Happy New Year....er, Tet!

That's right, by the Vietnamese (and Chinese) calendar, today is Tet, the first day the year of the Pig. Over the past week we've seen a growing frenzy of excitement in the towns and cities. The markets have been even more bustling and crowded than usual as people buy all the traditional decorations, foods and gifts that go along with Tet. If ushered in properly, Tet holds the potential for an auspicious upcoming year. People take that seriously here. Following tradition, people decorate with the proscribed flowers; clean house, shop and temple; clear outstanding debts (try that America!); buy new clothes for the children and more. This is the most important holiday of the year in Vietnam and you can feel it everywhere. Being especially nice to others (including foreigners) augurs well for relations in the upcoming year, so we've been the recipients of more smiles and hellos than ever. Very nice.

A Long Road

A few mornings ago, as I packed my backpack and the sun reddened the eastern horizon, I asked, "how many towns has it been?" In the fourteen months since leaving our house to when we arrived in Hoi An, where we are now, we've slept in 121 places. I was surprised how easy it was to trace back through each of them, some no more than a single night sleeping in an open Arkansas field or a non-descript Indian guest house. I guess that says something for the ability of variety to inscript your memory.

A few weeks ago we observed we were carrying six (it's now seven) kinds of currency. Only two of them are in throw-away quantities.

Hello . . . can you read me?

Barring Thailand, Vietnam has been the most materially comfortable place we've visited since Europe. The Vietnamese are a little like northern Europeans in that they work hard and keep things in order. One rather ominous downside, though, is that there are some websites that you cannot view from inside the country, notably Blogspot/Blogger. We can post but we can't read what we post once it's up. Weird.

In many parts of the world, dissident political dicussion, banned from all mass media, is forced to migrate to the World Wide Web. Voices find their outlet on blogging sites . . . unless they are in Vietnam or countries with similar free-speech restrictions.

Here's a link to a BBC story discussing a handbook to protect your blog or website from censors: Link
Actual web address: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4271062.stm

Made It

Made it on the bus and enjoyed the six-hour ride from Kon Tum to Da Nang on the coast. Took the above photo over the shoulder of our driver on a stretch of what used to be the old Ho Chi Minh Trail very near the area of Dak To, an area of very extensive battles forty years ago. The Vietnamese are slowly re-grading and paving the former North Vietnam army supply route as the second north-south route in the country.

So, we made it as far as Da Nang that night. Our goal was Hoi An, 30 kilometers further south but there were no more busses running by the time we arrived. We found a guest house and, fortuitously, a vegetarian restaurant and settled in for the night. We woke up just after dawn the next day to some scratchy anthemic music and distorted, loud speech echoing above the traffic noise. I went to the roof of the guest house and saw this commemoration in the roundabout just down the road.

Don't Believe Everything You Hear

Woke this morning before sunrise to catch a bus. We're trying to get from the central highlands town of Kon Tum out to Hoi An, on the coast. Supposedly the bus companies have to pay more for insurance for westerners than Vietnamese so the price for the ticket (we were told) was almost twice that for locals. This happens a lot in Vietnam. After travelling for a while, especially in poorer countries, you get used to folks trying to make extra cash off your white skin. Fair enough, but we have to try to bargain. Also, after a while on the road, bargaining becomes part of the sport and even an obligation.

So, we argued...and argued - and as we argued, one bus after another left the station for various destinations - including ours. In many towns, there is one big, morning departure then only infrequent buses for the rest of the day. We had two local moto-scooter drivers (sort of a taxi driver) who shadowed us at every bus we queried and every time we went to the ticket desk. At first I thought they were sabotaging our effort to pay the local fare. Then I thought they were just trying to help us as our Vietnamese is very limited and English is almost non-existent. Everytime we'd struggle to ask about price, time and destination; the moto drivers started chattering in Vietnamese. The driver or ticket taker inevitably listened to them and told us there were either no tickets or gave us some riduculously inflated price. By the time the last bus left the station, I concluded the moto-jerks were, indeed, running interference and had stranded us. Hey, it happens. It hasn't happened much at all to us on this trip but here we are. After the station emptied, we ended up getting a normal ticket on the afternoon bus - our fingers are crossed in hope that they actually let us and our backpacks get on board. We found an internet cafe and are trying to fill some time. Let's see if we make it.

