Jizzy's adventures in SE Asia

[Paddo Colt 61]

You started it buddy at #13 with your Left threat to "democracy".

MR has the good manners to feign enthusiasm for the blow by blow holiday but, apart from the occasional street food, Bangkok is a dump and we can't be persuaded otherwise.

[ism22]

Update on yesterday...

- Yesterday was more of a rest day where we went back to Bangkok from the waterpark resort. We dawdled about after the buffet breakfast and got a little bit of our energy back (my wife's got a sick tummy so is struggling a bit). The ride home in one of those awesome Hiaces from Japan (oldish but feature full - limousine style) was comfy and there was no scamming (thus the guy got a decent tip). However, it took about 4 hours through dense traffic so I'm glad we had a few empty water bottle for our son.

- Dinner was at the local (lower-key) mall. Think I've said it but IMO convenience stores and popular chains are under-rated when travelling.

- This morning I'm just grabbing a quick coffee while the others sleep in. I'm no coffee snob or anything but IMO they do a surprisingly good coffee here with regards to the basics. The barista downstairs from the hotel just pulled out a quality cappuccino, presumably without hipster beans and $$$ special milk. The coffee's the right temp (not burned) and the milk's perfectly sweet/creamy. Loving it!

- Will leave for the airport soon. Next stop Hanoi... which should be a bit cooler, so I'm hoping to get a decent run in. Also I seem to have won the arm wrestle about dinner with my father in-law. He ALWAYS says that river snails are the 'local speciality' and finds a place that serves nothing other than them & a side of morning glory. IMO this pollutes my opinions about Vietnamese food as such dinners make me wanna puke and leave me nibbling on little sprigs of morning glory. They then keep saying 'driiink... drink some hard liquor!!!' and get all confused when I say 'NOOOO!!! I DO NOT WANT HARD LIQUOR, SNAILS AND MORNING GLORY!!! BAD MIX FOR MY FOREIGN STOMACH!!!' This time I said a hard no to the father in-law's choice (surprise surprise - a snail shop that he promised 'has everything' and is 'the local specialty' [for snail fans]). Did a web search. Snails don't feature... don't wanna be a tool but I demanded a place that features on most western (and Vietnamese) travel guides. Snails. Again I dunno the local culture but they're not showing up on any of the fine dining guides.

[ism22]

You started it buddy at #13 with your Left threat to "democracy".

MR has the good manners to feign enthusiasm for the blow by blow holiday but, apart from the occasional street food, Bangkok is a dump and we can't be persuaded otherwise.

LOLz so be it... Jizzy's holiday wouldn't be complete without Paeddo 69's skepticism and anti-western (plus anti-eastern in this case) rants.

Glad it's my holiday and not yours. The developing world is clearly very different from the luxuries you're used to. This is what we're trying to explain to you about China and Russia. Glad that weed, John Menadue and a first year arts subject have taught you more about the world than any first hand experience could possibly do, however.

[ism22]

Just landed in Hanoi BTW.

[ism22]

Quick post about Hanoi... it's about 20'C and humid as (feels at least 30'C). However, people are rugged up in their arctic jackets as if this is freezing weather. Power to them I suppose.

After my food rant, we got bun cha from a popular restaurant (owns shops on either side of the road and serves up bun cha at street-style tables as their only dish). Was pretty awesome.

Next to us at the table there was a couple going on a blind date. The dude was all kitted up like a pop star in a pink jacket and the girl was all dolled up in a ball gown. Was pretty cute watching them slowly connect with each other while we smashed down a heap of street, while still all yucky from the flight.

Did a 10km run around one of the lakes. Comparison? Look the city's streets are tiny and there's way more crazy scooter riders so I physically can't run around the streets. However there's a well lit lake with a massive temple in the middle that you can run around as there's a paved area. Not expecting the people to dodge me, but I had to be pretty careful as there's a lot of people about and all the noise/chaos means they can't hear/see a runner coming. Often there's big gaps for me to run through (for example) and while I'm running forward, people will be walking into me, blocking my path (instead of continuing to walk in straight lines). It was like a crazy obstacle course. Kinda strange... I developed a technique where I'd start faking to go one way and then going the other as it literally tricked them into walking away from me instead of into me. Anyway, that was a hectic run and while it's 'cooler' here, the humidity (and probably pollution) were subjectively much higher IMO.

