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Friday, July 26, 2013

One hell of a ride


Day 10

So where were we? Oh yeah, that 20-hour bus to Vientiane I keep complaining about …

I got picked up at my hostel in Hanoi by motorbike and he dropped me off at the side of a parking lot, saying he would pick up other people. After a while, we all took a minibus to the bus station and got on our bus – I’d rather not sit in the back because I heard the roads were pretty bad in Laos and it’s hard to get out to the bathroom and such. The seats are basically recliners with some space in the front to stretch out your feet, but I could see how someone even just a little taller than me (I’m 5’ 6”) would have to sleep with their legs bent or something. Again, a lot of Europeans on this bus with a few Vietnamese who automatically got the front seats. As with a lot of things in SE Asia, we always had to take off our shoes and put them in a plastic bag when boarding the bus, although we were pretty caked in mud by the end of the trip, so I didn’t know if it really mattered.

A Korean guy sat next to me and I could overhear him talking with his friends about asking me or the other European in the seat over to switch with them so they could sit together. I offered to switch with one of the guys who was holding a seat in the front, but as soon as I got there, the bus attendant shook his head and said it was his seat. I looked back and didn’t see any other seats, but turns out there was one in the very back in the corner. Great. Next time, no time for being nice traveler and I’ll just stick to the seat I got in the first place. But I did end up sitting next to four English guys (they’re everywhere!) and another Dutch guy, all of us in one row, a German guy and Indian guy in front of me, and two girls from Belgium in the second-to-last seats on the other side. We all sort of bonded through the trip and they always teased me for being American (“The window curtain fell off and it’s all the American’s fault!”). I also met a Pakistani guy who was an Economics grad student at Yale – we both used the “I go to school in Connecticut line” and that’s how we figured out we were both at Yale, SMALL WORLD – and his wife from San Francisco on the same bus. It was interesting to hear my seatmates’ conversations about traveling, especially backpacking through America. I’ve never really thought about traveling America that way because it’s home – if I have to go somewhere, I sleep in hotels, not hostels in America because the dollar makes sense to me and I have higher standards for accommodation. It was nice to hear some appreciation for America – the German guy talked about how most people didn’t realize how diverse it was and how more people should check out the Midwest (not just the NY/West Coast route) to really get a taste of it. Ahh, I would love to take like a one-month long road trip someday to see more of America – the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and other beautiful places in the Midwest.

5-seater in the back - but at least the company was good

Our first bathroom stop was one of those outdoor restaurants in the middle of nowhere in Vietnam, but the bathrooms were covered in cobwebs and spiders. The guys I was with were literally freaking out and said they’d rather go pee in the wild. That’s what I ended up doing too, even though I’m not too afraid of spiders. I accidentally got a lot of mud on my shoes, which stayed on throughout the rest of the trip – well, it kind of made it seem like I had been to places at least.

A little after 3 a.m., we arrived at the Vietnam-Laos border, but from reading travel blogs beforehand, I knew they weren’t going to open up until 7. Why did the buses leave so early from Hanoi then? Maybe just to queue early for the immigration line. So we were all stuck on a hot, miserable bus (they had turned off the air conditioning long ago) with the added danger of getting bitten outside of a major city, which could have meant malaria. I put on bug spray like crazy and gave some to the guy next to me. I couldn’t fall asleep because I had to go to the bathroom again, so I decided to make the trek out of the bus – I stepped on a few locals who were sleeping on the bus floor and they were pretty annoyed, but what else could you do? The German guy was already outside (he had jumped out of the window) and was scratching his head as to how I managed to get out from the back of the bus.

This little box of Vietnamese crackers sustained me through that hell ride

I was able to catch a couple hours before they woke us up for immigration. It was a pretty slow process, as it seemed the Vietnamese officials prioritized exit stamping locals first. Some of the people on the bus had trouble with their passports – the Indian guy had the wrong exit date written on his passport when he got his Vietnamese visa, so he spent a good deal arguing with the officials. He did get the stamp in the end without having to bribe them for it. Two girls also didn’t have enough USD for a Laos visa (they only take USD), so one of them ended up taking a taxi back to the nearest ATM on the Vietnamese side. That was a reckless idea, as she wouldn’t come back for another two hours and the bus had to leave the two of them in the end. The other people on the bus were all saying they definitely have offered them money if they had asked – sometimes, you shouldn't hesitate to ask for strangers’ help.

After we got our passports back, we were a bit confused as to where to go next, because we had seen our bus go past us. Turns out we had to walk about 1km on a pretty muddy road from the Vietnamese immigration office to the Lao one. The bus attendant kept pushing us to hurry up, but the Belgian girls got pissed off because they wanted to wait for everyone else at the Vietnamese office. We all made our way eventually to the Lao office, which was a lot quicker than our exit procedures and got back on the bus. The roads weren’t as bad as I thought, although it was pretty windy. I was able to catch up on sleep a bit. The only bad thing after that was getting bit three times in another bathroom on the way – I really hope they weren’t malaria-infected mosquitoes because my Yale travel health session didn’t give me malaria pills after I told them I was only traveling in major cities. If no symptoms show up after 40 days, then I probably don’t have malaria, but we’ll see…

We got to the bus station in Vientiane surprisingly early (around 3 p.m. instead of the projected 5 to 7 p.m.) and I got a jumbo (basically a bigger tuk tuk on the back of a truck instead of a motorbike) to take me to my hostel. I met some more Americans in my dorm (whoot fellow American travelers) and caught a much deserved sleep.

