From worthy volunteering to selfish, shallow tourism; but can't wait to have my own bathroom!

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UntitledDear Everyone,

What a lot has happened since my last entry! I've had my share of ups and downs in the last few days, but I am sad to be leaving the project, the children and the other volunteers. This, however, must be balanced against my VERY real need for my own bathroom! Tomorrow I begin my tour and cannot wait to sample the great beauty, variety and cuisine of south-east Asia beyond Hanoi. I hope you're excited, because I certainly am!

Last time I left the prospect of Japanese Day up in the air - actually this was quite enjoyable, although we had some WIERDY pancakes. Quite nice, despite being slightly overdone, but hey, this is much better than slightly underdone, right? The only annoying thing was when the Vietnamese volunteers ate and ran (sans any assistance in preparation and leaving a huge pile of washing up, as well as some that some other Vietnamese volunteers had failed to finish the previous day), but they have returned tonight for Danish Day so we shall force them to do the washing up! Hahahahaha! As it was late we were unable to really engage in any Japanese activities, and only a few turned up for the event Reina (the Japanese girl) was a little disappointed, but we made sure to make up for it by having a really pleasant origami session the next day. The Vietnamese volunteers were REALLY impressed with the paper fortune-teller I made - odd how a child's game can bring so much joy. Anyway, Friday was a pretty great day, and although the teaching was light it was still quite fun and I was left feeling totally psyched for my trip to Sa Pa.

By the way - as far as the teaching is concerned, no day has proven to be as effective as Thursday, partly because the kids seem to go to school regularly on Monday and Friday afternoons. But actually, I know that I have made a difference in several big ways. The teaching I have done with the kids - it may be a bit limited, and as we would recognise it I have only given one full day of lessons. But in terms of using cards to teach the kids some English vocabulary I have helped enormously, and I can't believe the improvement in pronunciation - as well as the seemingly learned variety of nouns - of some of the children. By talking to the Vietnamese volunteers, teaching them, going through pronunciation with them etc I have helped some members of a generation striving to achieve at university, to make their country prosperous and improve things for the children, and what's more they seem to be really grateful. By providing lunch for the kids, they are no longer horribly malnourished (looking at how small some of the older ones are I shudder to think what life was like before the project started). And personally, my constant badgering of the poor SJ Vietnam staff to let us teach the kids in a more structured way seems to have stirred them into action - looking at the plan for the next volunteers on the project, they have arranged a clear school schedule involving teaching Literature, maths and English (only the last by international volunteers) classes, so I can go away feeling pretty good. Really, it was quite a rewarding project and it will be with a slightly heavy heart that I leave this project house.

Back to the exciting happenings! Well, as you guys know, at the weekend I was off to Sa Pa, a community of ethnic minorities up near the Chinese border. This of course had its advantages - the possibility of escaping dismal Hanoi weather, copious forests of beautiful bamboo etc. But unfortunately it meant one night spent on a train from Hanoi station and an 8 hour journey. Now, as you all know I am of course a strong, confident young man for whom hardship is by no means a problem, and so I arrived at the train station raring to go and absolutely prepared to "rough it" for one night on the comfortable sleeper beds. Oh, little did I know... The travel agent dropped me off - actually he was good and took me on to the train. However, whilst I was expecting to be led off to the luxurious 4 bed sleepers or even the crampt six bed sleepers I was abandoned on a bustling compartment on the soft seats. As soon as I sat down a guy yelled at me in Vietnamese and gave me a bit of a threatening look, and my agent explained that he had asked to switch seats to be by the window but that I had declined. This was of course followed by more oddly unnerving looks after my guide left and so I pulled out of the station 1) annoyed at my guide for booking me the wrong ticket (I asked him to get me a sleeper for the journey back. He was uncertain.) 2) Tired anyway but absolutely unable to sleep despite the possibly fairly described reclining "soft seat" under me 3) Fearing for my life and my property, a fear that was increased when a random stranger came and sat down and told me in broken English that he was totally fluent in my language and started asking me questions. But, ever the intrepid person, I composed myself and decided "if I can survive this, I can survive anything." Actually, another guy came and kicked the creepy guy out of his seat, but that still didn't allow me to catch any more than broken moments of sleep as I held my wallet close in my inner pocket and tied my bag to my leg in a most uncomfortable way. I was also further taunted by the posh sleeper carriage train that was parked parallel to my compartment where fat westerners prepared for bed before leaving Hanoi, and so this kinda made it worse. I have to say i was relieved when I heard an announcement (in Vietnamese, not that I can understand it - it's a pretty impossible language) telling us that we were approaching Loa Cai (station for Sa Pa), but it was only at this point that a friendly Vietnamese guy in front (not any of the creepy ones) introduced himself and we had a relaxing conversation. Getting into the station was one of the greatest reliefs of my life, but the tribulations of the weekend were far from over...

