A Tunnel to...

Cu Chi! 

After coming back from the Mekong, Kelly and I decided to go on a little day group tour out to the Cu Chi tunnels, tunnels where whole villages went underground to avoid US bombs. There are miles upon miles of these tunnels with different levels and areas for different purposes. 

Where'd he go?

This was a quick bomb cover hole and a way to hide during battle. 

Go Kelly go!

Gone!

bahahaha

We then walked through one of the actual tunnels (well, kind of actual, this is a real tunnel but they widened it a bit for giant foreigners)

We walked the length of a football field in this tunnel. It was tiring!

There were some huge tall Australians behind us that had to give up and take a side way out because they were too big. It was hilarious. 

The tunnels were a really cool experience to wander around the jungle and see all the traps, hidey-holes and tunnels. You also had a chance to shoot real guns from the war, but it was expensive so Kelly and I sat instead. Haha. 

Although it was a tour with a big group, it was a nice relaxing day not having to worry about anything more than falling in hidden holes.  

The Knight Bus

 After flying from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh and Ho Chi to Da Nang, we were already spending a fair amount of Dong (VND aka the $$) just getting up and down this gangly awkward teenage boy of a country. So there we were, in Hue, about an hour flight from to Hanoi, but $70 each in flight tickets. While seemingly not a lot, figuring you might pay that much to go from SF to LA, but Kelly and I, like all true college students, are cheap. Just as we were about to bust out the $70 to buy our ticket, our hostel manager walks in and puts a paper in front of us.

On said paper: "A sleeper bus to Hanoi, 6 pm to 6 am, 220,000 D"

Translation: "$11 each and no money is needed for a hostel or hotel that night"

I turn and look at Kelly. She gives me the nod, but adds in that it's my decision (Being that I have a bit of a fear of buses..). 12 hours. 12 hours and 22 dollars instead of 140. We went to lunch to "think about it", but we all know what happened. The Knight Bus was booked. We were set.

    Twenty four beds. One squat toilet. 12 hours. A 30 minute dinner break. Games upon games of cards. Snacks and cookies. And very little sleep.
No talking head. No changing shapes of the bus (though sometimes we did have a real squeeze passing a few truckers). And no Harry Potter.

   Although a bit rough at times and a bit tired afterwards, traveling by night bus is a great cheap way to get around and I'd do it again.

The Graves of the Motorcycle

Vietnam, the land of the motorcycles, lawless streets and a love of honking. Honking when you pass someone, honking when you cross a street, honking when you see someone you know...

It's a bit like Venezuela really, motorbikes and buses stampeding all about in Lion King like manner.

After being hit ourselves whilst on foot in Hanoi, surrounded in Sigh Gone, and being berated by constant honking the entirety of our trip, Kelly and I felt like we were ready for the impossible:

Our OWN motorbikes! We wanted to join in on the fun! 

 We were to join the herd! (Warning: While I may use the word "herd" I in no way imply that there was order and a pattern to the chaos that are the streets of Vietnam)

Kelly and I may be a bit crazy, but we decided to not sign our own death warrants and thus waited for lovely Hue of central Vietnam to have our first motorbike venture instead of the death traps of Saigon and Hanoi. 

We woke up fairly early on our first day in Hue and of course firstly made our way over to a cafe to get breakfast (My stomach then roared in approval while scarfing down moderately tasty backpacker cafe banana pancakes). 

After filling the beast, it was time to attempt to mount a different kind of beast. 

    Scary, right?

We returned to our hostel and told our little manager man that we wanted to rent two motorbikes. He thought we were crazy that we wanted no guide, that we didn't want to go on a tour, and that we were each getting our own motorbike. Hahaha. He doesn't know the bamfness of the Pearson sisters. 

So there we were in our little back alley of our hostel, Kelly had the manual bike and was receiving a quick 2 minute instruction while I sat there slightly freaking out...I know that I'd ridden a scooter before, but not a motorbike, and we might have s.t.r.e.t.c.h.e.d. the truth a bit to our motorbike experience...

I couldn't even figure out how to turn it on.

Although I was a bit nervous at first, once we got out on the road, we were good to go! A bit timid at first whilst in town, especially when I was trying to navigate our way out of the city center to our destination, but eventually I got it figured out. 

As we were making our way out of town, we decided to Miyazaki a bit as well. I knew that we were trying to make our way to this one Pagoda on the outskirts of town, but what we came across was so much cooler. We found this giant guy ^.^   There were cows just grazing right by his feet. He was awesome.

