Vietnam: "You Buy from Me?"

Mike and I have been in Vietnam for about a week now, and have one more week to go before we take a boat up the Mekong River into Cambodia. The first couple of days we spent in the extreme northern mountains, trekking around some hill-tribe villages and exploring the jungle. Our trek was led by a very nice guy named Don who loves Karaoke. We also found the French version of Wilkerson on the trek, I will try to find a photo of him and upload it soon. It had rained that morning so the steep hike down the hillside was full of us slipping and sliding and falling all over the place while the hill-tribe women with us bounded down with ease. We stayed with a Zou family in the small village of Ta Van, sharing green tea from the plants right outside and a fantastic dinner in which the father wouldn't stop giving us shots of home-brewed rice wine, always with a smile and a loud declaration of "one more!" That night we also did some great Karaoke with our guide, bringing great renditions of classic songs such as "Africa" "St. Elmo's Fire" and "Total Eclipse of the Heart" to the village. All the other travelers in our group refused to sing so it was basically Mike and I and our guide making fools of ourselves. The surrounding countryside was incredibly beautiful, filled with terraces of rice fields and bamboo forests.

We then took a night train (free upgrade to soft-sleeper class!) down to Hanoi and got swindled by our taxi driver to the hostel who had a ridiculously fast meter and drove us around in a circle to get to our hostel. We got checked in and visited Ho Chi Minh's masoluem (unfortunately his body isn't here right now, its being worked on for further preservation in Russia) abd got to see some of the humble houses in which he lived. We also went to the classical Temple of Literature and visited the prison where John McCain was held during the Vietnam War and had been used earlier by the French to detain political opponents during the colonial period. It was a really interesting museum and although a bit skewed (apparently all the American POW's had a great time with Christmas parties and daily basketball games) was definitely worth the visit. We also enjoyed some extremely cheap bia hoi (draft beer) with some locals, all of whom seem to get really drunk during their lunch break and then return to work. We also met a Vietnamese student by the lake who introduced us to some random Vietnamese girls who were really nice and took us around the town for a little while.

We spent the last couple of days out in Halong Bay, an incredibly beautiful place filled with 3000 limestone islands and rock formations. We signed up to take the boat with our hostel which turned out to be a sort of booze cruise through the bay. We took a bus to the port town of Halong and got on the ship in time for lunch and just in time for people to start drinking. Soon everyone started jumping off the top of the 3-story boat into the amazing clear blue water below, and we also did some amazing kayaking around a few of the islands and found a cave filled with bats and spiders. We had to kayak back in the dark and almost got lost and eaten by a shark (I swear I saw a dorsal fin poking out of the water at one point) but made it back alive in time for dinner and the party. The happy hour special was three shots for the price of two so Mike and I decided to get 3 each and followed it up with a massive game of Kings (called Ring of Fire by our shipmates, and involving about 25 people) The rest of the night is a bit hazy but filled with jumping off the boat into the water and assorted other fun adventures with our newfound friends (Mike can fill you in on the details) Needless to say, the next morning it was very hard to wake up but we did some more swimming and cruising around the bay filled with small fishing boats and deserted islands before getting back to port and taking a bus back to Hanoi. Unfortunately my camera had broken and was in the shop so I couldn't get any photos, but Mike will post some good ones.

Last night we enjoyed a traditional Vietnamese water puppet show and tonight we take an overnight bus to the city of Hoi An in the center of the country and will make our way south from there. Expect another update in about a week or so with the rest of our adventures in this awesome country.