Advertisement
Published: October 12th 2009
Edit Blog Post
We have been in Vietnam for 5 days and it feels more like two weeks. Magical how time can slow down when you remove the routine of work. Thus far we have spent about three days In Hanoi, the captial, and two in Sapa, a mountain town in the North.
Currently chilly in Sapa. While I do not know the actual temperature no one else is complaining about being cold as much as I am. Shows me my blood truly has changed after 9 months of living in Thailand. What was once considered brisk is now "freezing!" to me.
Today started with Sofia and I being bombarded by hilltribe women as soon as we left our hotel. Most of the hilltribe people in this area are Hmong. There are a lot of Hmong in Chinag Mai and Northern Thailand in general as well. There has been one huge difference in the Hmong people I have interacted with here and in Thailand. Many of the Hmong people in Sapa speak perfect or near perfect English. When we asked a 14 year old Hmong girl where she learned English she responded "in the streets." Many hilltribe women spend there days in the streets
Happy Sisters
At our local breakfast and in markets attempting to sell their knick knacks and hand woven garmets and purses to tourists. The women who approached me today spanned from about 3 years old to 65 years old. The Hmong in this area are the Black Hmong because of how much indigo they use.
Because of their English skills we have been able to actually engage with them rather than just feel annoyed by being hassled to buy things and not being able to comunicate. We befriended a group of these women yesterday and spent our morning with them today. Sapa is a rainy and foggy town. All of them carry matching umbrellas. All checkered but in a variety of colors. Same same, but different. They all wear awesome layers of hand woven clothes and indigo dyed garmets. They call out to you "Where are you from? what is your name?" and most of them have some spunky attitudes. They remind me of some sort of a spin off of tweeny punk rockers in a suburb. Wearing the coolest of clothes, out going as hell, and not afraid of what anyone thinks.
A group of them walked with Sofia and I as we went to
get breakfast. When I mentioned that we wanted cheap food they turned us around and directed us to a market that we had passed by without even noticing it. In the market I saw my first ever dog meat. Knew it was dog meat because the head was next to the meat. Then they directed us to their friends food stall. We had amazing soups and sauted bamboo. We filled our bellies and three of our new friends' for about 4 bucks.
Then Vikki and Collin joined us for a magestic 5 hour long walk to and from a hill tribe village. On the sides of the path were hundereds of spider webs glistening with dew and large shiny spiders in the middle. I do not even have a fear of spiders but even I was quizzy from it. They were all huge and the women walking with us informed us that we would need to be taken to a hospital if bitten. When asked where the nearest hospital was they had no answer.
At the beginning of the walk we could barely see any of the mountains around us due to the intense fog. But as the fog partially
cleared we could see rolling hills filled with terraced gardens, rice paddys, ducks, what seemed to be pot-bellied pigs and piglets, and rushing waterfalls. Not to mention the smiling faces of beautiful little kiddos. Actually not all smiling. There was one toddler crying his eyes out. I remembered Love and Logic and started making the same noises as him. There was another toddler near him who found this hillarious and joined in with me. Their grandmother laughed and maybe thought I was crazy, but the babe did stop his wimpering and put a huge smile in my heart.
We return to Hanoi tomorrow. It has been nice to get out of the pollution and insane streets of Hanoi for a few days but I look forward to another night there. We have made the old city of Hanoi our main turf. This part of the city radiates out from a small lake in the center. A very picturesque lake that is lit with romantic lights at night. Much of the lake's structure and vibe is European, yet it has a temple in the center of it to remind you that yes, you are still in Asia. The entire city is
like that. French names all around, and then Chinese dragons. I love it. I had been afriad to even go their due to its notoriously terrifying streets. There are more motor bikes than cars on the road and there is very little chance that the cars will be stopping for you to cross. You have to just wait for the slightest gap in bikes and then slowly walk through fast fast traffic. Terrifying for sure but at moments it is almost gratifying. As a girl who nearly got ran over by the trams in Amsterdam hundereds of times just a few years ago, making it across the streets of Hanoi is like some sort of tangilbe evidence that I have learned a thing or two in my time abroad traffic trekking.
11 more days in Vietnam, hope it feels like years!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.09s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 6; qc: 51; dbt: 0.0536s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb