Results tagged “Vietnam”

Part three of my top 100 travel photos, starts in Siem Reap, Cambodia, from where I headed back to Vietnam and towards Hoi Anh before going to Hue and crossing into Laos to catch the end of the Laos New Year Festival.

11. Angkor Wat, Siem Reap, Cambodia

Without a doubt, Cambodia's star attraction, the temples at Angkor. As the best maintained temple, Angkor Wat is the most easily recognised and is featured on the Cambodian flag. While taking this photo, I was standing amongst a crowd of close to 100 people waiting for the sunrise.

12. Wat near Tuol Sleng, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

13. Vegetable Garden, Hoi Anh, Vietnam

I went out on a bike ride with a friend I'd met on the bus coming into Hoi Anh and saw some of the poorest people in Vietnam, working their hardest to eek out an existence.

14. Fishing Trip, Hoi Anh, Vietnam

My friend Vuong invited us to his place for lunch one day. He suggested we go on a fishing trip with his mother one day, to explore the waters around the town.

15. That Ing Hang Stupa, Savannakhet, Laos

I came into Laos on the last day of Bpee Mai (Songkran aka Thai/Laos New Year), a three day festival that consists of a daily water fight. Worshippers went here during the festival to pour oil on each of the Buddha statues in the area. It is believed that some of Buddha's remains are stored here.

The photos for this post and more like it are found in the photo galleries for Angkor Temples, Tuol Sleng, Vegetable Farm, Hoi An and Savannakhet.

Part two of my top 100 travel photos, this collection involves Phu Quoc Island in Vietnam (an amazing island with lots of beaches that's fun to explore on motorbike). The second set of photos comes from Phnom Penh in Cambodia, where I was pickpocketed and robbed of my wallet, credit card and money. Please add your feedback in the comments section.

6. South Beach, Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam

While exploring the Island, we found a beach with crystal clear waters and palm trees all around. The water is shallow and the sand is white, the food is cheap and the people so friendly and hospitable. There were five of us on the entire beach at the whole time, something that you can't say about the big Thai beaches and islands.

7. Restaurant, Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam

A small restaurant overlooking the water, right next to the pier where the fishermen sell their days catch. Featuring Phu Quoc's cheap and famous seafood, a definite favourite of Vietnamese and travellers alike.

8. Sunset, Phu Quoc Island, Vietnam

I happened to be travelling the island with a photographer, we were riding through the island on the way home as the sun started to set. They say there are really only two good times to take photos, sunrise and sunset. We were passing the tree and lake on the side of the road, Bao noticed it and was already of his motorbike with camera in hand before I even realised what was going on. With him, I learned a lot about photography and composing amazing shots.

9. Monkeys at Wat Phnom, Phom Penh, Cambodia

Coming out of a temple in Cambodia, I see a mother monkey with her baby. Animals and children are great subjects for photos, a baby monkey, that's a no brainer. I started snapping away. The monkey's were barely a metre away from me. The flash startled the mum, she defensively ran up to me and bit me as soon as I snapped the photo. I didn't get rabies, but I stood back a little further the next time I was taking photos of monkeys.

10. Royal Palace, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Some photos are repeated hundreds of times. Any tourist destination will have every place captured from every different angle and available on flickr before you even set off. The trick with these places is to set up the shot so that the crowds aren't visible. If you show up in the early morning or late afternoon or when the weather looks like it could get worse, you can get the shot. Sometimes you can just pretend you work there and move everyone out of the shot, if you act with enough authority, people will move.

The photos for this post and more like it are found in the photo galleries for Phu Quoc, Phnom Penh and the Royal Palace.

After Sapa, I need to cross the border as my Chinese visa expires the following day. I'm incredibly nervous about the trips because I'm changing passports between the two countries and have heard less than favourable things about the Chinese border guards.

Forty minutes after entering the Vietnamese side of the border, I'm allowed to cross to the Chinese side after the official checks and rechecks and re-rechecks both of my passports and Visas.

