Worldwide Woman

Hitting our stride in Cambodia

Marshall — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:06:27 +0000

Mel and I like Cambodia. It’s because of the people. On our bus journey here, we met at very nice guy (and his wife and son) who took care of us when we got off our bus and ensured that we weren’t ripped off by a taxi driver. He actually interjected with the taxi driver and helped us out and called us a taxi from the government registered company- so really going out of his way. He had done an MBA in Thailand and was an engineer with an import business. Who’d have though that that would be the first Cambodian we would meet?

As luck would have it, it was the annual three-day ‘Water Festival’ when we arrived, so our bus had to stay out of town and dropped us off 15km away so we had to find our way into the city on a taxi. The guy from the bus would have given Mel and I a lift in his taxi had we not just picked up another two travelers from the bus (to split the taxi into town with). He was very insistent that we get into town to see this amazing sight (fireworks, a big floating parade down the river…) however by the time we made it to our accommodation, we were in the middle of a torrential downpour so couldn’t leave. So technically we were there for the big Water Festival- we just didn’t actually see it. Oh well, 3 days ago I didn’t even know what the Water Festival was…

Soon after arriving, you feel a big cultural difference, from the tourist perspective. They aren’t out to screw you over. Often they would call out to me across the street, i’d look over and they’d wave at me and say ‘Hello!’ That’s it- just wanted to say hello and get a smile. Or the Tuk Tuk driver would say ‘Tuk, tuk, tuk’ just like he was a chicken (‘buck, buck, buck’) but at the same time, he’d be laughing away to himself- not really trying to get a sale out of you. Nice people. During the almightily downpour on our first night, Mel and I sat inside a restaurant watching some of the Cambodians working, putting up decorations in the rain. Instead of moaning about it, they were laughing and joking with each other and even doing little dances in the rain- they seem a happy and content people.

The next day we walked ALL OVER Phnom Penh . It’s a very attractive city actually, and the people are very ‘smiley’ which is nice. Even the tuk tuk drivers or sales people who pester you, do so in a friendly, smiley way. It’s no London or Paris , but it certainly does have a nice feel to it- it’s quite spacious with lots of wide boulevards with little mini gardens in them, statues scattered about and the temples really are quite beautiful. Mel and I kept saying ‘Oh, that must be a temple’ and then we’d go for a closer look or look it up in the map and it’d be a restaurant or a theatre. Then go a few more meters and we’d hit a slightly ghetto looking block of flats. Then go 2 more minutes and you hit some amazing (expat? Government people?) houses with security gates and which are just huge.

It is a little strange to be a tourist here, though. After our afternoon of walking around town we went to the Genocide museum and then the next day we went to the ‘must see’ Killing Fields. Interesting tourism thing that they’ve got going on here. Worthy and all, as it keeps the lessons learned, but just a bit strange, too. We stopped off at a local cafe while we were out there and I had something that tasted completely different to all of the other food i’ve tasted in Asia ( Laos = Thai ‘influence’, Vietnam = Chinese influence etc). It was like a very strong tasting soup- so not quite a sauce and not quite a soup with some green vegetable, what appeared to be bits of bark and some rather grizzly beef. You then ate this with rice. Cambodian food seems to be… well, Cambodian. Again, we were getting looks from Western passer bys (they’re eating the LOCAL food?!)

The place where we’re staying is quite the backpacker ghetto. It’s on the lake and consists of a long, shanty, laneway with guesthouses and lots of Western food. Our room is $4USD and it would appear that every surface in our room is made of linolium. If you look through the cracks of the floorboards, you can see the lake below. This is probably closer to the Camboida I had been expecting. The mosquitoes are out in full force here and I’m being extra vigilant with the malaria tablets, insect repellent, covering up etc. I’d lie in my bed at night, completely engulfed in my blanket, dying to expose my arms because I was hot but too worried that that my glowing limbs would shine for miles to all of the mosquitoes in Phnom Pen. I actually had a dream that I was like a pig on a spit that night.

We like the feel of things here though, so we decide to stay one day longer than we had planned so that we can see more of the city. Next up is Siem Reap (see my banner photo for Siem Reap’s main attaction, Angkor Wat).