Aftermath

A final, belated note about Cambodia. You'd have a difficult time moving around in the country without crossing paths with some persons who've been physically maimed by war. The following is from the web site Mekong.net

• "Unfortunately, one of the most lasting legacies of the conflicts continues to claim new victims daily. Land mines, laid by the Khmer Rouge, the Heng Samrin and Hun Sen regimes, the Vietnamese, the KPNLF, and the Sihanoukists litter the countryside. In most cases, even the soldiers who planted the mines did not record where they were placed. Now, Cambodia has the one of the highest rates of physical disability of any country in the world. While census data for Cambodia is sketchy, it is generally accepted that more than 40,000 Cambodians have suffered amputations as a result of mine injuries since 1979."

Click on the link and check out the rest of the history. It's a singular study in ongoing human suffering.

I add this information as images like these have been difficult to get out of my mind. Cambodia really won me over. Her people were the single biggest reason for that. Even after so much suffering, they live with a love of laughter uncommon in my experience.

Landmines are still manufactured and used widely in conflicts around the world. More often than not, they are placed in an area for some short-term war need, then left only to be stumbled upon years later by someone who had nothing to do with the conflict. If you want to learn more about landmines you can see the web page of The International Campaign to Ban Landmines.

Really Cool

We have a friend back in the Bay Area who's done a lot of travel over the years. He's a genuine adventurer and when he goes out on the road he dives right into whatever experience is before him. I'm only guessing, but I'd say he's been traveling for almost as long as I've been alive. He's seen a lot and when you've visited as many parts of this world as he has, I think you get a more tempered perspective on what's exciting. This isn't to say he doesn't get thrilled or enjoy interesting experiences. Even now, he still travels more than anyone I know. I think he just feels less compelled to "sell" his excitement. If a place is worthwhile to visit, he'll say it's "pretty cool". If it's exceptional say, like Macchu Picchu in Peru, he'll amplify that to "really cool". It doesn't seem to matter if he's talking about someplace that might break and ordinary person's heart. If a place shouldn't be missed, he'll let you know with a "really cool".

After a more than a year on the road seeing wonder upon wonder, the last week Tami and I spent wandering around the ancient ruins of Angkor. It was really cool.

Link to Angkor Photos

A Country of Hustlers and Jokers

Around the ancient ruins of Angkor, the children are the most motivated vendors. Moreso than perhaps any place I've ever visited, the kids know how to work the charm. Their most effective weapon is their stylized use of English. The letter "r" changes to "ah", "v" changes to "b". Syntax gets modified so the kids sound a little like Yoda, from the Star Wars movies. Statements come out in a sing-song, rise and fall of the voice - the end always trailing away on an elongated, plaintive drawl.

• "Buy one moah my beeah (beer)..."
• "Gib me one moah orange again..." (From a girl who saw oranges in a small bag we carried. We had given her no oranges in the first place.)
• "Buy my cold drinks, okayyy...?"
• "Buy my post card nowww..."
• "Don't say no, say yes..." (after I answered in the negative.)
• "No? Buy twooo..." (after I answered that I didn't want one.)
• "Hello Sah (sir). I sell you cheap, cheap big plan. Two Coke for one dollahhh..." (from a boy running up to us, menus in hand.)
• One common tactic involved the kids trotting up the final twenty or so steps to us saying "hello" breathlessly. Initially, we asked them what was wrong. They'd answer something like, "I ran so far to catch you." It took us a couple times to realize this was a sympathy ploy for us to recognize their hard work.

I mentioned in the prior post that Cambodians seem to love to have a laugh, especially if it's at the expense of a 'falang'. One morning I saw this crude looking saw laying on some blocks. I thought it looked interesting so I clambered over for a photo. A small group of women workers eating close by took an interest and started talking. At first they watched me maneuver around the rubble trying to get a good angle. Two came over to look at my camera screen to see why the heck I might be trying to take a picture of a weed chopper. One woman sitting facing the group started a monologue that elicited periodic ripples of laughter and affirmations from the others. I could tell she was talking about me because she and the others would glance in my direction just before or after the laughs.

I got my shot and walked past. Her monologue continued without a break. Both she and the others tried to stifle increasing laughter. Since I was the obvious object of the joke, I stopped to watch. The monologue lady was laughing so hard she was rubbing her belly, gasping and wiping her eyes yet still she talked on. This had been building for something like two minutes. Just behind her, facing myself and the ladies, sat a small group of men groundskeepers. Throughout, the guys never fully shared in the laughs. After I stopped to watch, they only smiled nervously shooting me furtive glances I can only assume were intended to confirm, without a doubt, that I didn't understand what she was saying.

