Spain - Girona - Gothic Vaults and Postcard Views

After doing some calculations both financial and entertainment wise, I figured I didn't really need to sit around in Barcelona between visiting my godmother Marie and my friend Rob, which would have brought my total time spent in Barcelona up to almost ten days straight. That's longer than I've spent in some countries on this trip! So I closed my eyes and pointed to the map of Catalunya, and Girona became my getaway destination for four days.



I had no idea what to expect, but Girona is very pleasant. It's a medieval town with lots of Gothic architecture. It was a stronghold of the Spanish Jews before the expulsion of 1492 and the historic Jewish quarter is still largely intact today as kind of an open air museum. The cathedral here boasts the largest Gothic vault in Europe (I know fancy that!). And the pace of life is definitely more chilled out than Barcelona.



I spent yesterday with Hannah from Nice and Linn from Stockholm going up and down a million cobblestone staircases to see the cathedral, the old ramparts wall around the old part of the city, and the plazas, as well as dropping in on the Saturday markets in the park. One note on the big park, on weekends, they open up three big tent bars/dance clubs in the center of the park called Las Carpas, bringing a whole new meaning to the expressions 'park party' and 'drinking in the park'. And Spaniards don't even think about showing up at club venues until well after 2am, so my sleeping schedule is all over the place lately. No wonder they're dedicated to their siestas!



My hostel here is especially great, with a kitchen, clean bathrooms, comfy bunks, nice staff and fellow travellers and best of all, a terrace with views of the canal, old quarter and cathedral, where I will spending the rest of today with my book.

Spain - Barcelona - Take One: Have You Seen The Fountain Show?!

I passed my remaining days in Rome at a fantastic camping village just an hour's commute outside the city center with some great girls (Ania from South Africa and Jayde from Queensland) in an air conditioned bungalow with a pool, hot tub and bar on site. Great way to relax and recharge after my whirlwind tour of Italy, excepting the one party night where I somehow stayed up chatting with other travelers in the parking lot until 6am after the toga party. That made for a rough next day.

Ah, but now I am in Spain... Ole! A lot of people Ive met have asked why I haven't got the UK, France or the Netherlands on my itinerary, but I just can't squeeze everything in. Also, the UK is SO expensive. Or so my reasoning went, since this was before I looked at hostel prices in Barcelona, which are a lot for crap dorms. The concern was moot in the end since I scored big time and my godmother's holiday in Spain coincided with my arrival in Barcelona, so I was thankfully able to crash with her and her friends at the fabulous Le Meridien 5 star hotel off Las Ramblas.

Now this is the first time around in Barcelona, since I'm due back there in four days (camped out in Girona for the next little while) to meet up with my friend Rob from Australia, and then again later in September to join Margaux, the most recent travel buddy to join on my world tour, before going to Germany. So in fact, there will be three passes through this city in all, hence my sidetrip to Girona this week.

Barcelona is great... a very young city, the word vibrant comes to mind. Marie, Marcus, Lenny and Bonnie were fantastic hosts. We went out for tapas and Clara my first night there to a great restaurant called Ciutat Condal on Las Ramblas. Clara is a bit like a beer lemonade but not sweet - so refreshing in the continuing European heat wave. And Las Ramblas makes for great people-watching with street performers ranging from flamenco dancers to Alien to Pharaohs to breakdancers.

It also makes for great pickpocketing though, so keep an eye on your stuff, folks! One ride on the metro ended very unhappily with one of our wallets being stolen right out of the purse being carried after a bump and run (not mine, thankfully). The creeps managed to charge over $1000 in the half hour it took us to get the hotel to call and cancel the credit card (thankfully not responsible for those charges either). Lesson learned... I already am a bit paranoid with my things but I'm even more vigilant now. They were BOLD.

We also wandered down Las Ramblas to the artisan tents and the Mirador, a very impressive statue of Colombus on the waterfront, and a bit into La Boqueria, the famous fresh market which I will definitely devote more time and fruit-eating appetite towards on my next pass through town, which will be shared with the Gaudi sites around the city.

The definite highlight however was the night music and light show at the fountains in Montjuic. I can't really describe how amazing it was - definitely one of those big moments of the trip - better than fireworks.



For anyone who ever comes to Barcelona, this is a must-see!

Italy - Pompeii and Napoli - Ancient Splendour and Delicious Pizza

Pompeii was quite something. Of course we pick the hottest time of the hottest day of the hottest heatwave in Italy to go see it, but whatever!



Our lovely Ijourneys audio guide Deb informed us all about the Maritime Gate, the Temple of Apollo, the storehouses, the Forum, the Baths, the House of the Poet, the House of the Faun, the brothel, the bakery, the amphitheater, the training ground, the taverns and the arena. We had to fast forward her a little since it was so hot and Pompeii is so extensive.