A long wait and one sunrise later we were in the minibus, driving up the winding road to Sa Pa. Blind corners, cliffside roads, unspecified overtaking rules, boyracer minibus drivers and motorbikes don't make a good mix, and I have to say that there were several near-misses, but luckily no fatalities. It didn't shock me too much though - it wouldn't when you are used to the traffic in Hanoi! We were dropped at the hotel for breakfast, which due to lack of sleep I ate loads of but was really careful about food and water because I had been warned that it made even Vietnamese volunteers ill and then set out in search of adventure on a trek to some of the ethnic villages around Sa Pa. The landscape around the town is totally spectacular, and though very poor some of the traditional houses are very beautiful, however Sa Pa itself is a bit of a grimy, touristy concrete block resort town, and incidently the only place where an old lady in ancient handmade clothes has ever offered to sell me marajuana and opium (don't worry - I declined) and so I have to say I was quite glad to escape.

On the trek I met some more great people - it was just 3 of us and a guide - a nice beautiful 32 y/o Japanese chalet girl from Osaka who spoke little English and a cheerful 27 y/o female surgeon in training from Hanoi hospital who despite talking English to and around the Japanese girl told me that she spoke virtually no English and insisted on speaking to me in French! I have to say I had no objections - after all, my charity is Solidarites Jeunesses Vietnam, and has a French parent company, so I was expecting to be speaking in French pretty much all the time anyway, but it made for quite a surreal trip. The hills and valleys around Sa Pa are really beautiful, and if it weren't for the other places of beauty in Vietnam I might say that this would justify the trip, but actually, I think more fun and learning could be had in the interactive museum of Ethnology in Hanoi. But it was good, and on the first day's hike we trekked 12km, saw 3 villages, visited a family and met a 96 y/o ethnic Hmoung woman - still pottering around and weaving in her home - and visited several cultural highlights. Also, oddly, as we left the hotel, two ethnic women came and started talking to us and following us on our tour, and they continued to walk with us for almost the entire journey, helping the girls over rocks and talking to us in pidgeon English about her family. Number of female Vietnamese stalkers = 3 and counting! We felt sorry for them and bought some rubbishy bracelets, but they were about 10p each!

Anyway, one refreshing trek later, back at the hotel I finally was able to check in. They must have labelled me as backpacker as soon as I walked in the door because the room they showed me to, although it had a spectacular view, and despite being apparently 2 star, had dirty walls, was filthy and had oddly no lampshades or mosquito nets. Deprived of sleep, this was too much for me so I went to complain - after all, I had paid $60 for this trip, which is quite a lot of money in Vietnam. A smug receptionist refused to move me without charging me an extra $10 - by bemoaning the cleanliness of the hotel loudly amidst a lobbyfull of guests I was able to get this reduced to $8, $4 of which I got the tour operator to pay me back afterwards (but only after they charged me $5 extra for a six bed sleeper compartment bed for the journey home. Even the new room was not really clean, and I had to send the towels back 4 times because they kept bringing me dirty ones. Steer clear of the Bamboo Sapa Hotel! Of course, this put me in a slightly off mood for the evening, which was only partially alleviated by a nice conversation with my fellow trekkers at dinner in the hotel, which was not so nice. But I had to cut dinner short, as despite my precautions with the water I soon found that, for the first time (amazingly, as I have been eating out of street kitchens in Hanoi) I had a really upset stomach. A little miserable, I lumbered off to bed. Waking up at midnight from a semi dream/hallucination, feeling totally ill was probably THE low point of the trip, and I have to say that at no time up to that point had I missed home so much. Anyway, in the morning I felt a little better and after insisting on the restuarants dry toast (as long as I could be sure to be safe I wasn't going to let them cheat me of any more money) I decided that rather than sitting, miserable and alone, in the hotel lobby with the evil receptionist laughing at my pain I would set out for another day's trekking.

