And so I have come to a new town. And that town is Margaret River. Margaret River is notable for being two things: a town, and a river, also called Margaret River. To reduce confusion I shall call the town Margaret River, and the river Margaret River-river. Still with me? Good.
Margaret River (and Margaret River-river) is in a remote rural region of south-west Australia. Never-ending miles of hills and unspoilt woodlands lie on all sides. The climate is temperate and wet, making it a little reminiscent of West Yorkshire, albeit with drastically improved weather conditions!
The feel is of a remote, countrified place in a lush rural setting, first colonised less than two centuries ago. Apparently the river, and the town, were named after a woman called Margaret who the original settlers knew. She must have been quite something. Or maybe she paid them lots of money to do it, I don't know.
There are lots of vineyards in this region, and orchards too. 200 miles south of Perth's sterile pretentiousness, the two are worlds apart. This is a sleepy country town where folk stop to say 'how do you do' in the street and neighbours lend a hand churning your butter. Probably.
And what is it brings me, intrepid explorer and cultural ferryman of the masses, to this pretty and unspoilt corner of the world? Well my visa lasts till April next year. If during that time I spend 3 or more months doing specific types of labouring (e.g. vineyard work, orchard work, construction) in remote rural areas of Australia I am entitled to apply for another 12-month working visa in the future.
I've fallen in love with Australia and I'd love to come back. Problem is, a lot of the jobs on the list are back-breakingly arduous and no-one in their right mind would want to do them. Hence the immigration department's special concession allowing desperate backpackers eager to risk life and limb (that's me!) to work towards the golden ticket of a second working visa.
And loads of travellers do it! It's known as the harvest trail, and it has a whole supporting infrastructure of work agencies, backpacker hostels, pamphlets and free advice guides built up around it.
In the grand scheme of things I would rather be poncing round with a pair of secateurs on a vineyard, or trampling grapes like Sideshow Bob on the Simpsons, than hoisting cinder blocks up a ladder in 40 degree heat. Time will tell if I am being cavalier or misguided in my romantic flirtations with viticulture!
After a final whirl of farewell drinks and parties, and the tying up of various loose ends, on Sunday (9th Nov) I left Perth. Loading my bags into my housemate Maria's car I felt a curious mix of elation and nostalgia at a huge chapter in my life closing. Shortly followed by frustration when I realised, halfway into town, I'd left some stuff back at the house!
We drove back to get it but it made us late for the bus. Maria 'put the pedal to the metal' as the young people say, and got me to Esplanade bus-port on time, the light Sunday traffic not posing much of an impedance. I hugged her goodbye and staggered off down the concrete forcourse carrying my entire life: 65 litre rucksack with sleeping bag, roll-mat and travel guitar attached, small rucksack, two bags full of clothes and a full-size guitar in a heavy case!
Stepping into the bus's air-conditioned interior, I felt a cool sense of relief and smugness that I, Andrew Bond, was advancing on my mission. The bus glided off in a hiss of air-brakes and I soon drifted into sleep.
Opening my eyes a few minutes later I couldn't believe what I saw: the bus only made a stop to collect passengers outside Murdoch Uni, 200 metres from my house! I'd made us embark on a whole mad scrambled journey into town for no purpose! Thankfully Maria saw the funny side too when I texted her.
That comedy moment aside it was a pleasant journey south to Margaret River. I caught up on more sleep as lush green countryside sped by under a watchful azure sky. My slumbers that particular day were soundtracked by Captain Beefheart and then some ambienty Radiohead stuff on my music player. And that perpetual moment of inner peace and tranquility finally encapsulated for me what travelling should feel like.
After arriving in Margaret River I spent a few lazy days writing, playing guitar and drinking endless cups of tea at my friend Ruth's house. There was no TV so at night I sat outside listening to the rustling of the trees, bathed in multicoloured lights on the veranda. This, my friend, is what backpacking should all be about. Now to find some work!
Having paced the quiet streets I have found the town's attractions to number: some shops, a few cafes, restaurants and pubs, an internet cafe or two, a cycle trail out through the woods, and a bridge over a lily pond. That's right: a bridge. Over a motherf***king lily pond. Jealous? This town is where it's at.
The town's free weekly paper, the Margaret River Mail, carries an astonishing lack of headlines. This week its readership were treated to the exciting news that CowParade, the international cow art festival, is coming to Margaret River next year. Maybe. Apparently it is next on the list after major cities like Prague, Sydney and Chicago. A likely story!
Also a local author is launching a children's book featuring a talking lamprey. All this while a black man has been elected to the White House and the times they are a-changing. You don't know what you're missing folks!
I have been taken aback how the people here are very friendly, generous and helpful. The woman at the internet cafe knocked two dollars off my bill the other day just because I seemed hard-up. Country people rule!
I've just moved into a house-share with a guy called Nick who is a chef, who brings home free boxes of red wine from his work! And all I have to do now is watch and wait for the phone to ring with work. And I might just get shit-flying drunk while I do so! Doing nothing never felt as good as this.
Saturday 15 November 2008
Thursday 6 November 2008
Perth part 3 - departure imminent!
Hello and welcome once again to my travelling tales. Please help yourself to a mint imperial and tell your fellow guests to do the same.
How am I and where am I at? Apart from a brush with shingles and a recent head-lice scare, I am well and good. I am still in Perth, though at long last I shall soon be leaving. Off to the countryside to work on a vineyard, where exactly I cannot say.
And what of the intervening weeks and months since last I wrote? A strange and wonderful time it must be said. New friendships have been made and new places have been visited. My fresh and revitalised mental state has sent a cascade of creativity gushing forth, revealing a shower of wondrous new songs and lyrics galore. I feel I'm writing (and thinking) on a higher level than I have ever done in my life.
I've played a few gigs in Fremantle and Perth which, while not leading to any great new opportunities, left me in no doubt my music has been well-received over here. I am also busy finishing off two new songs in a recording studio. The studio is in the suburb of Bassendean - birthplace of Rolf Harris, no less! Bassendean is a quiet suburb much like any other – there were no tributes or statues to Rolf evident anywhere. How can their famous wobble-boarding son continue to be overlooked in such a way?
Anyway, the songs will go on a compilation of local artists which will hopefully garner some modest airplay on the radio. And I want my songs playing on the radio – it would make me feel I've finally achieved something with my life. And then my mum can go around telling people, "My son gets played on the radio in Australia you know," as she has no doubt long been craving to do.
"But Bondy!" you ejaculate. "Enough of your music news, what of your travelling?"
Well beloved reader, I have been getting up close and personal with the wheat belt. This isn't some item of farming fetish wear, but rather a vast tract of farmland that surrounds Perth on all sides for hundreds of kilometres. Nipple/areolae is the relationship we're talking here, on a vast scale. And it's the closest I've come to seeing any boobies in a long time I must say!
My friend Shannon took me to spend a weird and wonderful weekend in the country with her family. Some of her 'rellies' (that’s what they call relatives over here) have bought a vast plot of land out in the wilderness. We pitched a tiny two-person tent amidst the empty acres and joined them around the bonfire to listen to rude Australian music and enjoy a beer.
With the WA property boom sending house prices to astronomical levels over recent years, many folk have taken to buying an empty plot of land out in the middle of nowhere and building their own home on it. It takes years to do – the people we stayed with had only been there long enough to set up a homely tin shack and a few caravans on their land to use as an occasional weekend retreat.
Using this as our base, Shannon's dad (a colossus of geography and plant knowledge) led us on a series of bushwalking adventures around local rock features. This wild terrain was all new to me and in my eyes it was a fantastic and authentic Aussie experience.
I have seen the sun set over the rolling open farmland, and spied the shining of the moon in rock pools fashioned by angels. I have ridden a dune buggy over the crest of majestic hills like a medieval knight atop a proud steed. And also I have gone for a dump in a wooden shack humourously titled the ‘site ofice’ (sic).
This was also my introduction to the great flora and fauna that lurk out in the vast wilds of WA: namely lemon-scented orchids, red snapper orchids, chicken burrito orchids, kangaroos, emus, flies, more flies, tics, head lice, gonorrhoea and drop bears. A drop bear is basically a cross between a kangaroo and a rhinoceros that can bounce up to fifty metres in the air and spits poisonous acid in the direction of whatever perturbs it. They look like this:
I’ve been on another trip away, down to Castle Rock near Dunsborough, to camp right next to the beach! Castle Rock is notable for being, err, a big rock shaped a bit like a castle. It’s in the middle of a national park on a beautiful stretch of coastline 250 kilometres south of Perth. Notable things about that weekend include:
How am I and where am I at? Apart from a brush with shingles and a recent head-lice scare, I am well and good. I am still in Perth, though at long last I shall soon be leaving. Off to the countryside to work on a vineyard, where exactly I cannot say.
And what of the intervening weeks and months since last I wrote? A strange and wonderful time it must be said. New friendships have been made and new places have been visited. My fresh and revitalised mental state has sent a cascade of creativity gushing forth, revealing a shower of wondrous new songs and lyrics galore. I feel I'm writing (and thinking) on a higher level than I have ever done in my life.
I've played a few gigs in Fremantle and Perth which, while not leading to any great new opportunities, left me in no doubt my music has been well-received over here. I am also busy finishing off two new songs in a recording studio. The studio is in the suburb of Bassendean - birthplace of Rolf Harris, no less! Bassendean is a quiet suburb much like any other – there were no tributes or statues to Rolf evident anywhere. How can their famous wobble-boarding son continue to be overlooked in such a way?
Anyway, the songs will go on a compilation of local artists which will hopefully garner some modest airplay on the radio. And I want my songs playing on the radio – it would make me feel I've finally achieved something with my life. And then my mum can go around telling people, "My son gets played on the radio in Australia you know," as she has no doubt long been craving to do.
"But Bondy!" you ejaculate. "Enough of your music news, what of your travelling?"
Well beloved reader, I have been getting up close and personal with the wheat belt. This isn't some item of farming fetish wear, but rather a vast tract of farmland that surrounds Perth on all sides for hundreds of kilometres. Nipple/areolae is the relationship we're talking here, on a vast scale. And it's the closest I've come to seeing any boobies in a long time I must say!
My friend Shannon took me to spend a weird and wonderful weekend in the country with her family. Some of her 'rellies' (that’s what they call relatives over here) have bought a vast plot of land out in the wilderness. We pitched a tiny two-person tent amidst the empty acres and joined them around the bonfire to listen to rude Australian music and enjoy a beer.
With the WA property boom sending house prices to astronomical levels over recent years, many folk have taken to buying an empty plot of land out in the middle of nowhere and building their own home on it. It takes years to do – the people we stayed with had only been there long enough to set up a homely tin shack and a few caravans on their land to use as an occasional weekend retreat.
Using this as our base, Shannon's dad (a colossus of geography and plant knowledge) led us on a series of bushwalking adventures around local rock features. This wild terrain was all new to me and in my eyes it was a fantastic and authentic Aussie experience.
I have seen the sun set over the rolling open farmland, and spied the shining of the moon in rock pools fashioned by angels. I have ridden a dune buggy over the crest of majestic hills like a medieval knight atop a proud steed. And also I have gone for a dump in a wooden shack humourously titled the ‘site ofice’ (sic).
This was also my introduction to the great flora and fauna that lurk out in the vast wilds of WA: namely lemon-scented orchids, red snapper orchids, chicken burrito orchids, kangaroos, emus, flies, more flies, tics, head lice, gonorrhoea and drop bears. A drop bear is basically a cross between a kangaroo and a rhinoceros that can bounce up to fifty metres in the air and spits poisonous acid in the direction of whatever perturbs it. They look like this:
I’ve been on another trip away, down to Castle Rock near Dunsborough, to camp right next to the beach! Castle Rock is notable for being, err, a big rock shaped a bit like a castle. It’s in the middle of a national park on a beautiful stretch of coastline 250 kilometres south of Perth. Notable things about that weekend include:
- Seven of us travelling down in 3 cars, in various states of inebriation and tiredness
- Arriving at 1am on Saturday and pitching our tents in the black of night
- Waking up later that morning to discover a stunning ocean view right in front of us
- Climbing Castle Rock and standing triumphantly atop it, hollering into the ocean breeze
- Everyone seeing a whale in the sea, but me missing it
- Me and Josh drinking a beer at 6am on Sunday while we attempted to keep the fire lit in adverse weather conditions
- One of our brand new camping chairs collapsing into the fire and quickly bursting into flames – flame-retardant my arse!
- Enjoying a replay of Radiohead’s Glastonbury ‘97 set on Triple J (radio station) on the drive back up to Perth, to soothe the hangovers
What more could you demand of a weekend? Well, sex and loads of money perhaps. Nevertheless it was pretty cool.
I am still house-sharing in sleepy old Murdoch. There have been upheavals of the housemate variety – Dave did a runner owing us all money (as we long feared he might) and lives to fight his battles another day in locations unknown. Our empty room was taken by Tim, a punk guy from Sydney who’s just moved over to Perth.
It’s been a nice enough house to live in on my occasional forays outside my head, but the living area now festers in a state of woeful untidiness. As is usually the case with house-shares, no-one wants to concede the mind-games and undertake any housework! Though I now suspect beer and TV have probably left us too lazy and defeated even for mind-games.
The atmosphere in the house is one of neglect, and soon the four of us shall all go our separate ways. But weep not dear reader - even the radiant chrysanthemum must wither and die as part of the great cycle of life.
I have also been on a voyage of momentous personal discovery. A couple of months ago I did another personal development course with Mitch Behan called ‘Letting it go’. Essentially it was a two-day cram-a-thon held for the benefit of me and a few dozen other people coming from all walks of life. We received an expert education in quantum physics and the principles that govern the divine order in the universe. Then we learnt how to apply these principles to achieve lasting success in our own lives.
Simple eh? Actually, the courses were among the toughest things I’ve ever done – not only for the work I did but the concepts I was trying to grapple with and understand in my head – and they pushed us very hard. Much as I don’t want to be a killjoy I have to be vague and mysterious as it is all proprietary knowledge. It mostly concerns building and then deploying nuclear weapons.
I know what you’re thinking and it’s probably, “what the f**k!?” Well I’ve not changed. I’ve not joined a cult or become a scientologist or anything. Everyone makes their own way in life and whether you choose to believe in a ‘higher power’ and all that jazz is up to you.
The jury’s still out on whether this will help me fulfil my dreams, but so far the work we’ve done has taught me a great deal about life and I feel much happier and more complete. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, “All my life I've had one dream: to achieve my many goals.”
In a work sense not much has changed. I am still a humble research officer for the Office of Public Sector Standards, though my job finishes this week – hence my decision to move on. It’s been a rollercoaster ride and during my time on the 17th floor I have bonded meaningfully with my erstwhile colleagues in an atmosphere of supportive cerebralism. I have had some sucky temp jobs in my time but this is one I shall most definitely miss. Just one of the varied worlds I have inhabited upon my journey.
And my final thoughts on Perth? Well, after spending 6 months here, I will be f**king glad to see the back of the place. Much as it is a beautiful, unspoilt little city it is ridiculously cliquey. Making friends as a new face in town was impossibly difficult. As a handsome well-heeled motherf**ker-about-town I was not accustomed to having gaping open spaces in my social calendar. It’s given me plenty of opportunities to work on my writing at least – just like being a teenager all over again really. And now I’m counting down the days till I move on!
I hasten to add I’ve had a great time in Perth, but the flimsy little world I’ve built for myself here has all the staying power of a paper bag and is about to blow away. A pocketful of dreams and a heart that’s willing will only get you so far in this world, and I feel a lot of the time like I’m sinking in the quicksand of indifference. What better reason to hit the road, Easy Rider stylee?
