Day Before a Holiday, Cat Ba Island

Crossing the bridge, plastic chairs lined up with "fresh" beer and pandan leaf wrapped snacks.  Wooden boats docked five thick float on trash that floats on water.  Families in the darkness of their cabins eat on the floor while watching Vietnamese dramas on TV.  Two iron grey navy boats are moored together.  The troops are in their boxers sharing their bath time with each other and the world on the ship's bow.  In one junk, I see a group of sweaty shirtless fishermen sharing dinner and rice wine.  One of them spots me and summons the attention of the others.  They beckon me inside.  If I entered and never came out, no would ever know where to start looking.

The sun sets behind the limestone peaks, the mosquitoes come out for their nightly binge drinking.  The streets are quiet before the holiday.  Quiet except for a lone club, glass doors wide open, flashing lights and loud disco.  A bartender with no one to serve.

Only the deaf and dying will go to sleep early tonight.

Surviving Tiger Falls

Dalat, a home away from home for many French during Vietnam's colonial era.  High elevation, a large lake, mountains, pine forests and cool weather.  The French would holiday here when the tropical weather of the rest of the country became to much to bare.  It was also a popular destination for hunting.  Deer, boar, rhinos, elephants and tigers could all be found in nearby forests.  However, the hunters were all to successful and now there is hardly a squirrel to be seen in the forests and mountains surrounding Dalat.  Still, Daphne and I decided to go there to enjoy the nature and remember what it feels like to not sweat every waking moment.

Sergey Kahn, Tea Infusionist

The idea to do something with tea in Saigon has been festering in my head for the past two years.  Of course I have dreams of opening my own tea house, but needless to say, at 25 years old, I've yet to have that kind of financial flexibility.  I decided to start small and last Friday I led my first Tea Workshop at Soham Yoga Studio and Boutique.

Food and Film

Long time no post!
My apologies. I have been very busy the past couple months.  Between my internship and teaching, I only have one day off a week.

Rock The Cat Ba

Deciding to take advantage of the long holiday weekend (Reunification/Labor Days) Daphne headed for a village in Northern Thailand to do a Thai Yoga Massage training.  Since it wasn't really the kind of holiday I could join, I made my first solo trip in nearly two years to the same place where I did my last solo trip.  Rock climbing in Ha Long Bay.

Top 7 Most Annoying Drivers in Saigon

When I first came to Saigon and was faced with the traffic, I couldn't see any sense in the chaos on the roads (and often times on the sidewalk).  But as many of my friends here can attest, there is a logic to driving in the city and the sooner you get a bike and get into it, the easier and less scary it will be.  Having said that, there are however certain drivers whose habits can be quite irksome if not also dangerous.

Designer Life

Last week I began a new journey without leaving the city.  I started an internship at an architectural firm.  Pentago, a Malaysian based company, specializes in hotels, villas, and other luxury tourism designs throughout Asia.

Fowl, Dust and Quiet

I was woken up by a text coming in on my phone.

LEE: "Running a bit late.  Be there in five."
A quick check at the time and I realized that I was the one who would be late.  Today, a small group of us were driving away from the flat urban expanses of Saigon to the nearest outdoor rock climbing location.  Buu Long.

I rushed to get ready, packing my climbing shoes, camera, bandages, and tissues.  All of which would come in handy. 

On Police Chases

"What if you don't pull over and just drive away?"

The question came up while we were discussing traffic laws and handling cops in Saigon.  We were in Ellen's apartment after a session of acro-yoga on her rooftop by the pool.  Ellen, a teacher from Wisconsin, was doing much better for herself working at an international school in Saigon than her contemporaries were back in her home state where they have to fight just to keep the meager salary that they were making.  The pay and benefits for "real" teachers(not ESL teachers, like myself) are cushy.

Short Acting Career

A lot of posts from me this month, a good way to start the year I think.

Daphne and I went to a themed potluck on Saturday called Latitudinal Cuisine. It originated in the UK and has spread to our humble Siagon. The basis is that you choose a Latitude or Longitude and everyone brings a dish from one of the countries that lies on the line. This week we did Longitude 15E. Presentations are made, stories are told and then very delicious food is eaten.

The Do’s and Don’ts of Renting in Saigon

When renting a house or an apartment laws and expectations vary greatly between countries and, often enough, between cities. Knowing your rights and what to expect can keep you from embarrassment or regret. Nobody wants to sign a one-year lease and find out a month later that they’ve settled for less than they should. That’s why we’re going to cover some basics of the hunt that you’ll need to make your new home in Saigon a happy one from day one.

