5 hours in Tokyo & then the sprint to the finish

So we landed at Narita International Airport at around 6:30 a.m. for the start of our nearly 11-hour layover. Our first immediate impression was just what a delight the airport was compared to the airports in Vietnam we had experienced: Narita was clean, well-lit, not humid, clean, orderly, well laid-out, clean, had lots of easy to read signs, clean...well, you get the picture. We noted that we had to travel to Japan someday because it seems like the "orderly" part of Asia. Frankly, after 3 weeks in Vietnam, we were ready for a helping or two of "orderly".

We cleared immigration, cleaned ourselves up, and stopped at the information desk to learn how to get into Tokyo city center, which is about 40 miles away from the airport. We had attempted to check in for our United flight, but the United ticket counters were not yet open, and by 8:15 we had decided we would head into the city first, then return a couple hours prior to our flight to check in.

We got phenomenal assistance (in perfect English, no less) from the tourism agent, exchanged some $USD for yen, stowed our carry-on baggage in a locker, purchased our round trip ticket on the train, and hopped on the express train into Tokyo where we arrived about an hour+ later at Tokyo Station. Tokyo Station is the main transit point for the city - numerous subway and bus lines converge there - it was massive...literally a hive of activity, shops, restaurants, and people moving every where; we had to escalate literally 5 levels from where our train came in to the main exit at street level. On each level were more shops and lots of people hurriedly moving about.

We finally got to street level, left the station, and promptly couldn't figure out how to get where we wanted to go - which was to the Ginza district (the toney shopping district). We stopped at a bus stop to ask either of 2 women, and neither of them could speak English. An elderly man ambled up to us, looked at our map with the circled area, took our map and motioned for us to follow him. He led us through a veritable 20-minute maze of underground crosswalks and intersections until we arrived at our destination - of course, the whole time I'm thinking he's a judo expert who's leading us into a trap or is going to ask us to buy him lunch for helping (I'm the perfect yin to Michelle's yang as a traveler). However, as soon as he got us to the doorstep of the 1st store we had sought, he handed us back our map, bowed, wished us a good trip, and circled back to return to his original destination. He was such a helpful person to us - without him, we would have gotten lost in yet another Asian city for sure. And he asked for nothing in return, despite my worst inclinations during the entire walk.

We arrived at the 1st store Ito-Yo, a speciality paper store, at 10:20 - which was 10 minutes before it opened. We were invited in to sit in some chairs, and offered some jasmine green tea to drink. It already felt good at that point.

We shopped a bit more, ate sushi lunch, had some cake/pastries, and generally people-watched on what was the equivalent to Chicago's Magnificent Mile (and since there were no global chain stores on the main street, it actually seemed nicer than that). Of course, compared to all the extremely fasionably-dressed locals in the Ginza district, we looked like schleps from our overnight flight in our wrinkled travel clothes and sneakers...but we had little choice - and besides, we're always happy to confirm stereotypes that other people have about Americans. We headed back to the station to catch the 2:00 Express back to the airport so we could check in.

When we arrived back at the airport, we proceeded to the United counter to check in. It was at this point we felt like we had been kicked in the stomachs because the United rep informed us that they had no reservation or flight record for us on any United flight leaving Narita at any time that day. We gave them every piece of paper we had to show that KAL had changed our routing, and they still had nothing in their system. They laid out our options and the best one was to try to fly stand-by on the 5:30 flight we thought we had been confirmed onto. However, all their flights leaving Narita that day were sold out - and most were oversold; they told us that it was possible that only 1 of us would get out today. We were placed on the stand-by list, instructed to hang out near the check-in counter, and to check back at 4:30 when the flight should be closed for boarding. Our minds were racing as fast as our hopes were disappearing. All the good energy we had amassed during the trip to Tokyo - the seeming flawlessness of our plans - seemed to evaporate.