Then we hit the jackpot! We found this sweet lying down Buddha that I made Kelly imitate.

The ponchos are hot, right?

It had started to rain, and luckily our Momma had packed each us a poncho in our stocking stuffers. (Put them to good use Mom! =]  ) 

I don't really know about Kelly, but I was feeling like a superhero in my poncho. With the speed of the motorbikes and the wind, the poncho magically transformed into a cape of superhero proportion. 

On to the real destination (though I would say in full cliché form, it was more about the journey bahaha): 

The graves of these Emperors from the 19th and 20th century.

 These things were PALACES! We only paid to go inside of one (the tickets were steep man, 60,000D each (aka $3). I don't know what these guys were planning to do once they were dead, but they had hunting grounds, fishing grounds, places for people to stay who came to visit them...It was insane! Kelly was saying she would go hang out there if she was the Emperor before she'd die. I would too. hahaha.

I swear, palaces! 

There was all this religious meaning to crossing over these different houses and passing into different sections of the afterlife and crossing over bridges and lakes, but since we didn't take a guide (muahah) we didn't really understand that, but it was lovely to just wander and Miyazaki. 

The final gate in this picture leads to this forest-y area that is enclosed by a giant wall, that's the final resting place of the Emperor. Now there were about...7 or so of these big grave areas spread throughout the surrounding countryside of Hue. We drove by most of them, wandered around one that was under restoration, and explored this guy's fully! 

Hark!

I peed right next to this ruin. I feel kind of bad, but it was a Leaning Tower of Pisa kind of moment. 

Kelly and I spent the full day out on our motorbikes. It was probably one of my favorite days in Vietnam. It was nice to get out in the countryside and have the freedom of going wherever we wanted. We drove by beautiful rivers, wound around sharp turns in villages, and honked our way through the city (well Kelly was the real honker, I couldn't find my horn button...hahah). 

Eventually, we made our way back to Hue and while we had tamed two beasts, two others were down right barbaric. We had tried to find food for lunch, but we were just too far out and couldn't find anything, so literally as soon as we got back to our hostel we set out for a night of restaurant hopping and scarfing and ended the day with a bang. 

Sigh Gone

Saigon. 

   Saigon was definitely not a sigh of a city. The city surprised me in so many ways, not all good, but not all bad either. First off, I was surprised by how much quieter of a city it was. No crazed honkers were present, most of the time. I don't know if it was the big streets or the heat, but the city pace felt slower, less bee hive-ish. Yet, it wasn't dead either, it was the weird inbetween moment,  almost as if it was just emerging from a cocoon, freshly rejuvenated and updated and rearing to go.
    Secondly, I was surprised by the heat. I don't know why I was, but being dumb, I had only looked up the weather for Hanoi and as such had only brought 2 pairs of pants, sweatpants for sleeping, and a pair of running shorts. So, me being me, I just wore that one pair of shorts for basically a week and a half.

    Contrary to my above statements, here's the streets on New Year's Eve. All the motorbikes were at a standstill. Luckily they weren't honking.

In Saigon, even the type of tourists were different from Hanoi. In Hanoi, it was all about the hippie wanderer types, the scruffy drop outs, the liberals. In Saigon, there were two major categories. The newly empty nesting older couples with a bit more money and the backpacking party kids. Saigon is known as having one of the best club scenes in Southeast Asia, and you could tell. Kelly and I, while not saying we normally necessarily are looking good (well Kelly does), but we felt so underdressed compared to the other tourists. (Especially me in my little black Soffe shorts that were a bit wrinkly) 

We didn't spend a lot of time in the city, but it was fun wandering around drinking ice coffees, exploring palaces, and scarfing down Indian food. 

富士山を食べたいよ！(I want to eat Mt. Fuji!)

  

    "I want to eat Fuji-san! He looks delicious, doesn't he? Just like ice cream, right?" Ji In, a study abroad student from Korea states with odd simplicity in perfect Japanese. Her long hair and glasses and smiling face give off a good vibe. She smiles at me and asks as if it's the most normal statement, "Right?!" 

  

   I laugh and I agree completely. I can already picture the cherry and hot fudge on top just waiting to be gobbled up. We then proceed to talk about our favorite ice creams as both our stomachs begin to grumble in response to the tasty thoughts. 

    

    This happy go lucky fluent gaijin is my roommate. 

