in the greater confines of the Ho Chi Minh area was his house, where he lived and worked from the 40s to the 50s, as well as his two room house on stilts where he lived, worked, and ran the Vietnam war from the 50s until he died in 69. All in all, a very cool morning.

Water puppet theather is another distinctly Vietnamese tradition. We went to one show at the national theater and I was quite impressed - I hope we have time to go back one more time while we are in Hanoi - and at 20,000d a ticket, its quite a deal. So, to explain, water puppets are like regular puppets, except there are no strings, the stage is a giant pool of water, and there's lots of smoke and fire. I'll try and find a website and post it here at some point to explain. (1.23.08) Online performances from Thang Long.

Onto Sa Pa. Sa Pa is a town in the Tonkinese Alps that was originally built and occupied by the French until they got kicked out. Now, it has become a major tourist destination because of the many ethnic minority tribes that live and work in the area, as well as the great hiking options. We headed up looking to get some fresh air after the pollution of Ha Noi. We stayed at the Auberge Dang Trung, which I would definitely recommend to anyone. We got a room on the top floor with awesome views of the town and the valley below with a fireplace for 20$/night. However, being that it is currently winter there, it was cold. The first day the entire town was completely fogged in, so we just spent our time trying to stay warm by the fireplace.

Must have nodded off for a second there. Or a few days, whatever. Back in Hanoi now, heading to Ha Long bay tomorrow morning for a two day trip so we will definitely have some pictures for you after that. However, I wanted to finish up on Sa Pa and the North, and today in Hanoi.

Sa Pa - like I said, was once a resort town built by the French, and I was surprised to see how large it was. I was also surprised, and much more than that, disappointed, to see how many of the local minority tribes have embraced tourism. More than embrace it, they generally follow you around town trying to get you to buy their crafts. The calls of 'You buy from me, you buy from me' seemed to come from every direction. I saw many tourists hasseled into buying things they didn't want. We too were victims of that, but to an even worse degree when we took a moto northeast to Ta Phin, which I hoped was far enough out to not be too corrputed by this mentality. When we arrived, we were followed by six women who showed us around town and were quite nice. They invited us into one of their houses, but once we were in, we were immediately surrounded and had all of their goods pushed into our faces. We got out of there as quickly as possible, but were pestered until the edge of their town to buy something. Now, what to make of all of this? It was the greatest degree of tourism based change in a traditional village that I have seen - many houses now had satalitie dishes on them (probably should have been a sign something was amiss) - but who is to say that their lives are better or worse? I certainly see it as worse - I wouldn't tell anyone to go back there, and I would actually tell them to stay away from Ta Phin. Now, in 5, 10, 15 years of treating tourists like that, I would be surprised if anyone goes back there, and then where does that village stand? But do those people who live there think it is worse? I'm sure it won't be the last time on this trip we see the negative impact that tourism has (that I perceive). So, how do we as tourists make sure to leave no trace, when fundamentally our presence and dollars make a large impact?

All of that being said, Sa Pa was quite nice. We ate almost everyday at Viet Emotion, simply because of the giant fireplace they had there, and met quite a few other people there that enjoyed it as much as we did. The owners there seemed to like us too, and gave us a very nice discount off our last meal in Sa Pa. While Ta Phin was quite unpleasent, the walk back from Ta Phin was beautiful with sharp limestone cliffs and terranced rice paddies as far as you could see. On the fourth day we rented a moto ourselves and drove around Vietnam for the first time. This was a great, if not a bit cold time, as we drove about 30km south to the town of Ban Ho. But, a stop on the side of the road for a cup of vietnamese drip coffee helped with the cold.

On Sunday, we visited the markets of Bac Ha, and I enjoyed this much more than Sa Pa. Ashley didn't quite enjoy the ride out there though, which was a 1 hour trip on paved roads from Sa Pa to Lao Cai, and then 2 hours on windy, bumpy, unpaved roads from Lao Cai to Bac Ha. On a sidenote, Lao Cai is on the Chinese border, and is the first place that the Red River enters Vietnam. It was largely destroyed by the Chinese when they invaded Vietnam in 1979 (which I did not know), so much of the town had been rebuilt. But onto Bac Ha - these markets were quite impressive as they seemed to consume the entire town. The ethnic minorities here greatly outnumbered the Vietnamese and even the tourists, and the atmosphere was much more relaxed as they went about their business in the markets. There are 14 (?) different minority tribes that come to the Bac Ha markets, and I believe most of the photos we posted were of the Flower H'Mong people, who stand out because of their bright embroidery. However, I could be completely wrong on that, as some of the tribes dress very simiarly. We had some fresh sugarcane from the markets for 4,000d and took a walk through one of the closer villages later in the afternoon. If there was one place I could go back to in the North, Bac Ha would be it.