Nha Trang New Year

Not having been sunburned in far too long,

Another Move

I am now writing from my third apartment since I moved to Saigon in June of 2009. While Daphne and I loved our old place, the landlord, who had been studying abroad in England, was returning to live in it once more. After an exhausting and often frustrating search we found a new home not to far from the old one. In fact, it's in the same building but in a different block. The rent is $600 [$50 more than what we were paying for the old place] for the same size space but different layout. Things we like about the place: bigger couch, bigger TV, wooden floors, bigger kitchen, bigger bed, better quality AC, bigger shower. The only thing we find lacking is that the layout is shaped to include a hallway, making the living room a bit smaller and the extra bedroom smaller. Also, there is the lack of storage space. Thanks to the successful delivery of Daphne's seven boxes, our storage demands are much higher than the average expat teacher couple. Pictures below:

[Entre]

[We like the couch, despite the animal print motif]

[The larger bed, however, makes some of our bedding obsolete]

[la cuisine]

[la disastre]

In other news, if you want to see what it looks like when the Vietnamese win a football[soccer] game, it looks something like this:

[Vendors capitalize on the event by selling cheap flags on the street]

[The city becomes a party on wheels]

[I don't even know]

November Rains

This last gap between blogs is not due to a lack of having anything to write, but rather waiting for a few 'stories' to play out so that I wouldn't be blogging half way into them. Daphne and I had been visited by a string of bad luck and it would have been poor form to blog about these things without including resolution.

Motorbike Diaries
It began a couple of weeks ago when Daphne got into her second accident. It happened on her way back home from a yoga class just outside our apartment building. A woman crossing the street stopped in the middle of the road to stare at Daphne and her big bag that she uses for all her yoga gear. This caused Daphne to swerve, her yoga bag just catching the woman and causing an imbalance and fall. She didn't look so bad when she got home. It didn't seem as serious as last time, just some scratches on her leg and a swollen hand. But the hand got so swollen [it didn't help that Daphne still went to teach yoga] that we had an x-ray done the next day. Her left pinky was broken just above the knuckle. The doctor put a splint on it and said to get another x-ray done in two weeks to see if it was healing. Meanwhile, Daphne goes on and keeps teaching and driving, despite the doctor recommending against it. But what's a yoga teacher gonna do? Not work for two weeks to a month? Freelancers don't get medical leave.

Exactly two weeks later, driving home from work, Daphne is rear ended by a young guy with track marks on his arm. I get a call from her to meet her at the nearby local hospital. She doesn't call me from her phone though, she forgot that at home that day. I arrived at the dingy hospital in just five minutes. Mosquitoes were flying around the emergency ward and the water cooler in the waiting room had only three reusable plastic cups. Daphne comes out in better condition than I feared. A scrape on her shoulder was the only visible wound but then she showed me the crack in her helmet where she landed on from the fall. Fortunately, she was concussion-free, though she did sport a nasty headache for a couple of days. This time she was quite shaken up and I played chauffeur for the next couple days. We went to get the x-ray done but the bone hadn't healed yet so the doctor said it'll be another month with the splint for her.

I drove Daphne from her class in District 2 to District 7 by testing out a new route that was supposed to be more direct and faster. It was also very dusty, crowded with trucks and crater infested. The brilliance of this route however, was the massive arching bridge, Cau Phu My, that goes from one district to the other. It offered an incredible view of the city at sunset that almost made the grime on our face worth it. On the other side of the bridge we needed to turn left, but what we didn't realize was that the left turn only went into a car lane, an engineering oversight that was being taken advantage of by the motorcops at the next light. We got pulled over and the cops started asking for things in Vietnamese, a language I don't know. I began to speak really fast in English, a language they don't know, while pointing back the way I came. One of the officer pointed to a registration card and license, a document I don't have, and I pretended to not understand and just pointed back and kept on talking. They tried ignoring me for a while and went about doing paperwork, but as that didn't shut me up nor get me to produce what they wanted they finally just waved me away.

Seven Boxes and the Black Friday
Meanwhile, a boat arrives into Saigon bearing seven boxes addressed to a Ms. Chua. What's left of Daphne's possessions from her past life have arrived. Now there was just the not so simple matter of getting it cleared through customs. What should have taken only two days ended up taking two weeks. The problem initially arose because of a change in law. You used to need to fill out a customs declaration card upon arrival to Vietnam, but recently the law has changed so that now you only need to do one if you're bringing more than $7,000. While it's nice to have one less document to fill out in life, it would be even nicer if Customs had adjusted their shipping rules to accommodate the new law. As it was, they still required that you give them your declaration card to get your shipment. Since our arrival from the States was after the new law was instated, we had no such card. You would think that enlightening them with a simple law check would have cleared things up quickly, but no such luck.

