Hanoi frenzy

I have never known a city like Hanoi. It is not as big as Bangkok or even Saigon, and with an old quarter, a couple of inner-city lakes and Lenin Park, it is quite quaint. But the pace of life is faster than I've ever seen. If you stand still you'll get run over. The city is 90 per cent motorbikes and there are no road rules, they just go whether they see a space, including the pavement. I feel like an old man gone to pick up his grandson from nursery and there are a thousand toddlers running around playing tag - only on motorbikes.

I do like Vietnam but it is possibly my least favourite of the three south-east Asian countries, although I've not had enough time to do it properly. The majority of the people are wonderful but some are slightly harder and more arrogant than in Thailand and Cambodia, sometimes I feel more meal ticket than guest. A girl I met on the way up here from Hoi An said she felt less safe here than in Cambodia.

It would be ridiculously presumptious to guess a reason for this after just a few days, so here I go. I think all three countries have been shaped by recent conflicts, or in Thailand's case the lack of one. Cambodians are more wary and Vietnamese are very confident, with a real style and swagger about them. They believe, rightly or wrongly, that they fought off the US during the war, winning against the world's greatest superpower. I think to a certain extent the war has made them hard and winning has made them very self-possessed, which is generally a good thing, but can be negative. Anyway, I've had to cut my trip to Halong Bay down to one day, the Chinese visa is still up in the air, the embassy in London has been supremely useless, apparently losing the countless documents I've sent them. I think it should be OK, but it has been an incredible pain in the...

Chasing buses, indecent proposals and the rain

I'm now in Hoi An, half way up the Vietnamese coast, and it is pouring down. I got here early after an overnight bus ride and managed to sort a few things out early doors before the rain came. For the last couple of hours I've been stuck in my room watching Die Hard 2! Anyway, Hoi An is a very cute little town. It has more of a Chinese influence than French, in the old town all the buildings are faded yellow, many with lanterns hanging up outside. The Vietnamese, it seems, love to shop and there's no end of stores here - fashion, furnishings, gifts, etc - but I'm trying to save cash.
In Siagon I did the tourist thing - bit of a mission - in one day I went to the market, the fine art gallery, Reunification Palace and the War Remnants Museum.
The bus journey was almost 24 hours in total - two buses with an hour change in Nha Trang, where I probably would have spent some time if I had more of it before I am due in Hong Kong.
I almost didn't make it that far. South-East Asians love to eat and every bus journey is peppered with seemingly needless lunch, brunch, dinner, afternoon tea, midnight supper, etc, breaks. We stopped for a lunch in a two horse town and the bus took off while I was in the toilet! I came out to see it rounding a corner out of view and had to chase after it (and both my bags) on the back of some guy's bike.
While in the Nha Trang tourist office waiting for the second bus I shared around some biscuits. Most people politely declined but one Vietnamese woman took a handful then told me I could take her to Nha Trang for $10. In truth it wouldn't have been tempting even if she was free and I suggested she pay me $10 and I'd think about it. We all laughed though I'm not sure she understood.
Hopefully the rain will stop as I've got a two day trip to Halong Bay, which looks absolutely stunning, the day after next. Then it's the pretty crucial moment of truth regarding a Chinese visa. Hopefully I'll get to go as my blagging for Hong Kong has gone into overdrive and I have five free nights in top hotels and three tours all booked up. I can go to Hong Kong without a visa but would need to get a flight rather than go by land, which would cost much more, then I would have to sort out another additional flight to Tokyo, eek. I can't load photos at the moment as the CD with the hardware doesn't seem to be working, but as soon as I sort it I'll update the posts.