   As we're standing in line for dinner, I hear someone mention vegetarian food. It's the girl next to me. She's Malaysian with the cutest little red hat. We eat our vegetarian meals together talking about Japanese cooking and まめ（mame, Japanese beans). Later that night, it starts to snow. Adorably, it's her first time. As soon as we realize it's snowing, we both just start running towards the door, throw on our shoes on, and next thing we know, we are in a snowball fight! She is adorable in the snow. Her face lights up like a child's (or my sister's) face on Christmas. Even though she's wearing jeans, she lies down and swiftly makes a snow angel.

   

   Next I meet a girl from Vietnam. I'm so excited and still suffering from PTSD from the food that I just start word vomiting all about the tasty things I want to eat. I attempt to explain the orgasm rolls in Japanese, proceed to switch to English and still can't figure out how to talk about my favorite rolls. I even start to tell how you have to fight to get them and the price of the rolls, but no luck, she has no idea what I'm talking about. I promise to send her a picture and get her to promise me that if she hasn't eaten them, she has to when she goes back to Hanoi.

   

    Then there is Tomo-chan, a Japanese high school student who knows "I scream for ICE CREAM!" She is always dancing and always laughing. She also speaks fluent amazing English and Spanish. 

   

  And one cannot forget sweet Fai-chan's from Mexico. She literally didn't speak a word of Japanese before she came 6 months ago, but now she has become so good! And just from talking with her host family and listening to Hippo tapes. We talk in Spanish about traveling, Japan, and of course, food. 

    I spent the next 24 hilarious hours in a small town near Fuji-san at a Hippo retreat.  Hippo, a worldwide club that I heard about from my host mom, is a club that works on learning languages without books and with a special focus in traveling and doing homestays in other countries. At the retreat, we attended workshops learning different languages, we danced, we ate, and we listened and learned from each other's respective travel stories and life experiences.  I personally just had a great time making friends and getting to know these amazing people, who although we didn't share a common native language, we were able to communicate and enjoy each other's company. Thinking back on it, it feels like I spent at least a week with these girls, but sitting here and actually counting the hours we spent together, it quite literally was only twenty four.

  I'm glad that I got to eat Fuji-san. He was delicious. 

   

The Village

 It was a dark and misty night in Hoi An, Vietnam. 

So there we were, a week in to Vietnam and basically in the very middle of the gangly teenage country. We had loved our adventures thus far, Saigon, the Mekong and Hanoi, but we were ready from something a bit...calmer. 

And well, we definitely fished our wish. 

We arrived in Hoi An pleasantly surprised to find a French Riviera. Hoi An was calm, beautiful, and fancy this, quiet! It's known for it's fine silks and tailors (so if you're looking to get all fancy like for cheap, head to Hoi An), and it's known as a UNESCO world heritage site thanks to it's gorgeous old part of town, but this fact, combined with the abundance of tailors has led to a bit of a movie set town. (Kelly and I are convinced those boats above are props). 

While strolling along the promenade like streets, we couldn't help but notice tourists happily riding on bicycles. They looked so peaceful, so much so, that we soon became jealous. 

We decided to one up them and ride bikes on our very own island. We found a ferry, paid white girl fee's, and next thing we knew, we were off exploring!

Rice fields and Kelly. Her bike matches her shirt!

Beautiful blue sky. 

 Now that's actually a bit scary...

Jungly 

A cow that I almost killed.

I wish I had pictures of the preceding events, but...it probably would have been rude. 

It was Kelly's turn as lead bicyclist. She was doing a great job. We were wandering, Miyazaki-ing as we like to call it.    We'd arrive at an intersection and turn the most interesting looking way. Well, after a few turns, we ended up on this rocky brick dirt trash road thing. It was well, bumpy. After arriving at a dead end and turning around, we kept going. Everything seemed fine, no harm no foul. Sometimes your Miyazaki may lead you astray...

No. Within three minutes my tire was flat. Dead flat. 

So there we were, a good thirty minute bike ride away from civilization out on these muddy back roads with rice fields. We're sitting there discussing what we're going to do when all of a sudden, a Vietnamese woman comes out of her house and starts talking to us in Vietnamese. 

We of course, don't understand. We motion to her. She motions at us. We turn and look at each other and all three of us laugh. Kelly and I whisper about what we're going to do and what we want. Finally she motions towards our tires and we understand that she understands our problem. At this point, the neighbors are also intrigued. Three other women come over and are all laughing and enjoying themselves. Our first friend brings out her pump, but it doesn't have a needle. I'm sitting there with three Vietnamese women all of us with our hands on my tire trying to make this pump work. 

