Asymmetrical Warfare.

Cu Chi Tunnels

Last day in Vietnam. Our last sightseeing event is the Cu Chi tunnels some 70 kilometers outside of Saigon. The Cu Chi tunnels are an intricate system of tunnels and underground complexes dug by hand to facilitate the guerilla warfare that the Vietcong engaged in to grind the US and French forces to a defeat in their respective wars. We hire a cab to take us out, and the distance is uncommon, because our cab driver gets lost several times in the process. In fact, I secretly wonder if he can read, as he asks for directions several times after passing signs that direct our route to the Cu Chi tunnels. Once there however, he takes a nap as we go explore our tourist site. He’s scored today, he’ll take us here and back to downtown, and that will be all he’ll need to work the entire day. A good thing too, because this far out, not many cabs service the area, only the odd bus, loaded with tourists.

The tunnel system is as extensive as it is small and although my slight frame slips through the asian sized holes with ease, it is not in any sort of comfort that I maneuver the hot and dark passageways. From the holes in the dirt, I can see everyone’s ankles in complete secret, and I marvel at how well constructed these earthworks really are.

Murderous traps and clever breathing holes decorate the jungle, until you suspect every ant and termite mound of harboring ill will. No wonder US forces suffered higher proportionate casualties in this war then World War 2, the very jungle is hostile and you can see how war in this treacherous landscape could drive one to insanity. Despite the horrific effects of Agent Orange, looking at these minute murder holes that dot the landscape you feel some sympathy for the idea of using such indiscriminate destruction.

The  Cu Chi tunnels are plain evidence of one of Vietnam’s premier exports; military planning to defeat the largest super powers on the planet. Vietnamese advisors are found in many third world countries, giving lessons in asymmetrical warfare and attrition. We wrap our tour eating a snack that sustained the Viet Cong throughout the war, and proves to be a childhood snack Mother often provided us. Steamed Yucca root dipped in crushed peanuts. A simple snack which is a surprisingly pleasant reminder of an earlier time.

Saigon International Airport  is a stark contrast to Hanoi. If Hanoi International is LAX, then Saigon International is the JFK equivalent. Modern, new and shining with shops, glass and tile. Even the soldiers manning customs here are specked out in fancy new uniform. Certainly, Saigon is Vietnam’s face to the world, though we are here to say goodbye.

We depart in a late evening thunderstorm, rain lashing the windows as we escape, back to the world of the familiar.

Submissive gorilla stance

A short nap and then breakfast at the Hotel Continental; one of the oldest hotels in Saigon, established in 1880. The Hotel is well maintained, but it is old. Proportions are all sorts of strange and the materials throughout the hotel hearkens to a different era. A pleasant breakfast in the agreeable outdoor atrium is punctuated by Mother’s stories of how she used to go on dates in this very hotel some thirty odd years ago.

After breakfast, we pick up our cameras and leave to see what sights Saigon has to offer. A statute of St. Maria, a catholic cathedral, all is very mundane until we hear sounds of chanting; while chasing the touristy sights, we have led ourselves unwittingly into the city center. An unusually visible police presence is evident and from the chanting we quickly discern why. For the second week in a row, Vietnam has done the unprecedented and is permitting public protests throughout the nation. Here in Saigon, students are protesting what they view as Chinese aggression and encroachment on their territory. It’s a fairly small crowd as far as protests go, some 50-100 people chanting anti-China slogans and waving signs.

Saigon protest

Though the crowd is small, it does block traffic in the city center roundabout and quickly the crowd doubles. Motorcycle motorists are arrested by the crowd as well, and their curiosity allows the crowd to temporarily swell in size dramatically. This, this is what my blood thrills on, the spectacle, the potential for danger, the threat of disaster; I am rewarded quickly. A couple of arguments have broken out, and I film a young man breaking from the crowd. Plainclothes police agents converge and charge him so quickly, they threaten to trip over their victi. They pin him and then quickly pull him out of view. One of the plainclothes officers responsible for the takedown suddenly changes targets running at me and gesturing angrily. My camera has drawn attention and offense and I quickly lower it and do my best submissive gorilla impression, eyes down, camera down, hands up, murmuring soft nonsense to placate the officer. It works and with a final angry stare and unintelligible  shout, he disappears back into the mob. The instant he is gone, one of the the students around me, grins and gives me a thumbs up for capturing the moment.

The height of the excitement is over however, and through excited vietnamese continue to flock to view the unusual spectacle we turn away to explore the rest of the city.

Evening finds us touring the city’s beer gardens and pubs pulling alcohol at US prices. I frequently get comments for wandering around with two girls, and lewd comments to boot. A guy on a bike winks at me and motions me over.

“You want a betta one?” he grins, gesturing to my friends. I answer in the negative.

“Ah, maybe you can do with one more then?” He pursues. I chuckle slightly and brush him off to catch up with my travel companions.

Saigon at dusk

Later, we pass a set of neon doors titled “49″ and “51.” At the doorway a flock of girls in sultry evening dress invites wandering guys in with a chorus of high pitched cheers, laughter, and cajoling. We pass the curious establishment and find our way into a bar to celebrate our last nights in Vietnam. While my friends are in the toilet, I order a strange drink for the table. The server promises fire, and I am rewarded with an elaborate stack of glassware from which flaming alcohol of a sickly sweet flavor cascades down into glasses which we suck up with straws.

“One pull, don’t let air in the straw, or you will drink fire!” our sultry waiter in a white cocktail dress cajoles us. Down it goes, and we wander out of the bar, late into the night, wandering the empty streets back to our hotel.

High country

Lak Lac

“How did you sleep?” Mom asks as I yawn and stretch.

“Good,” I reply.

“Really?” She asks, “I’ve been up all night going to the bathroom. I don’t feel so good.”

“That’s what you get for drinking yogurt drinks that have been sitting out on the counter for god knows how long.” I reply matter of factly.

“Maybe,” she replies, looking pretty worse for wear. “You go on ahead to breakfast, I’m going for a walk, see if my stomach stops rumbling.”

I nod my understanding, and take my leave to join my friends in the long house where breakfast is being served. This is worrisome, needing a bathroom every twenty minutes is seriously going to cramp our motorcycle touring style.

Bejin has some stomach pills however, so Mom takes a couple, and by the time we’re ready to get on our bikes again, Mom announces that she’s feeling significantly better. A short ride over, and we stop at another ethnic village for indigenous people. Perhaps the most significant thing about this village, is that they’ve got a pair of domesticated elephants that they use for tourist sightseeing in the village and rice patties. Mom takes to them like she does any living thing, bubbling and gushing all over like a singing tea kettle.

I stare at the animals silently for a moment, making eye contact to apologize for the noisy creatures I have unleashed in their presence. Like any animal that serves under man, the elephants deal with the noisy intrusion stoically, and I wander off to see what the village holds.

Stoic Elephants

For the most part, it’s hard to see what makes this village ethnic or special. The people look pretty vietnamese to me, the only difference I notice is that the houses are all built on concrete stilts some six feet above the ground. All around this village is rice fields and a lake, so flooding must be a commonplace occurrence. The other curiosity are tractors with no cowling to hide their insides, and controls placed far in the rear behind a swivel mount that gives it an impression of a chariot, or a pod racer from Star Wars.

Sometime around noon, we stop at a silk factory, watching the raw cocoons get processed into silk. The balls of silk are boiled to help loosen the silk threads and then, while the cocoons float in hot water, several strands are peeled off to form a single thread and attached to a rubber spool that is spinning rapidly. The spools wind the silk up and form larger spools of collected silk. The girls here in the factory are young, late teens, to early twenties. Some of them look painfully young, but it’s probably due more to genetics then anything else. Mom inquired earlier about child labor laws, and was informed that Vietnam has child labor laws in place, how strict they are, or how well enforced, is anyone’s guess.

