Home (ish)

About 24 hours from the door of my hostel to the door of Mr & Mrs Andy and Hannah Pring, so I had plenty of time to take advantage of Aeroflot's extensive film library.

I arrived back at Heathrow at about 10pm (about 5am in my head) and was greeted by Andy and Hannah with 'Welcome Back' balloons. Amazing!

We got back to theirs, had a glass of water and I went to bed in great comfort, with no sound of scooters outside. I'm now having marmite on toast and a cup of tea for breakfast.

End of trip. 

Philanthropy

I went for an evening stroll around the old quarter in Hanoi. Feeling pretty hungry as I hadn't eaten since the morning, after 10 minutes I decided on a 'Restaurant/Bar' which seemed pretty local and cheap. I wanted to try some Pho - a very traditional Vietnamese noodle soup. I asked the young guy running it if he had it or if I could see a menu. There was no menu but he said he could do me what sounded like 'Garlic Dog'. He also showed me some frozen sausages and frozen ham. I decided just to have a beer. Later I found some Pho and delicious it was too - and nice and cheap which was a bonus.

Walking around Hanoi is not relaxing. Scooters race around dodging each other, cars, pedestrians. The constant honking of horns means that just walking a few streets can be a pretty stressful experience. Full of Pho, I went back to the hostel and had a good sleep.

The next day I decided to have a good explore and, after I'd explored the old quarter a bit, walked about half an hour to Ho Chi Minh's Mausoleum. Turns out it's only open til 11am each day so I had missed it by about an hour. Nevermind, it's quite an impressive building anyway.

It was as I was wandering about with my map, trying to decide where to go next that a local driver came up to me and offered me a tour.

'No, thank you' I declared confidently in my I've-been-offered-a-million-bike-tours-in-the-last-two-months-and-I-certainly-don't-need-yours voice.

But he was persistent, as they always are, and he told me he could show me some bits of planes that had come down during a US offensive during the war. It sounded interesting and he only wanted $5 for an hour's tour. Sounded good. Perhaps a little too good.

So within a couple of minutes I was on the back of Lamchau's bike and he was good to his word and showed me what he said he would. We even had a bit of a laugh and a joke as he pointed out some Hanoi landmarks. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy.

The trouble started when our hour was up and I wanted to go back to my hotel. Lamchau seemed fine with this and we set off back to the gayest-named hostel in the world, The Lucky Queen (it's not a gay hostel).

Lamchau wanted to stop off for a quick cup of tea as we passed his friend on the road, so he invited me to have a small cup for free and we were having a good laugh and a joke. Then talk turned to money and I asked whether he wanted the $5 now or when we got to the hotel. The conversation that ensued consisted of truths and lies on both of our parts.

Lamchau's claims...
I had agreed to pay in Vietnamese Dong (False).
He had been driving me round (True)...
...for 2 1/2 hours (False)


My claims
That his claims were false (True)
That I did not have much Dong on me (True)
I did not have my cash card to get money from the ATM (False)

It all got a bit heated and I suddenly felt very aware that there were no other Westeners around and Lamchau was getting quite aggressive. He wanted me to pay 1,000,000 Dong (about 30 quid). I refused but frankly wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. After an intimidating ten minutes I agreed to pay him 500,000 Dong which I had back at the hotel.

A tense journey back followed and I was glad that I hadn't wasted a photo on a picture of the two of us on the disposable camera I had bought earlier in the day.

He dropped me off. I paid him. He left.

Some cynics might see me as the gullible victim of a scam, but I like to look at this experience in a different way. By allowing Lamchau to intimidate me and agreeing to pay him the extortionate fee of 15 pounds, I made him into a half-millionaire. How often is it that we get the opportunity to turn someone's life around by giving them that sort of opportunity?

I will probably never be a millionaire. Now Lamchau is halfway there thanks to me.

Scam? No. Philanthropy under duress.

Cold

In hindsight I spent too long on the Thai islands.  Looking back on the last 2 weeks or so, it's been a lot of fun, but I haven't really done much.

It was sad to leave the good friends I have made, but also exciting to have a couple of days in Hanoi before heading back.

I was surprised by the number of people on the flight wearing scarves and jackets. Fair enough, I thought, it's an early morning flight and planes can get chilly - that's why I've brought my cardigan. I only realised that the real reason for this when we disembarked in Hanoi and a wave of cold air hit me for the first time in 2 months. Everyone else had clearly done their homework. I quickly scrabbled in my big bag for my jacket, which has seen very little wear since I got here. Putting it on was like hugging an old friend.

Order your Vietnam Visa on Arrival at Airport. Simply order online - no hassle at airport! No waiting! Quick and easy!

Bollocks.

Order your Vietnam Visa On Arrival online, be first to give it in at the desk and then wait for the following process...