One thing’s for sure – I ain’t coming home anytime soon!
Tuesday 19 August 2008
Perth part 2 - mega update!
Hello! You are now reading my latest 'letter home to the folks'. A lot has happened since those crazy days of June when I last blogged as a fresh and spunky 26 year old. I am now a withered and haggard 27 year old, as it was my birthday in July.
I'm still in Perth, living with Josh, Maria and Dave. The relentless piss rain of the Australian winter is giving way to sunny springtime. Bunny rabbits playfully frolic in gay meadows and past splashing waterfalls. Such pleasant surroundings cannot help but rejuvenate the soul.
I stayed in Perth for work, and now I rather bloody like the place. It has a small-town charm all of its own, yet it is free of Deliverance-style inbreeding. My computer monkey work at the agribusiness place (otherwise known as Castle Greyskull) finished several weeks ago and I've had a few different jobs since then.
First my agency sent me to a suburb called O'Connor, to a bus depot, to fill in for the Human Resources department while their HR girl went on leave. I am not a girl as such, but I did very well in this role.
For me the term 'HR department' normally conjures up images of sterile skyscrapers, faceless suits and needless written warnings, but this HR department was none of the above. It was a portacabin. With a desk and computer in it. I liked the bus company's low-key approach!
There wasn't much to do apart from go through all the bus driver application forms that came in the post, and phone up the least scary and unhinged people to offer them interviews. I got to fulfil my lifelong dream of working in a portacabin. And it gave me a new-found respect for Perth bus drivers, who are a cheery and helpful bunch despite their modest wages.
But my cushy role as HR girl soon ended after the regular HR girl came back from New Zealand. Then I got to play at being a boy, working as a 'bloke in a warehouse'! The agency gave me a single day's work with a betting company, packing promotional gifts into envelopes to be sent out to competition winners (baseball caps, rugby balls, umbrellas and the like). This was possibly the most tedious and mundane job I have had ever since I worked as a chip shop potato preparer in Meltham. I'm like a modern-day George Orwell, doing shit jobs then writing great books about them (sort of).
At that point the teat of opportunity ran dry, and I spent a week as an unemployed layabout, searching for jobs at the library then going home and writing whiny entries in my diary about how shit it is to be an unemployed layabout. Thankfully this period of moping and introspection soon ended when the newly-refilled teat of opportunity came knocking on my door, to mix a metaphor or two. I then suckled on the teat of opportunity. And got an opportunity. (Isn't it nice when a teat knocks on your door?)
Anyway, the situation improved because I got a job temping for local government. Oh the joy of sailing into familiar clerical waters! On my first day I discovered my workplace was actually a huge great big skyscraper with a revolving restaurant on the top!
High on the 17th floor, with great views overlooking the city and surrounding river, there exists something called the Office of Public Sector Standards. Basically they have to monitor all the government agencies to ensure no employees are being mistreated or unfairly passed over for promotion. It's like the Batman of the admin world, and as a minion in this department I'm like a non-homosexual Robin.
I've been working there for two weeks and it's actually going bloody well. They've been so pleased with my job of being a non-homosexual Robin they've extended my contract till October, given me a payrise and promoted me to Research Officer! (I don't know what that equates to in Batman terms... quasi-Batman maybe?)
While the ox of my employment has been roaming free in the fatty pastures of success, I have been through a few life-changing and inspiring experiences. During the earlier part of my travels, I saw a lot of wonderful things and met some great people, but despite all of this I didn't feel I'd really grown or learnt anything as a person. The whole purpose of doing this travel was to broaden my mind and get some answers about what my life is about, and despite being fortunate enough to see many of Asia's wonderful spectacles, my mission was in danger of falling flat on its arse.
In June I got wind of a personal development seminar happening in Perth called Relationships and You. These seminars are run by an Irish guy called Mitch Behan, who does this sort of thing full-time. Rather an inspiring chap too, I must say. He would be the first to point out he's not Jesus or anything, but he's been through a lot of ups and downs in his time and dedicates his life to helping people overcome their problems and realise their true potential.
I liked what I saw at the information evening and signed up there and then. I spent a weekend with Mitch and eleven strangers on the course, and after undergoing some tough challenges, the twelve of us emerged unburdened of our collective woes, as firm friends. While I have to remain vague about what went on during the course (for proprietary reasons) I will say that it was a profoundly uplifting and inspiring experience that has left me with renewed optimism, strength and self-belief. (I would recommend the course to anybody, but unfortunately there are no plans yet to introduce it to the UK.)
As you may know dear friend, last year I endured something of a nightmare on my birthday, when I got pick-pocketed and had to cut short my trip to the Ukraine. This year I was determined to put those troubles firmly in the past and have a f**king blast!
On 20th July, a couple of weeks after the seminar, I met up with my buddies from the course in Fremantle. We enjoyed a slap-up meal at Cicerello's - a huge fish 'n' chip restaurant on the quayside - then lots of beers next door in a giant brewery/pub called Little Creatures. It was a beautiful sunny Sunday (if a little on the chilly side) and we had ourselves a grand old time. It wasn't the most ostentatious birthday celebration ever, but 27 is the age of rock star death so I figure I should avoid coke and hooker binges for the forseeable future!
A lot happened in July and the month was not without its ups and downs. I've always been something of a frustrated entrepeneur - printing my own newspapers, selling my CDs at gigs to widespread public indifference; you name it, I've tried it in the name of making a quick buck. Actually, just the selling CDs - I added the newspapers thing to pad out the list a bit.
Anyways, my housemate Dangerous Dave asked me one day if I'd like to make some extra money. Thinking he was asking me to rob a bank or be in a porno, I asked him what he meant. He said he'd just been introduced to a company called ACN by a ladyfriend, and proceeded to show me a slick promotional DVD. Shouty rich man Donald Trump promptly appeared on the laptop, waxing lyrical about a glorious new investment opportunity in telecoms. Hey, if Donald Trump endorses it, it must be a good idea!
In essence, you buy an ACN sales license then go about obtaining customers and reps for the company. Every time one of your customers pays a phone bill, you get paid a percentage of the money. The reps you recruit form part of your business, and every time one of their customers pays a bill, you receive a percentage of that too. Meanwhile your reps recruit their own reps, and you earn off them too! Month after month, year after year, you keep earning more and more money - no effort required.
Sounds too good to be true doesn't it? That's because it is. I know that in hindsight. Pyramid schemes have existed since the dawn of time. Only these days they are cleverly embroidered with terms like 'network marketing' and 'warm selling' to try and remove the stigma.
ACN are a growing worldwide communications company who don't rely on traditional advertising, but rather the aforementioned network marketing and warm selling. This involves getting reps to pitch the company's services to their friends and family, thus buying a form of advertising no TV commercial can match in credibility - for a fraction of the cost of traditional advertising.
Man, I was dubious, but the DVD said all these great things about using ACN to achieve lasting financial freedom, quit your day job, achieve all your wildest dreams, etc. etc. As I watched, a succession of permatanned, dimpled, smiling Americans were wheeled out in front of the camera to make blithe testimonials like, "yeah, me and my friends enjoy a jet-set lifestyle thanks to ACN, man. We're like a bunch of rock stars, we travel around in luxury, having a blast! It's totally radical, to the max!"
The camera then cut to a montage of the people frolicking in limousines and fancy restaurants, laughing and joking without a care in the world. (Presumably they were laughing at all the people who say pyramid schemes don't work.)
If I have one failing it's that I sometimes forget the end doesn't always justify the means. It's like the time I torched that orphanage just so I could bake some muffins on the roof. All my life I've wanted money so I can be free and make music all day, and not kow-tow to some stupid boss with multiple personality disorders.
To cut a long story short, I naively allowed myself to be wowed by it, and signed up as a rep, paying $495 for an ACN sales license. Then a couple of days later, the bullshit spin from the positive corporate messages began to fade in my mind, revealing the bare truth. I realised there was no way I could stoop to warm-sell anything to my friends and family, and I withdrew from the organisation immediately.
Fortunately I got my money refunded - though many people in my situation have been left out of pocket. The way I see it, I sold my soul - but then I got it back, with a few dents and scratches on! And in doing so I glimpsed Hell.
I saw the company's stifling corporate culture, and the obedience and dedication it demands of its reps. I heard the stories of people who'd 'made it' in ACN - superstar salespeople supposedly raking in millions of US dollars a month through their huge phalanxes of customers and reps. I met the reps at ground level who slaved away night and day building their mini-empires without success; people too far down the line to ever go back or to stop believing the lie.
The basic truth is that these types of company are designed to make more money off the reps than the customers. In the main ACN attracts a professional crowd as its reps, with a wide variety of ages present, including a sizeable contingent of brillcreamed Asian businessmen. These people aren't fools, but it goes to show how powerful the herd mentality can be. You're told to sell a dream you have no personal proof of actually working. I for one couldn't do it. I never sold a single phone, and I was happy to walk away and carry on my clock-punching life. Working hard for an honest wage never felt so good, or so liberating.
Happily reunited with my soul, a couple of weekends ago I finally had my first proper travel adventure in Australia! Some friends and I drove 300 kilometres south of Perth to stay at my housemate Josh's mum's house out in the woods, near the remote town of Kirup. This short leap on the map became a magnificent odyssey into the unknown. The lush green of the countryside passed by in a magical drunken blur.
The house Josh's stepdad and mum built in their woodland is amazing - it's completely self-sufficient, running off solar power, with all its water supplied by a rainwater tank on the hill! Some day I want to retire to the Western Australian woods and build my very own self-sufficient dream home. And at the present rate, if I keep on selling CDs at my gigs for the next million years or so, I'll have the funds to do just that!
So here's to accomplishing your dreams. Until next time, "catch ya"!
Wednesday 18 June 2008
Perth part 1 - that's agribusiness!
Hello! It's been a long time since I wrote a blog. Indeed one could well opine there has been an unnerving pause in the narrative. If one has just swallowed a frigging dictionary that is. As a matter of fact I have settled down in Perth and got a job. I'm working in an office doing data entry (read: tedious computer monkey work) for an agribusiness firm.
'Agribusiness?' you say. 'What the hell's angrybusiness?'
Well, it's an agricultural investment company who let rich people invest money in farming and get even richer. You see, unlike the UK where most farmers have either gone bankrupt or shot themselves, farming is big business over here in Western Australia.
Farming and mining are booming industries in this mineral-rich land, huge areas of which are still largely untapped. Everybody you meet seems to be either raking it in running their own business, or coining it in working out on the mines. It seems like there's possibilities and opportunities ghosting round everywhere in this vast tundra.
I'm living in a suburb of Perth called Murdoch. This may or may not have been christened after Rupert Murdoch. I'm staying in a house with my mate Josh, an Aussie I met in India, and his housemates Maria, Dave and Bruce, who are Aussies too. Well, this is Australia isn't it!
We're out in the vast urban sprawl, in a rented house 10km south of the city centre. All the streets are wide and spread out, lined with palm trees and roomy-looking single storey houses. It's like the streets you see on Neighbours!
Getting to work in the morning takes me an hour, on a bus, then a train, then another bus. Going down the shops for a bottle of milk involves a 20 minute hike along a main road. Walking anywhere takes a mammoth effort. Conurbations like this weren't built with the pedestrian in mind!
It all makes me what kind of sinister influence car manufacturers exert on city planners. They want us all to need a car. I dare say I'll get kidnapped by men in suits one of these days and whisked away for brain re-programming for daring to use my legs. So if my next blog is titled 'why cars are utterly brilliant and we should all buy as much petrol as we can', you'll know what's happened.
I'm feeling pretty cynical on the subject after seeing Who Killed The Electric Car?, a film about a hugely-promising electric car prototype released in America back in the 90s. It was fast, cheap and the motorists who test-drove it loved it. It was even poised to enter mass production, but suddenly the project got mysteriously shelved.
As the film reveals, the whole thing was scuppered by major car companies and oil conglomerates fearful of a loss in trade. I don't mean to get all deep and preachy in a light-hearted travel blog, but my god, has anyone else noticed how humanity is utterly doomed thanks to its own stupidity!?
When not ruminating cheerful subjects like the end of the world and the downfall of civilisation as we know it, I have been doing my best to escape the drudgery of life in the suburbs. So far I've visited the nearby coastal town of Fremantle, headed out to the vast forests east of Perth to enjoy a pub lunch in Parkerville, and gone to the Subiaco Oval to watch an Aussie rules football game.
Aussie rules (confusingly called 'football' by the Aussies) is a bit similar to Gaelic football. The players all wear vests, and kick an egg-shaped ball through rows of posts on an oval-shaped pitch. Crazy! (I don't know much about Gaelic football other than it's a bit like rugby, and the games probably involve violent thugs on Cork housing estates stamping on each others' heads - but I was told Aussie rules is similar to it. So if that makes any sense to you then I genuflect in all my humble literary magnificence!)
My housemate Dave (who like 90% of all Daves in the world is nicknamed Dangerous Dave) got some free tickets, and so on 14th June we witnessed Fremantle Dockers end their chronic losing streak with an emphatic 120-67 victory over North Melbourne, who come from Melbourne. Similarly to normal sports, the big number shows which team won the match.
As a sport it has a lot going for it: it's a game of speed and skill played in front of passionate crowds in noisy arenas. But I doubt after one game it will replace my lifelong love of the working man's game, an honest sport played all over the globe, bigger than any other. I'm talking about Risk obviously.
I've been getting to meet plenty of Aussies and they are a friendly and quick-witted bunch. Getting the hang of the Aussie lingo is a bit challenging though. I have deciphered a few of their linguistic heiroglyphics, shown here in the following chart:
Sunnies = sunglasses
Stubbies, longnecks = bottles of beer
Doccos = documentaries
C**t = an affectionate term for a loved one
Hey/eh = standard exclamation at the end of a sentence (see Canadian English)
Servo = petrol station
Salvos = the Salvation Army
The Chuck and Di story = the marriage and subsequent heart-rending divorce of our future monarch and England's tragic rose
Pom(mie bastard) = English person, usually found on the Gold Coast eating kangaroo and chips.
90% of backpackers from the UK end up hanging out in the tourist haunts on the east coast. If you know anything about me at all you will know I am a colossal snob and loathe to rub shoulders with the great unwashed in the discotheques of Marbella. I followed my instincts and headed west, intent on exploring Australia's lesser-known delights. Besides which, Marbella is in Spain.
What has struck me is the number of Aussies I've met who have spent some time living in the UK. If you lived somewhere hot and sunny would you bother heading up into the northern hemisphere to shiver in the piss rain for a few months? I doubt I would. Maybe our sceptred isle is not such a shit tip at all in the grand scheme of things. That's probably the homesickness talking, it's sending me daft.
Far from starting a new life 'down under', I find myself settling into a familiar pattern: I work in an office every day, which I hate, then I come home and while away my precious free time drinking beer and watching the Simpsons. Am I really so irrevocably set in my ways?
I was expecting a bit more of Perth - there isn't much to do. Though they do put on a lot of big gigs here, thanks to international touring artists making an obligatory stop in WA. Daft Punk, Elton John and Sting all played here recently. In fact I know a guy who worked as a roadie at the Sting gig, and not only did he get to keep his plectrum, but he got to have his picture taken with him! That Sting seems like a nice generous man.
I got to work as a roadie the other weekend with Dave, my housemate. I didn't meet any rock stars or anything, but it wasn't that sort of event. But I got to pack up equipment, carry boxes and f**k my back in - all part and parcel of the roadie existence. It's also worth noting the amount of band memorabilia the good roadies get their hands on - tour T-shirts, setlists, drum-skins... you could make a tidy sum flogging this stuff on Ebay.
