Well this is the very last place on our trip around the world. Arriving on Tuesday 16th October and leaving to go back to London on Friday 19th in the evening. So again like Hong Kong the priority is shopping. We got to Hong Kong from Macau by ferry that took an hour. Simon would have loved to go by Helicopter and whilst it wasnt that expensive we really couldnt justify the cost.
Apart from the last night we stayed in the tiniest room possible at the Bridal Tea Room hotel, which was in a great location near the tube station but was tiny. It had 2 small single beds, tv on a wall, and then the toilet/shower. TINY TINY TINY and about 25 quid a night which really in terms of Asia was expensive but it was the best we could do for Hong Kong. Having said that, the room may have been small but it was clean and it did mean that we purposely didnt spend any time in it but would sit down at the little cafe downstairs where we had free internet and could watch the back street life go past. Which surprisingly was good as we could watch the one armed octopus guy cooking food across the way and the chinese people would sit on the plastic chairs eating it. I did try some food from the cafe next door but it wasnt very nice - noodles with some spicy red things on top.
But to make up for it we paid $1200 HK Dollars (about £70) and we stayed in the Royal Garden Resort on the last night. It was the best because as well as being gorgeous we had dressing gowns in the room. This has made my year. For me it just meant that we might have enjoyed doing cheap and cheerful but its also great to do posh at the same time and completely reiterates that we are not backpackers but poshpackers. I LOVED THE DRESSING GOWNS. My list of things to have done this year defo included that.
On one our days in Hong Kong we went to Disneyland. We had a great day here, we caught the train to get there and one of the train journeys was on the disney train, it was like a fantasy limo inside with velvet seats, disney shaped windows. Very cute. We had a great day it may have included kids rides but we enjoyed them (well i did) just as much as the scary space mountain. One of the best rides (if u wanna call it that) was the haunted house where we had to walk through and things (people) would jump out on us. It was strange seeing chinese ghosts and zombies. Some of the people we walked around where really scared and would scream there heads of, it was funny watching them.
When we started our journey nearly a year ago the first night we went to a chinese restaurant in San Francisco. Now in Hong Kong we had an American meal by going to TGI Fridays. Oh my it was expensive. Struggling with the prices in Hong Kong as everything has been so cheap in the rest of Asia.
We discovered because alcohol is so expensive in Hong Kong ie a fiver for a glass of wine that they way to do it was to go to the happy hour places and do BOGOF, which is what we did. We found a nice bar that most western people seemed to go to and we was able to have a couple of beers and cider and then round the corner a kebab, eh this is the life. This was of course after a hard day shopping.
On a couple of evenings we walked down to Kowloon harbour to look across to the hong kong skyline and watch all of the buildings light up at night and then at 8oclock the buildings all have a bit of a lighting show set to music, this is definatly one of the best views we have seen.
Whilst waiting for the lights we walked along examining the Avenue of stars which is the same as Los Angeles except its all Chinese people which of course we dont recognise apart from Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee. We did put our hands though on Jackie Chans handprint.
On our last evening, we spent a busy couple of hours running around, getting our hair done, shopping, seeing the lighting show and then we ended up in a mexican/chinese bar. We ended up somehow chatting to an American guy with a very interesting mustache. The conversation started off okay but it gradually started to turn into a pathetic conversation whereby he was telling us he travelled the world for his job checking planes (ie an ex pilot) but he owned a gun store in america and wanted a website down for it, and he thought me and Simon would be really good and we should talk business the next day blah blah. I very very stupidly told him (as i was still excited about it) about our dressing gowns and he asked me why was i telling him, was i inviting him in to see them. The conversation really was starting to go very dodgy so we left him at about 1 in the morning. Really i didnt want to go out for long as i just wanted to sit in my dressing gown, so i slept in it instead and then we didnt leave the room the next day until 12 on the dot so we could enjoy the room and the tele for the morning.
On the last day as well as running around looking for a white Ds from me (thank u Simon x), a teapot, Simons Ipod touch we wanted to go up to the Peak via the tram and see the skyline from high up. This was something again on my to do list but was something i expected to be a quiet affair and would be about seeing a temple at the top. How wrong i was, it was an hour queue to get on the tram, and then it was totally commercial at the top. We ended up eating at the Bubba Gump restaurant looking over amazing views and of course buying some more rubbish.
To get to the Airport we took our suitcases and our many bags of hand luggage and caught the train, we managed to get one of us on free as the Octopus card simon had bought previously to validate the airplane tickets seemed to continue to work. I spent most of this extremely fast journey trying to pack things tidyingly up in the suitcase. Once we got the airport we was extremely lucky as the plane going 10mins after our plane going to London had been delayed for 20hours. I dont think our mums would have been pleased if we had landed an extra day later.
Back home in England - 20th October 2007
Thursday, November 08, 2007
Monday, October 22, 2007
Macau
Macau is an odd place, the first reaction would be to say what everyone says and that it's the Vegas of the east, but it's not...it's the Blackpool of the China!! OK, it's got the grand casinos of Vegas but it also has the regular tourist attractions like old buildings from it's colonial past, you can go to the top of the tower to see the view from too. Also, just like Blackpool, finding anyone who speaks English is quite a novelty. They really don't speak a word of it here in Macau, Andrea opted for the 'shouting the question in English even louder whilst I just got better at pointing.
Anyway, arriving in Macau is an eye opener. The taxi took us past the new venetian casino which is simply enormous and is the second largest building in the world, then over the bridge gave us view of the Grand Lisboa which is like a giant LED ball with a golden palm tree shaped hotel planted on top of it.
We stayed at the Hotel/Casino Fortuna initially which had more modestly priced rooms but like vegas the room prices go sky high on a Friday and Saturday night so we had to move again to a regular hotel that had views Chinese mainland! The casinos here are what Andrea call "hardcore" casinos full of very high stakes games, oh and stupid card games like Casino War which consists of everyone being given a card and if the dealers card is higher than yours, you loose ! it's a nice fast way to loose your money.
Walking about one night we stumbled upon the control tower for the motor racing street circuit. There has been nods from the bods saying that it will be on the F1 Calender soon, apparently. Further on from here was a weird "theme village" that contained, a volcano, a Chinese kinda temple, a stereotypical middle eastern town, Italy, New Orleans, and of course Africa. Apart from the middle east and the volcano, the other areas were themes for the restaurants within them. It was all very cheesy and the locals and Andrea loved it. The thing that made me laugh was there were quite a few posters advertising a kind of an advanced laser quest that was going to the held in the middle east !! I'm guessing the soldiers vs terrorists is a stereotype too now!
Anyway, wandering about we discovered where the new MGM Grand is going to be built, it's certainly big and kinda looks like 3 giant lego bricks ontop of each other. The MGM Lion is very impressive as its colours change occasionally.
On the next block to the MGM we stopped at a bar called the "MP3 Bar" that had some westerners there. The geeky side of us was drawn to the MP3 but after sitting down there it wasn't until a very scantily clad lady came up to us and asked what we fancied to drink did we realise what it was all about. It was then that we noticed that all the westerners were blokes and all the ladies were Russian/East European go-go dancers. They even had a pole in the middle of the bar where occasionally one of the girls would give a performance. Anyway, there were a lot of men that were "on business" in the bar with leggy blonds all over them, that was until a bunch of leggy asians wandered up the road and stopped outside (i think they were mobile go-go girls, have to keep up with the times i guess). They then swamped the blokes and were chatting and getting all touchy touchy. I had the feeling that at any moment a great big "girlfriend" *wobbles head* fight was gonna break out between the blonds and the asians....alas not. It was all very interesting though and I would recommend it for a drink or two.
Macau seemed to be famous for two things food wise, one was these really dry shortbread biscuits, which are quite nice once the dryness has gone, and these pieces of flat beef jerky Chinese style with all sorts of sauces over them. The shops selling these things were swamped with a throng of asian tourists buying loads of stuff whilst outside there were ladies from the shops offering samples of the biscuits and the jerky. They were at least to everyone except for Andrea as one lady refused to give her a sample biscuit. There was a moment where the woman was stood on the spot turning in circles whilst Andrea was running round the outside trying to grab a biscuit ! hehehe.
Andrea loved Macau and could of probably spent a couple of weeks here, for my part I though Macau was ok but it would be interesting to see it in about 5 years or so. For me, Hong Kong was much much better. :)
Anyway, arriving in Macau is an eye opener. The taxi took us past the new venetian casino which is simply enormous and is the second largest building in the world, then over the bridge gave us view of the Grand Lisboa which is like a giant LED ball with a golden palm tree shaped hotel planted on top of it.
We stayed at the Hotel/Casino Fortuna initially which had more modestly priced rooms but like vegas the room prices go sky high on a Friday and Saturday night so we had to move again to a regular hotel that had views Chinese mainland! The casinos here are what Andrea call "hardcore" casinos full of very high stakes games, oh and stupid card games like Casino War which consists of everyone being given a card and if the dealers card is higher than yours, you loose ! it's a nice fast way to loose your money.
Walking about one night we stumbled upon the control tower for the motor racing street circuit. There has been nods from the bods saying that it will be on the F1 Calender soon, apparently. Further on from here was a weird "theme village" that contained, a volcano, a Chinese kinda temple, a stereotypical middle eastern town, Italy, New Orleans, and of course Africa. Apart from the middle east and the volcano, the other areas were themes for the restaurants within them. It was all very cheesy and the locals and Andrea loved it. The thing that made me laugh was there were quite a few posters advertising a kind of an advanced laser quest that was going to the held in the middle east !! I'm guessing the soldiers vs terrorists is a stereotype too now!
Anyway, wandering about we discovered where the new MGM Grand is going to be built, it's certainly big and kinda looks like 3 giant lego bricks ontop of each other. The MGM Lion is very impressive as its colours change occasionally.
On the next block to the MGM we stopped at a bar called the "MP3 Bar" that had some westerners there. The geeky side of us was drawn to the MP3 but after sitting down there it wasn't until a very scantily clad lady came up to us and asked what we fancied to drink did we realise what it was all about. It was then that we noticed that all the westerners were blokes and all the ladies were Russian/East European go-go dancers. They even had a pole in the middle of the bar where occasionally one of the girls would give a performance. Anyway, there were a lot of men that were "on business" in the bar with leggy blonds all over them, that was until a bunch of leggy asians wandered up the road and stopped outside (i think they were mobile go-go girls, have to keep up with the times i guess). They then swamped the blokes and were chatting and getting all touchy touchy. I had the feeling that at any moment a great big "girlfriend" *wobbles head* fight was gonna break out between the blonds and the asians....alas not. It was all very interesting though and I would recommend it for a drink or two.
Macau seemed to be famous for two things food wise, one was these really dry shortbread biscuits, which are quite nice once the dryness has gone, and these pieces of flat beef jerky Chinese style with all sorts of sauces over them. The shops selling these things were swamped with a throng of asian tourists buying loads of stuff whilst outside there were ladies from the shops offering samples of the biscuits and the jerky. They were at least to everyone except for Andrea as one lady refused to give her a sample biscuit. There was a moment where the woman was stood on the spot turning in circles whilst Andrea was running round the outside trying to grab a biscuit ! hehehe.
Andrea loved Macau and could of probably spent a couple of weeks here, for my part I though Macau was ok but it would be interesting to see it in about 5 years or so. For me, Hong Kong was much much better. :)
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Bangkok
We were here for 3 days and purposely didnt want to do any of the normal temple sites but go shopping and see the night sights.
So first stop was a hotel on Th Khao San called D & D inn. We arrived here at 8 in the morning from the train journey. We didnt actually want to be on Khao San Road but the taxi driver managed to overcharge us and then just dropped us off on this road even though we directed him to another road putting us both in a bad mood.
This road is where all the backpackers stay on. Its a drinking road but weirdly closes at 12. For example at 12 oclock on the first night we were sat on the road on some plastic stools chatting to some people drinking from plastic glasses, when suddenly we had to stand up and look like we were just walking around as the police went past. We then were able to sit back on our plastic stools again and continue chatting.
The days were spent shopping, we found a great shopping centre that had floors and floors of stuff to buy, so we bought a lot of stuff. It was Simons turn to go mad this time.
To go shopping we took what they call Tuk-Tuks . This was one of those things on the tick list to have done and is now completed. It was not the nicest journey we have had as it stinks of exhaust fumes and is very nosy.
The other entry on our list of things to do was to go to a ping pong show on Patpong Road. This was a disaster as we got ripped of when we went in to a club and had to pay triple the price of the drinks that they said. I tried to argue with the madam but really we didnt have any choice and as Simon pointed out, me arguing with this women is not going to get us anywhere apart from a punch on the nose. The girls just wanted tipping all the time for trying to massage my arms whilst we watched the bored fat semi naked girl fire darts from her bits into the balloons (was actually pretty impressive). We quickly had our drinks and left and instead of going into any other bars we went around the market instead. Ah shopping again.
So it was back to forgetting the seedy side of Bangkok and sticking with the dodgy shopping side of Bangkok. I think overall i preferred Kuala Lumpur for shopping.
Just before we left Thailand i managed to convince Simon that he couldnt leave without having some type of massage so he had 30mins of foot reflexology and i had a back massage. I think Simon came out better then i did because the women whilst very good caused me a lot of pain pulling me and pounding me. I think the objective is for them to get my bones to crack but as my bones dont really crack anyway it really hurt :-).
Flight to Macau was on Thursday 11th October on Air Asia
So first stop was a hotel on Th Khao San called D & D inn. We arrived here at 8 in the morning from the train journey. We didnt actually want to be on Khao San Road but the taxi driver managed to overcharge us and then just dropped us off on this road even though we directed him to another road putting us both in a bad mood.
This road is where all the backpackers stay on. Its a drinking road but weirdly closes at 12. For example at 12 oclock on the first night we were sat on the road on some plastic stools chatting to some people drinking from plastic glasses, when suddenly we had to stand up and look like we were just walking around as the police went past. We then were able to sit back on our plastic stools again and continue chatting.
The days were spent shopping, we found a great shopping centre that had floors and floors of stuff to buy, so we bought a lot of stuff. It was Simons turn to go mad this time.
To go shopping we took what they call Tuk-Tuks . This was one of those things on the tick list to have done and is now completed. It was not the nicest journey we have had as it stinks of exhaust fumes and is very nosy.
The other entry on our list of things to do was to go to a ping pong show on Patpong Road. This was a disaster as we got ripped of when we went in to a club and had to pay triple the price of the drinks that they said. I tried to argue with the madam but really we didnt have any choice and as Simon pointed out, me arguing with this women is not going to get us anywhere apart from a punch on the nose. The girls just wanted tipping all the time for trying to massage my arms whilst we watched the bored fat semi naked girl fire darts from her bits into the balloons (was actually pretty impressive). We quickly had our drinks and left and instead of going into any other bars we went around the market instead. Ah shopping again.
So it was back to forgetting the seedy side of Bangkok and sticking with the dodgy shopping side of Bangkok. I think overall i preferred Kuala Lumpur for shopping.
Just before we left Thailand i managed to convince Simon that he couldnt leave without having some type of massage so he had 30mins of foot reflexology and i had a back massage. I think Simon came out better then i did because the women whilst very good caused me a lot of pain pulling me and pounding me. I think the objective is for them to get my bones to crack but as my bones dont really crack anyway it really hurt :-).
Flight to Macau was on Thursday 11th October on Air Asia
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Overnight Train to Bangkok from Champeon
Sat on a train writing this, its 10 oclock at night sat in 1st class on the lower bunk with Simon nattering away to me in the dark on the top bunk. We have left Ko Toa and caught a boat for 3 hours to mainland Thailand and now we are on the overnight train to Bangkok. We paid 1500 bahts each which is about 23 quid altogether. We decided to go 1st class as we get our own little cabin with a sink and space for the luggage. Shame we arrive in Bangkok at 6 in the morning. Before we got on the train we had a couple of hours to kill at Champeon town so we went for a really nice but oh so so spicy thai meal. I had spicy shrimp noodles and Simon had fried pork and fried rice with extra chilli added. We both had to sup our drinks quick just to get rid of the inflamed lips. We had a quick nosy through the night market and bought some grapes for 20bahts,and a really tacky but amusing dragon drum thingy for 40bahts(75p). This seemed to amuse people as we were waiting at the platform trying to work out which train we should get on, admittedly tippsy after supping a lot of drink cos of how spicy the food was. When i went in to the toilet at the station (which i took a pic of cos of the mold on the wall) Simon got accosted by a thai women and her son and he thought they wer begging for money but actually the son he had a questionaire that he wanted answering for school. We got a pic of them. I also got a pic of me with our guard from the train. They did the Vietnam giggling thing of wanting to see the pic once it had been taken.