Photo from the Vietnamese side of the border after finishing the formalities in Vietnam, Lao Cai (Vietnam) is in the foreground, Hekou (China) in the background.

The Chinese side of the border crossing is far easier, I fill out my entry card, show my passport and visa and am let in to China within ten minutes.

I book a sleeper bus ticket to Kunming (having just missed the last bus) and have to spend the next five hours in the town waiting for the bus. As with my border crossing into Laos, it's raining for most of the day so I spend the time inside chatting to a fellow Aussie (Richard) that was walking past my restaurant while I was having lunch.

Richard walks me to the ATM and with an hour to go until my bus, informs me that the time in China is one hour ahead of that in Vietnam, I now have five minutes until my bus. I run through the rain to the bus station, meet two Singaporeans (Dawn and Waisan) on the bus and thankfully, I don't miss my bus.

Two hours into our trip, we are woken up by police that come on to the bus and check everyone's passports and ID cards. Dawn takes a photo of one of the police women who then confronts her and makes her delete the photo.

After the scary experience of being ID checked, the bus driver decides he would like to kill us and spends the rest of the trip speeding (40km/hr instead of 25-30) over the potholes. No one is getting any sleep now as we are too busy holding on to our seats. I count the number of times we hit a pothole so fast that that I fly out of my sleeper and hit the ceiling and still have the small bumps to show for it.

We arrive at six at Kunming, have one of the worst meals ever and spend the next two hours looking for a nearby hotel as Waisan and Dawn are flying to Beijing the following day.

The train gets us to Lao Cai at six in the morning and we are able to negotiate a minibus for two thirds of the tourist rate. When we get into Sapa, we look down from the rooftop of our guesthouse and see every tourist followed by a throng of Hmong (dressed in blue) women selling their trinkets.

We hire two motorbikes and a driver for 200k and proceed to follow the route that most people take for their 15km trek to visit the minority villages.

Rice paddies.

Hmong (blue) intruding on Dao (red) turf. I expect this to be as violent as a typical bloods and crips meeting but find that they're all friends and probably hang out at the same pub after work.

The day sets a new standard for worst roads I've been on and involves avoiding potholes by driving through a shop, overtaking trucks on blind corners off the road and driving up roads so steep that the bike gets stuck, even in first, and requires a bit of leg power. Our driver on the other hand is atypical of a Vietnamese motorbike tour guide and is by far the slowest driver I've seen in Vietnam.

As always the kids are a lot of fun, these girls speak fluent English. I try and sell them on a three day, two night trek that involves a home-stay in a Hmong village.

Coolest Hmong chick ever.

Every tourist I'd met in Vietnam has recommended Halong Bay, so I was very excited about coming back to Vietnam to visit this Unesco world heritage site.

When the minibus comes around in the morning, every time the bus stops to pick up a passenger, one of us hops out for one reason or another, buying a padlock, going to the bathroom and buying breakfast. After the third stop, the driver lets out a long string of curses and we decide to mess around no more.

The views are amazing, but there is a lot of traffic, they say that 300 of the 500 licensed boats are out on the boat at any one time and we always see at least one other boat.

This is a snap from the first cave we visit. It's littered with neon lights and looks more like a disco than a heritage site.

Typical view from the boat.

Left to right: Irene from Austria, Tanya from the Netherlands, Alex from England and yours truly.

After the trip, Tanya, Irene and myself end up catching the same sleeper train to Sapa, Alex misses out.

I only have several days left before my Chinese visa expires, and I'm still keen to visit Hanoi, Halong Bay and Sapa.

The bus ride from Luang Prabang to Hanoi takes around 36 hours and I'd have to make a visit to Sam Neua so in total it would take three days of travelling at a  minimum. Although I'd made the decision to avoid flights, I had no choice but to shell out for the very expensive flight.

On the plus side, the plane left half an hour early and arrived fifteen minutes after it was supposed to depart.