If I had to make the same route again, I’d probably fly. But I am glad I got the experience, met new people, and saved $150. Maybe someday when I have a decent job and some money, I can afford hotels and flights, but while I’m still young and broke, I’m sticking to the hostels and overnight buses because that’s an experience you can only get when you're this age.


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Thursday, July 25, 2013

Getting out of Laos (more visa issues)

Day 14

[Skipping ahead, but I want to post this now so my last post doesn't have to be about visa issues. I think I'd rather end on a good note in Laos]


Whew, just got hit with another day of full of visa hassles and I’m sort of stuck in Laos for the time being while my stuff for China is processing. I made the unfortunate mistake of thinking I could get into Beijing for 72 hours without a visa because of the new transit policy instated this year by the Chinese government, but because I make a domestic stop in China (Kunming) on my way from Vientiane to Beijing, I was only eligible for 24 hours of transit. I didn’t figure this out until the night before my flight to Beijing in my hostel in Luang Prabang when I was looking up transit procedures. Um, could the fine print about the domestic stopovers have been a little bit more noticeable? The only thing I could find was off an Air China website and things from Tripadvisor forums. The embassy notice about the transit policy regulations say nothing about this. I couldn’t sleep all night thinking of what I could do:

Plan A - at least talk to the China Eastern airline agents once I got to Vientiane and see if I could change around my flights at a reasonable price so that I would get back to Tokyo within the 24 hour limit
Plan B - get a rush Chinese visa ($160) at the embassy in Vientiane like I had done in Cambodia for my Vietnamese visa in time for my flight to Kunming at 2:50 p.m.
Plan C – book a cheap flight to Tokyo with another airline (I had spent hours the night before looking up possible routes and the best deal was maybe taking the bus to Bangkok or flying to Seoul and getting a flight to Tokyo from there, but it was still pretty pricey)

When I got to the Vientiane airport, I scurried around trying to find an agent for China Eastern. Too bad none of them show up at the counter til around noon because their only flight from Vientiane leaves at 2:50 p.m. I even went to their office in the back and it was dark and locked. After getting more nervous, I decided to chance it and try out a travel agency that could do Chinese visas I had found on a forum last night. Whenever I’m stressed, I don’t really think clearly about money matters, so I paid a good bit for a taxi back to town. I got to the travel agency as soon as they were opening, as well as some other Chinese tourists who were looking to get into Thailand. Of course, they were there first, but I couldn’t help feel a little panicky as I waited for my turn. But all the travel agency can do though is print out your flight itinerary and a temporary booking for a hotel to make it look like you’ve got lodging there, both documents required for applying at the embassy directly. They were nice enough to call the embassy for me and ask if a same-day visa was possible, but the reply they got was that it was only possible by 4 p.m. The travel agency said I could try at the embassy anyway and show them my flight itinerary, which clearly had me leaving Vientiane today. So I withdrew some quick cash from a nearby ATM and exchanged it for USD (which burned a whole in my pocket since most ATMs have withdraw limits of ~$130) and got a tuk tuk to the Chinese embassy (again not bargaining much gaah), which is pretty much out in the middle of nowhere but at least not super far from the city center.

I walked up to the cluster of people around the clerk and waited what seemed like forever for an application form. I asked the guy if it was possible to get a same-day visa and he was like, “No, no…” “Please, I have a flight at 2:50 p.m.” Still shaking his head. Crap. I grabbed the visa form anyway and got the tuk tuk driver to head back to the airport to see if the China Eastern people had shown up.

They still weren’t at the counter, but I went to the office again and this time, a light was on. I went in and a surprised agent peered at me around his cubicle. I started speaking in English but blank stare – switched to Chinese, but it wasn’t enough, so he got an Air Asia agent to translate for me. (Curse my deteriorating Chinese.) The Air Asia agent confirmed that it was only possible for me do 24 hours in China because I had a domestic stopover, so I had to change my flight route to fit that. The China Eastern agent motioned for me to go back to the departure lobby, and I thought we could change it right then and there, but in fact, he just got me an airport taxi to take me to the China Eastern airlines office in town. Oh god, not here again and not another wasted transportation cost. Well, the driver was nice, and when I got to the office, I was able to explain my situation in better Chinese after I had calmed down, so the agent there could understand. However, we had to wait around for the other agent to come around and make the actual booking. When she came, she looked up flights for me and said it would be pretty expensive for me to change my route to Tokyo because the flights from Beijing to Tokyo were full and I would probably have to pay for a business class seat. So I asked about just pushing my original flight from Vientiane to Kunming to Beijing to tomorrow, and she said it would only cost around $50. Great, a lead. Now all I had to do was get that Chinese visa by tomorrow morning… She called the embassy and they told her it was possible for me to go when it opened up for the afternoon at 2 and get it by 9 the next morning.

It wasn't even 1 yet, so I just ate lunch in the meantime, booked a room at the hostel where I had rented my bike the day before (it turned out to be just a tad sketchy) and tried to stay calm as I couldn’t do anything for the time being except fill out my visa application. I also went back to the travel agency to “book” another hotel for the next night. Finally, around 1:30, I got another tuk tuk to the embassy, but he didn’t speak English, so it was a little interesting trying to direct him the entire afternoon. We got to the consulate at 2, but even after 15 minutes, the gate was still closed. I walked up to the embassy building instead and banged on the door because I could see someone in the little building at the entrance. Luckily, he knew English, but he kept telling me the consulate had closed for the afternoon. I was really frustrated at this point, so maybe I came off super whiny, but I insisted China Eastern had phoned them that morning and received word that I could come at 2. He told me to go talk to the guy in the little building by the consulate, but that guy didn’t know any English at all. I went back and banged on the embassy entrance again; this time, he asked me who had called in and I told him my airline. I guess he went back and talked to someone because finally, the consulate gate cracked open a little. I rushed in and saw the same guy I talked to in the morning about getting a same-day visa. He seemed surprised and said they didn’t take any more visas for the day as they were closed, but again, I told him about the phone call. I must have seem pretty frustrated and desperate at this point because finally he relented. He gave me the $160 bill for the visa and told me to pay it at the ICBC bank (a Chinese bank) and come back with the receipt the next day to pick up my visa. Oh god, the biggest relief I’ve had all day.