One woman yells to her daughter. At this point Kelly and I are feeling bad that we're taking up all their time and making this a big deal when we both know that a pump isn't going to fix this tire, but we figure we'll just fake it after this...

There is really no way out though, and I'm enjoying myself too much to care. 

The daughter comes over, she tries the pump. No luck. She says something quickly to her mom and takes off running. Kelly and I look at each other and shrug. 

Another woman comes out and motions towards her house. We understand that we're supposed to follow her, so I push my bike along down another lane. She gets out her pump and we all get ready to make it work. 

The girl comes running back with another pump! 

We now have: 

 3 pumps. 

5 Vietnamese woman. 

1 teenage Vietnamese girl. 

2 bikes. 

2 white girls. 

1 tire that won't inflate. 

I feel like there is a lightbulb joke somewhere in that but...

Next thing I know, a motorbike turns the corner on to the lane where all of us (bikes included) are blocking the path. As Kelly and I start to move, the women begin to talk and motion to him. They seemingly knew him, and the poor guy was beckoned in to this clown circus.

Somehow he gets the tire to inflate. We all cheer and everyone feels so accomplished. I bow to them all and use my few words of Vietnamese I know to say thank you. 

You would think the story was over what with a successfully blown up tire...

Like I was saying, Kelly and I knew that the inner tube was popped, so we knew it wasn't going to stay inflated. I was hoping we could get away before it re-deflated...

As soon as we turned the corner back to our initial location, the tire officially was flat. 

Teenage girl comes running up to us and starts speaking in Vietnamese. An epic conversation of pointing and nodding ensued. Three minutes of confusion later, she pulls out her bike, motions for me to get on, and next thing I know, she's hopped on the back of her bike that I'm riding. She gets my bike in her arms, and well, I pedaled us the twenty five minutes back in to town with her dragging my bike. 

There we are! Kelly snuck a picture. 

First off, as we were driving, we passed motorbike dude at the basketball/soccer area and he just pointed and laughed. It was awesome. 

To add to the trouble, Kelly's tire popped on the way back. It really was quite a show on this little rural island. (People kept yelling at us and saying hello. Kelly and I felt like celebrities) 

Vietnamese girl proceeded to lead us to the bike repair shop. We figured we would just return our bikes to the rental shop and hope for the best, but...there we were at the town repair shop. We even got to meet his cute daughter as we chilled on the porch for the next half hour. 

Our new Vietnamese friend really was very kind. In the end, she spent over an hour and a half trying to help us fix our bikes and figure out our situation. 

 All in all, attempting to converse with 6 Vietnamese women in the middle of a tiny rural island is probably one of my favorite memories of Vietnam. 

The sunset was gorgeous. 

We ended the day at the Lazy Gecko for smoothies and a game of pool. 

The perfect way to end a perfect day. 

My stomach: The Viet Nam Story

Viet Nam. A country of contrasts. The mountainous village tribes of the North. The river life of the Mekong Delta in the South. Ho Chi Minh, a city of wide boulevards and fancy shops. Hanoi with the small winding (dangerous!) alleyways of the Old Quarter. In the middle, the beautiful historical towns and beaches that provide a more calm contrast to it's large neighbors in the South and North. I'm spending two weeks here, exploring and getting lost and I'm loving it.

Like that of the tonal language I cannot pronounce, the food that is so delicious yet varied, and that of the contrasting cities and countrysides that make you believe you're in another country depending on your coordinates, I've decided to go all Rambo on my posting, and take it not chronologically, but by ideas, exeriences, and memories.

As with all things in my life, I shall lead with my stomach.

Let's just get this straight out on the table right away, the food is off the chain. I have eaten so much and so well and so constantly that my stomach is almost too overwhelmed, too full on deliciousness. Vietnam is a food powerhouse! Western food, traditional Vietnamese, French bakeries, Thai food, Chinese, Indian, Spanish, the list goes on and on!  Not only is it diverse and awesome, it's so cheap! Coming from Japan where I eat at convenience stores for lunch and still pay the same price if not more for a huge meal here, the prices here are awesome, so much so, that it only adds to my overeating since I figure it's so cheap, what's another big meal...hehe

On another note, while a few friends were concerned that I would face challenges in eating vegetarian here in Vietnam, I have found quite the opposite. As long as there is an English menu or a friendly waiter willing to help me out, I (that being the grand entity of my stomach) am almost always in the delicate state of food-baby.