Today in Hanoi, Ashley went shopping for some silk here in Ha Noi, I'm waiting to see what she comes back with (and how much it cost). I walked around quite a bit, saw the Hanoi opera house, the Hilton that was built next to the opera house, which is called the Hilton Hanoi Opera, and then I went to the real Hanoi Hilton, the Hoa Lo Prison complex. The prison speaks highly of the Vietnamese comrades who rebelled against the murderous French. It also has a number of photos of American POWs playing basketball and laughing, as well as pictures of protests of the Vietnam war from around the world. So, the propaganda was quite interesting, but the prison itself and the instruments of torture were quite horrific looking.

Been on the move a lot the past week as we visited Ha Long bay and Ninh Binh before taking the overnight bus to Hue, touring the DMZ, and then heading further south to Hoi An, where we currently are. So, to recap the past few days, we finished up all of our business in Ha Noi, and shipped it all home. I can't imagine the route that box will take over the next three months when it will hopefully show up in New York. We did the north in the off season, which has its pros and cons - pros being that there are still quite a few tourists, but not as many as there would be in the summer months, when apparently traffic at some of the more popular sites, like Hang Sung Sot and Tam Coc becomes almost stop and go. Cons are a few - the weather is generally colder and rainy, and the rice is out of season, which is why you will see a lot of brown muddy land in some of these pictures.

We took a two day trip to Ha Long bay, (which means bay of the Decending Dragon) to view the karst and the caves. We went out with AP Tours, for 59$/person for 2d/1n, which came in about the middle of the price range of tours that were offered. Things that were highly recommended on thorn tree came in at about 107 - 130$ per person, which was a bit out of our budget. I think the boat overall was fine, I do have one gripe with it that i'll mention later, but we didn't sink - even though we did hit a rock at night and were stuck there for about 4 hours until the tide came up! Yea, when the crew starts to run around frantically and pictures fall off walls, you know you hit something pretty hard. Anyways, we visited one cave, Hang Song Sot, which translated means 'Amazing Cave', and it was pretty cool - Ha Long was designated a world Heritage site in 1994, and the limestone caves and cliffs that are there were formed over 2 milllion years ago while they were still underwater. If the weather was nicer, I would definitely recommend 3d/2n, but since it started pouring on the 2nd day, we were happy to get out of there.

Onto Ninh Binh (remarkably similar name to a place in Australia) which is called Ha Long bay on land, because of its simliar geography. However, instead of ocean, these caves and clifs are surrounded by rice paddies. We stayed at the Xuan Hoa II, which was a bit out of town, but quite nice for 15$/night. The next day we took an awesome bike ride through the countryside to visit Tam Coc, Bich Dong temple and Mua Cave. Tam Coc is essentially a stream that runs through rice fields and awesome scenery and goes through three different grottos. Its a very enjoyable ride, if you can get over the floating convience stores (see pictures) that pester you to buy stuff, as well as the rowers who know that they have you trapped on their boat for two hours and try and get you to buy stuff, and then ask for tips (not a Vietnamese custom). Seems as though this tourism thing has penetrated everywhere. I was glad we did Tam Coc in the off season though, because at times we were the only ones on the river - very cool. Bich Dong is an old temple that is built into a cave - you have to go through the temple to find the stairs and then the path that lead to the top of the mountain. Mua caves is a 4 k bike ride from Bich Dong and Tam Coc, and gives excellent views over the entire valley, as well as the river that we rode through Tam Coc - however, there are quite a few stairs to the top - Ryan was none too pleased after biking all day.