A nervous 45 minutes passed (okay - admittedly, Michelle handled it much better than I did...I was just so deflated and feeling that all the good karma we had experienced during the day in Tokyo City had used up our allotment). During that time, we determined our contingency plans since we knew we would have to decide immediately at 4;30 what we would do. We agreed that we would take any seat on the plan - even a middle seat trapped between two sumo wrestlers, if needed. We decided that if only 1 of us could get out, we should take at least that and get one of us stateside. We agreed to pursue reimbursement for any additional nights stay in Japan from KAL should we need it. And finally, we agreed that Michelle would stay behind if we needed to separate.

At this point, it's worth noting that Michelle has been snake-bitten while traveling thru Narita. On two separate return trips from Asia via Narita (one from Hong Kong and one from Thailand), she has missed connections and been required to fly out a day later than planned, and been re-routed as part of the experience. It appeared likely that we would be facing the same outcome yet again. Which, indeed, was part of the reason we had liked the original itinerary that routed us thru Seoul/Incheon and enabled us to avoid Narita.

At 4:20 went back to the counter. It was a bit earlier than they instructed us for one main reason: they had already told us that, at best, we would have 45 minutes to get from check-in thru immigration, customs and security and to get all the way to our gate which was at the far end of the terminal. They made it clear that 45 minutes was possibly not enough time, so that even if we got ticketed at the United check-in counter, we could miss the flight if we got delayed at any of those chokepoints. (Again, I'm thinking the odds were against us.) United was unable to confirm seats for us at that time, but did tell us it "looked good" and gave us forms to get beyond the security checkpoints without boarding passes. They told us to "hurry" to the gate to try to check in there. We bolted on our mission.

We paced a steady clip, slalomed through the maze of people who were in our way, and made it thru all the checkpoints and got to the gate in about 25 minutes at 4:50, slightly out of breath and definitely sweating. We checked in at the gate, and they had confirmed seats for us - next to one another and in the Economy Plus section to boot (which meant 3 inches more legroom than the rest of coach). It appeared that the travel gods were smiling on us. We ran quickly to get some bottled water, grabbed a bite to eat on the flight now that our stomachs could actually accept food - and then returned to board the plane immediately. Our luck continued when we got on the plane because we were assigned 2 interior seats in a 5-seat row, but someone actually wanted to trade with us, so we got an aisle and the next seat in.

It was at that point, we sighed deeply - knew our travel adventures were behind us, and felt such huge relief at seeing the little map on the display console showing the flight route ending in "Seattle", where we would arrive less than 9 hours later. We departed Narita at on time at 5:30 p.m Saturday local time and arrived in Seattle at 8:30 a.m. Saturday PT. The long journey over - and given what we had just been through in the final 28 hours or so, it felt like the trip to Vietnam had been days ago.

We've had fun keeping you all up to date...blogging sure beats sending postcards!! We'll post some photos this weekend now that we finally have a reliable USB connection and share with you some of the visuals from the trip. Travel snafus and all other annoyances aside, this was a wonderful trip - and Vietnam is definitely worth a trip if you're at all considering it. We'd be happy to help any of you (or your friends/relatives) who are planning a trip there - just e-mail one of us.

Happy to be at home typing this...Dorothy was right, "There's no place like home".

A funny thing happened on the way out of Vietnam

When you travel abroad, you expect something substantial to go wrong - so you just deal with it when it happens. We hadn't had any major issues while we were in-country, and considered ourselves fortunate. Perhaps it also lulled us into thinking we had gotten away from the travel gremlins altogether. Not so much.

Turns out, the pilots for our carrier (Korean Air Lines) staged a walk-out starting the day before we left, which caused our flight from Seoul to Seattle to be canceled. Later, we learned that over 1/2 their flights were scrubbed, so we considered ourselves just part of the collateral damage. We were notified when we arrived in the Hanoi airport (we flew from HCMC to Hanoi prior to flying on to Seoul) by the KAL rep who just approached us out of the blue and asked for our tickets as we were standing in line waiting to check in for our KAL flight.