I got back on the tuk tuk and we headed out to the city center again. On the way, the receipt for the visa flew out of my folder, and I flailed and yelled at the driver to stop as I kept an eye glued to where the paper was flying around on the road – it took him a while to get me, because again, he didn’t speak any English. I ran back and yes, it was still there as a motorbike swerved around me as I picked it up. Couldn’t help but laugh at everything that had gone wrong that day as I met up with my driver again, and his eyes were smiling too.

Things continued going a little awry - he dropped me off at the wrong bank first – as I walked back out, I asked a lady for directions, and she ended up driving up alongside my tuk tuk in her motorbike, able to communicate with him about directions. What a saint. We got to the right bank, said a lot of things in broken Chinese with my teller, but I got my receipt within a few minutes.

So while this day has been nothing but frustrating, I’ll list some things to stay optimistic – I could have ended up trying to check in for my flight and not had enough time to change things around, or worse, flown to China somehow and get deported for not having the proper visa. I made a list of things I had to pay for today because of all the changing plans, and while it’s a couple hundred, it’s better than shelling out god knows what for a business class seat. I’ll still get to go Beijing, see a couple friends, and get a taste of mainland China again, if only for few days. God knows I had to stretch my Chinese today. When I finally land on American soil (or any soil that is friendly to American passport holders for that matter), I can laugh about all this as it is a good story. And most of all, a lot of people were kind to me all day, even if they couldn’t quite express it in English.

Now fingers crossed that everything will go as planned for tomorrow. I’ll get to the embassy when it opens to get my visa, go back to China Eastern airlines office to confirm my flight, and then head out to Beijing!!


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Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Hanoi and Ha Long Bay


Now in a hostel in Vientiane with crappy Internet, so I’ll post this when I can. Whew, so much has happened since now and then. I’ll start with where I left off…

Day 7
I felt pretty much recovered the day I flew out to Hanoi. I had my last Banh Mi in the morning and was in Hanoi’s old quarter by 2. All the taxis will try to rip you off, but there’s a minibus that goes from the airport to the city center for 40000 dong (approximately $2), and if your hostel is close to a Hanoi bus stop, you can also get a ride for as little as 7000 dong. The hostel I stayed in Hanoi was seriously the nicest hostel I’ve ever stayed in, and I’m not just talking about being clean – the staff wanted to do everything for me, giving me cups of water every time I sat down and not even letting carry my small bag up to my room. I got the “You’re Korean!” thing again, even though I kept saying I was American but they were super friendly. I couldn’t help but be a little suspicious if they were expecting a huge tip or something, but in the end, I guess they were going after those Hostelworld ratings… Since I didn’t get there til the afternoon, I wanted to do as much as possible. First, I went to Bach Ma temple – has some really cool artifacts in the main room, and this was my first exposure to Vietnamese temples. I kept seeing those exotic bird motifs everywhere. 

Bach Ma Temple

The ever-present bird

Then I and headed out to Hoan Kiem lake to see Ngoc Son Pagoda on the little islet in the lake and the locals hanging out as well as a water puppet show at Thang Long theater. The puppet show is worth seeing for 60000 dong – it’s just small puppets maneuvering through water, an art created by Vietnamese farmers, but the traditional music was good and some of the effects were impressive.

Ngoc Son Pagoda

Water Puppet show at Thang Long Theatre

People chilling by Hoan Kiem Lake

When I got out, the sun was setting over the lake, and it’s quite beautiful. I stopped by the Ly Thai To statue to get rammed in by a kid on roller blades – it’s a popular spot for skating and B-boying.

Ly Thai To statue - can't see all the crazy skaters around, but this is a popular spot

My impression of Hanoi is that it’s a tad bit slower than HCMC (I mean, there’s a bus system that actually works on the streets! Although the roads are still bustling with motorbikes) with more cultural things like temples and pagodas. There’s still some French architecture as well.

I ended up having a quick dinner in Lotteria because I was just hungry (I know I should have tried Vietnamese food, but more to come later!). It was actually my first time trying the Rice Bulgogi burger in Lotteria and it was pretty good, although the rice kept falling apart.

Rice Bulgogi burger from Lotteria

Busy street by the lake

Day 8
I headed out to Halong Bay on a 2-day, 1-night tour booked through my hostel. I’m sure I could’ve gotten significantly cheaper if I looked around when I got to Hanoi, but I just didn’t want to deal with the hassle of wasting time to find the best deal and the price they gave me wasn’t too bad. Again, the staff was creepily nice during breakfast. I joined the other people on the tour on a 4-hour minibus ride that took us to the pier in Ha Long City to board our junk boat. I would find out that this was just a series of transfers between smaller and larger vessels that would mark the entire weekend.

Unfortunately, our guide had terrible English, but it turned out to be a pretty good trip. Most touristy thing I’ve ever done and sometimes the crowd was just plain annoying, but it was my first experience throwing myself into a group that I didn’t know at all while solo traveling. I shared a room with a guy from the Netherlands who was also alone. As expected, there were a lot of couples on the trip, but I didn’t feel too left out, as there was a good number of travelers from England as well. Almost everyone was European; I was the only American on the trip. I found this to be a common phenomenon throughout my trip in Southeast Asia – maybe the Europeans just know how to vacation better?

