Welcome to Vietnam!

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So we got a hold of some Vietnamese Visas, and decided it was high time to leave Phnom Penh. We searched through our guide for the best route. We could've gone with a slightly cheaper/faster option and just taken the bus into Ho Chi Min city (Saigon), but the guide said that the most scenic route was a boat trip down the Mekong Delta, through Chau Doc. It was only six dollars more, so we opted for the boat. There we met a couple of English girls, Nick and Sara, who we wound up travelling with for the next five days.

The boat ride was amazing, definately on my highlight reel for SE Asia. Once we'd crossed the border, we found ourselves going down a small canal, with extremely primitive looking fishing boats every now and then, someone swimming... no, building a fence underwater. Then we saw our first water buffallo pull itself out of the river and onto the land. Wow. Big thing, great big horns.

As we continued down, it became a little more popular - we were getting the best possible view of a small society built on the water's edge! As the children heard the motor of our boat approaching, they all ran out of their homes to call "hallo! hallo!". They got such a thrill from a response, it was just adorable. Even their parents smiled and waved as we passed.

Then I saw something a little offputting. A human body, shirtless, lying face down in the water, still.

I nudged Nick. "What the hell is that." We looked on in silence, disbelief. Surely not? We looked at each other. Alert the driver? The man at the front of the boat wore a sheepish grin. Could this be a regular occurance?

We floated past in silence, uncertainty. As the body was nearly out of view, it popped up, took a deep breath, and started laughing. The driver joined in. Some joke!

Women were doing their laundry in the river, kids were swimming, laughing, or helping to take care of the family waterbuffallo. Hundreds of duck were crammed into a single fenced off area in the river. Dodgy looking bridges connected the two sides of the river. Beautiful. Just BEAUTIFUL!

We got to the city of Chau Doc, where I hired an old man to take me to the bus station via bicycle. I felt awful making him push me, and considered volunteering to push him, but he seemed to be keeping up alright.

The girls had decided that they wanted to do a homestay with a Vietnamese family. We had been planning to head straight for Ho Chi Min, but after consulting the guidebook, decided to tag along.

So, we hopped on a bus, and arrived at the bus terminal of a neighboring city at 8:30 with no idea where we were, no idea how to get into the city of Vinh Long. Our only guides were the moto drivers, who were non-english speakers more concerned in getting us on the bikes than in where we wanted to go. We finally managed to explain Vinh Long, and negotiated a price. We had an exciting drive down the highway, weaving in and out of traffic, me with a guitar on my knee.

So, the next day, we organized a homestay. We decided to stick with the family the guidebook recommended, as the old man who lived there was once a member of the Viet Cong! kinda wild. Anyway, we arrived, were served a nice bit of breakfast (fried noodles with cabbage and a side of homemade whisky), and we headed off on our bikes to have a look about.

We went down the potholed highway, saying hello to all the kids and waving at all the fruit venders. Stopped on the side for a drink, where the son spoke loudly to us in Vietnamese for quite some time, interspered with fits of laughter, in which his family joined him. The only thing we understood was that he liked Kieran's beard, or thought it was funny, anyway.

We kept on for a way, but decided to turn back when it started raining. We pulled off the road to a fruitstand and bought the weirdest looking things we could find. We were familiar with some of the fruit from Buriram, including one we were not happy about finding again - the fart fruit. This fruit is about the size of a basketball, although more ovalish, and covered in sharp spikes. Even once you chop it open, it's not very pleasant - it has the texture of overripe avocado and smells/tastes like.. well... a fart. I happen to know that it is not allowed in some hotels.

We got back and started our feast. It was a great haul - one massive one that looked like a pear on the outside ended up tasting like a combo of grapefruit and orange. we had some starfruit, which was mild, crisp, and a bit citric. Of course, there were the Nga, covered in red spikes on the outside, and like delicious eyeballs on the inside, jackfruit, which tasted like candy, yummy. Then it came to the fartfruit. We coundn't get it open, so the old man who used to belong to the Viet Cong came out and helped us. He could barely walk, but boy could he use a machetti. He was a little surprised when we could barely finish off a quarter of the thing.

Dinner was fantastic - they started us off with great big fish, that they'd caught in the pond by their house. It was sitting upright, with a leaf of lettuce jammed in it's mouth. They cooked it with the scales still on. The scales were salty, crunchy, delicious.

In vietnam, they do what are called fresh spring rolls. You take a sheet of rice paper, fill it with lettuce, mint and other herbs, rice noodles, and, in this case, some fish. We all picked the meat off the fish and put it into our rolls. Dipped in a salty, spicy sauce. Mmm! We finished with some pork and rice, and of course, some fruit for desert. Ah, and don't forget the homemade whiskey. We stayed up late singing songs.

The next day, we went off for a boat ride. We visited a factory where they were making rice paper, as well as coconut candy. Sweaty work! We also sailed past the floating market. The river was full of these barely seaworthy boats, all filled to the brim with fruits and vege. Boats were shacking up for the trade, tossing pineapples back and forth.

Around 11, we got back into the town, and hopped on the bus for Saigon, Ho Chi Min city.

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