Hello Hanoi!

Right from the moment we began our decent to land, it was clear that Vietnam was going to be very different Laos, or any country we’d been to so far. As we flew over the rice paddies on our approach, it was hard to believe we’d travelled for little over an hour and not even in a jet. The dry yellow and brown mountainous landscapes of Laos had been replaced by vivid green planes of flat rice paddies that stretched as far as the eye could see. On exiting our plane, the weather seemed strangely familiar with a light drizzle, grey clouds and a temperature that wouldn’t have been unusual for London in summer. It was also quickly evident, as we took a shared taxi through the urban sprawl into the city centre that we were now in city far larger anything in Laos. We made our way to Old Quarter, the usual destination for foreign tourists on a budget. Despite being unsuccessful at finding any of the hotels we’d eyed up in the Lonely Planet we soon found half decent hotel with all mod cons at a reasonable price. Before long we were ready to head out on the town in search of our first taste of authentic Vietnamese cuisine. Getting around on foot was to prove the first challenge, more specifically crossing the road. The narrow streets around the old quarter are alive to the constant hum of an endless stream of mopeds, the only practical form of motorised transport in Hanoi. With little or no traffic signals, never mind pedestrian crossings, crossing the road is somewhat of an art form requiring nerve and a little faith. It’s virtually impossible to wait for a break in traffic (which you’ll see recent foreign arrivals doing until the cows come home – as did we) so you have to simply walk, slowly and deliberately, into the swarm of bikes entrusting that all the oncoming traffic will steer around you. Making your movement across the road predictable is the key to safety, so you must resist the urge to make any sudden changes in speed or direction and the golden rule; never ever go backwards.

After struggling with getting around (made no easier by the confusing streets and useless map in our guide book) we ended up at a restaurant seemingly as popular with Vietnamese as it was with tourists and enjoyed a Vietnamese fish speciality along with a couple of glasses of bia hoi (draft beer). Vietnamese take their food seriously and it was clear that there was a level of artistry in their food that we hadn’t seen since our time in Thailand. After dinner we decided to hit the local party scene, which had more than its share of trendy venues, playing the sort of electronic music and R’n’B that you might expect to find back at home. Having enjoyed playing in Vang Vieng I was keen to see if I could get myself another gig, so trading off the excuse that it was Maren’s birthday (it was her birthday weekend!) we asked around. Before long we got talking to an English girl working at one of the more plush bars in the Old Quarter, who suggested that we go speak to her friend who ran one of the more underground clubs in Hanoi, so we jumped in a taxi that took us across town. There we talked to Han a young Vietnamese guy who owned the club who made us feel very welcome and said he would be happy to let me play along side his regular DJ. Keen to avoid any of the unpleasantness that had occurred at Jokers I befriended the resident DJ and we chatted about music and the sort of night he usually put on. After a few more drinks talking to Han we headed home, buzzing with excitement after our first few hours in Vietnam and the prospects of a great Saturday night ahead with Heidger and my chance to play out again.

Vietnam had so far confounded our expectations. We had prepared ourselves mentally for a more challenging environment than that which we had left behind in Laos having heard mixed reports from fellow travellers. A number had complained about their experiences such as hassle from hawkers, being conned out of money on dodgy tours and bad accommodation. Big capital cities also tend to be harder, more unfriendly places so our guard was up and we were on the alert for anyone trying to take advantage of us. However this proved, at least for now, to be unwarranted. Everyone we had encountered had made a good impression, keen to be helpful and friendly. The was a buzz and an edge about the city, but nothing that had been scary or overwhelming; in fact we’d thoroughly enjoyed our first night and we were now really looking forward rest of our time in Hanoi and Vietnam.

After late start in the morning the following day we started to explore the sights and the sounds of the old quarter, following a tour by foot suggested in our guide book. Hanoi is somewhat of a consumer paradise, especially for faked/copied goods. Sunglasses, shoes, designer jeans and all the usual suspects you find around South East Asia can be found, but the scale, selection and quality are taken to another level. The biggest novelty for us was the fake money on sale (burnt at temples as offerings to the spirits) and the fake hotels. Even successful businesses are cloned here, with restaurants and travel agents the other common victims of unscrupulous competition trying to trade of someone else’s reputation. That said, the quality of some fakes are often as good as the real thing with many major fashion houses producing their products in Vietnam. I’d been on the hunt for a pair of sunglasses having lost my Raybans weeks earlier in Thailand. I managed find a shop selling high quality copies that I found difficult to tell apart from originals (I have bought several pairs of one particular style) bar the leather case which had a small mistake on the print. At a tenth of the price of the originals I bought in London they have to be one of the best bargains of the trip so far.