So thus far money is something I have mostly been only dreaming of, though by the time my temp job finishes in late July I should be quids (or Aussie dollars) in and ready to start fresh adventures. Until next time, I remain your friend, wannabe roadie and spinner of exquisite bollocks extraordinaire.
PS - Don't forget to check out my India photos on Fakebook!
Dharamasala/McLeod Ganj photos here:
Rajasthan photos here: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
I am without internet at my house for the forseeable future but I hope to whack some more on as soon as I can. Sorry!
'Agribusiness?' you say. 'What the hell's angrybusiness?'
Well, it's an agricultural investment company who let rich people invest money in farming and get even richer. You see, unlike the UK where most farmers have either gone bankrupt or shot themselves, farming is big business over here in Western Australia.
Farming and mining are booming industries in this mineral-rich land, huge areas of which are still largely untapped. Everybody you meet seems to be either raking it in running their own business, or coining it in working out on the mines. It seems like there's possibilities and opportunities ghosting round everywhere in this vast tundra.
I'm living in a suburb of Perth called Murdoch. This may or may not have been christened after Rupert Murdoch. I'm staying in a house with my mate Josh, an Aussie I met in India, and his housemates Maria, Dave and Bruce, who are Aussies too. Well, this is Australia isn't it!
We're out in the vast urban sprawl, in a rented house 10km south of the city centre. All the streets are wide and spread out, lined with palm trees and roomy-looking single storey houses. It's like the streets you see on Neighbours!
Getting to work in the morning takes me an hour, on a bus, then a train, then another bus. Going down the shops for a bottle of milk involves a 20 minute hike along a main road. Walking anywhere takes a mammoth effort. Conurbations like this weren't built with the pedestrian in mind!
It all makes me what kind of sinister influence car manufacturers exert on city planners. They want us all to need a car. I dare say I'll get kidnapped by men in suits one of these days and whisked away for brain re-programming for daring to use my legs. So if my next blog is titled 'why cars are utterly brilliant and we should all buy as much petrol as we can', you'll know what's happened.
I'm feeling pretty cynical on the subject after seeing Who Killed The Electric Car?, a film about a hugely-promising electric car prototype released in America back in the 90s. It was fast, cheap and the motorists who test-drove it loved it. It was even poised to enter mass production, but suddenly the project got mysteriously shelved.
As the film reveals, the whole thing was scuppered by major car companies and oil conglomerates fearful of a loss in trade. I don't mean to get all deep and preachy in a light-hearted travel blog, but my god, has anyone else noticed how humanity is utterly doomed thanks to its own stupidity!?
When not ruminating cheerful subjects like the end of the world and the downfall of civilisation as we know it, I have been doing my best to escape the drudgery of life in the suburbs. So far I've visited the nearby coastal town of Fremantle, headed out to the vast forests east of Perth to enjoy a pub lunch in Parkerville, and gone to the Subiaco Oval to watch an Aussie rules football game.
Aussie rules (confusingly called 'football' by the Aussies) is a bit similar to Gaelic football. The players all wear vests, and kick an egg-shaped ball through rows of posts on an oval-shaped pitch. Crazy! (I don't know much about Gaelic football other than it's a bit like rugby, and the games probably involve violent thugs on Cork housing estates stamping on each others' heads - but I was told Aussie rules is similar to it. So if that makes any sense to you then I genuflect in all my humble literary magnificence!)
My housemate Dave (who like 90% of all Daves in the world is nicknamed Dangerous Dave) got some free tickets, and so on 14th June we witnessed Fremantle Dockers end their chronic losing streak with an emphatic 120-67 victory over North Melbourne, who come from Melbourne. Similarly to normal sports, the big number shows which team won the match.
As a sport it has a lot going for it: it's a game of speed and skill played in front of passionate crowds in noisy arenas. But I doubt after one game it will replace my lifelong love of the working man's game, an honest sport played all over the globe, bigger than any other. I'm talking about Risk obviously.
I've been getting to meet plenty of Aussies and they are a friendly and quick-witted bunch. Getting the hang of the Aussie lingo is a bit challenging though. I have deciphered a few of their linguistic heiroglyphics, shown here in the following chart:
Sunnies = sunglasses
Stubbies, longnecks = bottles of beer
Doccos = documentaries
C**t = an affectionate term for a loved one
Hey/eh = standard exclamation at the end of a sentence (see Canadian English)
Servo = petrol station
Salvos = the Salvation Army
The Chuck and Di story = the marriage and subsequent heart-rending divorce of our future monarch and England's tragic rose
Pom(mie bastard) = English person, usually found on the Gold Coast eating kangaroo and chips.
90% of backpackers from the UK end up hanging out in the tourist haunts on the east coast. If you know anything about me at all you will know I am a colossal snob and loathe to rub shoulders with the great unwashed in the discotheques of Marbella. I followed my instincts and headed west, intent on exploring Australia's lesser-known delights. Besides which, Marbella is in Spain.
What has struck me is the number of Aussies I've met who have spent some time living in the UK. If you lived somewhere hot and sunny would you bother heading up into the northern hemisphere to shiver in the piss rain for a few months? I doubt I would. Maybe our sceptred isle is not such a shit tip at all in the grand scheme of things. That's probably the homesickness talking, it's sending me daft.
Far from starting a new life 'down under', I find myself settling into a familiar pattern: I work in an office every day, which I hate, then I come home and while away my precious free time drinking beer and watching the Simpsons. Am I really so irrevocably set in my ways?
I was expecting a bit more of Perth - there isn't much to do. Though they do put on a lot of big gigs here, thanks to international touring artists making an obligatory stop in WA. Daft Punk, Elton John and Sting all played here recently. In fact I know a guy who worked as a roadie at the Sting gig, and not only did he get to keep his plectrum, but he got to have his picture taken with him! That Sting seems like a nice generous man.
I got to work as a roadie the other weekend with Dave, my housemate. I didn't meet any rock stars or anything, but it wasn't that sort of event. But I got to pack up equipment, carry boxes and f**k my back in - all part and parcel of the roadie existence. It's also worth noting the amount of band memorabilia the good roadies get their hands on - tour T-shirts, setlists, drum-skins... you could make a tidy sum flogging this stuff on Ebay.
So thus far money is something I have mostly been only dreaming of, though by the time my temp job finishes in late July I should be quids (or Aussie dollars) in and ready to start fresh adventures. Until next time, I remain your friend, wannabe roadie and spinner of exquisite bollocks extraordinaire.
PS - Don't forget to check out my India photos on Fakebook!
Dharamasala/McLeod Ganj photos here:
Rajasthan photos here: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
I am without internet at my house for the forseeable future but I hope to whack some more on as soon as I can. Sorry!
Monday 12 May 2008
Sydney: will drop pants for food.
How yus goin cobbers? Tie me kangaroo down sport, toss another shrimp on the barbie, "that's not a knife, that's a knife!" and all that gubbins. It's high time I crawled out of the woodwork and whacked an update on here.
After my long journey through Asia I have entered Australia on a working visa, to live, work, frolic and fornicate in this vast and plentiful land for a period of anything up to twelve months. I've been in Sydney for nearly four weeks now, doing some sightseeing, hanging round with other backpackers and living out of a suitcase at a hostel. I backpack, therefore I am. Halfway round the world already - who'da thunk it!
I flew in on 15th April, fresh from the madness of Hong Kong. It was a shock to finally be out of Asia and back in the 'real world' again. A world of drinkable tapwater, expensive coffee, sensible traffic and rain. Winter is fast approaching over here, and the hot weather is gone. There's still a decent amount of sun though, and not enough to get annoying.
Sydney is a nice place to wander round - it has a calm and relaxed feel and everywhere you turn there is either a harbour, a skyscraper, or a restaurant offering exotic cuisine from some far-flung corner of the globe. But it's a very expensive place to live and it can easily devour vast sums of travellers' money in the blink of an eye. All the fun stuff like bungee jumping and learning to surf is bloody expensive. Take the credit cards and bury them in concrete!
The cheapest way to spend time in Sydney is definitely walking round looking at things, as this costs nothing. As well as numerous picturesque bays and beaches (such as Bondi beach, my near-namesake), it also boasts the iconic opera house and close by, the Sydney harbour bridge. This is a magnificent towering iron structure dating from the 1930s that spans the entire harbour. Paul Hogan, aka Crocodile Dundee, used to be a maintenance worker on it before he was famous.
Sydney is the showbiz capital of Australia. Keanu Reeves was here the other week for the premiere of some film or other. There are big gigs on all the time. The Pope is coming for an official visit in July, meaning the city will be swamped with pilgrims, i.e. Christian nutters. If you want to see the Pope you'll have to a) make sure you buy a ticket, and b) be under 35. Apparently he wants a youthful crowd, to make Christianity seem hip and cool to the world's cameras. Isn't religion just the biggest load of shite ever!?
Anyway... after a few days staying at a city-centre hostel full of drunken yoofs I migrated out to the suburb of Glebe, a long leafy street that would be the preserve of middle-class snobs and ballet schools if it were in England. But it's a really cool area - full of Victorian-style pubs, restaurants and 'alternative' shops with incense sticks burning in them. The bottle shop (what they call an off-license here) has a mural of an Aboriginal flag and the word 'SORRY' daubed underneath it. There are cats in the gardens and possums lurking in the trees (a possum is sort of a cross between a cat and a rat).
The people are nice and friendly, and there is a local newspaper, the Glebe, full of parochial grumblings about how shocking the public transport is. It's an immensely likeable place, but after a few weeks here I've run out of things to do. So today, like most days, I sit here in the library on the internet, trying to write my blog and cursing my writer's block.
I've spent more than three weeks staying at Glebe Point YHA, a small and friendly hostel that lurks behind a forest of trees on the main street in Glebe. I've made friends, learnt to cook again and even helped out at the weekly rooftop barbeque, in exchange for a free night's stay. There are a huge amount of British, Irish and German travellers here. I look forward to the day when I can meet some real Australian people!
My week revolves around the quiz night at our local pub, the Landsdowne. The guy who does the quiz is an actor who used to have a bit-part in Neighbours! (He played Brett Stark, Neighbours fact fans.) Unlike most pub quizzes they seem quite happy to sidle up and whisper you the answers, and you get drinks vouchers for winning. The beer in Australia is great - there's no Fosters (thank Christ) but beverages like Toohey's New and Cooper's Sparkling Ale slip down a treat.
This fancy living is eating into my travel funds, so I've been on the lookout for novel and ingenious money-making schemes. I tried busking with my travel guitar in a subway near Central train station, and made $5 from 30 minutes of afternoon troubadourage. It's somewhat gratifying to have a handful of coins chucked at your feet while you're belting out an up-tempo version of 'Dreaming of You', but it won't pay the bills at this rate.
No stranger to losing my dignity in surprising ways, I also tried my hand at medical testing for cash! Well, everyone has to once, don't they. It all started when my friend spotted a notice in the paper, advertising for paid volunteers to test suncream at Sydney University. I volunteered, and spent a week sitting on a chair in an office, reading a book, while a friendly old lady drew on my back with lipstick and sunblock then pottered around shining UV lights on it.
The photobiology department there is like a private company that carries out testing and research on new suncreams for cosmetics giants like Avon and Boots. They offer cold hard ca$h to penniless students and backpackers willing to risk a bit of sunburn. It's money for nothing in effect! As a pasty-skinned part-ginge I was a prized specimen, and after several hours' of tests I walked away with $180. There have been no side-effects, apart from a strange network of lipstick noughts and crosses on my back that didn't wash off for ages!
As well as suncreams, I've also been dosing myself up on culture. As the earliest European settlement in Australia, Sydney has quite a lot of history. The rash of humungous skyscrapers in the central business district is surrounded by streets full of quaint Victorian buildings. The oldest part of the city (known as the Rocks) reputedly has ghosts lurking in it.
Though it's true that Australia was once a prison colony, most of the convicts weren't really criminals in the modern sense. Minor crimes like sheep-stealing, forging a one pound note, or disrespecting the King of England's chin could see you transported half-way round the world in shackles. Within a few years all the prisoners were freed, and a new kingdom was on the rise.
Before the first ships landed, Australia had been an undisturbed continent populated with a multitude of ancient Aborigine tribes. Aborigines are one of the oldest civilisations in the world, but their days were numbered once the Europeans arrived and brought exotic new diseases such as smallpox with them. Some tribes still exist today in remote areas, but a lot of the indigenous culture and language has been lost for good.
Until late in the 20th Century the government had a shockingly medieval attitude to the Aborigines; they weren't granted full citizenship rights, and liable to have their children taken away and re-homed with white families (the so-called stolen generations). The Australian government only just this year issued a formal apology to the Aborigines for all the wrongs of the past. It's a harsh and unforgiving land with a surprisingly cruel history.
Australia is such an unfeasibly vast country and one month in, I've only explored the tiniest part of it. I've seen some of the countryside around Sydney, which features some areas of outstanding natural beauty. A few weeks ago I did a day trip to the Blue Mountains, but it was foggy and we couldn't see anything.
Last week I went on a wine-tasting trip to the Hunter Valley with Ross and Lucy (two chums from the hostel) and we gorged ourselves on the finest wines available to humanity. The Hunter Valley is a stunning area of rolling green hills and vineyards about two hours' north of Sydney.
We stood there, in glorious sunshine, getting plastered at ten in the morning on a farm. Brilliant. I learnt that to drink wine properly you're supposed to sip it and make "f-f-f-f-f" noises like Hannibal Lecter. It does taste better and more interesting when you do that.
I was originally planning to get a job in Sydney and stay here for a few months, but I've seen all I want to see and I'm ready to move on now. I've arrived in Sydney at a time when the weather is turning to crap, and the conventional traveller logic would be go somewhere else in the country where the weather is nice, possibly to pick grapes while wearing sandals that were made from hemp fibre in an ethically sound factory/commune.
On a whim I've bought a plane ticket to Perth in Western Australia. I fly there on Saturday, to stay with an Aussie guy called Josh that I met travelling in India (at the Banyan Tree in Goa). Perth is supposed to be very nice, and a lot cheaper to live in than Sydney.
Money is a pressing concern so I need to get a job over there for a couple of months, then Josh and I are planning to explore the country by road. My first month in Australia has passed by quite uneventfully, but it promises to be a gas from here on in.
This blog was brought to you by Coon - the racist cheese!
Tuesday 15 April 2008
HCMC & Hong Kong: war is stupid and people are stupid.
Howdy again. I apologise for the recent gap in updates for anyone who is becoming hooked beyond all sense on my travel stories. It's understandable. Please see your GP, who will immediately prescribe you some hard drugs or send you for an unnecessary operation.
So I left Vietnam, spent some time in Hong Kong and now I've reached Sydney! After getting two hours' sleep overnight on the plane my body clock is once again in a sense of confusion re. the arse/elbow conundrum, and I am a greasy-haired jetlagged mess. I'm sitting here attempting to gather my thoughts in a strange new land. At the moment Sydney is cold and wet like England don't you know!
Well Ho Chi Minh City turned out to be mad and hectic; a bigger and busier version of Hanoi without the old-world charm. It's full of concrete skyscrapers and neon signs, and the busy streets are over-run with biblical swarms of motorbikes and cyclo taxis. There are a few interesting sights to see but once you've done that it's just like any other big city in Asia. And Christ there are a lot of motorbikes!
Cyclo taxis are a bizarre invention: a one-seat bicycle taxi where the passenger sits in front of the pedalling driver like a kamikaze wheelchair patient! I've not tried riding in one but it's meant to be shit scary - you have literally no protection against the traffic hurtling towards you. Tourists are warned against using them due to the risk of muggings and bag-snatchings if you're a cyclo passenger.