All the goods on a boat

One of the many caves


It's supposed to look like cockfighting

One of the many cliffs around the bay

Beautiful sunset

The boat was small, but still large enough to have a dining room with a bar, our rooms, and a sundeck on top with lawn chairs. I took advantage of the sundeck a lot since I wanted to get as much of the bay as I could. We were pretty lucky with weather – it was clear the entire first day, when we did most of our outdoor activities – getting off at an island to look through a cave, kayaking (I felt sorry for my Dutch partner because I’m sure I wasn’t putting in nearly my fair share with the paddling), and stopping at another island for going up to the top for some views and swimming if we wanted. It’s a shame that it was just filled with tourists the entire time though; I’m sure the gigantic cliff faces dotting the bay must have been even more stunning when it was completely empty 30 years ago. But how did people travel back then without wifi and a completely non-English environment?

For night activities, there was fishing (but no one had much success) and just hanging out on deck. I struck up a conversation on the sundeck with an English guy about everything from traveling to health insurance in different countries. The view of the bay was equally beautiful at night, and I think it was worth paying extra to spend the night. As with the rest of the trip, I didn’t sleep much, but the beds were comfortable and the private bathrooms surprisingly clean for a boat.

Room on the boat

The second day was pretty cloudy with significant rain coming in the second half, but we could just stay indoors as we ate our last meal. We went to another inlet area for some more pics, but I think there’s only so many things you can do in a bay. I would say 2 days is sufficient enough for a tour if you just want to have good views of the bay, maybe 3 days if you’re splurging on a luxury cruise and you enjoy that sort of thing.

We headed back on the minibus to Hanoi and the English guys invited anyone who was interested to go to a great Vietnamese restaurant they had found near their hostel. I joined in, and it was the best dinner I had in Vietnam thus far - as much as I enjoy traveling alone, there are definitely advantages to traveling in a group after all. The restaurant is packed with locals, but the waiters are super efficient and the menu is packed with various Vietnamese dishes.

Quan An Ngon Restaurant - so packed but I recommend it!

Afterwards, one of the guys and I went to the night market, where I finally succumbed to souvenir shopping – and I got the iPho shirt I’ve been wanting! My hostel warned me that this was a prime place for pickpocketing, so I kept a tight hand on my bag. Also, everyone tries to rip you off if you’re a foreigners. I had to barter down a silk scarf 50% and I still think the woman was probably ripping me off. The key is to pick places that aren’t busy and walk away when they’re not budging to fit your suggested price. Still, I wish I knew some Vietnamese because that would have helped a lot.

Hanoi night market - soon to be PACKED a couple minutes later

Day 9

It was my last day in Hanoi as I would leave on the overnight bus to Vientiane (capital of Laos) that night. I walked over to the Ho Chin Minh Mausoleum, but the lines were super long, so I decided to just visit the nearby Ho Chi Minh Museum instead. I mean, I’ve heard it’s worth looking for the creepy atmosphere, but I’m one to think the dead should be buried or cremated in peace. The museum was also really crowded (probably tour groups coming in after the mausoleum as well as schoolchildren running around) but I loved all the quirkiness. It’s basically all propaganda with the signs endlessly glorifying HCM besides artsy displays that would “interpret” his vision for Vietnam or another. It’s also got some memorabilia of the man himself (his glasses, his weights he used to exercise, etc.). My favorite was a 3-D representation of Guernica or as the sign read, “the fight against fascism”. Definitely worth a look, and probably more interesting than the mausoleum, or at least that’s what I tell myself.

Cool Guernica exhibit at HCM museum

This is supposed to be some sort of representation of nature ... not sure exactly but quirky enough for me

HCM's personal weights

HCM mausoleum

Next, I went to the famed Temple of Literature, a Confucian temple with 5 different compartments with the last being an ancient university. They’ve really done up the place, with colored hedges neatly spelling out Chinese characters and beautiful lakes in the first several compartments. Again, it was crowded, but I definitely appreciated the aesthetic of the temple.

One of the lakes in the complex

The lawn staff keeps it up here

Temple of Literature - gorgeous

Then I stopped for some pho (finally!) by the side of the temple. But remember to always check your change because the guy tried to cheat me off 100000 dong when I was paying for my meal, but good thing I thought to count that time.

It was a little hot towards midday, so I decided to try out the buses. I was clueless as to how to pay when I got on board, but I soon found out it was like Bangkok – there’s a guy on the bus who collects money by hand and issues you a ticket saying you’ve paid the fare. I reached West Lake, a larger lake than Hoan Kiem in a more residential area, with Tran Quoc Pagoda, the oldest pagoda in Hanoi, in an islet off it. Since I got there right when it opened after lunch, I got to see inside the main complex which is chock full interesting Buddha figurines and other artifacts before the many elder nuns shooed me away.

Tran Quoc Pagoda

Nuns setting up for the afternoon

I took the bus back to the hostel where they were nice enough to let me take a shower before my loooong ride. I was right about them being all about Hostelworld ratings because they reminded me to do so when I got the online prompt. But I can’t deny they were the nicest hostel staff I’ve ever met.