I hadn't realized how big the city was and it really is a remarkable preserved snapshot of the past. It also really shows how similarly people lived in those days as today. There was the main drag with all the good bars and shops, the central marketplace, bread still in the bakery ovens, the laundromat across from the brothel and more. Very interesting and oh my goodness, the Pompeiians had MONEY.



And you can see Mount Vesuvius looming in the background of the whole city - would have been a terrifying sight when it was erupting over a day and a night to bury this place.



But again, very hot, so we bounced after a few hours to reward ourselves with a meal. And what kind of people would we be if we didn't have pizza in its birthplace? After a solid hunt for a recommended restaurant (to no avail) and a near miss with spraining my ankle on the cobblestone sidewalks, we found a hole in the wall pizzeria that gave us a margherita and a marinara pizza and a drink for less than 6 Euros.

And I can say it really was the best pizza I've had so far in Italy. The ingredients were all super fresh and well balanced and the crust was paper thin. Perfect!



Aside from amazing pizza, Napoli will be remembered for the groping hands and flirtatious manners of its male population. While ordering pizza, Luigi (actual name) our pizzamaker was flirting it up with Krishna and practically proposed to her over the course of ten minutes. He did get a solid shoulder squeeze in before we left. And as we walked down the street, construction workers overhead were going all out with the whistles and catcalls, despite us being sweaty, dusty and generally a mess. And when we met up with Seema who'd stayed behind at the train station to book tickets, she had a tale to tell as well. In our twenty minute absence, she had two guys besiege her and one even full on kissed her two minutes into the conversation. They seem to mistake Canadian polite manners for invitations to bed. Quite a cultural miscommunication!!

Italy - Rome - You Should Go

WOW.





No really.





WOW.





I met up with Seema and Krishna who Id met in Florence early in the afternoon, arriving to the crazy heatwave in Italy that is making the news everywhere. Yes, it really is over 40 degrees during the day. However, as insanely hot as that is, there is NO humidity compared to say, Vietnam or Borneo, so Im not letting it slow me down too much. We had a delightful surprise upon arrival... the hostel had overbooked the dorms so we were upgraded to a private room with ensuite and AC for the same price for our three nights in Rome together. Wicked!



Krishna and Seema do not mess around. They have been travelling Europe for five weeks and have been to almost every country already... almost a different city every day! They slowed their pace a little for me and Rome, taking a whole three days to check out the Eternal City, where the saying A Lifetime Isnt Enough is all too true. The great thing about this city is despite the wide streets, you literally turn a corner and a massive fantastic monument is right there and you didn't even see it coming!



Our very first night was no small feat. We circumnavigated the Colosseum, which was actually a bit smaller than I imagined it would be, but was still terribly impressive. We watched the sunset behind the Arches of Constantine and Tito and Palatine Hill. As we ambled over to Travestere, the uber trendy night market area for dinner, we took in the Opera House, the Jewish Museum, the old chariot racing track and Ponte something or other. After dinner we climbed Capitoline Hill and saw the monument for Vittorio Emmanuel II up close.



Our second day we hit up St Peters Basilica and Piazza in Vatican City in the morning. Bernini's work inside the Basilica was astonishing. I was truly overwhelmed by the detail and the clever placement of the windows to cast beams of light in just the right places to give the church a really heavenly overtone. We then wandered over to Piazza del Popolo with a huge Egyptian obelisk with hieroglyphs inscribed everywhere (I believe Caligula the Emperor hijacked it from Heliopolis) and climbed the very worthwhile Pincio Hill for sweeping vistas of the city. The views from Castel SantAngelo back towards the Vatican were nothing to sneeze at either! After our refreshing siesta, we checked out the definitely overrated Spanish steps, which are great for people watching but really are just a big staircase leading to mediocre views of Rome. We capped off the night with gelato and gazing in wonder at the Trevi fountain, possibly my favourite sight in Rome. We did the obligatory tossing of a coin with our right hands over our left shoulders to ensure our return to Rome, though we missed out on drinking from the side fountain that is said to have the power to revirginize. So many random superstitions in this town! On our somewhat lost way back to the train station, we passed by Piazza Barberini where Bernini's Triton and Slut Fountain are on display. Not a typo. The tiny shell and bumblebee fountain was sculpted to imitate a lady's netherparts to stick it to the Pope and is nicknamed the Slut Fountain.



