Videos From the Trip!

Here are some fun videos from the trip...The first one is a video that Linh, my roommate took, when we finally got off the ruins site and on a walkway back to the bus area. At first I didn't know she was taking a video, so when she asked me, "Where are we?" I gave her my honest answer: "I don't know!" This is how I feel about the whole trip, and I kind've like it! I don't know where we are or where we're going, but I don't really care - i'm just enjoying the adventure!


Here's a video of Mr. Hao telling us about "Holy Water" that the ancient Cham peoples used to drink!

Here's how you cross the street in Viet Nam! There are not crosswalks, and VERY few stoplights. Don't make eye contact with any driver - just step out in the road, and cross the street. It is the responsibility of the driver to weave around you!

And here's what it looks like driving inside a big beast of a taxi...

At the royal palace, there was a huge moat, as well as a number of large ponds. This pond was the main pond, and we happened to walk by during the Coy feeding time! The coy are huuuge!! Watching them flap all over each other is kind've strange though.

Here's a video of Halong Bay, our first major tourist excursion. The beginning shows the boat that latched onto our boat and sold us fruit, and the end shows the floating house with it's fish and seafood for sale swimming inside the front porch!

This is one of America's former air fields - today, it is one of the most toxic areas in the world. It is covered in Agent Orange. You can kind of see in the video - there are still large amounts of people living there, in the extremely toxic region. They're homes, families, businesses, and lives are rooted in this area, even though it is basically poisonous.

Here's some Hanoi rain - not as heavy as rain we saw later in Hue, but still very heavy. Everyone puts life on hold for a few minutes and waits under store overhangs until the rain passes!

This is the lovely Mr. Hao...I happened to capture a golden nugget of him saying "Holy Babies"...he says many amusing phrases!!

How Now Brown Cow?

This past weekend was amazing!!! We went to Hoi Anh, the ancient trading village, for 2 nights. On the drive up, we saw some breathtaking views of both the countryside and the coast of Vietnam!

Upon arriving, everyone went out to dinner at the "Cargo Club" - a restaurant very well known in Asia and Europe for it's cuisine. Sitting under billowing tents in the cool evening breeze, I once again felt as if someone dropped me into a movie scene that isn't supposed to exist in real life. The restaurant sat next to a river, which floated calmly under the moon. We sat two stories up (most restaurants in Vietnam are 1-4 stories up), on a beautiful porch, painted with rustic golden yellow walls. Small wildflowers graced the tables, which were made of beautiful dark wood. Known for it's international cuisine, I ordered Moroccan grilled salmon from the restaurant. SOO good!

Later that night we walked down the river, towards a bridge. People stirred all around the bridge, visiting an evening market and enjoying the general splendor of the village. Hoi Anh lights up at night, resplendent with lanterns hanging from every possible tree and storefront. Floating in the river were two enormous lanterns made entirely of silk- one was a huge, multi-colored coyfish, and at the moment I am so tired that I can't even recall what the other one was. 

The next day I went to the market in the morning and became overwhelmed with how many goodies and baubles and clothes spilled over onto the streets. After bargaining hard, I bought a lot of stuff, like a greedy kid in a candy store! I tried to seem not too greedy and discreetly hide my trinkets.

Later that day Linh, her cousin and I went to the beach, where we later met up with the group. The beach was like nothing I have ever seen before - so tropical!! It was beautiful and very hot!! In the evening, although everyone else was going out to a bar, Linh and I stayed in and did homework. 2,000 years of history packed into 2 or 3 weeks is not exactly "light reading." (This is somewhat of an exaggeration - we focus intensely on WWII - present day, so the rest is just background stuff.)

In the morning, I woke up and went for a morning swim in the hotel pool....HEAVENLY! The hotel had inlaid the pool with stone and filled it to the brim. The stone made the water appear a deep, teal blue, and it spilled over into beautiful stones from the beach (the stones covered the gutter/drain surrounding the pool). Palm trees surround the pool, and from the pool you can see the river, complete with fishing boats.

