"You and you make me, me, me, me, and me VERY HAPPY!!!"

Dalat is a city in the mountains known for its production of fruit, vegetables, rice, silk, flowers and coffee. We hopped on a bus for an 8 hour ride leaving behind the hustle and bustle of Ho Chi Minh City. When we arrived, it didn’t take us long to realize how nice the climate was; quite cool compared to any other place we’ve visited in SE Asia. This climate is ideal for growing and harvesting anything you can imagine. We learned that this area of Vietnam is one of the richest. The local farmers ship over 400 tonnes of fruit and vegetables to HCMC every morning, ship flowers all over SE Asia, and coffee all over the world. In fact, Vietnam is the second largest coffee exporter in the world behind Brazil and ahead of Columbia. We were both surprised by this and were told that 1 Kg of Dalat’s best coffee beans is worth $3000 US in the global coffee market.

We stayed in Dalat for three days and two nights. On one of the days, Julia and I jumped on the back of motorcycles and cruised around with the “Easy Riders”. The “Easy Riders” are a group of 82 men who take tourists around the countryside on the back of their motorcycles stopping along the way to teach about the local culture and farming. On this day, we visited yet another amazing waterfall, a silk factory, coffee plantations, a rice wine brewing station, local farms, a crazy house (which is compared to Alice in Wonderland) and had a great lunch with our guides (after they teased us about ordering monkey, snake and dog for us to try). It was a great way to see the area and learn about Dalat’s richness in a country that for the most part remains quite poor.

Another event that will remind us of Dalat forever is a family that we met one evening. As we made our way back to our hotel after a delicious Italian meal, we were approached by four young men. Hesitating at first, we engaged in a conversation once we discovered they weren’t trying to sell us something or rob us. Out of the 4 of them, only one spoke a little bit of English and he invited us to join them for a coffee. So away we went following them down little alleyways to their favorite local café. We had some good drinks, a few laughs, practiced our miming skills (it’s amazing what you can communicate with your hands!) and learned that our presence was making these guys “very happy”. Em, who spoke very little English kept saying you and you (Julia and I) make me, me, me and me (he and his friends) HAPPY!!! It was quite nice to see the smiles on their faces and in return, they made us happy as well. We tried to cover the bill once we finished our drinks and the owner of the café quickly told us to put our money away. In Vietnam, it is customary to treat those who you invite and as guests, we were expected to simply enjoy. It was quite a treat knowing how little these four young guys have and learning about how hard they work each day to help support their families. After our coffee, we were then invited to go to Em’s house for a cup of green tea…this is when the evening got really interesting. Within 30 seconds of us entering their home, at least 15 of his family and friends appeared to greet us. His mother was a precious woman with four kids aged 26 to 34; she was 65. We were made to sit down and sip away on some fresh green tea as they took many pictures of us, petted my arm and facial hair, and admired Julia’s white skin. It was hard to communicate with them but their smiles and laughter told us all we needed to know. They were so happy to have us in and show us how they live. For Julia and I, this experience was extremely eye-opening in seeing how these people live and how happy they are with so little; just a big happy family thankful for having each other, a house, some clothes, and enough to eat each day. They have already emailed us twice and have given us their address. We are going to put together a care package when we get home with some Canadian memorabilia to send to them.

Next we are off to Nha Trang; a beach town that has become one of Vietnam’s largest cities. We are looking forward to chillin’ on the beach. More to come…

Good Morning, Vietnam!

Just when you think it can’t get any better, it does! We arrived very tired in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) after a 16 hour bus trip from Siem Reap. There is nothing better to wake you up than this city! With a population of 7 million (9 million people in the city at any given time with business people and tourists) and 4 million scooters on the road, this city is the epitome of chaos! We had been given a good hotel recommendation while in Thailand, so we booked in for four nights at the Duc Vuong Hotel. We have never stayed at a friendlier place and we got free breakfast and “family dinners” each day. Also, every Sunday they have a “Family Party” for all guests. We luckily were there on a Sunday so we were able to attend the party. It was by far the funniest thing we have ever seen! There was a lot of bad karaoke and dancing which made for an eventful night. It’s as if the Asian people get high as soon as the karaoke machine gets fired up. They turn into superstars who clearly watch waaaayyyy too much MTV. They were pulling out provocative Britney Spears-type dance moves and loved being in the spotlight. It was as if they were performing to a crowd of 100,000 in a huge stadium. As per usual, the volume of the karaoke was also at that level. This night was one of our highlights so far and we have videos to watch if we ever feel like we need to smile or have a good laugh.