The bus stopped in the central backpacker district of Pham Ngu Lao (trust me, it's much easier to say than to spell), which is a concentrated touristy area much like Khaosan Road in Bangkok; a bustling street densely packed with hotels, tourist agencies, restaurants and bars. Everywhere you can sense the hum of machinery for milking the constant supply of tourists. I found a cheap room for $7 (US) a night in a tiny family guest house hidden down a quaint alleyway; a shoebox of a room hoisted high up in the armpit of a congealed mass of tangled urbanity. I felt more like a degenerate lodger in a French art-house film than a backpacker, and I loved it!
Ho Chi Minh City was known as Saigon in its colonial past, and within Vietnam it is still widely called by that name. It's famous for historical stuff, i.e. things that happened in the past. Primarily it was the capital of the old Republic of Vietnam, who America decided to "assist" in the war. As we all know that didn't quite go to plan - the commies from the NVA (North Vietnamese Army) ended up winning, rolling victorious into Saigon in 1975, by which time the yanks had long since buggered off.
I went to see the Reunification Palace, which was once the headquarters of the Republic's government. Here in 1975 the NVA's tanks stormed through the gates to historically end the war. Strangely it has a boxy 1960s facade that makes it look more like an NHS hospital than a palace, but it looms on a grandly impressive scale amidst expansive grounds. Many of the rooms are preserved in the way they were found in 1975; there are subterranean comms bunkers complete with the original equipment, the President's bedroom, luxurious reception suites and even a gambling room with Austin Powers-style retro furnishings!
The same afternoon I visited the War Relics Museum, which was more of a sobering experience. Thousands upon thousands of photos unflinchingly catalogue the horrors of war; one exhibition tells the stories of the many fearless war photographers who did one mission too many with the US troops and never came back. There are lots of old warplanes and tanks standing outside; having seen the end effects of these ruthlessly-engineered killing machines it's suddenly hard to take pride in our monkey race's technological mastery.
The Cu Chi tunnels are a vast network of underground tunnels, sniper holes and various nasty booby traps that the Viet Cong secretly constructed outside Saigon. These allowed them to launch surprise attacks on the enemy and the Americans in their own back yard. The tunnels are still there for tourists to visit so I went on a day trip to see this piece of war history.
Our group, led by a jovial grandfatherly Vietnamese chap nicknamed 'Slim Jim', crawled through a hundred metre section of tunnel that was specially enlarged to allow tourists to get through. Some of the original tunnels were as small as 80cm high by 80cm wide! Only a diet of rice and communist rhetoric could leave you thin enough to get through a space that small. The Viet Cong excelled in their ability to hide out in tight confines, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. The enlarged tunnels were still a bloody tight squeeze to get through with my bulky western frame!
Near to the tunnels is a firing range where tourists can shoot with live ammo. A dollar buys you one bullet. I stood by while some others tried it, and live ammunition is bloody loud let me tell you! Bondy despises war in all its forms. "War is stupid and people are stupid", as the Culture Club once sang.
I did another day trip, round the Mekong Delta - a network of muddy brown rivers fanning off from the Mekong towards the coast (forming the conclusion of the river I travelled on earlier in Laos, that runs all the way down from Tibet). That was dull in a pleasant sort of way. Rivers look like rivers on your holiday photos, no matter what country they're in.
Also there was a lunch buffet featuring evil-smelling durian fruit and a short concert from a traditional folk band. I've liked a lot of the other Vietnamese music I've heard, but not this lot. Their timing seemed out and they were playing random notes all over the place - it sounded more like a Captain Beefheart album than anything meaningfully oriental! (Not that I'm knocking Beefheart - the man was an insane genius - but there is a time and a place for that sort of thing.)
The next day (11th April) it was time to leave. After some fruitless attempts to track down an airport bus, I endured a nailbiting ride to the airport on a motorbike taxi, hanging on for dear life with my big rucksack strapped to my back. It was an adventure to tell the grandkids about, but next time I'll pay extra and sit indoors in a proper taxi!
Flights from Vietnam to Hong Kong are bloody expensive for such a short distance, so I found a cheaper route there via nearby Macau. Macau is a small city state on the coast of China, that as a 'special administrative region' allows Westerners to come and go freely without so much as a nod and a wink to the top brass.
Until 1999 it was under Portuguese rule, and was actually the last place anywhere in Asia to be under European rule. Go Europe! I only passed through, but it left me with the distinct impression of being a drab wasteland full of casinos where the Chinese come to gamble away the weekend. I don't like casinos much in case you wondered!
The tourist information girl at the airport was nice though. With her help I found a bus to the ferry terminal, and boarded a gleaming hydrofoil hovercraft catamaran-type thing which propelled us at high speeds towards Hong Kong. Also, being thick, I inadvertently purchased the most expensive type of ticket and ended up sat in the VIP lounge at the front of the boat. I helped myself to not one but two complimentary cups of tea to ensure I got my money's worth. The businessman sat next to me was an executive manager at one of the casinos. We didn't share much in conversation, with him working in casinos and me hating casinos!
After an hour of gliding serenely past the shadowy mountains of south-eastern China we rounded a corner of the land, suddenly confronting the vastest cityscape of skyscrapers you will ever see! (We'd got to Hong Kong in case you're wondering.)
I alighted from the ferry in one of the vast terminal piers on Hong Kong island, suddenly aware of a new and pressing difficulty. Darkness was falling and I'd not got anywhere to stay! I'd tried several times during the day to phone ahead and book at a youth hostel, but they were all full up.
A quick search of the Central district for anything hotel-like proved fruitless. I wandered from block to block in a vast streetlit kingdom of monolithic skyscrapers, overpasses, underpasses and sterile shopping malls. Quaint Blackpool-style electric trams scurried between the tall hulking buildings. But there were no hotels.
I caught the underground MTR train to Causeway Bay, a couple of miles down the road. Causeway Bay is a shopping district similar to Central, where the streets are bathed in the overwhelming kaleidoscopic glow coming from galaxies of gigantic Chinese neon signs.
Despite the influx of Chinese culture since 1997 the road names all remain stoically British; Gloucester Road, Lockhart Road, Wellington Street and the like all have Chinese translations on the bilingual street signs. It's a crazy mix of east and west with a character all of its own, and after getting over the initial culture shock I began to like it!
Behind the glitzy shop fronts the conditions are cramped and the buildings are often decaying. I found a place to stay, upstairs in a poky hostel bizarrely called 'Bin Man Hotel' (next to another simply called 'Clean Hotel')! The room was small and basic but set me back 300 Hong Kong Dollars, just shy of twenty quid. I was starting to panic at the expensive prices after the relative cheapness of Vietnam!
I consoled myself by heading out for dinner and a drink in the Lan Kwai Fong party district. I chanced across a small Chinese eatery which was an experience in itself; a condensed, speeded-up version of a regular restaurant! You queue up outside, then the waiters quickly usher you in, shove you on to a table with a load of random strangers, and jot down your order before rushing off. You eat, then you take your slip of paper to the till to pay, and off you go. No nonsense, no messing about. The turnover of customers is so rapid it's more like being sat in a beehive than a restaurant!
I also discovered the immense delights of Chinese condensed milk buns - they resemble small toasted tea-cakes and are possibly the sweetest thing I have ever tasted. If a bread product could be said to represent heroin, this would surely be it.
Thanks to the restaurant's 'seating randoms together' policy I got talking to Lish, an Ozzie guy, and we set out on an unprecedented alcohol and hookah-pipe binge. It was a good laugh but Christ that was an expensive night. I am loathe to disclose how much I spent but it was more than I would ever spend on a night on the lash in Blackpool. A pint in Hong Kong can easily set you back 4 quid! That's worse than London even, surely!
The next day I quickly bade farewell to the overpriced Bin Man Hotel, catching the Star Ferry across the harbour to Kowloon, which is on the Chinese mainland but still forms part of Hong Kong. From my conversation with an English guy in a bar the previous evening, I knew it would be a much cheaper place to stay in than Causeway Bay. Kowloon has more of everything Hong Kong island has; skyscrapers, malls, traffic and British-sounding street names. I ended up more by accident than design at the notorious Chungking Mansions on Nathan Road.
Chungking Mansions isn't a mansion so much as a giant concrete nightmare. It's a tower block full of hostels and shops that boasts a cult following among backpackers. It was originally built in the 60s to house the area's large Chinese population; a domineering grey slab of a building nearly twenty floors high, that looks like it hasn't seen a coat of paint (or a window-cleaner) in nary a year.
The bottom two floors house a fascinating honeycomb of small markets, Indian restaurants and stores. From there upwards the building sprouts into several different blocks, each housing a bewildering cornucopia of cheap 'n' nasty guest houses. 'Death trap' and 'fire risk' are two tags it has acquired in recent years. Nevertheless it is a big hit with travellers, and it's packed out all year round. Vast queues form waiting for the lifts; there are just about enough of them to cope with the sheer volume of people heading up into the abyss, and a security guard is on hand in the lobby to marshall the crowds coming up and down.
After protracted inquiries with a number of hoteliers wandering about in various states of nakedness, I found a room to stay in a place on the 16th floor of A block. The guest house owner was a wizened old Chinese man with a mole on his face that had a long hair growing out of it!
This would be cheap, 9 quid a night. But it smelt bad. And it looked worse than it smelt. The grey tiles on the walls were straight from a prison cell, the strip-lighting flickered a sickly shade of yellow, and though I had a window it was far better to keep it shut! The window opened out onto a sort of dark internal quadrangle, festooned with foul-smelling AC ducts, that stretched down as far as the eye could see into the nefarious bowels of chez Chungking. Was this really to be my domicile for the forseeable? Beggars can't be choosers.
I hurriedly set about doing some sightseeing, heading over to Lantau Island for a go on the much-hyped Ngong Ping 360 ride. This is a brand new attraction where you are carried high over the sea and then on over the top of some densely-wooded hills, on an epic cable-car journey that lasts for miles. In clear weather you are witness to some stupendous views of the surrounding territory. I cursed the murky grey clouds that were obstructing my view! It was still worth doing for the occasional glimpses of scenery.
The end destination of Ngong Ping village is marked by a gigantic bronze Buddha figure on a hillside (the Tian Tan Buddha) which is the largest of its kind in the world. It was a eerily majestic sight, looming through the mist with the palm of its hand outstretched as the cable car descended. (Buddha says, 'practice cable car safety!')
I went for a walk up close, to study its giant Buddha face inquisitively for clues of enlightenment. No clues came, but I found a machine that sold me iced coffee in a can. Then I went for a walk through the woods to the 'path of enlightenment', a series of giant wooden pillars carved with Chinese characters that were laid out to form the infinity symbol (∞) from above. 'God/Buddha = infinity = enlightenment = a Good Thing' was the message I think.
The next day I got a bus to Aberdeen, a small fishing town hiding round on the other side of Hong Kong island. On impulse I hopped on a ferry to nearby Lamma island, which is green and pleasant. It boasts a huge range of seafood restaurants equipped with displays of exotic-looking fish, lobsters and crabs swimming in tanks.
I'm no expert but I suspect there were a few endangered species in amongst them! Presumably you point to the one you want to eat, then wait at your table salivating like a barbarous Chinaman. I just ordered a plate of squid and they seemed sufficiently depersonalised to consume, coated in thick yellow batter.
Yesterday (14th April) I checked out of Chungking Mansions and headed over to the eatery on Hong Kong island to enjoy the delights of condensed milk buns one last time. I choose not to choose life - I chose something else! Then I caught the tram to Victoria Peak. This is a very steep tramway that takes you to the top of the big hill, where you can look down on Hong Kong and Kowloon in all of its immensity. Thousands of skyscrapers jostle for space on the shoreline, presenting a fantastic spectacle of man-made engineering from above.
But then I had my plane to Sydney to catch, so I rode the metro one last time with my bags, over to the airport. It felt like an ending. Travelling in Asia is bewildering and frustrating at times, but I certainly will miss the endless variety and new discoveries it presents. From here on it's back to the west and its elevated cost of living! I shall have to find work.
Hong Kong airport is modern, sparkling and bloody huge - getting to your departure gate is a marathon three-day trek for which you need a sleeping bag, tent, compass and a couple of Sherpa guides.
As the plane lumbered into the sky, I was treated one last time to the awesome panorama of Hong Kong's skyline, in glorious night-time technicolor. This is in all honesty one of the definitive sights of the modern world, and it topped off what has been thus far an amazing journey. My three months in Asia are at an end and a whole new adventure is set to begin in Australia.
So I left Vietnam, spent some time in Hong Kong and now I've reached Sydney! After getting two hours' sleep overnight on the plane my body clock is once again in a sense of confusion re. the arse/elbow conundrum, and I am a greasy-haired jetlagged mess. I'm sitting here attempting to gather my thoughts in a strange new land. At the moment Sydney is cold and wet like England don't you know!
Well Ho Chi Minh City turned out to be mad and hectic; a bigger and busier version of Hanoi without the old-world charm. It's full of concrete skyscrapers and neon signs, and the busy streets are over-run with biblical swarms of motorbikes and cyclo taxis. There are a few interesting sights to see but once you've done that it's just like any other big city in Asia. And Christ there are a lot of motorbikes!
Cyclo taxis are a bizarre invention: a one-seat bicycle taxi where the passenger sits in front of the pedalling driver like a kamikaze wheelchair patient! I've not tried riding in one but it's meant to be shit scary - you have literally no protection against the traffic hurtling towards you. Tourists are warned against using them due to the risk of muggings and bag-snatchings if you're a cyclo passenger.
The bus stopped in the central backpacker district of Pham Ngu Lao (trust me, it's much easier to say than to spell), which is a concentrated touristy area much like Khaosan Road in Bangkok; a bustling street densely packed with hotels, tourist agencies, restaurants and bars. Everywhere you can sense the hum of machinery for milking the constant supply of tourists. I found a cheap room for $7 (US) a night in a tiny family guest house hidden down a quaint alleyway; a shoebox of a room hoisted high up in the armpit of a congealed mass of tangled urbanity. I felt more like a degenerate lodger in a French art-house film than a backpacker, and I loved it!
Ho Chi Minh City was known as Saigon in its colonial past, and within Vietnam it is still widely called by that name. It's famous for historical stuff, i.e. things that happened in the past. Primarily it was the capital of the old Republic of Vietnam, who America decided to "assist" in the war. As we all know that didn't quite go to plan - the commies from the NVA (North Vietnamese Army) ended up winning, rolling victorious into Saigon in 1975, by which time the yanks had long since buggered off.
I went to see the Reunification Palace, which was once the headquarters of the Republic's government. Here in 1975 the NVA's tanks stormed through the gates to historically end the war. Strangely it has a boxy 1960s facade that makes it look more like an NHS hospital than a palace, but it looms on a grandly impressive scale amidst expansive grounds. Many of the rooms are preserved in the way they were found in 1975; there are subterranean comms bunkers complete with the original equipment, the President's bedroom, luxurious reception suites and even a gambling room with Austin Powers-style retro furnishings!
The same afternoon I visited the War Relics Museum, which was more of a sobering experience. Thousands upon thousands of photos unflinchingly catalogue the horrors of war; one exhibition tells the stories of the many fearless war photographers who did one mission too many with the US troops and never came back. There are lots of old warplanes and tanks standing outside; having seen the end effects of these ruthlessly-engineered killing machines it's suddenly hard to take pride in our monkey race's technological mastery.
The Cu Chi tunnels are a vast network of underground tunnels, sniper holes and various nasty booby traps that the Viet Cong secretly constructed outside Saigon. These allowed them to launch surprise attacks on the enemy and the Americans in their own back yard. The tunnels are still there for tourists to visit so I went on a day trip to see this piece of war history.