Now onto the hellish bus ride across the Laos-Vietnam border and to Vientiane…

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Thursday, July 18, 2013

HCMC


Day 5

Woke up feeling weak and lightheaded. It seemed like a slight fever but I really wanted to see the city center so I thought I would walk around but take it easy. It was a nice, cool day (well, cool meaning low 80s and cloudy) which was a welcome break from the heat in Cambodia. I hopped on the motorbike again as my friend’s brother dropped me off in front of the Reunification Palace, the former headquarters of South Vietnam and the mark of the end of the war as the North Vietnamese army crashed into the palace during the Fall of Siagon. There are numerous meeting rooms with plush chairs, offices with military maps, and communication rooms in the basement. My favorite room was the game room, still with domino sets stacked on a table in the corner.

Like a modern palace...

Even the higher-ups still need some games every now and then.

Walking around the city center was much more manageable, although again you need to look in all directions and people will ask you at every corner if you want a ride on their motorbike. I thought maybe some food would help me feel better, so I headed over to a café and had watermelon juice (yum!) and egg over noodles for breakfast. I did feel a little better, so I kept on walking to the Ben Tranh market, again filled with everything from silk to what I now knew to be fake electronics. Then I walked to the Saigon River and looked around the Bitexco Financial Tower. You can go up to the skydeck for a view of the city but given the price ($10) and the cloudy conditions, I decided to skip it. I walked back to towards the middle of the city center on the main street lined with 5-star hotels and name brands like Gucci. I guess there’s a significant gap between the rich and poor here too.

Silk in Ben Thanh Market

Bitexco Tower

I wandered around taking pics of the French architecture (left over from being a former French colony) including the Opera House, the Post Office, City Hall, and the Notre Dame Cathedral in Saigon. I wanted to go inside the cathedral but it was closed for lunch, so I rested up in the nearby Saigon Post Office, another landmark building.

Me and Uncle Ho in front of City Hall

Notre Dame Cathedral (in Saigon)

Saigon Post Office

My last stop was the War Remnants Museum, which is something I definitely recommend to see because of the different view of the war you’ll get here. Although it’s mostly just galleries of photos, they’re pretty moving. They do sort of demonize the U.S., but they also had an exhibit of American youth protesting the war and seemed to acknowledge that a lot of American people at least were against the war. Then plenty of photos of American soldiers being pretty brutal towards Vietnamese civilians, including the effects of the chemical Agent Orange  – well, the photos are true and that’s what happened after all. I was feeling pretty weak at this point though, so I kept stopping at each floor to rest for 15 minutes – I felt like an old lady who couldn’t walk anymore. Normally, it would have taken me an hour and a half at most to go through a museum of that size, but I ended up staying there for 3 hours. After the final floor, I went outside to get some air again and look at the U.S. planes and tanks that were also on display around the museum. God, if a ginormous tank with a flamethrower rolled up in my village, I wouldn’t know what to do. 

Actually, I've been thinking about the military as a possible career choice recently (out of the many other options running through my mind), but after going to the museum, I think even the possibility of such war crimes happening now (and I'm sure they do still happen) has discouraged me a bit. 

"The above picture shows exactly what the brass want you to do in the Nam. The reason for printing this picture is not to gut down G.I.'s but rather to illustrate the fact that the Army can really fuck over your mind if you let it. / It's up to you, you can put in your time making it back in one piece or you can become a psycho like the Lifer (E-6) who really digs this kind of shit. It's your choice."

Very powerful picture

Well, this is kind of intimidating.

For dinner, I had delicious fish and thin noodles with my friend’s family (ah, I forgot the name of the dish), and although I didn’t notice a temperature difference when I felt my forehead, they insisted I had a fever. They also served me lots of fruits – mangosteen, oranges, rambutan (Malay for “hairy”, which is basically a more natural and better tasting version of lychee), but I was losing my appetite by the end of the night, so I could only eat a few. I took some Tylenol before going to bed at a very, very early 9, only to wake up at 2, blog for a bit, and go back to sleep at 5.

(Stock photo) Rambutan: It has a funny name and shape, but it's basically lychee in the wild and it's AMAZING. Trust me. 

Well, if I had to pick when to get sick, this was the best time, since I was staying with a friend and in a convenient city.  This is the first time I’ve gotten sick while traveling (besides the occasional stomach sickness from questionably hygienic foods), and it’s not a good feeling. As a hypochondriac, I Googled dengue fever, malaria, and Japanese encephalitis, all of which have similar symptoms that appear anywhere from a few days to two weeks after getting bitten by a vector mosquito, and I decided to look out for any new developments in the next few days. Yes, I know I was being paranoid, but this was my reasoning - I got a lot of bug bites in Japan a few days before I left, but the only mosquito bite I got in SE Asia was one on my finger while I was at Angkor Wat (guess you need to spray bug spray thoroughly on your hands too!). There’s a very small chance of it being malaria because I haven’t been bitten in a malaria-affected area, or Japanese encephalitis since the chances of getting that in Japan is like close to zero. Possibly dengue – if I develop a rash in the next few days, it probably is. The sad thing is, even if I know what it is, there’s no treatment for dengue fever or Japanese encephalitis. I’ll just take Tylenol like crazy and try to take it easy for the next few weeks if this fever lasts more than a day.

The #2 quality you should have while traveling after flexibility is OPTIMISM. Even though I got sick, I’m very thankful it was when I’m staying at a friend’s house, my fever wasn’t that high, and I still got to see a lot of HCMC. Also, my travel plans worked out perfectly in terms of the strenuous stuff - I definitely couldn’t have had the energy to bike around Angkor Wat like this. And when I was planning for the trip, I was about to book overnight trains to Da Nang to see Hoi An after HCMC, but at the last minute, I decided against it because there just wasn’t enough time to do each place justice. So instead, I booked a direct flight to Hanoi, which will be only 2 hours of traveling (and surprisingly cheap - almost the same price as the train) vs. the 15 or so hours to Da Nang on the train. Of course, I would still love to see places like Hoi An and Hue some day (excuse to come back to Vietnam!) but it did somehow work out perfectly. Fingers crossed that I’ll be fully recovered by Laos because that will be a bit more work.