What entertainment I could have provided by merely taking a photo, I have no idea. I could still hear the laughs and the occasional "falang" as I rounded the corner of a ruin.

Cambodia for Sale

Roadside, hand-filed keys.


I'm not sure what I expected of Cambodia. No other travelers we'd met said they really liked the country but none said they really hated it either. It made me curious how they almost all paused, thoughtfully reassessing their experiences to see if anything had changed since the last time someone had asked their opinion. We'd heard that it was 'lawless', a bit like the wild west, that you had to watch your back. I knew, like its neighbor Thailand, Cambodia had a thriving sex trade. I'd heard the legends about shooting ranges where you could fire off AK47's or grenade launchers. (True, even now.) We heard from more than one person that, if you wanted it, you can get it in Cambodia. The past half century has seen Cambodia struggle to get out from under the yoke of the colonial French, stagger from the horrific maelstrom of violence that flooded over from the U.S. war in Vietnam only to then fall into a ghastly genocide at the hands of the Khmer Rouge.

What we found after we arrived was a surprise, if a surprise can unfold slowly over weeks. I don't know that I've ever visited a country that confounds and charms the way Cambodia has. It's a scruffy land of hustlers who seem to love few things more than having a laugh at the expense of a "falang" (foreigner). Easy to obtain visas, low cost of living and the ability to live under the radar have drawn expatriates from around the world who've opened all manner of businesses, notably bars, restaurants or other entertainment oriented ventures. I didn't know Bogie's Casablanca still had modern day cousins but Cambodia seems like that kind of place.

• You can rent scooters or motorcycles easily. Forget the helmet, though. Cambodians don't bother with those.
• Traffic flow on the streets is akin to blood cells in a vein. Where there is space, bikes, scooters, cars or cycle rickshaws crowd into the lane until they can flow freely. At intersections, it's very common for the two-wheeled vehicles to cut the corner by cruising right through a gas station or parking lot without slowing.
• Books, the backpackers' great indulgence, can be had here for a fraction of what they cost even next door in Thailand. Cambodia puts little effort into copyright protection. There is a cottage industry re-printing (i.e. photocopying) books. DVD's and CD's can also be had for extra cheap. There is even a small chain of shops (see photo below) here that allows you to download MP3's to your audio player from "their" very extensive catalogue. For the local folks looking for Asian pop music, some enterprising Cambodians simply set up a computer, a monitor and some headphones on the sidewalk and allow people to plug in and get music right on the street as if it's a snack.

• Sex for hire is as common as coffee here. It's an old, routinely accepted practice in southeast Asia. Some entrepreneurial expatriates put new spins on it, though. Down on the coast, Russian "investors" (i.e. mafia) opened a club where customers choose from girls who swim in a pool mermaid style or lounge with large snakes.
  
  A lady and a potential customer.
  

(Written December 21st)

Link to current photos

Today marks a year since we pulled out of the driveway back in San Francisco. If you can remember that feeling you used to have when you were a child on the first day of summer vacation - you had all the time in the world ahead of you and you were free to do whatever you wanted - that was how I felt last December 21st. The following 365 days have not disappointed in the least way. I suppose some people roll their eyes at my or Tami's repetitive expressions of how grateful we are. Call me naive but I still feel it strongly.

After a full year of literally wandering the planet, we finally landed on a beach. We're on an island in the Gulf of Thailand called Koh Mak. In my mind, when you strap a backpack to your body and board an international flight, a tropical beach hovers confindently somewhere in the wings as the inevitable default destination. If you're lucky, you can find a beach with the right balance of calm serenity and comforts. Palm trees, sand and clear, warm water might be the comfort food of backpacking travel - perhaps of all travel.

Beach life is one of those parts of a big trip that you know is going to give you some low-impact, intimate interaction with nature. It's going to give you a sure chance to slow down. (And no jokes about what the heck do we need to slow down from...everyone needs a little beach chill in their lives from time to time.)
Koh Mak delivers. Actually, if Koh Mak were any more relaxing, I'd think it was fiction. Apart from a thatched hut on stilts, we virtually live outside. We can walk through huge groves of coconut palms swaying in the breeze. We get to submerse our bodies into the limpid ocean all day. Beers are cheap and very cold.

We may be in and out of touch for awhile. Tomorrow we take a boat for Cambodia. If the next year turns out to be anything like the last, we're in for lots of fun. May yours be that, as well.

Happy holidays and all the best!