Vietnam & Cambodia: Sparklettes

     Just a few random thoughts and photos before the postcards start again from Australia:

Saigon Park

  The Vietnamese loves their parks and plan them for maximum use. Badminton (BIG here) lines are painted everywhere, topiary, chess, shade, etc.,etc.  This is one of my favorite pictures of the whole trip. A mom was teaching her little boy how to jump rope. The rope wasn't moving at all, he was practicing the jumping part. And doing a spectacular job of it.  I regret not getting her address to send her a copy. She loved the shot when I presented it in playback.

Small small businessman

    Not every business needs premises. This scooter repairman set up on a street corner, as did a bike repair guy, a shoe repairman, the lady with a portable gasoline pump, a barber with a mobile clientele, a cold drinks vendor and a slew of fast food merchants. Low overhead costs- we pass the savings unto you!

tailor made in Vietnam

  Going to Thailand or Vietnam?  Get a worsted wool suit made for $60. A dress shirt for $17. Dress slacks for $25.  Having bespoke (that is, custom or tailored) clothing made is high on the list for many tourists. Smart customers bring pictures and give sufficient time to the task. Quality dips on an overnight order. But at these prices...?

AK 47 ammo

           Cu Chi and its underground tunnels and meeting spaces vexed the American army 35 years ago.  Tours now are interesting. Downright tempting  was the offer to shoot clips of ammo for Russian weapons, AK 47s and M60s, etc. We cheaped out of this ("only a whole clip, not individual bullets?") otherwise we would have joined the others on the range. I skipped the claustrophobic tunnel walk.

   Young girls selling bananas to temple tourists in Vietnam over their back fence. Our guide tells us this is good charity.  The money made helps pay for schoolbooks.  We're good with this.

Tortoise soup at Phu

      And finally, what is an exotic vacation without an exotic meal or two?  In Ho Chi Minh (formerly Saigon), there was an unpretentious restaurant named Phu that had a wide variety of meats and dishes. Wild boar, goat, eel, snake,  snail, guinea pig, chicken feet and Kev's new favorite, tortoise. O.K. turtle. Not as cheap as the chicken but Kev does have an adventurous palate.  Phu was popular with businessmen, probably because the relatively high prices (Turtle was a walloping  $11) kept out the riff raff. Couldn't be because of the child size chairs and tables Phu used...

Phu for us

     Time to put the fork down.  Get on the plane -  or click your heels three times - and get back to OZ.  Hope you enjoyed the postcards. There will be an Australian cancellation on the next postcard.

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Vietnam & Cambodia: Toilet Talk

    Funny thing about Asians, they really like their squat, or scout, toilets. [Call them toilets. Restroom , Bathroom, Washroom are simply foreign terms that need translating. WC sometimes works but only if spelled.]  Without discussing their ergonomic (or is that anatomic?) merits, they tend to pose dilemmas for Westerners, especially when first encountered.  What is the best way to do this? And what is that hose for?  The basket?  Time for a toilet talk - a public service to all who may travel through these parts at some point in their life. 

upscale toilet

    If  you are a female, travel in roomy skirts, it will make your life easier. Place your feet on the ribbed track on either side of the porcelain. Make sure your business end is near the depressed area/plumbing toward the back. Notice there is no toilet paper here. If you brought your own, put it in the trash bin or basket in the corner, don't flush it. However, for that fresher feeling, use the water hose (at low pressure, I recommend) for an efficient clean.  Think of it as a mobile bidet.  This toilet is pretty upmarket.  See that red handle on the left side? Turn that to flush the toilet.  Slick.  Usually there is a cistern or a bucket of water so you can manually flush by scooping  water from the bucket into the toilet.

Angkor Wat - #1 in restrooms!

    There is bad news and good news in the restroom department in Cambodia.  First,  public restrooms are a rarity and, of those, few are free. The good news is that Western pedestal toilets are more common than scout toilets.  Important to note, and your guidebooks will tell you as much, that the public restrooms in the Angkor Wat  area are not only free but are downright spectacular in comparison to anywhere else including  budget hotels.  This restroom was photographed several times by tourists while I was in it. Plan your temples, plan your pitstops!