Day 6

Felt MUCH better today, although it could have been just because of the Tylenol. I decided to stay in mostly and just rest up, since I had seen mostly everything I wanted to in the city center yesterday. My friend treated me to delicious Banh Mi at a local food stall for breakfast – the meat was so fresh and the bread was also crisp because it had just been baked. I took a picture with my phone around the area, but then my friend told me to avoid taking photos in the local streets if I could – someone had been doing the same with a fake Chinese iPhone and had gotten their hand cut off as a motorbike came by to steal the phone. All for a fake iPhone… I lounged around in the morning in a hammock watching the Vietnam television’s version of MTV and attempting to study for the GRE with little success. Vietnamese TV, at least at my friend’s house, has lots of international channels too with English, Korean, and Chinese channels (although the Korean and Chinese are often dubbed over).

Banh Mi - oh man so good. Best breakfast in a while.

For lunch, we went out again for pork sausage, a Chinese vegetable I’ve already forgotten the name of (but would like to know because it was so good!), and “broken” rice – called broken because it’s almost like a couscous quality. I also had a sweet southern Vietnamese dessert called chè with shaved ice, various beans, jellies, and coconut milk mixed into one delicious drink, as well as a sweet pastry. So full, but so satisfying :)

Chè with lots of beans and jellies :)

In the evening, we went to a massage place because my friend told me it was really cheap in the area. I’ve never gotten a professional massage before because it’s not really a thing to do back home and even when I’m traveling in places that are famous for their massages (especially Thailand), I’m a little intimidated by figuring out the best places. We were originally just going to do a foot massage for $4, but they had a special that day for 45-minute foot + 90-minute full body massage for $10. We did the foot massage first, watching the music video channel again. Vietnamese foot massages actually encompass the legs, and the guys who did it for us also added a brief shoulder massage at the end. It was a little painful, but your feet and legs after all are the parts of your body that endure the most. We tipped at the end, and I put down the same amount as my friend – but then they gave us a funny look when we gave them the tipping receipt. Oops, I guess it was too low for the place.

Next, we went up to another room where the women gave us the body massage. It wasn’t as painful as the foot one, maybe because the women were tired at the end of the day, but it still felt good. Massage is like acrobatics in a way – my masseuse had me do all sorts of stretches that I never knew existed. The best part was when they used these hot stones to rub across your body – it’s a burning sensation, but it’s not too painful and somehow your back appreciates the searing sensation. They also did a head massage at the end which felt awesome.

I gave a larger tip (30%) this time. I don’t know how my masseuse felt about it, but my friend’s masseuse asked her, “Are you sure this is (amount)?” and gave her a look afterwards. So I guess it was still low. Apparently, they sometimes get tipped the same amount as the price of the massage from generous men, so of course, anything we tipped would have been ridiculously low. But that massage place paid their own workers at least, so I didn’t feel too bad.

We ate dinner at the house – pork and lady fingers with shrimp-flavored sauce. I LOVE Asian meat because they keep all the good fatty stuff people trim off in America. Then we ate a ton of rambutan, and watched the Vietnamese version of Don’t Forget the Lyrics and the soccer match between the Vietnamese national team and the Arsenals, who they had invited to play in Hanoi. The Arsenals won 7-1, but the Vietnamese people are pretty patriotic and cheered just as loudly when they scored a goal.

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Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Day 4 - More of Phnom Penh

Woke up at 6 again - but I guess this isn't a bad thing if you want to get an early start to the day. I got another tuk tuk driver for the remaining half-day I was in Phnom Penh and told him to take me to a travel agency that had offered to arrange my Vietnamese visa within five hours. But he took me to a slightly cheaper place that got it done even quicker. Ah, the end of my visa woes - I was ignorant enough not to realize I couldn't get a visa on arrival until a week before I left Japan, and there wasn't enough time for me to mail it to the Vietnamese embassy in Japan. You can get a sort of prepared visa if you apply online and fly into one of the main airports, but I was going by road on a bus. The easiest and cheapest way to get a Vietnamese 15-day tourist visa is to apply for one in Cambodia - you can turn it in at 8:30 and get it back by 6 on a weekday for $45. But I realized I would get to Siem Reap late Friday night (which doesn't have an embassy in the city so it takes longer here) and not get to Phnom Penh until a Sunday when the embassy is closed, leaving me only Monday morning. Since I was leaving on a 2 pm bus on a Monday to HCMC, I had to pay $75 for a 30-day visa because that's the only one you can get rush, but still a lot cheaper and faster than the $100 I would have to pay in the U.S. Even before I left Japan, the airline agents stalled to give me my boarding tickets after learning I didn't have a Vietnamese visa and told me they weren't responsible if I got stuck in Cambodia. They say a U.S. passport is one of the best in the world, but I still have to pay for visas in every country I'm going to on this trip... (not to mention China if I wasn't just a transit, but I won't rant here).

Anyways, I went to the Royal Palace as planned, but there was a Buddhist ceremony going on, so only the Silver Pagoda was open for a while. The main building houses a ton of gold Buddhas with stupas and shrubs dotting around it.