Ko Tao - on the populated side of the island
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ko_Tao
For the past 4 or 5 nights (im struggling to remember the day nether mind the date) we have stayed at the Sunset Buri resort. In a nice air con room. We went as cheap as we were willing to go in the 500 baht room over the otherside of the island, this place is 1000baht(13quid) and is much nicer and it has a swimming pool, which is good because the water here is full of jelly fish which im scared of. Simons been teaching me in the pool to dive down and pick the stone up from the bottom. i finally achieved it on my last dive down on the last day, with my goggles on and my nose clip. Diving in from the side next lesson.
Ive had a bad belly most of the time here and kept having to run off most nights back to the hotel. Bit embarrasing after meeting a couple(Roxanne and Peter) that Simon had met at Brekkie in Ko Phi Phi. We went out with them a couple of nights in particular to play pool, watch england beat aussie in rugby and then caberet. Caberet consits of the lady boys badly miming to songs dressed up in wild outfits, very entertaining.
We have been on 2 trips whilst being here:
Fishing trip. Simon caught a fish but whilst winding it in, a baracuda came and bit the fish of so Simon only ended up with the head of a fish. However as that was the only thing we caught he won our round the world fishing comp this time so its 2 each at the mo, might have to wait until we get back to england for the tiebreaker.
Andrea - Fiji, Whitsunday islands
Simon - Cairns, Ko Toa
Sorkeling trip. This was one of the best places we have ever snorkeled. We went to 5 different places over the day. The first stop was Shark Bay. I didnt see it but Simon said he saw a shark that was bigger then him. He said that was scary. One of the bays we went to was like a school for baby fish. It had all the pretty fish everywhere but they were tiny. We saw lots of 'Finding Nemo' fish but the best bit was seeing the baby sharks. We saw a couple of them swimming around and we would try to swim after them to take pics but they are to fast and to scared of people. Another bay called Mango Bay had the most amount of jelly fish ive ever seen. Its strange but i dont mind getting in the water knowing there is baby sharks there but show me some jelly fish and im scared.
The final stopping place was the island of nang-yuan. This is a beautiful island that has the water coming in from both sides and there is a tiny strip of sand you can sunbathe on in between. Of one of the sides you can go snorkeling which had some great fish and coral but for me the most interesting thing was watching the scuba divers in the water learning how to dive properly. They would be in the water, taking their masks of and learning how to put the mask on and clear it of water. I cant even dive to pick a stone up from the bottom of the swimming pool without lessons from Simon, i really dont think scuba diving is for me.
For the past 4 or 5 nights (im struggling to remember the day nether mind the date) we have stayed at the Sunset Buri resort. In a nice air con room. We went as cheap as we were willing to go in the 500 baht room over the otherside of the island, this place is 1000baht(13quid) and is much nicer and it has a swimming pool, which is good because the water here is full of jelly fish which im scared of. Simons been teaching me in the pool to dive down and pick the stone up from the bottom. i finally achieved it on my last dive down on the last day, with my goggles on and my nose clip. Diving in from the side next lesson.
Ive had a bad belly most of the time here and kept having to run off most nights back to the hotel. Bit embarrasing after meeting a couple(Roxanne and Peter) that Simon had met at Brekkie in Ko Phi Phi. We went out with them a couple of nights in particular to play pool, watch england beat aussie in rugby and then caberet. Caberet consits of the lady boys badly miming to songs dressed up in wild outfits, very entertaining.
We have been on 2 trips whilst being here:
Fishing trip. Simon caught a fish but whilst winding it in, a baracuda came and bit the fish of so Simon only ended up with the head of a fish. However as that was the only thing we caught he won our round the world fishing comp this time so its 2 each at the mo, might have to wait until we get back to england for the tiebreaker.
Andrea - Fiji, Whitsunday islands
Simon - Cairns, Ko Toa
Sorkeling trip. This was one of the best places we have ever snorkeled. We went to 5 different places over the day. The first stop was Shark Bay. I didnt see it but Simon said he saw a shark that was bigger then him. He said that was scary. One of the bays we went to was like a school for baby fish. It had all the pretty fish everywhere but they were tiny. We saw lots of 'Finding Nemo' fish but the best bit was seeing the baby sharks. We saw a couple of them swimming around and we would try to swim after them to take pics but they are to fast and to scared of people. Another bay called Mango Bay had the most amount of jelly fish ive ever seen. Its strange but i dont mind getting in the water knowing there is baby sharks there but show me some jelly fish and im scared.
The final stopping place was the island of nang-yuan. This is a beautiful island that has the water coming in from both sides and there is a tiny strip of sand you can sunbathe on in between. Of one of the sides you can go snorkeling which had some great fish and coral but for me the most interesting thing was watching the scuba divers in the water learning how to dive properly. They would be in the water, taking their masks of and learning how to put the mask on and clear it of water. I cant even dive to pick a stone up from the bottom of the swimming pool without lessons from Simon, i really dont think scuba diving is for me.
Friday, October 05, 2007
Holy Storms
It pretty much rains in Asia everyday, it's a bit like Florida in that it just chucks it down for 30 mins or so then disappears until the day after. The storms here in Thailand are like that, except that they tend to pounce on you. You can be sat on the beach reading your book or listening to your ipod and you spot a storm off in the distance. Then for the next hour the storm is still no nearer to you and the sun is shining. All of a sudden it will be chucking it down because the storm seemed to teleport to your beach. I only mention it because it happened again today, this time I forgot to grab my book in the rush to take shelter...it's soaking. Whenever it does happens though it always makes me laugh as it reminds me of this Monty Python sketch...
...oh btw, Andrea is the one camping it up !
...oh btw, Andrea is the one camping it up !
Monday, October 01, 2007
Koh Tao
The laptop has become infested with tiny little ants/termites (i can't tell which). Anyway, if the laptop is infested then i can imagine that everything else is. It makes typing this blog entry rather interesting. It's like a game of "whack a mole"...or rather "whack a mite". Our entry into the UK will be interesting going through the "something to declare" ;)
After arriving here in Koh Tao it was a taxi journey to the east side of the island. The roads here are really bad and taxi's tend to be Toyota HiLuxs or other big pick up 4x4 trucks. Everyone just sits in the back of the pick ups getting bounced around. Today, Andrea tried to use the camcorder on the back of one, i suspect it'll make everyone sick who watches it.
Anyway, the reason that we chose Koh Tao was that it was a little of the beaten track and it's also the #2 diving point in the world (#1 being the barrier reef). This was all according to them, which judging by the sheer number of diving companies here they might be right. As i've pointed out already, there isn't much in the way of roads here, but that's not all...24 hour electricity is a luxury, as is hot water. The mossies are pretty rampant on this island and seem to attack at any time of the day, the good news is is that you can see them to hit them. I walloped a big one yesterday that was feasting on my leg, when i lifted my hand up there was a big blood splatter mark left. I'm guessing it was my blood.
We were told that the east side was the best side to come snorkeling so we ended up at a place called Black Tip Diving in Tanote bay. The snorkeling was very very good, except that sometimes the water got a little cloudy. Great coral of all sorts, some small and wavey, some the size of buses. The variety of fish is pretty good too. The only problem with the place we stayed at was the hotel room, it had curtains that were too small, ants/termites and mossies everywhere (hence the problem with the laptop), power cuts, the worst shower ever (more of a cold dribble), and the hut had the same build quality as a "Prisoner Cell Block H" set...close the door and the whole wall wobbles.
Today, we had enough of slumming it and decided to leave the east side and head for west side where civilization is a bit better. Still no hot water though, but it appears to be one of our best rooms so far.
After arriving here in Koh Tao it was a taxi journey to the east side of the island. The roads here are really bad and taxi's tend to be Toyota HiLuxs or other big pick up 4x4 trucks. Everyone just sits in the back of the pick ups getting bounced around. Today, Andrea tried to use the camcorder on the back of one, i suspect it'll make everyone sick who watches it.
Anyway, the reason that we chose Koh Tao was that it was a little of the beaten track and it's also the #2 diving point in the world (#1 being the barrier reef). This was all according to them, which judging by the sheer number of diving companies here they might be right. As i've pointed out already, there isn't much in the way of roads here, but that's not all...24 hour electricity is a luxury, as is hot water. The mossies are pretty rampant on this island and seem to attack at any time of the day, the good news is is that you can see them to hit them. I walloped a big one yesterday that was feasting on my leg, when i lifted my hand up there was a big blood splatter mark left. I'm guessing it was my blood.
We were told that the east side was the best side to come snorkeling so we ended up at a place called Black Tip Diving in Tanote bay. The snorkeling was very very good, except that sometimes the water got a little cloudy. Great coral of all sorts, some small and wavey, some the size of buses. The variety of fish is pretty good too. The only problem with the place we stayed at was the hotel room, it had curtains that were too small, ants/termites and mossies everywhere (hence the problem with the laptop), power cuts, the worst shower ever (more of a cold dribble), and the hut had the same build quality as a "Prisoner Cell Block H" set...close the door and the whole wall wobbles.
Today, we had enough of slumming it and decided to leave the east side and head for west side where civilization is a bit better. Still no hot water though, but it appears to be one of our best rooms so far.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Mooning at Ko Pha-Ngan
Last night we went over by speed boat to another island for a Full Moon Party. We left our island at 7 in the evening and the first boat to take us back to the hotel was going to be 3 in the morning, so we knew it was giong to be a full on night.
So we went by speed boat - which did in fact speed. We were sat right at the front of the boat and as it flew over the waves we would lift out of our seats, at this stage i decided that there was not a chance i was going to get drunk at this party as there was now way i could get home by speed boat without being sick. When we got to the island the boat stopped so far from the beach we had to slide off the front of it and wade through the thigh deep water. Simon being the mountain goat that he is pretty much jumped of the boat and spend most of the evening with completely soaking shorts and undies.
Our first stop was somewhere to eat where luckily for me, they took that long to bring the food over i got to watch 2 shows of Friends on the tele. Next stop to even it out we went in a bar that had Family Guy on, which was extremely unfortunate because the 2 shows it was showing, we had watched the previous evening on the laptop.
At this stage the partys on the beach had really started to liven up and we spent the majority of the evening people watching getting pissed and falling over but still clutching their alcohol buckets.
The music was pumping out from about 10 different clubs on the beach and you could walk from one in to another watching people dance, only at one place did we really stop and listen to the old skool music before moving on people watching. As the night progressed more and more people were using the sea as a toilet, or using the beach as a bed. At one part of the beach there was a safe bed zone, ie a cornered of area that you could safely sleep. This was starting to get very busy.
At one stage whilst sat down on the rugs on the beach, a bunch of lady boys came and sat in front of us and were obviously perving at a bunch of english guys with their tops of. At one stage they got a picture all together but then when the lady boys tried to talk to the guys they hastely moved away. In another bar Simon saw a very drunk boy kissing a ladyboy and it was like oh he is so going to regret that tomorrow morning. hahaha
Simon had his head painted with a yellow mohican style strip which glowed in the dark and i got some red lit up horns, it helped us to find each other and Simon did look very cool.
By the end of the night after i had done a quick shop (to buy the souvenier t-shirt) and Simon had watched a girl crawl along the floor trying to hide under a shop stand and then wee'd herself whilst her boyfriend finally decided that giving her another drink probably wasnt the best idea. We decided to sit near our speed boat and try and get home. We managed to get on the 3 oclock speed boat not after having to wade through the water to my waist and fight the other 50 odd people trying to get on the boat as well. Highly amusing but hard work trying to keep the camera out of the water and being glad that neither me or Si were very drunk.
The speed boat back is one of the most terrifying journeys i have ever had, in that again we sat at the front and at some stages we were lifted out of our seats, and then it would bash down into the water. He had to slow down at some stages as the water was so rough. It didnt help that i had my hair washed and straightened at the hairdressers earlier and after the boat trip it was like a big ball of knots and Simon had spent most of the journey having it slapped against his face. hhahaaha
So we went by speed boat - which did in fact speed. We were sat right at the front of the boat and as it flew over the waves we would lift out of our seats, at this stage i decided that there was not a chance i was going to get drunk at this party as there was now way i could get home by speed boat without being sick. When we got to the island the boat stopped so far from the beach we had to slide off the front of it and wade through the thigh deep water. Simon being the mountain goat that he is pretty much jumped of the boat and spend most of the evening with completely soaking shorts and undies.
Our first stop was somewhere to eat where luckily for me, they took that long to bring the food over i got to watch 2 shows of Friends on the tele. Next stop to even it out we went in a bar that had Family Guy on, which was extremely unfortunate because the 2 shows it was showing, we had watched the previous evening on the laptop.
At this stage the partys on the beach had really started to liven up and we spent the majority of the evening people watching getting pissed and falling over but still clutching their alcohol buckets.
The music was pumping out from about 10 different clubs on the beach and you could walk from one in to another watching people dance, only at one place did we really stop and listen to the old skool music before moving on people watching. As the night progressed more and more people were using the sea as a toilet, or using the beach as a bed. At one part of the beach there was a safe bed zone, ie a cornered of area that you could safely sleep. This was starting to get very busy.
At one stage whilst sat down on the rugs on the beach, a bunch of lady boys came and sat in front of us and were obviously perving at a bunch of english guys with their tops of. At one stage they got a picture all together but then when the lady boys tried to talk to the guys they hastely moved away. In another bar Simon saw a very drunk boy kissing a ladyboy and it was like oh he is so going to regret that tomorrow morning. hahaha
Simon had his head painted with a yellow mohican style strip which glowed in the dark and i got some red lit up horns, it helped us to find each other and Simon did look very cool.
By the end of the night after i had done a quick shop (to buy the souvenier t-shirt) and Simon had watched a girl crawl along the floor trying to hide under a shop stand and then wee'd herself whilst her boyfriend finally decided that giving her another drink probably wasnt the best idea. We decided to sit near our speed boat and try and get home. We managed to get on the 3 oclock speed boat not after having to wade through the water to my waist and fight the other 50 odd people trying to get on the boat as well. Highly amusing but hard work trying to keep the camera out of the water and being glad that neither me or Si were very drunk.
The speed boat back is one of the most terrifying journeys i have ever had, in that again we sat at the front and at some stages we were lifted out of our seats, and then it would bash down into the water. He had to slow down at some stages as the water was so rough. It didnt help that i had my hair washed and straightened at the hairdressers earlier and after the boat trip it was like a big ball of knots and Simon had spent most of the journey having it slapped against his face. hhahaaha
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Koh Sumui
It took us a day to get here. Ferry from Phi Phi island to Krabi (2 hours), then a coach for 3 to 4 hours (very nice coach big recliner seats) and then a ferry for 2 hours to Koh Sumui and then a minivan to take us on to the other side of the island to Chaweng. We are staying in the Bann Chaweng Guest House. This town is massive but it is one long stretch of road(7km) with a lot of posh hotels. Our Guest house is 600bhts (just under a tenner) and is ok but as we found out last night its actually situated at the end of a little paved road and the 2 bars next to it are both gay bars, so they like Simon (he walked past before and they asked him not to be shy and come in.
Spent the day on the beach doing nothing. I keep shopping though, today I bought for 2 pound a table runner (at least thats what i think it is) of a guy on the beach. The girl behind me was buying 3 so we bargained together to get the 4 cheaper. Tomorrw im thinking a komono, i havent got one of them :-) oh and Si needs some new swimming shorts.
Tommorrow night of to the famous full moon party on the phangan island.
Spent the day on the beach doing nothing. I keep shopping though, today I bought for 2 pound a table runner (at least thats what i think it is) of a guy on the beach. The girl behind me was buying 3 so we bargained together to get the 4 cheaper. Tomorrw im thinking a komono, i havent got one of them :-) oh and Si needs some new swimming shorts.
Tommorrow night of to the famous full moon party on the phangan island.
Ko Phi Phi cont...
So we ended up spending about 5 days in Ko Phi Phi, which was a slight diversion of our trip but was a good choice in the end. It was a shame not to meet up with Erika (girl from Vietnam trip) in Krabi but we just couldnt get the ferry over in time and really from what we have seen and heard going to Ko Phi Phi was defo the correct choice.
On our last day we braved the 100+ steps to go up to the viewpoint which gave a panaromic view of Phi Phi. In the evening we went to the Cosmic restaurant which is our 3rd time there in 5 days as Simon liked the pizzas from there.