Evil Plane

The taxi scams were running in full swing when we arrived, initial rates were 10USD from the airport to the city, however speaking with several travellers, I've heard of them stopping halfway and asking for more money or taking the guests to a different hotel for which they'd receive commission.

I didn't really know which bus was the bus to the city centre, however one of the guys touting a minibus was kind enough to inform me that I didn't want to take the number 17 bus since it takes so long.

While riding on the #17 bus, I start talking to the Vietnamese people around me and it so happens that one of them has a "friend" that works in a guesthouse for $7USD. I tell him I'm only looking for $5 and as luck would have it, they apparently have one of those also.

When the bus arrives, the guy calls his "friend" who picks me up with his motorbike and drives me to the guesthouse. The rooms are still $7 however the girl showing me the room is inexperienced and I get the room for $5, with air-con, TV, hot water and two beds.

I give my friend Bao (from Phu Quoc Island) a call and we grab some cheap beers (less than 25c AUD a schooner).

Wandering around in the evening, I stumble upon Hanoi's finest nightspot Minh's Jazz Club and spend the next two hours in a trance enjoying the fine Jazz.

In the morning, I enjoy my free breakfast and am informed that my room was booked for the day and that I'd need to leave. No dramas, I find another room (more of a box really, the door hits the bed) but I only need it for the night, I plan on going to Halong Bay in the morning.

During the day we take in the sights of Ho Chi Minh's museum (the Mausoleum is closed so I don't get to see his corpse), the cathedral and the museum of ethnology.

Rocking out with Uncle Ho.

Posing with a statue at the museum of ethnology. It's a lot of fun to watch all the Vietnamese trying to avoid looking at the statues here, those that do giggle like children.

The following morning, I need to catch a bus to Laos as my Vietnamese visa is expiring and will take too long to extend. I meet a couple of Thai girls that are heading back home, doing the same bus trip. When the Mercedes sprinter bus arrives, I’m told that they won’t take me and that I should wait for another bus.

The bus I travel on is used for daytrips to the DMZ, I’m the only Laos passenger on the bus. After several hours driving, we stop for breakfast and it starts pouring. Since I’m not on the DMZ tour, I don’t get a breakfast, instead, I’m ushered to a minivan. This minivan is not watertight and water starts dripping inside the van, I hope I’m on the right bus and decide I’ll catch up on some sleep on the bus.

After several hours, I am prodded awake by the other passengers and told to get my things and get off the bus. They point the direction I need to walk in and speed off while I’m getting drenched in the rain. After one kilometre’s walk I arrive at the Vietnamese side of the border and go through the necessary formalities.

I cross to the Laos side of the border, where I’m greeted by the two Thai girls I’d met in the morning. Another companion they’d met on the bus is not being given a visa as they don’t like the USD bills he presents them with. I give the guy change for his bills, and after one hour at the border, he can finally enter the country.

The Thai girls, Garbor (the guy with the visa troubles) and I start walking down the road into the border town, with no real idea of where we are going or whether or not we will be meeting a bus. After twenty minutes walking we find our transportation into Savannaket, an old fifties era bus that doesn’t look too roadworthy. We climb aboard and are blinded by a fog of thick smoke. As we cough, we hear the laughter of the culprits responsible, fifteen Laos men decided they’d welcome us to the country by closing all the windows and smoking. They decide we’ve had enough of their welcome after a few minutes and open the windows.

As the smoke clears, we see that the bus is full, everywhere we look there are people, luggage or goods from Vietnam. Our seats are tiny plastic stools placed in the aisle of the bus, we’re told we have six hours and we take off without needing to purchase a ticket.

The bus ride is rough, flat roads are bumpy, the bus is slow and makes a stop every few kilometres as the bus driver is unsatisfied with the amount of passengers on the bus and takes on several more.