The overnight bus ride to Hue was unpleasent at best - going to have to get the sleeper seats to get down to Nha Trang - but Hue itself was awesome. Hue was literally leveled in 1968 by the American forces who reclaimed it after the NVA and VC had captured it during the Tet offensive. Its main heritage site, the Hue Citadel and Imperial palace were largly destroyed, and although the main structures have been rebuilt, there is still much work continuing on these sites currently. Hue is split by the Perfume river - the picture of Hue in my mind was something out of Full Metal Jacket - soliders marching along the Perfume river at night with the town burning around them - happily though, it is now a quite different picture. Most of the town has been rebuilt, and it appeared rather affulent, with many art shops and cafes lining the central streets. We did a very long one day tour of the DMZ which is about 75 kilometers north of Hue. Much of this area north and south of the 17th parallel and the Ben Hai river (which marked the center of the DMZ) has been reclaimed by rice fields and rubber and coffee plantations in the hills. Because of this, most of the sights were uneventful, but one could only imagine what hell this area was 40 years ago. We saw the Rockpile, an area used as a forward observation point for US Marines, the Khe Sanh combat base - scene of an intense 77 day siege which provided a diversion for the Tet offensive -, and the bridge and road that were once part of the Ho Chi Minh trail. However the only one worth visting and the last stop of the day was the Vinh Moc tunnels, which housed an entire village of Vietnamese civilians of approximately 1,200 after the devestating bombardment by the US forces. Seventeen children were born in these tunnels during the war, in the designated 'maternity room' 15 meters underground. A heavy dose of pro-Vietnamese propaganda came with all of these sites.

Onto happier things and Hoi An, a Chinese fishing village dating back to the 2nd century. Some of the buildings in the old quarter where we are staying date back to the 15th centruy, when the area came under Vietnamese rule, and the area was largely spared by the war (Da Nang, the large US base, is only 30 km north). The sun looks like its trying to make its way through the clouds so I think I'll end here and head to the beach for the afternoon. Wish we could stay longer here, but with only 14 days left on the Vietnamese visa, we need to be moving on.

We spent about 27 days in Vietnam, and this will be our first post in about 2 weeks, so I'll see if I can re-cap the last half of the trip. Seems like the time and motivation to write has been lacking - hopefully you'll get more than one post a month by the end of this trip, but I make no promises. So, Hoi An was quite nice, we stayed at the Phu Thinh guesthouse for 3 nights before leaving for Nha Trang. After the first day there, the sun was hardly ever out, so we passed most of the time sitting by the river in the old quarter and reading. The 3,000d (30 cent) beers were nice too. We got to Nha Trang only semi-painfully on the overnight sleeper bus - not nearly as bad as the trip to Hue. Stayed at the Phu Quy minihotel there. Tet was almost upon us, so we were a little torn about whether to stay there on the beach for almost a week (because the country pretty much shuts down during Tet and no busses run), or whether to move on to Da Lat in the mountains. After a day at the mud baths north of town, we decided to leave the beach - there'll be plenty of that to come anyways. Speaking of the mud baths, they're not too easy to find. What should have been a 5 km bike ride took us nearly an hour and a half (and about 20 kms of tracking and backtracking)- luckily the baths were very relaxing.

Tet was spent in Da Lat, where I think we (being the only westerners staying in their guesthouse) were kinda adopted into the family that owned the place. They spoke very little English, except for the daughter-in-law that worked at the golf course, but the humor that can be found in the thought of killing the rooster that has been waking you up every day at 5am and eating it transcends language barriers. So, we had a wonderful time with them, even though they fed us more than we could possibly eat (the matriarch was very motherly), and made us drink more homebrewed 'Vietnamese Vodka' than I could stand. And all for 6 bucks a night! The name of that guesthouse was Thanh Dong at 9A Bui Thi Xuan street - sorry no website, but definitely stop by if you're ever there.

From the relative peace of Da Lat, it was off to Saigon. Not a whole lot was done in the 36 hours we were there - Ash was a bit bed-stricken with some stomach problems. But I did get a chance to go down and explore the 'Chinatown' of Saigon, called Cholon, and all of its pagados.

We took a 2d/1n tour through the Me Kong Delta to get where we are now - Phnom Penh, Cambodia. It was through Delta Adventure tours, and although I read a lot of bad stuff about them on Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree Forum, I was very pleased. You certainly get treated like cattle sometimes, and this tour was no different, but I was just happy with the amount of the delta we saw, and how nice the boat was. It was a different story for some other people we met up with later, who had signed up for a delta tour, but instead spent 9 hours on a bus. But, the people in the delta as we drove through were just wonderful - a wave and a smile came from everyone we passed on the banks of the river.