Silver Pagoda

I kept going to the gate of the Royal Palace to ask if the ceremony was over, but they kept telling me one more hour. Well, such is life ... they did open up the Royal Palace an hour and a half later so I got to take some pics. But I was a little disappointed you couldn't see anything but the main courtyard - I've been to the Grand Palace in Bangkok and there's a lot more ground you can see there. They also say the Royal Palace's architecture is a lot more coherent than the gaudiness of the Grand Palace, but I think I prefer the outrageousness of the Grand Palace. Still, I was glad I got into the Royal Palace and the architecture was awesome.



Royal Palace

Since I still had some time to kill, I had my driver take me to Wat Ounalom and Central Market. It's basically a huge dome with the jewelers in the middle and aisles of electronics, clothing, souvenirs, kitchenware, and anything else you can think of branching out from it. I ate some noodles at one of the food stalls (I don't know any Khmer so all I could say was noodles), but I think the lady charged me extra because I was a tourist (although it was still pretty cheap). Note to self - decide on a price before eating. Also, I kept seeing these Starbucks logo shirts in the clothing stalls - how is this fashion? And strangely enough, I hadn't seen any Starbucks while I was Phnom Penh, although I saw KFC, DQ, and a lot of other brands.

Starbucks trend?

$12 Beats - too good to be true

I waited for Mekong Express to pick me up at my hostel, but I started getting a little worried when they didn't show up after 10, 20, 30 minutes the time they said they would come. I was about to ask a tuk tuk to just take me to the bus station, but suddenly the bus rolled up right on time.

The bus from Phnom Penh to Ho Chi Minh takes about 6 hours with a ferry crossing at Neak Loeung and of course, customs and visa procedures at the border. Unfortunately, our bus had technical problems halfway, so we were delayed an hour and a half as we changed buses at the border. The border process also took a while, as there were busloads of people being called up individually through a stack of passports. As we got back on a bus and crossed into Vietnam, I asked the bus attendant if I could call my friend who I was staying with in HCMC on his phone, and he was kind enough to get another attendant's phone.

My friend's brother picked me up on his motorbike while it was drizzling quite a bit in HCMC. It was my first time on a motorbike, and I must say - it was AMAZING. The streets of HCMC are even crazier than Phnom Penh -  most people drive motorbikes as it's really too crowded for a car, although there are the persistent few. We zipped past bustling streets with neon signs, food stalls, as well as familiar places like Pizza Hut. I always wondered how other people on the back of motorbikes sat without falling off, but now that I've been on one, I find it's not too hard to balance yourself on it. I seriously want to rent one somewhere while I'm SE Asia, but given my terrible driving record in the U.S., I think it's best if I don't.
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Sunday, July 14, 2013

Blog catchup: SE Asia!


[I did terrible at blogging during my last trip to SE Asia, but this time, I will do my best to update on a regular basis!]

Day 1

Pretty much all day was traveling – left my friend’s apartment at 9 a.m., 2 hours to Narita Airport, 3-hour layover in Shanghai before reaching Siem Reap at 10 p.m. It was nice hearing Chinese again, and I practiced a little by reading the magazines on the plane, plus everyone assumes you’re Chinese if you’re East Asian so they approach you in Chinese. I flew China Eastern, which my friends have often criticized, but it was a pretty good flight with a free meal on each leg. Surprised by the brown sea that greeted me in Shanghai – is the pollution this bad or is it something else in the water? Bought water and a red bean bun at the Shanghai airport for around 1 USD – ah, this is how things should be.

Got to the airport and got my visa in less than 10 minutes, only to wait for an hour and try to make a call to my hostel on the payphone with no success. There were tons of people holding signs with names and clamoring me if I was the person they were picking up. Finally, a guy who had also been waiting for an hour asked me if I was Ms. Feng. I said no, but he offered to call my hostel for me. Turns out the reservations had been mixed up and they had overbooked. A tuk tuk driver came to get me and transport me to a sister hostel. The guy was nice enough, apologizing for the mixup and making conversation on the way. I got the “You’re Korean! I love Korean dramas!” but his knowledge of Korean actors was far superior to mine. Then he talked about the Cambodian monarchy and said the young people probably wouldn’t accept another heir once the current king passed away. I realized how ignorant I was of Cambodian history and vowed I would read more about it as soon as I got the chance.

The hostel was a little sketchy, but I guess I’m used to these things by now. The water was pretty smelly, so I decided to brush my teeth with bottled water. I shared the night with a lizard that kept scuttling around my room – good thing I don’t mind reptiles. On the other hand, I got a 3-person room to myself because of the booking mistake and slept pretty well because of the generous air-conditioning.

Day 2

I had considered waking up early to catch the sunset at Angkor Wat, but I didn’t fall asleep til around 2 so I thought it might be better to rest up for the all-day trip. I woke up naturally at 6 anyway (I have a curse for terrible sleep when I travel) and rented a bike from my hostel for $2. I biked around the streets of Siem Reap, asking for directions to Angkor Wat and grabbing breakfast at a stand – a red bean bun with an egg yolk in the middle. I gave the vendor a dollar and she gave me change in Khmer Riel; this is the norm when you’re in Cambodia, but be sure to spend all the loose change before you leave!

Bike rental for $2 - pay attention when you're biking through the streets though! Pretty crazy and congested...

It was 7km from my hostel to Angkor Wat, and I absolutely loved the bike ride. Guess I haven’t really biked regularly since livin g in Japan for the year. Angkor Wat itself didn’t look as stunning as the pictures on the Internet, but that’s to be expected. I parked my bike in front and a vendor insisted I buy something from her for parking there. She was probably just lying, but I needed water anyway, so I gave her a generous $2. I ignored all the kids though who kept trying to sell me postcards – and boy, are they persistent!