Meh I'm tired and had better sleep. Big day ahead and I'm hoping it's lotsa fun!

[ism22]

Today I took a photo for Paddo because I love him long time...



This is possibly the only remaining statue of this size/scale still out there in the open.

We also had morning tea in an awesome commie bunker. Egg & condensed milk coffee before a visit to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum.

[ism22]

Morning tea in a commie bunker near Uncle Ho's mausoleum ... pretty awesome!

[ism22]

Updates... still in Hanoi. More runs (did one around their ~17km lake this morning). Went to a big mall and some temples yesterday. Afterwards I hung put with my son in a playground for a few hours while my wife / in-laws did some Vietnamese stuff. A nice rest for us all. Worth noting my son's far more popular than I am, so I just let him play with the locals while I had a snooze (near some mall that's designed to look like Ukranian architecture FWIW).

Um. Lotsa micro details that I won't delve into. Not homesick but I do learn to better appreciate...

- Being able to use streets without constantly competing with people. Won't say people are 'rude' but there's no concept of courtesy (e.g. not blocking the pathway / pushing people off it) or respecting people's personal space (e.g. not bumping me every time you walk past).

- A light breakfast inside my own personal bubble. I dunno if they really have a concept of breakfast here as all the vendors will sell the same stuff for breakfast/lunch/dinner. I'm glad that I've got my running as breakfast's pretty rough (everything's too heavy / adventurous) and the 'western' style cafes are basically full of obese, grey, expressionless Russians / French / Americans who are chain smoking, making the only 'comfortable' venues completely inaccessible (cough cough cough... there's already enough pollution guys!)

Our hotel has a (legit) massage joint upstairs. After lunch (which should be sweet) I might go up there for a bit of relaxation / rejuvenation. Feeling a bit stiff from today's run so this could go down well.

Okie enough rambling. Time to get out there!

[ism22]

I eat my words about the food... lunch was awesome! (I got to choose and just picked a place off a travel site).

Walking around all day loosened up my running muscles so I don't really need that massage (though might anyway as it's our last night in Hanoi).

Just did a whole city tour on an open top bus. Grabbing some Cantonese for dinner.

[ism22]

My posts are slowing down a bit as I'm super busy and having a great time.

Last night after dinner I enjoyed a pizza and a deep chat with my father in-law on his balcony (he had the premium suite at the hotel so it had a pretty sweet view all over Hanoi). We downed a nice bottle of scotch too... it's really awesome to be enjoying Vietnam and also getting to know that side of my family better.

Before that my son hired an electric tank and drove it around central Hanoi (they close-off the central lake to cars/scooters at night so you get lotsa clear space, markets, people playing games / music / dancing...etc). A dude came up while my son was riding the tank around and asked if we're from Russia. Won't share as it's private but I got some pretty awesome footage of him going around the lake...etc. He rented it for 20 minutes and went about 3km so it was a solid ride.

Today we're in Quy Nhơn (central Vietnam) where by father in-law is from. We skipped breakfast and lunch as we were busy with traffic and flights. However, we got another egg coffee before leaving Hanoi, which was nice (my son had the kids version which he says 'tastes like cookie dough'). Calling it 'egg coffee' probably doesn't do it any justice - the 'egg' is beaten really heavily and sweetened with nutmeg / condensed milk. My guess is that it's the local way of making coffee sweet/creamy when you don't have access to fresh milk or an espresso machine. Whaddo I know! It's a surprisingly decent start to the day whatever it is.

In Quy Nhơn we got a solid (large) dinner and ai suspect we'll get a pretty similar spread at our cousin's farmhouse (old-school style with no electricity...etc) tomorrow, served with some stiff turps (they do a rice wine that you can get drunk off sniffing the vapours of). The restaurant (which is an original building that's been renovated) was done up with lotsa fun commie propaganda and old style furniture. I'll upload a few pics of it later on as it's pretty cool.