Finally, the shippers told us that the boxes would be cleared last Friday morning, so I waited at home for them while Daphne went to teach. When they didn't show up I telephoned the shippers to find out that they've hit another snag with customs who now won't release the boxes until they meet Daphne. I hop on my bike to go meet her at work, but as I'm driving up the ramp my hand gently brushes against a corner of sideview mirror, causing the tip of my finger to slice open and blood to rush. I run up stairs quickly with my finger in my mouth to keep from dripping blood everywhere. Thankfully I manage to stop the bleeding. Wrapping my finger up in toilet paper and medical tape I went back downstairs holding my finger up to the sky to keep it elevated. I drove that way, finger pointing up, all the way to the studio to get Daphne. From there we drove our bikes to the shipping office, left Daphne's bike there, and followed one of the shippers on a 40 minute dusty ride to the port. We had a housing appointment at 1pm but we moved it to 2:3o and Daphne had to cancel her afternoon private class all because the customs officer wanted to see her. But when we got there they were out to lunch. So we waited a half hour, met with the officer who then said we had to go to the warehouse where the boxes were. So we went, waited for the warehouse to open, the boxes were brought to us, opened, searched, a 'token' fee was paid and off we went. We were told that the boxes would finally be released that night. We could only hope.

We got on the bike and just as we left the port a massive storm fell upon us. This time of year, the rainy season should have already been over, so the events that follow I blame entirely on global warming. As we made our way back we found ourselves on Cau Phu My bridge again, but the lower part was flooded. The engine flooded and the bike stopped. We trenched through the water, Daphne pushing the bike from behind while I tried to start it. It would start, she would hop on, and then it would die. About ten times. After some ten minutes of this I finally managed to get it started and kept on long enough to get back on track. Meanwhile, my makeshift bandage is nothing but tape now and stinging. We make it to our housing appointment thirty minutes late and absolutely drenched. We look at the place for about one minute, shake our heads and head back down to the parking to make our way home. Somehow, the parking tag disappeared in the short span of time we were there. The rule for losing your tag is that the garage keeps your bike for 24-hours. Somehow this 'proves' that the bike is yours and that you're not stealing. Because the parking tag is considered more legitimate than the registration card in my wallet for my bike. This is the my last straw, and I end up in a massive shouting match with the security guards. As neither party was backing down, I had to give in[I was surrounded by six guards] and fill out the paper work. We tried walking around the garage checking every corner but could not find the tag. It was gone and I was bikeless. We took a taxi to get Daphne's bike at the shipping office and, feeling like karma rejects, made our way in the rain back home for a much much needed hot shower. The day did end on a good note, however, when at 9pm those seven boxes that caused us so much grief arrived at our door, like Santa coming down the chimney at a wake.

And Then
The next day I woke up in an ill mood having to take a xe om to work[motorbike taxi]. But it was Teacher's Day and my first class of the day gave me roses. Yes, I'm a guy who feels better when he's given flowers, sue me. Other gifts included a couple of cards, $5 and a tie with pink polka dots. When I went to get my bike I picked up some beers and gave it to the parking attendants as an apology for flipping out on them. It's amazing what some flowers can do to your mood.

Now, we have seven more boxes of stuff to move mid-December. We did find a place and have just put down the deposit. While we love where we live now, the owner is returning from his time abroad and wants to live here again. Fortunately, we've found another great place in the same building so moving won't be too difficult. But before that, I think we are in desperate need of a vacation...

Eating My Best Friend

It will come to no surprise to my readers, or anyone that knows me well, that there is very little that I won't eat. If you're new here[welcome, I'm not sure how you got here but good for you and I hope you leave entertained] then allow me to illustrate this with a short list of food that I've tried:

Kangaroo[Highly Recommended]
Shark Fin Soup[Tastes good, but not good enough to justify the cruelty of the industry. Try a Chinese crab soup instead, it's very similar.]
Duck Fetus[Flavour is OK, but its appearance is just wrong. Gave me food poisoning.]
Fried Bamboo Worm[Tastes like Cheetos, but healthier]
Crocodile[Like chicken but with more awesome]

The delicacies mentioned above are all ones that I consider novel. Occasionally I will mention having tried a certain food to someone that I don't think of as being taboo and they give me eyebrows about it - things like rabbit, caviar or fois gras. But I suppose its all subjective.