We also did a day trip to Napoli and Pompeii in the middle (separate post for that) and to make sure we got it all in, on our last day together we went to the Vatican Museums and the Pantheon (which I liked way better on the outside than the inside) before the girls had to get on their night train with a side stop at the greatest gelato shops in the city of course. We made it our mission to sample as many flavours as possible: banana, coconut, pineapple, lemon, field berry, strawberry, malaga, grandma, bubblegum, chocolate, nutella, hazelnut, stracciatella, tiramisu, caramel, coffee, and even one called Viagra (bright blue of course!). Seema had to sweet talk the scooper guy into selling her that one, since apparently Viagra flavour is only for men. But since he wanted to exit with her (direct quote... he meant 'go out'), it didn't take much convincing.

And the museum is when the history geek in me burst out. The Vatican Museums were phenomenal. As I put it to the girls, walking around the Egyptian and Ancient Greek wings were like the Hollywood Walk of Fame for me. My dorky knowledge of ancient civilizations worked to their benefit though since I could tell them anecdotes about all the artwork and statues we were seeing, like the story of Perseus and Medusa, of Remus and Romulus being raised by a wolf, of Hercules and the Greek gods, the Odyssey and the Trojan war, of mummification in ancient Egypt, etc. Not to mention the philosophers and poets in the paintings in the Raphael rooms like the School of Athens and Rodin's Thinker.



And Michaelangelo's ceiling in the Sistine Chapel wasn't half bad either! ;)

Italy - Florence and Pisa - Wait, Incredible Cultural Contributions AND Gelato? What More Could I Ask For?

Alright, I get it. Italy's kind of a big deal and not without reason. Having now been to Florence, the city that gave birth to the Renaissance, Machiavelli and Michaelangelo, it's hard to not give this country props for how much it has contributed to the world over the years.

I had expected a lovely train ride into Firenze (Florence) from Milan through miles of sun-drenched Tuscan fields of sunflowers and vineyards. What I got was intermittent pitch black tunnels for two hours, since apparently it struck the railway engineers as easier to bore through the mountains than to travel over or around them. Oh well.

Florence was also a bit quiet, though definitely livelier than Milan, though it was mostly in sheer volume of tourists. I met two awesome fellow Canadians, Krishna and Seema, at my hostel and wasn't shy about inviting myself along with them to check out the city centre.



The Duomo was incredibly impressive. I had no idea it was green and red up close and it was too big to fit in one photograph even from a block away. The inside was also fairly spectacular and free to see (my favourite!).



Afterwards, we wandered by yet another castle, then by the Uffizi Gallery (the Louvre of Italy), through the markets where knockoff designer purses and silk ties for 3 Euros were on offer, and ended up at the train station. On a spur of the moment decision, we hopped the train to Pisa for the afternoon to picnic at the leaning tower, which despite its hype is still a pretty interesting sight, as it defies gravity.



That night at the hostel we were treated to an impromptu concert with a drum, piano and guitar featuring classics such as La Vie En Rose and Redemption Song. The jam session was broken up by a MASSIVE bee that attacked the party out of nowhere and it was a team effort to capture and release it from the common room.

Seema, Krishna and I all had such a blast that we agreed we'd do Rome together as well, so I cut Florence short by one day to join them in the Eternal City. Stay tuned.

Italy - Milano - Knock, Knock... Anybody Home?

I didn't have the greatest time in transit getting to Europe. Although I got myself to Bangkok airport relatively hassle free, from there it went downhill. Royal Jordanian Airline tries really hard to please but didn't really meet its potential. First off, despite having massive crowds of people waiting by its desks to check in and get boarding passes, they opted to not open said desks until an hour and a half before the flight was to leave. In the mean time, I had the pleasure of waiting in the pretend line behind a bickering couple, the man of which was riding on a luggage cart because he had purple sunburns on his feet. We're talking serious degree burnage here... I wanted him to seek medical attention because this was above and beyond the call of aloe vera.

By the time I boarded the flight after midnight, I was rewarded with the seat next to the only obese passenger on the plane who decided my window seat leg space equally belonged to him, leading to a good deal of pushing to and fro throughout the night. And who doesn't turn off the plane lights on a nine hour overnight flight?! The main overhead lights remained on the entire trip, making sleep that much more of an elusive goal.



I wasn't a very happy camper arriving in Amman, Jordan at 5am with less than three hours of sleep under my belt. I was an even less happy camper when the signs and pictures in Arabic got me lost outside the transit zone and beyond the immigration desks without a visa or stamp. This entailed explaining I was lost and had not meant to leave the check in area and had no entry stamp to Jordanian security officials with a smattering of English ability at not my finest hour. They were incredibly nice and sorted it out for me despite having no idea what I was talking about most of the time. Note to self... come back to Jordan, they are super nice.

So I arrived in Milan with a lot of mental baggage from the annoyance of the flights, all of which started melting away the second I stepped out into the warm Italian sun. Ah, Italia, you lil charmer you.

