Rice Paddies and Moto Drivers

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Í've decided to bite the bullet and backtrack to fill in some entries, because as of now I have not updated everyone as to the last few weeks of our journey... and my anxiety grows as each day I have new stories to share and little time to type them up. So here goes!

Chris and I traveled the length of Vietnam with a crew of other travellers, who came to be know as "Team Fight Club". This is because we survived many ordeals and even a shipboard mutiny together. We spent a few days up north in the capital, Hanoi, where along with the rustic French colonial architecture meshed with sprawling Asian markets and motorbikes. For New Years our crew toured the Literary Museum, a beautiful complex of Chinese-esque courtyards, and ate lunch at Koto, an upscale restaurant and program that allows street children to get jobs, housing, healthcare, etc., and it was fabulous!

On our tour of the city, we stopped for the first of several 'bia hoi', the local brewed beer, which runs at about 10 cents per glass. We sat tucked away at a hole-in-the-wall joint, perched on tiny plastic stools, and cheersed ourselves silly. That was pretty much the extent of excitement of (our western) New Years in Hanoi, as the more celebrated Buddhist Tet (late January- early Feb.) is their true affair. Our group did make it to a rooftop restaurant for cocktails and counted down the minutes-- the mojitos arriving at exactly 11:58. Unfortunately, they were colored with creme de menthe and absolutely inedible, but we cheered and hugged anyways when the clock struck the witching hour...

We also decided to sign up for a tour through Halong Bay, the UNESCO site and ultimate tourist destination in the north. There are dozens upon dozen of competitive operators around town, and we scoured through a few books before signing up. We had 3 wishes: As uncrowded of a boat as possible (since there were already 7 of us, we hoped for a max of 16 people), a few hours of daylight kayaking, and accomodating food for the three vegetarians. However, from the moment we boarded the bus to the dock nothing went as planned, in an annoying and frustrating fashion. In fact, for the entire 3 days we were all royally cheesed to the point of screaming and yelling, some emotional breakdowns, and a complete mutiny when the captain and crew refused to give one guy his passport back. After an hour of us foreigners demanding he be given it back if we were to leave the ship, the tour guide confessed that in fact he lent the man's passport to another ship to be used to compensate for police records, and that the guy could retrieve it the next night... It sounds weird to write how this was all so frustrating and emotional, but basically a lot of people got ripped off and lost a lot of money and had a very unenjoyable 3 days on their vacations. For instance, we were packed on a crowded boat of more than 35 people, and we in fact were only taken to kayak at 5:15 pm, after the sun had set... The last night we had an incident of vegetarian food, which was not being provided (although the meat eaters could hardly touch their mystery globs of fish parts too), when we were served fried fish, bloody uncooked fish, fish sausage, peanuts, french fries, and rice. One of our friends literally started crying because each meal we requested a veggie fare and they shooed us away and said Yeah Yeah, but nothing changed. When her boyfriend stood up to demand some sort of alternative, the crew angrily yelled that we had plenty-- by way of peanuts and french fries!

So anyway, I don't feel like I can type out details in length, but in a nut shell it was a terrible cruise in a beautiful location. Which actually may not be beautiful for long-- Halong Bay is an area of large karst mountains piercing up from tranquil water, dotted with fishing boats and hiding immense caverns of limestone hideaways within the rock. However, tourism has quadrupled in the last 2 years, and the Vietnamese are not yet ready for so much growth-- the water is filled with junk after junk of tourists and recently constructed floating villages, spewing deisel and garbage into the water, creating massive pollution that is detroying the site. In addition, we witnessed dynmite fishing boats as we curved around some cliffs one afternoon, surely not kosher as a UNESCO site !

From the north, we all took a sleeper bus down to Hue, in the middle of the country, to visit the ancient citadel and location of the famous Tet Offense during the American War. Not my favorite place, but we moved on to Hoi An, a wonderful town spread along the river, and full of tailor shops, bright hanging lanterns, and the old shop houses of Chinese merchants who sold tea, silk, and rice in the hey-days of the great SE Asian maritime trade. Chris and I stayed in a shophouse turned guesthouse, which was full of charm, but also a little creepy with the family's wall-sized shrine to their ancestors. The two-story home is made of dark wood with Chinese architectural embellishments, and at night the only lights were the red bulbs that constantly illuminated the shrine.

Of course, we had some clothes made-- Chris had several silk shirts and rough cotton tops made, which we then later shipped home from Saigon. Its too tempting to come to Hoi An and stroll the streets wihtout having at least one article specially designed for you!

I absolutely loved this town, especially sunrise at the fish market, where hundreds of people bustled around with baskets of various sized fish and other sea creatures, shouting and bargaining for a good price on the day's catch.