Ferry privy

boardwalk dunny

   Just few snapshots of what you might encounter on the road. Ferries take care of their customers by separating their customers from the water with a pedestal toilet. Pity the engine is exposed on the inside, one female had half her skirt sucked  into the engine by accident.  The now useless bit of fabric was retrieved and the engine restarted.  The cafe in the floating village had an outdoor dunny: a hole cut into the boardwalk and blocked off by a few sheets of corrugated metal.  Whatever are those fish waiting for?

     The picture on the left, a favorite of mine and Kev's, is pretty self-explanatory. And still people don't catch on.  People who have never seen or used a pedestal toilet just can't get the hang of the idea.  Footprints, footprints everywhere.
     One last thing: bring your own toilet paper from home. Take out the core and put it in a small plastic bag. You'll thank me later.

Vietnam & Cambodia: Beauty School of Cambodia

     One of Kev's must-do items while overseas is to get a haircut.  He is enamored by the non conventional  "barber shops" [say, a guy with a scissor, comb, mirror and stool under a shade tree] as well as the price - ranging anywhere from 15 cents to two dollars depending on the country.  It's a tradition all his own.
      In Takeo, our southern most stop in Cambodia near the Mekong Delta, we made a brief overnight stop just long enough for Kev to see some B-grade temple in the afternoon and get a morning start into Vietnam.  I walked around the village instead. And lo, at the end of the street, was the beauty parlor portion of someone's home.  It took only a nanosecond to decide that I, too, wanted a haircut and slipped into hair show mode. I've been a hair model for many a hair show where one surrenders control of their head for the professional education of others. Since you have no idea how you will look at the end of it, 'letting go' is a safe attitude.  

     Anyway, I walked into the shop where two young females were gossiping and giggling.  "Hmmmmm, is it possible to get a haircut?",  I ask in a language they know little of.   Self-referential as all teenagers are, they're reaction was, 'You want us to cut your hair? Cool!'  It didn't dawn on them to perhaps track down the proprietor or her assistant to provide the service.   Why? They just had me hold the magazine with how-to instructions easy for them to see. One advised, the other happily scraping away with a razor scissor.  I maintain the hair model Zen that separates me from hirsute hysteria.  The passing crowd is highly amused by what they see. 

Cutting up in Takeo

    Eventually, a slightly older female (20?) showed up, clucked in a way that said stand back and without consulting either of them finished what they were doing in the back.  Customer then pointed out the uneven lengths in front- "Same...same" is a well known phrase in these parts - and the 20 year-old hacked away at the front with her dull paper cutters.  It's a beauty school cut if there ever was one.
     And now the question that was not asked earlier.  How much? This required a group consultation and it was conducted in hushed, urgent tones. Eventually, they decided the fee was 2000 rial ...  or 50 cents in a more commonly traded currency.  I pay up, money tucked into a random drawer, everyone starts breathing and I continue walking about the edge of town.  After chatting with a fellow tourist near a rice paddy, I returned to the $5 mildewy hotel room along the popular riverfront park. And who do I see?  My entire style team, doubtless banished by the salon owner, walking as a huddled group toward more familiar territory.  
      It's all part of the adventure.  I can see why Kev does it.

Vietnam & Cambodia: Exotic Animals Everywhere

OH BOY!  We've cheaped out on doing a lot of things but not this time in Bayon Wat.  I never heard these magnificent elephants coming. They are surprisingly quiet considering their size and quite majestic, also. For less than the price of one 90 second ride at the Royal Show, we rode this beauty around some minor temples. The mahout steers with his feet behind the ears of the elephant.  It's so touristy, but the other option is to pay a few hundred bucks to learn how to bathe and feed elephants by a greenie organization.  That would cut out a week's worth of travel, so no dice. Call me Tourist.