As a child, not a birthday passed that I didn't ask my parents for a dog. I loved dogs, cats too for that matter, and dogs loved me back. "He/She really likes you!" I heard this a lot from owners of difficult pooches when they saw how quickly their leashed companions took to me. My best friend in childhood from across the street had two huskies that I played with often, and my roommates in University had a dog that I lived with for two years. So the addition of Dog to the list above may come as a shock even to those that know my eating habits well.

How does a dog lover like me drag himself to a dog meat restaurant? Curiosity[this time it killed the dog...sorry, bad joke]. Curiosity and a belief that putting animals into categories of 'pet' and 'food' are completely culturally driven and not objective rules. If the Vietnamese can eat dogs, so can I. I always make an effort to cross cultural boundaries to strive for a higher, unifying understanding of human nature. That's what traveling is all about, letting go of your inhibitions and taboos.

Now that I got the rationalizations out of the way, let's move on to it. Daphne held no interest in trying dog[she often tells me that I'm more Chinese than she is], so I waited for her to leave town this weekend before my culinary escapade. I drove down to an alley not too far from the backpacking district known for its many dog meat quans and stopped at the first place that said, cay truong. I wasn't sure at first if it was correct. I knew that cay was a word that meant dog, but my last attempt to get dog based on that word didn't work out. It happened like this, I walked into a place for dog and when they didn't understand what I wanted I pointed at a dog that all too conveniently walked up to me at just that moment. Cay also means tree, it was part of their restaurant's name. Really need to pay attention to those accents.

This time though, I was in the right place. They handed me a menu with only two pages, one with the many ways they can prepare the dog meat, all in Vietnamese, and the other half had a list of rice wines and other liquors. I guess alcohol and eating dog go hand in hand? It seemed that way when I ordered iced tea and the server practically scoffed. As for the dog, I ordered thit nuong, which meant barbecued. It was also the only cooking style I recognized on the menu.

The portion they brought me was rather big for one person. I have to say that it looked quite good as far as meats go. It was sprinkled with sesame and served with veggies, rice cracker and pepper/salt for dipping. Now for the tasting. I must confess, despite my rational I was feeling apprehension towards what I was about to do, but as far as I was concerned I was beyond the point of no return. The taste and texture was like a cross between beef and venison, with a hint of what was indisputably dog. I didn't realize that I knew what dog tasted like and it disturbed me to recognize that taste in my mouth. As the serving boys snickered nearby, I was determined not to be beat and finished the whole plate. Afterward, despite my convictions that there was nothing wrong with eating dog, I couldn't help but feel a wave of guilt nausea. A tingling in the stomach, a flush of the face and a few awkward burps. I spent the next couple of hours feeling like a different person. I wondered, will dogs be able to smell my crime and avoid me from now on? That would be tragic.

So, will I ever eat it again? Only if a friend wants to try it, I think it will feel less strange the second time around, but it's not something I'm going to crave. Do I recommend it? If you're like me and you need to try everything, then it doesn't matter whether I recommend it or not, but if you're on the fence and not sure that you can do it then you probably can't.

As for myself, I think I'm basically out of strange foods to eat. I decided to clump cat into the dog category and leave it alone. And as for live monkey brain, no way. Am I missing something? Is there an odd delicacy that I still haven't tried?

Should I Stay Or Should I Go Now?

Stuck at home, sick, on a Saturday I realize that it's been a while since I've posted anything. My initial excuse would be that there hasn't been anything worth writing about, but is that fair? Perhaps then I should take it as sign that I need to be out there doing more interesting stuff or maybe I've been here so long already that I've lost the ability to find what makes the things in my life extraordinary. I'm inclined to think it may be a bit of both.

Not able to find things of interest to outside, I began looking in. I helped Daphne out by making her a website for her yoga: www.daphnechua.com. And also took some new yoga pictures for her, as she has just been sponsored by a local clothing company: www.yborn.net/home/.





I looked even further in and started taking Mandarin on Rosetta Stone. I now know more Chinese than Vietnamese. Why am I not taking Vietnamese instead? Learning languages is difficult for me so I want to use my energy to learn one that I want to know forever, rather than just one that I'll use for a year or two.