After the meal we walked around the island and bought some t-shirts and tried to find chopsticks (to add to our collection) and also to pass the old cute women shouting 'youhooo pancakes pancakes). Last stop was the irish pub to watch the man u versus Chelse match before bed.
Cute thing to remember - the little bird on the beach with the broken leg came to visit me both days whilst we were sat in the same deckchairs, obviously his little section of the beach.
On our last day we braved the 100+ steps to go up to the viewpoint which gave a panaromic view of Phi Phi. In the evening we went to the Cosmic restaurant which is our 3rd time there in 5 days as Simon liked the pizzas from there.
After the meal we walked around the island and bought some t-shirts and tried to find chopsticks (to add to our collection) and also to pass the old cute women shouting 'youhooo pancakes pancakes). Last stop was the irish pub to watch the man u versus Chelse match before bed.
Cute thing to remember - the little bird on the beach with the broken leg came to visit me both days whilst we were sat in the same deckchairs, obviously his little section of the beach.
Massages
Whilst ive been sat on the internet tonight, Simon was in a bar watching the rugby, after his second drink the waitress came up to him and asked if he wanted a massage. He said no, but can i have the bill and left hahahahahha bless him.....
Saturday, September 22, 2007
The Beach
We had a great time yesterday (Friday 21st Sept) on the afternoon trip. First stop was monkey beach, which to be honest me and Simon are both over seeing monkeys now as our experiences have shown us that they can infact be nasty buggers and therefore instead of finding them cute they scare me instead.
Next stop was an amazing place to snorkel. We saw some great fish including a catfish, and a big fat slug and Si saw some nemo's.
After that we went on to Maya Bay which is where the film 'the beach' was filmed. To get to the beach though we had to jump in the sea and then swim over to a little cave and crawl through it. Very exhilerating but fun.
Next stop was an amazing place to snorkel. We saw some great fish including a catfish, and a big fat slug and Si saw some nemo's.
After that we went on to Maya Bay which is where the film 'the beach' was filmed. To get to the beach though we had to jump in the sea and then swim over to a little cave and crawl through it. Very exhilerating but fun.
Friday, September 21, 2007
Phi Phi Island and Bond
The weather has turned and its hot hot hot, its that hot its almost to hot to sunbathe but not quite. Finally got Simon to sit out for most of the day in the sun yesterday and he has now got some colour. Hes hiding today though but hes gonna get more colour later when we go on the snorkling and then sunset tour. We get to go to the maya island where they do the film 'the beach'.
The other day we went on a trip from Patong to go to see a temple, a village on water and then the highlight of the trip around the James Bond island from the film 'the man with the golden gun'. The island was very good.
Phi Phi island is beautiful and has helped to change my attidude about thailand as Patong really didnt give a good impression of the place. Phi Phi has no cars or scooters and its all little paths that you walk around going into shops, travelagents, restaurants or internet cafes and then either walk over to one side where the pier is with the boats or the other side where the beach is. Our hotel is bang in the middle of both so not far to walk for either.
The other day we went on a trip from Patong to go to see a temple, a village on water and then the highlight of the trip around the James Bond island from the film 'the man with the golden gun'. The island was very good.
Phi Phi island is beautiful and has helped to change my attidude about thailand as Patong really didnt give a good impression of the place. Phi Phi has no cars or scooters and its all little paths that you walk around going into shops, travelagents, restaurants or internet cafes and then either walk over to one side where the pier is with the boats or the other side where the beach is. Our hotel is bang in the middle of both so not far to walk for either.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Thailand
It was very hard leaving Vietnam as both of us fell in love with the place, but all good things come to an end. Thailand is very different, much more developed and people don't stare at you for being a westerner.
We landed at Bangkok airport and stayed the night at a hotel nearby so we could decide where we were going next. Bangkok will be the last leg of our Thailand trip as Andrea has said that's where she'll be buying loads of stuff from. I think it's a favour so i don't have to carry so much around Thailand, i just have to carry it from then on ;) We decided on Phuket as geographically it seemed like the best place to start. This was the first time that we've ever turned up at an airport and not had a flight ticket, and we didn't have much trouble getting one. Bangkok airport is massive by the way and quite impressive. This was also our first taste at seeing some UK shops for almost a year. Andrea was all in a flutter when she saw a Boots Chemist !
Landing in Phuket the weather was really bad, the rain was very wet. We managed to book into a very classy hotel at Patong Beach called "PS2 Bungalow" it's about 8 pounds per night, has a pool/aircon and is our cheapest hotel yet ! woo! There are no PS2's in the room though which i think is blatant misadvertising, there are however a team of cute kittens that come up to us when we're outside. Patong is a dump really, it's very touristy and full of fish and chip shops and tacky shops...Not that any of this is bad, Andrea loves a bit of tat (or "classy tat" as she calls it).
Walking about here is pretty scary, not by the fact that you might get mugged or anything, but in the sheer number of Massage Parlours. They're all genuine and most of them have teams of thai ladies ouside and will shout, grab, probably flash their bits too, just to get you inside them. We've discovered that "Oil Massage" is the code word for the "extras" that may accompany a massage (how delicately did i put that !). Walking on my own it's ten times worse for me as that's when they start blocking your path and grabbing you. Andrea has it easy.
After three days here we finally hit the main street where all the action was. Before this we were spotting ladyboys (can't believe they have a link for ladyboys)here and there, but when we got to this street...oh my! It's on the street where the Thai boxing stadium is, and you can't swing a dead cat in this street without hitting a ladyboy or a go-go dancer. Most of the ladyboys are really easy to spot...they're just to butch, beardy, or hairy. Some of them however are really hard to spot. Andrea and I spent the night in the main place where they all are drinking and trying to come up with a system to spot them. We found one, their feet size if their weakness, they're massive bloke feet. That took all night to figure out in the mean time there are some sights to tell about.
Firstly, the ladyboys on the poles/podiums are quite bitchy to one another. One ladyboy got into a bit of an tizz and the removed one of his/her chicken fillets to mop her brow ! They are quite open in showing their bits to everyone, alowing photos and everything (we forgot our camera thankfully). It's all very entertaining. Other occurances was this 60 year old man turning up at the bar we were at with 3 "ladies" with him !!! Andrea was amazed and had a chat with both him and the girls. There was also a time when i needed the loo, upon my return, Andrea was swamped by a ladyboy and a waitress who were asking Andrea if she was a ladyboy. Everyone in the bar was laughing and the waitress even felt Andrea's boob to see if it was real! Andrea couldn't communicate with me very well as she was laughing so hard about it all, so waitress told me all this.
We left our ladyboys here and headed for a go go bar. This was just as entertaining as the place we were in was more like a go go market with one path that went through about 20 bars. Blokes here were really getting grabbed loads by the girls and getting a lot of hastle. Andrea and I went through it all unscathed. We found a bar where the girls were dancing on the bar and then waited for some sights, there was only one and that was a really drunk westerner who came in with his "lady" she then proceeded to get him to buy all the bar staff and go go girls a few drinks...they really were fleecing this guy for all that he had.
After a few days weathering out the storm here, the sun finally came out today...Andrea has already ordered a load of chip fat for her upcoming sunbath'o'thon.
We landed at Bangkok airport and stayed the night at a hotel nearby so we could decide where we were going next. Bangkok will be the last leg of our Thailand trip as Andrea has said that's where she'll be buying loads of stuff from. I think it's a favour so i don't have to carry so much around Thailand, i just have to carry it from then on ;) We decided on Phuket as geographically it seemed like the best place to start. This was the first time that we've ever turned up at an airport and not had a flight ticket, and we didn't have much trouble getting one. Bangkok airport is massive by the way and quite impressive. This was also our first taste at seeing some UK shops for almost a year. Andrea was all in a flutter when she saw a Boots Chemist !
Landing in Phuket the weather was really bad, the rain was very wet. We managed to book into a very classy hotel at Patong Beach called "PS2 Bungalow" it's about 8 pounds per night, has a pool/aircon and is our cheapest hotel yet ! woo! There are no PS2's in the room though which i think is blatant misadvertising, there are however a team of cute kittens that come up to us when we're outside. Patong is a dump really, it's very touristy and full of fish and chip shops and tacky shops...Not that any of this is bad, Andrea loves a bit of tat (or "classy tat" as she calls it).
Walking about here is pretty scary, not by the fact that you might get mugged or anything, but in the sheer number of Massage Parlours. They're all genuine and most of them have teams of thai ladies ouside and will shout, grab, probably flash their bits too, just to get you inside them. We've discovered that "Oil Massage" is the code word for the "extras" that may accompany a massage (how delicately did i put that !). Walking on my own it's ten times worse for me as that's when they start blocking your path and grabbing you. Andrea has it easy.
After three days here we finally hit the main street where all the action was. Before this we were spotting ladyboys (can't believe they have a link for ladyboys)here and there, but when we got to this street...oh my! It's on the street where the Thai boxing stadium is, and you can't swing a dead cat in this street without hitting a ladyboy or a go-go dancer. Most of the ladyboys are really easy to spot...they're just to butch, beardy, or hairy. Some of them however are really hard to spot. Andrea and I spent the night in the main place where they all are drinking and trying to come up with a system to spot them. We found one, their feet size if their weakness, they're massive bloke feet. That took all night to figure out in the mean time there are some sights to tell about.
Firstly, the ladyboys on the poles/podiums are quite bitchy to one another. One ladyboy got into a bit of an tizz and the removed one of his/her chicken fillets to mop her brow ! They are quite open in showing their bits to everyone, alowing photos and everything (we forgot our camera thankfully). It's all very entertaining. Other occurances was this 60 year old man turning up at the bar we were at with 3 "ladies" with him !!! Andrea was amazed and had a chat with both him and the girls. There was also a time when i needed the loo, upon my return, Andrea was swamped by a ladyboy and a waitress who were asking Andrea if she was a ladyboy. Everyone in the bar was laughing and the waitress even felt Andrea's boob to see if it was real! Andrea couldn't communicate with me very well as she was laughing so hard about it all, so waitress told me all this.
We left our ladyboys here and headed for a go go bar. This was just as entertaining as the place we were in was more like a go go market with one path that went through about 20 bars. Blokes here were really getting grabbed loads by the girls and getting a lot of hastle. Andrea and I went through it all unscathed. We found a bar where the girls were dancing on the bar and then waited for some sights, there was only one and that was a really drunk westerner who came in with his "lady" she then proceeded to get him to buy all the bar staff and go go girls a few drinks...they really were fleecing this guy for all that he had.
After a few days weathering out the storm here, the sun finally came out today...Andrea has already ordered a load of chip fat for her upcoming sunbath'o'thon.
Sunday, September 16, 2007
We're ok
For those of you that know where we are at the moment and those that don't, we're ok
We landed at Phuket airport yesterday from bangkok with the one-two-go carrier, and today this happens...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6997381.stm
We wont be using the 500 baht off the next flight voucher that we got. Just to say that we're fine and having a competition on how many ladyboys we can spot (There's a great big grey area here between men and women).
We landed at Phuket airport yesterday from bangkok with the one-two-go carrier, and today this happens...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6997381.stm
We wont be using the 500 baht off the next flight voucher that we got. Just to say that we're fine and having a competition on how many ladyboys we can spot (There's a great big grey area here between men and women).
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Day 14 - Last Trip on our Trip
Today was really the last day of the trip, there was only one excursion planned today and then a meal at lunch to say goodbye to everyone as a few in the group were changing hotels to bolt onto the start of a new tour (Cambodia).
The trip was quite a good one too, it was a visit to the Cu Chi tunnels which was used by the VC in the war. It was quite amazing just how massive these tunnels are, there are over 700km of tunnel network, most of which are still considered very dangerous because of the landmine and bamboo traps that litter them. They had kitchens, armories (converting US bombs into mines/grenade), sleeping areas,distilleries,watchposts and even schools! On the surface they seemed to mark areas whereby there was a trap or entrance by creating a fake termite mound, the US forces didn't suspect a thing, sometimes the tunnels were even underneath the US bases. Anyway, after a brief video at the start, we then wandered round the area with Khiem being our guide. He was showing us all sorts, trapdoors, entrances, giant bomb craters, termite mounds, ventilation, tanks, and bits of bomb still lying around. It was made all the more interesting by a soundtrack of gun fire in the area. I thought it was just speakers playing it but we found out that they had a firing range!
The firing range was good fun, you could buy bullets for all sorts of guns. Carmel was first to decide what she wanted to fire, it was an AK-47 the world most popular gun...Andrea told her that she was "common" and then went for the M-16. As for me, well not to be outdone by the ladies (especially after Andrea's shock decision), i went for the daddy...the M60 ! Whilst we were queuing to get our ammo, Carmel was jumping out of her skin every time a gunshot was heard on the rifle range. Andrea on the other hand got her 5 rounds and all of a sudden became a soldier of fortune ! I've no photo's of Andrea shooting the gun unfortunately, but i do have some camcorder footage of it all ! woo ! Every time Andrea shot hers you could see it kicking back into her shoulder and she'd turn round frowning about it all and then just start shooting again. I got 10 rounds for my M60 and i must admit when i fired the thing (on full auto) it drowned out every other gun on the range, great fun but a little scary too. As for what we were shooting at, i thought it would be Americans but it was "just" cutouts of tigers and elephants, not that anyone hit them.
After this we managed to watch rice paper and wine being made and then managed to go down into part of the tunnel complex that had been widened for western bums. It was pretty impressive, there was turning off points in the tunnel, trap doors to more tunnels going further down. We had a military guide in the tunnel who lead the way so we didn't go anywhere off the beaten track.
The trip was quite a good one too, it was a visit to the Cu Chi tunnels which was used by the VC in the war. It was quite amazing just how massive these tunnels are, there are over 700km of tunnel network, most of which are still considered very dangerous because of the landmine and bamboo traps that litter them. They had kitchens, armories (converting US bombs into mines/grenade), sleeping areas,distilleries,watchposts and even schools! On the surface they seemed to mark areas whereby there was a trap or entrance by creating a fake termite mound, the US forces didn't suspect a thing, sometimes the tunnels were even underneath the US bases. Anyway, after a brief video at the start, we then wandered round the area with Khiem being our guide. He was showing us all sorts, trapdoors, entrances, giant bomb craters, termite mounds, ventilation, tanks, and bits of bomb still lying around. It was made all the more interesting by a soundtrack of gun fire in the area. I thought it was just speakers playing it but we found out that they had a firing range!
The firing range was good fun, you could buy bullets for all sorts of guns. Carmel was first to decide what she wanted to fire, it was an AK-47 the world most popular gun...Andrea told her that she was "common" and then went for the M-16. As for me, well not to be outdone by the ladies (especially after Andrea's shock decision), i went for the daddy...the M60 ! Whilst we were queuing to get our ammo, Carmel was jumping out of her skin every time a gunshot was heard on the rifle range. Andrea on the other hand got her 5 rounds and all of a sudden became a soldier of fortune ! I've no photo's of Andrea shooting the gun unfortunately, but i do have some camcorder footage of it all ! woo ! Every time Andrea shot hers you could see it kicking back into her shoulder and she'd turn round frowning about it all and then just start shooting again. I got 10 rounds for my M60 and i must admit when i fired the thing (on full auto) it drowned out every other gun on the range, great fun but a little scary too. As for what we were shooting at, i thought it would be Americans but it was "just" cutouts of tigers and elephants, not that anyone hit them.
After this we managed to watch rice paper and wine being made and then managed to go down into part of the tunnel complex that had been widened for western bums. It was pretty impressive, there was turning off points in the tunnel, trap doors to more tunnels going further down. We had a military guide in the tunnel who lead the way so we didn't go anywhere off the beaten track.
Leaving the tunnels we then pottered round the gift shops on the complex and then a bus journey back to the hotel. We then went for, what we thought would be, our last meal together. The lunch was ok, nothing special as it was another Vietnamese meal. In the afternoon we hit the market for some bargain hunting and then back to the hotel. The evening was another meal but this time it was outside at the market, very good meal too. Andrea and some of the girls were watching the frogs swimming in this big tank and thinking how cute they were when the chef grabs one, whacks its head on the kirb, then chops his head and legs off, and stuffed its chest (not paxo) ! Some of the ladies were almost sick. This is suppose is the Vietnamese way, they really do eat anything here.