    Monkeys came out at dusk at Bayon for photo opps and free feeds. Won't shake your hand but happy for the handout. Another critter on the company payroll: Lizards with really long claws and starbursts around their eyes. They patiently sit while visitors to My Son focus their cameras and then slink off into the woods having performed their little show pony bit for the day. Mighty nice of them.

fish massage

  Kev made a few friends himself. Butterflies seem to hover around him at Angkor Wat...or do they just use the same sunscreen Kev does? Way cool was the fish massage. At the (yes, tourist) Night Market in Siem Riep were large fish tanks where you would stick your feet in and kararufa fish would nibble off the dead skin. Felt totally weird at first, but then just settled into a tingle. Afterward you had the softest feet two bucks could buy.

O.K. What is a trip to an exotic country without a few  way out there photos?  Sheep head , anyone? Heaven only knows what the natives did with this.  Many  people roasted a whole pig (or piglet) for the Chinese New Year and displayed it along with other foods as a welcoming gesture. Picturesque to be sure.

Elephant through the gate at Bayon

Vietnam & Cambodia: Floating Villages

      I suppose if there is a lot of water around, it is quite possible that villages will pop up on it.  And I do mean ON it. Tonle Sap  is a well known water district, we gawked at the Stung Sen River floating villages on our way to Battambang.  My own little private joke is to name one of the villages Lifebuoy.  Hey, cracks me up every time I think of it.  I like travelling on the water. Water is cooler and softer than bumpy, dirty roads and the wildlife -four legs, two legs, winged- is fun to watch. Kev gets bored with it [especially when a five hour trip takes eight due to very low water levels] but humors me once a trip because I enjoy it so much. And he gets a little extra sleep in.

boathouse

houseboat

floating UNICEF school

So what do we see over the side of our transport?  Houseboats and boathouses-moored and moving. Churches and hardware stores are pontooned as is the local authorized cell phone dealer.  Ever wonder where that money you collected for UNICEF in little orange cartons every Halloween went to?  I have found at least one floating school UNICEF helped build. Another school had a top floor so kids could run around during recess. [Quick note: school is recommended but not compulsory or free.] I wondered  where kids got the chance to run freely.  Same can't be said for the pigs and chickens in floating pens tied to the house. Animal Alcatraz.
     It doesn't quite look like Venice, but this lady accomplishes her retail rounds just the same.  Notice the scale in the center of her boat. We cruised through an early a.m. floating market. Wholesale only, we couldn't buy just one frost apple. Still, it was fun to watch commerce occurring in an entirely different kind of venue.

boys bathing at the shoreline

     Rivers are the lifeblood of communities the world over. I have gotten incredibly spoiled by living and working in such clear water places like French Polynesia so that the idea of washing the dishes, clothes or myself in murky brown water simply does not  appeal. But no one here thinks twice about it.   These boys are having a fabulous time. Men will wear underwear in the water to lather up. Often a small boat is sunk right at the shores to afford pareo-clad women a little privacy as they scrub and shampoo.
     Eyes forward, the next stop is here.

Vietnam & Cambodia : $1 ATM Machines

    In Cambodia, there are $1 ATM machines. They are highly mobile units which require very little maintenance. They are also known as 'tourists' to the locals.  Every thing costs a buck.  It is such a small amount. Really, what is a dollar here and a dollar there?  Until you realize that you are now paying more for stuff here than back home. And a buck goes muuuuuuuucchh farther here.

deformed hands of silk businesswoman

    I mentioned in the first V&C postcard that Cambodians are not shy about their impecunious state. NGOs and NPOs [non government organizations and non profit organizations] have flooded into the country to help - including for the disabled, by birth or accident. The disabled are just shy of being seen as untouchables here and no social services are set up for them, so NGO assistance in setting up business opportunities goes a long way to help them achieve independence. Many people, including myself, have chosen to make our tourism dollars  really count by supporting such initiatives.  It doesn't make things cheaper...think Fair Trade items and their comparative prices...but I asked a lot of questions about the organization, the profit-sharing scheme and working conditions at the Heritage Handicrafts Fair that conveniently was held while I was in Siem Riep.  A true win-win-win situation was the reed weaving company based at a floating village.  Hyacinthe is choking the river, the villagers need employment. So the hyacinthe is harvested, processed and woven into beautiful baskets, mats, shoulder bags and the like and sold in the big cities. The NGO is helping them establish a business model.
     Don't know what a floating village is?  Stay tuned.

