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October 24, 2003 : Central Vietnam
Visiting temples and tombs, not much else you can do around here.... except making clothes that is.
Relaxed...
It was really nice to get off the bus in Hue after the horrible busride, get a room on a hotel, eat some breakfast and then sleep for a few hours. After such a long time in Hanoi, it's just nice to be in a place where the pace is so much slower, you can actually cross the street without risking your life!
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| I'm driving Andrew and half Hue around |
I spend a couple of days just walking around Hue and taking it easy, drinking beer with Petra and Andrew on DMZ bar in the evenings and don't really do anything useful at all. Nice... :)
Culture
The three of us decides to go on a tour around the city, so we book one through a cafe there, and me and Andrew decides to drive the motorbikes ourselves, it's more fun that way (although I doubt my mother would agree... =). I feel a bit shaky in the beginning, since it was about ten years ago I spent any longer times on the back of a motorbike, but as soon as we get out of the city (yeah, well, the traffic there was a bit too much to start with really) it was just nice to have the wind flow through your hair (yeah, I know I don't have any hair, but it sounds better that way!) as you drive along the rice paddies in the Vietnamese countryside.
It was a quite interesting day and definatly worth the few dollars it costed us. Our guide was a funny guy, that liked to tell small educational stories, if I just could remember the name of the place he had I'd recommend it...
During the day, we visited:
Thanh Toan japanese bridge and the local market
Thien Mu pagoda
Tu Hiey pagoda
Tiger fighting arena
Locals making incense
Tomb of Tu Doc
and last, a Chinese pagoda in town
(for more information about the places, I suggest google)
| | Thien Mu pagoda |
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| | Andrew making incense |
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| | Tu Hiey pagoda |
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More culture
We decide to go south the next day, so we book a busride to Hoi An, the paradise for people that loves clothes. Or hell, depending on how you look at it I guess. This left me with a couple of hours to visit the Hue citadel before the bus departed. The citadel is an old imperial city, where the emperor used to live and rule the country. Quite interesting and a lot to see. More than I thought it would be, so I had to run back to the hotel to catch the bus...
| | A guard in the pagoda |
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| | I like dragons! |
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| | Commie bastards... |
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More interesting busrides
The bus we took from Hue to Hoi An was crap. We never went faster than 45km/h ... but that was probarbly a good thing, considering that every time the driver used the breaks, the bus turned left. After a couple of hours we stopped for lunch and than they filled it up with water (it was leaking or something like that) and tried to fix the breaks. They failed. Having bad breaks is not a good thing. Especially not when you are traveling over the mountains and have a steep hill on one side of the bus. The left side of course. Anyone with a fear of dying should just stay out of Vietnams traffic, because if it isn't overcrowded with motorbikes, it's just plain horrible... :)
Hoi An
When we arrive in Hoi An, we go to a small place by the street, to get away from the crowd and to relaxe with a bottle of beer or two, before trying to find a place to stay. As soon as we sit down, a young girl approach us and offers her help in the matter, she knows a good place not to far away. Petra goes away with her on the motorbike while I watch our bags. The place wasn't that good though, so we decide to find one on the street we are on instead, but since the girl was helpful and nice to talk to, we agree to come and take a look at the place she works at, one of Hoi Ans two hundred tailors. Bad idea...
The next day she takes us to the market where the tailors are. I end up ordering two complete suits, one with a waistcoat, two shirts, one tie - and a thick and long wintercoat. After measuring us in all ways possible, we are allowed to leave, to return the day after and try the clothes on.
In the evening we try the nightlife in Hoi An, and it's not too bad... I end up coming home at three o clock, after talking to a couple of nice swedish girls. Little did I know that i would end up seeing them everywhere from then on... :)
The next day I try out the clothes and they just need a few adjustments, and somehow they talk me into buying a pair of travel-pants. Bah. Not that I didn't need them, but still...
I spend a few days in Hoi An, just relaxing and meeting interesting people. It's a beautiful little town, but it's very easy to spend a lot of money on clothes there! Had to pay $35 just to send my clothes back home, hopefully they still fit when I get there in a few months... or not, depending on why they don't fit me anymore... ;)
Posted in: Travel
, Vietnam
by mdk @ 14:01, October 24, 2003
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