My two week pregnant stomach would like to give a few shout outs to its favorites so far:

To the delicious bread roll that I discovered while walking down by the Temple of Literature in Hanoi and that I fought Vietnamese women for when you first came out of the oven: 
Your buttery goodness is a sin for a vegan on vacation. Your warmth and gooeyness warms my soul. Your caloric content and bad cholesterol has taken years off of my life. Thank you for entering my life.

To the red and green fruits that I bought at a bus stand:
 I don't know your real names, yet I know you are strange and delicious. Throughout the first week of travel, I didn't dare to dream of your exotic tastes and flavors in the face of white girl priced fruit that street ladies tried to gip me for. At long last, I was able to purchase and taste your oddities thanks to posted prices in a bus stop in the middle of the Mekong Delta.  In a moment of extreme happiness, I, like Noah, got two of each of you and with my sister (hopefully unlike Noah...this might be wrong to joke about, esp. according to my beliefs,  but what tasty animals are you meat eaters missing out on thanks to a long 40 days at sea?), munched down awkwardly upon.  Since then, I still haven't been graced by your presences often (stupid white girl prices), but I thoroughly enjoyed trying to figure out how to eat you.

To Indian food:
To the garlic naan. To the curries. To the samosas. Just talking about your goodness is making me hungry (and I had curry for lunch...)  Right next to our alley located hostel in Ho Chi Minh was the first time I met Indian food in Vietnam. Old Indian men sat amongst you chatting the night away. The next night, in a city known for it's culinary restaurants of amaziness, we couldn't resist your tempting presence and ate at the same Indian restaurant, literally next door to our hostel. The same Indian men and a few new men sat there chatting, while Kelly and I stuffed our faces before our flight to Da Nang. While the flight story is for another post of craziness, we almost missed our flight because of a confusion on our parts, and thus had quite literally 10 minutes to eat you. We literally ate so fast that we were sick the whole car ride to the airport. Indian food, oh how cheap and delicious you are.

To the vegetables: 
You know your own praises.

To Kelly and the Vegetable Spring Rolls (which oddly sounds like some hipster band name):
 I give all the credit to Kelly on this one. My stomach thanks Kelly for ordering you our first night, which led to my subsequent obsession. To the white rose in Hoi An, the delicious noodle version in Hue, the simple vegetable version in the South. Your diversity yet deliciousness is inspiring.

And my stomach would like to give the Oscar for Best Picture to.....

To my soulmate which no words of introduction can show you how deeply you have affected my life, Vietnamese Coffee:
(Yes, Lucy's stomach and brain knows what our readers are thinking, no surprise that coffee is the Best Picture, you're probably thinking that Lucy is a coffee addict, and of course she and her stomach would choose coffee, that it's an unoriginal choice by the committee, but yet... )

Seriously, Vietnamese coffee you are BAMF personified. Quite literally the best coffee I have ever had in my entire life, and that's saying something. You are so rich in aroma and flavor, full and just amazing. I'm sitting here trying to describe you after already having three cups today, and it's just...impossible. I love you iced with a bit of condensed milk at the bottom that I mix in creating a creamy lush flavor that just invades the senses. Amazing. Dear Reader, ask any Vietnamese person you know about their coffee, I bet they'll say it's the best. I dare you reader.

While I won't try it since I don't really agree with practices, (I wish I could attest to it's deliciousness as well, but)...they even have coffee beans that a weasel has ingested and once passing through all the proper systems, is then ground up and made into a super powered coffee bean. (Go! Go! Power Rangers!)

Coffee culture in my opinion says a lot about a people. For many in the US, coffee serves as a tool to stay awake, to get more done in a day, to stay up to study for that final, to survive that research paper. In Venezuela, it's a frothy latte in a small thimble that is enjoyed in strength. In Spain, it's the espresso. In Japan, it's the expensive black coffee and sitting in a cute cafe. In Vietnam, it's about waiting for the water to sift down through the grounds of deliciousness. It's about watching the dark liquid drip and pool in front of you. As it gathers, you relax and chat on the streetside cafes. Each small sip of the sweet drug slowly and surely warms the soul. (Sometimes I can't help myself and just kind of...down it. It's depressing when that happens).

Out of all of the words I know in Vietnamese (thank you, excuse me, I, vegetarian, bathroom, and coffee), coffee is my favorite to use.

My stomach and its unborn food child could go on and on and on and on and on and on about food, as I'm sure you see here on my post literally just about food, but "surprisingly", it's dinnertime here and my stomach is the Queen.