We spent one day at the Cu Chi Tunnels where we learned all about the war and much of Vietnam’s history. There remain over 200km of underground tunnels that were built during the war to protect the Vietnamese people from the invading Americans. It became evident how clever these people were/are, as they made various traps out of bamboo and other homemade weapons. Their best defense in our opinions, were the tunnels themselves as they were made to only fit the Vietnamese. Believe us, there is no way an American could ever fit inside these things! One tunnel has been widened for Western tourists to experience, but even that was claustrophobically small.

We spent the other days touring around the city and although Saigon is easily seen on foot, the heat was too much for us. Even with the bit of walking we did, we were dripping with sweat within the first 2 minutes and had little energy to go any further. We decided then, we needed to find another way to see the city. Vietnam is the only place in the world that still uses cyclos as a type of transport. A cyclo is essentially a rickshaw, but instead of being pulled behind the bicycle you sit in the front. We were approached by an older man and although we declined at first, his charm got the best of us and before we knew it, we were cruising amongst the 4 million scooters on a cyclo. Mr. Hieu was a sweet man from Mekong Delta. He moved to the city to drive a cyclo and we later found out that this was also his home. He whisked us around all day in the sweltering heat and spoke descent English. We had a great day seeing the sights, although had a few scary moments when we found ourselves on the highway! We visited many markets and temples, but the best part of the day was when we took Mr. Hieu out for a couple of beer. We chatted more and learned about his family, his village and his life in the Mekong Delta. We have come to realize that it’s the experiences like this that we cherish the most on our travels. Before parting ways with Mr. Hieu, he wanted us to write a note in his “book of friends”. He was so grateful, as were we to meet him and spend the day with him. The next morning we were walking down the street and all we could see what this orange baseball hat running towards us and waving. It was Mr. Hieu! He was so excited to see us, as we were him. We went for a couple of more drinks and he took us to one of his friends “bars”, where we shared some Saigon beer with 4 old Vietnamese men! Mr. Hieu’s friend was a shoemaker by day and a barman by night. As he says “Mr. Shoeman in the day, sell beer in the night”. We had a lot of laughs and stumbled home talking about the funny things that had happened.

One other highlight of our time in Saigon was our quest to find the most impressive motorbike. For those of you who have been to the city or have seen pictures; you know this is no easy feat! They carry everything on their scooters, but we wanted to spot “the best”. While we still don’t think we’ve seen the best yet, I’ll summarize just a few items that have made our shortlist:
• A fridge. The driver had the fridge strapped to his body and to the scooter. If it went down, he was going with it!
• A kitchen table and chairs
• A variety of animals- ducks, dogs, pigs, rats, etc.
• A bamboo ladder. If you picture a typical extension ladder that one would have in their shed, multiply its length by two and you would get this ladder. The best part of it was that he wasn’t carrying it length-wise, but width-wise. It took up at least 2 lanes of traffic.
• Tractor tires. Wrapped around their bodies while driving, obviously.
• Flat screen TV
• Toilet paper. We still haven’t quite figured this one out because they don’t really use toilet paper here, but we saw many scooters with a block (2 metres high by 1 metre wide) of toilet paper.

We haven’t even mentioned the number of people they fit on a scooter yet. We thought for the first couple of days that the record was five…we were wrong. We saw six! We got way too excited when we saw them fly by, but we knew then that we had a new record. I’ll try to explain how it worked. There were two adults (assuming they were the Mom and Dad) and four kids. One kid stood in the front and held onto the speedometer area. The Dad drove, two other children sat between Dad and Mom (who was on the back) and Mom held a newborn baby in front of her (essentially sitting on the other children’s laps)! It is hard to explain, but hopefully you can get the picture. The kids were all suited up with their shades and their face masks on and cruised by as if it was a normal occurrence…which is obviously is. Who needs a minivan when you can all fit on a scooter? We tried to snap a few shots but they were always driving too fast. We also got a scare when we saw a few tourists get their cameras snatched right out of their hands or off their bodies, so we kept our camera hidden for a lot of the time.

All in all, we loved Ho Chi Minh City. It is definitely at the top of our list in terms of cities we have visited around the world. The chaos and the people seem to work so well together which makes for a very exciting couple of days! We are now off to the highlands where we will check out the mountains and countryside in Dalat for a couple of days. We then plan to head back out to the coast to veg on the beach for a break from sightseeing and touring around.

More to come...

We have continued blogging but haven't been able to upload them. We will have them up in the next few days. We are enjoying our last two days in northern Vietnam before heading to Hong Kong for 4 days and then to PEI! Can't wait to see everyone so soon!