From Hoi An, Chris and I rode the Reunification Express to Saigon. The scenery down south is spectaular-- from the windows we watched as the train sped passed field after field of green rice paddies and the conical hat-topped workers. We arrived in Ho Chi Minh at 4 in the morning, when the bars still hadn't kicked out the last of the drunken patrons, and waited on the front step of a back alley guesthouse before the owner woke up. She was full, but found us a cheap room nearby ($9, the most expensive room as of yet! But still quite a bargain in HCM).

On a whirwind tour of Saigon, Chris ended up at the War Remnants Museum while I went to the post office and internet, because I'd really had my fill last time and with our visit to museums in the north. We tried our first durian, the famous stinky fruit I've been dying to try, and hated it. It really does taste like something rotten. Mostly our time in Saigon was walking, and being assaulted by moto drivers every two feet along the way. We only stayed in Saigon one night, catching a bus out the next morning to Phnom Penh, partly because we'd convinced ourselves that we should be moving faster if we want to get to Malaysia on time. However, in truth, we realized that Vietnam is simply exhausting because we (and also every backpacking we spoke to) felt like we were being ambushed by merchants and moto drivers demanding money every 2 minutes, and always being scammed along the way. It felt like every shop we walked by someone was yelling "Buy from me!" and a thousand guys on their motorcycles would relentlessly demand "Moto? Moto!". And every transaction felt like a rip off, especially for busses, which leaves us feeling helpless to be at their mercy. I feel really torn between guilt and anger, because yes as an American I clearly have more money than them, but I am completely turned off from their culture when every person on the street is demanding that I give to them, which was so differnt from Laos and Thailand, who are much worse off financially. A shame because on my SAS I adored Vietnam, and now it has lost all of its appeal...


Well, for now we are in Cambodia!! From the moment we crossed the border we fell in love, and we're not even sure why yet. The people here are so much more friendly, and when we say No Thank you to motoride offers, they smile widely and say No Thank you back! I've fallen in love with the not-so-national 'amok' soup, which is a fish and coconut curry soup, served in a giant coconut shell. As well as the vegetarian noodle soup, which has a tumeric broth and loads of mysterious vegetables, and is served on the street for 1000 R (that's 25 cents).

We stayed 4 nights in Phnom Penh, visiting the wats (including an afternoon as the monkey-filled Wat Phnom, where the city was founded), the Teul Slong Museum (Prison S21, where thousands were held captive and tortured by the Khmer Rouge), the Killing Fields (and glass case memorial full of thousands of unearthed skulls), strolling the riverside, busy with its glowing western restaurants and young Cambodian lovers, and sat many hours in the National Museum, where some of the best of Angkor's art treasures are housed. Phnom Penh is a great walking city, although huge, it somehow seems appealing even in the mid-day sweltering heat. We met a university student while hanging at a busy riverside temple, and treated him to dinner in a fancy western restaurant, where the meals cost $2- 3. I was sad to find out that the amok soup is completely fabricated for western tastes, and I laughed when he sort of couldn't choke it down the way I sometime can't choke down local streetfood...

To end here, I will let you know we are in Siem Reap, and tomorrow we're going to begin a 3 day exploration of Angkor. Siem Reap city is absolutely packed with foreigners and enormous resorts, all dishing out money to come visit the ancient temple complex. I already feel the anxiety one gets when entering Disneyland-- so much to see, so many people, so little time!
We're going to pay $40 for the 3-day pass, plus $25 for a two-day guide and moto driver (the nice man who took us to our guesthouse from the only bus stop 14 km outside of town), and already I'm feeling guilty for the lack of money I'm going to dish out into the hands of begging children and crippled Khmers. It seems outrageous to try and give to everyone, so which ones do you give to? And will a little bit of cash help them really get anything? Or does it create a reliance upon a lifestyle of entitlement? I hate that the site (Angkor) takes so much foreign money but doesn't contribute anything to the temples or for the badly needed social programs here. Every street and restaurant is filled with beggars, its overwhelming to think that the pain of suffering of starving Cambodians who survived the genocide still goes on.
OK that's all for now-- we must embark on the journey back to the guesthouse and rest up for tomorrow's events. Bon soir!

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Comments

[Arlene & Tom]

Happy New Year!
Dear Courtney and Chris, Loved your update. If I had an address ;) I'd send this card: "What we can learn from a dead battery: In life, there must be both the positive and the negative, or stuff won't work." After your great introduction, I'd like to visit Cambodia, too. Crossing the border into Spain had a similar effect on me. I hope you both enjoy the mysteries of Angkor. Not to worry; it costs about the same as Petra. Know that when you look at the night sky, we'll be looking at it thinking of you, too.