He took us over to another airline counter - and we got excited because it was Japan Air Lines (JAL) and we had instant visions of delicious sushi and gracious service for the in-flight meal. Our hopes were dashed, however, when the JAL people shuffled us off to the Vietnam Airlines desk. Yes - back on Vietnam Airlines again, which meant a notch below for the service level - and even though it was a 777, we didn't get to use a jetway (we're convinced VAL just doesn't pay the higher fees to use gates that actually have jetways). But now we were routed from Hanoi to Narita/Tokyo instead of Seoul - and on United Air Lines from Narita/Tokyo to Seattle.

So, all in all, it was a pretty minor change - and the net result was that we had a shorter layover and actually arrived into Seattle a few hours earlier than originally planned. Unfortunately, Vietnam Air Lines was not able to check us in all the way through, so we knew we'd have to check in again at the United counter in Narita.

What we wish could come back with us...

Also we thought about things that we wish we could have in the US that we had in Vietnam:

5. Fresh fruit juice at every restaurant (more than just orange juice)
4. Consistently ripe tropical fruits such as dragon fruit, ramboutan, mango, papaya, pineapple
3. Palm trees everywhere you look
2. Bun Cha, Fresh baguettes (available streetside), and pho for breakfast
1. "Four-hand" massage for $30 - at a reputable spa

What we look forward to back stateside...

While we've really enjoyed this trip, just today at breakfast we allowed ourselves the chance to reflect on what we're excited about returning to:

10. Karate class (that's really just from Michelle; Todd has appreciated this trip because it provides a ironclad excuse for not going to the gym)
9. Reliable drinking water and ice cubes in restaurants
8. Consistently fast internet connections
7. When we're ill, we're ill in familiar surroundings!
6. Mexican food!!!!
5. Sullen, inattentive sales clerks in stores who don't hassle us to buy and prices that are non-negotiable (no more dividing by 16,000!!!)
4. Mostly reliable public restrooms and sinks with soap
3. Our own shower with consistent water pressure and hot water
2. Cooler weather (yeah, feel free to remind us of that one when we complain it's too cold or rainy!!)
1. Seeing friends and family

Top things we will NOT miss

Vietnam is a fantastic place to visit - and we'd recommend it to any of you reading this. We would certainly visit again, but until then there are some things we will not miss:

9. Lin from Hoi An who shadowed us for 2 days to come to her tailor shop in the market. After making a vague promise to visit the 1st day, we were shocked that she spotted us on day 2 and began to follow us again. She was the catalyst for us to begin speaking in German and Russian.
8. Having to divide by 16,000 in order to do mental currency conversions and figure out how much in $USD something costs.
7. Being on the lookout to avoid chicken, eggs...or anything that might have chicken or eggs in it. Okay, we lied in an earlier blog - most places have no chickens, but many do still offer it on the menu and in Hoi An and even outside HCMC we saw them in people's yards. We just didn't want to worry anyone by telling that part earlier (that's you, Mom!).
6. The inconsistent state of public restrooms and having to carry a supply of toilet paper and hand sanitizer with us whenever we left the hotel.
5. The cacophony of honking from vehicles in Hanoi - it starts before 6:30 am there and doesn't end until late in the night, usually 10:30.
4. The benzene smell from the moto-bikes (mostly in Hanoi) that makes you forget what fresh air smells like.
3. In museums, propaganda about "the American devil" - it wasn't completely unexpected, and in some ways might be understandable, but it was still pretty intolerable in some exhibits. Despite what the reader boards at the Hanoi "Hilton" prison stated, we don't believe for a minute that our POW's were treated as "guests".
2. Being verbally (and sometimes physically) poked and prodded to buy whatever the person is selling. Having every smile from us met with "You buy from me?" which really makes you want to stop smiling at people - or, as we did, dust off your high-school/college foreign language skills to end the conversation and make them stop following you.
1. The heat and humidity - and more critically, the volume of sweat they produce. To feel clean at mid-day is something we look forward to once again.

Top things we will miss...