So, how to sum up a month in Vietnam? I think its a country that has suffered from the quick and widespread adoption of tourism. Everyone seems to be out for themeseleves and their families, with no regard to preservation for the future. That sounds rather bleak. In respect to the way that the tourist dollar is coveted, I reckon it is true. However, (most) of the people themselves are very eager to talk to you, tell you about themselves and their country, and to take you into their homes. No grudges seem to be held here against Americans, or the French for that matter - the only grudges seem to be those the government has against their countrymen who helped the Americans.

Never did quite finish up what I wanted to say about Vietnam, so I'll try and do that now on a cloudy day in Siem Reap.

#1 - Rant on transportation in Vietnam: Getting anywhere is quite frustrating. The tourist bus costs 29$ to go from Hanoi to Saigon, a distance of like 1100km or something close to that, and you can get on and off whenever you want at the main cities (all of them listed above with the exception of Mui Ne). However, these busses pretty much have you at their will once you're on, and you can be sure that you will be stopping at all of their friend's restaurants, etc, along the way. They also probably haven't been replaced since the trade embargo was lifted in 1994, so they're usually in bad shape. Lastly, the drivers don't really seem to realize that the tourists pay for the ride, so they usually insist on having their way in terms of music (terrible), whether the windows are open or closed - you can generally just expect to be treated like cargo. Speaking of being treated like cargo, mini busses are even worse. There is no idea here of forming a line, and then once the first bus is filled, the second one takes its place, and so on. This would be too orderly. What instead happens in that each bus sends out their 'scout' to recruit customers. These guys generally spot you before you see the bus. Then, each bus doesn't leave until it is completely filled, so even if there are 3 busses waiting around, with 5 people on them each (which would equal one full bus) all three of them are just sitting there. If you decide to get off one bus to go to another one that is almost full, the driver simply starts the engine and drives around town, so you become their prisoner. This whole system simply sucks. The drivers end up wasting more gas driving around town then it probably takes to get to their destination. Passengers end up waiting 2x as long as the ride takes just to leave (literally). And, at the end, drivers of the busses probably take less than a full bus because they can't find enough customers. These people need to learn how to form a line and take turns. Moral of the story: Don't be in a hurry to go anywhere by bus in Vietnam.

#2 - Things I've observed about motocycles and their riders: 1. Helmets, while sound in theory, generally impede more important behaviors like talking on a cell phone or speaking to the driver next to you (while in motion) 2. A family of 5 can comfortably ride on a motocycle 3. A motocycle is like valium for kids under the age of two and acutally puts them to sleep 4. Frantically waving your hand in the direction you want to go is superior to any other type of signal 5. Livestock weighing under 100 pounds can easily be transported by moto (ducks, chickens, up to 20 piglets, or 1 full grown pig) 6. A sidecar makes for a handy moving restaurant 7. People belive they are invisable and their engine is ultra-quiet - the horn is the only way to warn others of their approach, passing and leaving

#3

Money in Vietnam - Vietnamese currency is the Dong, and it comes in values of 500, 1000, 2000, 5000, 10000, 50000, and 100000 notes. Rarer are the small 200d notes, as well as the larger 200000 and 500000 notes. The ATMs generally only dispense 100000 notes, and the max withdrawl is 2,000,000d (~126 USD). The exchange rate was around 16,000d to 1 USD, but since an ATM withdrawl of 2mil d charges you 20,0000 d, you're really only getting 15,900 to the dollar. The other funny thing is that for a country where the average salery is 2 USD/day, or so I've read, everyone seems to have a lot of the stuff. Change was hardly ever a problem when paying in bills up to 100,000d, and although I got a dirty look when using a 500,000 note, she still had the proper change. US dollars were not as easily used as I thought. We used them for a few small (<5$) transactions in Hanoi, but no where else. Their only real use is to pay hotel bills, which at 15-20$ a night can run up to about a million real quick. Yup, no where else does 'about a million' have so many practical uses. Coins come in 500, 1000, 2000, and 5000 increments, but don't seem to be widely circulated. We cashed in 120$ of travellers checks in Saigon for a 2$ fee on a Sunday at the Sinh Cafe. No one harshly inspected any of the bills that we used - US or dong.