After twelve hours of bus travel since the start of the trip, we finally arrive to Savannaket, which is in the middle of celebrating the final day of the three day Thai/Laos New Years Celebration. It’s customary to throw water on anyone and everyone, while we were on the bus as we passed by the groups of locals, those too slow to close their window were given a quick soaking.

In the evening Garbor and I share a room and decide to join in the big water fight. We walk up and down the streets partying with the locals, hopping into their pickups, and dancing to the new Laos national anthem (Flo Rida – Low).

It was too dangerous to carry a camera since it would be soaked. This is the following day, when the eager kids remained on the streets.

Stefan and I decide to rent a motorbike for the day and organise our own tour. In the evening I ask the receptionist how much the bikes are ($5 USD manual, $6 USD automatic).

The following morning I enquire about prices again ($5 USD manual, $8 USD automatic). We take the automatic for 90k VND.

The first stop we make for the day, I make the mistake of parking in a “parking bay”, an unmarked patch of dirt that you need to pay to use. The attendant will give you a ticket and as a foreigner, you need to pay 5k VND to use. The rest of the day, when we park the bike, if we’re offered a ticket, we move the bike 10m and don’t pay anything.

The day sets us back a lot of money as we need to pay 55k VND for each of the three tombs we visit.

Tu Duc’s Tomb

Khai Dinh’s Tomb

Minh Mang’s Tomb

When we stopped for lunch, we ordered a chicken and rice. The chicken was some of the toughest meat either of us had ever tasted, and so we weren’t all too satisfied when the rather large bill arrived. After pointlessly trying to negotiate the price down,  we pay the fare and leave having felt like we were robbed. When I retold the story about lunch to Stefan’s hotel receptionist, she said that the price we paid was in fact quite reasonable and that the chicken is tough because it’s farm fresh, not the usual kind of chicken you can get in a shop. After this, I felt like an ass for trying to get the price down.

Riding through one of the small villages between the tombs we are approached by some Vietnamese children. They start begging when we arrive (something I experienced in Cambodia, but not in Vietnam). I tell them I’ll take their photo. After showing the kids the photo, I ask them for a dollar, they laugh and we go our separate ways.

The final stop on our day trip, Thien Mu pagoda holds the car that the Buddhist Thich Quang Duc used to drive to the location of his self immolation. For more details of his story, I highly recommend the Wikipedia page.

Marble Mountain (Thuy Son Mountain) is a holy mountain complete with pagodas and caves.

The temples are very beautiful, many Vietnamese come to this mountain to pray.

There are several caves like this in the mountain.

After the ascent to heaven, our efforts are rewarded with the most amazing view. Shortly after we descend, it starts pouring.

On the bus from Hoi An to Hue, I start chatting to a German fellow next to me. Stefan took four weeks leave prior to starting some work in South Korea,

Our bus has difficulties getting up hills, and we joke about getting off and walking up, since it would be quicker.

They really love their communist propaganda in Hue.

After finding a room for the night, we walk to the Imperial City. It’s beautiful but inside there is a lot of restoration work that the workers seem in no rush to finish.

Wake up early and realise my Visa is going to expire in five days and there's no way I will be able to finish with Vietnam in time. I grab my passport from the receptionist and visit my friend Miss Trang, manager of another hotel in the area. She tells me that the office is closed on Sundays, so we'll sort out the visa tomorrow.

Mr Trum (who caught the bus with me from Nha Trang) and I rent a moto and head down to Mr Vuong's Romantic Tour. We travel through the countryside, past Danang to a place called Cua Huoi.

Countryside along the trip.

The place is exactly as described, a series of small waterfalls cascading down the mountain, forming small pools for swimming. Flowers fall into the water and the scent is amazing. The only thing missing is a single flamenco guitar player and it would be the most romantic place I've seen in Vietnam.

I can't resist and decide to go for a quick dip in the water. Within five minutes I am approached by ten curious middle-aged Vietnamese men who are very excited to offer me beers. It would be impolite to decline so Trum and I join them for beers. Next thing you know we're eating lunch with them, and they are introducing all the unwed women for myself to find a good wife.