Direct from the home office in Saigon...the top things we will miss about Vietnam:
10. Hanoi's Old Quarter and Hoan Kiem Lake.
9. Warm or cold facecloths to start every meal.
8. Fresh fruit juices - all day long (with no ice, please).
7. Three words: Ana Mandara Resort (in Nha Trang).
6. Authentic Vietnamese food - even pho in America won't taste quite as good now that we've had the real thing. And the ice cream is incredible (of course, it ought to taste good when it's so hot here!). Food bought from street stalls: fresh baguettes with cheese, pain au chocolat, nem sai gon and bun cha. Beef cooked on Roof Tile at the Ben Thanh market.
5. The tailor shops in Hoi An - high quality workmanship and so, so , so inexpensive to have clothes made
4. The exchange rate in our favor: pho for 50 cents. Heineken for 75 cents. Pain au chocolat for 30 cents. Baguette w/cheese for 35 cents.
3. Lucious and delicious fruit for breakfast that we knew (mango, melon, papaya, pineapple, longan) and that we never knew before (jackfruit, dragon fruit, ramboutan, chinese apples).
2. Our Hanoi "Breakfast of Champions": pho from a sidewalk stall early in the morning, seated in tiny plastic chairs next to schoolchildren
1. The people: their quiet dignity & friendliness toward foreigners. From Michelle's family whom we met for the first time to complete strangers - everyone has a story about America to tell...we never heard a negative word, except in the official propaganda films at some of the sites. The people are truly gracious.

How you know when you're ready to leave...

Usually at some point in an extended vacation you reach a point where you're just ready to leave and return home. That point came Thursday morning for us as we set out to visit the HCMC's Cholon district, which is the "chinatown" area of the city.

We had considered walking to it, but got advice from the concierge to cab it since it was about 7 km away from our hotel (yes, this really is a sprawling, teeming city). We started out easy enough at a church where in 1963 the S. Vietnamese President hid while fleeing a coup. Well, he didn't hide so well because they found him, captured him, and killed him on the ride back downtown. Two historical notes to ponder: (1) that President (Diem) had been put into office by the US; (2) the coup to oust him was supported by the US. Discuss amongst yourselves.

After leaving the church, we also easily found an amazing temple - very beautiful and still very active. Many people were praying in it - constant flood of people coming in and out and burning incense. Pretty moving stuff to watch.

After that, the wheels came off. We walked and walked and walked trying to find this major market listed in the guidebook - and kept ending up on major thoroughfares that were not listed in our Lonely Planet map of Cholon. It was hot, the streets were pretty dirty, we couldn't find a decent bathroom, and we were hopelessly lost. So, we did what any right-thinking traveler would do: we hailed a cab and beat a trail back to our hotel - at that point, it was the best $4 decision we could make. Frankly, we had seen everything we wanted to, and it was all beginning to look the same.

That's the point I was talking about - and if you've hit it before while traveling you'll know to what I'm referring: the moment when nothing is exciting or interesting anymore and you just want to go back to your hotel and read your book. I guess it's a saturation point, if nothing else.

It reminded us of an amusing comment a fellow traveler had made earlier on this vacation. On our trip to Cat Ba Island, we had the opportunity to trek into a number of limstone caves - each cave had a lot of steps to climb up and down in order to enter, and it was pretty stifling hot. Everyone was getting pretty sweaty and we still had about 1.5 hours until we reached our final destination. Everyone entered cave 1 - and then after we hiked to cave 2, the guide gave us the option of entering or not, but he clearly encouraged everyone to enter. One guy was the first to decline the offer, and the guide asked him why he wasn't going into Cave 2. In heavily accented English (the traveler was from Israel), he said "Seen Cave 1....then have seen cave 2". A cave is a cave is a cave, sometimes - at least when you're reached the saturation point.

