Hello hello!
Right, firstly i must apologise for the delay in updating the blog as I've had numerous abusive emails of complaint about this. Anyone would think we're on holiday and we've nothing better to do ha ha! We have actually found it really difficult to find wifi connections in Cambodia so i'll just condense everything we've done so far!
We came across the border from Nanning to Hanoi in Vietnam a few weeks ago now. Literally as soon as we moved countries the scenery changed dramatically. There were big mountains everywhere covered in tropical trees and it was all so green and beautiful. When we arrived in the capital Hanoi we were staying in a place called the old quarter which is full of tiny streets and crossroads. The traffic is mental and nobody would stop to let you cross, so we just had walk into the road and pray that the motorbikes would swerve around you! On the corners of these streets were guys sat on motorbikes offering you rides, (which we obviously thought was a stupid idea!) until we later realised later they sell drugs on the side, which must make up for the lack of business!
Hanoi was a really cool city, full of culture and atmosphere. We went to a water puppet show which is really famous and it takes years for the puppet masters to learn this skill to make the puppets look like they're walking on water so we were really looking forward to it. What we actually saw however, was a screen with sticks poking through and dragons splashing around. As it was in Vietnamese we didn't know what the story was about and because the theatre was originally made for vietnamese legs and not Alistair's, he spent the entire night with his legs crushed! We couldn't even leave halfway through, because we were rammed in from either side and couldn't move until everyone else got out first. It was definitely an experience!
On the day we left we decided to have a bit of western food and had tuna mayo baguettes before we got on a sleeper bus. Halfway through the night i started being sick in carrier bags which was great for everyone sitting around me! Also when we got off the bus and into the nearest hostel, Alistair gave the bags to a woman to put in the bin and everyone who had just got off the bus started laughing because they knew what was in there! I would've been really embarrassed if i weren't so ill. I ended up having gastroenteritus and had intense stomach pains for about 5 days which meant we were stuck in a place called Hue which was incredibly boring and Alistair had to keep wandering around by himself, bless him.
After Hue we went to a place called Hoi An which is full to the brim of tailor shops so you can get some clothes made however you want. The clothes we got were ok but the quality wasn't that good because they made everything overnight so it was a bit of a rush job. The actual town was a really nice riverside one and it would be the sort of place we would visit again. Once again though we caused a scene at the market place! We bought some jewellery at quite an expensive price (but it would be cheap if they were bought at home) and then found a woman further down selling them at a quarter of the price! We ended up going back and complaining to the woman we had bought the jewellery off who then demanded to see who was selling it cheaper. It caused a bit of an argument and the cheaper woman denied that she had told us a cheap price and they all started making out like she was a crazy old woman, which got our backs up. Soon lots of other market workers were coming over to see what was going on and we then started to get worried that the police might be called because things were starting to escalate! We agreed to not have our money back but just take a extra necklace instead. With that, we still had been really ripped off but we learnt from that to shop around first in the future!
It was great here too because everyone kept coming up to me and touching me saying i had beautiful skin. They really wanted to be pale and white and the women who worked on the beach here were completly covered from head to toe, even their hands and faces in the boiling hot sun! A woman selling bracelets told me that she wanted a job in a hotel but couldn't because her skin was too dark, which meant she was from a lower class as her family were probably farmers. The paler you are, the better job you have because you will be inside and out of the sun. I was telling her that people are the opposite in the UK and everyone wants to be brown which she thought was strange. This is one time that being pasty actually pays off!
Next stop was a beach resort called Nha Trang were we did some diving. I thought i would really enjoy diving and everything seemed ok until i went into the sea for the first time. You have to perform certain skills underwater in order to get your licence, such as taking your mask off and clearing the water out of it etc. On the floor of the ocean i started having a panic attack because i got water up my nose and when your breathing is limited it's not really the best idea to start panicking! My instructor took me back to the boat and said i could wait until the next day to finish the course. I qualified in the end after being a drama queen and Alistair got his advanced diving which means he can dive deeper and he could take us out on our own now.
The beach was really nice, but it was spoiled by people coming up to us constantly saying "you wan buy book?, you wan massarrrrge? you wan soo sine meester?" (even when wearing flip flops!). We timed it and they came up every four minutes which was ridiculous! The kids would say "i know you don't waan it sir but buy anyway!"
In the hotel we stayed in here we had some things stolen out of our hotel room. My purse with my cards in and Alistair had a book stolen. The hotel denied all knowledge and the maid said she saw the book and the purse together on the bed the day before and we must have moved it. This wasn't true because both the items had not come out of our bags and it was pointless anyway because they was no cash in my purse and i cancelled my cards straight away. It was surprising as well how little English people can speak when you're accusing them of something too!
The last stop in Vietnam was Saigon or Ho Chi Minh City so we could go to the Chu Chi Tunnels. The tour was good and they showed us all the traps that were left for the Americans, but there was a lot of propaganda around and the film we watched at the end described the Americans as 'crazy devils'. There didn't appear to be much truth around the reasons behind the war so we never really got to the bottom of it. The war museum we went to showed the affects of Agent Orange where kids had oversized heads etc and that was pretty horrific. Saigon ended up being a bit depressing really after seeing all that, so we only stayed a few days and decided to head into Cambodia early.
We have gone over budget quite a lot as we vastly underestimated how much things cost here. We found a jar of peanut butter (yeyy!) and was living on that for a while on baguettes with cheese and banana (thanks Ebby ha ha!). I think that has actually made us put on weight rather than lose it though because it's really bad for you, especially twice a day!
Anyway the update for Cambodia so far, will be on asap with all the piccies (when i've given my hands a rest!)
Ciao for now! xxxxxxxxxxx