Will be off to Vietnam on Sept 27 for 19-days

On Sept 30, we enjoyed the water puppet show, where the puppeteers are semi-submerged in water for hours at a time. What is amazing is how they are able to manipulate those puppets. This art form is over 1,000 years old.

On the following day, most in our group took the optional tour to a village that hasn't changed for hundreds of years, but I stayed behind to enjoy more of Hanoi by walking around West Lake.

Going on a walking tour now, so will continue later on.

Five of us did the walking tour that's supposed to be the main shopping street next to the river. However, after walking a few blocks on that street, we decided not much will change even if we walked some more blocks. We did stop over at a high-toned strip mall from the street to the river, and saw some inteeresting shops and some ladies in their country's dress. We took another route to walk back to the hotel. It's now 4PM, and we're meeting at 7PM for a short bus ride to a restaurant for dinner.

On Oct 2, we traveled by bus to Halong Bay - a UNESCO World Heritage Site where it's dotted with some 3,000 mountain islands with jagged profiles with some that resembles animals. On the way to Halong Bay, we stopped at a craft shop where the handicapped produce some arts and crafts for sale. This was also our rest stop on this 3.5 hour trip from Hanoi to Halong Bay.

We stayed overnight on the junk, but the water was very calm, so it didn't feel like we were on a boat.

The following morning after breakfast, we cruised back to disembark from the boat to travel back to Hanoi to visit the Mueum of Ethnology, and to catch our flight to Hue - pronounced "hway." They show the history of Vietnam and the many tribes (54) that live on this narrow land between Cambodia, Laos, and the China Sea (Gulf of Tonkin). The open museum in the back shows the different home styles in Vietnam with some very interesting sculptures and boats.

We arrived in Hue after 6PM, so our tour director suggested we have dinner at the hotel.

Oct 4: We visited the Citadel after breakfast to visit the imperial capital built by the first king of the Nguyen Dynasty in the early 19th century. The French transferred first city status to Hanoi, but Hue remained the cultural capital. We then visited the Min Thu orphanage where 200 children are cared for by Buddhist nuns. After we were introduced to the head nun, and were provided with some information about how the children ended up here and what happens to them after they reach adulthood, we were given a tour of the facilities. One little boy came and held my hand during the first part of the tour. We visited the nursery where some are only a few months old, and it seemed that some of the older children cared for them. We had a savory vegetarian lunch at Dong Thien Pagoda prepared by Buddhist nuns.

After we returned to our hotel, a few of us went for a walk.

We are now up-to-date with my travelogue.

I'm enjoying your report, Tak..

We are now in Hao An, and UNESCO World Heritage Site. We're now in the old town of the city that used to be an important port city with ships coming from China, Japan, and Europe. This old section is half Chinese and half Japanese; with a Japanese bridge separating the two. The bridge was built in 1572, but the architecture in the Japanese section is a mix between Chinese and Japanese. We visited an old house built in 1781 and is listed by UNESCO; it's a museum, silk embroidery workshop, and living quarters for eight people. Some in our group purchased table clothes and place mats. We did a short walk through town, and visited a temple that's used as a Chinese assembly hall. As of the moment, we're at a tailor shop recommended by our travel company, so I purchased two tailored shirts for $56. They will deliver it to our hotel.

If you visit after I get home and post the pictures, you're going to surely enjoy them. This is a beautiful country with beautiful people, good food, and many contrasts.

PS. This location was used to film the Quiet American with Michael Cain. We can see the many places where the floods have come into the city during the recent storm..

We drove 1.5 hour to the Champa Sanctury, My Son. Going to dinner now, so will continue later.

Bookmarking.

Sorry, the name of this city is Hoi An; it's a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There is and old town split into a Japanese section and a Chinese section; with a Japnamese covered bridge in between. Although there are about 5,000 Chinese still in Hoi An, there are no Japanese living in the Japanese section.

however, I am jumping ahead of myself, because we visited the Champa sanctuary, also a UNESCO site. The Champas are people who came up to Vietnam from Indonesia and Malaysia, but their ruins resembles those of Hindus. They provided us with a cultural show with dancing and music that was just wonderful. It reminded of the dancing I have seen in Thailand.