Silk factory

In any case, the girls perform their job without taking any notice of us. This is a tourist attraction after all, so our nosiness is well accustomed to. Many of them perform their jobs with earbuds, some of them even managing to tap around on their phones while they work. Like anywhere in the world, you can tell that there is a certain hierarchy for women. The pretty ones get to be silk saleswomen, in delicate ethnic dress selling expensive tapestries like the ones I bought from in Hoi An. As the girls get more comely, they fall to places like these, the prettier ones trying to hawk poor quality tapestries here at the factory, the others back here, pulling threads off of cocoons.

The silk looms draw my particular attention. They’re largely made of wood, and operate through a complex system of gears, pulleys and paddles. To thread the cloth, the shuttle is loaded with silk, and it is rocketed by a spring loaded hammer which hits it, back and forth at a furious rate, creating a tremendous racket. The silk has intricate geometric patterns and I upon closer examination, the looms reveal huge punch card sheets that help determine how the silk will be woven, all without computers. The ingeniousness of the setup quite impresses me and I spend several minutes gawking over the engineering details.

As we wind up and down country roads, I gun the Yamaha aggressively, bouncing and navigating the deep potholes with exhuberance. Nam grins at my excitement, “Next time, you a certified Easy Rider! Time to ride a bigger bike!” I nod in agreement, “I’ll be back for sure!” We come tearing out of the chilly central mountains, into farming country, and we stop to take in the countryside. Nam leads us through coffee plantations, showing us the bright berries. I nibble the sour berries, curious to the fresh component to one of the world’s most popular drinks. All in all, I am distinctly unimpressed, though I taste the distinct flavor of caffeine, the weakly sour berry really doesn’t resemble the beverage at all. I momentarily ponder at what sort of extensive experimentation must have gotten us from this sad and sorry berry to the dark beverage we all know and love.

As we get close to Dalat, the farms become more and more numerous, and greenhouses sprout up everywhere, harboring flowers and fruits. It is relatively chilly up here, but still, hard for me to contemplate any sort of protection necessary for the plants, considering where I come from and what I know can grow there.

We wind through Dalat, Mom eagerly looking around, trying to recognize something. This is her home as much as anyplace. As a child, she was sent to a catholic boarding school in Dalat much of her childhood, and this town probably dominates her memories in Vietnam.

“Recognize anything?” I ask. She shakes her head.

“No, not really, the central lake is still there, but everything else is so different, I don’t recognize it at all.”

And of course, Vietnam is one of Asia’s fastest growing economies, boasting almost 20% GDP  annual expansion within the last three years, this land is in constant growth and upheaval. It would be slightly remarkable if she did come back to some sort of time capsule.

One of our last stops into Dalat is the Crazy House, a Gaudy mess of concrete designed by a minister’s daughter. It’s still under construction, but it already is a confusing maze of dead end halls, pocket rooms, and stairs that lead to nowhere. It bears a passing resemblance to the Winchester House in San Jose, except this place replaces madness with whimsy. Organic forms spill from every direction, and a right angle or straight surface cannot be found. This place would be fantastic for a game of hide and seek, or a horror movie.

As we motor up to a hotel a block away from the lake front, we arrive with the realization that our epic journey with Nam on motorcycles is finally over. I bid Nam a fond farewell, fully intending to make it back one day with a full blown biker gang to experience Vietnam the best way possible, with the wind in your face, and a full tank of gas.

Dalat is a nice little mountain town, little in that it’s easily navigable and spares the overwhelming press of sights and humanity so common to most of Asia. The central square is built at the bottom of an amphitheater shaped hill, so shops and vendors pack the valley as well as climbs the steps of the surrounding hillside. The weather is quite a bit more palatable up here, in the high country, as evidenced by the packed busses filled with domestic tourists. For the first time since we’ve been in country, we order hot drinks, Mom and the girls go with hot soy milk, while I opt for tea.

The vegetables and flowers are especially abundant and colorful up here, a testament to the excellent growing conditions found away from the incessant heat that plagues the lowlands. We stop at a street vendor who packs rice flakes into a bronze popsicle mould before steaming it. The entire process is exacting and time consuming, and we buy her first confections for a mere quarter a piece. I nibble curiously, and come away largely unimpressed, the flavor and texture resembles a mediocre version of mochi, and I quite fail to see how the economics work out for these time consuming snacks that charge a mere quarter. Still, she is plagued with a large and growing crowd of curious customers, so something must be working.

Later, after the sun has set, the girls get it in their mind that we must absolutely rent the swan paddle boats out on the lake. I shrug, and we pair up to take boats out on the dark lake. Being as I’m with my mother in a swan paddle boat, the first thought comes to mind is to physically assault those who have brought me to this situation. Without further ado, I churn the paddle works, steering for the girl’s boat, crashing into their stern satisfyingly. Mom however, tries to brake when she realizes my intent, and gets a thorough whacking in the shins by the paddles as she tries to abort the driven crankshaft.

“Nobody gave you permission to stop paddling!” I bellow, “This boat is meant to CHAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGE!” Again and again we spiral in pathetic circles smashing into the girls’ boat as fast as the paddles will allow, which means it’s something like watching snails fight. Eventually, Mom even gets into it, not as if I gave her any other option, and she paddles with as much gusto as she can muster. My obnoxiousness eventually stirs the other boats on the lake, and some other kids join in on the bumping and ramming, making this silly activity infinitely cooler, if not totally satisfying experience.

Dalat at night

And thus we wrap up Dalat, finding ourselves on another sleeper bus which we had the precognition of getting assigned seats to avoid the disaster of the Hoi An leg of our journey. Even though we come onto the bus with seat assignments, we don’t have the receipt that the driver insists on, and I roll my eyes as I anticipate another verbal battle amongst those of different languages. Eventually, the driver calls the station and confirms our purchasing of our seats and nods that all is well. Mom gives a laugh and an eyeroll.

“He just asked for the seat assignments of the Frenchman traveling with three foreign women.”

“Oh really?” I reply, “I don’t know whether to take that as a compliment or an insult.” I’m bloody proud of being an American, I was born in the reddest heartland of America, even so, I fully understand the image problem that Americans’ often have abroad, and I take solace in knowing that I can pass as something more nuanced then what is expected from my country. With those muddled thoughts in mind, I pull my contacts out and nod lazily to sleep as the bus bounces along the road to our final destination in country; Ho Chi Minh city.

Open road

fishing boats

Nam is waiting for us at our hotel in the morning. We lash our oversized luggage to the bikes and take off, me riding a 100cc Yamaha. “Biker’s advice,” extrapolates. “Under 220cc, always get a Yamaha, over 220cc get a Honda. Over 500 get American.” He makes good on his advice, riding a big red Harley. One of the guides notices I have some trouble shifting and points out that the shifter goes forward and backwards. News to me, I’d been shifting up through 4th and neutral just to get back to 1st. I had thought that that had been the most ridiculous system invented, but had gone with it because I thought bikers had a reason for the madness, nice to know it’s simply my own incompetence and not a whole world gone mad.

We take off down the path I had previously explored, and I ride immediately behind Nam enjoying riding my own bike, without the responsibility of trying to figure out where to go next. We stop through a cute little fishing village on the coast, where we all stop to fuel up our bikes. While Nam is buying petrol, we wander to take some photos of the brightly colored fishing boats in the harbor. It is here that we come upon a curious oddity, circular boats.

basket boats

The boats are literally woven baskets, large enough to fit a person, coated with tar and pitch to keep the water out. An oar is threaded through a rope ring, and through this one ring, the boater paddles their oar in a curious figure 8 motion, which works surprisingly well. Not as well as any other boat perhaps, but all things considered, damn impressive.

