Ouch my wallet part 2
Trip Start
Sep 19, 2002
1
94
129
Trip End
Sep 22, 2003
Hoi An,
Vietnam
Monday, May 26, 2003
Somehow it wasn't quite as I expected. She led me down an alleyway into a shed with open windows and no curtains and I had to lay on a bed made of bamboo with no face hole. She then proceeded to wash me with a cold flannel and then squeeze various bits of me with no apparent order while digging her extra long nails into my skin. She then said "I think I need to clean your face" and proceeded to scrub my skin like I was a naughtly little girl with chocolate round my mouth. She applied loads of cold cream with vigour and then carried on with the bed bath. She then grabbed my feet and said "Oh I think we need to take this dead skin off" and before I could answer she was slicing the bottoms of my feet off. Whilst laying helplessly here, the persistent lady with the tailoring shop from before poked her head in the window and demanded that I go with her to her shop after I had finished which I strongly declined. After another bed bath Trinh told me "okay we do your legs now" and I was feeling too weak to say no but oh how I wished I had. She applied chalk to my legs and then got a couple of bits of cotton wound around her fingers which she danced over my skin. The hair gets caught in the cotton and pulled out so it's a bit like waxing and it bloody hurt. I thought it would never end and when it was finished I could still feel hair there but there was no way I was going to ask for more torture. Of course, all this started to add up and I was asked to pay $12. By the time I got back to the hotel (with cap in hand asking my hubby for more money) I was neither relaxed or invigorated, just poor, feeling guilty, stressed and very sore. Hey ho, we shall do better in Thailand where they know what they are doing.
In the evening we were approached a number of times by orphans selling various items of tat. They have special te-shirts and ID cards stating they are legitimately orphans and the cafes and restaurants let them in as it is a good cause. As much as I wanted to buy something from them it was all the same and all cheap and nasty things or stuff we really didn't need so we managed to hold back. They had another little trick though - they ask where you are from and then ask you for coins from that country for their collection. Of course as soon as we say England we get lists of football players and teams and cheers of "oooh Beckham, yes?" Some of the kids were very knowledgeable about English teams but they meant nothing to us in the main so they soon moved on.
24th May - One of our special "walking tours" courtesy of the Lonely Planet guide book and we began by having our pockets rifled by orphans at a place we thought was a temple. We saw another Japanese bridge and looked around an old merchants house where we were actively encouraged to purchase something. Which we didn't. We had a drink in a floating restaurant - the river is not that big so it almost touches both sides, and looked at all the quaint buildings before heading to the cloth market to relieve Pip of some more money. We had planned to look at the fabulous materials so they we could send some home for soft furnishings etc (always thinking of home arn't I?) but when we got there we found that it was actually lots of tailors in a big warehouse. We were soon spotted by the persistent woman from the day before who demanded why we hadn't been to her shop yesterday when she waited for us for ages and we had promised. We were obviously having none of this ao she begrudgingly showed us the various materials. We saw lots we liked but wanted to look at other stalls and said we were not buying today. She then stormed off shouting "tomorrow, tomorrow, always tomorrow" interspersed with bits of Vietnamese. We ended up at another stall which was cheaper and the lady was very nice so we went back to the hotel to decide how much we needed. There are approx 200 tailors in Hoi An all vying for your business (especially now) and they would make you whatever you want - suits, dresses, tops, shirts, even underwear and shoes. It's all made to measure and ready in double quick time and very cheap so it's hard not to have anything made. We don't know of anyone who makes it out without spending a small fortune but with me desperate to lose weight and Pip having lost about 1.5 stone it was not practical to have anything other than travelling clothes made (which seemed a bit rediculous). But on the way back I spied a nice pair of 3/4 length trousers in another tailor shop window and before we could say "Ha and you thought you were going to escape Mr Johnson" we were beint fitted for 2 pairs of lightweight 3/4 trousers each for a total of $24! We told them exactly what buttons and ties we wanted where and I even had some geckos embroidered on one pair.
25th May - Took a day trip to My Son ruins which had been compared to Angkor Wat in Cambodia and Aythaya in Thailand (which was beautiful). However, it was less then impressive and a bit of a let down after such a good write up. Unfortunately the area was already in ruins before the war but that really finished it off as the VC used to hide there and there is not much left of many of the buildings. One section is partially still standing and this area was beautiful with a few little buildings and a special water bath which is the only one of it's kind in the world. The ruins date back to the 4th century and are from the ancient kingdom of Cham so unlike anything we had seen before and we went crazy with the camera if only for about 5 minutes. Despite it being a UNESCO heritage site, it looks like no-one cares about the area which is badly overgrown and unkempt and dirty. However they seem to have cracked down on the ticket sellers who used to sell you already punched tickets and then pocket the money so hopefully the money will eventually be used to tidy the place up.
Our next stop was a boat trip back to Hoi An and the boat was much better than we expected after our previous uncomfortable trips. We were given white rose for lunch which is a Hoi An speciality a bit like uncooked ravioli but Pip seemed to like it. We stopped at a Carpentry Island which turned out to be a wood furniture shop where the owner gave the boatman some money and we moved on. When we arrived back in Hoi An we were greeted by a toothless old granny with the baskets on a cane like the street vendors have but they seemed to be empty. We then heard her say "take photo, take photo" and so she makes her money by tourists having their picture taken with her. Beats working for a living!
26th May - Feeling energetic we decided to cycle to the beach so we hired two dodgy bikes for 20p for the day and peddaled the 4k out of town. Vietnamese people cannot understand why westerners ride bikes when they can afford taxis so they find it quite amusing and we got lots of stares and shouts of "hello!" which was lovely as we made our way through the countryside to the gorgeous beach. We were the first ones there as it was still fairly early and the hundreds of beach chairs were empty. We had breakfast on the beach and the odd dip in the clear waters with clean sand and sat watching the men catch the crabs for the restaurants dotted along the beach. By 12noon the huge beach was crowded with at least 10 other people so we decided enough was enough and went back to collect our new trousers. We met some friends some Sapa and one had had her purse stolen from her bag in Hanoi so that was 3 thefts just from people we knew! Saigon is meant to be much worse! It was then time to move on again and we were forced to travel overnight despite assurances to the contrary when we bought the tickets. We boarded the bus at 6pm and were due to arrive in Nha Trang at about 6am. Unfortunately the seats were like bus seats so there was not much chance of sleep and every seat was taken (but only one person per seat which was an improvement). The other thing that prevented sleep was the sheer quantity of vomit on the bus. Our friend Bas who is travelling alone was delighted with his young Vietnamese seat partner until she started barfing for the country. She continued to do this for practically the whole 12 hours and let me tell you that Vietnamese vomit smells REALLY bad but they did keep throwing the bags out of the window. We'd heard about the Vietnamese people's travel sickness before but not encountered it first hand until this night. They don't travel well and the girl near us was only one of a few people who vomited the night away. That coupled with the driver's inability to drive in a straight line for more than half a mile meant that we were seriously tired and queasy ourselves when we finally arrived in Nha Trang the next morning.