Vietnam & Cambodia: Angkor Wat and Wat Nots

ANGKOR WAT.  Indeed the mother of all temples.  It's huge, like two kilometers squared huge, with wings and side temples. It is possible to buy a seven-day pass to Angkor Wat and its neighbors- better than Disney for folks like Kev who cannot get enough of crumbling architecture.  And the reason we came to Cambodia.  I have to admit, it is impressive.  Not just its size and complexity but the details in the carvings and general workmanship. Most of the interior statues have been carted away to museums (or private collections) but the buildings alone are worthy of the parade of international tourists reading the legends and tenets of Vishnu and Hinduism on the walls. It was over 300 years in the making and finished at the end of the 12th century. In the mid 15th century it was abandoned to fable and the occasional wandering Buddhist. The French stepped forward in the mid-19th century and eventually brought it back to glory.  This is the same story, more or less,  for many of the temples in Cambodia.  Some are only a couple of years into their restoration.

Our lucky day at Angkor Wat.  Some serious filming going on-crew of 22, costumers, catering, the requisite gay guy doing make-up and a bevy of beauties dressed in gold dancing at various location within the temple.  Very Thai in style but it is all glamorous.  Glad to see I wasn't the only one with flowers in my hair.

Of course, Angkor isn't the only Wat around. Before 'temple fatique' sets in, you get to stroll around many other temples, get yelled at for trying to get a rubbing of ancient khmer writing, admire carvings, dodging people selling the same postcard sets or scarves and watch guys making genuine antiques for sale.

Here is an example of what a few hundred years can do to a temple. Plant life can sneak in between stones, wedge them apart and tumble them onto the ground.  Or, what the hey, just grow around the temple like the picture on the right.  There were a number of small and large temples held hostage by tree roots.  Our temple pass is about to expire. Take a last look and we'll move on.

Vietnam & Cambodia: Intro and Comparisons

Bayon face

   The Indochine Peninsula Adventure  was completed (the eastern half anyway) with our recent temple tour of Cambodia and Vietnam.  Add our visit to Laos over a year ago and the whole experience invites comparison of its composite countries.

    There are similarities: the endless grit, rice fields abound,  bicycles as preferred transportation, everyone is short and everything is cheaper than back home-to name a few.  And to the differences...

    Laos. The poorest of the three countries, but with quiet dignity. If a person had only two shirts, one would be clean and that would be the one he would be wearing. After the damage of the Vietnam War (called the American War in these parts) people picked themselves up and got on with life and living in a very resourceful way.  There are some local business initiatives designed to help neighborhoods market their handcrafted goods to tourists. The one national road, as basic and unimproved  as it is (especially in the countryside) goes where people need to go.

Angkor Wat

     Cambodia.  Home to the massive Angkor Wat and a jillion other temples in various states of excavation & reparation all calling the tourists streaming into the country.  Tourism is the second largest industry in Cambodia beaten only by the business of "Being Poor".  From king to tuk-tuk driver, everyone is only too eager to tell you how poor they are.  The beggars, touts and salespeople were persistent to an annoying degree everywhere. Even the post office got into the act by selling bundles of stamps for amounts ($1) greater than face value of the postage. No individual stamp sales.  Sigh.  Get the picture?

     Vietnam.  We walked across the border from Cambodia to Vietnam and the difference was noticeable almost right away.  Vietnam is a much more prosperous nation. It's greener.  The food is definitely better. And it is loaded with shysters who feel that not only should tourists pay more than locals but should get their "heads shaved" (dramatically overcharged) on top of it. Hey, the Communists may have won the war, but Capitalism (Ho Chi Minh-style) Rules the Day. You'll bump into the odd Vietnamese who does not make such a distinction and keeps you from painting the entire population with the same brush. [hint: take metered taxis and if you can't shop at a fixed price store, bargain HARD]  Vietnam also has a serious sleaze factor, especially in tourist areas.