Our group, led by a jovial grandfatherly Vietnamese chap nicknamed 'Slim Jim', crawled through a hundred metre section of tunnel that was specially enlarged to allow tourists to get through. Some of the original tunnels were as small as 80cm high by 80cm wide! Only a diet of rice and communist rhetoric could leave you thin enough to get through a space that small. The Viet Cong excelled in their ability to hide out in tight confines, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. The enlarged tunnels were still a bloody tight squeeze to get through with my bulky western frame!
Near to the tunnels is a firing range where tourists can shoot with live ammo. A dollar buys you one bullet. I stood by while some others tried it, and live ammunition is bloody loud let me tell you! Bondy despises war in all its forms. "War is stupid and people are stupid", as the Culture Club once sang.
I did another day trip, round the Mekong Delta - a network of muddy brown rivers fanning off from the Mekong towards the coast (forming the conclusion of the river I travelled on earlier in Laos, that runs all the way down from Tibet). That was dull in a pleasant sort of way. Rivers look like rivers on your holiday photos, no matter what country they're in.
Also there was a lunch buffet featuring evil-smelling durian fruit and a short concert from a traditional folk band. I've liked a lot of the other Vietnamese music I've heard, but not this lot. Their timing seemed out and they were playing random notes all over the place - it sounded more like a Captain Beefheart album than anything meaningfully oriental! (Not that I'm knocking Beefheart - the man was an insane genius - but there is a time and a place for that sort of thing.)
The next day (11th April) it was time to leave. After some fruitless attempts to track down an airport bus, I endured a nailbiting ride to the airport on a motorbike taxi, hanging on for dear life with my big rucksack strapped to my back. It was an adventure to tell the grandkids about, but next time I'll pay extra and sit indoors in a proper taxi!
Flights from Vietnam to Hong Kong are bloody expensive for such a short distance, so I found a cheaper route there via nearby Macau. Macau is a small city state on the coast of China, that as a 'special administrative region' allows Westerners to come and go freely without so much as a nod and a wink to the top brass.
Until 1999 it was under Portuguese rule, and was actually the last place anywhere in Asia to be under European rule. Go Europe! I only passed through, but it left me with the distinct impression of being a drab wasteland full of casinos where the Chinese come to gamble away the weekend. I don't like casinos much in case you wondered!
The tourist information girl at the airport was nice though. With her help I found a bus to the ferry terminal, and boarded a gleaming hydrofoil hovercraft catamaran-type thing which propelled us at high speeds towards Hong Kong. Also, being thick, I inadvertently purchased the most expensive type of ticket and ended up sat in the VIP lounge at the front of the boat. I helped myself to not one but two complimentary cups of tea to ensure I got my money's worth. The businessman sat next to me was an executive manager at one of the casinos. We didn't share much in conversation, with him working in casinos and me hating casinos!
After an hour of gliding serenely past the shadowy mountains of south-eastern China we rounded a corner of the land, suddenly confronting the vastest cityscape of skyscrapers you will ever see! (We'd got to Hong Kong in case you're wondering.)
I alighted from the ferry in one of the vast terminal piers on Hong Kong island, suddenly aware of a new and pressing difficulty. Darkness was falling and I'd not got anywhere to stay! I'd tried several times during the day to phone ahead and book at a youth hostel, but they were all full up.
A quick search of the Central district for anything hotel-like proved fruitless. I wandered from block to block in a vast streetlit kingdom of monolithic skyscrapers, overpasses, underpasses and sterile shopping malls. Quaint Blackpool-style electric trams scurried between the tall hulking buildings. But there were no hotels.
I caught the underground MTR train to Causeway Bay, a couple of miles down the road. Causeway Bay is a shopping district similar to Central, where the streets are bathed in the overwhelming kaleidoscopic glow coming from galaxies of gigantic Chinese neon signs.
Despite the influx of Chinese culture since 1997 the road names all remain stoically British; Gloucester Road, Lockhart Road, Wellington Street and the like all have Chinese translations on the bilingual street signs. It's a crazy mix of east and west with a character all of its own, and after getting over the initial culture shock I began to like it!
Behind the glitzy shop fronts the conditions are cramped and the buildings are often decaying. I found a place to stay, upstairs in a poky hostel bizarrely called 'Bin Man Hotel' (next to another simply called 'Clean Hotel')! The room was small and basic but set me back 300 Hong Kong Dollars, just shy of twenty quid. I was starting to panic at the expensive prices after the relative cheapness of Vietnam!
I consoled myself by heading out for dinner and a drink in the Lan Kwai Fong party district. I chanced across a small Chinese eatery which was an experience in itself; a condensed, speeded-up version of a regular restaurant! You queue up outside, then the waiters quickly usher you in, shove you on to a table with a load of random strangers, and jot down your order before rushing off. You eat, then you take your slip of paper to the till to pay, and off you go. No nonsense, no messing about. The turnover of customers is so rapid it's more like being sat in a beehive than a restaurant!
I also discovered the immense delights of Chinese condensed milk buns - they resemble small toasted tea-cakes and are possibly the sweetest thing I have ever tasted. If a bread product could be said to represent heroin, this would surely be it.
Thanks to the restaurant's 'seating randoms together' policy I got talking to Lish, an Ozzie guy, and we set out on an unprecedented alcohol and hookah-pipe binge. It was a good laugh but Christ that was an expensive night. I am loathe to disclose how much I spent but it was more than I would ever spend on a night on the lash in Blackpool. A pint in Hong Kong can easily set you back 4 quid! That's worse than London even, surely!
The next day I quickly bade farewell to the overpriced Bin Man Hotel, catching the Star Ferry across the harbour to Kowloon, which is on the Chinese mainland but still forms part of Hong Kong. From my conversation with an English guy in a bar the previous evening, I knew it would be a much cheaper place to stay in than Causeway Bay. Kowloon has more of everything Hong Kong island has; skyscrapers, malls, traffic and British-sounding street names. I ended up more by accident than design at the notorious Chungking Mansions on Nathan Road.
Chungking Mansions isn't a mansion so much as a giant concrete nightmare. It's a tower block full of hostels and shops that boasts a cult following among backpackers. It was originally built in the 60s to house the area's large Chinese population; a domineering grey slab of a building nearly twenty floors high, that looks like it hasn't seen a coat of paint (or a window-cleaner) in nary a year.
The bottom two floors house a fascinating honeycomb of small markets, Indian restaurants and stores. From there upwards the building sprouts into several different blocks, each housing a bewildering cornucopia of cheap 'n' nasty guest houses. 'Death trap' and 'fire risk' are two tags it has acquired in recent years. Nevertheless it is a big hit with travellers, and it's packed out all year round. Vast queues form waiting for the lifts; there are just about enough of them to cope with the sheer volume of people heading up into the abyss, and a security guard is on hand in the lobby to marshall the crowds coming up and down.
After protracted inquiries with a number of hoteliers wandering about in various states of nakedness, I found a room to stay in a place on the 16th floor of A block. The guest house owner was a wizened old Chinese man with a mole on his face that had a long hair growing out of it!
This would be cheap, 9 quid a night. But it smelt bad. And it looked worse than it smelt. The grey tiles on the walls were straight from a prison cell, the strip-lighting flickered a sickly shade of yellow, and though I had a window it was far better to keep it shut! The window opened out onto a sort of dark internal quadrangle, festooned with foul-smelling AC ducts, that stretched down as far as the eye could see into the nefarious bowels of chez Chungking. Was this really to be my domicile for the forseeable? Beggars can't be choosers.
I hurriedly set about doing some sightseeing, heading over to Lantau Island for a go on the much-hyped Ngong Ping 360 ride. This is a brand new attraction where you are carried high over the sea and then on over the top of some densely-wooded hills, on an epic cable-car journey that lasts for miles. In clear weather you are witness to some stupendous views of the surrounding territory. I cursed the murky grey clouds that were obstructing my view! It was still worth doing for the occasional glimpses of scenery.
The end destination of Ngong Ping village is marked by a gigantic bronze Buddha figure on a hillside (the Tian Tan Buddha) which is the largest of its kind in the world. It was a eerily majestic sight, looming through the mist with the palm of its hand outstretched as the cable car descended. (Buddha says, 'practice cable car safety!')
I went for a walk up close, to study its giant Buddha face inquisitively for clues of enlightenment. No clues came, but I found a machine that sold me iced coffee in a can. Then I went for a walk through the woods to the 'path of enlightenment', a series of giant wooden pillars carved with Chinese characters that were laid out to form the infinity symbol (∞) from above. 'God/Buddha = infinity = enlightenment = a Good Thing' was the message I think.
The next day I got a bus to Aberdeen, a small fishing town hiding round on the other side of Hong Kong island. On impulse I hopped on a ferry to nearby Lamma island, which is green and pleasant. It boasts a huge range of seafood restaurants equipped with displays of exotic-looking fish, lobsters and crabs swimming in tanks.
I'm no expert but I suspect there were a few endangered species in amongst them! Presumably you point to the one you want to eat, then wait at your table salivating like a barbarous Chinaman. I just ordered a plate of squid and they seemed sufficiently depersonalised to consume, coated in thick yellow batter.
Yesterday (14th April) I checked out of Chungking Mansions and headed over to the eatery on Hong Kong island to enjoy the delights of condensed milk buns one last time. I choose not to choose life - I chose something else! Then I caught the tram to Victoria Peak. This is a very steep tramway that takes you to the top of the big hill, where you can look down on Hong Kong and Kowloon in all of its immensity. Thousands of skyscrapers jostle for space on the shoreline, presenting a fantastic spectacle of man-made engineering from above.
But then I had my plane to Sydney to catch, so I rode the metro one last time with my bags, over to the airport. It felt like an ending. Travelling in Asia is bewildering and frustrating at times, but I certainly will miss the endless variety and new discoveries it presents. From here on it's back to the west and its elevated cost of living! I shall have to find work.
Hong Kong airport is modern, sparkling and bloody huge - getting to your departure gate is a marathon three-day trek for which you need a sleeping bag, tent, compass and a couple of Sherpa guides.
As the plane lumbered into the sky, I was treated one last time to the awesome panorama of Hong Kong's skyline, in glorious night-time technicolor. This is in all honesty one of the definitive sights of the modern world, and it topped off what has been thus far an amazing journey. My three months in Asia are at an end and a whole new adventure is set to begin in Australia.
Tuesday 8 April 2008
Vietnam - same same but different!
Hello and welcome to another fanschmabulous edition of my travelling tales!
Having spent several days hopping from place to place down Vietnam at a rate so fast it should carry a government health warning, I'm now nearing the end of my whirlwind trip. It's like something off a speeded-up Benny Hill sketch - I get on a bus, I look round, I get on another bus, I look round somewhere else, and on it goes. Sadly there's no birds in lingerie for me to chase around in a comical sea captain's uniform, but you can't have everything.
12 days is nowhere near long enough to "tick all the boxes" for Vietnam but I've done my best. I've seen some amazing places in this immense country, that curls round the eastern reaches of Laos and Cambodia on the map like some sort of sleeping topological dog.
I was in Hanoi when we left off. When you're travelling you start to lose track of what day of the week it is, and this causes the weeks to fly by faster than ever. That was several days ago. Since then I've been living a safe and pompous existance on air-conditioned tourist buses, staring out like a wistful dog at the endless rice fields zipping by. Travel is relatively cheap in Vietnam and it's been easy to get from one end of the country to the other, even on my limited budget.
I frittered away my last evening in Hanoi sat at one of the city's many streetside bars. The rain held off and I had traversed the maze-like streets of the Old Quarter to find 'Bia Hoi junction'. This is an intersection of busy shopping streets where you perch on children's patio furniture to enjoy incredibly cheap glasses of beer direct from the barrel! At 3000 Dong a glass (about 9p), Bia Hoi is quite possibly the cheapest beer in the world! (Does anyone else not find the fact that the Vietnamese currency is called Dong hilariously funny?)
Hanoi is famous for this tradition of amiable boozing on the street and rightly so. The convention always employs inappropriately-sized plastic chairs, presumably for ease of storage. It was great to sit (well, crouch) there on the pavement and watch life go by in this strange and exotic city. Tourists and locals mingled together, surrounded by flocks of conical-hatted street vendors and motorbikes streaming past in the warm and humid night.
Bia Hoi had a fresh but rather rough and ready taste, perhaps due to them not cleaning the pipes on the barrel. After a few glasses (and the usual 'where I'm from, what I do, am I married' conversational rounds with some inquisitive Vietnamese chappies) I could feel my stomach slowly rising up, like the Irish in the 19th Century. By ending the drinking here I avoided a major bacterial infection but I suspect I imbibed enough dodginess to do marvels for my immune system!
The next day we went to look at a museum about hill tribes, a few kilometres' bus ride out of the city centre. It was immense. The museum's grand central building was surrounded by a number of fantastic and outlandish looking replica tribal houses built in its capacious grounds.
Hill tribes in SE Asia worship a bewildering array of animalistic gods, and they aren't shy about graphically depicting fertility scenes! We saw some kind of burial shrine with carved figures copulating on top of it. They'd have to pixellate some of it out if they ever showed it on TV, let's just say that!
Once we'd got an eyeful of wooden tits and genitalia and whatnot, it was time to check out the museum's mammoth collection of ceremonial exhibits and photos. There was an exhibition of photos and writings from some French anthropologist bloke who'd studied the hill tribes closely in the early 20th century. We used up our whole day looking round. It's a very good museum, don't get me wrong, but there was just too much to see and take in. Spending that long in a museum can make you feel physically tired! I had to get out, and get back to killing my brain with beer.
The same evening we caught the sleeper bus to leave Hanoi. Vietnam's transport system is geared up for tourism in a big way and we were shuttled out of the city in a gleaming new coach kitted out with two levels of upholstered reclining beds. Each bed was housed in what I can only describe as an individual plastic pod, making the interior seem more like the sleeping quarters of Red Dwarf than a bus!
After spending the night contorting myself into a comfortable sleeping position in my space capsule and re-acquanting myself with Bill Hicks's album 'Rant in E Minor', I awoke the next day as the spaceship with wheels ground to an unexpected halt in the town of Hue in central Vietnam. We were now near to the old DMZ (de-militarised zone), which ironically was home to some of the most intense fighting of the whole Vietnam war. Nowadays it's a hub of Vietnam's tourist industry.
With a few hours to wait till our connecting bus to Hoi An we decided to go for a look round. Hue (pronounced Hooay) is a quiet little place with lots of old temples and pagodas which are quite pretty but rather expensive to get in. It was once the medieval capital of Vietnam (if I remember right), so it's got a load of history, but little stands out about it today.
Perhaps the pallid overcast weather cast the town in an unattractive hue (no pun intended) but it didn't offer any new thrills for us, apart from watching a coachload of Chinese tourists cavorting round and cackling excitedly inside a temple. I was glad I chose going to Vietnam instead of China - the Chinese culture seems so inpenetrable and alien.
After some travel-weary temple-spotting we caught our next bus, travelling a few hours further south to Hoi An. I stepped off the bus to discover a beautiful little river town trapped in a different age.
Hoi An is one of the must-sees of Vietnam. The afternoon sun bathes the sleepy streets with golden rays and illuminates the harbour waters a brilliant blue. Pagodas jostle for space with ancient French shop buildings in the crowded streets. A cluttering of small boats bobs peacefully up and down on the quay, while the adjacent street market throbs and hums with activity, the covered awnings reflecting all its sound and energy back inside.