We recovered from our saturation point enough to cab out to a Qi Shiseido spa (thanks for the recommendation, Janice!). Amazing services - we each got a one-hour "four-hand" massage for $30 USD - that's two people working on you at once. For an hour. For only $30. Did I mention two people working on you at the same time?!?! That helped our attitudes greatly, and we headed back downtown for our last night in HCMC, where I got to have the Beef Cooked on Roof Tile at the market stall. I'm gonna miss that dish!

We leave Friday night (that's tonight, local time) - so today will be spent on last-minute purchases and, time permitting, trying to find the house where Michelle's mother's family lived after leaving Hanoi in 1954. We've had little success finding it on a map - but are hopeful we can track it down.

These are a few of our favorite things...

Surprisingly to us, the food in the south has been very different from that of the north. It really shouldn't shock us - that's probably just our own myopic view of things getting in the way. After all, Vietnam is as long as Italy and we have no problem comprehending regional differences in cuisine there...so we learned there are the same types of regional differences here.

Tuesday night we ate at a food stall in one of the major outdoor markets in HCMC. We searched out the one that was most crowded with locals - and figured the food would be both safe and delicious (well, and cheap) there. We made good assumptions all around. First of all, bottles of Heineken went for 75 cents each. That alone is good in my book. But the rest of the meal was delicious too. Michelle ordered Beef on Roof Tile - which I thought was just a really metaphoric name for the dish until they brought out a metal hibachi with wood charcoal, placed a clay roof tile on top and instructed us how to cook the slices of raw beef on the tile. Turns out, they name food items quite literally here. It tasted delicious. I had BBQ pork skewers with rice vermicelli. We've concluded that grilled meat pretty much tastes good in any cuisine. And, did you remember that the Heinekens were 75 cents each...? All told, a tasty dinner for two with beer for $5 USD.

Tuesday night and Wednesday afternoon we continued our quest to sample as much ice cream as possible while in country. Both were good, but the Weds afternoon sampling was on the top floor of the tallest building in Vietnam - and the view was incredible. HCMC really sprawls...it was city as far as the eye could see. And the ice cream was pretty good too, albeit expensive. However, what can you expect when you have a bird's-eye view of the metropolis from 33 stories up? You know, for a Communist country they sure do understand market pricing theory!!

So, how many ways can one ingest rice? That's the true riddle of Vietnam. Rice is used in so many ways - steamed rice, rice paper, rice noodles (of all widths - thick & thin), rice pancakes, fried rice...we were informed that rice is Vietnam's #1 agricultural crop - and we believe it after all the ways we see it used. Only Thailand exports more rice worldwide than Vietnam. Okay , I'll stop now - when I conceived of a blog for this trip, I never would have bet money that I'd wax about rice for an entire paragraph :-)

Reminders of War

Today we visited a site about 70km northwest of HCMC, called Cu Chi - where there exists a network of underground tunnels that the VietCong used in wars against both the French and the Americans. Pretty eerie stuff - especially since you can walk through some of the very tunnels used by the VC. "Really small space" was our first impression. Then the guide told us that additional space had been carved out to accommodate Western tourists. Made us feel real good at that point.

We were able to view an original tunnel section which had not been expanded - and it was even tinier. Michelle entered that section, but quickly exited it as she barely fit. I did not even try. The propaganda film prior to the tour was as we expected...I think I heard the term "devil" applied to America a couple times.

After returning to the city, we toured the Presidential / Independence / Re-unification Palace. It's been referred to as all 3 during various points of its life, so call it what you want. This is where the President of the South Vietnam Republic lived and held office, the equivalent of the White House for us. It's pretty impressive - kind of beautiful in that 1960s sort of way that the United Nations Building in NYC looks. There was also a propaganda film at the end of this tour - oh well, what did we really expect, anyway? We have it in our country, too - it's just called "spin" so we can sanitize it.

You know, as we've viewed the different exhibits about the war here, it's easy to draw some similarities to current issues the US faces in Iraq. Same storyline - those who plan the war rarely fought in one - and the people we're fighting against work in small groups, believe passionately against the US, and are willing to sacrifice their lives for their beliefs. This trip certainly brings some of that recognition to the surface for us.