What certainly isn’t faked is the food on sale in the street markets. Clearly one of the factors that makes the cuisine so good here is that everything is exceptionally fresh. Any concerns about the fish we had eaten the night before, or the tiger prawns in our pho (noodle soup) for lunch quickly evaporated when we saw the plastic buckets and tanks used to keep seafood alive until it was sold and it’s not uncommon to see fish that has just been cleaved in half still wriggling on the chopping board in the markets. Meats and vegetables looked equally appetising which made me wish that our hotel room also had a small kitchen so we could cook up our own dinner. However this probably isn’t the Vietnamese thing to do, since it seems that half of the city eats out on the streets every night, another essential element of daily life here. As we wandered round it was sometimes rare to see a corner that hadn’t been taken over by locals sitting on tiny plastic chairs around equally small plastic tables as they consumed pho, local coffee, bia hoi or even cocktails. In fact, it is often impossible to walk on the pavement which becomes crowded with chairs and tables occupied by locals who seem to spend most of their free time on the streets socialising. Along with the constant buzz of traffic it’s difficult to think of a city I’ve visited that seemed so alive.

By the time we made it back to our hotel late in the afternoon we were exhausted; however we only had a couple of hours to rest and prepare for the night ahead. Fortunately the meeting point Heidger had suggested was just literally a few metres across the road and we were soon knocking back large bottles of tiger beer at a nearby bar. Heidger, as we had predicted told us of his recent exploits with all the enthusiasm and joy we’d come to expect from him in Cameron Highlands. Having spent time in Thailand with his girlfriend who had flown over to join him for a week, he had worked his way through Cambodia and travelled from the south of Vietnam to Hanoi in a reverse of the journey we planned to take over the next few weeks. This was the last stop on his travels before he headed back to New York via Bangkok. Listening to his stories it was clear that he’d truly been bitten by the travel bug. If on returning to New York work was in short supply he told us that it was very likely he’d be jumping on another plane to continue his adventures armed with his SLR Camera, Lens and several high capacity memory cards. As we continued our discussions over dinner at the restaurant we’d discovered the night before we also talked about how we might next meet up. Over the course of our travels we have met many interesting people who we have enjoyed spending time with, but there are a special few that we feel a strong connection with and hope to stay in touch. Heidger is definitely one of those people and it was such a pleasure to meet up with him again and we look forward to seeing him when we next visit New York or when he comes over to Europe.

After dinner it was time to head to the club and I was feeling a little nervous. Bars on the beaches of Goa and Shacks on the river banks in Laos was one thing, but an underground club (no matter how casual) in the capital of one of the most populous nations in South East Asia was another matter. Han the club owner had given me one polite warning that whilst he was happy to host us for Maren’s birthday (part 2!) he still had a business to run and he couldn’t afford to have an empty club on a Saturday night. I’d spent time selecting tracks earlier in the day that I hoped wouldn’t be a radical departure from the regular DJs musical style. On arrival things were still quiet so I had time to setup my equipment and spend half an hour playing a few tracks. However, later on in the night, when my turn came around on the decks it seemed that my music or presence wasn’t as welcome as I’d earlier thought and it wasn’t long before a “facing saving” manoeuvre was politely executed by Han who explained that the other DJs said that there was “something wrong with the sound coming from my laptop that was effecting the speakers”. With nothing obviously wrong with the sound as far as my ears (or Maren’s) were concerned I decided to pack up and enjoy the rest of the night with Maren and Heidger. In all honesty, it was amazingly cheeky that I’d got to play at all, especially on a Saturday night and whilst I was very disappointed not to play for longer, it was still a great experience. Perhaps if I’d aimed for Sunday night things would have been a bit different. In fact Han invited me to come back and play the following night, however with better things to do than pursue a DJ career in Hanoi it was time to move on. We’d had great fun in Hanoi, but the hectic pace of city life was starting to take its toll so the following day we made plans to visit what is perhaps Vietnam’s most famous natural attraction, Halong Bay. When you see the pictures it doesn’t take much convincing to book a trip, so we splashed out on two day cruise around the bay. Would Vietnam’s natural beauty make as big of an impact as its capital city had?