But I couldn't help but notice as the shuttle brought us into the impeccably architectured city that most places were closed. Funny, I thought to myself, no one mentioned that Italy observes siesta. Upon arriving at my hostel, I was then informed by the incredibly sweet and helpful host Sara that this time of year, everyone and their mom pack up and head for the coast, leaving about 10 percent of the population to service the tourists. Of those still in the city, there was a very visible presence of African street hawkers, with the typical pitch of here, this bracelet's free for you and then shock when you don't want to buy it. As annoying as the touts can be, in this situation I couldn't help but wonder if some or many of them would be boat people who had made the journey across the Mediterranean and how much choice they had in where they worked. I really haven't seen any Africans in more official job industries around the city... only hawking knockoff bags and jewelry outside the tourist sites.



On the whole, the silence in the city was a bit surreal - the tourists really have the place to themselves. August 15 is Ferie, a national public holiday when everything closes down, so to say it was a quiet stay in Milan is an understatement. I did explore the city with some of my fellow hostel stayers. The Duomo cathedral with its millions of spires and statues jumped out at us when we turned a corner into the main Piazza and as it has just been spiffied up, it was more than a little impressive.



I sucked it up and climbed the whoknowshowmany stairs to the roof, which had great views over the city centre. Afterwards, we toodled through the living room of Milan, the massive Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II shopping arcade, which houses Prada, Louis Vuitton and the fanciest and most out of place McDonald's I've ever seen and the famous La Scala Opera House.



The rest of the afternoon was spent sauntering about with coconut and stracciatella gelati in hand, frolicking and cooling off in the fountain in front of the Sforzesco Castello and people watching in the park. I then attempted to consume a pizza the size of a desk for dinner along the Canal, which was quite a pretty evening walk. All in all, a nice and definitely delicious intro for my time in Europe.

Footnote - Our Moms Told Us Not to Talk to Strangers but Nobody Told the Strangers Not to Talk to Us

As Mehr and I parted ways this week, I couldn't help but look back and notice a distinctive trend occurring in our travels together. I have already alluded to it in stories such as our plane ride with J. in Australia, but Mehr and I have an uncanny magnetism drawing strangers to tell us their life stories with no invitation.

In addition to J., there were the Jehovah's Witness Grannies who besieged us while we were having a snack in the park in Fremantle and the Italian Elders Social Club in the mall while I was repacking my bag. And that was just Australia. In KL, we had an older Chinese man who spoke no English stare us down at our restaurant table and then motion to us that satay makes people fat.



And later I was stopped on the street while walking to the Petronas towers by an Indian yogi who told me my fortune in super hushed tones (what I could hear was that Tuesday is my unlucky day and my face is very lucky). He also did a great trick where he predicted my favourite colour is blue and my favourite number is 7. Following that incident, on Pulau Perhentian, we ended up spending four hours talking politics with an Indian Malaysian internet cafe owner. We also had a tag along German guy in the Cameron Highlands... not even sure when he appeared, but he stuck by our elbows all day.

And in Thailand, a random American guy sweet talked his way into sharing a cab back to our hostel neighbourhood (that was worth it if only because when he heard we had been to Brunei, he asked if we knew the Sultan personally). And in Siem Reap, we were quizzed on things to do in the area by two passing by Irish guys. And in Vietnam, we had ladies showing us their wedding albums while selling us shoes or grabbing our baby fingers or full tummies in restaurants. We're pretty sure there is a sign over our heads saying Please Come Talk To Us.

Thailand - Bangkok - Bangkok, I Hardly Knew You

We only had two days in Bangkok in the end and I was wiped. I did some shopping and I did some eating and then I got on a really long not so great plane trip to Italy. Heres what I can tell you about Bangkok...

1) It is not nearly as stinky as I was led to believe... its smelly-ness is on par with other Asian cities.
2) The sex tourism is just as bad and pervasive as I was told. On one street, we thought a club had just had a fire drill, but it was all ladies of the evening doing their rounds. It easily could have been 50 girls on one block and it made me very sad for them.
3) The street food rivals Mexicos for best eats.
4) I wish Id had more time to shop and see the giant Buddhas. But mostly to shop. Next trip.

Vietnam - Halong Bay - Pirates of the South China Sea

To escape the blahness of Hanoi, we went all out and sprung for a 3 day minicruise through Halong Bay. After an always delightful three hour ride in a crowded minibus with tempermental a/c, we board a renovated junk ship (three floor vessel) and set sail. Halong Bay is so beautiful! Everywhere you look there are limestone cliff islands and green waters. Unfortunately because of all the tourist boats, there's also hidden pockets where some ships have dumped their garbage into the ocean, so you see the odd bottle, cucumber or wooden chair float past your boat.