Day 13 - Saigon
Like the previous post said we arrived in Saigon at 4:30 in the morning so we were pretty knackered. We couldn't even check in to the hotel until mid morning so we went on our tour of Saigon. Saigon is the western brother of Hanoi in the north. Saigon has more traffic lights and the mopeds are a bit more organised, but then there is a lot more on the road than Hanoi. Crossing the road here is almost as bad as Hanoi, except for the fact that they have "tourist police". The tourist police are great, they always look unhappy 'cause of the awful green uniform they have to wear, but when they see you they smile and help you cross the road or try to answer any questions that you have about the area.
We decided on having our cyclo tour round the city to kill some time. Like I said, everyone was pretty knackered from getting up early, Andrea was coughing like a trooper and not talking 'cause she's allergic to early mornings.
The first stop was the war remnants museum. This place was pretty amazing and will leave quite an impression on me for some time to come. Whilst the museum in Hanoi was overtly more biased, here the photos pretty much told the story. Outside the place there are capture vehicles, aircraft and bombs, but it's the inside that's the most dramatic. There are quite a few famous photos here and most of them have been taken by American journalists during the war. Of course i can imagine there was atrocities on both sides and this place wasn't going to speak about the VC ones, it certainly shouted very loudly about the American ones, particularly agent orange and the My Lai Massacre.
The next stop was the reunification palace, this was quite cool as we'd seen the different photo's from the war where the tanks went crashing through the gate (it marked the end of the war). Both of the tanks that did this are restored and are on displace at the from of the palace :) The palace itself wouldn't look out of place in Milton Keynes as it was pretty bland and ugly.
Our little cyclo tour then headed into the center of the city, on the way we saw a street stall selling puppies,turtles,squirrels, and chipmunks (our guide Khiem thought that only the puppies were pets the rest was being sold for food!). Then it was a off to the Notre-Dame cathedral and the post office in the city to look at their architecture, they're the oldest buildings in Saigon. That marked the end of the visits and only the return cyclo trip back was to go. The one sight i remember seeing on this journey back was going through the posh shopping area, there was a giant Louis Vuitton shop and right outside the shop was an old woman getting told to "move" by the police as she was trying to sell live chickens to passers by. hahahaha I'm guessing it'll be a while before the place is fully westernised and that'd be a good thing.
Back at the hotel we dashed out again to hit the big market, Andrea was getting an itchy purse. We went to a "Pho 2000" place for lunch first i had a beef stew which was nice and everyone else didn't like theres. There was a picture of Bill Clinton on the wall when he visited, the photos are following us as we saw a similar one on the wall in a craft shop in Hanoi. In the market, we lost people countless times and traders offered me clothing, watches, coffee beans, junk and tat. A massive storm hit then which made us stay in the market to try and wait it out, this storm was not going away though so we just had to make a break for it back to the hotel. Everyone pretty much fell asleep for the afternoon then.
The evening consisted of a few of us going out for a posh Chinese where they served stuff like "pig's stomach". I don't think anyone really enjoyed their meal that night and Carmel had to wait over an hour for hers to turn up (she was always last to be served).
We decided on having our cyclo tour round the city to kill some time. Like I said, everyone was pretty knackered from getting up early, Andrea was coughing like a trooper and not talking 'cause she's allergic to early mornings.
The first stop was the war remnants museum. This place was pretty amazing and will leave quite an impression on me for some time to come. Whilst the museum in Hanoi was overtly more biased, here the photos pretty much told the story. Outside the place there are capture vehicles, aircraft and bombs, but it's the inside that's the most dramatic. There are quite a few famous photos here and most of them have been taken by American journalists during the war. Of course i can imagine there was atrocities on both sides and this place wasn't going to speak about the VC ones, it certainly shouted very loudly about the American ones, particularly agent orange and the My Lai Massacre.
The next stop was the reunification palace, this was quite cool as we'd seen the different photo's from the war where the tanks went crashing through the gate (it marked the end of the war). Both of the tanks that did this are restored and are on displace at the from of the palace :) The palace itself wouldn't look out of place in Milton Keynes as it was pretty bland and ugly.
Our little cyclo tour then headed into the center of the city, on the way we saw a street stall selling puppies,turtles,squirrels, and chipmunks (our guide Khiem thought that only the puppies were pets the rest was being sold for food!). Then it was a off to the Notre-Dame cathedral and the post office in the city to look at their architecture, they're the oldest buildings in Saigon. That marked the end of the visits and only the return cyclo trip back was to go. The one sight i remember seeing on this journey back was going through the posh shopping area, there was a giant Louis Vuitton shop and right outside the shop was an old woman getting told to "move" by the police as she was trying to sell live chickens to passers by. hahahaha I'm guessing it'll be a while before the place is fully westernised and that'd be a good thing.
Back at the hotel we dashed out again to hit the big market, Andrea was getting an itchy purse. We went to a "Pho 2000" place for lunch first i had a beef stew which was nice and everyone else didn't like theres. There was a picture of Bill Clinton on the wall when he visited, the photos are following us as we saw a similar one on the wall in a craft shop in Hanoi. In the market, we lost people countless times and traders offered me clothing, watches, coffee beans, junk and tat. A massive storm hit then which made us stay in the market to try and wait it out, this storm was not going away though so we just had to make a break for it back to the hotel. Everyone pretty much fell asleep for the afternoon then.
The evening consisted of a few of us going out for a posh Chinese where they served stuff like "pig's stomach". I don't think anyone really enjoyed their meal that night and Carmel had to wait over an hour for hers to turn up (she was always last to be served).
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Day 12 - Getting dirty in Nha Trang
Ah, lazy start to the day, sat on the beach with Erika watching the crabs crawl out of their little hole with the sand in their claws and flicking it out then popping back in to get some more sand and doing the same thing.
Whilst i was crab watching, Simon was attempting to go for the cheapest haircut in asia but failed miserably. They started cutting his hair with a cutthroat razor and then he told them no shave it with the electric razor so they did but didnt quite do his bald patch as they obviously think it needs to be longer. They then asked him if he wants it shampooing which he said yes to, they then proceeded to massage his forehead, put cream on his face, wipe it off, put hot and cold steam on it, and then finally shampooed his head. Therefore it wasnt his cheapest hair cut yet.
In the afternoon we went of for the day to go to the mud baths, before we got there though we went to a cham ruin and a sleeping buddha (massive white lying down buddha) at Long Son Pagoda. The mud bath however was the highlight of the day. All of us got in to one big bath and they then filled it in with mud and we took turns to pour it on each others heads, we then went into the hot mineral spas to relax afterwards. We then could go for a dip in the swimming pool, its not cool though it was boiling.
This is our last day in Nha Trang and really it would have been nice to have a couple more days here to relax and especially to go over the sea on to the other island by cable car.
In the evening everyone went back to the Indian/Italian place but we decided to go to a Turkish restaurant instead and at the end Simon had an apple tobacco waterpipe(bong), we shared this with Mary, Roll and Erika. This was very funny watching them trying to inhale it.
After dinner back on the night train again, to arrive in Saigon at 4.30 :-(
Whilst i was crab watching, Simon was attempting to go for the cheapest haircut in asia but failed miserably. They started cutting his hair with a cutthroat razor and then he told them no shave it with the electric razor so they did but didnt quite do his bald patch as they obviously think it needs to be longer. They then asked him if he wants it shampooing which he said yes to, they then proceeded to massage his forehead, put cream on his face, wipe it off, put hot and cold steam on it, and then finally shampooed his head. Therefore it wasnt his cheapest hair cut yet.
In the afternoon we went of for the day to go to the mud baths, before we got there though we went to a cham ruin and a sleeping buddha (massive white lying down buddha) at Long Son Pagoda. The mud bath however was the highlight of the day. All of us got in to one big bath and they then filled it in with mud and we took turns to pour it on each others heads, we then went into the hot mineral spas to relax afterwards. We then could go for a dip in the swimming pool, its not cool though it was boiling.
This is our last day in Nha Trang and really it would have been nice to have a couple more days here to relax and especially to go over the sea on to the other island by cable car.
In the evening everyone went back to the Indian/Italian place but we decided to go to a Turkish restaurant instead and at the end Simon had an apple tobacco waterpipe(bong), we shared this with Mary, Roll and Erika. This was very funny watching them trying to inhale it.
After dinner back on the night train again, to arrive in Saigon at 4.30 :-(
Day 11 - Nha Trang
Just a little note about leaving Hoi An, it's just another thing to add to our stuff that we've missed. Hoi An is a beautiful town untouched by time and on the 15th of every month they have a lantern festival whereby all the shops and houses have lit lanterns outside to remember the dead. We left 5 days before this festival....great ! Anyway, loved Hoi An, and Carol is my Tailor :)
It was up early today, for another tour, this time round Nha Trang. This place, like Hoi An, is where a lot of the locals come for holiday as there is a great beach and lots of islands dotted around. Our tour today was a boating/island hopping one. The first island we went to was, err, can't remember the name but it was nice. The boat anchored up in the harbor and a load of ladies in their basket boats (yes it's a boat that's like a basket) turned up to ferry us to the village. You have to jump into the center of these boats as getting in normally will upturn them. After getting to the village we had a local guide that showed us how those boats were made(bamboo, cowpoo and tar), squid drying in the sun (sun dried squid is a delicacy here), lots of kids about saying "hello". Andrea, scornfully asked the guide why the kids aren't in school, he just replied "'cause it's Saturday"....hehehehe. We then ended up at this giant aquarium which looked like something from the Pirates of the Caribbean films, It was quite good. They had some stone fish, turtles, sharks, and giant moray eels.
Hopping onto our boat, which had come round to the other side of the island, we headed off to do a bit of snorkeling in the ocean. The first time in the water though, we had to jump off the roof of the boat with the skipper, it was only me, Roll and the captain that did it as the ladies were scared. We all then went in and had a great time swimming about near the rocks, apart from the usual fish you see there was some long things that looked like sea snakes but probably weren't.
We then had some lunch prepared for us by the crew. It was a Vietnamese meal which meant lots of nice dishes that i can't pronounce, oh, except spring rolls and rice - no noodle today ;) It was then a short trip to a neighboring island for an afternoon on the beach. Andrea and I had a good book each in toe, the others settled for sleeping/reading/parasailing/jetskiing. We left here and then headed back to the pool in the hotel to catch the rest of the sun and prepare for the evening meal.
It was just a few of us going out tonight to a Italian/Indian restaurant (yes you read it right) that was perfect for us as Andrea had a curry and I had a pizza. We then had a drink at a local bar where Vietnam was playing some other team at football, they were very passionate about it. Carmel spent the night trying to find a rich Vietnamese to marry. The walk there consisted of us walking past a big pile of rubbish that was left in the dark street, getting closer you could see it was moving with loads of rats, closer still and they'd scatter all over the shop. They'd run for cover under the metal fence but was stop just underneath with their bums showing to you, it was as if "If i can't see you, you can't see me" mentality going on with them.
After getting back to the hotel the others went to bed as it was 9pm after all, we were having none of it and decided to hit the town on our own. We came across the a club which ended up being full, so we moved to the very classily named "007 Discotheque". Outside we were greeted by a lovely Vietnamese girl in traditional dress who told us it was great in side and we should go in, as we never knew any other clubs we did. I say that "we were told", but according to Andrea the girl completely blanked her. Inside the club it was full of locals and waitresses, a few westerners came in shortly after. We just sat at a table an watched people and listened to the music go from Karaoke to europop to techno and to nam-house(?!?) During the europop phase the two western girls were up on podiums, pole dancing, much to the locals delight...they must of been from the UK. Anyway, littered about the club were these guys(/pimps) that were looking after these scantily clad ladies. The ladies were not going off with the locals but making them talk and getting them to spend there money on drink and stuff. The girl from the door kept coming in occasionally to check up on us and that we were ok. Unless you're in a "lock in" in Vietnam, everything closes by midnight as it's the law here, so we left the place on our latest night out yet in Vietnam!
It was up early today, for another tour, this time round Nha Trang. This place, like Hoi An, is where a lot of the locals come for holiday as there is a great beach and lots of islands dotted around. Our tour today was a boating/island hopping one. The first island we went to was, err, can't remember the name but it was nice. The boat anchored up in the harbor and a load of ladies in their basket boats (yes it's a boat that's like a basket) turned up to ferry us to the village. You have to jump into the center of these boats as getting in normally will upturn them. After getting to the village we had a local guide that showed us how those boats were made(bamboo, cowpoo and tar), squid drying in the sun (sun dried squid is a delicacy here), lots of kids about saying "hello". Andrea, scornfully asked the guide why the kids aren't in school, he just replied "'cause it's Saturday"....hehehehe. We then ended up at this giant aquarium which looked like something from the Pirates of the Caribbean films, It was quite good. They had some stone fish, turtles, sharks, and giant moray eels.
Hopping onto our boat, which had come round to the other side of the island, we headed off to do a bit of snorkeling in the ocean. The first time in the water though, we had to jump off the roof of the boat with the skipper, it was only me, Roll and the captain that did it as the ladies were scared. We all then went in and had a great time swimming about near the rocks, apart from the usual fish you see there was some long things that looked like sea snakes but probably weren't.
We then had some lunch prepared for us by the crew. It was a Vietnamese meal which meant lots of nice dishes that i can't pronounce, oh, except spring rolls and rice - no noodle today ;) It was then a short trip to a neighboring island for an afternoon on the beach. Andrea and I had a good book each in toe, the others settled for sleeping/reading/parasailing/jetskiing. We left here and then headed back to the pool in the hotel to catch the rest of the sun and prepare for the evening meal.
It was just a few of us going out tonight to a Italian/Indian restaurant (yes you read it right) that was perfect for us as Andrea had a curry and I had a pizza. We then had a drink at a local bar where Vietnam was playing some other team at football, they were very passionate about it. Carmel spent the night trying to find a rich Vietnamese to marry. The walk there consisted of us walking past a big pile of rubbish that was left in the dark street, getting closer you could see it was moving with loads of rats, closer still and they'd scatter all over the shop. They'd run for cover under the metal fence but was stop just underneath with their bums showing to you, it was as if "If i can't see you, you can't see me" mentality going on with them.
After getting back to the hotel the others went to bed as it was 9pm after all, we were having none of it and decided to hit the town on our own. We came across the a club which ended up being full, so we moved to the very classily named "007 Discotheque". Outside we were greeted by a lovely Vietnamese girl in traditional dress who told us it was great in side and we should go in, as we never knew any other clubs we did. I say that "we were told", but according to Andrea the girl completely blanked her. Inside the club it was full of locals and waitresses, a few westerners came in shortly after. We just sat at a table an watched people and listened to the music go from Karaoke to europop to techno and to nam-house(?!?) During the europop phase the two western girls were up on podiums, pole dancing, much to the locals delight...they must of been from the UK. Anyway, littered about the club were these guys(/pimps) that were looking after these scantily clad ladies. The ladies were not going off with the locals but making them talk and getting them to spend there money on drink and stuff. The girl from the door kept coming in occasionally to check up on us and that we were ok. Unless you're in a "lock in" in Vietnam, everything closes by midnight as it's the law here, so we left the place on our latest night out yet in Vietnam!
Day 10 Rollin in our Express Train
Time to leave Hoi An, after dropping our clothes off at the post office to be sent home. The post office was great she packed all our stuff up for us in a box, whether she managed to pack our conical hat safely is debatable but we will see what happens.
Anyway today is the lazy day 9 hours on the train, back in our lovely cabin shared with mary and Rollin, we got to admire the countryside and see the sunset though as we travelled along.
Me and Erika decided to go exploring the train, as we are in first class which is a pretty minging cabin we wanted to see what the other classes were like so we started to walk down the train past the 2nd class which was like our rooms but 3 levels of beds ie 6 people, and then into standard class which yeah were just chairs but they did at least have a couple of teles, they seem to like watchin Tom and Jerry. We carried on past them and ended up in the dining cart where all the staff seemed to congregate. We were suddenly the centre of attention and they asked us to sit down with them so we did, there was 2 policemen, the manager of the train his assistant and 1 other, a guy came over from the kitchen who could speak a little english. They were asking where we lived, they got excited when Erika said she was American and they pointed to one of the Policeman. They offered us some drinks which consisted of 333(bababa) beer and little shots of vodka (from a water bottle). Note this was the Police and the manager of the train, who was sharing their drinks. I was a wimp and kept saying no to them though as i kept rubbing my belly and telling them i would be ill. At one stage the manager tried to talk to Erika and was laughing at the colour of Erikas legs compared to mine. She has very white skin as we are discovering to the Asians -white skin is beautiful, brown skin is not. When we left the policeman shook my hand and tickled my hand. When i told Mary she thought this was really funny as it means something rude???