I was fortunate to have three people this past month that pulled me out and reminded me that I was living some place different and special. The first was my university mate, Zane, who has just come here to do his CELTA[for which I got a $200 referral fee] at ILA and teach English here. He described things that to me were ordinary in a way that made everything glow. For him everything shined like the sun, while I was still squinting to see the stars. As we taught him simple words and numbers, and he told us about the things that he saw on his first day and the people he talked to, I felt nostalgia for the naivety that comes with being some place new and that I too felt just a year before.

Later that same week, our friend, Bret, who had done the CELTA with us came for a brief visit. He has been living and working in Shanghai and was now on a six week paid vacation traveling through Vietnam and Cambodia. He wanted me to take him shooting around Saigon, something I hadn't done since after my first couple of months here. So on his last day I drove him to District Five, China town, and we walked about all afternoon taking photographs. ...

[Bret shows these guys the photo he took of them]

[Vietnamese grannies are cute, no?]

[Obviously, he didn't get it]

[I took this with one of Bret's lenses. After he left, I placed a long overdue order for two new lenses of my own]

[Cupping, removes toxins from your body, leaves giant hickeys]

[These kids will sell you a lion mask for a good price]

[While I go through great lengths to take mediocre shots, I hand feed great material to Bret on the ground below]

Bret was hardly gone when Daphne had a friend from Singapore visit us on their International Day weekend. Yvonne is actually Taiwanese so we can forgive her lack of patriotism for leaving The Red Dot on its biggest day of the year. Since Daphne was working most of Friday, I was left alone with her friend on tour guide duty. I took her rock climbing for her first time, as well as a few of my other favourite places.
"Just for you reference, that was a red light."
"And just for your reference, a bribe is only ten dollars."
Whenever she tried something new for the first time, it almost felt like I was trying it for the first time, too. Food tasted better, the coffee was stronger and sweeter and everything was beginning to look fresh again.

Now that my contract at ILA is coming to a close I've had to spend the last few months contemplating on what comes next. Do I stay another year or try somewhere else? My three visitors were like prophets pointing the way, they showed what glitters when I was hard at seeing. I'm thinking it's stay.

Paradise Lost and Found

The month of June marked my one year anniversary in Vietnam. Daphne's absence had left a void in my life, my schedule and my heart. Writing about personal stuff is a challenge for me and doing so in a public forum is all but impossible. So I'll be quite brief with it.

As I had mentioned at the end of the last blog, Daphne and I parted not for a lack of love but for other reasons. I won't go into what those reasons are, but let's just say that those 'other reasons' worked themselves out and exactly one month after I said goodbye to her at the airport she was back there with twice the load of luggage than when she left. I could probably write a book about everything that happened in between, but I'm afraid that all I can manage for the sake of a blog are two vague paragraphs. I hope the reader will understand and accept my censorship and read on.

Naturally, we had to give ourselves a short holiday, so we went to Phu Quoc again[this time by plane, not motorbike] to spend the week on the quiet beach, away from the world outside. We also chose it because during the time we were there, our good friend Sylven was getting married on the mainland just a short ferry ride away.

It's difficult to write about a beach holiday, anyone who's been on one will know. With all the lounging, sunning, swimming and eating it doesn't fit itself into a narrative structure very well. Because we were at the beginning of the rainy season, the weather wasn't as good as our first visit. Rainy, cloudy but also cooler in the nights and a bit less bitey in the evenings. It was the off season, so our room was only $10 and at first we were the only people at the hotel. Off season, however meant that the beaches weren't cleaned as regularly as they usually are, so what was a clean beautiful beach on our first visit was now littered. I'm told that if you were to get stranded on an uninhabited island, the beaches would be filthy there, too. Its all one ocean, after all. Worse than the general litter however, was the tar. Gooey black globs of tar lined the beach and the only way to clean it from the bottoms of our feet was to use the turpentine bottle we kept next to our bungalow. Why was there tar on the beach anyways?

Still we found ourselves having a good time despite these issues. We spent our time in hammocks, in the sea and reading a lot. I finnished Gulliver's Travels and Murakami's Norwegian Wood[on loan from a friend]. At nights we ate good seafood and played pool at Le Bistro while drink rhum lemons.