Oh - the weather outside is frightful...

...but the air conditioning is delightful! Yes, we've arrived safely in balmy Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), also known as Saigon -- our last leg of the trip. And while it's less humid than Hoi An or Nha Trang, it's a lot warmer. It was 94 degrees with 80+% humidity today. We now have keen eyes for water vendors and ice cream shops. Our ice cream stop today was at 11:00 a.m. and we had no shame in that - we're already planning to get more this afternoon.

We're staying at the Majestic Hotel - cool place that was renovated back to its original charm a few years back; and right on the river. Today we saw the Museum of War Remnants - mostly a collection of photographs, but by far the most even-handed display about the war decades. We tried to visit the old Presidential Palace - the one in the famous photo from the fall of Saigon with the N. Vietnamese tanks crashing through the iron gates, but it was closed for an official reception. We also walked by the old US Embassy - which is now the current US Consulate. Couldn't see too much because it's completely walled off.

After all that, we were pretty hot so we cabbed it back to the hotel and took a dip in the pool until we recalibrated to a normal body temp. One oddity is that the streets in this district are totally decked out for the holidays. Our hotel has two different trees in the lobby, a fake snow scene on the front door, and a mock fireplace with a gingerbread house on the mock mantel. Most of the hotels and many stores and restaurants also have similar decorations. The ice cream shop this morning had little snowmen suspended all around the windows. It struck us as extremely surreal to see snowmen in a country this hot! We'll write more later...

Life's a beach...

Well at least our life today was a beach, or more accurately - on the beach. We pretty much slacked the entire day away on the sand in front of our villa, reading bad paperback crime novels and watching the waves crash on shore. Of course, we did have to make the difficult decision about exactly what lunch and fruit drinks to have delivered to our lounge chairs, and then once or twice we took the long 20-yard trek back to the villa to get something else to read or to use the bathroom. Other than that, we didn't move a lick for over 7 hours.

We even stayed out there during a rainstorm - about an hour or so of time, but hey - it was unlike those Seattle rains. This rain felt warm and occurred when the air temperature was about 85 degrees (who knew rain could be like that?). No Goretex needed for us! Besides, we were sheltered on lounge chairs under a thatched roof umbrella - that's my idea of riding out a storm.

Today is our last night in Nha Trang - and tomorrow afternoon we fly to Ho Chi Minh City (formerly known as Saigon). That's the last stop for us on this trip - and we are sad that we have only 5 days left before leaving Friday night to head back stateside. Somehow it has gone both slowly and quickly at the same time.

This section of the trip was so relaxing and enjoyable - and I'm still trying to figure out how I can hatch a scheme to just stay the balance of our trip here and skip HCMC...alas, that scenario seems unlikely given that it would eat up significant budget. It's times like this one that I really wish both of us were less innately driven by managing scope and budget!!

Oh well, as much as we've enjoyed this respite, it will be fun to get back to real Vietnamese street/city experiences, not just a resort. Wait a minute - who am I kidding? This is the cleanest we've felt since we left Seattle!

So, it's time for feeling travel-grungy again; you know, that state you're in when you travel to a really hot country and you realize that you have become those tourists that you normally move away from because they smell. We'll post from somewhere in HCMC after we get settled in. Translation for those who might have missed earlier posts from our first days in a new city: "getting settled in" means we will proceed to get lost in yet another Vietnamese city and walk around in circles refusing to take out our Lonely Planet guide with the map for fear of being seen as tourists. Yeah - because taking out the guidebook is the only clue that we're not local.

Did I mention that I'm both the whitest and tallest person around except for the people we spot from Germany? Later...

Paradise Found

We're not sure if the plane actually crashed and we ended up in heaven, or what. But this place is unbelieveable. We're in Nha Trang - or more accurate, we're at a beach resort in Nha Trang. The city itself is pretty much like all others we've been in. But the resort is beyond description. I keep expecting to turn the corner and see Tattoo or Mr. Rourke walking towards me. It's that good.