Chatting with Kiem on the train he was telling us about Vietnamese and their relationships with each other. His analgy about life is:
People cant live without rice, just sometimes though people fancy a bit of noodle.
Rice being wife/girlfriend, noodle being bit on the side. Now i know Simon prefers Fried Rice over Noodle, so if he ever changes im gomma get worried ;-). Oh yes and he said to me that he thinks Simon is a Gentlemen.
Arrive in Nha Trang at 10 so went straight to bed, hotel is great its got a swimming pool and right near the beach.
Anyway today is the lazy day 9 hours on the train, back in our lovely cabin shared with mary and Rollin, we got to admire the countryside and see the sunset though as we travelled along.
Me and Erika decided to go exploring the train, as we are in first class which is a pretty minging cabin we wanted to see what the other classes were like so we started to walk down the train past the 2nd class which was like our rooms but 3 levels of beds ie 6 people, and then into standard class which yeah were just chairs but they did at least have a couple of teles, they seem to like watchin Tom and Jerry. We carried on past them and ended up in the dining cart where all the staff seemed to congregate. We were suddenly the centre of attention and they asked us to sit down with them so we did, there was 2 policemen, the manager of the train his assistant and 1 other, a guy came over from the kitchen who could speak a little english. They were asking where we lived, they got excited when Erika said she was American and they pointed to one of the Policeman. They offered us some drinks which consisted of 333(bababa) beer and little shots of vodka (from a water bottle). Note this was the Police and the manager of the train, who was sharing their drinks. I was a wimp and kept saying no to them though as i kept rubbing my belly and telling them i would be ill. At one stage the manager tried to talk to Erika and was laughing at the colour of Erikas legs compared to mine. She has very white skin as we are discovering to the Asians -white skin is beautiful, brown skin is not. When we left the policeman shook my hand and tickled my hand. When i told Mary she thought this was really funny as it means something rude???
Chatting with Kiem on the train he was telling us about Vietnamese and their relationships with each other. His analgy about life is:
People cant live without rice, just sometimes though people fancy a bit of noodle.
Rice being wife/girlfriend, noodle being bit on the side. Now i know Simon prefers Fried Rice over Noodle, so if he ever changes im gomma get worried ;-). Oh yes and he said to me that he thinks Simon is a Gentlemen.
Arrive in Nha Trang at 10 so went straight to bed, hotel is great its got a swimming pool and right near the beach.
Day 9 - My Son
Right, whilst Andrea was having a lazy day shopping and "living it large" in Hoi An, i decided to hop onto an optional trip to the My Son ruins. These ruins were built in the Cham Empire which is now kerput. The point i'm trying to make is these were actually as old as they looked ! yes, 8th century stuff. Apparently, they are very similar to the temples at Angkor wat in Cambodia, only not as large and wasn't in any movies. It was however, a hiding place for the VC during the war so part of the complex was completely flattened by the Americans, there are still bits of bomb and craters about.
Apart from that and the link there's not much to explain about the ruins themselves, other than they are impressive. One thing i would like to mention is that it was located in a place that the locals call "Sun valley" because it's like a giant crater like valley that acts like a radar dish and sucks up heat. This was really HOT, just walking 50 yards from the bus to the nice cafe made me break out in a mega sweat, let alone hiking round this place. I'm sure that Andrea was thinking of me whilst she was supping on her lime juice and living the live ;)
Apart from that and the link there's not much to explain about the ruins themselves, other than they are impressive. One thing i would like to mention is that it was located in a place that the locals call "Sun valley" because it's like a giant crater like valley that acts like a radar dish and sucks up heat. This was really HOT, just walking 50 yards from the bus to the nice cafe made me break out in a mega sweat, let alone hiking round this place. I'm sure that Andrea was thinking of me whilst she was supping on her lime juice and living the live ;)
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Day 9 - Living the life of a princess
This is the life, hired a biycle today as needed to go to so many tailors that it was the most efficent way around. This morning Simon went to My son at 7.30 in morning, i wanted a lazy day so he can write about that.
I felt like a rich princess today, i went around the different tailors for my fittings going from one to the other on my bicyle and then i went for breakfast at the cargo club and had a proper chedder cheese hot baguette - mmm i felt like a princess with caviar, when Simon got back we went there again and he had a blue cheese hot baguette.
My suit is looking good, my shoes are nearly finished, my coat, skirt and trousers are nearly finished. Simon loved his suit that much he ordered a pink shirt to match, and i admit it, he looked very tasty in his suit, it was definatly the correct colour so he and Carol were correct.
Later on in the day i went and had my hair washed and straightened in the weirdest hair salon ever, i had to lie down to get my hair washed, and it was rinsed over a bucket, the old women next to me used the combs to scratch her back. It looked great though, shame i just sweated straight away as it was so hot.
In the evening we went for a meal at the Green Restaurant recommended by Lonely Planet, my stomach didnt like the food though an hour later though. We also went and had a nosy again at the Karaoke as its so funny just seeing these little rooms with the teles and sofas.
I felt like a rich princess today, i went around the different tailors for my fittings going from one to the other on my bicyle and then i went for breakfast at the cargo club and had a proper chedder cheese hot baguette - mmm i felt like a princess with caviar, when Simon got back we went there again and he had a blue cheese hot baguette.
My suit is looking good, my shoes are nearly finished, my coat, skirt and trousers are nearly finished. Simon loved his suit that much he ordered a pink shirt to match, and i admit it, he looked very tasty in his suit, it was definatly the correct colour so he and Carol were correct.
Later on in the day i went and had my hair washed and straightened in the weirdest hair salon ever, i had to lie down to get my hair washed, and it was rinsed over a bucket, the old women next to me used the combs to scratch her back. It looked great though, shame i just sweated straight away as it was so hot.
In the evening we went for a meal at the Green Restaurant recommended by Lonely Planet, my stomach didnt like the food though an hour later though. We also went and had a nosy again at the Karaoke as its so funny just seeing these little rooms with the teles and sofas.
Day 8 - Hoi An - Tailor City
I would recommend that this is the place to go for a hen party, this is heaven city for a bunch of girls, with all the tailor shops its just so amazing.
The previous night, we went to a restaurant and had a Vietnamese cooking class, we all sat at the table and she talked us through cutting the veg etc and then putting it in the pan to boil etc, we made:
Pumpkin Soup - gorgeous
Spring rolls - gorgeous
Papaya salad - gorgeous
fish with a lemongrass paste on it - fish good, paste not so good
I had to heat the banana leafs (this fish went in that to cook) over the gas hob, i kept burning it instead of heating it, and i wasnt particularly great at cutting and grating the veg either.
The girl (Hin) who did the cooking class was lovely, earlier on in the day she had taken us around the market and showed us how to pick the best fruit and veg. She was telling us how she was 21 and her family lived in the countryside and she had come to the town Hoi An and had learnt to cook and was now doing these cooking courses, and she had put her older brother and younger sis though uni and school, she was now saving up to buy herself a scooter. She lived on the floor of the restaurant and worked 7 days a week.
Today was our first day of stalking the shops trying to get our clothes and shoes. Ive dropped my black knackered shoes off at a shop and they are going to copy them for me for 12 quid. The next stop was at the Yale Tailors, we have been told these are very good but slightly more expensive. Simon wanted a suit though so we went into here and you then get given books and books of pictures from next catalogues, fashion mags. Simon seems to know what hes looking for so he was happily trawling through the magazines with the help of Carol the asian girl helping him. They all have english names, my girl was called Angela. Simon picked an Italian Cashmere Grey material for his suit, i didnt like the colour but Si and Carol were adament it was the right colour. I being the quantity over quality picked a black polyester material knowing that yep i might be buying a suit but its not the only thing im going to get made. After being measured and photographed we was told to come back in a couple of hours for our first fitting.
In the afternoon we had the opportunity to go out on bicycles. Simon didnt go as he didnt feel so good, and he wanted to go for his first fitting on his suit instead of waiting until the morning. I went but i hired a scooter and a driver like Amber and Carmel, as i was still getting over my cold. Anyway the first stop was at an Orphanage, they asked if we could bring some toys so me and Simon bought a football and as soon as i walked into the orphanage a little boy spotted it and started looking at me with his soppy eyes. He got the ball in the end and we all had a quick game in the yard, it was defo the right pressie to buy so i was really pleased. Going through the orphanage was something i was initially worried about as i had visions of the orphanage pictures from Romania, and while it was bad it wasnt as bad as i thought it would be, there was kids playing in some of the rooms. The room full of the disabled kids was a strange room as it was full of cots and a lot of kids that were disabled, it also had a little baby 4 weeks old that had been left outside and had still not even been named.
After the orphanage we went out of Hoi An into the countryside and was showed around the fields where they grow the food for the whole of Hoi An, we then cycled past 100's of little ducklings that reminded me of the lymm easter duck race, then past a boy on the back of a water buffalo. Im gonna have so many memorys. Sue annoyed me at this stage cos i asked if she could carry my water bottle in his basket, as i was struggling on the scooter trying to hold on to the girl over the bumpy path and video the buffalo. She said no as it would mean she would have to carry it, Erika heard this though and shouted ' i will carry it' i love Erika.
Before we set out Kim asked us if we would mind buying some rice to give out to some of the poorer families, so this was our next stop at these 2 families, the women was lovely, if we took a picture of her with the camera she would then want to see it and would start laughing her head of about it, and try and show it to her friends. She also had the cutiest puppy. I then had to hand over the rice to her, Kim seems to inadvertedly always ask me to hand over either the tips and things to people.
After that we got a boat back to the Hoi An, and was able to watch the sunset.
In the evening we all went of to the Mermaid Restaurant and over to Eden for a drink and a quick nosy at the Karoake. We went up to the 3rd floor and asked could we have a look. Karoake to me is a bar full of drunk people making a fool of themselves, in Vietnam it is about having little rooms with sofas and a big tv and lots of snacks in the middle of the room. very very strange. Speaking to Kym though about it and he said there is 2 types of Karoake in Vietnam - mouth or by hand. Ie, Karoake by hand is another word for a brothel.
Im loving Vietnam, and im loving the people, as you ride through the little villages the kids will run out and all say Hi, i dont however, like the fact that because Amber is a big girl you can see that they laugh and want to touch her, which is partly because she is big but partly because she is so white. To the women being pale is a beautiful thing and you see them on the streets covering themselves up so as not to catch a suntan.
The previous night, we went to a restaurant and had a Vietnamese cooking class, we all sat at the table and she talked us through cutting the veg etc and then putting it in the pan to boil etc, we made:
Pumpkin Soup - gorgeous
Spring rolls - gorgeous
Papaya salad - gorgeous
fish with a lemongrass paste on it - fish good, paste not so good
I had to heat the banana leafs (this fish went in that to cook) over the gas hob, i kept burning it instead of heating it, and i wasnt particularly great at cutting and grating the veg either.
The girl (Hin) who did the cooking class was lovely, earlier on in the day she had taken us around the market and showed us how to pick the best fruit and veg. She was telling us how she was 21 and her family lived in the countryside and she had come to the town Hoi An and had learnt to cook and was now doing these cooking courses, and she had put her older brother and younger sis though uni and school, she was now saving up to buy herself a scooter. She lived on the floor of the restaurant and worked 7 days a week.
Today was our first day of stalking the shops trying to get our clothes and shoes. Ive dropped my black knackered shoes off at a shop and they are going to copy them for me for 12 quid. The next stop was at the Yale Tailors, we have been told these are very good but slightly more expensive. Simon wanted a suit though so we went into here and you then get given books and books of pictures from next catalogues, fashion mags. Simon seems to know what hes looking for so he was happily trawling through the magazines with the help of Carol the asian girl helping him. They all have english names, my girl was called Angela. Simon picked an Italian Cashmere Grey material for his suit, i didnt like the colour but Si and Carol were adament it was the right colour. I being the quantity over quality picked a black polyester material knowing that yep i might be buying a suit but its not the only thing im going to get made. After being measured and photographed we was told to come back in a couple of hours for our first fitting.
In the afternoon we had the opportunity to go out on bicycles. Simon didnt go as he didnt feel so good, and he wanted to go for his first fitting on his suit instead of waiting until the morning. I went but i hired a scooter and a driver like Amber and Carmel, as i was still getting over my cold. Anyway the first stop was at an Orphanage, they asked if we could bring some toys so me and Simon bought a football and as soon as i walked into the orphanage a little boy spotted it and started looking at me with his soppy eyes. He got the ball in the end and we all had a quick game in the yard, it was defo the right pressie to buy so i was really pleased. Going through the orphanage was something i was initially worried about as i had visions of the orphanage pictures from Romania, and while it was bad it wasnt as bad as i thought it would be, there was kids playing in some of the rooms. The room full of the disabled kids was a strange room as it was full of cots and a lot of kids that were disabled, it also had a little baby 4 weeks old that had been left outside and had still not even been named.
After the orphanage we went out of Hoi An into the countryside and was showed around the fields where they grow the food for the whole of Hoi An, we then cycled past 100's of little ducklings that reminded me of the lymm easter duck race, then past a boy on the back of a water buffalo. Im gonna have so many memorys. Sue annoyed me at this stage cos i asked if she could carry my water bottle in his basket, as i was struggling on the scooter trying to hold on to the girl over the bumpy path and video the buffalo. She said no as it would mean she would have to carry it, Erika heard this though and shouted ' i will carry it' i love Erika.
Before we set out Kim asked us if we would mind buying some rice to give out to some of the poorer families, so this was our next stop at these 2 families, the women was lovely, if we took a picture of her with the camera she would then want to see it and would start laughing her head of about it, and try and show it to her friends. She also had the cutiest puppy. I then had to hand over the rice to her, Kim seems to inadvertedly always ask me to hand over either the tips and things to people.
After that we got a boat back to the Hoi An, and was able to watch the sunset.
In the evening we all went of to the Mermaid Restaurant and over to Eden for a drink and a quick nosy at the Karoake. We went up to the 3rd floor and asked could we have a look. Karoake to me is a bar full of drunk people making a fool of themselves, in Vietnam it is about having little rooms with sofas and a big tv and lots of snacks in the middle of the room. very very strange. Speaking to Kym though about it and he said there is 2 types of Karoake in Vietnam - mouth or by hand. Ie, Karoake by hand is another word for a brothel.
Im loving Vietnam, and im loving the people, as you ride through the little villages the kids will run out and all say Hi, i dont however, like the fact that because Amber is a big girl you can see that they laugh and want to touch her, which is partly because she is big but partly because she is so white. To the women being pale is a beautiful thing and you see them on the streets covering themselves up so as not to catch a suntan.
Day 7 - Hue to Hoi An
This was a bit of a traveling day, we left Hue by bus for the 4 hour journey to Hoi An, it wasn't so bad as there was three stops on the way. The first stop was at a resort on one of the beaches just south of Hue. We just had a spot of lunch :) After here we then traveled up the mountain pass (called the Hai Van Pass, this thing just kept on going and the driver was the worst driver we've had so far as he was flinging the bus round the corners when there was a cliff edge on them, the scene in The Italian Job sprung to mind. Anyway, the Hai Van pass has strategic uses as apart from the Ho Chi Minh trail, its the only way to come from north to south and vise versa. So at the top of the pass is a load of bunkers that have the most amazing views. The bunkers themselves are riddled with bullet holes. The view to the north was of the route we came. The view south however was quite stunning as it overlooked a giant bay containing the city of Denang, and more importantly, the famous China Beach. We pretty much traveled straight to China Beach to have a stroll around and take pictures, it's just a really big beach to be honest, there was however the remains of the US helicopter base that was used during the war to ferry the soldiers to the beach for R&R :)
We finally got to Hoi An in the afternoon and had a tour of the city. Hoi An is very old and has been left untouched by war. There's some bridge that we walked over which was good and then the old quarter that had a really old house which looked almost Tudor. The main point about Hoi An is the shopping. Hoi An is filled with over 400 tailors and cobblers, and is considered one of the best places in asia for getting a suit made. As i would need a suit in England, i was determined to get one made here. Andrea just had to keep pulling her chin up off the floor, it's like a giant candy shop for women as they can make what you like !
We finally got to Hoi An in the afternoon and had a tour of the city. Hoi An is very old and has been left untouched by war. There's some bridge that we walked over which was good and then the old quarter that had a really old house which looked almost Tudor. The main point about Hoi An is the shopping. Hoi An is filled with over 400 tailors and cobblers, and is considered one of the best places in asia for getting a suit made. As i would need a suit in England, i was determined to get one made here. Andrea just had to keep pulling her chin up off the floor, it's like a giant candy shop for women as they can make what you like !