The new friends with whom we share dinner, notice the large amount of beers, they are what lead to the next source of entertainment. The man on the far right (Tung) is the father of the girl on the far left, she is a make up artist, can cook and clean and would make a great wife for me Tung tells me, with Trum translating.

Your eyes are not deceiving you, I am the one on the right in the straw hat, the man on the right is about to give me a big bear hug. After the many beers and rice whiskey shots, an old man hops on the keyboard and they give me a mic, requesting some English songs. I don't know anything they request and they don't know any of the songs I do, so I freestyle a song on the spot to the honky tonk tune being played. I sing about my trip, my friends in Hoi An, the beautiful countryside and about all the Vietnamese women I will marry.

Turns out everyone had stopped what they were doing and was listening to my ballad. They didn't understand a word I was singing but were still enthusiastically applauding when I finished the song with "I still call Australia home". For the rest of the day people approach my with a smile and tell me I'm a great singer. They're full of it but I thank them anyway.

We leave several hours later to head to Marble Mountain and run into trouble. Trum the genius didn't want to stop for petrol when I suggested we should, we run out and have to wait for a lift.

Trum knows more Vietnamese than I do, so I let him hitchhike in the sun while I chill in the shade and take some photos. It takes all of five minutes to find a lift (this is after we're bored of pushing the bike and coasting down hill).

When we fill up I tell Trum I'm driving, hop on the bike and figure out how to ride manual (thanks to the one lesson I had in Australia) while Trum grumbles about the heat. Shortly he is shouting for me to slow down, telling me he is scared that we will die. I laugh and tell him I am scared also. He is quiet most of the way to Marble Mountain. We make it in one piece.

In the late morning, Vuong swings past on his moto and we head down to My Son (pronounced Mee Son) Holy Land to look at some ancient Champa temples.

The temples are very similar to those at Angkor, but much smaller.

Vuong finds a trio of Aussie girls and they invite us to join in their picnic. In return, Vuong organises a car and hotel for the girls in Hue.

After the temple visit, we head towards Danang, where Vuong introduces me to more of his family. His sister in law is unmarried and is looking for a husband, young, good sense of humour, good looking and employed. Send all reasonable offers :)

In the evening we go to a Vietnamese concert, consisting of several groups of pop singers, a comedy duo, a cross dresser and a gay cowboy.

These gentlemen are exhibiting the latest in Vietnam fashion and sport more makeup than most girls I know.

This singer is very popular in Vietnam. Like most male singers he's sporting tight pants in bright colours. However he falls short on the cowboy boots and hat and the accompanying dance. The one song he sings in English, I can't understand as his accent is so strong.

In the morning Trung and I take a bicycle tour of the Hoi An countryside. We arrive at a vegetable farm and stop to have a chat with some of the farmers.

It’s hard to complain about life back home when you see some of the hardships faced out here. This farmer works harder than most people I’ve seen and stops his work to pose for a photo. He’s very happy despite the hardships he faces and I find myself completely lost for words, not that it would matter since we don’t speak a common language.

All work is done by hand and everyone works, men, women and children, young and old. These farmers make reasonably good sums of money I’m told.

After the vegetable garden, we ride to Vuong’s place for a lunch with his mother (Ba) and younger sister.

Following our lunch, Ba takes Trung and I out on her boat up the river to a beach for a swim.

Some Vietnamese fishermen confidently challenge me to a swimming race. I gladly accept thinking they’re like most Vietnamese when it comes to swimming. I’m mistaken, these guys are quick, really quick and they know it. That makes the defeat that much better, I pound my chest and tell them I’m Australia’s fastest swimmer and show them my victory dance, so much for winning gracefully. The guys take it in good stride and I bid them farewell as they must get back to the waters to fish.

WARNING: Chests in photos appear hairy because they are.