Angkor Wat, Cambodia and arriving in Vietnam

Feeling a little under the weather, think it may have something to do with being out every night for a month, so have decided to try and chill this evening. This has coincided with it being a Saturday, but in the life of the hobo weekends are meaningless.
Anyway, here's an update. Angkor Wat was magnificent. I spent a great day meandering around temples, although towards the end it was tiring, there's just so many of the blighters. Angkor Wat itself and the towers of Bayon with the faces of Hindu Gods on them are particularly brilliant. If the killing fields are the part of Cambodia's history it cannot escape, Angkor Wat is the part it can never live up to, but that's a bit churlish. They are justifiably very proud and the name appears on everything from hotels and shops to the national beer. In Thailand everyone warned me about Cambodia, but I found it really nice and while the people are not as outwardly friendly as Thais, they are once you get to know them. The only exception to this (in both countries) are the flaming tuk-tuk drivers who endlessly offer lifts, guns (only Cambodia), marijuana and girls. I just tell them I'll take two of each.
Oh, I met the crazy croupier lady in Siem Reap again. She was much saner this time, apart from when she had a happy pizza, but I managed to persuade her that she should see the Killing Fields rather than come straight to Vietnam with me. It's a pretty low act to use the massacre of two million people to my own advantage, I just don't know what to tell you.
Siem Reap is already very nice if also very touristy. Phnom Penh initially appears to be a bit of a dump, but it has a kind of faded beauty. I don't want to go all Location, Location, Location on you, but the French architecture is really nice, it's scruffy but not at all built up like Bangkok and Ho Chi Min City (Saigon), and just needs a bit of a paint job. With a couple of decades of peace, if it avoids being turned into a concrete jungle it could be stunning. Oddly in both Cambodia and Vietnam women wander around in pyjamas, whatever the time of day. I'll try to stick photos up soon, although I have a nasty suspicion my camera has deleted my Angkor Wat photos, which would be a blow.

The Killing Fields

In Cambodia now, and today I visited the Killing Fields of Cheung Ek and Tuol Sleng museum, which was a school that the Khmer Rouge converted into a prison. Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge ruled for almost four years at the end of the 1970s after winning a civil war. The movement was communist despite initially being backed by King Sihanouk, and very Orwellian seeking to ban possessions, education and all kinds of individualism. The killing fields are just outside Phnom Penh. The only way for me to get there was to get a lift by taxi or motorbike and inevitably the person who takes you would have lost friends and relatives during that time. About 2 million people are believed to have died - a quarter of Cambodia's population at the time - although some historians put much of that down to US bombing during the Vietnam war. Either way the killing fields are chilling. There is a large monument in the centre filled with 20 shelves full of human skulls, about 80,000 in all. They are grouped by age and sex. Dotted around the outskirts are hut structures surrounding pits filled with weeds and muddy rainwater, where mass graves had been dug up.

Much of Tuol Sleng is given up to mug shot photos of Khmer Rouge victims, staring back at their captors; emaciated, defiant and terrified. There are also stories from those who survived and relatives of those who didn't. There is a floor of brick cells and a floor of wooden ones, none were big enough for a person to lie flat. Aside from that there are more skulls and the instruments of torture used by the Khmer Rouge.

Generally, I'm in favour of this kind of morbid tourism, such as Ground Zero and the River Kwae Bridge, as they stop people forgetting things that shouldn't be forgotten and honour the dead or people who made huge sacrifices. But I feel sorry for Cambodians and people living in Phnom Penh because they are so reliant on tourism and the tourism is reliant on the killing fields. They are trapped by their own horrific recent history.

Oh my Buddha

Thais have great phrases, both in their language and ours. 'Jop shalop salai' (how it is pronounced, I don't know how it's spelt) means I'll give you a little slap! It's more cheeky than aggressive. They have the famous and nonsensical 'Same, same, but different', which is so popular is appears on T-shirts, and my favourite 'Oh my Buddha', which is great for moments of comic exasperation which, in the nearly 12 hour journey from Koh Phangan to Phuket there were plenty.
On my last full day in Koh Phangan I rented a motorbike and rode around the island. I've never driven a bike before and although it was fairly straightforward I was predictably incompetent, I'd like to think I resembled Steve McQueen in The Great Escape but it was more like Mr Bean Rides Again! We then all went to the full moon party. Yesterday my mind and body were ravaged by this hedonism,but I am now starting to recover. I spent most of the evening with a Fife girl (thousands of miles around the world and I end up with someone from Glenrothes!) she had a boyfriend back home and nothing happened, we just drank and danced and laughed on the beach until about 8am. To be honest it was a good excuse to escape the Cockney croupier couple (previous post) as, after a few drinks, the girl tended to become a couple of chips short of a casino.
I'm now back in the lap of luxury after blagging a couple of nights stay in a posh resort by a glorious beach in Phuket. Unfortunately the prices are so high round here I can't afford to go diving. Still, you win some, you lose some. More pics will follow soon, I promise.

