Uncle Ho

Ten of the sixteen days in Vietnam have slipped by and I am back in Ho Chi Minh where I started. We opted not to try and rush up to Hanoi and back, although we were tempted since everyone says the North is better. Instead, we ventured in the opposite direction, into the Mekong Delta. First stop was Phu Quoc Island, a straight shot across the Mekong and clear offshore for three hours by speed boat. We arrived after a long mini-bus ride positioned in front of the most awful Russian couple I have ever encountered, arriving in Rach Gia at 4:30 am, sleeping like homeless people on benches at the boat station, and FINALLY getting the boat to the island. We found a hotel right on the beach and stumbled down to the water to collapse onto the amazing white sand and lounge for the rest of the day by the water. We spent three days at Phu Quoc snorkelling, lying on the beach, and riding around on a rented motorbike. I really enjoyed Phu Quoc since it is not vastly overdeveloped the way Thailand's beaches are. There are still plenty of small fishing villages along the water and the interior of the island is covered mostly in forest. This made it especially enjoyable to motorbike around. The island is known throughout Vietnam for making superior fish sauce, and this was evident from the frequent scent that accosted our nostrils whenever we passed a fish sauce factory. I chose not to dispute this claim and just believe them, I did not to try any.
We left the island to visit a few other locations in the Mekong Delta, Can Tho and Vin Long. We did your standard boat trip to the floating markets in Can Tho. We attempted to get an independent driver to take us to avoid the package tourist trips. We found Hung, boat driver down by the water who offered us a cheaper trip than the packaged tour the hotel owner pushed on us. At 5:30 am, when we met him for our trip to the "less touristy" of the markets Hung took us to get some coffee at a coffee shop. In Vietnam this means small stall on the sidewalk with tiny plastic tables no more than a foot of the ground with a cluster of bright plastic stools that even well dressed businessmen in Saigon can be seen squatting on as they share a cup of joe. At our table a travel agent who Hung works for plopped down. We had succeeded ini organizing a packaged tour with the boat driver instead of the travel agent! We were still taken on the standard trip complete with plenty of photo opps and a few free fruits that hung peeled and offered us as he drove us there and back. Well at least we tried, and the cluster of boats loaded with tropical fruit and veggies clogging the side of the river was still enjoyable... even if I felt like a huge tourist as I happily snapped photos of the people there trying to buy produce to take back to their stalls in town. The houseboats that bring goods from the multitude of orchards and farms in the waterways of the Mekong are pretty impressive. Laundry is strewn up on the back decks, cooking pots from that mornings breakfast are being cleaned inside, and the family dog and small garden are located on the roof of the boat. Meanwhile a brisk business is being done at the front of the boat as smaller vessels pull up and load up on jack fruit, pumpkin, dragon fruit, or whatever the family has for sale.
On the way back we took the long way through the smaller waterways that were lined by rural villages and farms before heading back to Can Tho. From here we got suckered into booking another boat and homestay through the same tour operator to Vinh Long to do a homestay on Anh Binh Island. Several families on the island offer up their homes for tourists to spend a night and enjoy two homecooked meals. Unfortunately the fact that we are vegetarian was not successfully communicated to the family... which meant I ate fish and had to akwardly infrom the mother of the family why I had not touced the beef. We did get very enetertaining Vietnamese lesson from their twelve year old son and I ate some of the best star fruit I have ever tasted that I smuggled from a tree growing ouside our room.
Then we were back in Saigon for a day before we made our second attempt at getting off the beaten track by taking a tour with the Easy Riders of Dalat. This is a very popular motorcycle tour group that was started in Da Lat and today has hundreds of copy cat operations running throughout Vietnam. The groups are made up of Vietnamese motorcycle drivers who speak relatively good English (depending on which group you find yourself using) who take you on single or multi-day tours through Vietnam. Kara and I wound up with Tuan and Lee on a four day trip from Saigon to Da Lat along the Ho Chi Minh trail.