[Stop, Hammock Time]

We rented a bike and went cruising through the island, trying to find more things to do. At one point, we got into an accident when somebody who wasn't paying attention hit us from the rear. We felt a small bump behind us and then heard a crash. I stopped and looked behind to see a man falling off his bike, and some glass thing that he was carrying shattering on the ground into thousands of shards. In Vietnam, it's actually legal to drive away from an accident, so long as you go report it to a police station later[not likely to happen]. This is because Vietnamese onlookers can't help but get themselves involved and violence is not uncommon. I didn't drive away immediately and instead waited to see if he got up and was alright. When he got up and walked to his bike, he admitted wrong doing by not yelling at me and avoiding eye contact. Although I was ready to drive away from the situation, I held it together knowing I had to give both myself and him face. So I asked Daphne to get off, look at the damage on our bike and confirm that it wasn't a big deal. We then drove away without a word. Of course, it'd be nice to have seen to him and made sure that he was alright, take him to get a bandaid, etc. But without language, he would've assumed one of two things by our approach. Either we were going to ask him for money for damages, or that our polite tone meant that we were apologetic and claiming fault, to which he would've started demanding damages paid. So, under the circumstances, seeing that he was able to get up and lift his bike off the ground, I had to leave it at that.

One day, we took a trip to the far side of the island. We stopped by a pearl farm, where I played with a guard monkey, and went to small beach that had finer white sand then ours, but sadly was just as dirty. On our way back we got caught in some really bad cold rain and had to drive through it for one hour without raincoats. A hot bowl of Bun Rieu, helped warm our bones when we got back to town, and luckily we didn't get sick.

[He found my keys and tried to eat them]

Halfway through our stay, we went to Rach Gia for two nights to see our friend Sylven get married. Sylven's an American who did the CELTA with us and he was marrying a Vietnamese girl, Lan, in her family's house in Kien Giang in the Mekong Delta. Sylven really wanted to do the wedding local and do it right, but it proved to be harder than he had expected[ok, I don't know what he was expecting, but it was hard]. For the wedding, the dinner came first the night before. No pictures, sorry, we forgot our cameras. In order to get there we had to take a car from Rach Gia, where our hotel was, cross a slow ferry, drive some more, and then take a boat to the house itself[two hours in all]. The boat ride was at night, so while one guy drove Sylven had to shine a flashlight ahead to make sure we didn't run into any debris. I'm not sure how they're able to find their houses like this, but finding Lan's wasn't too hard. All we had to do was find the carnival tent with the loud electric keyboard tunes and screechy karaoke vocals emanating from it. The food was pretty good, large shrimp, crab, innards soup and other tasty things were served. Easy to come by for Lan's parents, who were shrimp and crab farmers. One problem, however, was the massive amounts of little insects that kept flying around and falling into the food. Each bite had to be closely scrutinized for unwanted guests before being invited into our mouths. Sylven made a big error with the mother-in-law that night, he didn't bring her an offering of roast pork. One of the many traditions of a Vietnamese wedding. Bringing it the next day wasn't an option either, it had to be then or never. Ironically, we had passed a lot of stands on the way there that sold roast pork[heo quay], Sylven and Lan just didn't know that he needed to bring it.

The next day, the responsibility for gathering all the necessary offerings had been allocated to some of Lan's cousins. That way Sylven could avoid making anymore mistakes. Lan had to spend the night at the house so that she can stay up all night and wash vegetables with her female family members[really] while we made the long trip back to Rach Gia, only to make it again early the next morning. This time, I had my camera.


Aside from Daphne and myself, the only others able to attend Sylven's side were his friend Thorin and his eight year old son[Thorin's not Sylven's].


The little boat we had to take was hard to balance your way onto, and it had no chairs. After that first night of squatting for thirty minutes in the boat, Sylven decided to buy some short plastic chairs for us this time around.

[Land ho]

[All offerings are in order, will Sylven be forgiven for the pig?]

Sylven is now in Lan's house. Offerings are all set. The tradition here is that the man comes to take the woman away from her home. She will now be a part of his family and no longer her own.

[The Bride waits for her cue]

So, as confusing as it was for us to understand what was going on at the wedding, we came to realize that we weren't the only ones confused. The man pictured above[some kind of uncle?] was leading the proceedings. However, in the living room were seated family members who kept interrupting him. Apparently, there was a lack of consensus for how a 'Vietnamese' wedding should be performed, each family member had his or her own opinion on what came next. And on a personal note, I begrudged the uncle with the mic for constantly standing in front of the bride and groom, making good photo-ops near impossible.


Meanwhile, while Uncle rants, family members burn incense and make offerings to their ancestors, or Buddha, or both[?].

