Chuc Mung Nam Moi 2007

---

The weekend that I was arriving into Vietnam was Tet - the Vietnamese new year which was why the bus had been so busy. This meant that all the tailors were shutting down and nothing was operating as it should be - which was probably just as well because there were less places to go shopping! It was really nice to be able to be here then though because there was quite an excitable atmosphere and the people were all really busy getting the last minute preparations which seems to be these tiny orange trees, yellow blossom trees and lots of flowers to it is all very pretty - and generally multiples of these would be ferried around on their motorbikes.

I arrived into Hoi An and I recognised the hotel that I had stayed at last time and had remembered that the sister hotel had a swimming pool that you could use so I found Cat and we both moved into the Thanh Binh II. We headed out for lunch to the Café BeBe which became our favourite with really tasty food for very low prices - the best we found in Hoi An. I had steamed fish with ginger and onion and Cat and the Hoi An pancake which is like an omelette that you wrap in rice paper with some salad and then dip into sauce, we also had prawn paste on sugar cane skewers which were surprisingly tasty.

The rest of the first day was spent wondering around the town and market and I bought my first real pearl! We found a nice bar where they sold nice wine so we decided to treat ourselves after the horrific journeys that we had both had into Vietnam. I also booked myself onto a cooking course by the same establishment for the next day.

The cooking course involved going for a trip around the market and being shown different cooking implements as well as all the different types of food and we then got on a boat and headed down river to where we to cook. It was a really nice location because we were right on the river in an open air room. The cooking itself was half demonstration and half practical and we learnt how to make rice paper from scratch which was quite good fun and I will have to have a go when I get home! We also make eggplant claypot, fresh spring rolls and Hoi An pancake. We then got to sit and eat it in the riverside restaurant - a very nice day.

That evening was new years eve so there was lots of activity and there were fireworks at midnight which were more impressive than I had imagined.

The next couple of days were spent beaching and sorting out onwards travel arrangements - not very easy because everything was booked up because of Tet. I had wanted to do a train journey but that seems to be the most popular form of transport - shame.

The beach at Hoi An was as lovely as I remember but it is quite incredible how many more buildings there are now than there were. In the town the other side of the river has all been built up and the road leading out to the beach and at the beach itself was all built up whereas last time I was here 3 years ago there had been none of it!

It was still a really nice little town though and the people were so friendly. On Sunday on the way back from the beach the chain fell off my train and as Cat and I were trying to sort it out this local man came up and sorted it all out for me and then they invited us into their house to wash our hands and have a drink. A particularly nice gesture when they couldn’t speak a word of English but they found the photos we took of them on the digital camera very funny so we are going to try and post them to them.

We did manage to get a flight down to Hochiminh City so unfortunately we had to say goodbye to the nice little town.

---

Comments

[cat]

It was indeed a very nice time
I have just emailed you. Love reading your blog! X