Vietnamese convenience stores

We motor on, off the water’s edge, and into the hills. Here we pass the US Ranger training grounds and military base during the Vietnam war. Though the flag has been replaced with a Vietnam one, and the statue of a US marine taken down, little else is done to the decomposing structures. We stop at a roadside “convenience store” and pick up fresh sugar cane juice to refresh ourselves. Similar goods are sold here, soft drinks, green tea, convenience foods, things that would be familiar in a convenience store at home. The biggest difference, is the abundance of hammocks beckoning gently in the noonday sun.

We stop for lunch at a com ga joint (chicken and rice) which basically is the most common food in Vietnam, even more so then pho perhaps. While com ga is a traditional meal, pho is typically a breakfast item in Vietnam. We sit down to our meal, which Nam assures us is excellent. I eat with gusto, but as usual, I’m rather unimpressed. The chicken is some of the most overcooked, tough and salty meat I’ve ever tasted, laced with bone chips.

As we leave the low country behind and start motoring through the tropical mountains, the temperature drops appreciably. Motorcycling has its own risks less obvious then death by road rash. Wind in your face keeps your body pleasantly cool, which allows you to completely deny the fact that you’re still in 100 degree weather with a tropical sun beating down on your skin relentlessly. I notice with some trepidation that it just might be time to start worrying about sunblock, an unheard of in my book.

Mountain roads wind through the highlands, and we take corners aggressively, Nam and I outpacing the rest of the group. For a moment, we’re stuck behind a truck, and Nam passes it with ease, I move into opposing traffic, and drop back, not convinced that I’m going to make it. This repeats time and time again, but never is their a big enough break in traffic for me to chance it. Finally, after several minutes roll by, with Nam getting further and further ahead, I drop the little Yamaha into 2nd and gun it into opposing traffic. Around the bend, a large Hyundai transport truck is thundering towards me, and I open the throttle, willing the little bike to press forward. I squeeze through with inches to spare on either end, weaving out of the way and in front of the truck I was trying to pass, like some sort of modern Tintin who escapes death by another miraculous Deus Ex Machina. The wind and dust whip into my face of the passing trucks, I simply open my throttle all the way and go chasing Nam down, without any sort of time to reflect on my luck and immortality.

The late afternoon finds us passing Vietnamese soldiers, doing what most soldiers do in a socialist country, build roads. These young lads, in their late teens and early twenties smile enthusiastically at us, four foreigners motoring down their little back roads. We cross a bridge over a reservoir, on which float a few houses. Nam explains that before the reservoir, some people lived in the valley, but when they flooded it, instead of moving, some of the villagers simply floated their houses, and now live in the middle of the lake. I can only wonder to the advantages they see in such an arrangement. Unless there are rampaging hoards of thieves in the area, I can hardly see how it’d be preferable to setting up shop on the shore. Rice grows particularly lush and green here, and in a country filled border to border with the green grass, I’m obligated to snap a few pics at how bloody saturated the chlorophyll is in this part of the world.

lush rice fields

After a full day of riding, my bottom is more then sore. The Yamaha was never made for long tours, meant instead for short little trips around town, and my ass can feel it. We gratefully check in into our lakeside resort which we’re staying in for the evening. Here, high up in the highlands, the air is delightfully brisk and refreshing. Our resort is built in old French construction, hearkening to better days. Still, the place is clean, even if it’s completely over run with wall climbing lizards and geckos. Mom apparently has a sudden thirst and downs a carton of some obscure yogurt drink that’s by the cans of soda left on the counter in our hotel room.

lizards everywhere

“Thirsty?” I ask, “What in the world are you drinking yogurt for?”

She rolls her eyes at me, impatient with my logic. I shake my head tiredly in response. Somewhere along the line, I became the parent and she the child. With my years abroad and around the US, little lifts my stoic lid. Compared to my childhood where nothing was allowed and I’d jump at the opportunity to try anything, I am a tired old man with little inclination or fascination with anything except the truly extraordinary. Conversely, my mother has been cooped up in Wyoming for decades, and everything is something that must be savored and experienced, her naivety would be enthralling except that she’s supposed to be my mother, and should have walked these paths of experience before me. I pick up the carton of yogurt drink and give it a cursory examination.

“The great thirst quencher, yogurt drink,” I say sarcastically, “good luck with that.” I pick up a towel and move to the shower to scrub the day’s road dust off.

Fake Disneyland

A day to kill.

It’s a beach town, so supposedly we all want to relax here for a bit. Nha Trang by and large however, is fairly boring. Though pretty and beachy, it’s not exactly why I go on vacation. Still, the ocean is right there, and that has never done me wrong. I immediately find a cabana, and rent it by the ocean, jumping into the water every half hour to regulate my body temperature.

The water is silly calm, and I swim out, much farther then I’d naturally care to go in the ocean, enjoying the warmth surrounding me. Vendors pop by our cabana every twenty minutes or so, selling everything under the sun. Vietnamese donuts, mung bean cakes, peanut candies, silken tofu, fresh bananas, cheesy holographic pictures, the vendors come on and on. One could easily eat and drink their fill of all sorts of  different items all while lying by the beach.

Eventually, the novelty wears off, and we start looking for something to do. Vin Pearl island is staring us in the face, and offers an easy option, so we grab a cab to the mainland cable car and ride over. Here, some 300 meters above the ocean, we dangle on the world’s longest wires as we traverse over the bay, watching as the speed ferries whiz underneath us, back and forth.

Vin Pearl is by Vietnamese standards, a bloody expensive tourist attraction, weighing in at $25 US a person. The reason for this, is it’s Vietnam’s only amusement park, and my best descriptor of it is… Fake Disneyland. Statues of Disney characters abound, all done in concrete. I could criticize, and say that the likenesses are rather poor, the proportions off, and the colors wonky, but then, it’s all done in concrete! If American amusement parks are a testament to our fascination with fiberglass and other plastics, then Vietnam’s amusement parks are display pieces for their craftsmanship with concrete. While it’s mostly Disney, it’s certainly not discriminatory. Batman and Superman make the odd appearance, and here for the first time I notice something that’s been bugging me all along this trip. All trashcans, in all major tourist venues, whether it’s the largest cave in Halong bay, the zoo, or here in Fake Disneyland, all of them are modeled after penguins. For whatever reason, stuffing a penguin’s gullet full of trash supposedly makes sense here.

We do a couple rides that are no more then glorified carnival rides, but have a blast anyway, mainly because it’s my mother’s first time out at an amusement park, of any sort at all, and she’s got her game face on. Though she’s not bouncing with rambunctious enthusiasm, she’s taking to all the attractions with little hesitation, and when she’s done, she’s inclined to try some more.

The rides are lame however, and we wander on through the park to see what else is buried on Vin Pearl island. Deeper within the park, we come across an indoor aquarium, and seek shelter within it’s air conditioned darkness from the glaring sun. At first, the acquarium mirrors many I have seen in the US, similar to the aquarium in Long Beach, with only disapproving Vietnamese clucking their tongues, exclaiming “You would be so good to eat!” to mark the difference between aquariums.

But then it get’s bigger. Downstairs, a moving walkway carries you through a huge acquarium tank, where sharks, whale sharks, giant mantas, and mermaids swim peacefully above you. Though the Vietnamese are enthralled by the six foot sharks roaming around the giant sea turtles, the mermaid with bright red hair definitely has their attention. Tacky is the only word that comes to my mind, but whatever get’s the tickets bought I suppose. Seeing giant mantas dodge five feet tuna with swarms of parrotfish keep me well amused however, and I go round and round the moving walkway, long after my traveling companions are bored and ready to move on.