All the pictures from Hanoi at http://picasaweb.google.com/kris.lander/Hanoi

The trouble with Vang Vieng

Having booked flights from Vientiane to Hanoi before we left Luang Prabang our last week in Laos was taking shape. We were looking for one last stop before heading to the capital and with Maren’s birthday just a few days away, Vang Vieng seemed like the obvious choice. Popular with backpackers looking to party it has acquired a somewhat infamous reputation.

Our first impressions on arriving were positive. With peak season over the town was somewhat subdued and we managed to find a nice guesthouse on the edge of town by the river away from any of the noisy bars and clubs located further upstream. The mountainous rocks that rise up around this town situated in the valleys of Vientiane province are striking and despite the somewhat ugly sprawl of the guesthouses and restaurants that make up the town there is a real natural beauty about the place.

However, we soon caught a glimpse of one of the less charming aspects of Vang Vieng as we walked around. These are the “TV restaurants” which have, in an attempt to draw in the young crowd, arranged themselves around batteries of televisions which show popular western TV series on continuous rotation. Two shows in particularly dominate the programming, Friends and Family Guy and it’s almost impossible to walk around town without hearing Rachel, Ross, Chandler and rest of the gang blaring out from a nearby eatery. Predictably, to go with the homogeneous diet of western TV, the food follows a similar pattern. Pizza, pasta and even English favourites like “Fish and Chips” or “Roast with Yorkshire Pudding” can readily be found on menus across town. As a result, it’s difficult to find a culinary experience here, especially with regards to local cuisine, as the majority of patrons are happy to wolf down their cheeseburger and fries. However having been forewarned by fellow travellers and the Lonely Planet, we knew what to expect and weren’t particularly disappointed. In fact, somewhat shamefully, we would have to admit to enjoying a couple of pizzas and seeing “The one where Rachel finds outs”.

Besides we weren’t here for the cultural experience we were here to celebrate Maren becoming a year older. Our plan was simple. Find a bar that we could take over with our friends and with any luck get them to let me take over the music by DJing for the night. This proved to be surprisingly easy and it wasn’t long before we’d found a shack-cum- bar called Jokers which was situated in a beautiful location on the river. One of guys that worked at the bar, an English guy called Shaun said they’d be more than happy to have us around for an evening.

The next day along with Trish, Liz (who had accompanied us from Luang Prabang) and their friend Ryan we decided to spend a lazy afternoon on the river. Vincent, Marc and Emilie, who had less time on their hands, were keen to try out the Vang Vieng phenomenon of “tubing”. This involves been driven few kilometres upstream and sitting on huge truck tire inner tubes to float back to town. So whilst waiting for the French trio to float past us we spent the afternoon cooling off in the river with “bucket” sized cocktails. With the beautiful surrounding, the clear blue skies (the first we’d seen in Laos) and music blasting from the bar sound system it was easy to appreciate what had originally drawn people here and we found ourselves starting the party early. When Vincent, Marc and Emily finally appeared on their tubes we’d decided to bring the birthday celebrations forward a couple of days and we gathered back at the river, armed with my laptop hoping to start a much bigger party.

Unfortunately the idyllic afternoon did not translate into a perfect night. The well intentioned Shaun, who originally had offered to let us take over for the night was not ultimately in charge of the entertainment policy at Jokers. Over the course of the night it became clear that his partner James, a drug-addled Yaba addict, had the final say on what went on at the bar. Despite his earlier promises he claimed that he had to follow his policy of letting customers rotate plugging in their iPods. I suspect he decided this when he realised that his definition of trance music (ear splitting mind numbing psy trance) did not match mine. That said we still had a great night. After giving up with the laughable music politics at Jokers, we continued long into the night elsewhere making some new friends along the way and in the end the quality of company and conversation more than made up for the lack of quality music later in the night.

The following day was unsurprisingly a quiet one, in which we rested up so we were ready to get “in the tube” and have our turn floating down the river. It wasn’t quite the experience we were expecting with the tubing providing very few little thrills with the pace back to town almost glacial at times. The action, as in town, is at the bars which line up on either side of the river bank at the start of the course. With loud music, waterslides, rope swings, free shots and cheap beer their aim is make you quickly forget any thoughts of using your tube to get back to town. And from the steady stream of Sawngthaews that turn up in town every evening full of drunk guys and girls it seems that they are pretty successful. However, expecting they’d be plenty of opportunities to stop for a drink further downstream Maren and I floated straight through. Unfortunately we were wrong and it wasn’t long before we were back in town with our tubes somewhat bemused by the whole experience. In the evening we met up our French friends for a final dinner together, as they were leaving the following day. They had discovered one of the few places in town that served up simple and honest Laos food. What made the meal special though was the red wine for they’d brought along for Maren’s birthday. We were both very sad to say our au revoirs to them at the end of the evening. By the time Maren’s actual birthday rolled around the less charming aspects of Vang Vieng were becoming harder to ignore and so we booked our transport to Vientiane a day earlier than we had planned. However we did our best to enjoy our final day and I did my best in spoiling Maren to make her birthday special.