I will continue later; it's so hot here in the hotel where their internet is located, I'm sweating...

We had a very short flight this morning to Nha Trang. We visited a village directly from the airport, and had lunch before watching family members making baskets for produce or fish. One person is splitting the bamboo into strips that are used for the basket and for the frame, and some ladies making the basket bodies. Another man formed them into baskets by making the rim, then sitting in the middle of the woven bamboo and folding them up to put on the rim.

We spent some time looking at them making baskets, then going into their home to look at a typical Vietnamese home. Our TD told us that the materials for a typical home in this area costs around $4K - without the labor cost.

On our coach ride from Hoi An to Danang airport, we stopped a short while at China Beach which is now being developed with many new hotels. We arrived at Nha Trang after a very short flight, and was coached to the basket making home at a local village where we were served lunch. We watched them slice the bamboo into strips, weave them, then making of the basket used for produce and fishes. We walked by another home where they were making wider, shallower, baskets used for other purposes. We were then coached to the elementary school.

This particular school is funded through a grant from Grand Circle Foundation, and is one of the better public schools in this area. Only children who live in this area are allowed to attend this school, but there are occasions with some political pull and money, other children have the potential to attend here.

At 6PM, we had a discussion period where we talked about the Ameriasian children during the Vietnam war. It is estimated that 75000 children were born from American fathers between 1962 and and 1975. 10% were able to contact their father, but only 3% met their biological father.

Our TD, Quong, also told us a little about the My Lai massacre, because that was a question I posed to learn how the Vietnamese now feel about this incident. Quong told us that as with most life situations, there are always the bad with the good.

Our dinner at the GIA restaurant was very good. It included a seafood salad, Clams on the half-shell with cheese, seafood fried rice, stir-fry bock choy with mushrooms, carmelized chicken, and a lotus flower dessert.

It rained while we had dinner.

We returned to the hotel by 8PM, so I went to bed early, and got up this morning at 6AM. No, I didn't sleep for 10-hours because I did some housekeeping of my luggage to prepare for the next day, and watched a little tv before going to sleep.

We're getting a tour of Nha Trang with miles of beautiful beaches, a boat tour of a fishing village, and a mini beach where we can go swimming if we wish.

Till later.

Today was a coach ride from Nha Trang to Dalat, a French colonial town located 5,000 feet above sea level with the cool climate most of us welcomed. On our way here, we learned after traveling over an hour that the road we were on was flooded, so we had to turn around and return to hiway 1 to get on another road. It delayed our trip by about two hours, but we had time to get a rather long ride on cable gondolas and a visit to a Buddhist temple. The cable ride reminded me somewhat of the cable ride in Cairns, because we went over some forested areas. From there, we headed to the Buddhist temple to spend a half hour walking its beautiful grounds with several tropical flowers and some interesting scenery.

We checked into the Novotel Dalat, and had about 1.5 hours to prepare for our hosted dinner at a local home. We were split into two groups, and group of five went to a math teachers home. Her husband is an architect, and he helped design the Buddhist temple we visited earlier. They have three young daughters, and the two older ones played on the piano.

The dinner they served is a typical new year's meal, so it was very special. It included a jellied rice cake, soup, spring rolls, a salad, a coconut soup, and red wine.

Not long after the meal, we were invited back into the living room where she had some tea and snacks ready for us, but ibefore we could finish the tea, our taxi was in front honking his horn to return us to our hotel.

We walked to Larry's bar at the Sofitel hotel across the street from our hotel, and had a cocktail.

Everybody except me are going on the optional tour tomorrow morning at 7:30 while I walk around the city to familiar myself to this resort town with an Eiffel tower. I will be rejoining the group at 1:45PM.