Outside, we move along to the waterpark portion of the amusement park. Mom gamely climbs the steep stairs and plummets down the slides with as much gusto as one could possibly hope for. After several particularly vertical drops and a near drowning or two, I’m damn proud of her; not many women her age would be going after these slides and rides. Perhaps it’s the fact that she’s never had an experience like this before in her entire existence, so maybe she doesn’t know better, whatever the reason, I’m grinning silly at the fact that she’s enjoying herself and not simply hanging on for dear life.

Back on the mainland, we set out to fulfill a goal that’s been on our minds for the past few days, a seafood dinner on the beach. Getting one, is amazingly easy. We wander by the water’s edge for a few minutes till we spot a seafood vendor, cooking in the sand. Basically, the seafood vendors carry two giant pots of fresh seafood, caught that day, and a hibachi grill. You pick out what you wish to eat, and they grill or steam it for you right there. We buy $25 worth of seafood, which is a small feast, dumped on a plastic tarp for our indulgence. Little dishes with a tangy, spicy dipping sauce are passed around, and then you dive in. Herbs from a certain tree are served with our meal here, and the smell hits with pungent clarity; diesel. In fact, I had smelled this exact herb before in Beijing, but had mistaken it simply as pollution. In fact, though it tastes and smells somewhat like diesel, when mixed in with this spicy, sour sauce, it makes a perfect complement. Though we dig into lobsters, crabs, and crayfish, the giant tiger shrimp are the highlight of the meal, and I am all too sad to see the last of them. The seafood medley is delicious indeed, but the dipping sauce wins the prize, and the four of us are still dipping our fingers long after the seafood is gone, much to our consternation. Indeed, I’m still hungry, and I set out to find something that’ll stick to my ribs. My biggest problem with seafood, is that it never fills one up, no matter how much one eats, you always have to eat something else to complement it, bread, corn, potatoes, something.

And so it is that I find myself at a street vendor, ordering a simple banh mi (vietnamese sandwich), which for a 70 cents is sticking quite a bit better to my ribs. This is perhaps my first authentic banh mi in country, and I relish the fresh baguette that makes up my sandwich. Canadian ice cream follows before I’m finally full, and we continue on our way. Another festival is supposed to Nha Trang tomorrow, and rehearsals are in full swing. We watch the performers practice on the government building, and I can only shake my head in amusement. This is not China’s communism, nor is it North Korean communism, the orders are sporadic, the choreography lazy, the participants hardly in time. Who can blame them, it is hard to imagine anyone taking any sort of order very seriously in this hot climate. The fact that the VC were able to work together long enough to drive the French and Americans out is quite a feat in light of this.

 

Crank it to eleven

bike taxis

The bus trundles into Nha Trang in the opening hours of the morning. Over the night, we’ve shed some of the passengers we’ve picked up, and tempers have fallen as everyone has dropped off. When the bus finally stops in the city center, we exit to gather our belongings, waiting while one of the older gentlemen who slept on the floor unloads his motorcycle from the undercarriage.

While the Europeans wander about in a mid morning daze, consulting tour books and the like, we make good on our most valuable resource and Mom commands a taxi for us, leading us to the waterfront.

Nha Trang is probably the closest Vietnam has to a Hawaii. A beach city, meant to cater the indulgent with beaches, shaded cabanas and water sports for visiting Europeans, particularly of the Russian sort. Indeed, the beachfront could be mistaken for Waikiki at first glance, even with a mountain ridge running to one side that sort of resembles Diamond Head Crater. To the south, Vin Pearl Island beckons  us with Hollywood style block lettering adorning the hillside. The world’s longest cable car ferries passengers from the mainland high above the bay. The destination is none other then Vietnam’s own amusement park, a rarity in this nation.

For a while, we wander the water front. The water is deliciously warm, but is depressingly devoid of waves. In the excruciating brightness of the morning sun, few people are on the beach either, except some few Russians burning desperately in the heat. The beach survey completed, we wander the town which is completely catered to tourists. The local markets and exotic restaurants have all boiled down to clean looking establishments selling ice cream, sea bass, scuba trips, and smoothies. For all that’s here, I could be in back in the US.

The heat is killer though, and after the trials of the previous evening still fresh, the girls are in need of a nap. I however, am not quite ready for such a thing. I recall back in Halong Bay, when the American’s advised me that Nha Trang was going to be boring quickly because of it’s touristy nature, and had advised me to get a motorcycle and spend some alone time. I bid my friends farewell, and stalk off into the hot sun to do just this.

Though I had seen motorcycle rentals everywhere, actually finding one at this particular juncture suddenly seems difficult. I am constantly aware that I’m a foreigner that doesn’t speak the language, and am consistently paranoid that I’m going to be taken for a scam at any moment. I pass several sidewalks packed with motorbikes, getting farther and farther away from my hotel. Finally, after some twenty minutes walk, I stumble across an establishment that declares in quite clear english, that they have bikes for rent. The place looks reputable enough, so I march in and enquire as to renting a bike.

The proprietor is a friendly enough fellow, by the name of Nam, eager to get me on a bike. I pick out a docile looking Honda, and he asks if it’s what I really want. I assure him that I’ve never driven a bike before, and this one looks fine for the first time out. He nods in agreement, fetches me a helmet, and gives me a 20 second primer in motorbike operation. Gears, accelerator, brake, boom.

I slam into 1st gear, almost careening into a nearby van and recover laughing in embarrassment. Nam merely smiles and waves me on, and with that permissive look, I shift into 2nd, then third, and down the street. Traffic, Vietnam traffic is quite the place to get your first taste of a bike, and I putter in a series of right turns, afraid of the main through fares and the traffic on them. Eventually I make a giant circle before I gain the confidence to push forward. Exploration rarely happens in circles, so I hit the main through fare and pause, pumping gears, 4th to neutral, neutral to 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th. Somehow I slip into the busy midday traffic, neither killing myself or destroying any of my immediate surroundings. Suddenly, this is starting to become fun. I’m still in direct interface with the elements, the breeze in my face, the sun on my skin, no barriers between me and everything the world has to offer. Except now I can access it faster, much faster then my own two feet allowed for.

Elation quickly gives way to immediate concern, my fuel tank is completely empty, and I need to find a petrol station, which like the motorbike rental itself, is proving somewhat hard to find now that I actually need one. Anxious minutes crawl by as I go further and further. Finally, I spot a state run petrol station on my side of the boulevard, and ease off, to come to a stop before the pump. This most common of tasks, is suddenly challenging and unfamiliar all over again. I lift my seat, where Nam showed me the tank was, and am accosted by the pump attendants. “How much?” they ask.

I can only shrug my shoulders helplessly, I don’t have a clue how much the bike needs or can take, “fill it” I reply, hoping that this doesn’t break the bank, someone had told me on the trip that gas was far more expensive in Vietnam then it used to be.

“One liter,” the attendant confirms before filling up my tank. It runs $2 American, and I pop my bike into 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, conscious that I don’t look like the most talented driver, but also pleased that I’ve navigated this new experience successfully again. I take the time to explore the city, looking for an egress route on the south side of Nha Trang. I run into the cable car that’s supposed to take one to Vin Pearl Island, but the route to actually leave city limits on the south side looks like a complicated navigational maze according to my iPhone. Still, there are supposed to be points south where the water hits exposed breaks and one might be able to scare up surf. I’m determined to try.

I wander down industrial streets, commercial alleys, and residential neighborhoods. One particular street goes up a steep hill, narrowing quickly, it turns into little more then a sidewalk, and I am forced to walk my bike back as it gets too narrow for me to turn. A Vietnamese girl walking her own motorbike down, grins and babbles something in my direction, probably a declaration to my stupidity, and I give a sheepish grin and motor away, trying to salvage my pride.

