Yesterday I posted about a visit to the Temple of Literature, so in keeping with that theme I thought that today I would write about books! Travelling offers a fantastic opportunity to catch up on all that reading that you always mean to do but can never seen to find the time to do at home. In a foreign country and away from your usual routine, you often end up with many long bus or train trips on the agenda, lots of downtime (for me, often spent in coffee shops and the like) and less distractions. I generally have a book on the go at home but read WAY more on the road.

What have I been reading lately? I am normally a fiction reader, but I’ve been reading quite a bit of non-fiction lately for some reason, perhaps because those are what books have circulated among our crowd. I thought I’d compile a list of the books I’ve tackled since we’ve gotten to Saigon.

Shantaram – Gregory David Roberts

My Sister’s Keeper – Jodi Picoult

Tears of the Desert – A Memoir of Survival in Darfur – Halima Bashir

A Long Way Gone – Memoirs of a Boy Soldier – Ishmael Beah

Into Thin Air – Jon Krakauer

River of Time – Jon Swain

The Rum Diary – Hunter S. Thompson

Reading at the moment (and loving it):

Anthony Bourdain – A Cook’s Tour

Next on the docket:

Graham Greene – The Quiet American

The Temple of Literature in Hanoi was built in 1070 by Emporer Ly Thanh Tong and is the location of Vietnam’s first university. It is still in good condition (compared to a lot of other historical sites we’ve seen) and is a great example of Vietnamese architecture.

The temple itself is dedicated to Confucius and contains 82 stelae inscribed with the names, birthplaces, and achievements of exceptional scholars. The stelae (pictured below) are mounted on top of stone tortoises, which represent wisdom, learning and stability. A visit here is awesome and a welcome escape from the busy city of Hanoi.

The outer gateway. Be sure to dismount!

Confucius says...

The stone stelae, inscribed in ancient Chinese.

We’ve sung the praises of the tailoring available in Saigon and Hoi An, but it hasn’t all been good. Days before Jen and I left on our 4 week-long Vietnam roadtrip, we had some tailoring done by the same woman who made our dress shirts when we first arrived. I ordered two dresses, but Jen was more ambitious – she ordered a number of different dresses and duvet covers. We had shopped for the fabric, given the tailor pictures of the dresses we wanted made and had numerous measurements taken to ensure the dresses were perfect.

Well, perfect they were not. The dress that Jen and I were most excited about was a black dress that we had found online. It looked awesome in the picture and the thought of having it tailored to fit for $13 made it even sweeter. They were not as we had imagined…

We were laughing before we even tried them on. They just weren’t anything like the picture we had given her – they looked more like bad 80′s prom dresses. Jen’s didn’t even fit properly. With all those detailed measurements, I’m still not sure how the tailor got it so wrong. It was so bad that we decided a photo shoot was warranted.

This is Jen and I checking out our dresses for the first time.  I believe Jen’s exact words were, “What the fuck?”

Then we took the photo shoot outside. Leaning up against a motorbike seemed appropriate.

Then we started posing with the staff. Pretty sure they thought we had lost our minds.

There were many more pictures taken, but you get the idea. What will happen to these amazing dresses, you ask? Well, Jen’s landed firmly in the garbage can, but I’m still packing mine around…I figure it’ll make a great 80′s Hallowe’en costume one day.

Man, Vietnam is truly a stunning country. Having been from the far reaches of the north all the way down to the south, I feel qualified to make such a statement. But I feel like I am repeating myself: “THIS is the most beautiful place in Vietnam”. Well, only one more time, I promise. Phu Quoc Island is everything a tropical island should be – white sand, turquoise water, palm trees waving in the breeze, and freshly caught seafood served grilled on the beach every night for dinner. On the other side of the road that lines the beaches there is lush, green jungle. This is one of those that places that you need to be careful about – if you don’t have anywhere to be, you could really get stuck here.

And the amazing thing about it is that it’s not too crowded. The main beach is fairly developed, but with beach-front bungalows rather than high-rise hotels. It’s only an hour flight from Saigon and it cost me $40 one way, and taking the boat back to the mainland is $8 plus the cost of the bus afterwards. I can’t believe more people from Saigon don’t come here for a few days break from the city.

But having said that, the cast from Season 1: Saigon actually did come here for a quick holiday from teaching. You can read about their experience here: http://www.jetsetzero.tv/2008/12/01/sna-phu-quoc/

Suffice it to say, it goes to show that it’s very possible to have two completely different experiences in the same place. The words “gruelling”, “irritating” and “island prison” certainly didn’t enter my vocabulary while here.

Note: the last picture is the series is literally where I wrote this post on my laptop, gazing upon the sun as it went down over the Gulf of Thailand. They will have to drag me kicking and screaming away from here.

There is a lot of awesome fruit here, but one of the cool things is you actually get to see how it grows. Ever wonder what a pineapple looks like before it is picked? Well, we are at the source. I’ve always thought dragon fruits were a neat looking fruit, but only recently saw a dragon fruit plant.

