Destination Vietnam, 12-21-2007
Traffic, Dalat and Mouse Stew,
I crossed the border on the 8th of December and stayed in Saigon for a week, sampling some of the hustle and bustle it’s famous for. On the first day in town I hired a cyclo to pedal me around while I sat and took pictures, poor guy only got a 1.50$ out of me and I know he was straining every time we started from a dead stop. Traveling by cyclo gives you the time to see people unfettered by car windows and or the need to watch where you going. Also you get a good feel on how the traffic moves in general. In Saigon most tourists find that simply crossing the street can be a major achievement. The shear number of motorcycles, bicycles and cars will astound even the most hardened traveler. Basically, to cross a street you have look in the direction of oncoming traffic and then stare down the closest motorcycle or car and hope they will veer to the right or left you as you slowly walk forward, never run as this will only throw off the timing. The closest I can describe it would be like crossing a river and the traffic is the water and it slowly flows around you as you cross. I am a big guy and it’s hard for them not to notice me, so I don’t wonder that when I cross the street, I have many people in my shadow using me as the lead. There are many accidents here involving other motos or bicycles, but very few involving pedestrians. Sitting on one busy traffic circle I watched as two very young children about 7 or 8 walked hand in hand across this huge traffic circle with 40 to 50 vehicles flowing around them like water. The one little girl only screamed when a car darted out scaring her, then seeing the children it veered off. I will post a picture of the drama when I get the chance but this happens millions of times every day all over Saigon. Once over the traffic shock, Saigon will dazzle you with some of the best food in Asia, and shopping compared to any city in the west, the real stuff or any knocked off you can think of, fashions, electronics, trinkets, art. One of the biggest sellers on the streets are the “real weather beaten Zippo lighters” and “dog tags” left over from the war, complete with year in country, platoon nickname or company logo. The Vietnamese have banned all motorcycles bigger than 175cc from the highways. Not to say there aren’t any in Vietnam, because I have seen a few running around. One was this 750 café racer, and another a Harley Davidson 883 and most of the police drive 400’s. There are a group of guides here called the “Easy Riders”. They are a collection of drivers with funky Honda 125’s and Russian Minks or Urals that offer trips from Saigon to Hanoi and anywhere in between on the back of their bike. Don’t know if I could stand being “guided” everywhere I went! I muse because I will be leaving the world of motorcycles behind for the ignoble means of transportation called buses, boats and trains again. Although the “Open Buses” (Tourist class with open ended tickets) are second to none, it still requires the queuing, assigned seating, and limited access to the countryside we will be driving through. A stewardess, movies, food and water is a luxury still un-afforded by a multitude of the masses, so I guess I can make an effort to endure. Imagine if you will, all the normal seats in a bus taken out and then a two story platform of metal isle’s welded to the interior. This metal platform has two aisle running front to back with a small staircase at the front and back for the upper level passengers. There is one window aisle on either side of the bus and one center row. Basically, three abreast front to back, upper and lower. The seats are almost as wide first class seats and lay back perfectly flat to make a bed for sleeping on those longer overnight trips. Two or threes of the legs here are 11 and 12 hours long. You can buy the tickets in a variety of route combinations, one example is Saigon->Dalat->Nah Trang->Hoi An->Hue->Hanoi or one 15 differing route possibilities headed north or coming south depending on time and need. When using these tickets, you simply book the seat the day before you travel and off you go, Stop at any city, stay as long as you like and then when you are ready to continue, book another seat one day in advance and there you go again. I booked my ticket and it was all of 22$ for the above mentioned trip. Anyway, other than the buses, I have the option of trains, they mainly follow the coastal route and are not a versatile as the bus and then lastly there is Vietnam Air. The cost to fly from Saigon to Hanoi is around $75. A flight to Hue is only $35 one way. Right now I will plan on going to Hanoi overland and then will have to decide if I will take a train or fly back to either Saigon or Phnom Penh..