Firing AK-47s in Ho Chi Minh City

Marshall — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:51:50 +0000

Then, just as we were starting to go off Vietnam a bit, along comes HCMC which exceeded our expectations. Granted, they were a little low to start with, but the city really did have a nice feel to it- much nicer than Hanoi . It’s modern and while there is still a lot of traffic, the motorcycle horns aren’t as loud and there’s lots to do here. Our first day trip was to the war museum. Going to museums about wars aren’t really my idea of a good time, but I thought that it would be a good idea to at least attempt to bridge one of my many world history knowledge gaps. Again, it was more interesting than expected. No wonder the Vietnamese are a little… erm… shall we say, keen to take what they can get from foreigners. They really have had quite a tough ride with American, French and Japanese occupations. I almost forgive those Tuk Tuk drivers now that I know this… almost.

The next day, we went to the Cu Chi tunnels which was again, really good! I was simultaneously appalled and impressed by the things that they came up with to defend themselves against the Americans. Our guide showed us the various booby traps they devised:

‘This is a trap door. The American solder would step on it and then fall into the spikes below. We used to put Cobra venom on the spikes to kill them, but Cobra venom was laborious to gather so then we started mixing Buffalo excrement with soldier urine and put that on the spikes which would give the soldier tetanus!’

We watched a video that explained the whole conflict. It was quite good with original footage and a helpful voiceover that explained everything in detail. There was also the odd surprising moment when the voiceover would proclaim in a loud voice that the solders on the screen now were ‘American killer heroes’. We met a lot of Canadians during our stay in Vietnam … at least, that’s where they said they were from when our tour guide asked if there were any Americans in the group.

Then we arrived at an original tunnel which they had widened out for tourists. We climbed in and walked, well, it was actually more like a shuffled hunch, through a tunnel than they had widened out for tourists to try and it was SO claustrophobic! I did 40m of a 100m tunnel and was dripping with sweat by the time I emerged. Some Viet Cong would spend about 6 months in these tunnels.

Then we went to the firing range where, of course, I couldn’t pass-up the opportunity to fire off 1 rounds on an AK47. At the firing range, they gave us protective headgear which was… are you ready for this… music headphones that had had the wire removed from them- so not even ‘proper’ protective head gear. I was standing about 4m away from the first guy who went and I got the shock of my life about how loud it was. Of course, as expected, by the time it was my turn and I was 3 rounds in, I was quite enjoying myself!

So all in all, we had a good time in HCMC and I’d be happy to return there again as I think that we only scratched the surface during our 3 day stay there. The next day, we were on the move again to Phnom Penh in Cambodia.

Gawker and rip-off fatigue in Na Trang and Da Lat

Marshall — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:41:04 +0000

Next up was the pleasant beachside town of Na Trang . We only stayed here for 1 day given that we had 1.5weeks in Thailand islands coming up. It was a nice enough town and we finally got our first taste of proper seafood when we stumbled upon a restaurant that was serving seafood platters at a really good price. It was a nice change from sitting on tiny squat chairs, eating from children-size tables at road side stalls, that had fast become our staple diet.

The next day we jumped onto another bus to Da Lat which is inland and up in the mountains. Da Lat is well known for being the main region where they grow the fruit and veg for Vietnam . Sure enough, as our bus approached and we looked down over the valley, there were 100’s of giant green houses growing flowers and every type of fruit and veg imaginable. The mountains were lovely, but they also brought with them a rude surprise: the cold! Problem being, the shopping spree in Hoi An had necessitated a bit of a wardrobe cull (‘What’s more important to me: this ball gown or a sweater? Ball gown!). Let’s just say that for the next couple of days, Mel and I were relieved that the chances of bumping into anyone we knew were greatly reduced as we walked down the street modeling layered t-shirts under rain jackets and pashminas.