Koh Phangan and stereotypes

I am now in Koh Phangan, awaiting the full moon party tomorrow night. I have a little hut by the beach and am surrounded by palm trees, it's all pretty idyllic although I'm not naturally a beach person. The journey here was long and arduous. It was 24 hours between leaving Kanchanburi and arriving at the hotel, and that trip included two buses, two taxis, then another bus and finally another taxi. However it was all worth it. Half way down I met a couple of Londoners. former casino workers and an ex-couple who still manage to argue like a couple! He is a bit of a cockney wide boy while she is like a Catherine Tate caricature (she even said 'what a liberty' at one point.) But they are a good laugh and I find one of the things about travelling is its best to take everyone at face value, if you have a certain type of person in mind to hang out with you'll only really meet that kind of person. It's been a period of stereotypes in that regard. In Kanchanaburi I met a classic northerner from Buxton ('Where't water comes from'), and a career traveller in his 50s who had packed in his job a decade ago, he was both very interesting and quite pretentious. I have managed to blag a couple of free nights in Phuket (disappointingly pronounced poo-get) so will head there for diving before going back to Bangkok for a flight to Cambodia. I will update the photos on the blog when I find an internet cafe that can do it.

A bridge over troubled water

Yesterday, a brief stop en route in Bangkok, was a nightmare. After a sleepless night on a bus down from Chiang Mai - the guy next to me had no concept of space boundries - I spent the entire day trudging round in search of the Cambodia Embassy, which had been thoughtlessly moved from a convenient city centre position to miles out. It has been baking hot the last two days, but I now have Cambodia and Vietnam visas sorted and it is full steam ahead.
I am currently in Kanchanaburi, home to the Bridge over the River Kwai (or Kwae according to the Thais, who told them they could name their own rivers, haven't they seen the film). One of my grandfathers was a WW2 POW (not here though) and, without wishing to sound too corny, the whole thing has been very moving. After all I could not do what I am doing were it not for their unbelieveable suffering. As well as the bridge, there is a very informative museum and a very well-preserved cemetery.
In the interests of honesty two things stuck in the craw. Firstly there is a Japanese memorial next to the bridge for Allied troops and everyone else who lost their lives. It was war, but even so one group was largely responsible for the deaths of the others, and many of those deaths could have been avoided though greater humanity. The second is how few Americans died here compared to Brits, Dutch, Australians and other Asians.
Still it's a long time ago and the only time my Taid (Welsh for grandad) spoke to me about his experiences in the war, he was not bitter towards anyone, including the Germans who held him captive. He actually spoke without any pride, sentimentality or bias whatsoever, which was the mark of the man.

Trekking

I've spent the last three days trekking in rain forest north of Chiang Mai. Most of the time it rained heavily and we got absolutely soaked. The trip started with a visit to a long-necked Karen tribe. There are three types of Karen tribes - red, white and long-necked. The women from the red and white tribes only wear red or white, depending on which tribe they belong to, until they are married. The women in the long-neck Karen tribe wear those fairly iconic rings all the way up their necks, they look pretty heavy but a woman I spoke to said they are not. We then had an elephant ride. This was better than the elephant ride I had in India as we went through rain forest and my elephant a five-year-old mare called Sitri was pretty unruly and refused to do anything her mahut, who looked like a Thai version of Blakey from 'On the buses' - "I'll get you for this Sitri (comic fist shaking)".
We then had a massive climb to about 3000ft, arriving sweaty and exhausted, and stayed the night with a Lahu tribe in a very nice wooden shack. The next day was all trekking and we were hit by the monsoon. The ground below became extremely muddy and at times resembled a dirty waterfall. I didn't have hiking boots as I couldn't justify shelling out for a few days and then carrying them the rest of the trip, and have the natural balancing skills on Bambi on ice at the best of times. For a while I found that light quick steps were the safest way to go, even if I did look like a drunken fairy, but as the rain got harder even this couldn't save me and my backside and the forest floor became close friends. Yesterday, the trek ended with rapids rafting and a ride on a bamboo raft. The group was all Dutch and German, apart from me, and we all got on very well (which I have to say as they may end up reading this, but it is also true).
Just a quick word about an elephant park which I went to immediately before the trek. They basically have performing elephants playing the harmonica, playing football, dancing throwing darts, spinning a hulahoop around their trunks and even painting. It may seem in bad taste, and I know it's impossible to tell for sure, but the elephants seem to enjoy it (there was a lot of showboating going on). Years ago elephants would be used in Thailand for logging and other agricultural work, but not anymore. Without the performances and the rides they may have no use and a sanctuary has already had to be opened for abandoned elephants. They are expensive to keep and the tourist stuff brings in much needed money to poor communities. So, on balance, I think it's a good thing.
Tonight I hope to get a bus to Bangkok to collect a Vietnam visa and then a Cambodia one, then head to Kantanaburi and the bridge over the River Kwai, before heading to the islands