One thing that does get tiring here in Saigon are all the street vendors, known in Asia as “Touts”, these are the people trying to sell mostly junk at inflated prices sometimes as much as 500%, books, lighters, manicure kits, hammocks, constantly badgering you to buy there wares and it’s seems never ending. I thought Bangkok was bad but the Vietnamese put any Thai Tout to absolute shame in their boldness and dogged persistence. They even try to sell to you at the dinner table while you are chewing a mouthful of food, walking right up to the table forming a line of people waiting their turn for a “No!” One of the locals showed me how he deals with them and it involves looking away from them and then raising your hand as if to wave and then shake it side to side, then you try real hard to ignore them, as much as possible anyway. If the touts are bored, as they usually are, they will keep trying to wear you down by shear determination. On more than one occasion I have seen a local westerner politely grab a tout by the hand and pull them on down the street a few meters and then return to the table to continue their meal, it can get down right brutal sometimes!
It’s Sunday, the 16th of December, I am currently in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, writing from a corner Café, in a city called Dalat. Dalat meaning “place of the river people”, here used to live seven or so clans of indigenous hill tribes called the Hmoong, the same ones who aided the US Special Forces in its war with the north. These days the Hmoong people live nowhere near the city. They have been assimilated into the Vietnamese cultures and pushed far out in the surrounding mountains sides. All the kings of ancient Thailand, Cambodia and Laos used to come here and hunt or capture elephants for their kingdoms but now there’s nothing but tired old elephants trudging through the jungle and forests with tourist on their backs. Unlike Thailand, here they don’t get to retire back to the jungle when they reach sixty years of age! Most of the wildlife was hunted to extinction long ago, but legend says there are still a few Tigers running around. So as “Chef” from the movie Apocalypse Now said “Never get out of the fricking boat man, never get out!” None the less the city and the surrounding mountains are absolutely beautiful, first “found” and then inhabited by the French as early as 1850 and continuing until their defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954. The city itself escaped the war with a mutual agreement by the Viet Cong and the Americans, leaving it almost entirely unharmed and used as a playground when on leave or R&R. The Americans occupied the center and south leaving the Viet Cong the north side. They still have at least 2500 old French Villas still in use here and strict laws as to anyone restoring them. Some of the villas were small and quaint two and three bedroom chalets, while a great many are very ornate with gated walls, gardens, some with 50 rooms or more, servant quarters, and heated swimming pools. The villas were used by the French as a retreat and Dalat looks very much like a town built in the French Alps complete with narrow winding streets and roof tops ready to shed snow. Almost every intersection is a traffic circle and it amazing to see how efficiently the traffic flows through them. Dalat is also famous for its beautiful forests and cool weather, bringing both Vietnamese and some foreign tourists escaping the heat of the Low Countries. Most Vietnamese coming here delight at the chance to wear fancy wool scarf’s, fashionable sweaters and tailored jackets, with the college kids and “old guys” still wearing the French berets. During the evening they will stroll around the banana shaped lake cutting through the middle of the town just as the French of olden times. The lake is lined with a nice sidewalk complete with Oaks, Willows, Pines and there’s even small paddle wheel swans for rent as you woo your girl. Even the main huge communications tower located on a hill overlooking the lake was built to resemble the Eiffel Tower in Paris. As luck would have it, I arrived just in time for the Annual Dalat Flower Festival, great for sightseeing and photography, but also meaning that most of the hotels were full. After looking around desperately for an hour or so, I was able to find a single room just off the lake for 15$. The room had a huge vaulted ceiling, king size bed, a real tub with brass feet, hot water and a small balcony overlooking the street, how lucky can you get… I wandered down the street and just a few hundred meters from the hotel found this small western owned restaurant called “V”… The prices were a bit on the steep side, a glass of Vang Dalat red wine going for 1.25$, a home cooked meal of oven baked pork loin with mashed potatoes and fresh vegetables costing all of 4.5$. The waiters were dressed in the classic French uniforms and a had tinge of a French accent. I had gotten used to only paying 2$ for a Cambodian or Vietnamese dinner and the bill never topping 3.5$... I guess I can afford to splurge once in a while! On another note, Dalat is known for it’s delicious red wines, but they