After asking reception on how to get to Dalat's downtown, I walked for about 1.5 hours walking all over these twisted streets, and negotiating the walking space with motor bikes and cars. The real trick to walking in Vietnam is to wait until the traffic gets to some moderate level then take a deep breath and start walking and hope all those vehicles will miss you. Not for people with tender hearts or stomachs. The difference here in Dalat from other cities in Vietnam is that this city is hilly while other cities are flat. Makes for a more interesting landscape.

I purchased a bag of hard candy while passing through a market to suck on while on long bus and airplane rides to keep moisture in my mouth - and try to limit my water intake so I won't have too many nature calls.

Dalat is also known for silk "paintings" of its people and scenery. They are beautiful and reasonably priced. I was thinking of buying about 50 of them, and selling them at craft-food-wine shows we have around our area during the summer months. The profit could be more than 500% for each! But, after thinking about it, I believe it seems too much like work. I'll take some photos and post them when I get home.

It's close to noon, so I'm going to Larry's bar across the street for a bite to eat.

Thanku Tak, for letting us know about your trip. Looking forward to seeing your photos when you return. Enjoy the rest of your time there.

Love x

I met up with our group at 1:45PM, and we were coached to the downtown area - to the place where they sell those silk embroidered pictures. We spent over 1.5 hours there; several in our group purchased some of their embroidered products, but I just sat around while they went shopping in the market area and rested. I was tempted by a couple of art works, but we have too many art works sitting in storage at home.

Our next stop was the Dalat University where one of the professors told us about the university. It used to be a catholic college, but some years ago it was changed over to a public school. They have 25,000 students and about 350 professors teaching 35 degree programs. They have masters programs, but must go to bigger cities for their PhD. After the professor sang some songs for us, some of the college students escorted us for a walking tour of the university in the rain. My escort was a lovely young lady named Nguyen Chi Nguyen. Although the first and last names are spelled the same, she informed me that they are pronounced differently.

After about an hour at the university, we were coached to a tribal village where they danced and sang for us. The city’s population includes about 5000 members of hill tribes, which make up 33 distinct communities in Lam Dong province. They didn't resemble the Vietnamese that was familiar to me, but more like Indonesian-Malaysian in skin tone, and their costumes resembled somewhat like American Indian in design.

We had dinner at a newish restaurant that included venison, dried noodle with a soup, curry with potatoes and shrimp, and banana with coconut ice cream. It was very good.

Since it's early rise tomorrow at 5:30AM, I'm saying goodnight for now.

All your food descriptions are making me hungry, Tak.
Am really looking forward to seeing your photos.

When I first saw this, the thought briefly crossed my mind you might be going on a tour of duty!

Interesting that you would make a comment about "tour of duty." We visited the Vietnam war memorial museum today, and I must tell all of you how our military's use of agent orange was one of the worst atrocities of that war. Many years after the war, many babies were still being born with deformaties that makes you cringe to look at, and the pictures with young children with deformaties laughing just tore my heart out!

I know some people on a2k believe that the US are always the good guys and never harm or target innocents, but that's not true; not even close. There were many pictures of dead men, women, and children killed by American soldiers. I will post some of those pictures, and want all to see what we have done. It's a great tragedy that most Americans are ignorant about.

******

Otherwise, today was a relatively nice first day in Saigon (the name change to Ho Chi Min City happened in 1975). Our hotel is located very close to the middle of town, so our Tour Director gave us a walking introductory tour. We ended up at a market with hundreds of stalls selling everything from t-shirts, shorts, polo shirts, foods, and souvenirs. What I didn't like is the fact that many of those women will grab you to try to sell you something, and our Tour Director warned us about pickpockets and thieves who are professionals; most wouldn't feel it when they steal your wallet or purse. The warnings were a) don't carry your wallet in your back pocket, and b) don't hang your backpack on your back but carry it on your shoulder.

We also visited a cloisonne factory, but I don't think we bought anything there, and we have shoppers in our group.

Someone in our group purchased a knockoff COACH handbag for $15. They are also selling ROLEX and other designer clothings.