Thaksin, the king and royal internet porn

I'm emotionally drained from my life improvement programme (and drinking until 3am with a friend from back home). Funny how its takes going into therapy to make you realise how screwed up you are!
Anyway Chiang Mai is very nice - a bit like Edinburgh to Bangkok's London - and the press trip people have been spoiling me (inbetween ravaging my soul and playing chess with my innermost demons). I've had a tour of their other three partner hotels, a hot oil massage from a very small but freakishly strong and somewhat sadistic woman, and high tea!
Thaksin Shinawatra, the former Man City owner, is from Chiang Mai and is still quite popular here. He is generally seen as a bit of a scoundral but reveered as a great intellect. A lot of the Thais up here would like him back as prime minister. However, he is nowhere near as popular as the king. People wear 'I love the king' wrist bands, there are picture of him on every corner. Mention his name to a Thai guy and he suddenly appears like a love-sick teenager... 'We have such a wonnderful king,' he'll say, smiling away to himself. Did you know he invented a kind of fake rain that single-handedly saved Thailand's rice farms. I'm a little sketchy on the details but you understand he is a modern day Da Vinci and apparently a hell of a trumpet player to boot. There are rumours that Thaksin, the old devil, was trying to dilute the king's powers when he was in charge and this - as opposed to the corruption - is pretty much seen as his only fault in Chiang Mai (not in Bangkok, there they hate him). The dark cloud on the horizon is that the prince and rightful heir to the throne is not as popular to say the least, the Thais say he is cruel, a womaniser, and has several illegitimate children in the US and UK. Now I've been told this in confidence so don't tell anyone else but apparently there's naked photos of the prince's latest wife on the internet. Fortunately we don't think the king knows about them, but it's a worry.

Ayuthaya and Chiang Mai

Left Bangkok early yesterday and took the train to Ayuthaya, the former capital. It was deserted several centuries ago when the Thais were under constant attacks from those pesky Burmese. A fair-sized modern city has now sprung up supported by the tourists who come to see the array of chedis and wats ruins. From what I can gather chedis are where the ashes of kings and Buddhas are stored and wats are like little temples. Ayuthaya also has one bloody big Buddha, in bronze no less - I'll load some pics soon.
Didn't stay overnight, instead got a night train to Chiang Mai and my four-day 'life improvement' course. So far I have just had to fill in a survey of more than 100 questions ranging from how stressful my work is (not very anymore) to whether I have ever felt like ending it all. Tomorrow the talking therapies begin. I don't mind at all - they don't want much of my time - and I am holed up for four nights in this great complex. I've stayed in very grand hotels in India (only when it's free of course) and although this is not as opulent, its probably nicer - rows of little white villas, a swimming pool, and all my food and booze seemingly on the house. Right now I am in the library, using the free internet, drinking complimentary cognac - it's a hard life.
After four days of ravaging my innermost demons I am going on a three-day trek elephant riding, rafting and meeting the hill tribes of northern Thailand. I had hoped to go with some Danish friends I met in Bangkok, but it would be unfair to ask them to hang around for four days while this crowd crack my soul open like an egg on the frying pan of life.
Finally, just a word on Thais, who I think are phenomenal. But there's a contradiction in that although they are naturally very friendly and hospitable and even when they are trying to scam you they are so good-natured they more resemble a kid stealing your car keys than a serious con-artist, however, 'face' is unbelieveably important to them and they can actually be quite dangerous. I've heard horror stories of extreme violence from Thais if they think they are losing face. It's obviously important to be polite as we're guests in this country, but it can also be very important for your health.