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Day 6 - One great day in Hue (hway)
Without a shadow of a doubt, this day was the best day of our entire 1 year voyage. I think i can speak for Andrea too on this one. We started the morning with a walk to the Perfume River for a dragon boat cruise along it. Leaving the pagoda and continuing our cruise along the river we came across the river police which we had to go and see to pay them some money to pass ! The locals told us that if you don't pass then they'll board your boat and find loads of stuff wrong with it. The boats that the police use look like the patrol boats in Apocalypse Now, judging by the age of them too. Leaving the police, we stopped at the Thien Mu Pagoda and buddist temple which is one of the most famous in Vietnam apparently. We got to watch the very young (around 10 years old) buddists training to be monks. They had a school lessons on writing in Chinese script and the older ones were preparing lunch for the monks. The old monks looked very peaceful and happy with life, but we all know our kung fu movies, turn your back on them and they'll be "flippin' out" at some ninjas whilst you're not watching and missing all the excitement.
Talking of film, they have a soap opera here that is quite good, you can pretty much guarantee that at least 2 people will be killed dramatically in every episode! Beats benders and corrie hands down for sheer drama.
Back to the day, we then got back onto the boat to travel further up the river only to find that the police had captured two sampans with dodgy taillights or something ;) They escorted them to the banks where some other police were waiting for them. Then without knowing it they then sped up to us and attached themselves to the back of our boat for cover ! The police were just wandering around the back of our boat. hehehe. I think the driver was pretty nervous about the whole affair. We then drove into the river bank in the country and went up the footpath where some motorbikes and drivers were waiting for us.
They drove us to some royal tomb (i'll fill in where exactly when i remember) which was really good, again it all looked ancient but in fact was from the 1800s ! It had this great lake that was filled with lotus leaves and flowers, admiring the view we then noticed a small boy wading through and picking the flowers. He then came towards us and tried to sell them to us, the guide took two for everyone to sniff and told the lad to "bugger off" in Vietnamese. The tomb was good, but it was getting up to midday so the guide would talk about stuff whilst in the shade then we'll all rush out into the sun to get closer and take photos then quickly back to the shade again. hehehe. Leaving the tomb we then hit the road again with our moped army to go to a place that made incense. They gave a demonstration on how to do it and Andrea had to then have a go. She did very well :) We then the road again and headed out towards a buddist nunnery. The guys on the bikes really did take us down all the back streets and country paths in the area.
The nunnery was going to be our place for lunch. Being buddists it was all vegitarian but great food. I was very surreal being waited on by buddist nuns and after the meal they even gave us pillows so that we could have a siesta in their sleeping area. Graciously leaving the nunnery, we then headed towards American Bunker Hill which had amazing views of the perfume river, the mountains to the west where the ho-chi-minh trail resided and also Hamburger Hill was visible. The bunkers were well, just bits of concrete really, what's really impressive is that the bomb holes and trenches that were dug around the bunkers were still present, there was even bullet holes in the bunkers.
We left here and then headed for the to the Tiger Arena (looks old but not again) where tigers and elephants fought to the death for the emperors pleasure. It was kind of a small amphitheater with scratch marks in the masonry and everything, ew.
Leaving here we went down more back streets Hue and ended up at a ladies house where she made the Chinese conical hats, hers are considered the best as you can hold them to the sun and you'll see a bunch of shadows that tell a story. She gave us a demonstration on how she makes the hats, what made it more impressive was that she only had one arm. The local hat making businesses weren't interested in a one handed hat maker so she thought blow it i'll start my own company, and now she makes the best ones in Vietnam...good for her.
Going on the road again we left to head for the Thanh Toan Bridge, which in itself was amazing but the fact that the village also had a fortune teller made it even better ! The old lady must of been in her 80's and had a very wrinkled and wise looking face. She came wandering to the bridge when she heard our mopeds approach, i think she heard the "ker ching" of till sounds. She was in a traditional vietnamese dress with one of those conical hats. I went first and then Andrea, and we were very careful about her seeing us together before our readings. My reading said that I used to be in a relationship with an older girl but "she no good", her words, she also knew other stuff about my past. Oh, she said i was handsome but it felt more like when your gran says your handsome..hehehe. Now for the future, she said that within in 5 years i'll be rich and living in a big house (looking forward to that one), also that the girl i'm with at the moment is the one :) and that i'll (notice the me bit here) have 5 children...yup you read that right, 5 ! Andreas reading kinda went like this, mumbo jumbo about the past, we really cant elaborate any more 'cause Andrea wasn't listening to her on that bit, about the future...she said that she works very hard and will earn a lot of money, also Andrea will have 3 children. So it looks like i'm gonna have to have a couple of love children to make the fortune come true. It was all a bit of fun really and the old lady was very sweet and full of character.
That was pretty much the end of the day, but what i haven't mentioned about was the traveling in between the locations and how cool it was. It was a mixture of countryside and urban back streets, we flew past giant buddist tombs, bomb craters, paddy fields, driving through roads covered in straw and rice, children running out of there homes waving and shouting "hello", and drive by hi-fives with some of the braver kids. The best thing was watching the people in the paddy fields harvesting the rice and bringing it in to the mobile threshers on the road, the stalks that weren't needed were just burnt there and then on the road. With traffic going past and dodging these fires, including our moped convoy on a few occasions.
The last journey back to the hotel ended in a tropical storm when it started all the drivers pulled over and gave their passengers raincoats, i was given this great big poncho which kept me completely dry. Andrea turned down her drivers offer of a raincoat saying, don't worry i have one here and pulled out the raincoat that my sister lent her. The raincoat, whilst waterproof in a drizzle, definitely wasn't up to a tropical storm and on arriving at the hotel Andrea proceeded to show everyone just how soaking she was...hehehehe. Fantastic day one to remember!
Talking of film, they have a soap opera here that is quite good, you can pretty much guarantee that at least 2 people will be killed dramatically in every episode! Beats benders and corrie hands down for sheer drama.
Back to the day, we then got back onto the boat to travel further up the river only to find that the police had captured two sampans with dodgy taillights or something ;) They escorted them to the banks where some other police were waiting for them. Then without knowing it they then sped up to us and attached themselves to the back of our boat for cover ! The police were just wandering around the back of our boat. hehehe. I think the driver was pretty nervous about the whole affair. We then drove into the river bank in the country and went up the footpath where some motorbikes and drivers were waiting for us.
They drove us to some royal tomb (i'll fill in where exactly when i remember) which was really good, again it all looked ancient but in fact was from the 1800s ! It had this great lake that was filled with lotus leaves and flowers, admiring the view we then noticed a small boy wading through and picking the flowers. He then came towards us and tried to sell them to us, the guide took two for everyone to sniff and told the lad to "bugger off" in Vietnamese. The tomb was good, but it was getting up to midday so the guide would talk about stuff whilst in the shade then we'll all rush out into the sun to get closer and take photos then quickly back to the shade again. hehehe. Leaving the tomb we then hit the road again with our moped army to go to a place that made incense. They gave a demonstration on how to do it and Andrea had to then have a go. She did very well :) We then the road again and headed out towards a buddist nunnery. The guys on the bikes really did take us down all the back streets and country paths in the area.
The nunnery was going to be our place for lunch. Being buddists it was all vegitarian but great food. I was very surreal being waited on by buddist nuns and after the meal they even gave us pillows so that we could have a siesta in their sleeping area. Graciously leaving the nunnery, we then headed towards American Bunker Hill which had amazing views of the perfume river, the mountains to the west where the ho-chi-minh trail resided and also Hamburger Hill was visible. The bunkers were well, just bits of concrete really, what's really impressive is that the bomb holes and trenches that were dug around the bunkers were still present, there was even bullet holes in the bunkers.
We left here and then headed for the to the Tiger Arena (looks old but not again) where tigers and elephants fought to the death for the emperors pleasure. It was kind of a small amphitheater with scratch marks in the masonry and everything, ew.
Leaving here we went down more back streets Hue and ended up at a ladies house where she made the Chinese conical hats, hers are considered the best as you can hold them to the sun and you'll see a bunch of shadows that tell a story. She gave us a demonstration on how she makes the hats, what made it more impressive was that she only had one arm. The local hat making businesses weren't interested in a one handed hat maker so she thought blow it i'll start my own company, and now she makes the best ones in Vietnam...good for her.
Going on the road again we left to head for the Thanh Toan Bridge, which in itself was amazing but the fact that the village also had a fortune teller made it even better ! The old lady must of been in her 80's and had a very wrinkled and wise looking face. She came wandering to the bridge when she heard our mopeds approach, i think she heard the "ker ching" of till sounds. She was in a traditional vietnamese dress with one of those conical hats. I went first and then Andrea, and we were very careful about her seeing us together before our readings. My reading said that I used to be in a relationship with an older girl but "she no good", her words, she also knew other stuff about my past. Oh, she said i was handsome but it felt more like when your gran says your handsome..hehehe. Now for the future, she said that within in 5 years i'll be rich and living in a big house (looking forward to that one), also that the girl i'm with at the moment is the one :) and that i'll (notice the me bit here) have 5 children...yup you read that right, 5 ! Andreas reading kinda went like this, mumbo jumbo about the past, we really cant elaborate any more 'cause Andrea wasn't listening to her on that bit, about the future...she said that she works very hard and will earn a lot of money, also Andrea will have 3 children. So it looks like i'm gonna have to have a couple of love children to make the fortune come true. It was all a bit of fun really and the old lady was very sweet and full of character.
That was pretty much the end of the day, but what i haven't mentioned about was the traveling in between the locations and how cool it was. It was a mixture of countryside and urban back streets, we flew past giant buddist tombs, bomb craters, paddy fields, driving through roads covered in straw and rice, children running out of there homes waving and shouting "hello", and drive by hi-fives with some of the braver kids. The best thing was watching the people in the paddy fields harvesting the rice and bringing it in to the mobile threshers on the road, the stalks that weren't needed were just burnt there and then on the road. With traffic going past and dodging these fires, including our moped convoy on a few occasions.
The last journey back to the hotel ended in a tropical storm when it started all the drivers pulled over and gave their passengers raincoats, i was given this great big poncho which kept me completely dry. Andrea turned down her drivers offer of a raincoat saying, don't worry i have one here and pulled out the raincoat that my sister lent her. The raincoat, whilst waterproof in a drizzle, definitely wasn't up to a tropical storm and on arriving at the hotel Andrea proceeded to show everyone just how soaking she was...hehehehe. Fantastic day one to remember!
Day 5 - Hue (hway)
Day 5 was the Vietnamese national day, where they celebrate their independence from the French. Finally, we're in a country where they're having their national day celebrated and not missing it by a couple of days like Malaysia and Singapore. Unfortunately, we were in Hue today so no fireworks, but we did catch a giant boat race using the locals Sampans, it seemed that all the locals were out to watch. We however had to get to the hotel which was stunning and very central. After unpacking, it was time for a bit of lunch and then another Cyclo tour to the citadel. As far as citadels go it was pretty impressive, they explained what all the places in there meant too. Unfortunately, a lot of it was bombed during the French and American wars but 'cause it's a world heritage site, it'll be restored to its former glory. One thing i would like to note, and i think this is the case of sheer neglect on behalf of the Vietnamese, is that the citadel looked ancient...it really did, but then when we asked how old was the place our guide said it was built in 1802 ! I mean i've been in loos in pubs that are older than that, at least they certainly smell older anyway. Then it was a cyclo ride back to the hotel and get ready for an evening meal.
The evening meal was at a place called "Lac Thanh" which is run by a deaf-mute family, which made it interesting when ordering the food. The owner also had a great party trick of opening 6 bottles of beer at the same time from some home made bottle openers. Other entertainment at the meal was watching a gecko on the wall singlehandedly eat around 100 flies, very impressive.At the end of the meal I went downstairs to the cafe part with Khiem (our guide) 'cause the Miss Vietnamese contest was on TV and one of his class mates at school was in it. We all cheered when she came out, however the owner being deaf didn't realise this and he was in front of us with his thumbs down...hehehe. Unfortunately, Andrea and the ladies got itchy feet then and wanted to leave to get back to the hotel...JUST when they were starting the swim wear part of the contest...damn it ! The owner did make us some home made bottle openers though and wrote on them for us. It's got to be number 1 when it comes to rubbish that we're bringing back from our travels, i mean it's just a bit of wood and a nut and bolt. We will have a new party trick to woo everyone at parties ! you'll have to supply the beer of course ;)
A side note on the weather here, it's hot. I mean Sydney was hot when it was in full steam but nothing like this. The temperature tends to be around 35 here which in Australia is bearable, but when you've got humidity that can easily hit 80% it makes it so much worse. We find ourselves walking about a hundred hards from the hotels and into a shop/cafe/bar then you stop and just burst. out into sweat. Here's the 5 day forecast for Hue.
The evening meal was at a place called "Lac Thanh" which is run by a deaf-mute family, which made it interesting when ordering the food. The owner also had a great party trick of opening 6 bottles of beer at the same time from some home made bottle openers. Other entertainment at the meal was watching a gecko on the wall singlehandedly eat around 100 flies, very impressive.At the end of the meal I went downstairs to the cafe part with Khiem (our guide) 'cause the Miss Vietnamese contest was on TV and one of his class mates at school was in it. We all cheered when she came out, however the owner being deaf didn't realise this and he was in front of us with his thumbs down...hehehe. Unfortunately, Andrea and the ladies got itchy feet then and wanted to leave to get back to the hotel...JUST when they were starting the swim wear part of the contest...damn it ! The owner did make us some home made bottle openers though and wrote on them for us. It's got to be number 1 when it comes to rubbish that we're bringing back from our travels, i mean it's just a bit of wood and a nut and bolt. We will have a new party trick to woo everyone at parties ! you'll have to supply the beer of course ;)
A side note on the weather here, it's hot. I mean Sydney was hot when it was in full steam but nothing like this. The temperature tends to be around 35 here which in Australia is bearable, but when you've got humidity that can easily hit 80% it makes it so much worse. We find ourselves walking about a hundred hards from the hotels and into a shop/cafe/bar then you stop and just burst. out into sweat. Here's the 5 day forecast for Hue.
Sunday, September 02, 2007
Day 4: All aboard the Reunification Express
We got up today at the unearthly hour of 7:00! ;) for breakfast on the Halong bay boat whilst we journeyed back to the harbor. The harbor was amusing because all the captain did was just drive into the back of another boat that was tied up to the harbor. Thing was, every other junk boat thingy in the area was doing the same, there were already about 100 docked, and another 20 coming in. So we started the day after breakfast boat hopping to get to dry land.
The journey back was pretty boring, this time we stopped of at a ceramic factory where they made those blue coloured asian bowls that you see about. I must admit they look a lot more impressive before they go into the kiln. All hand made of course. For some reason Andrea was preoccupied with the toilet so i wandered around and ended up sitting next to a Vietnamese lady that was doing the artwork on teapot lids. She gave me a saucer which had a sketch of some lilly pads and a dragonfly, i had to colour it in with the paints that she used. She complemented me on my colouring in skills, but i get the feeling she was just humoring me. She also asked me if I was married, that would of been a really long story so i just said "no". She then said that she's not married either, was it a hint? ;) By this time Andrea was getting into a whole heap of trouble with her bartering skills. She bartered the lady down so low that the girl just took the items and put them straight into her bag, then took the money and put it in her pocket !!! Andrea was shocked, i mean after all, it's just not cricket!
Anyway, nothing else happened on the journey back except that we saw a scooter that had a scooter on the back of it. We had a free afternoon this day which gave us time to catch up on the blog, wander about, and take about 10 showers. 6:00 we departed for the train station, this involved two cyclos taking every ones luggage and all of us just walking there. The train was pretty much as we'd expected, our filthy home for the next 14 hours. The train was going from Hanoi to Hue. We had to share with another couple as it was 4 bunk beds per berth. The journey out of Hanoi was fairly interesting as you could see right into the living rooms of the locals that really did live along side the track, we're talking about a meter away from it. It just went dark after hanoi so there's was nothing to report on the view. We stayed up to the giddy hours of 10:00 playing blackjack and eating rubbish. It's still to early to tell whether we've got head lice at all.