Sylven also has to pay up. Aside from a dowry that includes giving the mother gold, he has to give her gifts during the ceremony, as well as to all her sisters[and any other family member that wants to paid off]. In addition to the wedding ring, he also has to dress Lan with other bits of jewelery: necklace, earings, etc.

The ceremony ends with a bow to the audience and a bow to the ancestors/Buddha shrine. No kiss like in the West. Then, a meal, with much fewer guests in attendance than the night before, and we were off[after waiting for a short storm to subside]. Wedding finished. Instead of wedding presents, its customary, as in Chinese weddings as well, to give red envelopes with money instead. Daphne says, that its customary for Chinese to pay for their own wedding, but then make a profit[for some] off of the envelopes in the end[in the West, the parents pay and you get pillow cases and blenders]. However, for whatever reason, it was Lan's mom who got to keep the red envelopes. Payback for no roast pork, maybe?

Sylven and Lan had to leave for Saigon the same day, while Daphne and I stayed one more night in Rach Gia before going back to Phu Quoc to enjoy our last days of holiday.


It took some time before I could post this blog, I had some computer issues that had to be resolved first. Since then, Daphne is on the way to refilling her yoga schedule, I'm back at work, with less then two months before my contract ends. And after that, we shall see...

Hoi An Revisited

After a year and many travels, Daphne and I got on a train in Saigon and came back to the place where we took our first trip together, Hoi An. We left Sunday evening after teaching my last class and rode for fifteen hours through the night and morning. There were four beds in our cabin, but after the first stop the other two occupants got off and we had the place to ourselves for the rest of the trip. The train itself contained no new technology that it couldn't have been built in the 1920's and the rooms reminded us somewhat of a jail cell in their style. Having said that, it was by no means run down or dirty and the trip itself was smooth. The rhythmic sound of the tracks below us were meditative and the trip didn't feel as long as it was, except that Daphne managed to finish reading The Good Earth.

When we got into town that afternoon, we decided to avoid another headache hunting hotels and went straight to the same hotel we were at last time we were here, Thanh Binh III. The power was out and the sounds of generators were humming in the streets. Rainy season is slow to start this year and being that half the power in Vietnam is hydroelectric this means that scheduled power cuts are a norm, even in Saigon. Amazingly, the clerk at the front desk of the hotel remembered us and gave us a good rate on our room. Hoi An beats the rest of Vietnam when it comes to hotel rates for value of accomodations.

The following morning, our friend Melanie, who sings at the Hyatt in Saigon, came to join us for a day. We decided to do the walking tour of the Old Town again with her, which was fine because there was a lot we hadn't seen the first time around. For one thing we found a local government building devoted to gathering swallows nests for the use in a popular Chinese dish, Bird's Nest Soup. I haven't tried it myself, but I hear its good.

[And you complained that your government had too many bureaucracies]

[Birds' Nests]

Also, now that I could find it, we got to see the folk performance that we had come in late to last time we were there. It was quite charming, though short.

[Supposedly, this dance is about fishing, but I think its a metaphor for an old man who wants two young women]

[These bars mark the flood line of every flooding season. Last year looked pretty bad]

[Boy showing off his water puppet. Me showing off my photoshop]

We had agreed to save the shopping for later when it cooled down and we were done sightseeing, but it didn't stop Melanie from leading us into every shop along the way, which is pretty much every building. Even I spent a Dong or two on gifts. Later, we went to a tailor to get some clothes made. The tailor we had last time was gone, but fortunately we found a new tailor at Trinh 95 who did fantastic work for cheap. Daphne even designed a pair of pants of her own imagination that came out looking great.

The next morning, we left early for the beach since Melanie had to leave us at noon. When she did leave, we spent the rest of the day there.


The beach had gotten more crowded and loud since the last time we were there. Not as bad as the beaches in Thailand or [god forbid] Vung Tau, but not as good as we remembered. Plus, they were setting up for some rock concert that evening which, by the sound of things, wasn't going to impress.

On the way back to town, wanting to find some new ways to experience Hoi An, we stopped by The Sleepy Gecko where an Aussie guy, Steve, runs motorbike tours through the nearby countryside. We signed up for one two days later and then Daphne, who was in yoga withdraw, asked if there was anywhere where we could practice. Steve gave us direction to An Bang beach, which turned out to be closer and less visited than the better known beach of Cua Dai, and told us to talk to Sam at La Plage.

The next day, we decided to check out An Bang and were pleasantly surprised by how few people were there. There were a few seafood huts set up, as well as an Aussie bar called Phattie's on one end and the more chill themed La Plage on the other.