By this point in Vietnam we were also starting to get a bit… well… a bit sick and tired of people blatantly trying to rip us off. As a tourist, you’d be naive not to expect a bit of that, but in Vietnam it was now starting to become a constant thing to look out for. To give you an idea, our hotel cost $8 per night and lunch would usually cost about 50c each. We then went to the reception to book a 3 day trek and were told that it would cost USD$75 per person, per day. What?! That’s like… 10.5 Hoi An tailor made dresses per person! I had also started to tire of something I had never thought I would tire of: attention. The attention I got for my skin colour was incredible. People would nudge their friends as I went past or just reach out and touch me. I had the odd paparazzi experience too with people pulling out their mobiles to surreptitiously take photos of me, which is fine and all on a good day, but when you’re sitting at the side of the road in 35 degree heat after your bus has broken down, waiting for a new tire… well, let’s just say, I’m starting to understand why celebrities punch photographers every now and then….

As we walked across town in search of a cheaper tour operator (we found one for USD$10 a day btw), we added this experience to our list of other affronts (inflated restaurant charges, Tuk Tuk drivers changing the price half way through the journey and ‘all inclusive’ tours with sub par food or inclusions which simply failed to materialize) and concluded that our opinion of Vietnam was starting to go downhill. I’m a big fan of leaving the party while you’re still having a good time.

So, for the second time in our trip (the first being when we were in The Philippines and the monsoon hit, killing 270 people and leaving Manila 70% under water) we decided that the most important thing was for us to have fun, so we decided to cut our time in Vietnam 3-4 days short so that we could have more time in easy breazy Thailand. So we finally found a one day trek for USD$10 each and booked our bus to Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon ) for the next morning.

Shop ’till you drop in Hoi An

Marshall — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:20:25 +0000

So the one day only trip to Hue ended up being quite the flying visit! Our train from Hanoi to Hue was delayed by 8hrs which meant that we had to fly like the wind (ok, our Tuk Tuk drivers had to fly like the wind) over to the bus station to catch our bus to Hoi An. We made it by the skin of our teeth and found ourselves heading out of Hue 20min after arriving (looked nice enough from the bus windows…) and onto Hoi An.

Hoi An is well known for being a good town to get clothes tailor made at affordable prices. For this reason, I knew Hoi An and I were going to get along just fine. It’s a lovely town with quaint buildings, nice food and LOTS of tailors! The guide book had warned us that shopping fever soon takes hold for many a tourist so we had been forewarned… So off Mel and I bustled about from tailor to tailor, using their ‘showroom’ shop fronts as the starting point for getting what we wanted made. It was great fun.

We’d walk into a shop and say: ‘I like that dress up there, but can you make it shorter and in a different fabric and make the neckline a V instead of round? Great, we’ll see you for our first fitting tomorrow morning.’ We then carefully noted the shop name, what we’d ordered, when the first fitting was and how much it would cost. We also decided to buy pretty much only dresses (a girl can never have too many dresses, they were pretty cheap- about 20USD each and aren’t too bulky to fit into our backpacks).

Our shopping all started out very softly-softly and then reached the point where we had an entire day of fittings booked in (3 @ 11am, 1 @ 1pm, 2 @ 2pm and 2 @ 3pm). After six weeks and weeks of more or less ambling about, it was actually kinda fun to feel busy and to have all of these appointments we needed to keep. By the end of our stay, I was the proud new owner of 1 suit, 1 shirt and 11 dresses (2 ball gowns, 8 cocktail dresses, 1 casual). Never again can I legitimately say ‘I don’t have anything to wear, tonight’.

So, that’s basically how we spent our 4 days in Hoi An. Shopping. Oh, wait, we did do a ½ day cooking course too… but… yeah, it was pretty much all shopping. Needless to say, Hoi An is my favorite city in Vietnam so far.

Vietnam – In Photos

Marshall — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:16:49 +0000

full capacity with cargo

money running low, working way across vietnam

welcome to Halong Bay

taking in the views

Sa Pa, Vietnam

me and rice

y-u-m

guest house and the Sa Pa posse

one of MANY...