Sidewalks full of hot charcoal and animal intestines

Going for a run on an evening in December brings to mind jogs through Rock Creek Park and a distinct evening chill as I try to get in a few miles before it gets dark. In SE Asia I feel as though I wandered outside and set off on my run and then remembered that I am on shrooms, causing my entire run to be one long overstimulated mess. Funky dried squids that are flattened and hanging from a rack wave their tentacles as me as I dodge around a woman grilling strange little cubes in banana leaves over a pile of hot embers by my feet. When I step off into a street an army of motorbikes bears down on me in both directions and crossing is a matter of trusting that people are paying attention enough, and not distracted by the nine family members or herd of geese propped on the moto with them, so they can steer around you. This trippy experience has become quite normal and enjoyable for me as these four months near their end and I find myself in Can Tho, the largest city in the Mekong Delta. I usually experience at a slower pace, but occasionally when I am in a slighlty calmer location like Can Tho I have attempted a short run.
Kara and I have journeyed from Battambong in Cambodia since I last wrote a blog post. We did a homestay with Sambath, a motorcycle guide who offers his Aunt and Uncles rural home for two nights. This included a motorbike tour around the village and surrounding areas to sample sticky rice smoked in bamboo, watch rice noodles being made, see the rice paper village, journey through amazing fields of rice that stretched for miles, and eat delicious food prepared by his wife with a side of... RICE. We also got to talk to Sambath about his experiences growing up in Cambodia, and hear his account of Cambodian history which was really insightful. Talking to Cambodians while at our two homestays has been an intense experience that usually leaves me feeling depressed and embarassed at how lucky my cushy middle class suburban childhood was in comparisson. It is no wonder Cambodia is flooded with foreign NGO workers desperately groping for some answer to how a country that is still psychologically recovering from horrible wartime attrocities can recover. Talking to Sambath gives a picture of just how far the country has to go since they have yet to be able to vote a leader into power who doesn't pocket as much aid money as he can and spend his time arranging sinecures for all his friends.
Feeling a little disillusioned I returned to Phnom Penh for Thanksgiving... which lacked both tofurkey and pumpkin pie so it wasn't quite the same. However, its hard to feel homesick when your surroundings remind you so little of what you are missing back home (this doesn't mean I wouldn't have killed to enjoy a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, but it just didn't work out). We spent a few more days in Phnom Penh getting in some amazing Cambodian meals to make up for the absense of all the eating we should have been doing on turkey day. We went to the Friends Restaraunt, which is a program for street kids that is doing an amazing job providing lodging, education, and training for kids with no other place to go. If they can successfully stick with Friends they leave with training to work in restauraunts as cooks, waiters, artists, and producing handicrafts. On top of that the food at the two restauraunts they run around town are delicious. I really loved Cambodian food. The only challenge was finding vegetarian since fish paste (nicknamed Cambodian cheese by Sambath) sneaks into just about every dish. I have just lowered my standards and try to at least ensure there are not chunks of dog meat in whatever I eat.
Five days in Vietnam have led me to draw a very similar conclusion about the food, although I am not as big a fan of it as I was with Kmer cuisine. Vietnamese seem to love fish past and fish sauce even more than Cambodians. The smell of fermented fish accosts my nostrils everywhere I go. Traditional Vietnames cuisine doesn't seem to lend itself that well to vegetarian dishes, but I can still find some street food favorites to fall back on if I get tired of spring rolls or vegetables and tofu with garlic. One of my favorite things to do is sample street food (although this ended horribly for Kara in Bangkok so she usually won't accompany me). My latest favorite is rice cakes that are bigger than your face and cooked with sesame, sprig onions, and garlice. MMMmm. Here I have been sampling the unbelievable amount of unusual fruit in season. I still can't bring myself to sample Durian, the famous fruit that is banned from the Bangkok subway system it smells so bad. I can usually spot it because it smells like fermented garbage, but some people love it. Ah well, to each his own.
We have a few homestays lined up in Vietnam which should offer more food commentary soon.