Chinese New Year spread

     You might ask, and I sure wondered, if an American in these parts would be on the receiving end of ill-will or worse because of their citizenship and the war.  The quick answer is no.  That kind of sentiment was only found in parts of government museums. Any tongue lashings I received were from vendors because I refused to buy something they had been hounding me about for the last ten minutes- and that had nothing to do with my nationality.  

     O.K.  from here we go to a few notable bits.   

    

The Ocean Road Home

As fun as it is to rattle one's innards and car alignments on endless, unsealed, washboard gravel roads, we needed a see change for the last days of the trip. So this includes gritty mining port cities of Port Hedlund and Karratha. They seem to exist totally for the export of mined iron ore but I do applaud the permanent residents (as opposed to the fly-in,fly-out workers) efforts to improve quality of life. Art programs and art galleries featuring Aboriginal artists work, community programs and Target stores. I'm afraid their greatest offering to us was real beds, real showers and a chance to do a bit of laundry. We stayed at the holiday home of the CWA (Country Women's Association, see 3-28-09) a pleasure and a bargain at $40 in a city where a basic box hotel is $200 a night.

If Port Hedlund exists for mining, Exmouth exists for tourists. Ningaloo Marine Park is such a wonderful change from the grit of the interior. There are beautiful bays with snorkeling amongst the coral almost at water's edge in shallow, moderate waters. A squall followed us in, so it was two days before water activities became fun or even recommended by park staff. Of course, this did not stop Mr. Intrepid from giving it a go each day anyway. I don't know how our tent, anchored into sand, didn't blow away...even with us in it. What we didn't get to do was swim with the sharks. Whale sharks, that is. They eat krill, not people, and winter in Exmouth. They're a big draw, understandably, but expensive also. The official operator asks $380 for the couple of hours worth of thrill. I'll just feel my heart speed up looking at stock photos.

Carnarvon, the green stop of the vacation. Another CWA unit, no where near as homey as Port Hedlund, but an excellent base for exploring as it is located right downtown. Carnarvon has just the right conditions to be able to grow crops year round. In fact, 80% of all winter produce for the state comes from this area. We toured a banana plantation, which grows relatively few bananas compared to other crops, and learned heaps about how farming is done from underground water sources which are alloted by a shire water scheme. Very interesting. We visited every produce stand open on every farm hoping to stock up on farm fresh fruit, vegetables, herbs, eggs and ice cream. We hiked along a one-mile jetty and strolled through a sheep shearing station museum.

This really ended the exploratory part of the vacation. We had already visited some of the spots between Carnarvon and Perth ( see The Old Pearler, 2-13-09) so we broke up the long ride home with a stay at the Old Priory hotel. It's an old convent school that functions as an upscale country pub on beautiful old-growth property. Kind of a halfway house back into civilization as Kevin watched rugby in the pub and I lazed in a heated room drinking Baileys and watching Christmas movies (Christmas in July, the southern hemisphere's answer to Hollywood's northern version) and each having a good time.

Random Photo #1: Bound and determined to make the most of every possible experience this trip, Kev spits in the eye of Fate (or was that his own eye?) to stand at the very edge of a gorge eating fresh prawns. He would have called his stockbroker if we could have gotten cell phone reception. (OK, not really. But it sounds good, anyway.)

Random Photo #2: OZ has a thing for giant tourist landmarks. Meet Mr. Egg, a bit larger than Mr. Prawn, more colorful than the giant Guitar, but not as colorful as the giant Banana but not as sweet as the giant Pineapple. etc., etc.

Random Photo #3: Not to be confused with the giant landmarks in Photo #2, but there are oodles of these giant termite mounds in the Pilbara. Somehow, I hadn't associated termite mounds with this continent before this trip.

Random Photo #4: The Faithful Steed. Coated in red dust and now missing a tailpipe. Kev's coworkers had bets that the old jalopy wouldn't make it to the end of the trip. We're kind of amazed ourselves. Had a Plan B if the old gal gave up the ghost along the way--it entailed looonng hikes with whatever we could carry on our backs.
Advanced aged and creaking parts never seemed to deter Kev from driving 120 kph on the most wretched of roads. Hail Mary, full of grace...