Michelle had targeted this place to stay and we agreed this would be the one "splurge" on the trip. We just had no idea of exactly how nice it would be until we got here. More correctly, the fact that this part of our trip would be so very nice and so very different began to set in when we arrived at the Nha Trang airport. We got to the baggage claim area and were greeted by a representative of the resort who informed us that a porter would claim our bags for us. We were then ushered to a running, air-conditioned van, given a moist washcloth to freshen up, then handed ice cold bottles of water. Bottles of water that were covered in thin burlap bags so that the condensation on the outside of the bottle wouldn't drip onto us. We were stylin'.

It only got better as we arrived at the resort and were offered fresh juice or champagne, then taken to see our private villa and given a tour of the grounds. Our villa overlooks the ocean and opens onto the beach. We have a lanai with chairs and table - and our room is easily as large as the first two hotel rooms we stayed in put together. Of course, the room cost is easily as much as what we've paid this whole trip so far, but hey - as long as we meet the budget, it's okay.

It's a very different experience from the rest of the trip - and we certainly enjoyed the past few weeks as we really experienced life as local Vietnamese for the most part: eating pho and other meals from sidewalk stalls, walking everywhere, avoiding moto-bikes being driven with abandon. But, we also really enjoy this life too - everyone calling me "Mr. Todd", getting scented pillows at night to enhance our rest, a spa on site, dining at tables on the beach, taking a hot bath in clean-enough looking water, not sweating every minute of the darn day. I've realized that I would have been quite comfortable in the trappings of a colonial governor in SE Asia back in the day.

We'll post more if we can pull ourselves away from the busy-ness of doing absolutely nothing other than ordering pina coladas while sitting on the beach. Hope that snow in Chicago is treating you all well ;-)

D for Dee-lightful = Hoi An

All the guidebooks and articles about Vietnam we read recommended staying for a while in Hoi An - and they were spot-on with their praise. Granted, we spent the first day getting lost in yet another "old quarter" of yet another Vietnamese city, but since then it's been delightful.

We learned a few useful phrases for dealing with overly agressive street-hawkers. I use rudimentary German phrases like "Sprechen Sie Deutsch? Ich nicht verstehen Englisch." and then whatever else I can pull out of my memory. Michelle waxes poetic in Russian and inquires of the person if it will snow soon. At that juncture in either of the conversations, the vendor usually gets the hint that there's easier pickings somewhere else. Ah - everything we needed to learn to survive in Vietnam we learned in the 1st semester of foreign language classes!

Hoi An differs from Hanoi in two main features: physical size and population; Hoi An is much smaller by both measures. In fact, the Old Quarter in Hanoi has 50+ streets; Hoi An's old town has about 12. However, that didn't deter us from getting lost all the same. In fact, it was more frustrating when we got lost given that the town is so small. However, every other store is a tailor or sells shoes or purses, so it's easy for each intersection to look like the last :-)

The old quarter also includes a number of historic homes dating back 300 years when merchants from China and Japan settled permanently here - many are being restored and preserved as part of a UN Heritage Site program. We took a walking tour of some of them. The seaport has been active since the 2nd century AD, and was visited by many merchants from Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. For many hours of the day, moto-bikes and cars are prohibited from the streets (another difference from Hanoi). All in all, a much slower, and MUCH, MUCH quieter pace of life (which enables one to sleep in later, too!).

On to the damage: Michelle had 7 pairs of sandals or shoes made to measure (at $5 per pair, she claims 'who could resist?') plus a new wardrobe (I'm not sure who else she was being fitted for, but she assures me not to worry). I, on the other hand, drew the line at a dozen tailor-made shirts. You know, when they only charge $10 USD per shirt, there is no such thing as excess.