The southern route eventually turns out to be just too frustrating to navigate, and I resolve to try the northern passage, which is a matter of simply staying on the main boulevard that runs along the coast as it leaves town. I make a brief stop for nuoc mia (fresh sugarcane juice) which tastes faintly of diesel, and dodge through the city traffic, over the bridge on the north end of town, and around the point into the coastal hills.

As I motor around, my confidence in my abilities quickly escalates, and I open up the throttle, passing all but a few. As I climb the hill and pass around the bend, taking me out of sight of the city, I find myself baring a fierce grin. This, this is one of those experiences that rocks my world and keeps on giving. Seeing a side road, I take it, eager to explore off the main path, and check in with my emotions, savor the moment so to speak.

I’ve wandered down a curiously straight road by the sea, bordering on an imposing complex of concrete. Palm trees grow out of holes in the concrete walls at regular intervals, perfectly bent. Behind the walls, I see large resort buildings made of concrete, not quite overgrown with vegetation, but then, not maintained either. The entire facility stands like some giant Jurassic Park complex that was shuttered before it started, and I stop in front of the gated entrance, as the silence stares back at me ominously. What went wrong? I wonder. Part of me wants to scale the wall and explore on foot, the other part reminds me that I’m sitting on a rented bike, and there’s plenty of other ground to explore. Reluctantly, I start the bike up and motor back to the main highway.

I spend the rest of the afternoon motoring away up the coast, taking in one breath-taking view after another, further and further away from Nha Trang. Eventually, some thirty miles out of town, the road turns away from the coast, and starts climbing into the mountains. Finally at this point, I decide to turn back, my search for waves exhausted. I make a u-turn just off a freeway intersection, and sprawl unexpected in the process, laying my bike down painfully on the pavement. The Vietnamese are not particularly inclined to motorists crossing lanes, so instead of building a concrete barrier and marking it like one might expect in the states, they’ve merely raised the asphalt a few inches in the center, bringing it to a sharp ridge which takes out unsuspecting riders such as myself. I recover quickly before anyone can attempt to come over and offer their pity for my wounded pride and ride back to town.

I return the bike, late in the evening, and Nam asks me how it all went.

“Fantastic!” I enthuse.

“Great!” He responds. “Next time you can ride bigger, maybe Harley!”

My eyes widen and flash in the dark. “That would be fun!” I respond.

Nam then pulls me into his shop to look at a smorgasbord of photos he has tacked up to the wall. Besides rentals, Nam organizes tours of Vietnam by motorbike, and he begins the process of trying to sell me on the idea. For a second, I resist. I prefer to seek out my pleasures and interests, and am incredibly wary of solicitors advertising their wares or experiences; but motorcycling, Vietnam!

I nod enthusiastically, but tell him he’s wasting his time, as I’m traveling with three women who have never driven a motorcycle, and that it would be difficult to undergo such a journey. Nam simply replies that he’d provide drivers for each of my friends. I beg off, “you don’t have to convince me, you have to convince them.”

“Bring them here, and I’ll do it!” Nam retorts enthusiastically.

I grab a brochure and shake my head ruefully and stalk off into the dark, waving off the pimps calls to visit their wares, or the “boom boom room.” When I find my friends again, I tell them about the motorbike tour idea, and they’re suddenly intrigued. Minutes later we’re back at Nams, and minutes after that, after a couple rounds of negotiations, we’ve booked a motorcycle tour of the Dalat highlands. This trip just took a turn for the incredibly awesome.

Sleeper bus

My Son

My Son. (mi-son)

This is our poor man’s Angkor Watt. The civilization that spawned that mighty structure in Cambodia dotted the entire region, and about a half hour outside of Hoi An, we have our own set of ruins to explore. They’re not half as impressive as Angkor Watt, but they are considerably older, and they’re mortared together with mud and honey, so there’s that. More recently, the Viet Cong used the ruins as shelter from American bombs, so some of the ruins are destroyed, and bomb craters dot the landscape, not completely covered by jungle vegetation. Angkor Watt is a plane flight, visa, and border crossing we don’t have time for however, so here we are at My Son.

The ruins are mildly interesting, but in the noonday sun, it’s hard to muster a whole lot of enthusiasm for them. I spend as much time poking around the trees and streams, looking for shade and stumbling into the odd bomb crater. One of the streams has a elegantly signed rock, and I use it to anchor a picture, giving it the appearance of signed artwork to amuse myself.

rock with signature

Our tour of My Son is supposed to follow up with a boat ride down the river back to Hoi An, and helps illustrate the haphazard way tourism has sprung up in this country. The bus stops by a bridge, and we all pile out where a small rickety boat bobs in the water. Unsecured benches have been thrown into it, and we’re each given “lunch” a meager affair of cabbage, rice, bananas and a can of the local beer. The river is a thick soup, filled with silt, and a few fishing boats ply their trade in the waters. Here and there we see nets suspended by bamboo over the water, each the size of a building lot in LA. We make a stop off at a local wood carver to see the craftsmen at work. Though I’m a fan of wood carving, no one is currently doing any carving, so I quickly lose interest and push off to explore on my own.

Hoi An Riverboats

It’s a rather quiet neighborhood, so finding nothing else of interest, I hone in on a squawking bird in a wicker cage. He gets quieter when I’m around, and mimics my mouth shapes, at which point I notice that he has a set of serrated teeth deep within his mouth. Suddenly I realize that a bird’s beak is more like a set of nails that grew out of the chin and nose and came together, as opposed to an evolved mouth. For there, deep inside the beak, I see a horrifying little mouth.

Sharp pointy teeth!

Back in Hoi An, we pack our bags and wait for our bus to arrive to take us to our next destination. The bus stop is a haphazard affair, with us by the side of a random street on the sidewalk. I know that Nha Trang is a good 6-8 hours away, and I am concerned with the assurances we got from the ticket vendor that we’d be on a “sleeper” bus. At best, I’m holding out for something Grayhound quality, if we have seats that recline, it’ll be a bloody miracle.

When the bus does arrive, it proves to be a Chinese miracle on wheels. The bus is modern and clean, and features seats… That fully recline! To make this work, the bus has three rows, as opposed to two, and the seats are stacked two high. Entrance to the bus requires you to surrender your footgear to a plastic bag, and then you are assigned a seat, ours are in the back, and I get some wack bitch seat that is suspended in the air between two other seats. It is somewhat horrifying, for with myself lying down, suspended between the other seats, I make a human torpedo, with unimpeded ability to fly through the windshield of the bus should we have to stop suddenly for anything. Still, the seat fully reclines, and even little theater screens come down out of the ceiling to play some abomination of a Hong Kong movie dubbed in frightening vietnamese.

But the other curious thing, is that the bus is almost entirely filled with European women. This is both exciting and nerve wracking at the same time. Exciting because, well, it’s a bus full of young women. Nerve wracking, because you wonder if they all read the same travel guide, or were advised by locals to take this mode of transportation, and that we’re in for a misbegotten shady experience. Sooner, rather then later, my private fears would indeed come to dominate the bus ride.

As the night wears on the bus stops, again and again, and the remaining few seats are taken. One of the few other men on the bus gets in a yelling match with the bus driver when the driver orders him and his girlfriend to the back of the bus. He has an Israeli accent, and looks at the back of the bus like he’s in the middle of a 1960′s Rosa Parks scene; glancing fearfully at the back and angrily trying to retain his seat in the front with his girlfriend. On the one hand, I sympathize at his plight, to be given a seat, and then told to vacate it with little justification is hardly cool, but then on the other hand, he argues against coming to the back of the bus that I wonder if I’ve sprouted bubonic plague spores on my body, or perhaps I’ve finally achieved the serial rapist look, and he’s fearful I’ll savage his girlfriend.