The streets are lined with tailors' shops where you can get any item of clothing knocked up for a bargain price. A good quality suit would set you back about 50 quid, which is bloody good value whatever way you look at it. The tailors could probably make you something as outlandish as a P Diddy-style pimp suit or a taffeta ball gown if you asked nicely. Much as I was tempted by the idea of owning a taffeta ball gown, I had no space to carry it in my bag.
The next day I hired a rickety old bicycle and painfully creaked my way towards the coast. Cua Dai beach lies a couple of miles away from Hoi An; a stunning vision of blue sea, palm trees, white sand straight out of the tourist brochures. You can even buy a coconut and sit there and drink it like you're on a tropical island or something!
I sat there and read my book, a solemn story by Bao Ninh called the Sorrow of War. Some Vietnamese office workers in smart shirts kept trying to speak to me in Vietnamese, laughing at me for not understanding. I don't know what's up with me, I just can't be arsed interacting with the locals at the moment. That's what the joy of travelling is supposed to be all about - and I'm too jaded to enjoy it!
Travelling from country to country, you notice certain cultural differences. Vietnamese folk can seem a bit abrupt and rude at first, but then they generally warm to you if you make an effort with them. It contrasts with Thai and Lao people, who are automatically smiley and friendly with you even if they don't know you from Adam.
Vietnamese uses the European alphabet, but it is no easier to master than Lao, Thai or Akha. Again I tried to learn a few phrases but it just wasn't sinking in. Hearing someone talk in fluent Vietnamese is like being buried under an avalanche of syllables; an incomprehensible deluge of sing-song vowels and constanants. Everyday conversations sound like furious arguments!
The next day I went on a trip to see the ruined temples at My Son. That's right - My Son! You pronounce it 'mee sonn'. It was a bit of a disappointment, because the ruins of temples had been further ruined by American bombers back in the 60s, leaving just a few jaggy brick columns carpetted in weeds and moss! They date back to the 7th Century though, and that is very old.
Having got that over and done with, it was time to make another coccyx-numbing overnight bus journey, heading straight through Nha Trang (Vietnam's number one scuba-diving tourist trap) to another beach town called Mui Ne. After travelling together for a while, Sonia and I had to go our own separate ways here.
The Lonely Planet portrayed Mui Ne as a sort of deserted seaside fishing village. My expectations were confounded when I discovered it to be nothing more than a long strip of hotel resorts lining the coast, stretching on for miles and miles! Strange. It would take three or four hours to walk from one end to the other.
It was an immensely likeable place nonetheless, boasting more of the palm trees, blue sea, perfect beaches and relentless sun that the southern Vietnamese coast is dripping in. I saw fit to stay a full day here and chill out. Beer + sun lounger + a photocopied Nick Hornby book I bought in a Hoi An bookstore = good times!
Mui Ne is noted for its sand dunes, which are different colours, red and white! The next day I paid a man to give me a tour of them in a jeep. We drove south of the town to see some giant white sand dunes, and I tried sandboarding down the side of one, but it was expensive and crap. It was worth going to see the spectacular views of a lake and a forest of pine trees that exist rather improbably right next to the dunes. That was a pretty unique sight. Then we drove back north to see some red sand dunes, which were sort of red and dusty, but interesting also.
Later that day (7th April) I descended into the pandemonium of Ho Chi Minh City, but I'll have to leave it there as I'm running out of time and mourn for my dinner like the wolf pines for the full moon. Tomorrow I fly to Hong Kong. Goodbye for now and don't be a stranger! I will promise likewise.
Having spent several days hopping from place to place down Vietnam at a rate so fast it should carry a government health warning, I'm now nearing the end of my whirlwind trip. It's like something off a speeded-up Benny Hill sketch - I get on a bus, I look round, I get on another bus, I look round somewhere else, and on it goes. Sadly there's no birds in lingerie for me to chase around in a comical sea captain's uniform, but you can't have everything.
12 days is nowhere near long enough to "tick all the boxes" for Vietnam but I've done my best. I've seen some amazing places in this immense country, that curls round the eastern reaches of Laos and Cambodia on the map like some sort of sleeping topological dog.
I was in Hanoi when we left off. When you're travelling you start to lose track of what day of the week it is, and this causes the weeks to fly by faster than ever. That was several days ago. Since then I've been living a safe and pompous existance on air-conditioned tourist buses, staring out like a wistful dog at the endless rice fields zipping by. Travel is relatively cheap in Vietnam and it's been easy to get from one end of the country to the other, even on my limited budget.
I frittered away my last evening in Hanoi sat at one of the city's many streetside bars. The rain held off and I had traversed the maze-like streets of the Old Quarter to find 'Bia Hoi junction'. This is an intersection of busy shopping streets where you perch on children's patio furniture to enjoy incredibly cheap glasses of beer direct from the barrel! At 3000 Dong a glass (about 9p), Bia Hoi is quite possibly the cheapest beer in the world! (Does anyone else not find the fact that the Vietnamese currency is called Dong hilariously funny?)
Hanoi is famous for this tradition of amiable boozing on the street and rightly so. The convention always employs inappropriately-sized plastic chairs, presumably for ease of storage. It was great to sit (well, crouch) there on the pavement and watch life go by in this strange and exotic city. Tourists and locals mingled together, surrounded by flocks of conical-hatted street vendors and motorbikes streaming past in the warm and humid night.
Bia Hoi had a fresh but rather rough and ready taste, perhaps due to them not cleaning the pipes on the barrel. After a few glasses (and the usual 'where I'm from, what I do, am I married' conversational rounds with some inquisitive Vietnamese chappies) I could feel my stomach slowly rising up, like the Irish in the 19th Century. By ending the drinking here I avoided a major bacterial infection but I suspect I imbibed enough dodginess to do marvels for my immune system!
The next day we went to look at a museum about hill tribes, a few kilometres' bus ride out of the city centre. It was immense. The museum's grand central building was surrounded by a number of fantastic and outlandish looking replica tribal houses built in its capacious grounds.
Hill tribes in SE Asia worship a bewildering array of animalistic gods, and they aren't shy about graphically depicting fertility scenes! We saw some kind of burial shrine with carved figures copulating on top of it. They'd have to pixellate some of it out if they ever showed it on TV, let's just say that!
Once we'd got an eyeful of wooden tits and genitalia and whatnot, it was time to check out the museum's mammoth collection of ceremonial exhibits and photos. There was an exhibition of photos and writings from some French anthropologist bloke who'd studied the hill tribes closely in the early 20th century. We used up our whole day looking round. It's a very good museum, don't get me wrong, but there was just too much to see and take in. Spending that long in a museum can make you feel physically tired! I had to get out, and get back to killing my brain with beer.
The same evening we caught the sleeper bus to leave Hanoi. Vietnam's transport system is geared up for tourism in a big way and we were shuttled out of the city in a gleaming new coach kitted out with two levels of upholstered reclining beds. Each bed was housed in what I can only describe as an individual plastic pod, making the interior seem more like the sleeping quarters of Red Dwarf than a bus!
After spending the night contorting myself into a comfortable sleeping position in my space capsule and re-acquanting myself with Bill Hicks's album 'Rant in E Minor', I awoke the next day as the spaceship with wheels ground to an unexpected halt in the town of Hue in central Vietnam. We were now near to the old DMZ (de-militarised zone), which ironically was home to some of the most intense fighting of the whole Vietnam war. Nowadays it's a hub of Vietnam's tourist industry.
With a few hours to wait till our connecting bus to Hoi An we decided to go for a look round. Hue (pronounced Hooay) is a quiet little place with lots of old temples and pagodas which are quite pretty but rather expensive to get in. It was once the medieval capital of Vietnam (if I remember right), so it's got a load of history, but little stands out about it today.
Perhaps the pallid overcast weather cast the town in an unattractive hue (no pun intended) but it didn't offer any new thrills for us, apart from watching a coachload of Chinese tourists cavorting round and cackling excitedly inside a temple. I was glad I chose going to Vietnam instead of China - the Chinese culture seems so inpenetrable and alien.
After some travel-weary temple-spotting we caught our next bus, travelling a few hours further south to Hoi An. I stepped off the bus to discover a beautiful little river town trapped in a different age.
Hoi An is one of the must-sees of Vietnam. The afternoon sun bathes the sleepy streets with golden rays and illuminates the harbour waters a brilliant blue. Pagodas jostle for space with ancient French shop buildings in the crowded streets. A cluttering of small boats bobs peacefully up and down on the quay, while the adjacent street market throbs and hums with activity, the covered awnings reflecting all its sound and energy back inside.
The streets are lined with tailors' shops where you can get any item of clothing knocked up for a bargain price. A good quality suit would set you back about 50 quid, which is bloody good value whatever way you look at it. The tailors could probably make you something as outlandish as a P Diddy-style pimp suit or a taffeta ball gown if you asked nicely. Much as I was tempted by the idea of owning a taffeta ball gown, I had no space to carry it in my bag.
The next day I hired a rickety old bicycle and painfully creaked my way towards the coast. Cua Dai beach lies a couple of miles away from Hoi An; a stunning vision of blue sea, palm trees, white sand straight out of the tourist brochures. You can even buy a coconut and sit there and drink it like you're on a tropical island or something!
I sat there and read my book, a solemn story by Bao Ninh called the Sorrow of War. Some Vietnamese office workers in smart shirts kept trying to speak to me in Vietnamese, laughing at me for not understanding. I don't know what's up with me, I just can't be arsed interacting with the locals at the moment. That's what the joy of travelling is supposed to be all about - and I'm too jaded to enjoy it!
Travelling from country to country, you notice certain cultural differences. Vietnamese folk can seem a bit abrupt and rude at first, but then they generally warm to you if you make an effort with them. It contrasts with Thai and Lao people, who are automatically smiley and friendly with you even if they don't know you from Adam.
Vietnamese uses the European alphabet, but it is no easier to master than Lao, Thai or Akha. Again I tried to learn a few phrases but it just wasn't sinking in. Hearing someone talk in fluent Vietnamese is like being buried under an avalanche of syllables; an incomprehensible deluge of sing-song vowels and constanants. Everyday conversations sound like furious arguments!
The next day I went on a trip to see the ruined temples at My Son. That's right - My Son! You pronounce it 'mee sonn'. It was a bit of a disappointment, because the ruins of temples had been further ruined by American bombers back in the 60s, leaving just a few jaggy brick columns carpetted in weeds and moss! They date back to the 7th Century though, and that is very old.
Having got that over and done with, it was time to make another coccyx-numbing overnight bus journey, heading straight through Nha Trang (Vietnam's number one scuba-diving tourist trap) to another beach town called Mui Ne. After travelling together for a while, Sonia and I had to go our own separate ways here.
The Lonely Planet portrayed Mui Ne as a sort of deserted seaside fishing village. My expectations were confounded when I discovered it to be nothing more than a long strip of hotel resorts lining the coast, stretching on for miles and miles! Strange. It would take three or four hours to walk from one end to the other.
It was an immensely likeable place nonetheless, boasting more of the palm trees, blue sea, perfect beaches and relentless sun that the southern Vietnamese coast is dripping in. I saw fit to stay a full day here and chill out. Beer + sun lounger + a photocopied Nick Hornby book I bought in a Hoi An bookstore = good times!
Mui Ne is noted for its sand dunes, which are different colours, red and white! The next day I paid a man to give me a tour of them in a jeep. We drove south of the town to see some giant white sand dunes, and I tried sandboarding down the side of one, but it was expensive and crap. It was worth going to see the spectacular views of a lake and a forest of pine trees that exist rather improbably right next to the dunes. That was a pretty unique sight. Then we drove back north to see some red sand dunes, which were sort of red and dusty, but interesting also.
Later that day (7th April) I descended into the pandemonium of Ho Chi Minh City, but I'll have to leave it there as I'm running out of time and mourn for my dinner like the wolf pines for the full moon. Tomorrow I fly to Hong Kong. Goodbye for now and don't be a stranger! I will promise likewise.
Sunday 30 March 2008
Hanoi - turning Vietnamese!
Hello again. I've moved on to Hanoi in northern Vietnam. All my thoughts are on Australia now and the day of my flight to Sydney is fast approaching. But my trek through Asia is far from over. I've 12 days left in which to see the whole of Vietnam, and that's not a lot by any stretch of the imagination!
But the whole essence of my journey has been to see as much as possible in the shortest amount of time, surviving on overnight journeys galore and big bags of crisps from roadside shops. So grab a bumper pack of Lays (what Walkers crisps are sold as in Asia), a dubious bottle of local spring water and join me once again upon my journey!
I left off having just arrived in Vang Vieng in Laos. Vang Vieng is a town of modest size, a couple of hours north of the capital Vientiane. It is situated in a dramatic landscape of rivers and forests, in the midst of a range of beautiful and surreal dome-shaped mountains that glower down from over the water.
Once upon a time this place was a well-kept secret, but fast forward to 2008 and now it is more packed with tourists than anywhere in Laos. The town's central streets are swamped with bar after bar after bar. In a peculiar quirk of supply-and-demand marketing, there is a rash of 'Friends bars' in Vang Vieng; places kitted out with TVs and DVD players, endlessly replaying episodes of Friends all day long! I voted with my feet and went elsewhere.
If getting pissed in an exotic location - and watching actors who are now very very rich acting out humourous situations involving people who are not rich or famous - isn't your cup of tea, Vang Vieng offers alternatives. As promised I've been dabbling in watersports (teehee), and I had a mixed degree of success!
The main pursuit on offer at the dozens of tourist agencies in Vang Vieng is tubing, which skilfully combines the joys of drinking, swimming and floating in a river! By utilising a tractor's rubber inner tyre and the natural river currents, you can drift downstream in peaceful serenity. Don't forget to don your swimming togs first of course!
Backpackers throng to Vang Vieng for the tubing, and it is choked with travellers. Every morning the local guys who work as tourist guides ferry people up to the starting point, driving fleets of tuk-tuks with racks of rubber rings piled haphazardly on the roof. A long stretch of bars built on the banks of the river offer travellers drinks (plus in some cases the discreet vending of herbal products, should they be desired).
Failing to see a downside in any of this, we arranged to go tubing with one of the agencies. Dozens of tourist agencies exist in the town (side-by-side on the street in many cases), boasting similar prices and trying to undercut one another. But at the end of it all, no matter which agency you book with, or how low you haggle the price down, it's the same blokes that pick you up and act as your guides!
And so, after an exciting trip through some water-filled underground caves, our guides drove our group in a tuk-tuk to a patch of ground a few kilometres up the river. Then they issued us each with a giant rubber ring, and left us to float back down to Vang Vieng on the river currents! There's a lot to say for floating past the stunning mountain scenery in such comfort and serenity. All that was missing was a bland soundtrack by the Lighthouse Family and I could have been in an insurance commercial!
The river winds its way through several kilometres back to Vang Vieng, and at every bend in the river is a bar with rope swings or volleyball courts, blasting out loud reggae or trance music. Thirsty? Paddle closer to the bank and a man with a stick comes and tows you in to buy a drink. Then once you've bought a beer you can take it back in the water with you if you like, and drift away!
Or if you want to stay at the bar and enjoy the ambience, a tuk-tuk will ferry you back to town at night! This is rest and relaxation taken to a ridiculous extreme. On a sunny day it would have been utterly brilliant, but we went tubing in overcast weather and the time soon began to drag. Thank f**k I didn't have to listen to the Lighthouse Family!
I spent a few days in Vang Vieng and we did a guided cycling trip round a lagoon and some nearby villages, which was jolly good wholesome exercise. (I'd struggle to define what a lagoon is, but basically I think it's a pond that looks really pretty, with some trees and a swing and shit.) Sonia and I made friends with the guys at the tourist agency and ended up going out drinking with them in a Lao karaoke bar. They seemed really happy to show us around, and gave us a lift on their mopeds to a bar at the edge of town!