We also splurged tonight on dinner and had some fresh local seafood: calamari, crab and red snapper. That set us back a whopping $15 - which is what we've spent on food for some entire days in Hoi An. Fresh warm baguettes and french cheese is available for 35 cents on the street corners. Mmmmm! On our next trip, we would definitely spend another day or so here...after all, there are an awful lot of fittings involved in the tailoring process. On the bright side, we wouldn't have to go through the arduous process of selecting (and navigating back to) a particular tailor again - we found a keeper for sure.

Tomorrow early afternoon we fly to Nha Trang, which is a true beach resort. Because we haven't been hedonistic enough just yet ;-) Hope you all are doing well.

Top 5 reasons we haven't posted during our Hoi An visit

5. We've been too busy going in and out of tailor shops for fittings
4. Hoi An is much quieter than Hanoi - no honking moto-bikes at 6am, so we've been sleeping in past 8:00 every day
3. Computer access stinks - even when they claim a DSL connection, it's really, really slow - and we've been bumped off Blogspot twice before we got to save the posting
2. Our hotel is paradise - palm tree-lined courtyard, really efficient air-conditioner in the room, fresh flowers and fresh fruit every day - heck, we've come back during the day for naps!
...and the top reason:
1. It's bloody hot & humid here. Hot, hot, Africa hot. Hot enough to make me realize I'm a wimp when it comes to hot weather. And couple that humidity & heat with slow computer times - that's a recipe for long lapses between postings.

We'll make up for it with some more posts tonight before we head out Friday for Nha Trang.

"Is No Chicken. Chicken Will Kill You..."

...or so said our Vietnamese cabin-mate during our overnight train from Hanoi to DaNang. His statement was in response to my question to Michelle about what exactly the mystery meat was in her lunch that was included in the train fare. Chicken or not, it looked dicey - and, given my tender stomach at the time, I opted out. Even Michelle (who in Russia ate yogurt that sat unrefrigerated for days) declined to partake of it. Fortunately, we had stocked up on banana bread from the bakery in Hanoi before we left.

On the train ride we viewed some amazing scenery during the morning between Hue and DaNang: beaches & ocean to the east, mountains & jungle to the west as we climbed through Hai Vong pass. The rest of the train ride...ehhh, at least it was better than trains in Russia (e.g., bedding was included in the fare price and the restrooms were clean). However, it felt like it was about 100 degrees in the cabin overnight, which was a tad toasty for an "air conditioned sleeper". Our cabin-mate, Troung (which means "school") works for the Saigon Railway Station and had many informative insights about the Vietnamese train system. Of course, he also ate the mystery meat without hesitation, so I'm unsure how credible he really is after all :-)

We got to DaNang convinced we could find and walk to the transit station to catch a bus to Hoi An, which is about 30km away. Clearly we were suffering from the delusion of navigational mastery we had finally attained in Hanoi after staying there 5 days. We walked and walked and walked - and it was about 90 degrees and very humid. We lasted about 1 km, and then walked into a Ford dealership (!) to ask directions. The guy there told us it was another 2-3 km away. Disheartened and very hot & tired, we accepted a ride from this "taxi" that had been tailing us for the better part of our walk. Even though we had turned down several offers of a ride from them because I wasn't feeling very secure about them, at this point I figured being robbed might actually be less painful than sweating in the hot sun with a travel backpack loaded on me as if I were a pack mule. That, plus we really had no clue where we were going - because the bus station had moved since the map in Lonely Planet was published :-)

Turns out the guys were legit and for only $7 USD they drove us to Hoi An. Of course, we had an obligatory stop at a "souvenir shop" - this one a marble workshop. Cool stuff, but I didn't want to carry a 6-foot tall marble Buddha on the rest of the trip. We had to wait there for 20 minutes. Other taxis/minibuses came too. I was inspired when in one of them I saw the passenger upon arrival clearly decline to stop & request the driver to proceed to their destination - and just that easy, the driver acquiesced and did not make them stop. Ah-ha, now I knew what to do! So when after leaving the first place, our driver pulled into another to stop, I told him "no - just go to Hoi An - no more stops until Hoi An"...and he did. Whew - how easy that was.

More on Hoi An in a later post...it's been dreamy!