Our first day we cruised for three hours to get to a quieter bay to kayak. Yup, sea kayaking. They took us through the caves under the limestone cliff islands into hidden lakes where we could see monkeys on the land and jellyfish in the water. On that note, guess who held a jellyfish tentacles down in her palm?! Naturally, it was a non-stinging one, but pretty cool all the same - felt a bit like a heart beating in my hand. We spent the night on a private beach island with 20 other people overlooking Cat Ba island across the bay. You'll be pleased to know that we, Team Eastern Canada, beat Team Western Canada (Craig and Charity from Vancouver) in the national championship foosball tournament, although we were whomped in the international finals against Team France (Elsa and Pierre from Paris).



Over the next two days, we changed boats three more times and ended up kayaking and swimming again in the afternoon, with our new tour friends of the day staring at us as they overheard us singing "The Littlest Worm I Ever Saw", "The Other Day I Met a Bear" and "The Princess Pat" while paddling the Bay. We then walked the plank and jumped off the ship to swim (a few bruises on my leg from a botched entry into the water) and relax before our seven course seafood dinner (pretty sure it was caught off the back of the boat!). The tour also included a stop at the Amazing Cave which was pretty amazing. Less amazing was the heat exhaustion I got from standing around in said cave for an hour. And even less amazing than that was feeling sick the rest of the day as we traveled 4 hours back to Hanoi then took our flight to Bangkok and didn't get to a bed until 1am.

Vietnam - Hanoi - A Work In Progress

Alright, so I have to be honest, we didn't love Hanoi. Mehr was especially not fond of it; I think we might have enjoyed it more if we hadn't been staying in a hotel that was being built around us. Allow me to explain...

Ha Noi means "city inside rivers", and its more formal name Tham Long (I think) means Ascending Dragon. It is celebrating its 1000th anniversary as Vietnam's capital city on 10/10/2010. We stayed in the Old Quarter, the tourist area north of the astonishingly green Hoan Kiem Lake. Did you know that Eiffel the architect built one of the world's longest bridges in Hanoi? I do now.



Our hotel had top ratings online, but the experience left something to be desired. Upon our arrival, I noticed a very weird and strong smell in the room. Kind of like onions and new paint. Explanation: they had just painted the room and they use slices of raw onion to absorb the new paint smell. So we found little treasure troves of onions all around our dwelling. We had a brand new bathtub. Which leaked a lot. And our toilet either didn't have water or never flushed properly. Construction on the street started at 6am with the jackhammers and smoothly transitioned into the screaming and banging of a middle school band that was occupying the remainder of the hotel. And everytime we came back to the room, something was new. Example: we got curtains (there were none before). And a new sink. And a phone. Etc. Very bizarre.

The one real day we had for sightseeing, the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum Complex was closed. And the highly recommended Museum of Ethnology was 7km out of town. So we contented ourselves with a stroll around Hoan Kiem lake and ice cream (sidenote: why don't we have ice cream buffets in Canada?). Also, we don't understand where Hanoi dwellers go to eat, because there were about three restaurants in the whole Old Quarter... everything labeled "cafe" was in fact a tour agency. Very misleading. The Lake was quite pretty and apparently is home to giant tortoises. The legend is that the Viet king who defeated the Chinese after 1000 years of occupation with a divine sword returned the sword to its divine owners via the lake's golden tortoise.



We then got caught in pretty serious rains (which we later learned was the typhoon that hit southern China) and took in a water puppet show at the theater. No, you read that correctly. The art of water puppetry dates back to the 11th century, when they used the puppets to tell stories and legends on the rice paddies.



It was pretty entertaining despite being in Vietnamese. We then dropped in on a jazz club on the bar street which was pretty good.



We also learned why the houses are so thin here - property taxes are based on the width of the face of your property!

Vietnam - Danang to Hanoi - Stu The Bus

Oh, my loyal readers, how do I even begin?

Mehron and I are becoming tightfisted cheapskates as our journey progresses and our travel funds deplete. So we opted to take the 16 hour overnight bus from Hoi An to Hanoi instead of the $100 flight.

In retrospect, that might have been the wrong decision.



Meet Stu, our sleeper bus. I consider myself somewhat of a bus connoisseur at this point, having sat on them for well over 200 hours of travel time thus far on the trip. Stu is not the worst bus ride I've been on (Bolivian waterfall bus still ranks top) but he was ten kinds of special.

Turn on your imaginations, kids. You wait on the sidewalk with your luggage and the other forty passengers. The bus pulls up and you watch everyone abandon their bags on the street because naturally there are no assigned seats/beds. This is a form of entertainment for the bus staff who can then enjoy the melee that ensues as people madly scramble for places. Slowing down the process is the mandatory removal and plastic bagging of one's shoes on the staircase boarding the bus. As you struggle to remove your shoes and bag them in one fluid (not so fluid!) motion, you are then confronted by no less than three rows of bunk beds.