It was cool to get away from the main tourist strip and see where the locals hang out. The bar was a small dark room lit with neon, with the ever-present Thai pop music on the karaoke system; full of friendly folk enjoying a drink and a sing-song. Lao people love drinking in dimly-lit establishments, which oddly mirrors British culture!
On our last day in Vang Vieng we went kayaking. It was my first time on a kayak and I fell in a few times, as is the way. In a rush of bravado I followed all the experienced daredevils up a rock face, to dive off a ten metre high cliff!
When I reached the top of the cliff I realised I was not an experienced daredevil and began to sh*t myself slightly. I got the better of my nerves, stepped off the edge, then dropped like a stone and did a comical 'back flop' into the water! That was an experience I'll never forget for sure. Throwing myself hell-for-leather into life's turbulent jetstream, hoping for it to make me more of a man.
After the kayaking the guides drove us to our next destination, Vientiane. The capital of Laos is a smallish riverside city on the Mekong with some of the urban crush and pollution you'd expect of a capital. We quickly tried all the recommended guest houses, discovering as the hot and humid evening descended that horror of horrors, everywhere was full.
We met up with some Americans and Canadians who were kayaking with us, and eventually the five of us found a couple of rooms to share in a hotel. We recovered from the heat in the fridge-like air-conditioned rooms then headed out for a meal. A night of drinking ensued, and we ended up heading off in a tuk-tuk for a game in Vientiane's one and only ten-pin bowling alley! For me, bowling is a precursor to alcohol, not the culmination of the evening, and I struggled to adapt to the American way! It's hard to get in the game being several drinks worse for wear.
The next day I handed over my passport and a large wad of Lao Kip at the hotel reception to get my Vietnam visa rush-processed. This was followed by a rather good fry-up at a nearby cafe. Lao cuisine takes a back seat on many restaurants' menus! Bacon + hot dog sausages = enlightenment. What can I say?
The heat of the day became intense. Sonia, an American guy named Cesar and I did some sight-seeing round a bizarre park full of giant Buddha sculptures (Xieng Khuan). This lies just outside the city and is only reachable by taking a tuk-tuk down a long and extremely bumpy road. Then we went for a look round one of Vientiane's main temples, Pha That Luang. Always with the bloody temples! It was an amazing sight though, resplendent with a magnificent gold stupa. We chatted with some of the Buddhist monks, who were delightful chaps. One of the younger guys had been studying in the temple for ten years and was due to complete his duties and leave town the very next day!
One of the sights that defines Laos (and Thailand) for me is the flocks of orange-robed monks that congregate in towns and round temples. Being a monk is a highly respected position and most men will serve as a monk at some point in their life - in Thailand the back row of seats on buses is actually reserved for monks!
Another night of drinking with our kayaking cousins from across the pond ensued. The next morning (29th March) I was in a near-comatose state from over-exertion - not a good position to be in when you've got to pack your things and get ready for a flight! Somehow I managed. Sonia and I were leaving Laos for Hanoi.
I was a bit apprehensive about flying with Lao Airlines, having heard the rumours that they have frequent crashes. Their accident statistics are cloaked in secrecy by the Lao government and I know for a fact they're banned from flying over the EU!
The flight really was okay though. We flew in a smallish twin-engined propeller plane and got to Hanoi inside an hour. Lao Airlines seem to be tidying up their act these days; they're phasing out all the dodgy old Russian aircraft and they even gave us a charming in-flight lunch of shrinkwrapped cheese and ham sandwiches, much to my delight!
And so on to Vietnam. From the little I've seen so far it's clear that Hanoi is a hectic, bustling, frenetic place. It is built around the Old Quarter, which has existed for five centuries as a sort of giant marketplace. Whole streets are dedicated to shops selling different commodities such as shoes, china bowls and roasted fish. Women in conical hats sell fruit from baskets that they carry on a pole over their shoulder. It's like something from a different era.
The first thing you notice is how many motorbikes there are on the streets - there's millions of them! The roads are unbelievably chaotic. The unending streams of bikes and traffic constantly race from A to B, jostling for position. That's the thing about traffic in Asia - they just have a completely different idea of how it's supposed to work compared to us!
Crossing the road in Vietnam takes nerve and practice; unlike elsewhere I've been you literally have to step in front of the traffic and let it swarm around you! Vietnamese drivers will often even grant you the courtesy of keeping your life.
Also it is bloody confusing to find your way around Hanoi, as all the streets look alike and have similar-sounding names, e.g. Ngo Gach, Nguyen Sieu, Hang Chieu... eeh, it's all Greek to me! By which I mean Vietnamese. I like the Old Quarter though, it's got a definite character to it. There are some picturesque views round the Hoan Kiem lake in the centre of the city; the algae-infested water shines a pretty bottle green under the dour cloudy skies.
We've seen a few sights in Hanoi, such as Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, where the former communist leader's embalmed body is on display for public viewing, and a museum of his life story. I didn't really get the point of the museum, it was more like a modern art exhibition extolling the joys of Communism. Everywhere were photos of Ho Chi Minh making speaches and attending state events, but there was little obvious explanation of his life story. The whole thing seemed to serve to make a political point I had neither the patience or inclination to figure out.
Hanoi is famous for is its centuries-old tradition of water-puppetry, and I saw a water puppet show in a theatre by the lake. It was an eerie and magical experience unlike anything I've seen. The puppets appear to float by themselves in time to the unearthly oriental music. The stage is a rectangular pool of shallow water on which the figures float, and a group of musicians sit in a kind of orchestral pit at the side playing traditional Vietnamese music.
The puppets are cleverly controlled by levers from behind a bamboo screen, but glide around as if moving on their own. A bewildering cast featuring dozens of puppets are used to portray different animals and people. It was hard to tell what the f**k was happening, as the play just explores various themes rather than having a structured plot (various scenes are titled 'on a buffalo with a flute', 'catching frogs' and 'unicorns play with ball'), but it was an impressive spectacle. Apparently water puppeteers have to train for 3 years to master the art, and they have to get used to donning waders and working in waist-high water!
Also I went on a cruise round the northern beauty spot of Halong Bay, where thousands of small limestone islands are grouped in clusters around the coast. That was the first time since northern India that I've experienced weather as cold as the UK. It was beautiful, though the weather was cold and blustery and we couldn't see an awful lot.
We stayed overnight on Cat Ba island (where there is a large national park), and saw a massive street party commemorating the day 49 years ago when Ho Chi Minh visited the island. This guy pops up everywhere! I can't distinguish whether he is actually revered as a national hero among the people or whether the authorities are adamant that he be perceived that way.
Tomorrow we catch the night bus south to Hoi An to continue our journey. Hopefully there will come many more enlightening discoveries and wonderful adventures. But that's all for now - time for a crafty Bia Hoi at a streetside bar methinks! Arriverderci for now folks.
Sunday 23 March 2008
Laos part 2 - you've only got one pop song...
Oh God, I'm sat in an internet cafe again. What am I doing here? I might as well give you another update eh!
Me and Sonia have now moved on to Vang Vieng in central Laos, a nice little city next to a river with lots of beautiful craggy mountains nearby. It is a popular centre for trekking, cave-exploring and watersports (teehee). The watersports attract lots of barechested western jock types who drive up and down hollering like chimps on adrenaline. Watersports always bring out this side in people I suspect. Other than that life is very good. I myself will be going to caves and trying some watersports tomorrow. I will keep you updated on my progress!
I've been to Luang Prabang and Phonsovanh so far in Laos. Luang Prabang is a beautiful place. It's Laos' second city but has yet to develop any of the characteristics of a city; for now it is just a small unspoilt town that sits on the meeting-place of two rivers.
With no skyscrapers or modern buildings, and with its quiet streets and Parisian lamp-posts, it is strangely evocative of a small town in pre-war France. But then Laos was a former French colony - the British weren't the only ones who liked nicking other people's countries and changing all their shit around! There are hundreds of beautiful, glittering Buddhist temples spread throughout Luang Prabang, populated with flocks of orange-robed monks. After a day spent temple-spotting in the old town I have now definitely seen enough temples to last me a lifetime!
Late on Monday afternoon (17th March) our slow boat chugged up the river to the town, completing its mammoth journey down the Mekong. We gratefully disembarked, free to explore the town as dusk fell. Like many of the places in Thailand and Laos I've been, a small, cheap and friendly guest house just happened to be waiting in a backstreet for us to chance upon it.
The friendly old lady greeted us with 'sabadee!' (Lao for 'alright me ducks!') and once a price was agreed, she showed us to our room. That night I changed approximately 50 pounds of my Thai money into the local currency and was presented with 870,000 Lao Kip - a humungous wad of money literally an inch thick! I was rich!
The guest house, we later discovered, is built right next door to some sort of all-night open-air karaoke bar, where pissed Lao people go and sing Thai pop songs rather badly all the way into the wee small hours. But on the plus side, guests are welcome to free tea, coffee and bananas round the clock, so I was quickly placated! Oh and they have a big wall collage of former guests' pictures, from which one of my utterly minging passport photos is now gurning out at the world for all posterity. I cannot be held accountable for any loss of business or unforseen mental problems which will ensue from the airing of that rather unappetising photo.
Thai music and TV is everywhere in Laos. In some ways Laos is like a smaller sibling of Thailand, and the Thai culture pours into the void which westernisation is creating in Lao society. The two countries have different languages, and completely separate alphabets, yet there are many cultural similarities.
Even in the quiet backwaters, nearly every village has a house with a huge Jodrell Bank-size satellite dish bracketted to its roof to pick up all the Thai channels. Having seen Thai TV I'd rather face a life with no technology at all!
Thai pop music is kind of strange too. They ape western musical styles but they only seem to have grasped one basic tune. It crops up all the time on the radio in countless different songs - the chords run in a dirge-like circle of C minor-B flat-A flat-B flat, or something like that. And they've taken to one particular musical style with a relish - the all-out, balls-to-the-wall 1980s power ballad!
Our first two nights in Luang Prabang were marked with calm weather and unexpected monsoon-like downpours of rain. We did a few trips out to surrounding villages and beauty spots as is the usual way. First we rode on a boat to the cavernous Pak Ou caves, which nestle inside a big cliff on the Mekong. The caves contain a massive shrine and countless sacred Buddha figurines - small gold statues which visitors must not touch.
Then we visited a village where locals produce Lao whisky and rice wine for tourists, in rustic-looking metal vats. The white rice wine is excellent stuff - alongside the excellent lager Beer Lao, Laos has a lot to shout about alcohol-wise!
Finally we went swimming at the stunning Kouang Si waterfalls, discovering the Lonely Planet brigade from the river boat had all come to visit too! Eeh, it's like taking your holidays at Blackpool. I was affecting a haughty air of anti-western snobbery by this point.
On Friday (21st March) it was time to pack up and move on. We booked tickets at a travel agency and endured an eight-hour bus ride to Phonsovanh. That was tough going. Phonsovanh is a small town a couple of hundred kilometres from Luang Prabang through very mountainous terrain.
At many points on the journey the elderly bus was slowed to a crawl by the uncompromising gradients of the road's endless twists and turns. The views of the wooded valleys and plains, however, were spectacular. Our sanity was further tested by the endless replays of Thailand's one ubiquitous pop tune blaring from the driver's radio at full blast! I turned my music player up on full, stuck my headphones in, lay back and thought of England.
Phonsovanh was bombed to oblivion during the Vietnam war. Quick history lesson - America bombed Laos because they were on the commies' side, and refused to see that communism is dirty and nasty and wrong. Bad Laos! Dirty Laos! In your bed! And they didn't do it by half measures, dropping two million tons of explosives on the country in ten years; more than was used on both Germany and Japan in the second world war.
The town now been entirely rebuilt from scratch, featuring street after street of entirely new buildings. But bomb craters and unexploded bombs still litter the countryside. The debris of war lies everywhere, and much of it has been ingeniously recycled by opportunistic scrap-hunters. Rusted old bomb casings are used as fencing, house foundations and water carriers, and many of the guest houses have some sort of arrangement of old bombs and metal helmets outside to try and catch the tourists' eyes.
We came to visit one of the other 'must sees' in Laos, the Plain of Jars. This is an area of about 15 square kilometres of countryside, near Phonsovanh, containing thousands of giant prehistoric stone jars. No-one really knows when they came from, or why they were put there by the ancient civilisation of the time - are they funeral urns? Food storage? Was it... aliens?
The area was also the centre of intense fighting during the war and is still littered with UXOs (unexploded bombs) dropped by US planes in the late 60s. As much as 30% of the bombs dropped over Laos never detonated, and still lie in wait somewhere. (I have many more bomb facts and figures I intend to save for small talk at future dinner parties!)
So I spent the day yesterday wandering round various picturesque hillsides, littered with giant stone jars and ancient mossy bomb craters. In some places the earth is still churned up from those terrible events many years ago; and always the bomb craters are perfectly round and spherical in depth.
Also we went to see a cave where the Lao people once sheltered from the incessant American bombing raids, a rusting Soviet tank in a nearby village that had been cannibalised for scrap, and an imposing war memorial for Lao & Vietnamese soldiers up on a hillside. Am I a communist now? Not sure. But I certainly take the Vietnam war a lot more seriously now I've seen its implications in people's lives forty years on.
Finally we visited the local office of MAG, a Manchester-based charity who organise the clearing of explosives from Lao villages. There was a hugely interesting exhibition there explaining how many Lao villagers are very poor as they cannot farm on their bomb-infested land. Due to intense poverty they are forced into the incredibly dangerous route of digging up the bombs, attempting to diffuse them, then selling them on as scrap metal. The unused explosives also have monetary value. In an absolute sense the people are attempting to live off the land any way they can; accidents and deaths are commonplace.
What I can't believe is how forgiving the Lao people are - they love all foreigners! They're even friendlier than the people of Thailand. I was expecting the older generation to harbour grudges against Hawaiian shirt-wearing Americans at least. Most of the people don't seem to care, and every credit to them. They only want to rebuild the country and move on.
Me and Sonia have now moved on to Vang Vieng in central Laos, a nice little city next to a river with lots of beautiful craggy mountains nearby. It is a popular centre for trekking, cave-exploring and watersports (teehee). The watersports attract lots of barechested western jock types who drive up and down hollering like chimps on adrenaline. Watersports always bring out this side in people I suspect. Other than that life is very good. I myself will be going to caves and trying some watersports tomorrow. I will keep you updated on my progress!
I've been to Luang Prabang and Phonsovanh so far in Laos. Luang Prabang is a beautiful place. It's Laos' second city but has yet to develop any of the characteristics of a city; for now it is just a small unspoilt town that sits on the meeting-place of two rivers.
With no skyscrapers or modern buildings, and with its quiet streets and Parisian lamp-posts, it is strangely evocative of a small town in pre-war France. But then Laos was a former French colony - the British weren't the only ones who liked nicking other people's countries and changing all their shit around! There are hundreds of beautiful, glittering Buddhist temples spread throughout Luang Prabang, populated with flocks of orange-robed monks. After a day spent temple-spotting in the old town I have now definitely seen enough temples to last me a lifetime!
Late on Monday afternoon (17th March) our slow boat chugged up the river to the town, completing its mammoth journey down the Mekong. We gratefully disembarked, free to explore the town as dusk fell. Like many of the places in Thailand and Laos I've been, a small, cheap and friendly guest house just happened to be waiting in a backstreet for us to chance upon it.