Angkor Wat and some monks also being touristy

Next was Bayon, famous for its 200 faces of Lakasvera.

Bayon

Then Preah Kahn, said to be like a hall of mirrors because of all the consecutive doorways that create an illusion when you look through all of them. 

Preah Kahn

I had lunch afterwards, ordering some sort of pork sandwich, only to realize it was also prepared with a variety of raw vegetables. I probably shouldn’t have eaten it, but so far no sickness yet. Maybe my summer in China has given me some long-term immunity to certain things.

I also stopped by Mebon Rup and Pra Rup along the way. Even though they’re not as famous as the other temples, I enjoyed them as there weren’t any crowds here.

Pre Rup - yes to no crowds!

Last temple was Ta Prohm, famous for the gigantic tree vines growing into and around the ruins (as well as being one of the filming sites for Lara Croft Tomb Raider). This was one of my favorite temples because you really felt the age of the ruins.

Vine growing over one of the entrances to Ta Prohm

I biked back for a late afternoon view of Angor Wat before heading back to Siem Reap. Then I got lost on my way back to the city, but the clerk at another hostel was kind enough to look up directions for me.

Beautiful, beautiful day at Angkor Wat park

Several things from today:
-       Although it’s terribly cliché – it’s more about the journey than the destination. I loved exploring the temples, but I enjoyed the bike ride just as much on a beautiful sunny day.
-       Maybe it’s just because it’s super touristy, but I had no trouble communicating in English, even talking with the vendors on the street.
-       I was surprised by the number of Khmer guides who could speak other languages fluently – everything from Spanish to Korean. I wonder where they ingrained the language so well. I guess this is to be expected, but I’m not used to Japanese tour guides who can speak other languages well while I traveled in Japan, for example. (But large Korean tour groups are sometimes the worst. Shoot me the day I sign up for a large Asian tour.)

Day 3

Took an early bus to Phnom Penh, with convenient free pickup from my hostel. The guy at the front desk gave me a much lower sum at checkout than what I expected, but I wasn’t complaining. But I guess he was pretty persistent because guess who showed up as I was about to the board at the bus station, saying he accidentally didn’t charge for me for the second night. Oh well, it was fair enough. The 6-hour bus ride was pretty comfortable, and I sat next to a Filipino woman who was living in Vietnam for some time. She was surprised I was traveling alone, but so far, everything has run smoothly. The bus showed a couple of movies, but then entered into a strew of cheesy karaoke videos – first in other languages, like English and K-Pop, but then a streak of Cambodian ones in which the girl and guy always ended up breaking up and reflecting on their good times together. I didn’t find this too entertaining, so I caught up on some sleep before we entered the city.

I was in a hurry when I checked into my hostel since it was already 2 p.m. so I got a tuk tuk driver to take me to the Killing Fields, site of tens of thousands of deaths during the Khmer Rouge (1975-1979). Again, I am very ignorant of Cambodian history, but there was a pretty good audio tour at the site. Phnom Penh was virtually abandoned as people had to return to their villages to create an agricultural society. Many intellectuals, engineers, and other professionals were executed for being a threat to the government. Signs are posted by mass graves/torture sites/landmarks to explain the atrocities that had been conducted here only 40 years ago. Apparently, you can also still find random pieces of bones and clothing around the entire field, although I wasn’t one to go looking for them.


The skulls of some of the victims kept in the stupa in the middle of Killing Fields

Afterwards, we went to the museum – the former prison site for people captured by the government in which they were tortured until they confessed to be CIA agents, etc. The place has been pretty much left the way it was found, the prison cells and barbed wire still intact. The most moving thing is looking at the hundreds of victims’ photos. Often, entire families were rounded up, so there were many pictures of children as well. I looked at the photos and all I could think was so much suffering...

Bed for torturing victims still left intact

One of the hundreds of victims' photos at Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (S-21 Prison)

Afterwards, my driver took me past the National Monument and the Royal Palace for a few photos before stopping at the Sisowath Quay riverside for dinner. The meal was all right – I ate some Khmer curry, but I bet you I could’ve found something a lot more tasty and cheaper from the street vendors. But it was a nice way to end the evening. My driver dropped me off at my hostel and I snapped a photo with him – he was a pretty good driver and although, I knew he overcharged me for the trip to the Killing Fields, I bartered down the rest of the trip so much that he gave up asking for a specific price. I’m usually pretty generous when it comes to bargaining though – even though I know people are ripping me off, I feel like I can afford a few extra USD to help them put food in the table.

Beautiful sky after a brief rainstorm


My tuk tuk driver and I

During the evening, I decided to venture out into the crazy streets of Phnom Penh. I thought Beijing traffic was bad but the roads in Cambodian cities are something else – no stoplights, motorbikes making lanes where you didn’t think possible, and bike gangs (is this the appropriate word?) of young supporters for the Cambodian People’s Party waving the Cambodian flag and cheering everywhere. It is possible to walk, but you should keep an eye out in ALL directions and you will be haggled by tuk tuk drivers anywhere. I went up to Wat Phnom, which is somewhat of a hangout place at night for the locals and spotted a concert nearby with more of those young Cambodian Party people. Last of all, to the riverside where I people-watched guys playing hackeysack and ladies selling various trinkets.

Wat Phnom lit up at night - ahh I need a better camera for night photos...

Phnom Penh in tuk tuk was a nice break from sweating it out all day in Angkor Wat yesterday. I have to get my Vietnamese visa taken care of tomorrow through rush process because I'm leaving in the afternoon. Hopefully, I'll have time to squeeze in the Royal Palace!

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