Bunk beds made for elves, because even less tall Mehron could not fit inside them comfortably. We especially lucked out since we didn't get in on the mad scramble early enough and were left with a choice of five beds across either on the mountain climbing top level or the claustrophobic lower level. We opted for the top, which would later bite us in the rear, as it's VERY difficult to dismount in a pitch black bus that sways while going over bumps and has no ladders (more on that later) when one wants to use the facilities.

After we had assured our lovely accommodations for the night, we realized that our bags were still sitting forlornly on the sidewalk, screaming 'please steal me, I am not attended'. Mehr's somewhat clumsy yet quick dash off the bus ensured they were loaded, much to the annoyance of the busboy, who only forgave us for making him reopen the hatch when he learned we were Canadian. Gold card, kids, gold card.

We were delighted that the middle bed of the five was empty, separating us from 'ze long-haired Germans' with many smelly sandwiches (seriously, they had an endless supply; I think they ate seven or eight each!). Our hopes were dashed when later some random new passenger who we don't remember getting picked up crawled in next to me, and slept on one of my bags all night, having pushed over the rest of our belongings onto my legs, then onto Mehron's legs, then putting his legs clearly on MY bed, thus pushing ME onto Mehron, and Mehron crammed into the window. That was weird.

At first, we thought the rails between beds were the equivalent of armrest airport benches; designed to make you uncomfortable, unable to sleep and to block spillover into your neighbour's space. As previously mentioned with new guy, this did not succeed in preventing spillover and as the ride progressed we realized they were for safety because every time we hit a bump, we got major air. Kind of like being in kindergarten and scoring the back seat of the bus, but with none of the elated glee. Please note I couldn't even sit up on the bed, as the ceiling was too low and Mehron's was even lower, so we could only roll around on the spot, and even that, not very successfully.

We have two unique perspectives describing how our sleep passed.


Mehron: "It's like being strapped to a stretcher/spinal board on top of a waterbed underneath the Arctic drip in the jetstream with 25 strangers listening to Vietnamese musicals blaring from the world's tiniest television at the front of the bus (the only source of light aside from the sunset for the entire duration of the trip!)."


Holly: "I feel like I slept inside a blender."

Mine is somewhat more concise, but I hurt everywhere from keeping so tense against the flailing of the bus ride that I can't get into much more detail on that point.

Oh, Stu, we'll never forget you.

Vietnam - Hoi An - Shopper's Paradise

Hoi An is a speck of a town in the middle of the South China Sea coast of Vietnam. It has its charms, mainly in Old Town where the colonial buildings and waterway cut through the centre, but the big attraction is the plethora of tailor shops! Literally every street has ten or more custom made clothing stores, where you can pick from ready to wear designs on the mannequins, from endless catalogues or from photos from home. The hundreds of staff will alternately bargain or bamboozle you into buying an entire new wardrobe, all ready within 24-48 hours of having your measurements taken.



We had no intention of shopping here. And yet, we seem to be leaving with 5 new pairs of custom made shoes, an evening dress and linen pants. Imagine if we were looking to buy stuff! We actually didn't get around to seeing some of the sites of the area, like the Cham ruins of My Son or the nearby beach, because we had so many fittings to attend for our purchases. We consoled ourselves for missing these cultural experiences with beer o'clock in the hostel pool in the afternoons.



It turned out to be key to enjoy Hoi An by lounging the hostels' pools by day when the sun drives the temperatures into the 40s and save your perusing of the clothes stores and art galleries for the evening when Le Loi and several other major roads are closed off to traffic and become pedestrian shopping malls ("walking street"). The temperatures are cooler, the touts are less pushy and the town is prettier illuminated with Chinese lanterns.

One further observation: as we've spent more time here, we've noticed a marked decrease in sensitivity to personal space. Eg: when I was signing the check-in forms, the reception desk lady grabbed my hand and played with my fingers. "Like baby fingers!" she remarked, "very soft". I think what she meant was "still have baby chub". And while finishing a meal in a restaurant, the waitress grabbed Mehr's tummy to check if she had any room left for more food, which startled us so quickly that we didn't even have time to complain or be alarmed before it was over. And the shoemaker poked my nose more than a few times to illustrate that it's pointy. Right...

The silver lining is that they also understand our sense of humour a bit better. For instance, Mehr and I would point out various ugly prints/colours/paintings and suggest to each other we buy them for friends at home, sort of in a out-tacky-ing competition (example: "Hey Mehr, I think your parents would really like that chubby-faced Mona Lisa ripoff" "Hey Holly, you've always wanted to buy a turquoise and pink sequined leotard.", etc.). In Thailand, they would overhear this and then try to sell us many similarly tacky things thinking they were to our taste. Here, the sales people point to other tacky items, then wink and laugh hysterically because they've caught the joke. Irony is not lost on the Vietnamese.