The journey back was pretty boring, this time we stopped of at a ceramic factory where they made those blue coloured asian bowls that you see about. I must admit they look a lot more impressive before they go into the kiln. All hand made of course. For some reason Andrea was preoccupied with the toilet so i wandered around and ended up sitting next to a Vietnamese lady that was doing the artwork on teapot lids. She gave me a saucer which had a sketch of some lilly pads and a dragonfly, i had to colour it in with the paints that she used. She complemented me on my colouring in skills, but i get the feeling she was just humoring me. She also asked me if I was married, that would of been a really long story so i just said "no". She then said that she's not married either, was it a hint? ;) By this time Andrea was getting into a whole heap of trouble with her bartering skills. She bartered the lady down so low that the girl just took the items and put them straight into her bag, then took the money and put it in her pocket !!! Andrea was shocked, i mean after all, it's just not cricket!
Anyway, nothing else happened on the journey back except that we saw a scooter that had a scooter on the back of it. We had a free afternoon this day which gave us time to catch up on the blog, wander about, and take about 10 showers. 6:00 we departed for the train station, this involved two cyclos taking every ones luggage and all of us just walking there. The train was pretty much as we'd expected, our filthy home for the next 14 hours. The train was going from Hanoi to Hue. We had to share with another couple as it was 4 bunk beds per berth. The journey out of Hanoi was fairly interesting as you could see right into the living rooms of the locals that really did live along side the track, we're talking about a meter away from it. It just went dark after hanoi so there's was nothing to report on the view. We stayed up to the giddy hours of 10:00 playing blackjack and eating rubbish. It's still to early to tell whether we've got head lice at all.
Saturday, September 01, 2007
Day 3 - Halong Bay
Up early again in the morning and of to a charity for children called Blue Dragon. We had breakfast here with a couple of the little kids. The charity was created to help the kids act like kids, ie learnin to play. The little lad sat with us was 14 and his mum would keep disappearing for months on end so he would like at the home until she came back. They also did a little drumming show, which Simon was in as I was too scared.
Then a 3 hour trip to Halong Bay, on the way we stopped at a shop that was selling rice wine that had a snake and a scorpian in the bottle apparently its good for men.
On arriving at Halong Bay we got on a beautiful private boat, we all had a cabin each. (mum it was nothing like the yacht at whitsundays)and then of we went sailing around the absolutely beautiful Halong Bay islands. Apparently they are to be considered as one of the nature wonders of the world (something like that). While the staff cooked our food and sailed the boat we sat on the roof top sunbathing - bliss. Its a shame the water was manky otherwise we would have jumped in for a swim.
In the afternoon we went for a walk into a cave that had 3 chambers. 1 one of them was called the amazing cave and the reason was because when you walked in lit up was a piece of rock sticking out like a blokes willy. Apparently its good for the men if they touch it. We commented on the fact that its good for the women as well then ;-)
Back on the boat it was all about watching the sunset on the deck with a glass of wine for me and a vietnamese beer for Simon.
Starting to get to know everyone on the trip and whilst its a shame for Simon there is only one bloke its still a good crowd of people.
Local delicacy for Vietnamese people is dog. Apparently they all really like it. This is a defo no no. For our main meal they stayed with the seafood angle, of tiger prawns and squid, and for the vegetarians it was fake squid (aka mushroom). A really nice filling meal. The food is defo getting better better.
The evening was finished with a game of Charades...that knackered us out and we were asleep by 10.
Then a 3 hour trip to Halong Bay, on the way we stopped at a shop that was selling rice wine that had a snake and a scorpian in the bottle apparently its good for men.
On arriving at Halong Bay we got on a beautiful private boat, we all had a cabin each. (mum it was nothing like the yacht at whitsundays)and then of we went sailing around the absolutely beautiful Halong Bay islands. Apparently they are to be considered as one of the nature wonders of the world (something like that). While the staff cooked our food and sailed the boat we sat on the roof top sunbathing - bliss. Its a shame the water was manky otherwise we would have jumped in for a swim.
In the afternoon we went for a walk into a cave that had 3 chambers. 1 one of them was called the amazing cave and the reason was because when you walked in lit up was a piece of rock sticking out like a blokes willy. Apparently its good for the men if they touch it. We commented on the fact that its good for the women as well then ;-)
Back on the boat it was all about watching the sunset on the deck with a glass of wine for me and a vietnamese beer for Simon.
Starting to get to know everyone on the trip and whilst its a shame for Simon there is only one bloke its still a good crowd of people.
Local delicacy for Vietnamese people is dog. Apparently they all really like it. This is a defo no no. For our main meal they stayed with the seafood angle, of tiger prawns and squid, and for the vegetarians it was fake squid (aka mushroom). A really nice filling meal. The food is defo getting better better.
The evening was finished with a game of Charades...that knackered us out and we were asleep by 10.
Day 2 - Hanoi
7.30 start this morning to walk as a group to the Ho Chi Min Complex. Ie. The HoChiMin is the guy that everyone loves in Vietnam because he was the President and helped the country through all the wars. They love him that much that against his wishes that when he died he was to be burnt and his ashes spread across the country they build the Mausoleum for him and we all had to solemnly walk into the building and then quietly shuffle past him laying there. Hes been dead for 30 years but hes still lying there. Every couple of months they take him to Russia to be cleaned up ( i presume its a bit like looking after a stuffed animal). We then went around his house on stilts and also the museum.
Whilst walking to the complex. Kym has told us to follow him crossing the road, so we was crossing a one way street and i stepped off the curve to cross and then suddenly i felt a scooter wheel on my knee, didn't hurt and she apologised but really it was because i didn't look the other way on the one way street i was to busy concentrating on the traffic going the correct way not the wrong way. At least i can have the memory of: I got run over in Hanoi.
In the afternoon we chilled out, and if I'm honest this is the first city ive found ive disliked. However this soon changed in the evening. We were going to a puppet show, but to get there we had to go via cyclo. Which is a seat on the front of a bicycle. It was great fun but scary. We all went in convoy together and i was at the front. The first road we cycled down was only the road where the scooter ran me over and of course we were also going the wrong way as well. My driver kept saying No problem, no problem. We both loved the cyclo because it gave us a chance to see the city especially the Old Quarter.
The puppet show was very clever, it was like a Vietnamese punch and Judy show on water. The puppeteer's had to stand in water behind a curtain, the one problem with it though is that it was a Vietnamese story so we didnt have a clue what was happening.
Later on we went to a lovely restaurant where i had the pho noodle dish which is a traditional Vietnam dish. So far the food is okay but nothing to rave about.
Hanoi is great, its a very amusing city and if the rest of Vietnam is anything like this then we are in for a great time.
Whilst walking to the complex. Kym has told us to follow him crossing the road, so we was crossing a one way street and i stepped off the curve to cross and then suddenly i felt a scooter wheel on my knee, didn't hurt and she apologised but really it was because i didn't look the other way on the one way street i was to busy concentrating on the traffic going the correct way not the wrong way. At least i can have the memory of: I got run over in Hanoi.
In the afternoon we chilled out, and if I'm honest this is the first city ive found ive disliked. However this soon changed in the evening. We were going to a puppet show, but to get there we had to go via cyclo. Which is a seat on the front of a bicycle. It was great fun but scary. We all went in convoy together and i was at the front. The first road we cycled down was only the road where the scooter ran me over and of course we were also going the wrong way as well. My driver kept saying No problem, no problem. We both loved the cyclo because it gave us a chance to see the city especially the Old Quarter.
The puppet show was very clever, it was like a Vietnamese punch and Judy show on water. The puppeteer's had to stand in water behind a curtain, the one problem with it though is that it was a Vietnamese story so we didnt have a clue what was happening.
Later on we went to a lovely restaurant where i had the pho noodle dish which is a traditional Vietnam dish. So far the food is okay but nothing to rave about.
Hanoi is great, its a very amusing city and if the rest of Vietnam is anything like this then we are in for a great time.
Day 1 Vietnam Tour - Hanoi
We decided to take some time out of booking hotels and planes etc and let a tour company do it for us for the next 15 days in Vietnam.
So Day 1.
This is the evening we meet everyone in our tour. 15 days to spend with these people.
We had our meeting in the evening and introduced ourselves.
Kyimm is our leader he is vietnamese.
Carmel - From Bolton, has been living in Sydney in Alexandria, worked for 6 years at o2 down the road from my mums for 6 years. (31)
Amber - From Queensland
Erika - American girl been travelling Europe
Lynn - Glasgow (25)
Sue - New Zealand
Mary and Rollin - The mum and dad of the group from south of Sydney
Then we went for a meal, at the Little Hanoi, this was a little restaurant upstairs in the old quarter.
Before meeting everyone though me and Simon decided to explore some of the town. This was going okay for a while, we walked around a corner and then another corner and then had to stop to think okayyyyy how are we now going to get across the road. To truly appreciate how mad it is, heres some clips
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eC4BN9kInXg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_5uMtPqPtQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNIMbDIJSlQ&mode=related&search=
The first time we attempted to cross the road i tried to get a guy in the paint shop to help us he just laughed at us, and when we did cross we cheered, he laughed :-)
Next stop therefore that wasnt to far walking distance was in fact the war museum. Not really my cup of tea but netherless it was interesting to look at the pictures and read the wording about how america got involved in the Vietnam war.
Whilst im writing this im sat at the computer in the reception of the hotel and im looking across the road at a makeshift barbers. Its a chair on the side of the road and he is triiming the guys hair with a mirror in front, a clock on him. It would look extremly professional if it wasnt for the fact it wasnt ourside on the pavement. The barbers chair up the road even has an electric razors, he has managed to connect the razor to the electricity cables running along the road.
So Day 1.
This is the evening we meet everyone in our tour. 15 days to spend with these people.
We had our meeting in the evening and introduced ourselves.
Kyimm is our leader he is vietnamese.
Carmel - From Bolton, has been living in Sydney in Alexandria, worked for 6 years at o2 down the road from my mums for 6 years. (31)
Amber - From Queensland
Erika - American girl been travelling Europe
Lynn - Glasgow (25)
Sue - New Zealand
Mary and Rollin - The mum and dad of the group from south of Sydney
Then we went for a meal, at the Little Hanoi, this was a little restaurant upstairs in the old quarter.
Before meeting everyone though me and Simon decided to explore some of the town. This was going okay for a while, we walked around a corner and then another corner and then had to stop to think okayyyyy how are we now going to get across the road. To truly appreciate how mad it is, heres some clips
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eC4BN9kInXg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_5uMtPqPtQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNIMbDIJSlQ&mode=related&search=
The first time we attempted to cross the road i tried to get a guy in the paint shop to help us he just laughed at us, and when we did cross we cheered, he laughed :-)
Next stop therefore that wasnt to far walking distance was in fact the war museum. Not really my cup of tea but netherless it was interesting to look at the pictures and read the wording about how america got involved in the Vietnam war.
Whilst im writing this im sat at the computer in the reception of the hotel and im looking across the road at a makeshift barbers. Its a chair on the side of the road and he is triiming the guys hair with a mirror in front, a clock on him. It would look extremly professional if it wasnt for the fact it wasnt ourside on the pavement. The barbers chair up the road even has an electric razors, he has managed to connect the razor to the electricity cables running along the road.
Hanoi - the capital of Scooters
Arrived on the 28th August to Hanoi airport after flying from Langkawi to Kuala Lumpur and then to Hanoi. Was weird being on 2 planes that had Kuala Lumpur in common but were actually completely utterly different. The plane from Langkawi was full of Muslim people and majority of the women was wearing the whole black outfits covering their faces and bodies. To then get on the Hanoi plane with Vietnam people that looked at us strangely, checked in plastic bags, do not have a clue how to queue (very english comment to make), and some of them were very friendly. We got talking to a guy from Birmingham who was visiting family in Vietnam his job was a bit of import and export which sounded a big dubious and a guy on business flying to Vietnam and then he was going back to his house in North London. The other main thing we discovered with them is that they dont listen to the flight attendants. If the seat belt sign is on they would all walk around going to the toilet and when the plane was landing you could see people turn their mobiles on, especially when it had just hit the ground. They all got their mobiles out and the flight attendants was running down the aisle shouting at them..
Anyway on landing at Hanoi the next big is to get a taxi which is something we were warned about in the Lonely Planet guide as they are really bad at the airport for either taking you to a different hotel and telling you it had moved or by clocking the meter so it runs faster. The taxi rank we finally found was one recommended by the tour guide so was perfectly fine.
The journey though was an adverture in itself (always seems to be with the taxi drivers). As we drove nearer to the city what seemed to be a mixture of cars and scooter drivers with helmets on started to change to multiples of scooters with 2 people on. Simon counted 4 on one of them at one time and all having a deadwish. The taxi driver just constantly beeps his horn so they know he is behind them and then they carry on and when you get to a junction its like heh the lights are on green in all directions go go go and so they all did and they all came out safely at the other end with me screaming in the middle of it. I was very glad we was in a car not a scooter. I thought the scooter driving was bad in Kuala Lumpur its nothing compared to here.
For our late night tea we went to Koko a charity restaurant around the corner, Simon had sausage and mash such a Vietnamise meal :-) , luckily we didnt have to attempt to cross the road. We heard western people stood outside saying right ok we can do this, i will go first follow my lead, and the women saying no no i think we can find a way of getting back to the hotel without having to cross the road.
Anyway on landing at Hanoi the next big is to get a taxi which is something we were warned about in the Lonely Planet guide as they are really bad at the airport for either taking you to a different hotel and telling you it had moved or by clocking the meter so it runs faster. The taxi rank we finally found was one recommended by the tour guide so was perfectly fine.
The journey though was an adverture in itself (always seems to be with the taxi drivers). As we drove nearer to the city what seemed to be a mixture of cars and scooter drivers with helmets on started to change to multiples of scooters with 2 people on. Simon counted 4 on one of them at one time and all having a deadwish. The taxi driver just constantly beeps his horn so they know he is behind them and then they carry on and when you get to a junction its like heh the lights are on green in all directions go go go and so they all did and they all came out safely at the other end with me screaming in the middle of it. I was very glad we was in a car not a scooter. I thought the scooter driving was bad in Kuala Lumpur its nothing compared to here.
For our late night tea we went to Koko a charity restaurant around the corner, Simon had sausage and mash such a Vietnamise meal :-) , luckily we didnt have to attempt to cross the road. We heard western people stood outside saying right ok we can do this, i will go first follow my lead, and the women saying no no i think we can find a way of getting back to the hotel without having to cross the road.
Rent a lunchbox
The posts are a bit behind as our world really has been turned upside down since arriving in Vietnam, Andrea will illustrate that with another post. I'm here to talk about the day we hired a car and roamed around the island of Langkawi.
The island is about the same size as the Isle of White so it really doesn't take that long to get around the island. We hired the box of a car from the grocery shop up the road, don't ask me what make it was 'cause i've never heard of it before...all i can tell you is that it was a lunchbox of a car. I mean really, i could of made a better car out of a Lego set, it's only saving grace was the fact that it had air conditioning and an engine. The first place we headed was the petrol station as it had none, you've gotta pay here before you put the petrol in which is a bit strange, we filled the tank up with 30 ringits worth of fuel...that's less than £5 in real money! We then headed east to the capital of the island, Kuah. It's just barely a town, but it is the only place on the island where there is shopping centers, doctors, chemists and any infrastructure based stuff. We wanted the shopping center but drove straight past and hit a security checkpoint, and then again as we had to turn around. It was actually a customs check for the cars coming of the ferries from Thailand, we managed to blag it by being the dumb westerners :) The shops weren't that good, but saying that Andrea found a dress and I found a postcard. We then headed north to have a look at these two 5 star resorts and see what the beaches offered there, it was pretty quite and posh at the resorts, and to be honest you could of been in a resort anywhere in the world as it was pretty impersonal. We stayed a while, took a photo of a hermit crab walking on my hand and then left for the Langawi cable car. On the way there, we had to stop to let a giant monitor lizard cross the road, Andrea was most impressed.
The cable car place was pretty amazing, the base of the it was almost like one of those factory shopping outlets except that it had a petting zoo, elephant rides, an oriental lake, oh and a cable car. Now Andrea really doesn't like heights, but she'd committed herself to the cable car before she saw it thinking it wouldn't be too bad. I'm not that great with heights but living on the 9th floor of a flat for 6 months has kinda stopped the dizzy feeling you get. However, this brought it all back. After getting in and it started to go up, Andrea could see the elephant rides, and the complex below. After a while though she started looked at the journey to come and had to stop gripping the side rail so tight as her hands kept hurting. The viewing point at the top was fantastic, you could see the whole island, the mainland and even Thailand in the distance to the north. The funny thing was, was that at the top there was adverts saying "Stressed? Then have a reflexology foot massage here". There indeed was a place at the top for a massage. Andrea couldn't appreciate the views or even the foot massage place, she was just worried about the journey back but it wasn't as bad as going up...she survived at any rate.