We boarded the bus just after 10 am, and drove to ancient temple ruins of the Champa people. In the middle of the mountains, indeed, in the middle of the jungle of central Vietnam, this particular location served as a regular camp of Viet Minh soldiers.The temples date back to the 8th-12th centuries, but were bombed and ruined during the war. Now, although some have retained their basic shape and structure, they mainly look like piles of bricks. The tour guide spoke at length at every pile of brick...It was incredibly hot, and although perhaps under milder conditions I would have found the talks interesting, I must confess I was much more concerned with 2011 than 800 a.d. for the majority of the tour. The bus ride home was air conditioned and uneventful! 

The one glitch in the trip was our overzealous tour guide....Mr. Hao. On one hand, I love him because he is very spunky, obviously works hard, is incredibly friendly, and means well. On the other hand, he seems not to pick up on the body language of us foreign students, and feels determined to be the best tour guide possible regardless of anyone's fatigue. Consequently, he decided to stay in Hoi Anh for the weekend and "accompany" us, even though we were supposed to be alone. He accompanied us 100% of the time, pointing out this and that, and telling the history of things endlessly...Not wanting to be disrespectful, everyone would stand and listen...or pretend to listen, as we wilted in the hot sun, sweating, and dreamed of life without a tour guide. In the morning, Katie, Tori and I headed towards the breakfast room, only to be greeted in the lobby by Mr. Hao (who was not supposed to see us until the next day). He proceeded to tell us about breakfast and started talking about the history of the silk village we were about to visit. It was like that movie, "What about Bob?" about the man who becomes the eternal patient...Mr. Hao is the eternal tour guide. 

Later, at the ruins, even our professor remarked, "Mr. Hao is definitely the most enthusiastic tour guide I have ever had. His stamina is incredible. It's.........unrelenting!" On the four-hour drive home, Mr. Hao began telling us the history of every town or statue that we passed. (There are many.) By the 3rd hour of the trip, he began having his private conversations with Professor Giebel INTO the microphone provided by the bus. He clearly loves the role of tour guide! I have a feeling I will probably never forget Mr. Hao, for the rest of my life!

As a tour guide he was very funny though - ask me why when I see you back home :)

All in all, this weekend was phenomenal!

Finally a chance to sit down and blog...ah! :)
Life is wonderful in Hue, albeit a little busy and a little hot. The city, home to Hue University, is known for it's 'high culture.' Many scholars, physicians, and musicians come out of Hue. In addition, Hue is also known for it's diverse cuisine- lucky for me! There's all kinds of food here, and we have gone out to lots of different restaurants!

The sidenote I will mention is that Hue seems to be overloaded with tourists! Many of the restaurants have opened to accommodate tourists, which has created the problem of too-many-restaurants, not-enough-customers.

Class begins at 7:30 and goes until 11:30 - 4 hours. Hue university has given us a very nice room! Additionally, we get to break in the director's welcoming/receiving room -- which contains immaculate furniture. The first day that we arrived, the staff had put out plates of lychees out for us to eat! Lychees are a small fruit, creepy looking on the outside, and yummy on the inside.

 Later in our stay we visited the palace of the Nguyen Dynasty in Viet Nam. The palace has been greatly damaged and destroyed during the American war. However, today, while much of the palace lies in ruin, a lot of the 200-year old structures survive.

There's a really cool moat filled with lilly pads and lotus flowers surrounding the palace!

Lots of sculptures adorn the palace and the palace grounds - if you keep a sharp eye out, you can spot them everywhere! It's like royal where's waldo?

This used to be the national library, home to ancient canonical texts from China!

The natural structures that survived the war are breathtaking!!

 This is where the empress of Viet Nam, wife of Bao Dai, lived after he died. She also had a large building and pond devoted strictly to receiving guests!

