Sublime Sapa

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Now that I am in travel mode, I am feeling more settled - go figure! The course is becoming a distant (at times bad, then good) memory. I had a week of sickness and exhaustion following it, as well as reaching saturation point in Hanoi. It seems like the more I learn and speak Vietnamese, the more miscommunications I have. The good news is I've passed the course and am looking forward to teaching. It's actually loads of fun!

I am in a sleepy town called Sapa in the far north of Vietnam - a stone's throw from China - with a friend from my course, Jan, a Londoner. Sapa is the Asian equivalent of a European alpine resort, replete with stunning mountains (snow-capped in Winter but no skiing) peppered with rustic villages, French alpine architecture, meandering hilly streets and passageways, and to top it all off we are staying above a boulangerie called Baguette et Chocolat!

Lucky we did a 10km hike yesterday cos I have been eating baguettes and pains au chocolat till they are coming out of my ears!

The big tourist attraction in this region is the stunning mountain range - christened the Tonkinese Alps by French colonial explorers - and the ethnic minority hilltribes, all of whom look nothing like the Vietnamese and speak distinctly different languages. In fact they look more like mountain people from Bolivia or Peru! Colourful attire, headresses and big hoopy earrings, necklaces, etc.

So yesterday we hit the tourist trail into Cat Cat village, a Black Hmong community. The first site you see when you take a trek out of Sapa into the mountains are the dozens of terraced rice paddies along the hillsides, giving the illusion of a giant sculpted garden. We followed the well-trodden path past Hmong vendors, rustic village life with wild pigs and buffalo, and down into the river valley where we lunched next to an old drawbridge and cascades galore. Huge black-speckled golden butterflies danced in the river mist. Magic. In fact, Jan and I were half-expecting Monkey, Tripitaka and the horse to ride by at any moment. Or perhaps they were veiled by the clouds hovering above the mountain peaks. It's that kind of place.

All in all it was a spectacular day even though the area is somewhat touristy now with savvy Hmong people selling you bags, clothes and jewellery (okay so I am looking a bit "ethnic" now). I did a "take photos for buy bracelets" trade with a young girl washing her hair from a bucket with the stunning mountain backdrop (oh and a disposable sachet of sunsilk, which she did just dispose of into the pristine environment). We were both happy with the deal, but I wasn't happy with how they were trashing their own backyard with icecream wrappers and the like. Evil tourism and capitalism has brought coke, sweets and icecream to the mountain trail. I shouted at a few Hmong girls carelessly dropping their wrappers and pointed at the bin. It's the same all over South East Asia - I spose we have the benefit of hindsight in the West, even if we are only 20 years ahead in that regard.

Before our ascent back up to Sapa, we decided to take a detour into another village, still the well-trodden path but no other tourists or Hmong vendors in sight. Plenty of day-to-day village shenanigans. Kids chasing dogs chasing chickens and a bevy of young boys brawling and piling on top of each other.

About 3 km (most of it uphill) away from Sapa, it started raining. Then it bucketed down. We both put on our raincoats but were pretty soaked by the time we made it back. But hey, that was the funnest part of the day. And of course we had time to stop off for a Vietnamese tea by the side of the road to take stock of the sublime day.

Well this is the beginning of my five weeks "Tour of Duty" in Vietnam, then it's back to Kampuchea to start up my "new" life for a time.

And to finish, a quote about Indochinese countries from River of Time: "Even as they are being modernised by the West they remain aloof, tragic, beautiful and provocative, a bewitching medley of the senses..."

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