On the road again
Well, that's it for Hoi An - I'm in Nha Trang at the moment, which is pretty much the Surfer's Paradise of Vietnam, in a ridiculously overpriced internet cafe that doubles as a bar. There's free internet for an hour if you order a drink - hm.
It's odd to think that my time in Vietnam is almost over. I'm learning that Travel Time is a very strange beast indeed - I feel on the one hand as I've been travelling for months, and on the other that my time here has finished before it even began.
The last week has been fairly slow-paced, which is why the dearth of posts here - there's nothing really news-worthy to report. There's probably something to be said for full-on travelling, whisking yourself up and down coasts and having amazing adventures that make pat little anecdotes when you get back - gives you better entries for your blog, and I fully intend to come back and see the parts of this country that I've missed this time.
But I think there's also something to be said for just sitting and absorbing the rythms and nuances of a place. I've gotten to know Hoi An pretty well, and oddly enough, it's gotten to know me. I've made friends with a lovely old man who runs a tiny little antique store on Tran Phu, and who lives near the hotel I was staying. He fought for the South during the American War and showed me a few photos of himself in uniform. I went in to the shop for a chat a couple of times after that, and he told me that he'd seen me walking the kilometre or so to the main drag a couple of times a day - "No motorbike for you!" I gave him the response I usually give the moto drivers calling out in the street - "No thanks, I have feet!" Granted, it's not much of a quip, but it usually got a rueful smile or a wink from the moto drivers and they stopped hassling me after a few days.
I made friends with Diep, who runs a stall across the road from the hotel and who sold me bananas and water every day and who told me the best places to get coffee and which antique shops sold the genuine article and which sold fakes. (My soldier friend passed the test.) I met her friend Ly, who takes in laundry, and after that I got a big cheerful wave from the both of them whenever I left the hotel. There's nothing like having someone call out your name to give you a sense of place.
I made friends with Bao, the tailor, who ran me up a few things (thanks for the new clothes, Nagyi and Papa!) . I had a running joke going with a woman who ran a street kitchen about the fact that I don't eat meat. And I got to know the markets pretty well - the best person to go to for cuttlefish, the woman with the best banh bao cakes all wrapped up in a banana leaves, where they baked the freshest baguettes. It's all very well to see fields and fields of rice paddies all up and down the country, but I think that if you're missing out on the human contact side of things, you might as well watch a nature film.
Which is not to say that the scenery wasn't spectacular, or that staying in the one place didn't make me a bit antsy at times. Taking the bus, as gruelling as it is physically, is actually a nice balm for the feeling that I'm missing out on something - I'm seeing the country from a window, it's true, but so far I've seen nothing that would magically trump the last week or so, which, as low-key as it was, was pretty damn good.
Tonight's sunset made for a particularly pretty drive, with spectacular streaks of gold and pink making shadow-puppets of the mountains, and bouncing off the ponds scattered through the rice-paddies. The usual green of the fields deepened from inner-avacado to out; and just like that, the darkness. Off the coast all the fishing boats switched on their fluorescant lights and drifted like fireflies through an ocean of night.
I'm getting in to the city tomorrow so I may just get to see the sun rise over Ho Chi Minh. That would be a pretty way to end the trip. I'm going to see if I can leave my big bag somewhere - a lot of places have left-luggage facilities for a dollar - and then just walk all over the bits I missed the first week. Twelve hours straight of walking - I should be able to see a lot. And then back out to the airport: back through the shanty-towns that lie on the fringe; back towards the tarmac lying grubby in a field of green; and then onwards, upwards, towards Helen in Nepal.
I can hardly wait.
It's odd to think that my time in Vietnam is almost over. I'm learning that Travel Time is a very strange beast indeed - I feel on the one hand as I've been travelling for months, and on the other that my time here has finished before it even began.
The last week has been fairly slow-paced, which is why the dearth of posts here - there's nothing really news-worthy to report. There's probably something to be said for full-on travelling, whisking yourself up and down coasts and having amazing adventures that make pat little anecdotes when you get back - gives you better entries for your blog, and I fully intend to come back and see the parts of this country that I've missed this time.
But I think there's also something to be said for just sitting and absorbing the rythms and nuances of a place. I've gotten to know Hoi An pretty well, and oddly enough, it's gotten to know me. I've made friends with a lovely old man who runs a tiny little antique store on Tran Phu, and who lives near the hotel I was staying. He fought for the South during the American War and showed me a few photos of himself in uniform. I went in to the shop for a chat a couple of times after that, and he told me that he'd seen me walking the kilometre or so to the main drag a couple of times a day - "No motorbike for you!" I gave him the response I usually give the moto drivers calling out in the street - "No thanks, I have feet!" Granted, it's not much of a quip, but it usually got a rueful smile or a wink from the moto drivers and they stopped hassling me after a few days.
I made friends with Diep, who runs a stall across the road from the hotel and who sold me bananas and water every day and who told me the best places to get coffee and which antique shops sold the genuine article and which sold fakes. (My soldier friend passed the test.) I met her friend Ly, who takes in laundry, and after that I got a big cheerful wave from the both of them whenever I left the hotel. There's nothing like having someone call out your name to give you a sense of place.
I made friends with Bao, the tailor, who ran me up a few things (thanks for the new clothes, Nagyi and Papa!) . I had a running joke going with a woman who ran a street kitchen about the fact that I don't eat meat. And I got to know the markets pretty well - the best person to go to for cuttlefish, the woman with the best banh bao cakes all wrapped up in a banana leaves, where they baked the freshest baguettes. It's all very well to see fields and fields of rice paddies all up and down the country, but I think that if you're missing out on the human contact side of things, you might as well watch a nature film.
Which is not to say that the scenery wasn't spectacular, or that staying in the one place didn't make me a bit antsy at times. Taking the bus, as gruelling as it is physically, is actually a nice balm for the feeling that I'm missing out on something - I'm seeing the country from a window, it's true, but so far I've seen nothing that would magically trump the last week or so, which, as low-key as it was, was pretty damn good.
Tonight's sunset made for a particularly pretty drive, with spectacular streaks of gold and pink making shadow-puppets of the mountains, and bouncing off the ponds scattered through the rice-paddies. The usual green of the fields deepened from inner-avacado to out; and just like that, the darkness. Off the coast all the fishing boats switched on their fluorescant lights and drifted like fireflies through an ocean of night.
I'm getting in to the city tomorrow so I may just get to see the sun rise over Ho Chi Minh. That would be a pretty way to end the trip. I'm going to see if I can leave my big bag somewhere - a lot of places have left-luggage facilities for a dollar - and then just walk all over the bits I missed the first week. Twelve hours straight of walking - I should be able to see a lot. And then back out to the airport: back through the shanty-towns that lie on the fringe; back towards the tarmac lying grubby in a field of green; and then onwards, upwards, towards Helen in Nepal.
I can hardly wait.
posted by Jess at 4:20 AM
1 Comments:
Hey beautiful Jess, I'm kind of feeling homesick already for Vietnam! I'm going to miss your rich descriptions of country I'd love to visit some time. Farewell Vietnam and here's to a happy landing in Nepal. Lots of love to you
Judy
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