The friendly old lady greeted us with 'sabadee!' (Lao for 'alright me ducks!') and once a price was agreed, she showed us to our room. That night I changed approximately 50 pounds of my Thai money into the local currency and was presented with 870,000 Lao Kip - a humungous wad of money literally an inch thick! I was rich!
The guest house, we later discovered, is built right next door to some sort of all-night open-air karaoke bar, where pissed Lao people go and sing Thai pop songs rather badly all the way into the wee small hours. But on the plus side, guests are welcome to free tea, coffee and bananas round the clock, so I was quickly placated! Oh and they have a big wall collage of former guests' pictures, from which one of my utterly minging passport photos is now gurning out at the world for all posterity. I cannot be held accountable for any loss of business or unforseen mental problems which will ensue from the airing of that rather unappetising photo.
Thai music and TV is everywhere in Laos. In some ways Laos is like a smaller sibling of Thailand, and the Thai culture pours into the void which westernisation is creating in Lao society. The two countries have different languages, and completely separate alphabets, yet there are many cultural similarities.
Even in the quiet backwaters, nearly every village has a house with a huge Jodrell Bank-size satellite dish bracketted to its roof to pick up all the Thai channels. Having seen Thai TV I'd rather face a life with no technology at all!
Thai pop music is kind of strange too. They ape western musical styles but they only seem to have grasped one basic tune. It crops up all the time on the radio in countless different songs - the chords run in a dirge-like circle of C minor-B flat-A flat-B flat, or something like that. And they've taken to one particular musical style with a relish - the all-out, balls-to-the-wall 1980s power ballad!
Our first two nights in Luang Prabang were marked with calm weather and unexpected monsoon-like downpours of rain. We did a few trips out to surrounding villages and beauty spots as is the usual way. First we rode on a boat to the cavernous Pak Ou caves, which nestle inside a big cliff on the Mekong. The caves contain a massive shrine and countless sacred Buddha figurines - small gold statues which visitors must not touch.
Then we visited a village where locals produce Lao whisky and rice wine for tourists, in rustic-looking metal vats. The white rice wine is excellent stuff - alongside the excellent lager Beer Lao, Laos has a lot to shout about alcohol-wise!
Finally we went swimming at the stunning Kouang Si waterfalls, discovering the Lonely Planet brigade from the river boat had all come to visit too! Eeh, it's like taking your holidays at Blackpool. I was affecting a haughty air of anti-western snobbery by this point.
On Friday (21st March) it was time to pack up and move on. We booked tickets at a travel agency and endured an eight-hour bus ride to Phonsovanh. That was tough going. Phonsovanh is a small town a couple of hundred kilometres from Luang Prabang through very mountainous terrain.
At many points on the journey the elderly bus was slowed to a crawl by the uncompromising gradients of the road's endless twists and turns. The views of the wooded valleys and plains, however, were spectacular. Our sanity was further tested by the endless replays of Thailand's one ubiquitous pop tune blaring from the driver's radio at full blast! I turned my music player up on full, stuck my headphones in, lay back and thought of England.
Phonsovanh was bombed to oblivion during the Vietnam war. Quick history lesson - America bombed Laos because they were on the commies' side, and refused to see that communism is dirty and nasty and wrong. Bad Laos! Dirty Laos! In your bed! And they didn't do it by half measures, dropping two million tons of explosives on the country in ten years; more than was used on both Germany and Japan in the second world war.
The town now been entirely rebuilt from scratch, featuring street after street of entirely new buildings. But bomb craters and unexploded bombs still litter the countryside. The debris of war lies everywhere, and much of it has been ingeniously recycled by opportunistic scrap-hunters. Rusted old bomb casings are used as fencing, house foundations and water carriers, and many of the guest houses have some sort of arrangement of old bombs and metal helmets outside to try and catch the tourists' eyes.
We came to visit one of the other 'must sees' in Laos, the Plain of Jars. This is an area of about 15 square kilometres of countryside, near Phonsovanh, containing thousands of giant prehistoric stone jars. No-one really knows when they came from, or why they were put there by the ancient civilisation of the time - are they funeral urns? Food storage? Was it... aliens?
The area was also the centre of intense fighting during the war and is still littered with UXOs (unexploded bombs) dropped by US planes in the late 60s. As much as 30% of the bombs dropped over Laos never detonated, and still lie in wait somewhere. (I have many more bomb facts and figures I intend to save for small talk at future dinner parties!)
So I spent the day yesterday wandering round various picturesque hillsides, littered with giant stone jars and ancient mossy bomb craters. In some places the earth is still churned up from those terrible events many years ago; and always the bomb craters are perfectly round and spherical in depth.
Also we went to see a cave where the Lao people once sheltered from the incessant American bombing raids, a rusting Soviet tank in a nearby village that had been cannibalised for scrap, and an imposing war memorial for Lao & Vietnamese soldiers up on a hillside. Am I a communist now? Not sure. But I certainly take the Vietnam war a lot more seriously now I've seen its implications in people's lives forty years on.
Finally we visited the local office of MAG, a Manchester-based charity who organise the clearing of explosives from Lao villages. There was a hugely interesting exhibition there explaining how many Lao villagers are very poor as they cannot farm on their bomb-infested land. Due to intense poverty they are forced into the incredibly dangerous route of digging up the bombs, attempting to diffuse them, then selling them on as scrap metal. The unused explosives also have monetary value. In an absolute sense the people are attempting to live off the land any way they can; accidents and deaths are commonplace.
What I can't believe is how forgiving the Lao people are - they love all foreigners! They're even friendlier than the people of Thailand. I was expecting the older generation to harbour grudges against Hawaiian shirt-wearing Americans at least. Most of the people don't seem to care, and every credit to them. They only want to rebuild the country and move on.
Saturday 22 March 2008
Laos: Mekong madness!
Hello friends, enemies, relatives, the 'Man' or whoever else is reading this. I have now begun a whole new chapter of my travels. I'm in Laos; a wonderful and mysterious land that sadly, due to the Vietnam war, has a scarred legacy of being one of the most bombed countries in the world.
Take a look past the beautiful scenery and the nation is still struggling to find its feet after decades of war damage and oppressive regimes. The people are extremely poor. Whole areas of the countryside are still littered with thousands of unexploded bombs, dropped by US warplanes during the conflict. The bomb disposal squads from international charities will need to work away for several more decades (if not a whole century) to get rid of them all.
Since opening its borders in recent times - particularly the one it shares with Thailand - Laos is now suckling on the teat of tourism. If you can picture such an image. The yankee dollars are starting to pour in and the times, well, they are becoming different. There are hordes of tourists here, fresh off the riverboat from Thailand and trooping around landmark after landmark with their Lonely Planet guidebooks. My travel buddy Sonia (who I met on the volunteer camp) and I have ungratefully entered their ranks. This country didn't stay a well-kept secret for long!
Well the Akha volunteer camp finished last week. It was a really great experience and told me much about what goes on in this corner of the world. I was sad to move on, and I really liked the group of people, but such is life; nought but a patchwork of brief moments of respite.
The people at AFECT treated us with the typical warmth and hospitality westerners find so flattering and bewildering in south-east Asia. I think we learnt an incredible amount as a group in the two weeks.
We didn't do much work for the communities, mind you. We spoke to some other western people staying with us who told us this is always the case! I came to accept this project was more of an exercise in cultural exchange, i.e. like when you had to write a letter to a French pen-pal back at school saying, "bonjour, je m'appelle Andrew, j'aime jouer au guitar, ping-pong et le mini-disco" or something like that, and then wait eagerly for their reply.
Traditionally the hill tribes cultivated opium crops for their own use, but they are now forbidden to do this by the government, and now many people from the hill tribes have to migrate to the big cities in search of work. But the majority of tribespeople have not been taught and educated in Thai schools, and cannot obtain a national ID card.
The government will only properly acknowledge citizens who have an ID card, and as such, the Akhas struggle to fight for their rights. Their tribe's traditional way of life is dying out, and the other hill tribes of the region, such as the Lahu, Lisu, Karen and Hmong face the same threats too - so awareness needs to be spread.
On our final days we saw lots more of the region. On Thursday (13th March) we went on a day-trip to the Golden Triangle, where two rivers intersect and the borders of Thailand, Burma and Laos converge together like the slices of a big pizza. It was a delightful view, with lush green countryside on all three sides. There were no big black lines running over the terrain like wot there are on the maps, so it was kind of confusing to remember where each country ended and where each one began. Luckily though, God had marked out the borders with some handily-placed rivers.
The same day we went to the Hall of Opium in the nearby town of Sop Ruak, a compact little museum lovingly decked in regal bunting and portraits of the royal family that documents the Golden Triangle region's legacy of opium production. It was a fascinating place, packed with information and featuring real poppy plants and ornate 19th century opium pipes.
One of the things I discovered was that the British were originally to blame for introducing opium to Asia, when their traders needed something to bargain with the Chinese. That's the British empire for you - an efficient machine that spread railways, venereal disease, civil service-style bureaucracy and hard drugs to all corners of the world. I am seeing a lot more of our disturbing legacy as I voyage from country to country!
We also went on a crazy speedboat trip to Laos, which lay five minutes away across the Mekong river. Have you ever tried to eat an orange ice-lolly on a rocketing speedboat? It ain't easy. I got gunk from my lolly all over my digital camera and the lens jammed. And they say the US Marines had it tough in the Vietnam war!
The Mekong is a truly mighty river; it flows thousands of miles, all the way from the snowy mountains of Tibet down into the cornucopia of rivers forming the Mekong Delta in southern Vietnam. The stretch I've seen has a sludgey brown colour reminiscent of the Irish sea though; you wouldn't want to go swimming in it!
On the final evening we had a big outdoor party at AFECT's headquarters, dining on a huge spread of food with all the other volunteer groups. A dancing troupe of Akha ladies in fancy traditional costumes gyrated on stage to cheesy Thai pop music, while we filled our glasses from the endless bottles of Chang beer doing the rounds.
Our group cooked food from each of our countries; I treated everyone to the British classic bangers and mash! It lost something in translation, as the only sausages the supermarket sold were hotdog sausages, and they had nothing I recognised as gravy. But the mashed potato worked out well, and it seemed to go down a treat!
Then the next day it was all over, and we all left on our respective onwards journeys. Most people have travelled to Bangkok to fly home, or gone on to other places in Thailand. Zach went to Burma (brave guy!), and Sonia and I headed for the Laos border at Chiang Khong, a two hour bus ride away.
At Chiang Khong we caught a small ferry-boat over the wide expanse of the Mekong river, and that was it - the month I'd spent in Thailand was at an end. A month barely did it justice and there's plenty more that will have to wait for my next visit, such as the beaches in the south.
We disembarked across the river, at the Lao village of Houay Xai, and hauled our rucksacks up the concrete jetty. The first task was to join the queues of travellers waiting in the baking afternoon heat to get a tourist visa. We paid about 40 US dollars for a month's visa at the small immigration office. (In many Asian countries the US dollar acts as an unofficial second currency.)
We celebrated arriving in Laos with lunch at a small cafe. A Lao guy played his acoustic guitar at one of the tables nearby, before running off to shake some fruit down from a tree. The guitar is a very popular instrument in Laos - quite often you walk past guys sat on their own on the pavement, strumming on a guitar without a care in the world!
Houay Xai is a quiet little border town with nothing much to it really. There is one dusty main road lined with restaurants and tourist offices, targetted at the waves of people coming over from Thailand every day. All the shops and cafes accept Thai Baht, US dollars and Lao Kip, requiring their employees to do impressive leaps of mental arithmetic when calculating prices. The lights of Thailand blinked away from across the river in the night, reminding us of the place we'd just left behind (i.e. Thailand).
The next day we began what has been hailed as one of the definitive experiences of Laos - the two-day riverboat journey to Luang Prabang down the Mekong! I was really excited about doing this. Bear in mind most areas of Laos have never had proper roads, so journeying by river is often the quickest way to get from A to B (though this is slowly changing as more highways are built).
To get to Luang Prabang you have two choices: a) do it in six hours by speedboat, running the risk of losing either your hearing (from the deafeningly loud engine) or your life (in one of the fatal speedboat crashes that frequently occur). Or do the journey in much more relaxed style on a slow boat. While the conditions on a slow boat are cramped and uncomfortable, it leaves you free to chill out and enjoy the dramatic scenery.
We set off early in the morning from our guest house and we were collected by a man in a rickety tuk-tuk (rickshaw). A tuk-tuk is a small three-wheeled vehicle with a lightweight metal cage welded to the back, common in Laos and Thailand. I was astonished to discover a dozen other bleary-eyed travellers crammed into the back, and their luggage, piled into a tottering pyramid on the roof!
We gently hoisted our things on to the roof, taking care not to disturb the fragile equilibrium of baggage. Then we inserted ourselves into the cram of bodies and the driver set off through town to the slow-boat pier.
Down at the pier we registered for the trip, showing our passports to a stern uniformed man sat in an empty office whose job it obviously was to reassure us travellers that Laos really does have some sort of functioning government, honest! A line of slow-boats was waiting down on the river, one of them chugging its engine with intent. After carrying our rucksacks across a narrow rickety plank, we were safely on board!
Soon the wooden benches (and all other free space) inside the boat became packed with travellers, and after waiting for a few more stragglers, we were on our way. The boat made steady progress down the river, much swifter than I'd expected it to. The hours flew by; whirlpools, riptides, mountainous valleys and forests were punctuated by stops at villages on the riverside. Groups of village kids swimming in the river would wave to us - the latest bunch of exotic spectators passing through their lives. Despite the basic conditions of the boat and the arse-numbing wooden seats, such scenes of isolated bliss almost untouched by humanity made the time pass by quite fast.
Eventually it grew dark and it was time to make the overnight stop at the village of Pak Beng, halfway on our journey. Getting off the boat was a mad scramble, as everyone rushed to retrieve their baggage from the hold before the local villagers doubling as 'porters' attempted to carry their bags off for a fee! Time to stretch our legs after sitting on the cramped and uncomfortable wooden benches for several hours. Sonia and I clambered off with difficulty and joined the snake of travellers heading for the guidebooks' recommended guest houses.
Like Houay Xai before it, Pak Beng experiences a daily rush of tourists making the journey down the Mekong. The sights, sounds and smells of rural Thailand were present here too; chickens crowing day and night, the smell of wood smoke lingering in the air. We knew all the hotel rooms in the tiny village would quickly fill up from the people off the boat, but we managed to find a room in a small wooden guest house just up from the jetty that many people had overlooked.
It was cheap and accomodating and had fly nets over the beds, and a communal bathroom with cold water only - standard fare for this part of the world! The guy running it was very jolly and even offered to sell us a bag of weed for 500 Baht. What a rip-off!
Everywhere in town we glimpsed familiar faces from the boat. I randomly bumped into a British couple I met staying in the same hostel in Singapore. Then Sonia and I headed out for a meal, and we got talking to a jolly old Canadian guy who reminded me a bit of the Major off Fawlty Towers. He was raving about what a great place Vietnam is. Then we just had time to head back for an ice-cold shower before the village's electricity was shut off at 10pm. Many remote areas of Laos such as Pak Beng only have electricity for a few hours in the evening.
Normally when you wake in the middle of the night your eyes have adjusted to the dark surroundings of the room. But I woke and it was so dark I couldn't even see my hand in front of my face. A night with zero electricity or light pollution in the surrounding area is a very black night indeed!
Luckily the sun obliged and came back to light up the world several hours later. And off we left for Luang Prabang. And the rest of the Lonely Planet brigade left with us. And so, Pak Beng became a sleepy ghost town once more, for a few hours.
That was nearly a week ago and I've spent several days in Luang Prabang and Phonsovanh (town in eastern Laos). I will write more when I get chance. Ciao for now!
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