Leaving there we had one last thing to do before the sun went down and that was go to the north western part of the island to get a peek at this cascading waterfall. Unfortunately, for us it was guarded by a pack of small monkeys. The big male came up and sat on a rock on the path leading up to the waterfall, i took his photo. The flash went off which he didn't like. When it came to us getting passed the bit where he was standing, he leaned forward, growled and made it look like he was gonna jump at me. We backed off a little, then he went back to scratching his bits. So we tried again to get past and he did the same, then him and his whole gang started to appear on the side of the path so we backed away and they followed us back to the start of the path. I could tell you all that they were rabid and had blood dripping from their mouths, but it was just some little monkeys gone bad. :)
After that it was back to the hotel to watch the sunset on the beach, and then we went to a seafood restaurant and had grilled lobster for tea 'cause it was cheap. double yum!
The island is about the same size as the Isle of White so it really doesn't take that long to get around the island. We hired the box of a car from the grocery shop up the road, don't ask me what make it was 'cause i've never heard of it before...all i can tell you is that it was a lunchbox of a car. I mean really, i could of made a better car out of a Lego set, it's only saving grace was the fact that it had air conditioning and an engine. The first place we headed was the petrol station as it had none, you've gotta pay here before you put the petrol in which is a bit strange, we filled the tank up with 30 ringits worth of fuel...that's less than £5 in real money! We then headed east to the capital of the island, Kuah. It's just barely a town, but it is the only place on the island where there is shopping centers, doctors, chemists and any infrastructure based stuff. We wanted the shopping center but drove straight past and hit a security checkpoint, and then again as we had to turn around. It was actually a customs check for the cars coming of the ferries from Thailand, we managed to blag it by being the dumb westerners :) The shops weren't that good, but saying that Andrea found a dress and I found a postcard. We then headed north to have a look at these two 5 star resorts and see what the beaches offered there, it was pretty quite and posh at the resorts, and to be honest you could of been in a resort anywhere in the world as it was pretty impersonal. We stayed a while, took a photo of a hermit crab walking on my hand and then left for the Langawi cable car. On the way there, we had to stop to let a giant monitor lizard cross the road, Andrea was most impressed.
The cable car place was pretty amazing, the base of the it was almost like one of those factory shopping outlets except that it had a petting zoo, elephant rides, an oriental lake, oh and a cable car. Now Andrea really doesn't like heights, but she'd committed herself to the cable car before she saw it thinking it wouldn't be too bad. I'm not that great with heights but living on the 9th floor of a flat for 6 months has kinda stopped the dizzy feeling you get. However, this brought it all back. After getting in and it started to go up, Andrea could see the elephant rides, and the complex below. After a while though she started looked at the journey to come and had to stop gripping the side rail so tight as her hands kept hurting. The viewing point at the top was fantastic, you could see the whole island, the mainland and even Thailand in the distance to the north. The funny thing was, was that at the top there was adverts saying "Stressed? Then have a reflexology foot massage here". There indeed was a place at the top for a massage. Andrea couldn't appreciate the views or even the foot massage place, she was just worried about the journey back but it wasn't as bad as going up...she survived at any rate.
Leaving there we had one last thing to do before the sun went down and that was go to the north western part of the island to get a peek at this cascading waterfall. Unfortunately, for us it was guarded by a pack of small monkeys. The big male came up and sat on a rock on the path leading up to the waterfall, i took his photo. The flash went off which he didn't like. When it came to us getting passed the bit where he was standing, he leaned forward, growled and made it look like he was gonna jump at me. We backed off a little, then he went back to scratching his bits. So we tried again to get past and he did the same, then him and his whole gang started to appear on the side of the path so we backed away and they followed us back to the start of the path. I could tell you all that they were rabid and had blood dripping from their mouths, but it was just some little monkeys gone bad. :)
After that it was back to the hotel to watch the sunset on the beach, and then we went to a seafood restaurant and had grilled lobster for tea 'cause it was cheap. double yum!
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Still in Langkawi
Well still here, leaving on the 28th to go to Vietnam.
Its been hot hot hot, with some cloud and rain in the middle of it, but still beautiful.
We are still in Malibest but have moved 3 times because other people had booked in. The final room/chalet we are in for 3 nights is the best one as its the one right on the beach, we can sit and gaze at the sunset. However, we have been incredibly unlucky in that the morning we moved and we was in the other room a digger was outside the room picking up stuff, thus waking us up. Late on in the day he was then on the beach right next to us whilst sunbathing shifting sand and then as we were in the room relaxing he only moved up the beach to outside our chalet to shift more sand. Extremely unlucky. But its still beautiful.
The other day we went on an 3 island hopping tour. We went to 3 islands (obviously) by speed boat.
The first island was...
This was a gorgeous beach that we stayed for an hour, then only prob was the monkeys would come out and have a nosy at your bags. We had to race out of the water to stop them running of with the plastic bag, luckily a guy on the beach shoo'ed them away.
The second island was...
We didnt get of the boat at this island but fed the Seaeagles. This was cool. There was 3 type of eagles swooping down in the water to pick up the chicken food we had left for them.
The third island was....
This is where the lake which is a miracle because its so near to the sea but is freshwater and apparently is good if you have fertility problems you are supposed to jump in to the lake. I didn't bother. We could have gone on a solar powered peddalo, thats definatly a sign of the times. Whilst walking back to the boat from this island we ended up being surrounded by little monkeys again. Im starting to go off them now as im beginning to realise that they are very clever and having seen them try to pinch food of people and try and get into our bags im weary of them. This time though i flapped my fan around to distract them away and all it meant instead was that they came up and tried to snatch it away from me being inquisitive. so now i can say that my fan has had monkey claws on it. Better to be my fan then me.
In the evening we have taken to going to the Irish bar acrross the road from the hotel. They serve cheap tiger beer and cheap wine. They do do a mean sausage chips and gravy though with vinegar - ahhh bliss.
The other bar we have been to is called Little Laylia Chillout bar and this is owned by a Malaysian and his English wife and they spend 6 months here and 6 months in england now that is good. The bar was named after one of his little girls, he said hes going to have to open another bar somewhere with his other girls name on it.
Its been hot hot hot, with some cloud and rain in the middle of it, but still beautiful.
We are still in Malibest but have moved 3 times because other people had booked in. The final room/chalet we are in for 3 nights is the best one as its the one right on the beach, we can sit and gaze at the sunset. However, we have been incredibly unlucky in that the morning we moved and we was in the other room a digger was outside the room picking up stuff, thus waking us up. Late on in the day he was then on the beach right next to us whilst sunbathing shifting sand and then as we were in the room relaxing he only moved up the beach to outside our chalet to shift more sand. Extremely unlucky. But its still beautiful.
The other day we went on an 3 island hopping tour. We went to 3 islands (obviously) by speed boat.
The first island was...
This was a gorgeous beach that we stayed for an hour, then only prob was the monkeys would come out and have a nosy at your bags. We had to race out of the water to stop them running of with the plastic bag, luckily a guy on the beach shoo'ed them away.
The second island was...
We didnt get of the boat at this island but fed the Seaeagles. This was cool. There was 3 type of eagles swooping down in the water to pick up the chicken food we had left for them.
The third island was....
This is where the lake which is a miracle because its so near to the sea but is freshwater and apparently is good if you have fertility problems you are supposed to jump in to the lake. I didn't bother. We could have gone on a solar powered peddalo, thats definatly a sign of the times. Whilst walking back to the boat from this island we ended up being surrounded by little monkeys again. Im starting to go off them now as im beginning to realise that they are very clever and having seen them try to pinch food of people and try and get into our bags im weary of them. This time though i flapped my fan around to distract them away and all it meant instead was that they came up and tried to snatch it away from me being inquisitive. so now i can say that my fan has had monkey claws on it. Better to be my fan then me.
In the evening we have taken to going to the Irish bar acrross the road from the hotel. They serve cheap tiger beer and cheap wine. They do do a mean sausage chips and gravy though with vinegar - ahhh bliss.
The other bar we have been to is called Little Laylia Chillout bar and this is owned by a Malaysian and his English wife and they spend 6 months here and 6 months in england now that is good. The bar was named after one of his little girls, he said hes going to have to open another bar somewhere with his other girls name on it.
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Langkawi - so beautiful
Ah some sun and sea and a swimming pool.
Its beautiful here and it may have only been an hour away from KL but its certainly a different place. The village we are in is called Pantai Cenang and we stayed the first night in the Beach Resort - very nice for 180RM and now we are at Malibest for 100RM, which is also very nice. Hopefully we can stay here for another couple of nights without needing to move on.
Not done much but got sunburnt, gone in the water, eaten at some nice restaurants and generally relaxed.
Its beautiful here and it may have only been an hour away from KL but its certainly a different place. The village we are in is called Pantai Cenang and we stayed the first night in the Beach Resort - very nice for 180RM and now we are at Malibest for 100RM, which is also very nice. Hopefully we can stay here for another couple of nights without needing to move on.
Not done much but got sunburnt, gone in the water, eaten at some nice restaurants and generally relaxed.
Last thoughts on Kuala Lumpur
A few final memories.
1. We went to Nandos 5 times in the end.
2. The chinese market we went to was called Petaling Street market and we bought, deadwood season 3, house season 1, sex and the city season 2, dejavu film for the sum of 10 pounds. My bartering skills was excellent until i discovered that Simon was laughing behind my back and not being at all supportive as i was suggesting ridiculous prices.
3. Simons bartering skills are pathetic, he collared the taxi to take us back to the airport, and he said to me, oh got a good deal for 70Ringits, and im thinknig oooh Simon bartered. I asked him later what the bartering started as and he said oh 70Ringits and i said yes very good we will take that. hahahahahah
4. We finally got on an Air Asia flight that did not charge us for excess baggage (they only allow 15kg each).
5. The tallest man, may be the tallest but the most amusing part of his act was at the end when he got in a taxi, and i could see the taxi driver look at him in amazement and then distress as they had to try and get his very high kitchen chair into the boot of the car.
6. Petronas towers said outloud is Pet-re-nos.
7. Travelling Asia is great, but its tiresome having to always plan ahead and working out what the next stage is, and having problems booking into somewhere with rubbish travel agents. Got an Asian Simcard now so can always ring up places with that if needs be.
1. We went to Nandos 5 times in the end.
2. The chinese market we went to was called Petaling Street market and we bought, deadwood season 3, house season 1, sex and the city season 2, dejavu film for the sum of 10 pounds. My bartering skills was excellent until i discovered that Simon was laughing behind my back and not being at all supportive as i was suggesting ridiculous prices.
3. Simons bartering skills are pathetic, he collared the taxi to take us back to the airport, and he said to me, oh got a good deal for 70Ringits, and im thinknig oooh Simon bartered. I asked him later what the bartering started as and he said oh 70Ringits and i said yes very good we will take that. hahahahahah
4. We finally got on an Air Asia flight that did not charge us for excess baggage (they only allow 15kg each).
5. The tallest man, may be the tallest but the most amusing part of his act was at the end when he got in a taxi, and i could see the taxi driver look at him in amazement and then distress as they had to try and get his very high kitchen chair into the boot of the car.
6. Petronas towers said outloud is Pet-re-nos.
7. Travelling Asia is great, but its tiresome having to always plan ahead and working out what the next stage is, and having problems booking into somewhere with rubbish travel agents. Got an Asian Simcard now so can always ring up places with that if needs be.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Thoughts on Kuala Lumpur
Well, once again, due to my illness (i'm fully better now though) we stayed somewhere a lot longer than what we should of. Kuala Lumpur turned into a week long stay. That's not a bad thing though. Kuala Lumpur is very similar to Singapore, except where Singapore had clinically spotless streets with chewing gum and offense, Kuala Lumpur is filthy with the smells of the sewer system mixing with the smells of the restaurants and food hawkers on the street. We even saw a few rats, Andrea clocked one that was dragging a plastic bag containing some food up the embankment. It was doing a better job of cleaning the streets than the local refuse service anyway.
I'm sure i'm painting a pretty awful picture of Kuala Lumpur, but it all adds to the charm of the place. The locals are very friendly, often calling Andrea a "beautiful lady" when i'm not around. The shopping is fantastic, easily as good as Singapore. You have different shopping centers for different stuff. If you like your Prada, Gucci and Tiffany's there's a shopping center rammed full of them. There's also one thats full of computing equipment, apple, sony, hp, toshiba all present. It kinda reminded me a bit of a giant 7 floor Bowlers on a Saturday. Phone shops are everywhere, so much so that you think that they would never sell anything 'cause there must me more phone dealers than there are people that want phones!
Chinatown was also an amusing place, the market in the evening was rammed full of people and traders with alleyways no wider than your shoulders. Occasionally there will be a mobile fruit vendor that's pushing a trolley up and down the alleyways 'cause chaos for shoppers. You can also tell when the customs people are around as the traders all of a sudden become quieter and rapidly hide their dodgey dvds and fake watches. They all have walky talkies to communicate with each other when danger lurks.
I'm sure i'm painting a pretty awful picture of Kuala Lumpur, but it all adds to the charm of the place. The locals are very friendly, often calling Andrea a "beautiful lady" when i'm not around. The shopping is fantastic, easily as good as Singapore. You have different shopping centers for different stuff. If you like your Prada, Gucci and Tiffany's there's a shopping center rammed full of them. There's also one thats full of computing equipment, apple, sony, hp, toshiba all present. It kinda reminded me a bit of a giant 7 floor Bowlers on a Saturday. Phone shops are everywhere, so much so that you think that they would never sell anything 'cause there must me more phone dealers than there are people that want phones!
Chinatown was also an amusing place, the market in the evening was rammed full of people and traders with alleyways no wider than your shoulders. Occasionally there will be a mobile fruit vendor that's pushing a trolley up and down the alleyways 'cause chaos for shoppers. You can also tell when the customs people are around as the traders all of a sudden become quieter and rapidly hide their dodgey dvds and fake watches. They all have walky talkies to communicate with each other when danger lurks.
We also went up to do the skybridge walk between the two Petronas towers (pronounced a wierd way). The system is, is that they have a fixed number of free tickets available each day. It's a first come first served thing and you need to be there at 8:30 to grab your free tickets. Being the lazy arses that we are, we turned up at around midday in the hope of getting out tickets. Naturally, they were all gone for the day which was a disappointment, but then along came some german fella who offered to give sell us two tickets 'cause he couldn't make it. For 10 ringits (1.20 in real money), it was a bargain as i would of gladly went way above his asking price for it. The skybridge itself was good except that you have to sit though a naff 3D presentation on how great Petronas is as a company. It wasn't shrek 3D, and with the glasses on it made me feel quite sick more than anything...Andrea was wooed though. From the floor the towers don't seem to be as big as what you would think, i don't know why this is. Andrea says that the empire state building, whilst smaller, is much more impressive. Saying that though, at night the building looks amazing lit up as it is so bright that you can see a big column of light going into the sky.
The other thing we did apart from eat and shop was go to the top of the KL Tower which offered much better views than the Petronas towers could. With camera in hand we snapped away and even found our hotel in the city. Andrea, being the perve that she is, was using the free telescopes not to admire the view but to look into peoples hotel rooms. She worries me sometimes.
The trip to the airport was interesting too. There has been a lot of publicity here about the state of the coaches and the coach drivers after quite a few bad crashes. A lot of the drivers have actually been banned, but the system doesn't pick up on it. They also get paid for performance, so the quicker they get to their destination the more they get paid. This worried us enough to just get a taxi to the airport as it would be the safer option...or so we we thought. Once the taxi driver hit the motorway he just floored it, overtaking, undertaking, and going incredibly close to the car in front. Andrea told the taxi driver that he was dangerous and should be racing on Formula 1, he was more impressed than insulted. The taxi driver did tell me though that i looked a lot younger than what i was and that i had good eyes, that would of been good if it came from a lady, instead it just worried me slightly.
A bonus sight from the plane on leaving the airport was seeing the Malaysian Grand Prix circuit from above, it's very impressive.
So now we're here for a week on the beautiful islands of Langkawi. We're taking a bit of time out to sun ourselves and relax a little before we go to Vietnam on a whistle stop two week tour. Come to think of it, why am i writing this here when i should be in the sun!...i'm gonna go to the beach now and grab me a coctail or two. woo !
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