Smile of the Day:

Older gentleman compliments tiramisu to bakery attendant. She says "Yes, I really like it too." He responds with puzzlement and vague surprise "Oh, you eat?"

And Best pick up line award goes to:

Boy holds shirt out to girl. "Feel this," he says. She does. "Does that feel like boyfriend material?"

Vietnam - Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) - Wars, Armadas and Strip Clubs

Our bus trip from Siem Reap to Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) in Vietnam was interesting to say the least. You know what they love here? Karaoke and the movie Titanic. We had already noticed that Titanic shows regularly on tv here and that all music videos by regional artists include sing-a-long lyrics. On our bus ride, we were treated to both! Titanic is a little hard to follow in Khmer and Vietnamese ballads are somewhat difficult to pronounce, so I broke my rule of only changing my CD three times per trip (this keeps the rotation fresh among my 10 CDs and yes, I am that 90s dork on the road with a Discman instead of an Ipod, but it's indestructible and I don't care if I lose it) and listened to all 10 to drown out the television.

We had been told the trip would take 10 hours. It turns out that 10 hours in Cambodia is actually 14 in Vietnam, 4 of which were aimlessly driving around Ho Chi Minh City before reaching the last stop destination. My favourite part was the hour spent in a waiting area at Vietnamese immigration while our bus jockey disappeared into another room with everyone's passports... Since when does your passport get stamped to cross a border without you being there? Better yet, I'm still battling the remnants of a bronchial-sounding cold-related cough and with Swine Flu's Spanish Inquisition in Asia, I had to put a stranglehold on my lungs, esophagus and throat and breathe at half capacity to avoid overcautious quarantine. For an hour.

I think what's important is that we arrived. Only to be overwhelmed by the Vietnamese Armada, as we have taken to calling the army of motorbikes filling the streets of Saigon.



There are literally hundreds of them weaving and dashing on the roads in no discernible pattern and with little obedience of traffic lights or crosswalks. As you may expect, it is sometimes necessary to cross a road and Mehron and I then faced a terrible dilemma. We are the world's most skittish jaywalkers and Mehr has even been known to take a cab to get across Middle Eastern traffic lanes rather than cross it herself.

This put the pressure on me to determine how the locals move from block to block without multiple hospitalizations. Brendan Morrison had told me it was almost easier to close your eyes and go. I did not care for that strategy, but it's almost true! The key it turns out, is to watch for the big vehicles (cars, vans, buses, etc.) because they will hit you. Once there's a break in them and you only face the swarms of motorbikes you VERY DELIBERATELY AND AT AN EVEN STEADY PACE walk out onto the road and continue to cross at the EXACT SAME SPEED. Unlike in Canada, where you are expected to work around the cars, here the motorbikes will work around you. Usually. Be as predictable as possible and they will go around. Do not burst into a run at any time or stop part way. That will land you in an accident.

Ho Chi Minh is a really interesting city, traffic aside. It's got a lot of grittiness going on but not the gross kind. There's minimal garbage stench but some signs that it's rough around the edges. Also, for the booklovers out there, you don't go to bookshops because tiny ladies who appear to have hijacked stacks of books waiting to be reshelved at the library double their height wander the streets and restaurants bringing said stacks to you. And Vietnam has the world's thinnest buildings. I have never seen such narrow structures in my life. There will be three apartment buildings in a row the same width as a house in Ottawa.



Vietnam is also a country with the war very much alive in its consciousness. We visited the War Remnants Museum, which was a harrowing and very different perspective on the Indochina and Vietnam War. There were thousands of photos chronicling political events, battles, chemical warfare and after effects of Agent Orange on the population of Vietnam. They also had replicas of the POW prisons used by the French and the Americans, such as the tiger cages, where the descriptions of torture techniques were so graphic that we had to leave.

We also did a tour of the Viet Cong tunnels in Cu Chi, a network of over 200km of underground tunnels and bases. The army's motto was "in one hand the rifle, in the other, the plough". The entire population of Vietnam was mobilized during the war to repel the Americans; men, women and children were combatants awarded the status of "American killer Hero". This place really showed why the war was unwinnable. As we walked overground through the jungle with its puddles of mud from the rainy season and millipedes falling from trees while overhearing the gunshots from the shooting range nearby, it wasn't hard to imagine how hellish this war would have been for both sides. The forest was full of miniscule hidey-hole entries to the tunnel networks that were all but impossible to detect and certainly too small for the average American sized soldier to enter. And it would have been full of landmines and bamboo traps as well.