********
Some travel info on Vietnam for those who may plan to visit here. Don't pack too much clothes; it's very inexpensive to have laundry done here, and you can buy clothes here on the cheap. Be prepared to enjoy Vietnamese food; it's varied and very tasty! There have been enough opportunities when we have to eat on our own to eat American-type foods, pizza, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Indian, and other foods. What is most surprising is that even though the name of the food might be the same, the preparation of it is different and tasty. It very good example is spring rolls; the ingredient have been varied with different sauces, so they never seem to be repeated foods.

From my readings about best time to visit Vietnam, I have seen several recommend September, but remember that this is also the monsoon season with some heavy rains at times. We were lucky,, because some of our destinations suffered flooding, but by the time we arrived, most were clear except for the mud. Many places were still in the process of cleaning up the mud.

The people here are very friendly, and most places outside of Saigon are relatively safe. Women can walk at night and feel safe.

I'm glad I made this second trip to this country.

Tomorrow, everybody in our group except me will visit the Cu Chi Tunnels , a 125 mile maze where the Viet Cong and villagers hid underground with all the necessary facilities such as a kitchen, dining room, hospital, and sleeping quarters, because I went there on my first trip to this country. I will spend most of the day walking around the downtown area, and perhaps buy a souvenir or two.

I'm off to have dinner with the group. * 7PM

Thanks CI, I would not suggest I've got any great knowledge of world affairs but I've read Canada not only profited from the Vietnam war by selling armaments to the US, but had volunteers to help fight the war.
http://archives.cbc.ca/war_conflict/vietnam_war/topics/1413/

Our Tour Director's wife and two daughters showed up at the dining room as were just finished with dinner. They introduced themselves to each of us in the tour group, and we later sang a song together. They disappeared for a few minutes, but returned with their clothes change, and danced for us.

Since it was rather still early for bed, five of us went to a bar a few blocks from our hotel to have a night cap at a bar named "Q." We were all in agreement that the ambiance was similar to anyplace in a large city with a sidewalk seating. It was a pleasant evening weather-wise although we had some heavy rain during the day.

Till tomorrow.

Good morning, Vietnam! Just got up, and will go up for breakfast on the 11th floor. Will make it a leisurely day, and walk around town to window-shop and take pictures. See you-all later.

I walked over 2300 steps, but it seems like more, because of the heat. I walked towards the river from our hotel, and a bike-ricksha man followed me, trying to get some business, but I told him I wanted to walk. I visited the restaurant where I had dinner several years ago called the Mandarin which is recommended by many travel books, and the attendant in front gave me a tour of the restaurant even though it's closed until dinner time. He showed me the three levels of the restaurant, and I think I remember where we sat when we came here before. Most entrees are less than $15, but one can spend over $50 for some of their specialties.

During my walk, I saw a caucasian man sitting at a restaurant, so I asked if it was okay to join him. It turns out he's from Texas married to his second wife, and he owns two restaurants in Vietnam. He's from the Dallas-Ft Worth area, and he used to own a construction supply company. His name is Wayne McCoy, and the name of his (only American restaurant) called "Texas BarBQ & Steak Restaurant." He claims his is the only restaurant that serves Angus beef steaks in Vietnam, and he gets many American expats who come here as regulars. His business is doing well even though he pays $3,500 rent on his restaurant-home building. He has a home in Saigon, but rents it out, because they live on the third level of the restaurant building, and it's more convenient to stay put - with the traffic and distance he can ignore/miss. He married a Vietnamese woman in Texas, but she passed away, so after selling his business, he came to Vietnam (for the lower cost of living), and married another Vietnamese woman. I had a Tiger beer.

After walking for some time, I stopped at another restaurant and had a coconut shake. I was a bit `of disappointed, because the coconut flavor was rather mild.

After walking for what seemed like more than a dozen blocks, I knew I was lost, so I took a taxi back to the hotel; it was less than $2. After a short rest in my air conditioned room, I walked to a Japanese restaurant in the neighborhood and had a large plate of sushi with Tiger beer on tap: $16.

I'm now back at the hotel, and it's almost 1PM. I'm going up to my room (the largest in our group), and rest a bit.

Till later.