Planes, trains, automobiles … and boats

Marshall — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 23:01:44 +0000

After 28 hours, we arrived in Hanoi. First impressions? Loud. Very, very loud. Possibly the loudest city i’ve ever visited. There are no footpaths here so you have to walk on the roads with the thousands of motorcycles, cars, tuk tuks, taxis and women carrying goods to sell. And it’s not like they’re thinking ‘Oh, there’s a tourist, better be careful’. It’s every man for themselves so you really need to have your wits about you when walking around here! It also appears that there are very few rules which means that the roads are crowded with motorcyclists who either have their hand constantly on the horn or who are texting on their mobile phone at the same time as navigating the streets. Some cars have horns where if you push it once, it continues to beep for a further 10 seconds or so- it’d help with RSI, I guess.

We decided pretty early into our arrival into Hanoi that this isn’t a city built for strolling about it. It’s a city built for using as a base to get TF out of. So we booked two trips straight away. The first to Halong Bay and the second to Sa Pa. Both were great trips.

In Halong Bay we visited a(nother) cave, went for a trek in the national park and then sailed and kayaked around the bay for the rest of the time. It’s one of those places that looks exactly the same as it does on the postcards. They control the number of boats that can sail around the bay so it’s pleasantly uncrowded.

Then we went to Sa Pa. We took a sleeper train there and back and then spent a night in the village at a homestay. It’s funny that even though you’re in a completely different culture, that it’s still easy to pick out the same characters. The teenage son of the house was grudgingly eating at the dinner table with us and then sped off on his motorbike straight after (the obligatory?) dinner with the tourists and the mum was obviously rather fond of the drink. She kept saying ‘Cheers’ and urging us all to drink ‘Happy water’ (murky looking rice wine) with her from shot glasses. Given that the choice was Beer or Rice wine, I went with the rice wine. I think she warmed to me because of that. But at the same time, some things are very different here. My natural inclination to question took over which led to some interesting conversations with local women during the trek:

C: Do you have a boyfriend?
W: No!
C: When will you get one?
W: When i’m married
C: Can’t you have a boyfriend before marriage or even hold hands?
W: We need to get married first. Then we can hold hands.

Boy is she in for a surprise…

C: So you have 2 children?
W: Yes.
C: And you’re how old?
W: 20
C: Did you meet your husband at school or in the village?
W: My family choose him.
C: Oh. So you didn’t get to choose?
W: No. Some can choose. Some the family choose.
C: Oh. So did they choose well? What’s he like?
W: He’s ok. Not great. Some are better. But he’s ok.

What else to say about Sa Pa? It was beautiful. The countryside was lovely and so were the people (when they weren’t following you across the rice paddies saying ‘You buy this? Little money for you? You buy two now?).

Visiting Sa Pa also brought home for me something that i’ve always latently understood but obviously hadn’t actually absorbed; why Aisan Australians perform so much better in schools in Australia. It’s because their parents are probably saying to them: ‘Your 13 year old cousin’s in Sa Pa at the moment working in a rice field everyday helping her family make a living. I assure you, school is no labour compared to the rice field, my dear!’ (although to be fair, ‘working in a rice field’ has probably now been replaced with ‘sewing trinkets to sell to tourists’ by now). It’s kind of like the old ‘I used to walk three miles in the snow to get to school when I was young’ thing but ‘I used to work all day long in a rice paddy field’ is a much more compelling argument than walking in snow.

Tonight we hop onto a(nother) sleeper train to Huế. We will then carry on south-bound down Vietnam.

Good times with tubes, mud, and booze buckets in Laos

Marshall — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 19:03:05 +0000

Where to begin on our time in Vang Viene? We arrived at 3.30am on our night bus (3 hours late). Picture this: a barely lit, grim looking gravel road with a scattering of tattered, small shops and not a sign of life for mile. Hummmm. It didn’t look great. We were tired, didn’t know where we were and had heavy backpacks on. Is the town just over the gravel road or is this one of those places where the town is a 15min tuk tuk ride into town? Had we been in a horror movie at that point, we would have most definitiely have played the roles of ‘two girls on a lonely road at night’. But we weren’t in a movie, we were in Vang Viene, a ‘backpacker town’ so everything was going to be ok…

We found a nearby hotel where a couple of Laos people put us on the phone with their son who spoke English so that we could book in, fell onto our beds and had a sleep. When we woke-up the world looked very different. We were in a very attractive town, surrounded my mammoth mountains. Ok, so not so horror movie afterall, but what’s important is that it felt that way for these two London girls at the time… Here there’s lots to do (caving, drinking, “tubing,” drinking, rock climbing, drinking, kayaking etc). We had so much fun here that we ended up spending 5 days.