When we arrive back at Hai’s place (conveniently situated opposite my hotel), the family invite me for dinner and I have another meal of fish and rice. Hoi An hospitality is amazing.

I meet a Vietnamese guy (Trung) on the sleeper bus between Nha Trang and Hoi An. Trung knows a local girl, Hai. Hai works in her family’s tailor shop and her best friend, Trang,  is the manager of a hotel. The tour operator at the hotel is Vuong (English name King) and the final person in my new posse is Hien, a bartender at a very popular bar just out of the old town.

We grab breakfast in the morning, I play tourist during the day and we catch up for dinner consisting of sting ray and fresh fish in the DIY burrito style I tried in Nha Trang.

Japanese covered bridge, one of the many sights in the old town of Hoi An.

Hoi An old town is a tourist oriented town and as such everyone you see in the old town is trying to sell you something. Walking past a row of eateries when you’re not hungry can be annoying, every tout will ask you to eat in their restaurant. I can’t remember the number of times I’ve said Khong Gam On (No thank you).

The city is famed for its collection of tailors, it seems that every second shop can get you measured for a suit, one day later the suit is made. A suit generally goes for 100USD, a shirt 15USD and the quality is amazing, you would easily pay ten times the price back home for the clothes.

Walking back to our hotel one night the sound of live music draws me to XQ - a combination art gallery, art factory and artist space.

Hand woven silk shirts and traditional dresses are on display in one of the rooms. Another room has wooden carvings and statues, depicting struggles faced by the Vietnamese. Embroided canvases are the organisation’s product line and are sold in large quantities from the many offices in Vietnam.

Embroidery has a strong history within Vietnam, unfortunately, it’s going the way of the Japanese geishas. Few girls want to make a career out of embroidery due to the amount of time required to perfect the art.

A portrait requires one girl two months of work to do and four to five years of experience to undertake. Larger scenes can take four girls three months each to complete. The pictures sell for between 800 and 3500 USD from what I could see.

The courtyard cafe serves hot tea, as four guitarists sing and play songs composed between the 40s and 70s. They sing songs of love, songs about the daily lives of fishermen and farmers and songs of mothers and fathers watching their children go to die in the American war. Our front row seats for this spectacular performance come free of charge, the music is so moving that the owner of the gallery picks up a microphone and joins in the songs. Nhac Gi Trinh Cong Son, the composer of many of the songs, is known by all in Vietnam and his music is loved by many.

Our day trip of the islands sets us back 100k VND (~$8AUD) and involves a new age Vietnamese pirate, snorkelling around corals, a big lunch, some chill time and a visit to an aquarium on a boat.

Every day we are approached by women, children and the elderly trying to sell something. On several occasions, Vincent will discretely give them a small donation to help them out. He is also happy to pay double the price for water from elderly ladies as he knows that they have no other way to survive in life. His dream is to one day open a house in Vietnam for the elderly and for the many orphans. He occasionally takes a day off to visit some orphans in his neighbourhood and cut their hair free of charge. One particular incident we witnessed broke my heart after I learned more about the situation.

Sitting in a cafe drinking iced coffee, we were approached by a young girl, no older than nine that is suffering from sort of disability, possibly related to agent orange. In Vietnam, it's fairly common for children with disabilities to be abandoned by their parents at a very young age. After Vincent gave her a small donation, she approached another tourist sitting by herself playing with the phone. When the young girl gave the older tourist a pack of postcards in an attempt to sell them, the older girl threw them on the ground for being interrupted.

The young girl, who by all accounts should be in school is instead forced to spend her days walking the tourist beat trying to sell cigarettes and postcards in order to make enough money to buy food to eat or somewhere to sleep for the night. While the older girl thought nothing about her encounter with the younger girl, it was clear to everyone who'd seen the situation that the younger girl's spirit was crushed. She put on a brave face, blinked away the coming tears and carried on with her day's work.