The argument gets more and more violent, and finally he compromises by taking a seat midway down the bus with his girlfriend. This only after the bus driver angrily yells at him to get off the bus. Whooo boy. Guess I’ll not complain about my bitch seat suspended between the aisles. As we crawl towards our destination, the bus stops again and again in the night, and more and more passengers pile in, long after the seats are filled. Soon, the floors are packed with bodies, all trying to sit and sleep on the floor, and you have to step on faces and stomachs to make your way to the bathroom in the back. Worse, we hadn’t eaten since the rice and cabbage lunch, so our stomach’s violently protest the prolong absence of calories. In hindsight, probably all for the best, as it would have been impossible to navigate to the rest room anyway. I close my eyes to the press of humanity, hoping against hope that this is merely the low point of the nightly experience.

Baller

Hoi An Sunset

New Year’s day. Or something. It’s the middle of June, I suspect a Chinese solstice, as I’ve always been under the impression that Chinese New Years was sometime in February, but what do I know? What I do know, is that it’s a holiday, and Vietnam has ground to a virtual halt.

And so have we, after over a week on the road, flitting from destination to destination, we’ve made the decision to recapture some of the traditional meaning to the word “vacation” and park ourselves in Hoi An for the New Year. As a result, the girls and Mom are up at dawn for breakfast and to check on the tailor. I mutter crossly at them, and luxuriate in a late morning in bed.

When I do wake up, the sun is high in the sky, and morning is well advanced. I crawl out of bed and wander around our Treasure Island complex. During the busy season, the place looks like quite a display of local talent. Thatched huts illustrating weaving and basket making techniques dot the area, and by all appearances, they are filled with artisans, or actors to complete the scene. Now however, in the off season, the complex is very much dead, and I wander to the river. There I come across a couple water buffalo, tied to trees on short leashes of a thin insignificant material. Though a water buffalo is a tough, pig headed sonovabitch, they are quieted by the leash that threads through the ring through their nose, delicate tissue there, that allows for their control and docility. PETA would have a field day. Watching the buffalo swelter in the heat, yards away from water makes me sympathetic to its plight. I reassure myself that the buffalo is property, and that the owner will ensure it gets enough water to satisfy the economic investment that is represented by this hulking ton of cow flesh, but still, I muse how particularly cruel it seems to stake him down to such a limited area, in this heat, so close to water, with no access at all.

Animal rights are not my particular crusade (I eat dogs, with no moral compunctions, what do you want from me?) so I sit on a stump and watch the buffalo suffer in the heat, watching it idly, the same way I contemplate ants rip each other to shreds in a colony war. Eventually, Mom comes back from her explorations of the market, and together we go explore the town.

Sugar cane juice is our standard here in Vietnam. It is easy and plentiful to find a sugar cane juice vendor, pressing stalks of cane fresh. Though you can find it well enough in the farmer’s markets here in LA, the Vietnamese have a secret. Green kumquat juice is added to the sugar cane juice, and the flavor blend makes all the difference in the world. Drinks to go means that the juice is dumped into a plastic sandwich bag and rubber banded with a straw sticking out of it.

I order lunch at the Banana Split cafe, the charming establishment with the well spoken proprietors, western bathrooms, and varied menu selection (though rather underwhelming in quality). Someone a table over orders a duck… Which means something a bit more primal here in Asia. Across the street, a duck vendor has several dozen live ducks at the stall, and the chef walks across and picks one out, carrying it back by its neck, squawking and making a general ruckus. It carries on for a while, until the chef pulls out a sharp knife and makes a clean cut across its throat. I lean over to my friends.

“You hear that?”

“No, what?” They reply innocently.

“Exactly,” I grin wolfishly and point to the dead duck, which is being rapidly plucked and cleaned, made ready for the pot before our eyes. Shuyi gets a tad squeamish, but the others are largely unfazed by the incident. Asians live in a much more pragmatic world then most, and the slaughtering of ducks for dinner is hardly the most exotic thing they have or will ever see.

After lunch, we separate again to explore the town. Mom and I poke through various craft shops, including one that sells model ships the size of my bed for a mere $50. An agar wood craft shop is particularly interesting as the sales lady explains that it’s a pithy wood, made expensive by the destruction of a tree by insects? Bacteria? Once fully destroyed, the wood apparently is used for carving, incense, teas, tinctures and various and sundry tourist knick knacks. Mom buys a small amount, and I take great delight in pointing out that it’s a male “performance enhancer.” Shit, when it comes down to it, everything in this country is marketed as a “performance enhancer.” A little tiger penis, some snake wine, and some agar wood tea, and I should have a raging manhood that’ll never go away.

We poke into an embroidery shop, and I poke through the canvases. Once upon a time, when I was a wee lad, I took up embroidery with an unusual fascination with cross-stitch work. It was kind of like painting, except with thread, and much more painstaking. The skeins of floss had always fascinated me with their bright colors, all shimmering in the light, and my first canvas was a small one of a grey wolf, a favorite icon of my childhood. I was much to young to have money when I created the canvas, so I remember creating a frame for the canvas out of paper mache to give to my parents one early Christmas. It still exists, supposedly on my mother’s wall. Though I left the world of embroidery far behind, the skill and incredible time required to produce a canvas have left an indelible impression, and I browsed the canvases for quite a long time.

And walked out, having bought canvases of a dollar amount that could have easily funded another trip to Asia. Girls may be buying machines, but when the day ends, I prove that I can apparently hold my own, and lay some serious buying hurt when I put my mind to it. The sales ladies take my picture with my friends and my mom, probably as a record to send to artists that actually created the canvas, so they can all puzzle over the American kid buying up embroidery. I flipped through their photo album, and am assured that I am their youngest buyer by a very long shot.

Now that I have spent a small fortune on tapestries, I push on to rent bikes, the idea being to make our way to the ocean some two to three miles away. We find bikes ($1 a bike a day!) and tour the area, before making our way towards to ocean in the approaching dark of dusk. It is New Year’s however, and the streets are packed with people going to and from celebrations. I lead the way down the street, which abruptly ends into a dirt mess as it is under construction. This obstacle doesn’t stop any of the traffic however, which takes to riding on the sidewalk and in the dirt.

Much later, and much darker, we find ourselves on the beach. Thousands of people are all out here, celebrating New Years, drinking, eating, lighting celebratory candles. I splash around in the water to pay my respects, and am pleased to feel it quite a bit warmer then I’m used to. We bust out mangosteens and rambutans (hard to describe fruits that are somewhat similar, but yet quite different then the lychee) in our own makeshift New Year’s celebration. Around us, you can hear the men pissing in the dark, quite oblivious to their surroundings. The women are simultaneously disgusted by the wanton display of penis, and envious of how easy it is for men to make the entire world their stand up urinal.

We return to Hoi An, myself, singing in the dark at the top of my lungs. Asians gawk and stare, as well as give encouraging grins. I don’t particularly know why, but making a fool of myself is fun to do with Asians; they’re always so embarrassed, I think I get a kick of how easy it is to make them wish the earth would swallow them up, as their association with myself is suddenly the most painful thing they’ve ever had to experience. I titillate the crowd with opera and Disney songs, the only ones I really know a majority of lyrics to, and lead my friends through the traffic.

Hoi An

Home away from home

I grab my freshly laundered clothes off the line in the dark of morning and congratulate myself for packing mostly synthetics. In an environment of over 90% humidity day in and out, cotton takes its own sweet time drying, and I can smell the effects of that from my friend’s laundry.