During our last couple of days we began to reflect on Vang Vieng and the effects of the party scene that has developed in this little corner of Laos. Whilst Luang Nam Tha was a role model for how tourism can have a positive impact in poorer parts of the world, Vang Vieng highlights some of the more damaging aspects. Having over time become a playground for young Westerners looking for a good time, Vang Vieng has become somewhat of a backpacker ghetto and not everyone is happy about it. With cheap booze, readily available drugs and parties running late into the night on the river many of the local population have become deeply unhappy about what has happened to their town. The cultural differences whilst not immediately obvious compound the problem. Laos people are far more conservative than their Thai neighbours never mind the backpackers that come here. As a local teacher explained to Vincent, when you have a country where it is frowned for a women wear tops that reveal more than their forearm stories of drunken girls being seen running through the street at night wearing no clothes at all do not go down well. In fact the sight of guys walking around town bare chested is enough to antagonise locals. Parents are also concerned of the example is being set to their young impressionable teenagers especially in regards to drugs. “Happy” shakes, “Special” pizzas and “O” Tea were on the menu all over town and one bar was brazen enough simply offer “1g of Opium” for 100,000 Kip (less than 8 pounds).

Whilst it may be somewhat disappointing to see the negative effects as a result of pursuing the backpacker dollar, it is also quite understandable, especially in a country as poor as Laos. Unfortunately, I suspect that it is a minority, rather than a majority of locals that are benefitting from the money being made. When the majority of backpackers are just out of school or university looking for a good time rather than a cultural experience it’s not surprising that pizza and burgers end up on the menu instead of Laap and sticky rice. It’s also not surprising that young people away from home on vacation will experiment with drugs when they are so easily available. All of this has made Vang Vieng one of the most difficult places to write. Whilst we might have conducted ourselves with a little more decorum and respect than most who visit here, we still felt uncomfortable with how our fun might have impacted the local community. When there are such differences in both culture and wealth it is inevitable tourism will bring change. This is often at a frightening pace and even with the best intentions this change can be problematic and unsettling. Of course it is not all bad and along with valuable income there are many benefits to both tourists and residents alike in the exchange of cultural ideas and knowledge. However, in the worse cases where those differences are not respected or even recognised the change can be traumatic and destructive. In a place like Vang Vieng, where the number of visitors quickly started to outnumber the residents, a town’s original identity can quickly be destroyed with little forethought to the consequences. Unfortunately, those who suffer the worse are invariably those with the least power or choice in the matter. It therefore has only made both Maren and myself even more determined to travel as responsibly as possible and to always ensure that on balance our travels do far more good than they do harm.

Our time in Laos was almost over. We arrived in Vientiane the following evening with just a day to look around the capital before catching our plane. We took the opportunity to enjoy some more refined food than that available Vang Vieng and I caught up on some blogging while Maren spent the last of our Kip at the market. We also bumped into both Vincent and Marc on the street when we arrived and I’m sure that when we get back home we’ll be seeing them again sometime in the future. Laos had certainly lived up to the hype that we’d heard from many people, both on our travels and back at home. The people are especially friendly and perhaps the most laid back in South East Asia. It always seemed easy to have conversations and interactions with locals that went beyond usual polite pleasantries or practicalities such as ordering your food. Our experiences with the hill tribes and the celebration of the Laos New Year were undoubtedly highlights of the trip and we’d also made some great new friends. Vietnam would have a hard act to follow, however with temperatures over 40 degrees in Vientiane we were happy to be boarding our plane taking us to the more temperate climate of north Vietnam which according to weather reports was nearly 20 degrees cooler. Our first stop would be the buzzing capital of Hanoi, where we had learned that our friend Heidger (who we’d first met in the Cameron Highlands of Malaysia) would also be soon arriving. We were excited at the prospect of meeting up and sharing stories of our adventures over a cold beer.

All the pictures at

http://picasaweb.google.com/kris.lander/VangVieng

http://picasaweb.google.com/kris.lander/Vientiane