Travels: Ho Chi Minh to Da Lat

Tuesday May 29^th, 2012 7:19 AM Da Lat, Vietnam

The past couple of days have made a few things clearly evident to me. First off the road transportation in Vietnam, at least up to this point, is hectic and dangerous at best. Travelers that I’ve met continuously quote some numbers about deaths on the roads in Vietnam each year. Most say that something around 9,000 people die every year in moped accidents. We even happened to witness a minor moped accident. With how many mopeds there are on the road, and witnessing the recklessness of the bus drivers, and all of the drivers for that matter, it’s no surprise that many people are injured every year. I watched from the back of our bus as it traveled from Ho Chi Minh City to Da Lat as countless mopeds were forced off of the road as we zoomed into oncoming traffic to pass someone, often just blaring on the horn and avoiding head on accidents by as little as an inch. Here lanes mean next to nothing, and you will almost always find someone coming into oncoming traffic and just hoping for the best. The second thing that I can say with certainty is that Vietnamese food is some of the best I’ve ever had. Maybe the fact that a good meal is $2.5-3 is skewing my view, but the aromas of the pho that wafts from shops lining the streets, the wonderfully prepared fish, and so much more has converted me to somewhat of a fanatic. I’d say we eat out at least two times a day, but with prices as they are I don’t feel too bad about it. The third thing that I know is that meeting other people out traveling may be the easiest thing to do in the world. I’ve never felt so much confidence walking up to a random group of people and knowing that I will have a great conversation with them. Everyone has been so willing to discuss anything and everything, and all groups will welcome new people in just to find out where they’re from, what they’re doing, where they’re going, etc. I find myself just walking up to people, intending to ask a random question or for directions, and I’m suddenly in a long conversation about someone’s travels. Anyways the last day in Ho Chi Minh was fun, though not filled with many sites or excellent adventures as the first couple days were. We went to get some pho, which as per usual far surpassed anything I could have ever dreamed of. Also on a side note I may be addicted to Vietnamese coffee, but if you don’t know what I’m talking about order it on your next visit to a Vietnamese restaurant. It’s magnificent, tasty, and strong. After some pho we went out to buy some essentials that I didn’t have: a phone, sim card, and a SD card reader so that I can save photos on Google Docs along the way. We made our fourth and final visit to the central market, and this time I spent some time bartering, working my way to 40% off at the very least. The bartering is fun for the stall owners and for me, and we both get what we want out of the interaction. I grabbed a couple trinkets and then we headed back to the hostel. The central park, while functioning as a place of respite and relaxation for locals, could be fairly annoying as a tourist. We knew that locals would come and practice English with us if we just sat in the park, but I don’t think we were prepared to be approached within a couple minutes. We definitely weren’t prepared to be surrounded by 15 people. Bo, Marlowe, and I were quickly engrossed in 3 separate conversations with groups of locals attempting to learn English. One of the men I talked to had been teaching himself English in the park for seven months, and he had a fairly good grasp of the language though he made a point to have me write down words in his book that he hadn’t encountered, and he often mirrored my pronunciation to make sure he was speaking correctly. It was very interesting, and we got into a discussion about ex pats who visit for young Vietnamese women (I expressed my disgust at the ex pats using their money and influence in such a sad manner), but the man hadn’t ever heard anyone speak negatively about these men and he seemed surprise at my openness. I will say that talking with locals has been very eye opening in many ways. Anyways we made it back to the hostel avoiding the park for our last day, and the hostel staff had prepared Vietnamese fair for the guests and arranged some games. These games included passing and apple down a line of people using only our mouths, putting out a candle with a banana that dangled between our legs as we were blindfolded and given directions, carrying two balloons placed between two peoples’ heads and stomach and scooting along sideways being careful to not drop the balloons, and my favorite fitting a piece of spaghetti into a straw with a partner and without the use of anything but our mouths to fit them together. Rice wine was handed out generously to the losers of each round (as punishment they had to take 3 shots of rice wine in a row), and in the final round each person got to blast baby powder on to the heads of the losers. After that they just brought out more rice wine and all enjoyed some drinks on the house. The group of 10 of us who had played games all went out to enjoy some ever present cheap beer. The appeal of 50 cent beer is crazy, but we found a place that had 6,000 Vietnamese Dong beers or approximately a 30 cent draught beer. It may have been completely terrible, but that’s the cheapest beer I’ve ever had. After winding down around 2 AM we headed back to the hostel, and I prepared mentally to wake up in 4.5 hours. Upon getting up promptly to get on a bus to Da Lat I found that I was sadly the first person up, even though Bo and Marlowe had retired earlier than I had. We checked out and headed off to the bus station, not realizing that we needed to head to another bus station to catch our bus to Da Lat. We caught the 10AM bus to Da Lat, just barely making it in time following our long journey on the public transport to the second bus station. Our A/C was very weak on our 8 hour trip from Saigon to Da Lat, and Bo and I found ourselves sweating even still on the cooled bus. The aforementioned craziness of the bus driver made the trip to Da Lat extremely interesting and often quite terrifying. Once we arrived we headed into town finding a hotel quickly with a double room (enough for the three of us), booking it for $15, we went pretty much next door finding a place where they had amazing food. Marlowe had a whole fish that literally simmered in a broth at the table above flames. It was some of the best fish I’ve ever had. Next Bo and I headed to the market on a mission to get mimosas which we’d been thinking of for the whole bus ride up. Bo and I having stated that mimosas being the drink of the Gods and unlike any other would stop at nothing to find champagne and orange juice in the vastness that was the night market in Da Lat. After 15 minutes of searching we located what was labeled Champagne, but what turned out to be sparkling red wine. We then needed our orange juice. This was the catalyst that led us to meet another group of travelers at the market equivalent of a food court, though food was available at almost every other stall, whom we spent the night with after I approached them inquiring about orange juice. The market spread across a large roundabout and the streets surrounding it. Bo and I successfully located some in a supermarket type store and then headed back down to the fellow travelers to share in our random celebration. I popped the bottle of champagne in the market scaring both myself and everyone around me. We then poured sparkling red wine mimosas with syrupy orange juice drinks into some beer bottles for our new found companions and sat down in the market to talk. After our newfound friends retired to their hostel we attempted to find ours. This proved to be much more difficult, and I found myself walking around with a third of a bottle of wine and orange juice concealed in a bag as Bo and I failed at finding the hostel. We searched far and wide, walking up alley ways, turning this way and that, until we conceded and used the hostel card and many locals to point us in the right direction. At one point we were right across the street from the hostel and had to get pointed in the right direction as they just laughed at us. I guess that’s how it goes in unknown cities sometimes.

Here are some pictures from earlier to give you an idea.