We went caving which, again, probably doesn’t sound so scary. But perhaps to better communicate, you shoud picture the caves, which have had great big vats of banana skins and Fairy washing up liquid dumped into them. Then picture stairs leading into the caves, covered in mud and with rickety slats and now you’re starting to get the picture. Crazy. No insurance company in their right mind would authorise this as a tourist activity. Mel and I however emerged unscathed (we rock). Then we did a hour long trek through some beautiful countryside before arriving at the water cave – a cave which you go through with headlights and on big inflatable tubes. Slightly claustraphobic, but good fun.

Then, onto the tubing. Erm. What to say about this? How about: What. An. Experience.

I’m not sure that my words will do them justice and even looking back on the photos i’m not sure that it captures the moment well enough.

An introduction, worthy of the Collins Dictionary: Tubing involves individuals, sitting on large inflatable inner tubes, while they float down a river. This activity is undertaken whilst stopping off for refreshments (buckets of vodka Red Bull) at establishments (see “bars”) which are dotted (plastered- 13 bars in total) alongside the river. If one is in need of additional diversion, there is also the option of swinging off giant flying foxes and swings into the river (whilst taking care to not come into contact with those tubing and kayaking below). Oh yeah, and there are also about 300 screaming, drunk, 20-30 somethings doing it at the same time as you.

Enjoy the photos.

We’re off to Hanoi now (on a 24 – 30 hr bus, but we’re trying to forget that detail so let’s end on the high of tubing, shall we?)

'home' for the next 5 days

Vang Viene

more Vang Viene

approprate slogan 'keep calm, carry on'

Careful! It's slippery

pleased to have survived caving

right then ... better pay the 2000 kip

First tubing experience with our tour guide

I'm clearly having a terrible time and want to go back to work

One of the tubing bars... not sure this photo does the atmosphere justice

Easing into the party spirit

First swing ride

It's important to do a gymnastic salute at the end of a swing

One of the bars

Our posse for the day (would't think of braving the midday sun without a rash vest!)

Second swing... this is where it started to go wrong

An excellent dismount if I don't say so myself... but ufortunately still a good 8 to 10 metres from entering the water

Yep, still good fun

don't try this at home

With our tour guide at another refreshment stop

Not that an explanation is necessary... but this is the mud bar

Mud bar

no explanation necessary

We’re in Laos (Vang Vieng). Here’s how we got here…

Marshall — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:53:44 +0000

These photos also go with the post below.

: BreaKfast morning view

Evening on Mekong river

Kids eager to greet us on Mekong river stop-off

Young monk

More Mekong

Our overnight stop-over on Mekong river. Great breakfast view.

The '1.60GBP' shot (I can explain)

The 'above average' waterfall

Top peak of waterfall with some show off at the base

A slow boat on the Mekong River

Marshall — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:52:23 +0000

After three days of travel (one day in a minibus to the Laos border and two days on a slow boat down the Mekong river) here we are in Luang Prabang, Laos.

The Mekong river journey was good. It was an experience. A long experience. On narrow benches. And one that brought me about 200 pages closer to understanding the mystery behind The Order of the Phoenix. The views were great though, and as we went on, the scenery became more spectacular. It did remind me a lot of a river journey I went on in China, though, which either speaks to the two country’s similar scenery or my inability to distinguish differences in landscapes when taking long river rides. Either way, we arrived on dry land and stumbled up with our backpacks to discover this small town. As it’s low season, we managed to find a nice enough place for 60,000 Kip (5 GBP) a night. Apparently it’s really hard to get genuine Laos food as the locals don’t really eat out and Western tastebuds prefer its neighbours cuisine (tough competition, though: Thailand, China and Vietnam) so we splurged and went to a proper restaurant. It was actually quite nice- soup, deep fried bamboo shoots stuffed with pork, a minced meat dish and I had Laos wine (brave, I know: tasted like Ribena) and Mel had a strange iced tea. It wasn’t spectacular, but it was still pretty good.