The other Vietnamese street sellers, who risk losing their belongings if caught by the local police, cheer up the girl, get her some food and exact her revenge by systematically approaching the older girl to sell her things until she is fed up and leaves the cafe.

When the little girl glances in my direction, our eyes meet, I give her a smile as if to say I understand your situation and have nothing but the utmost respect for you. When the girl responds, her eyes light up and her cheeks slightly redden as her lips part to show the widest, most beautiful grin I've ever seen. A girl as young and brave as her smiles so genuinely and warmly that I have to blink away the tears and am completely lost for words.

After witnessing the event, I begin to understand why there exists a set of prices for locals and a set of prices for foreigners, because the locals care about the poor, the hungry, the sick and the elderly, the orphans, the unemployed and those that have no form of welfare to support them.

Karma shows her presence once more as the cafe owner notices the older girl has left her hotel key behind. Not being the kind to smile at the situation for too long, we chase the girl down and return her key.

Within minutes we see the little girl again selling her wares to an older tourist who's donation allows her a place to sleep for the night.

Our first day in Nha Trang we spend swimming and taking in the sights the city has to offer.

Vincent and myself in front of Nha Trang Beach.

Lunch involves the Vietnamese equivalent of burritos. Vincent is a professional at rolling them and has me doing likewise in no time.

In the evening we book a boat tour of the islands and I discover that in Vietnam, piracy not only covers movies, books and music, but also tours. Have fun playing spot the difference.

We picked the company on the left because it was cheaper.

Vincent and I hop on the bus to Nha Trang in the morning. The ride is mostly uneventful until we stop in Mui Ne, which is very popular with Russian tourists, every second shop has a sign written in Russian.

Outside the bus stop is a big mango tree, filled with juicy green mangoes. As the taller one, Vincent asks me to grab the fattest mango he sees. After pulling down the mango, I’m accosted by the owner of the tree for stealing her mangoes. Since I don’t understand a word she’s saying, I apologise and let Vincent take the heat for it.

When we hop on the bus, everyone is laughing as they saw what happened from the bus. The elderly woman sitting opposite myself leans over and says “nothing in life is free”, pauses to let the thought sink in and adds “especially love”.

The phrase runs through my mind as I ponder the life of Chris McCandles (Alexander Supertramp) from Into the Wild and I have one of those long deep moments that occur when one think about the meaning of life and their purpose.

My internal philosophical discussion is interrupted within half an hour when a girl nearby asks Vincent if they can have the mango in exchange for some of their fruit. The offer is too good to pass up, we give her the mango and I am startled to see her pull out a small knife to cut the fruit. While I’m trying to get Vincent to tell me why Vietnamese girls are carrying knives on buses, she puts away the knife, pulls out a bigger knife and delicately carves the fruit into small pieces. I take a mental note to not mess with Vietnamese girls on buses.

Vincent and I decide to go to the coastal beach town of Nha Trang and book the bus for the following morning. This leaves us with a day to spend seeing more sights of Saigon.

After taking a snap of Uncle Ho in Saigon’s central post office we pop down to the Vietnamese museum located outside the zoo where I experience the Vietnamese double standard once more, Vincent as a local pays 2k VND, while I as a foreigner must pay 15k VND.

Inside I take a couple of photos only to be stopped by security and told that no photos are allowed (code for bribe me). I take this as a challenge and decide to risk it. After studying the security guards’ patterns around the museum, I find the times when I can take photos and take plenty.

In one of the rooms is an exhibit of traditional Vietnamese instruments and after some quick tuition by the curator of the exhibition, I belt out a stunning rendition of Mary Had a Little Lamb on the electrical who knows what’s it called.

Vietnamese instruments are pretty badass but aren’t really setup for playing blues.

After the museum we enter the zoo and I take photos like a good little tourist boy. I see a woman in a wedding dress and am most amused so I start taking photos of her. 

Turns out she’s a model, I’ve never seen models at Taronga zoo before.