Vietnam – Chapter 3 – AshWoodhall.blog

With Natalia going home from her visit to Vietnam, I did the only thing I knew would help me with missing her – comfort things.

As I now look back at the photos I took in the days since Natalia left, I realise I was seeking comfort and familiarity. Well, except a random visit to see some short films in a random building with a bunch of random people. Other than that anomaly, I dined at ‘homey’ places (Spanish Tapas, Starbucks etc.), went clubbing with Alex and bought some HP sauce…

Around that time, the next part of this wonderful and memorable adventure started – my dad and his partner Anna arrived!

Dad and Anna’s arrival

Soon after their arrival, we starting doing the types of things families do when dads are involved; going to war museums and looking at trains. Haha. I joke, we all wanted to see old planes and be stood on streets so close to trainlines that nearby cafes had recently been forced to close, as, “selfie-seeking tourists cause safety problems“.

Were we about to risk our lives to find a naughtily open-armed cafe and take dangerous selfies and videos? Of course not…

And if you’re interested in seeing some planes and tanks the Vietnamese captured during the war:

It was really something special having dad and Anna come to visit us in Vietnam. I realise now how lucky we were. Not only to be able to travel just before the pandemic, but to experience such an adventurous and quite frankly, random family holiday in Asia, I suppose all thanks to Alex. These things don’t come around often unless you really try to make them happen and I know I’ll always look back and cherish these times. I’d love to have more of these adventurous with my family.

Integration

Now dad and Anna had settled in a little. It was time to integrate them into the Vietnamese culture. Namely, making dad smoke a very strong tobacco bong, watching some rock singer in a pub shower the microphone with seven liters of saliva (a genuine case for a covid mask) and eating, a lot.

Tết / Lunar New Year

According to Wikipedia, Tết, short for Tết Nguyên Đán, Spring Festival, Lunar New Year, or Vietnamese Lunar New Year is the most important celebration in Vietnamese culture.
In short, they take it seriously. Memorably, on the day of Tết the heavens opened to produce one hell of a thunder storm. This made it slightly difficult for Alex, Dad and I to leave our separate accommodations and meet in the centre of Hanoi to witness the annual celebration. In fact, here’ a video of the struggles one local was enduring on my street:

You’ll be pleased to hear we did indeed make it through the temporary ocean to convene in Hanoi and enjoy the fireworks. The centre of Hanoi hosts a pretty yet “I wouldn’t swim in that if the world was on fire” lake, perfect to watch a rather spectacular firework display. Alex and I were able to somehow find each other amongst the chaos. Dad and Anna had paid a kick-in-the-balls type of sum of cash to get into some KFC or other type of establishment which was pleasantly placed on one of the top floors of a central Hanoi building. There was no fried chicken but they did get shelter and some rather special views of the display above and chaos down below.

After some expensive cellular calls we all managed to meet down by the lake to witness the rest of the evening. This is where things got a bit interesting. As part of Tet, the Vietnamese have a rather curious tradition of burning ‘useful’ items in the street. Houses, cars, iPhones, money, alcohol, subscriptions to Netflix and Pornhub, selfie sticks. Okay I got a little carried away there, no selfie sticks are burned – that would be absurd. The idea is, by burning these fake items, they will make it to the afterlife of dead relatives, thereby making their afterlife more, erm, how to say, fulfilling? This is known as ancestor worship and stems from the belief that the spirits of the deceased are still interested in the affairs of the world. In which case, they could probably use some face masks. Must be embarrassing to die in the afterlife?

There is a whole industry supplying the demand of fake items and money, so they can be burned in the street.There may be no logic in this tradition, but it is a tradition nonetheless and witnessing it was quite something. Literally, every street we walked through had numerous families stood around their separate fire, burning their piles. There is a great blog post here on the origins of the tradition which, some say started as a scam so one businessman could sell more paper.

Then there are the temples. We visited one, to find the locals silently praying and donating various items. I felt disrespectful taking pictures here, so I only took one. I had to, just look at the pile of booze, fruits and sweets that people donate as offerings to Buddha. The mystery question for me is what magically happens to all this stuff? I have my theories but can’t help but see a lot of beauty in how the people celebrate Tet.

Hạ Long Bay

After a wonderful yet slightly bizarre Lunar new year celebration, we headed to one of Vietnam’s national treasures – Hạ Long Bay, which, after the fumes of burning iPhones and internet-connected vacuum cleaners (those ancestors gotta be down with the kids), was quite literally a breath of fresh air.

Like the last trip, the bus journey to the boat dock conveniently and totally by coincidence left us for 1 hour at a huge indoor market where one could buy all the Vietnamese souvenirs of their dreams. More coincidentally perhaps, there was a car park full of other buses and tourists all over the shop – how very thoughtful of the trip organisers. I bought some overpriced nuts to keep me going whilst my dad probably bought some entirely useless souvenirs as per usual.

Even more thoughtfully, the market had gone a step further and designed a bus-sized banner with the health and wellbeing benefits of Vietnam’s “regional specialties”:
“Did You Know?”
– Peanut Candy improves memory and anti-aging (so that’s how the locals look so youthful and always remember all 245 of their ancestors birthdays so they can burn more things in the street)
– Dalat Wine increases bone density (useful for when you drink three bottles and fall down the stairs).
– Dried lotus seeds treats insomnia (right, okay), irregular appetite (who wants to be more hungry?) and urinary problems (useful for a night on the Dalat wine).
– Coffee brightens your mood and fights depression (useful for when you wake in hospital with all limbs bandaged after a night on the Dalat Wine).

Check out the picture below for more science based facts:

Boat life

We settled into our new home for the next days, a 3* boat, whatever that means in this part of the world. What comes next is an exploration of these rather wonderful islands, some of which we step foot on, one of which we get lost on. But first, boat life:

After taking our chances on the water, we stop off at one of the islands to explore a huge cave which wasn’t discovered too long ago but dates back to long-ago times…
We also stop off at ‘monkey island’ where Alex tries to adopt a dog and we all get lost. The guide told us to explore and come back within an hour. A group of us try to follow a trail around the island but get it all terribly wrong at some stage, leading us upon a 2 hour trek in which we decide to turn around and try to work our way back. Google maps really needs to up it’s game.

Monkeys and wet pringles

One of the days lead us to another island crowded with monkeys, hungry ones. I wasn’t about to convince a large excited tourist group that feeding the monkeys may not be in the monkey’s best interests. So I grabbed some bananas and got stuck in. Somehow, they escaped with some pringles!

Story time. One random day whilst Alex and I were hanging on the boat, there was a young Vietnamese chap hanging around too. He was a member of the boat crew. Alex may or may not have been smoking a plant-based herb, when this young chap gave a glance of curiosity. Naturally, Alex offered to share his treat. The young boy obliged, took a good few puffs, reacted as though someone had just told him he was adopted, and threw the treat overboard, much to Alex’s distress. We didn’t see the young boy for the remainder of the afternoon. And it isn’t like this boat was large, there were about 6 rooms. We imagined him disappearing from his work duties and sleeping in a customers bedroom for a few hours, only to wake up and raid the chef’s kitchen before being promptly fired by the tour company.

The stunning islands