We were obviously tired from our journey as as our exploring only lasted long enough to make it back from dinner, stroll through a night market for 20 min and then we hit the sack and woke up 12 hours later. If that’s not an achievement, then I don’t know what is. It’s amazing how tired simply travelling can make you. It’s not like you’re actually doing anything but the heat, sun, cramped conditions and continual snacking on Asian delicacies (Lays crisps, Oreo cookies and the Thai crackers which are actually sweet biscuits in denial) all add up, I guess.

Fresh from our marathon sleep we left the hotel at 11am, walked around in the sweltering heat (maybe 35-36 degrees?), got some lunch: noodle soup, stir fry veg and homemade lemonade. Then we walked back across town in the sweltering heat to a ‘must see’ temple, according to Rough Guides. Erm. What to say about this temple in a public blog? Something diplomatic, but which gets the point across that I want my 20,000 Kip back (1.60GBP). Actually I tell a lie, I got a great shot of Mel roaring back at the dragons on some statue outside the temples. That was worth 1.60 GBP. Then back out in the heat again, quick stop off to our hotel to get out of my respectful but hot knee-length skirt and long sleeve shirt and into some shorts and a singlet so that we could climb up to see a giant buddha foot (yep, looks like a big giant foot- no false advertising, there). From there, there were also great views of Luang Prabang. By the time we reached the top, sweat was streaming off us (and not in an elegant ‘glowing’ way, either). Then we headed back down, passed a few friendly looking monks along the way and continued onto the street stalls where we had a plate of veg salads, two spring rolls and a whole grilled fish- for 27,000 Kip (2.10 GBP).

Tomorrow we’ve got quite an action packed day. We’re going to visit the Pak Ou Caves and the Kuang Si Falls and then a whisky distillery. No really. Then we jump on a 7-hour bus to Vang Vieng.

It has air con. Praise be.

Peppers, elephants, and the elusive Thai massage

Marshall — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 18:28:10 +0000

After a good night of sleep, we woke up earlyish and went for our cooking class from 9 – 4pm. It was a pretty professional set-up with proper outdoor cooking stations and four chefs and about four cooking hands. They also gave us a cookbook with all of the recipes of my course and the other courses, too.

It took me right back to high school home eco classes- everyone with their own little portions of each ingredient on a plate, own cook station and own pots and pans, teachers saying ‘If there’s smoke, it’s burning!’ and running around adjusting everyones stove flames. Well… the open air kitchen and and the fact that Mrs. Wainwright had been replaced by a Thai guy did make it feel a little different to home eco class but it was fun to be back in that environment again.

I’m not going to rattle through all the dishes we cooked but suffice to say that we were STUFFED by the end of the day. One lesson I did learn is…. that hot and spicy really adds flavour. Not a groundbreaking insight for your average Joe, I realise, but for me it’s quite the insight. For years people have said to me ‘You don’t like H&S? But that’s what adds the flavour!’ to which i’d retort ‘Yeah, but it also burns your mouth at the same time so i’m ok with no pain and less flavour’ (I still maintain that this is a fair line of reasoning). One dish that we made was Red Curry with fish and I though ‘Ah ha! I see a way out of this firey curry, i’m going to use 1/2 a tablespoon of curry paste instead of a full one to make it less spicy’, (meanwhile Spice Woman Mel was adding extra chilles and had a heaped tablespoon). As we sat down to eat, my Red curry resembled a murky pink curry and Mel’s was a lovely colour and aroma and when I tried hers, it WAS so much better (even though it burned my mouth). So, I will continue on with my journey of tastebud discovery.

Then we came back to our hotel and lay on the beds for about 1 hour like beached whales while we waited for our 6-course meal to digest. Next up is a Thai massage. I’ve been here a week and this is my first Thai massage- a crime if ever there was one!

cooking class

Coming together nicely...

Mel dives in

still need convincing

Chiang Mai scenery

Chiang Mai taxi

the art shot