But our visit to Saigon wasn't all doom and gloom. On our way home from the museum, a huge rain cloud burst on us and we sought shelter from the downpour at a nearby restaurant. Or so we thought. The facts were these:

1) the only other customers were all men seated at one table
2) said other customers stared at us dumbfounded for twenty minutes as we drank water and orange juice
3) not a lot of food was on the menu for a restaurant
4) there was a massive glass cabinet with high end scotch and whiskey
5) on closer inspection, the multiple rooms I had taken to be toilets in the back hallway were marked with numbers and "VIP"

I whispered to Mehr under my breath, "Um, Mehr... I think we're in a gentlemen's establishment..." Yes, folks, we had afternoon tea at an upscale strip club by accident! To add to this event, I also mistook my 100,000 dong bills for 10,000 and almost overpaid our $3 check by $50. Thankfully the staff was honest and returned the extra money.

We put that money to good use at a fantastic hair salon where $15 got us a shampoo, cut, blowdry, massage and facial. Nice. It's so affordable to be stylish and well-groomed in Asia!

An Open Letter to Southeast Asia Concerning the Confusion Over What Constitutes "Tea"

Dear SouthEast Asia (except you, Cameron Highlands of Malaysia, you are excused),

I am writing to you out of concern. Perhaps translation has failed us, but every time I sit down at a cafe to enjoy a hot beverage and order "tea", you unfailingly deliver to me the most dreadful of all hot drinks, the "teacino". If I had wanted this concoction, I'd have ordered a cup of tea, a cup of coffee and a cup of condensed milk and mixed them together myself.

Being such close neighbours to the great producers/consumers of tea, China and India, there is really no excuse for this substitution and stinginess. If you only offer teacino, please desist from listing it as "tea" on your menu. They are in no way the same beverage. This would save me and others a great deal of disappointment and disgust.

Regards,

Holly

Guest Post - Open Letter to Greyhound Canada from Mehron

Dear Greyhound Canada,

I feel obliged to bring to your attention some unfavourable facts concerning your lack of bus service etiquette. I am a concerned citizen on a trip around-the-world, who after enduring bus rides of lengths up to 15 hours in 7 different countries, have come to the conclusion that your services are completely inefficient. This is a travesty of international proportions.

In no other country has there been a blatant disregard for movie usage on bus tv's (I know you still have copies of Men In Black...I have witnessed their showings back in the 90's), painful mandatory stops at the overly-priced and under-supplied Log Cabin restaurant on highway 7, recorded decapitations and subsequent threats of the like and/or unreliable time scheduling (it should never take 7 hours from Ottawa-Toronto, even a snail dragging a tractor could get there faster).

I propose some of the following ways that other national bus lines have used to amp up their services:

1. Replace the current uncomfortable seats for La-Z-Boy chairs that fully recline (Malaysia)
2. Use that relic of a tv that currently inhabits all buses and if they are not working, instead of leaving it as clutter, just bolt a 60" Plasma tv in its place. Voila the passengers are satisfied (Vietnam)
3. Once the tv is working and movies are playing, a good economical way of passing the time is to pop in Titanic in Khmer...it works like a charm (Cambodia)
4. If there is hesitation that the passengers will mess up the newly acquired seats then covering them with the same plastic sheeting one's grandmother uses on her couch will do the trick (Brunei) or alternatively putting up a sign indicating that passengers should refrain from ingesting stinky food on said bus will also help - i.e. "No durian or shrimp paste allowed!" (Malaysia)
5. If the trip is long and there is hesitation that the passengers will become restless then a round of musical chairs that will allow them to move around the cabin at midnight to swap seats with on-coming passengers is always a good idea (Malaysia)
6. If there is prior notice that the bus will be heated up to 28 degrees Celsius or cooled down to arctic temperatures due to air conditioning then I strongly stress that a hostess and massage chairs are employed (Thailand)
7. If there are complaints regarding the smell emanating from the toilets at the back of the bus might I suggest that moving it downstairs to a secret compartment...this may entail major alterations to the shape/mechanics of said bus (Thailand)
8. If there is to be a border crossing then instead of making the passengers individually go through immigration, it will be better if they stand at the border for hours while their passports are checked without them physically being at the counter...much like a ghost being cross examined at immigration, it's much speedier (Vietnam)
9. Personalize drop off services so instead of ending the journey at a generic bus terminal at the center of the city, the bus can drop off passengers to their respective neighbourhoods; thus extending the trip from 10 hours to 14 hours...no one can resist a good long ride (Vietnam)

I strongly urge that Greyhound Canada take my suggestions seriously as it will only serve to greatly strengthen and elevate its standing in world bus lines. Thank you for your time and patience.

Sincerely,

Mehron (a.k.a Connoisseur of the art of traveling for extended periods of time on foreign bus lines)