On this trek we saw the old French hydroelectric dam and more ethnic minorities, and once again I was surrounded by beautiful asaian women, this time Australian expat-Vietnamese sisters (5 of them) who had moved there when they were babies and had come back for the first time. When I explained I was ill as I bought some water halfay round they were so nice to me and began asking if I was Ok and complimenting me on exploits such as being able to climb outcrops. I met such nice people and saw stunning scenery, so it seems a shame that otherwise the weekend was a bit of a disaster, but I had a sleeper carriage on the way back so I slept comparatively well.

Despite arriving back at the volunteer house at around 5 am, I caught 3 hours sleep and then was up and raring to go at 8:30. Monday was a great day - the teaching was limited and there were few children, which is always easier to handle, and it was the nice (but naughty) ones. The afternoon was great as we had free time to go shopping, so Lan (by far my favourite Vietnamese girl - despite constantly threatening to marry me so she can come and live in the UK, she is totally hillarious) took Reina (Japanese), Eunbi (Korean) and me shopping, and I was able to finally get some Vietnamese communist propaganda posters (copies, of course, although still quite expensive)to redecorate my room! My favourite caption - not actually on one of the posters I bought - was "Uncle Ho says Victory, It mean Victory!" and I look forward to placing them lovingly on a newly repainted wall this summer.

Shopping did drag on a little which unfortunately meant we were quite late getting back - not great for me, as it was English day and I was supposed to be cooking! I'm afraid the lack of oven drove me to bacon butties with fried tomatoes followed by pancakes with sugar and lemon. As I had an upset stomach I had plenty of Vietnamese volunteers helping me cook, although some got so hungry they started eating cereal! Hunger, tiredness and ilness exasperated me a little, and I must say that this combined with sheer numbers of people to cook for (the Danish volunteers, 5 of them, working on another project decided to come to English day although they had not been to Japanese or Korean day because they had already had so many of them), language difficulties, inabilty to understand the concept of whisking and my fear of giving everyone food poisoning meant I did get a bit bad-tempered with one of the Vietnamese volunteers (who later apologised and admitted she was trying to wind me up) so dinner was a bit tense (also for some reason the Vietnamese volunteers didn't seem to want to eat with the Danish ones). But thanks to some timely assistance with the pancakes by the Danish volunteers and of course the tireless efforts of some of the Vietnamese volunteers everyone thought it was delicious and said as much. To clear the tension between the two groups after dinner I heroicly intervened with English games (the post-it on head famous person game and charades) with delicious Dairy Milk chocolate as prizes, so I tghink that overwhelmingly the evening was a success!

Today was my last real day (tomorrow a new group starts the project, and I have to pack) and it was really great. This morning we played with the children (and I learnt, and this will come as no surprise to my friends, that by far the most effective method of communication with them is not speaking English but through the medium of dance) which was totally great, and I was able to do a little teaching. This afternoon I hit the town with Lan and we saw some parts of Hanoi I hadn't seen before, which was great. And this evening was Danish day, which meant delicious Danish potato soup and then that really stinky fruit and much learning about Denmark (I now consider myself an expert) and some games. It was a really great way to end the project and I feel that I am really going to miss everyone here now - Eunbi had already left, and i will be expecting her feet to be poking against mine in our adjoining bunk beds tomorrow morning! Everyone here has been great but I know I will keep in contact with them and I will always have somewhere to stay in Hanoi. But as I told Miss Phuc (SJV director) I can't wait to get to a comfy bed and a bathroom not shared with 8 other people. So, whilst I am sad to be leaving the project, I am looking forward with great hope to my tour and further travels! (hopefully not travails). Please follow me as I travel through south-east Asia, and I promise my next update will not be so long!

Love to you all,

Richard

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