also have a dam good home brewery going on as well. I just found this local restaurant up the street call “Big Man Beer”… The three beers they offer are all on tap with, Yellow beer the cheapest at 35cents a pint, the Red beer for 60cents, and the best being the Black beer complete with a frothy head, also for just 60cents a pint. Needless to say it’s my first stop before going out to dinner every night This town also has hundreds of small “Café’s” serving only drinks. Tea’s fresh juices, shakes, sodas and the most prevalent being the “Ca Phe” as the Vietnamese say it. There are a almost as many different Ca Phe’s as there are tea’s, One I like in particular is called a Vietnamese Ca Phe, using locally grown beans and concocted in a tall glass with about a ¼ inch of Sweetened Condensed Milk at the bottom of the glass and then served with the Ca Phe maker/filter on top of the glass. Another specialty here along with the hundreds of white, yellow, red and black tea is Asparagus Tea, this made from the entire plant after being dried and ground. I have had a few cups and found it to be very tasty, but don’t add sugar, they say it ruins any health benefit of the tea. Again here you don’t need air conditioning you need a good down jacket, the average temperature is hovering at a daily high of 75 degrees and a low of 55, hot water is the main concern for everyone. As I was walking around the next morning I even saw the farmers heating water in a big black pot for bathing. Speaking of farmers, Dalat is also the salad bowl of Vietnam. Here in almost any open space not forested or covered with habitation they grow every vegetable imaginable, lettuce, (8 different varieties), all kinds of fruits and berries, spices like chilies, black pepper, oregano, basil, you name it, and all to be found at this huge semi enclosed market right in the center of town. The market is surrounded by the biggest and best hotels, while the cheaper backpacker hotels are up and over the hill. I spent many hours just walking around talking and photographing all the people coming and going, buying and selling. It was a virtual maze of food stuffs. Ripe fruits, dried this, pickled that, food everywhere, one corner was for seafood, one for meats, inside was the rice market, while the second and third had a food court and clothing shops. I sampled some here and there, and the locals were always trying to get you to try this and that. To this day I know not what it was I had eaten some good and some very bad. Then in the heat of the day when you’re hot from all that walking around in the sun, go to the food court and there they will make you any fruit or vegetable drink you can think up for only 25cents.
Vietnamese food has to be some of the most diverse on the planet. Here, everything is on the table. If it can be boiled, baked, fried, grilled, sautéed or stewed, they will eat it. Most higher class restaurants and even a great many smaller ones will have aquariums filled with fish, crabs, mice, ( yep, ordinary field mice) frogs, snakes, eels, squid, crocodile, octopus, kangaroo, ostrich and all displayed and ready to be eaten. Just walk over, point out which one you want, show them how you would like it cooked, and viola, dinner is served. I met this Finnish guy the other night and we went to dinner at a local restaurant where nobody could find a English menu for us, so we opted to take a chance and point at the food we wanted and then animating how it was to be cooked. The restaurant’s “Mama san” was very helpful and even went as far as taking us back to the kitchen to see how the food was going to be prepared. I chose something simple and had this clay pot filled with shrimps, garlic, tomatoes and these little red hot mouse poop chili peppers. The clay pot had handles on each side and then all the ingredients were stuffed into the pot and then placed onto white hot coals until everything inside was simmering in a kind of tomato sauce. My friend the Fin was into adventure, he ordered the mice, he pointed out 4 or 5 big fat ones and then the “Mama san” suggested serving it as a stew. Remember, all this was done with out the benefit of a menu or English!!!
Well, my dish was spectacular, served over a bed rice and it was delicious. The mouse stew was a novelty for the both of us and we wondered how it would be served. As it turned out the mouse had been skinned, then mostly the legs and arms and breast meat made it into the stew along side potatoes, carrots, green beans, onions and a curry like sauce, it smelled great from my side of the table. When ever he spooned up a piece of the mouse, he decided to just finger it and eat as you would a chicken leg. I, by the way, could not bring myself to try it! Maybe next time I’ll muster up the courage and have bite of the crocodile…
I am now in the beach town of Nha Trang, (NA Chang), here I will sit for a few days lazing about and then it’s off to the Ancient City of Hoi An, 12 hours to the north. I hope this finds everyone doing well and do write when you get the chance, seems the internet here is faster that Cambodia and I will also upload some more pictures in the next few days… Tam Biet (good bye)
George