We stumble out of the farm stay in the pre-dawn light. Outside, some of the help/farm staff have passed out in hammocks and are still sleeping, a perfectly enviable way to pass a night in this tropical climate. Originally, I had planned on taking a shuttle or cab into Dong Hoi, 30 miles away, and from there, catch a train to Da Nang about a 100 miles south. Bich however, has twisted my arm, informing me that there is a bus that stops at the very doorstep of this farmstay, and goes all the way to Da Nang, and the ride is very affordable ($6 a person). The only caveat, is that it arrives at 5 in the morning, depriving us of our rather luxurious accommodations prematurely.

So this is how we all find ourselves packed into the back of a Ford shuttle, uncomfortably sitting on barely masked seat springs, and quickly realizing that there is no working air conditioner in the vehicle. The bus seems to stop at random alongside the road, picking up people who obviously are waiting for the bus, but with no indication what so ever that any bus stop is around. Very quickly, the shuttle is filled to the brim, and the operator taking the money is forced to stand between the seats, so another passenger can be accommodated.

The road conditions are nothing short of atrocious, and we bounce up and down violently as the shuttle weaves its way slowly through a tortuously torn road. Very quickly, one of the passengers becomes sick and pukes quietly and efficiently into a plastic bag provided by her boyfriend. Her vomiting over, he ties the bag, and tosses it out the window. The littering no longer particularly surprises me, but I’m starting to notice that no matter what and where we’re driving, we always seem to have a puker. Whether they’re unused to enclosed vehicles, or of weak constitution, or simply a by product of viciously degraded roads, the Vietnamese are commonly road sick.

Hours pass before we stop at a roadside pho shop, where everyone stops to take a bathroom break and grab breakfast. The concept of litter is rather foreign it seems, as food detritus, napkins, and chopsticks litter the floor. In Vietnam, it is uncommon to keep trash on the table, instead throwing it all on the floor, in between the meal rushes, people will come out to sweep the entire floor, but till then… You sit in a pile of used napkins and lime rinds.

I take the time to check my iPhone and view our progress. After three hours of bouncing up and down over and trying not to suffocate in the back of the shuttle, I inwardly sigh as I see the blue dot of our current location still a long way away from our destination of Da Nang. Shuyi makes a point of asking how much further we have to go, and I capitulate on her misery as I give her the answer, taking some small solace from this small case of schadenfreude.

The hours crawl by, and I watch our little blue dot move painstakingly closer to our destination. Da Nang is a beach town, and soon our bus is bouncing along the highway by salt marshes and tropical bays. Eventually we crawl up the coastal mountains and our driver yells at me to close the window. I comply regretfully, this small vent with the outside world is all that is preserving my sanity, and I can only wonder why he’s suddenly concerned with my window after five hours.

We dive into the mountain into a dark, dimly lit tunnel. Poorly ventilated as well apparently, which displays the driver’s concern for my window. The minutes crawl by, and still we trundle into the dark, the temperature climbing rapidly in our mobile sauna. “Expensive” is my only thought as we finally emerge from the tunnels exit some 10 miles later. The cost and engineering that must have gown into that tunnel are somewhat staggering. Though I have been through much more impressive tunnels in my past, the fact that Vietnam can afford such an engineering task has me slightly taken aback.

In Da Nang, we pile out at the central bus station. Cabbies flock around us, trying to pull us into their cabs. I push away the most persistent ones to take a moment to grab our bearings. From here, we need to take a cab to Hoi An, the tailor city some twenty miles away that the girls have been harping about all trip. Eventually, after much negotiation and gesticulating we pile into a tiny cab that the cabbie insists will accommodate all of us and our luggage. It does, with much difficulty. Mom rolls her eyes at me, “they said we didn’t understand Vietnamese, and we were stupid.” It is obvious from her tone my Mother has a similar opinion of the cabbies.

Da Nang is a resort city, boasting only the 3rd major airport in Vietnam. Here giant casino and resort complexes are going up by the ocean front, like some tropical version of Vegas. None of it is quite finished however, all slated to be done by early next year, I can only imagine at how much it will have changed in a mere 24 months.

Eventually, we find ourselves in Hoi An, going down cute little streets and bridges looking for a hotel that Bich had recommended to us the previous night. The town reeks of a tourist trap, but it is quite empty; Vietnam’s busy season is the winter, when Europeans flock for vacation. Right now however, they have sensibly found vacation in places like North America, while I tool around the tropics in the midst of summer.

Eventually we find our hotel, some curious treasure island style resort village, which reminds me obliquely of my own home back in California. The complex is empty, and the bell hop is only too eager to see a face and carry our bags to our bungalow style rooms.

By day, Hoi An is a quaint little river town some 2 miles away from ocean. The colorful pallete of this tourist quarter is packed with shops and restaurants, and the all important tailors. Hoi An is a central gathering place for all the artisans of Vietnam, especially those that ply their skills in fabric and thread. Every other shop is a tailor or cobbler, offering custom fitted suits and dresses of any style for a mere pittance. Though I could easily pick up a fine tuxedo for under $50 here, I have no use of things, whatever their price, and find an internet cafe to relax at, and drink some of the local brew.

Latern Shop in Hoi An

At night, the riverfront explodes with color with brightly colored lanterns that pack the various restaurants and tourist shops. We stumble upon a performance by three dancers who are balancing pottery on their heads. It proves to be a scam however, as none of the pottery has bottoms, so they fit on the performer’s heads much like hats. I shrug dismissively, confident that I could find better at my home beach in Santa Monica.

Scam dancers

Phong Nha

Early in the morning, our cabin mates leave for their stop. “One more hour till Dong Hoi” they assure us; it is 3 am. Four o’clock arrives however, and the train rumbles onwards in the dark. Everyone is awake however, between the uncomfortable beds, and the anxiety of missing our stop, everybody is up and wandering around. I go to use the bathroom, one of those squat toilets, a pit in the floor with water rushing through it. In China, it weirded me out, but now, my travel legs are under me, and such things are no longer a surprise. I use the squat toilet unceremoniously, clutching the bar in front of me with a death grip, as the train bounces and clanks down the line. The one advantage of these toilets, is there is no danger of splash back which was quite evident with the western toilets on the other trains.

Phong Nha Countryside

The sky has lightened considerably, and for the first time in over a week, I view the unadulterated sun, coming across a blue sky untinged by grey pollution. The change does dramatic things for my spirits. Outside a pastoral farmscape trundles by. Fields of grass, and spots of forest, with random water buffalo grazing the fields; I feel my pulse quicken as an undeniable surge of my Wyoming roots basks in the abandonment of the overwhelming crush of humanity and its excesses.

Eventually, in the bright of morning some four hours after our cabin mates informed us we’d be in Dong Hoi, the conductor announces our stop and we pile out into the warm sunshine. We’re supposed to meet a driver here who will take us to our farmstay in Phong Nha, which I had arranged a few nights prior. Due to the uncertainty of when the train arrived at the station however, when the driver was supposed to pick us up has always been in question, and I hope fervently that our driver is still here, otherwise, it’s a $60 (US) cab fare out to the farmstay some thirty miles outside of town, and the possibility of getting hopelessly lost is high.

The driver has no trouble spotting me however, one lone western face, with three foreign asian women, it would be hard to go unnoticed with that description tagging me. He waves the farmstay’s card, and I eagerly greet him as he takes us back to the shuttle. A spacious Mercedes shuttle bus arrives, and I am pleased that the part of the journey I have taken exclusive responsibility for is going along so well so far.