1. Officer A collects all the passports from all the passengers on the plane along with visa forms and puts them in a big pile while Officers B, C and D check their emails and smoke.
2. When Officer A has finished, it is now Officer B's turn to do the stapling. Officer A is now free to smoke with Officer D, whiloe Officer C does her very best to ignore the group of 50 people wondering why she's not helping Officer B.
3. Now it's Officer C's time to shine. She arranges the passports into groups travelling together (biggest groups get dealt with first, single travellers last - a bit unfair since I was first at the counter). Officer B goes back to his computer while A and D smoke. Perhaps they don't like Officer B.
4. Officer C then calls out names and charges us each $25 for the 45 minute process we have just been through.
5. Go team Visa!

An hour and a half after we landed I left the airport in a very cheap local bus for my first view of Hanoi. Lots of tall, slim houses which apparently is to do with the tax you pay on the width of your property. Looks very cool. I didn't have much time to look around though as I needed to find the Lucky Queen Hostel. Sounds a bit fruity but it's the cheapest I could find and seems really nice. I am on the top floor so have a good view over the busy street below.

Have just had a five hour nap, put on more layers than I have worn in months, and am going out to explore.

Paint, Buckets and Rain

After the non-event of real Christmas, fake Christmas was a complete success. Annie's boyfriend Ian had come out a few days earlier so the two of them, Lizi and I geared ourselves up for a day of xmas fun.  We found a British pub on Kho Phagnan and spent the day there playing Pictionary, Who am I, Charades. We even had balloons. Finished off the day with delicious sausage and mash and a few games of pool. Ian and I bonded over reminiscing about Top Gun and we all piled into a taxi to take us along the treacherously hilly roads of Kho Phagnan back to the safety of our hostel.

It's pretty hard to get around here if you don't drive or hire a bike, and so that's what most people do, but the hills are seriously steep and there's a lot of bikes about so you have to be careful. The number of people we saw with pretty bad injuries was enough to put you off. There were a couple of guys in our hostel who'd come off their bikes on xmas day and were now on a 10 day course of antibiotics, having to go back to the hospital every day to get their bandages changed, on crutches, no alcohol over xmas and new year because of it. Understandably they were both pretty down about it. They were the worst we saw, but tons of people with bandages, cuts, bruises.

Thankfully no bandages for us and we were all fit and healthy by new year. Because we'd had to postpone xmas day, fake boxing day was actually real new year's eve, and they go for it big over here - 50,000 people on the beach, all wearing luminous paint, luminous clothes and dancing to techno.

Not my cup of tea at all and I thought I was going to hate it, but actually it was brilliant fun. There were a fair amount of dickheads there, but generally everyone was really friendly and we even bumped into Rourke from our bus trip and another guy we'd met along the way too.

I'm not a fan of fireworks either - I find them pretty boring (grumpy I know), but the ones on the beach were great and the buckets of cocktails helped us enjoy them even more.

We were lucky with the weather because even though it hadn't been that sunny during our time on Kho Phagnan, it hadn't rained much, if at all. But on New Year's Day a storm blew in and stayed for 3 days. Constant rain, wind, the loudest thunder I've ever heard. Everybody just had to sit in the hostel looking miserable, but it gave everyone time to recover from New Year so no bad thing really. Plus it gave me a chance to wear my Mum's bright yellow Kag in a Bag that I have been carrying round for the last two months.

 After a good two weeks on Kho Phagnan it was definitely time to leave and when the weather had cleared, the four of us headed over to Kho Samui, another island just 30 minutes away by boat. I leave Samui today and so have only had 3 nights here, one of which was Annie's birthday - my only chance to explore the island (the others are staying for longer).

Ian paid for us all to go to a waterpark for the day, so we all got our trunks on, grabbed our towels and headed to the only waterpark on the island ready for a day of crazy water fun. When we arrived it turned out it was a kids' water park and that the 200bht / 4quid entry fee really wasn't worth it, plus we would have looked pretty weird.

Ian looked a bit downheartened as he had planned the trip, but we explored the island a bit more and found a pretty stunning waterfall to swim under and some rocks in the shape of genitals. Dinner and dancing later and all in all a very successful day.

My boat leaves in about an hour to start me on my trip to Hanoi. I'll only be there for a couple of days before I fly home, but can't wait to see a little bit of Vietnam, even if it is only a very little bit. 

The Christmas that never happened

Still no photos - camera still knackered. 

The journey from Krabi was an interesting one. Annie, Lizi and I turned up at the bus station and met 3 other people who were also travelling to the islands. They were...

Rourke (this was honestly his name) - a friendly Canadian medical student.

Thomas - A 43 year-old German guy.

Maxi - Thomas' 25 year-old girlfriend. (Thomas had done well for himself).

As soon as we got on the bus there was clearly a problem. Six of us and only 2 seats on the bus full of people who had clearly been on there for hours, possibly days already judging by their glazed expressions.

