Okydo, I'm ready to write some more.
To be able to find out what Hue is like we rented bikes, since that is the cheepest and most intense way of experiencing your surrounding. We started beeing a group of 8 people ( Jeremy [Lewis dad], Courtny, Breanna, Tommy, Janice, Derek, Angie and me). It was a little rainy already but we didn't care and found a really nice place to drink some coffee and do some fishing. Later on we found a mausoleum in the middle of nowhere, right next to a bunch of ricefields and farmers on it. That was the first time we could actually escape from all the touristic spots and get a real impression about the country and it's life in it.
That's just so much better than beeing harrassed by people trying to sell you stuff nobody needs.
Anyway it started raining quite hard after a while and the sun stood low, so we split up the group. Janice, Tommy and I went for the adventure further down the muddy road whereas the rest headed back.
We found a bamboo bridge, but there was no way Tommy could have made it over that dangling little bridge with his motorbike so we made a huge circle, found some tombs on our way, a water resort and a river. Speaking of water by then we were soked and had a pretty rough work out. Men it felt good to move again. And we accidently found a shortcut back to our hotel too, amazing.
Since Tommy rented this motorbike and filled it up with gas. It was his aim to kill that gallon he put in even though it was raining like crazy. So he took Angie and me on motor bike rides all around town. We crossed a bridge not even a meter wide, it was pretty scary. If you can drive here, you can drive everywhere!
The next day we got a complete history lesson about the Vietnam war, which they call here the war of American aggression. It was pretty bad and lasted way to long without any results.
The weirdest thing I thought there was about this place, that they were selling real dog tags to the tourists. Men this is not a souvenier, this is real and they don't belong here, they belong to their families!
During the war about 300 people were hiding in a complex tunnle system for about 4 years. We went through, you couldn't stand up. A family would have had maybe two square meters for themselves. The conditions must have been horrible. No daylight, no bathroom that was not recognizable of beeing a bathroom and they even bore children down there.
This day was actually already quite enjoyable but since a guy from the hotel next door asked me earlier if I wanted to join a poker round later this night, I was glad to join. So I played quite some rounds with Marteen, Simon, Ruth, Katie and ... . We continued playing until they physically swept us out of their bar, so we stayed in the last open bar there was until 2 a.m. and continued talking in one of the boys appartments. I ended up promising Marteen to tattoo him on his right leg in about 5 years in bulgaria. In return he will show me how to make real homemade chocolate and he gave me some really helpful adresses in New Zealand to help me with a place to stay and get a job. And Simon promised me to let me stay at his when I'll be down there, as soon as he comes back from South Africa, which would be at the end of February '08. Men we were fooling around this evening we even had a rickshaw race with the locals and I got to drive a rickshaw. It's kinda hard to keep 'em up when you turn around. It felt really good to go out and enjoy a bit of nightlife!
People I met:
- Alex (Schweden) [I was sitting next to him on the bus and I got a complete impression about Sweden now. I never realized that I never really thought about this littel country up there. You got a right to camp there for free, I should try that some time ;o)]
- Heike (Germany/Spain) [Met her in the pub, men she came around, speaks 4 languages, has a doctor title and gave me that superduper hint that you can get a working visa for Australia for one year once in you lifetime. And if you have a international drivers license you can move around by helping car rental companies to return their vehicles. I'm gonna do this I guess.]
- Rob + Sven (America/Beeijing, English Teachers) [Met them twice now on the bus and the cool thing is, they are doing exactly the same thing as we are doing. So maybe they could join me later on when the second semester is over, sounds like a good option to me.]
- Marteen (Bulgarien/New Zealand) + Simon (Aussie) + Ruth + Katie (England) + ...
[what a clubbing night ;o)]
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