When Daphne asked Sam about the yoga classes, Sam told her that she doesn't teach the class but instead just does free practice with dvd's and a tv outside. Upon hearing this, of course, Daphne offered her services, free of charge, to teach a class the upcoming Sunday. And with these plans laid out, we went to the sand and laid out for the second full day in a row on the beach. The water was so clear that we could see that this time there were jellfish everywhere, where as last year there weren't. Our stay in the water was always limited to the first jellyfish sighting, at which point Daphne was ready to get out until the memory of it faded and we were back in again. The solitude of the beach during the day was great and as the sun went low, locals started coming, setting up mats and makeshift sun-shields to block the last rays. They swam in their clothes and food was cooked and sold not ten feet from the water.

[We're taught to wait 30 minutes after eating before we swim?]

[Beach Boys]

And, just like last year, the sun said its last goodbyes with a light shower and a rainbow.

[Nice]

The next day, we went to the Sleepy Gecko to do our motorbike trip. I was a bit disappointed that I had to drive an automatic motorbike and only became more so when I found out what the trip demanded out of it. The majority of our party for the trip was made up of funny old Aussie men who can't tell a story without making a joke out of it and being as indirect as possible with giving honest details about their lives. Aussies would make excellent spies.

The trip started simply enough with a countryside drive. Steve showed us some farms, taught us about what was planted, how its done, how they fish, etc. Then, he took us to a small canteen and proceeds to give us beers, rice wine[note:wine read 'vodka'], and snake wine, where in a snake is put into the jar that holds the rice wine.



After ensuring that everyone had a good buzz, he leads us to an area that is heavily flooded for farming and then makes us drive across several rickety bamboo bridges that look like something Indiana Jones would struggle with. Fortunately, no one was hurt though we're told that it happens. A few of those later he took us to see how they make beach mats and the women let us have a go at the weaving process. I was a natural, Daphne did...alright.


For the climax of the trip, Steve took us to a secluded beach where we had a short dip. For the finale, we then had to drive along the coast, on the sand, in our less than capable motorbikes. Needless to say this was no easy task, especially with two people on a bike and especially on an automatic Yamaha. We must have driven one kilometer before we got to the road again, by which time we were completely drained and ready for a cold beer. We were so wiped out though, that we were in bed that night by 9.

[The catch of the day]

The next day was my birthday! We rented a bike and, since we had only seen one of the Marble Mountains the last time we were there, we drove out to see the other four that we missed. We found when we got there that the other mountains had a lot less attractions than the main one, so after visiting two of them we aimed our sights at the mountain called Monkey.

To get to Monkey, we had to drive 20 km up the coast of Danang, the third largest city in Vietnam, which was lined with empty beaches and massive would be resorts that were waiting for the coming tourist boom. Monkey had only one finished road and it was all uphill. It took most of the remaining gas to get to the top. The winding road was hypnotic and we had to pop our ears several time for the quick changes in elevation. At the very top was a government complex that had two big white domes on a couple of their buildings. The place looked like something from an old Bond movie and we were turned away at the gate, never knowing what the place was for anyways. Just below that there was a lookout point where we could overlook the South China Sea and get a temporary reprieve from the sun.

The way back we did with the engine off, since it was all down hill and I was low on. In fact, I ran out of gas right in front of a gas seller on the street shortly after we got off the mountain. On the way back, we stopped in to Phatties at An Bang beach for a seafood lunch and a couple of beers.

[Daphne stole a fedora]

After being undercharged for unknown, and uninvestigated, reasons we headed back to the hotel for a shower and out on the town for some wining and dining.

Not surprisingly, we spent our last day on the beach again, worn out from two days of adventuring.

[They are very serious about their boat]

At sunset, we set out some yoga mats at La Plage and Daphne led a class with me and three, much more capable, women.

It quickly turned into a spectator sport, as a crowd of locals, tourists and even dogs came to watch us. I earned a lot of laughs from the locals.

[These kids show off their own skills while we practice]

Our last morning, we took a last swim in the hotel pool before heading to the train station. The train doesn't arrive into Saigon until 5am the next day.

And here, a sadness, for this was to be Daphne's last day in Saigon. Those that read of our first trip to Hoi An may be experiencing a deja vu, for again she left for Singapore and again with no promise of return[well...maybe a hint]. The reasons I won't get into. I'll only say that it was not for a lack of love on either of our part but instead had to do with those nitty gritty details of our lives that no amount of love can erase. And so, once again we say goodbye.

[And we wait]