We drive through Dong Hoi, a fairly provincial town by the sea, and I note with curiosity the motorcycle dealers we pass by. A boulevard of motorcycles, all gleaming and polished for sale. I recall a conversation I had with one of the Californians in Halong Bay about the necessity of renting a motorcycle for part of the trip, and wonder if I’ll be able to make good on that idea considering our packed itinerary. The bus creeps along the street, the driver looking fervently for something, and it becomes apparent that he is lost. My stomach sinks, as it considers numerous possibilities. Did our driver leave, giving the business card to another driver to take us to our destination? Is Phong Nha farmstay such a western destination that numerous drivers just flash the business card looking to get western business? I stare glumly at our driver wondering what sort of nefarious double crossing scheme the locals have hatched this time.

He pulls a u-turn after questioning some random person by the side of the street, and we crawl along the street once more. Up ahead, a western girl in black is standing by the side of the road, and he accelerates to stop in front of her. “Phong Nha farmstay?” she asks, and the guide nods his head. Ahhh… So he was looking for another passenger, not our destination… Good, and if this is a giant scam, we got someone else to commiserate with should something go horribly wrong. But with the arrival of our new passenger, the driver now drives with purpose, going down streets and country roads with authority, and I lean back, comfortable in the idea that we’re finally going towards our destination.

Phong Nha farmstay is a two story guest house down a dirt road deep within the countryside. I had acquired the information at random from tripadvisior.com, which rated it #1 of 1 in the Dong Hoi area. While that’s not a lot of competition, the reviews had panned the place out as something special, and I had picked up a business card at the Vietnam Backpackers’ Hostel back in Hanoi, so I was hopeful. The proprietor of the place are a friendly couple, Ben, an Australian expat, and Bich (pronounced Bick) his Vietnamese wife. Ben had spoken clean concise english (if distinguishably australian in slang and accent.) when we were setting up reservations and it is bloody amazing how important, how much that makes you feel like home abroad. Having to wade through muddled accents and broken english gives you a distinct appreciation every time you hear a native speaker.

The house dominates the farm, and is packed with motorbikes for the tourist to explore the countryside with. Behind, a sparkling pool invites the travel weary, and hammocks are strung up liberally for your relaxation pleasure. Breakfast menus are put in front of us, and we’re left to contemplate our morning meal choice. Everything is in english, and because it’s so far from any major city center, the prices are somewhat inflated as well. It also boasts a fair selection of western food items, pizza, burgers, and the like, and encourages you to ask for something if you don’t see it on the menu, as the staff will attempt to accommodate. The western menu items however, are considerably more expensive, on par, and sometimes exceeding the cost of what you’d get back in the states.. Mom cautions us not to expect too much from the region, as it is some of the poorer country in Vietnam, and food is bound to be of poorer quality then in the cities we’ve been bouncing around lately. I order the customary; more pho, desperate to find something that will knock my socks off.

My socks are kept on, and I greatly suspect that it was made from some instant packaged fare. The unimpressive breakfast complete, we move on to our tour for the day. The Phong Nha region boasts two main tourist attractions of note. It is the narrowest point of Vietnam, here the country is barely 50 miles wide, and it is here that the US made its furthest advance north during the Vietnam war before being stopped cold by the Viet Cong guerrillas. Though you couldn’t tell from the lush rice fields and picturesque farmscape, this is the most heavily bombed stretch of country in the world, and even today, a great many craters can be found in random places with little exploration off the beaten path.

The area’s second claim to fame is the world’s biggest cave. This is the reason why I’ve pushed for an excursion into this part of the world. Though recently discovered, and off limits to tourism, I hope to get a sampling of the caves that dominate this region. Our tour bus loads up, and we go into the nearby mountains, getting a cursory history lesson about the Vietnam war (and an apology from the Australians at how they must harangue our country’s name at every turn because of it.) The sun is murderous up in these highlands, and I quickly lose interest in whatever bombed what, and who died where. Eventually we arrive at the cave system on our tour for the day, the “Paradise Caves” and we trek, up, up a mountain to get to the entrance. The heat is crushing me, and I feel slightly nauseated, my mother is slowly making her way up, and I climb the mountain in a sullen silence. Both irrationally irritated at how slow her progress is, and also focused on not passing out from exhaustion and heat myself.

Paradise Cave

The entrance of the cave is cool and refreshing, and I eagerly descend into the gloom, drawing strength from the drop in temperature. Inside the vast cavern stretches on and on with unique cave formations. In its entirety, you could fit an entire town of several thousand inside, and the ceiling often is a hundred meters above us. Though much larger, the boardwalk for tourists only extends about a kilometer into the cave, but by this time too, I am starting to grow weary of superlatives, and complete my exploration of the cave system perfunctorily.

After lunch, we’re taken to a mountain river, where the river naturally gets deep enough for swimming. This too however has been taken advantage by the locals, and tickets for access are required, which in turn does allow for some rudimentary changing facilities. The first jump into the river instantly changes the day. The brisk water washes off midday sullenness, and immediately the colors of the valley leap into vivid color, and life becomes worth living again, suddenly this whole trip becomes a vacation once more. My Mother and the girls are notably circumspect of the whole experience, but I’m enjoying myself too much in the delicious coolness to care one way or another about their aptitude for being boring.

Mom and I. Smiles made possible by cold water. Photograph by Shuyi Wu

Back at the farmstay, we take advantage of the fantastic facilities, delighting in the distinctly western construction and choice of appliances. Outside, I listen and watch a pig at a neighboring farm scream its lungs out as it is bound and loaded onto a motorbike for transport to the market. Curiously, the minute it’s bound and loaded, the pig becomes strangely quiet and docile, like it’s resigned to its fate at the hands of a butcher, or perhaps it’s passed out from the shear anticipation of what lies ahead.

Light thundershowers pass overhead in the setting sun, and I stand on the balcony of my room, thrilling in the storm winds and delighting in the incredible landscape before us. It is in this moment I decide that Phong Nha is something special, and worth returning to, a first in my experience in over a week away from home.

Between the dip in the river and the fresh shower, my appetite has renewed, and I order the special, a beef stew with french baguettes. Though not the most mind blowing thing I’ve ever eaten, the food sticks to my ribs like nothing else I’ve had in country since, and I order a second bowl, determined not to let all my body mass evaporate in this ungodly heat. Mom informs me that if I’m interested, the local girls have learned that I’m half Vietnamese, and that she can arrange a meeting if I’m interested in marriage. I roll my eyes at her, she knows well enough that I don’t date asians, and neither one of us is big on the idea of marriage. Mom agrees, and responds that she’s only passing along the message. I nod my sarcastic thanks and take my leave to relax in a hammock, listening to the other westerners drone on about nothing important, and take in what it means to truly enjoy life. Good scenery, good swimming holes, a full belly, a hammock and cold brew. Life could be like this for quite a while before I’d get impatient.

Phong Nha Farmstay

Scarcely an hour has gone by before my eyes grow heavy with sleep, and I move to take care of our bill with Bich. She’s a whisper of girl, very cute and petite, and we talk about her background for a while, and how she came to be out here in the countryside of Vietnam. She just had a child, manages this farmstay, and spent most of her life in Australia. When I learn that she is barely six months older then I am, I can only marvel at how fast she’s grown up and assumed life’s challenging responsibilities. Despite our closeness in age, her life experience seems so far removed from my own, and I wonder if I’ll ever get to where she is. Between my career and my dedication to hedonism, I’ve carefully crafted a lifestyle that allows for me to stay in some prolonged adolescence, and I wonder if I’ll ever come to a point in my life if I’d choose to change that experience. Though she encourages us to stay, and I’d love to wander the countryside on my own, I decline, knowing that the girls are displaying patience for my cave runabouts in return for my own when we get to our next destination; the tailor city of Hoi An.

I say good night to our hosts, and return to my room, throwing open the windows, and take advantage of the clever design that allows for the back door to be opened and cool night breezes to waft through the room. I pull the mosquito netting around the bed, and fall into some of the deepest sleep I’ve yet to experience on this trip.