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Published: November 13th 2006
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Hello all. Well we are in Vietnam now, which is our fith country in 9 weeks. It's a facinating and beautiful place but the locals let it down by being money grabing crooks. Getting here was fun, or rather bloody auful but a trip I will remeber.
We got the truck from 4000 Islands in Loas to Pakse then got the 6:30pm bus that brought us to Hue, Vietnam. As every the bus was cramed with sacks and boxes and everything imaginable including buckets of snakes. They had cleverly removed the back 14 seats to fit all this in but eveidently forgot that that left 14 people without seats. We got seats but other people just sat on top of the sacks the whole way.
The bus never seemed to go for more than 30 mins without stopping and every thime it stopped everyone got off for 30 mins. Needless to say we didn't more very fast. However we still go to the border 5 hours before it opened. Why oh why does the bus not leave 5 hours later?????!!! So we tried to sleep in the bus for 5 hours. At 6am we were all told to get
off. We found out that we were supposed to walk the remaining kilometer to the border. Why the bus couldn't takes us I have no idea. We got to the border early and started to form a que to get stamped out of Laos. However, soon we realised our wester ways were useless as people started to bardge forwards and pile up thier passports on the counter. We had been warned that we would be asked for 1 USD but that this was a bribe and we shouldn't pay it. However, everyone else had a dolar in thier passport and we soon realised that we would be put to the bottom of the pile if we didn't. There was no way I was going to let my passport out of my grasp so I held on to them and when the immigration officer looked put I shoved them into his had. This seemed to work as he promtly stampped them, took the dolar amd handed them back. I had just passed a bribe and jumped a que of about 100 passports. Cool.
You can see the difference between the wealth of Laos and Vietnam just by looking at the buildings on either side of the border. The Laos side is run down and old, the vietnam side is big and modern. Going into Vietnam thier is quite a bit of paper work and running about between different windows. They even check your bag and sniffer dog everything. In Laos we just strolled in. It was also funny becuase just as we were queing at one window a load of Laos people started bardging in front but the Vietnamses officer was having non of it and made them form an orderly que behind us. It was a shock to thier systems I think.
When we got back on the bus I decided we hadn't eaten in far to long so I got some boiled eggs. When I cracked them open to my horror they both had chicks inside!!! As a vegetarian I freaked out rather. After some argument I managed to exchange them for one real egg. As yet i have not worked out if this was an accident or boiled chicken feotus is eaten here.
We arrived in Hue after only a few stops. We were dumped miles from anywhere so had to get a motorbike taxi. Moto drivers and the scum of the earth. Tuck tuck drivers are bad enough but moto drivers are everywhere and follow you down the street shouthing at you. They charge a stupid amount and will rip you off for all your worth. They also think that if they take you a stupid route that doubles back and goes in a big circle then you will think you have gone further and pay more. It's people like this that really let the country down. However, we have had some clue as to why people are like this.
Two years ago the government liberalised the economy meaning that people suddenly had access to more money than they had dreamed off. This means that now everyone is obssessed with money and material goods. The result is that everywhere we go we get hassled by people trying to sell us things for stupidly high prices and getting nasty when we turn them down. It is possible to ignore most of this and I have learnt that everything should be haggled for. This includes telephone calls. Last night I wantted to call mum and someone offered me 5000 dong a min. When I told him no F***ing way he droped it to 2000 dong. Thats a big difference and just shows how much people try to rip you off.
We have met a fe nice people but even they seem to ask you for money. Anyway, we arrived and are installed in a very comfortable hotel, en suit, tv etc. It was the cheapest going at 6 USD a night. You get way more for your money here in terms of accomodation. I'll tell you about the last few days in the next blog.
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