Officially exhausted.

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Hellooo again...as you gather from the title we are offically pooped as Sam would put it!!! But still having a great time. We have exchausted Ho Chi Minh and around of all it has to offer. We have been to the war reminants museum which was interesting/shocking if one sided about the Vietnam war. Perhaps it was the side that was always hidden from us, some the pictures of the effect of the chemical spraying on the present and next generation were really horrific. Yet we knew it was all not quite as it seemed as there was a small section saying how they never executed or tortured any Americans (Anyone seen Deer hunter?). The next day we took a trip out to the Cu Chi tunnels as we mentioned in our last entry. They were fascinating and a real insight into how the Americans lost the war. The people had a maze of a tunnel network which they strategically used to fight using shrapnel of the American bombs against them. There was a section of the tunnel in which you could still squeeze through, decending through three levels and to say it was a bit tight and uncomfortable was an understatement. The tour was enhanced by our guide who was a war veteran who served as an officer in the US Navy (he was actaully Vietnamese who claimed his father was American) who was a complete bag of contradictions, our favourite of which was the 'fact' that Vietnamese people are the freest in the world and have more freedom than America as they have free roam over the internet (do we not?). He later told us he is woken up every morning by a loudspeaker the government play outside his window every morning along the lines of "good morning Vietnam remember to not have any more than 2 children"...freedom hey!!! Another of our favourites was that he seemed extremely proud of the Cu chi people (which he was meant to be fighting against) especially those that were hailed as American Slaughtering heroes! All a bit mad.
That afternoon we did the school (never did find out why Mark had to cover his knees) which can only be described as hell on earth. Mark got the job of teaching the older 'cooler' kids who obviously could not be bothered to learn anything. Sam on the other hand got the really bad job of the english singing class, she was thrown in front of 2 seperate classes with a microphone and made to sing english songs she has never heard...we were glad to get out alive.
Yesterday we left for a 2 day Mekong tour which was good but we have decided we are not tour people. We hate the get on the bus, get off the bus, next we will do this routine. We did see a coconut candy factory, a couple of little Mekong villages, one of which we rode through on a horse and cart and a bee farm where we enjoyed some traditional entertainment, while a huge Python was passed around for people to have photos with. Luckily at night we were free and enjoyed a chill meal for 2. The town was buzzing because there was an Autumn festval on and all the children were making lanterns and boats and putting candles in them and floating them down the river (while at the same time filling it with even more rubbish) it was still really sweet. It seems our beeming white skin was rather interesting for the locals too who were pointing us out to one and all (all friendly and smiles). This morning we were dissapointed by the floating market which had nothing for us (unless we wanted 10kg of dragon fruit) and kinda wish we had just done the one day tour. We are back in Saigon now and are waiting for a night bus to head out to Dalat in the mountains where hopefully we can catch up on some sleep and enjoy some chill time doing what we want to do when we want to do it.
Will update all again in a few days.
Hope all is well at home x

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