No Problem! said the bus guys and opened what seemed to be a luggage compartment in the bowels of the bus. With dread we clambered in, but were amazed to find a little table with a comfy bench round it. Rourke pulled up a box and the 6 of us fitted in snugly but comfortably. The three hour bus ride turned into the best bit of travelling we've done as we spent the journey playing 'who am I?' round the table. 

We later arrived at Surat Thani, a port town with various boats going to the Thai islands. We all had stickers to show where we were going, which made me feel like I was on a school trip. We dumped our bags on the boat to Kho Phagnan and prepared ourselves for the night boat - 2 levels of mattresses laid next to each other  so we were shoulder to shoulder with the strangers next to us.

And strange one of them was. Just as we were about to set off a right werdo got on and scared the shit out of Annie. He slept opposite and was just being a general sex pest so we didn't get much sleep for the 7 hour journey. 

We arrived at about 6am on the island, stressed,  sleep-deprived and headachey. Straight to the hostel for much needed sleep.

Once we'd had a few hours we set about getting things ready for xmas day the next morning. Unfortunately both Annie and  Lizi were feeling pretty rough so we just had to cross our fingers and hope they'd be better by the morning.

The next morning we did presents (I got 2 books, some soap and an afternoon of my choice like canoeing or something - excellent presents!), had some breakfast and then I went for a morning swim. A bit later we headed down to the beach for lunch, but the girls were still feeling dodgy so our xmas merriment was pretty forced. I had the most disgusting burger for xmas lunch - more of a gristle patty than a burger really.  Later on we all got to skype our friends and families which was great. But as soon as we were done Annie crashed out on the sofa in the internet cafe and Lizi wasn't feeling too hot either. So xmas turned into a trip to the chemist for sleeping pills, painkillers and water, followed by an early night.

Today (boxing day) we declared xmas a write off and we'll do it properly in a few days' time. Hopefully everyone will be back on form by then. 

 

The Great Escape

No photos with this blog as my camera is knackered from all the sand in it.

Two days of very tiring travelling and we finally arrived in Krabi. It felt great to be back in Thailand and be based somewhere for a few days at least. Food much nicer than Cambodia, prices much cheaper, people much friendlier. Krabi itself is pretty stunning, with huge rock formations jutting up from the land and sea. Stalacmites and stalactites everywhere and even some monkeys thrown in for fun.

It's very odd seeing xmas trees everywhere but it's so hot that I burn in 10 minutes on the beach. My body can't quite work it out. I've tried to kick start it into xmas mode by downloading 80 classic xmas tracks and listening to them on the beach, but it still feels weird.

Today Annie, Lizi and I travel to Kho Phangan - a small island on the other side of the mainland. We arrive on xmas eve and spend about 2 weeks there before I head home.

I got chatting to a Dutch guy on a boat yesterday. I had been thinking I was looking pretty brown by now, but apparently not.
"How long have you been travelling"
"Oh about 6 weeks now, mostly in Thailand"
"So why are you so white?"
"Erm, oh, I just don't tan."

So apparently I won't be returning home looking any rosier than if I'd just been for a jog.

Krabi - I got this photo off Google

Sihanoukville

The last few days have been down on the southern coast in a town called Sihanoukville, Cambodia's only real beach resort.

Lots of lazing around on beaches, drinking cocktails and forgetting the bustle of Phnom Penh and Siam Reap. I hired a bike yesterday and rode up to Victory Hill - one of the other parts of the town - in the blazing sun. It's quite hilly here so I was lucky to have a bike with gears - a novelty in Cambodia. Managed to have a good cycle round and felt like I'd done something at least. The sweatiness proved it.



There are 3 bad bits about Sihanoukville / Cambodia.
1) There doesn't seem to be a regular rubbish collection or any bins for that matter, so the rubbish from the restaurants is just heaped out on the street to sit in the blazing sun all day. It's a formidable scent. It stings the nostrils.

Beach sellers by sunset

2) When you're trying to relax on the beach you constantly get hounded by kids selling bracelets and fireworks - "open your heart and open your wallet mister!", women selling massages and pedicures or amputees begging for money. It's really sad to see cos there was probably a landmine involved somewhere, but if you gave money to all of them you would spend a fortune - they're everywhere.

3) The money here is very confusing. You pay in dollars and then get a mix of dollars and Cambodian Riel in return. It's 4,000 Riel to one dollar and they have 100 Riel notes, so you end up with a huge wad of money that is pretty useless. Also, nobody ever seems to have change. If the bill comes to $6.50 and you give a $10 note, they make a noise like a builder giving an estimate ("it's gonna cost ya") and ask if you have anything smaller. Well no. No I don't. A massive wad of Riel is then thrust in my direction.

So Lizi, Annie and I are busting out of here tomorrow with travel plans back to Thailand where the people are less pushy, the money is less confusing and the rubbish collection seems to be better organised.

Escape!

I did end up having a pedicure on the beach. My feet look bloody lovely.