Why oh why must some of the European ladies go topless on foreign beaches? Is it that they haven’t taken the time to learn about the culture they’re visiting or is it because they know it’s inappropriate but simply don’t give a shit?

Whatever the reason, it really pisses me off. I’m not personally offended by it, but the look of shock is evident when locals pass by these ignorant women. Vietnam seems fairly liberal in its big cities – visit either Saigon or Hanoi and you’ll see many young women dressed stylishly in revealing dresses and heels, though even this will get clucks of disapproval from the older people. In the smaller towns or at religious sites proper, respectful attire should be donned. And it’s NEVER okay for a woman to take off her top in public. How important is it for you to tan your damn nipples?

Every responsible traveller should educate themselves about where they are going BEFORE they go. Many Aussies don’t realize that we tip in North American restaurants and they spend their vacation stiffing servers wherever they go. That just leaves a server grumbling that they missed out on some potential cash. Exposing yourself in a conservative country has a much longer-lasting effect on the people. It’s no wonder how negative stereotypes of Western women come to be born.

Apparently there is a strong “food” theme in my posts. Let’s continue that, shall we?

I had walked past Fanny’s Ice Cream Parlour almost every day on my way to work in Saigon and had always managed to engage my willpower to continue walking past its doors. Price was also a factor – it labels itself as “gourmet ice cream” and prices it as such. If I needed my fix, I’d cheap out and go get a delicious Black Forest Cornetto for $0.75 instead.

Jen and I were in Hanoi, lamenting on the fact that we were back in the traffic and noise of the city after weeks of relative quiet and solitude. We had spent a few hours walking through the French Quarter, where I had hoped to find a giant block of cheese to gorge on. Turns out the French Quarter isn’t as French as I thought it would be and we were headed back to the Old Quarter empty-handed when we passed a Fanny’s Parlour. I noticed a sign outside that announced a relatively new promotion: on the first Friday on each month they do an “all-you-can-eat” ice cream buffet for $4.  ”What day is it?” I demanded of Jen. “Friday” was her reply. “WHAT’S THE DATE?” I shouted, my voice betraying the excitement I felt. “The fifth”, she said, as the realization dawned in her eyes.

Oh, happy day. We decided to forego dinner and consume as much ice cream as humanly possible. It was glorious. It’s actually a really social event, frequented mostly by young Vietnamese folks. Everyone mills about the room, glass dish or cone in hand and chats, giving it the atmosphere of a bar. They have over 30 flavours including chocolate chili, banana and young rice, as well all the regular classics.

In the end, Jen ate 21 scoops of ice cream and claimed that she was close to vomiting. The competitive streak in me came out, bringing my total to 21 scoops plus a scoop in a cone for the walk home. Oh yeah, plus the crepes and the fruit dipped in the chocolate fountain. It caused the tummy to hurt but made us so, so happy.

Please note that the following does not endorse unauthorized prescription medication use…always check with your physician first!

But with that being said, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the beauty of the Asian pharmacy. It depends on the country, but at most shops (which can be found EVERYWHERE), you can purchase many things that you cannot get at home without a prescription and for a fraction of the price. Sometimes you need to make up a bit of a story, but they just don’t have the same type of rules and regulations that many Western countries have.

For example: a recent trip to the pharmacy in Saigon yielded me a year’s worth of birth control ($3 per pack, same brand as I normally use), 100 generic Tylenol 3′s with codeine ($6), 3 months worth of malarial medication ($6), and 20 Zyrtecs ($0.50). Makes you realize how much we are getting gouged at home.

No, this post is not about Jen. Though I’ve seen more of Jen sans pantalons than I’d like to admit.

Chances are, when you visit a traditional Vietnamese village, you will encounter the adorable, dirty, pantless village children on your journey. I used to have a tradition of sending my mom a postcard of such a scene, which I knew always made her inevitably cringe as she gazed upon their dust-smeared smiles. While in Sapa, we were not let down. Perhaps most importantly of all, I was very happy to find that they didn’t once approach us asking for money or candy but simply waved, grinned and yelled “HALLO!”

I’m glad to see the no-pants-dance is still going strong in Asian villages.

We’ve posted about eating dog before. We went to a local restaurant in Saigon a couple months back that specializes in dog meat (or “doggie” as they call it here). Serene ate it by accident that night and was pretty upset. I tried it at a dinner party and I have to say, it was quite delicious. It’s not something I’m planning on eating on a regular basis, but I’ll try anything once. But in Northern Vietnam, it’s a lot easier to find on the menu…

I first noticed the difference from south to north when I saw “thit cho” on a lot of the signs. My Vietnamese is practically non-existent but I do know that this is the phrase for dog. Once I had seen it a couple times, I started looking for it and I realized that it’s found all over the place up here. In Hanoi, there’s a 1km-long district of dog meat joints. There’s definitely a stronger prevalence for dog-eating in the north.

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