TBH this is probably my favourite part of Vietnam as it's got a MASSIVE beach (with walkways along it - no scooters...etc running you down) and people are more chilled. Hard to talk about the fact everybody's poor but IMO it's just a feature of the place. Sure some people are loaded (as in very very rich) but your average person's over-worked, earns pittance, will live in a tiny little apartment (in Hanoi many have no windows and are sorta 'down a narrow passageway') and won't have a lot of headspace for anything other than their task at hand (understandably).

Where I am now it's pretty different as there's seemingly less people and less pressure. As I went for my jog along the beach today (after a full buffet + a few beers... slooow and steady!!!) lots of kids were playing in the park and saying 'HELLO!!!', smiling at me or encouraging me. Of course, my presence is not important to anybody (and shouldn't be) but I think the fact people have headspace for games and polite greetings says something about the community. If anybody's planning a holiday then I'd totally go here as you can stay in some lovely hotels with panoramic views for chips (the one I'm at is cheap & western-standard luxury... some aren't up to scratch but this one is!) Also, you can walk around without risking your life... which I say honestly... crossing the road here is a shyte because nobody obeys traffic signals and you're just walking out into a sea of scooters that swerve all about the place. Not here... you can easily cross the road to the beach using an underpass and both sides of the main strip are completely clear (aside from the odd street vendor).

That's about it from me tonight ay. Hope somebody enjoyed reading it. I'll try to find a photo or two to post later on as we're getting to the good part of the trip. However I think most of the good ones have either me (who I'm guessing one or two people on here know by fiest / last name anyway) or my family.

[King Salvo]

Today I took a photo for Paddo because I love him long time...



This is possibly the only remaining statue of this size/scale still out there in the open.

We also had morning tea in an awesome commie bunker. Egg & condensed milk coffee before a visit to Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum.

You don't have to buy flowers and bow in front of that statue like people in North Korea (Kim Statues) which is mandatory even for tourists.- Cult of Personality clap trap

[ism22]

You don't have to buy flowers and bow in front of that statue like people in North Korea (Kim Statues) which is mandatory even for tourists.- Cult of Personality clap trap

Nah they have the big statues but anecdotally the government doesn't really interfere with people's everyday lives.

I think the main nuance is that you'd get in a lot of shyte if you actively criticised the government or published materials that brought into question the government's official version of history.

IMO it's reaching a stage where some people may not agree with what happened during the Vietnam War. However, they're happy that Vietnam's independent and it's starting to see some solid economic growth (roughly 8% per annum, which is much better than most of the region, including China right now). If you get most locals a bit tipsy, I think they've mostly moved on from the Vietnam war. Their concern today is China progressively trying to claim various islands and the like (there's many land disputes).

China calls Vietnam a 'western puppet' today, which is ludicrous when you take a step back and remember who Ho Chi Minh is. IMO the bare reality is that China wants them to be a 'little China' as they are 'communist'. However in reality no countries are really 'communist' and Vietnam's a friendly country that just wants to see its economy + quality of life grow (who doesn't!)

While China and Russia love taunting 'the west', Vietnam hasn't adopted that model. Instead it's opening up to the world and IMO is quite an exciting place to be. I recommend people visit at least once as it can be done quite comfortably.

As a retro electronics dude, it doesn't have all the gaming gear you can get in Japan. However, it uses 230v and you can get a LOT of vintage AV gear here. I wish I had a shipping container as there's some awesome CRTs and stereo sound systems going for reasonable prices. Lots of funky art too... I might dress-up my mancave with some of it.

[ism22]

There's a view of it BTW - lovely place!

[Andrew Walker]

My eldest Brother spent 6 weeks in Vietnam late last year Nothing but rave reviews about the place

[ism22]

My eldest Brother spent 6 weeks in Vietnam late last year Nothing but rave reviews about the place

That's good to hear! Do you know where he visited?

IMO it's a great time to be visiting as there's a sense of energy / growth around the place and it's only gonna get better over time as it develops. You can see from a lot of new infrastructure that travel's becoming easier and they're factoring in more public spaces...etc where people can chill.