At night the group goes out to dinner - so far Indian food has been the winner. Although Indian food makes the entire group sick, everyone keeps going back there for food! Linh, my roommate, and I, have recently started boycotting the Indian dinners. Last night we went to "Cafe Cathi" and had two Hue specialties - fried rice steamed INSIDE a coconut!!! And beef with lemongrass, which was phenomenal!!! It also did not make us sick - quite a plus.
The woman who owns the restaurant is 22, and runs it with 3 of her closest friends, also around 22 years old. She's very sassy! Linh and I love her!

Yesterday we went to some elaborate tombs of the deceased emperors - I'll write about that later. Today, we leave in 10 minutes for Hoi Anh, a 1500 year old trading port and village that somehow survived decades of war. It is promised to be one of the highlights of the trip! I'm most looking forward to the lantern shops....aaah!

Last of Hanoi

Yesterday we boarded a plane for Hue! Our last day was full of intrigue. In the morning, we went to a Masoleum, where the nationalist party displays Ho Chi Minh's dead, embalmed body. He glowed a creepy shade of orange underneath the preservation lights. Let's just say I'm not trying to go see anymore dead people, no matter how famous or important they are.


Later in the evening we visited the French Quarter, where the French built their living quarters and government buildings. Viet Nam used to be a colony of France, and the Viet Namese suffered under the thumb of French colonial rule for many years.  In fact, Ho Chi Minh is called the "Father of the Revolution" and is revered as the first to seriously cry for Viet Namese Independence. Long before the Americans became involved, the Viet Namese people had been involved in decades of struggle with colonial France.


A lot of the buildings built by the french are very french, for lack of a better description. Some of the buildings are not even constructed in a way that makes sense according to Viet Nam's climate, being constructed in a way that prohibits ventilation. The above photos are the French University in Hanoi, which I think was built in the 1940's maybe??

I did spot something veeeery interesting on the walking tour:

Later, we visited the Catholic Cathedral in Hanoi. The people of Vietnam practice many different religions and life philosophies, including Buddhism, Daoism, Confucionism, and Catholicism. It is ethnically and religiously very diverse. Catholicism in Viet Nam is largely due to missionaries visiting during the Colonial period, I believe.

Anyway, we are now in Hue. I did enjoy Hanoi very much- it's very green, and very beautiful. My favorite thing is how people spill out onto the streets at night - it's much cooler in the evening. Children run around playing as their parents sit on stools, eating and talking outdoors. The streets buz with mopeds weaving every which way. Just like in the US, you can easily spot the young adults out on dates, dressed all up, looking nervous, riding on mopeds together. (Well, maybe they don't ride mopeds together in the U.S!)

That said, I am happy to have moved on. The city, though beautiful, is full, crowded, and tight-spaced. Perhaps these things are what make it beautiful, but I can only handle being crowded when it's below 85 degrees...
Hue is much smaller, and so far, it is just as beautiful, if not more. We'll see what happens!

 As of yesterday, the "study" part of the program officially commenced! Professor Giebel took us out to a restaurant recommended by one of our TA's, Houn. The restaurant, called KOTO, is owned by an Australian woman and is a non-profit dedicated to 'rescuing' at-risk youth from the streets of Hanoi. KOTO runs a 2-year program for its trainees, which is free of charge. Afterwards, the young men and women are equipped with skills and experience to earn a steady wage in the city.
I ate Bun Cha, a traditional Viet Namese dish filled with pork, cilantro, a briny broth, and pickled vegetables. SOOO good!!

Viet Namese coffee is very dark. They serve it with sweetened condensed milk, which tastes like sugar on crack (as the saying goes) and pours out like molasses. It makes the coffee incredibly sweet and concentrated, but very good! Discretion is advised, in my opinion!

Later in the day we went to the Temple of Literature, which is a Confusionist academy founded in 1070 (I believe). It is one of the world's oldest academies.

The temple had 5 separate courtyards, with the final courtyard ending in a temple. The temple used to be mainly a celebration of Confucious and Confusionism, but has taken on somewhat of a religious tone (according to Prof. Giebel). Like the Buddhist Pagoda we visited the following day, the temple shone full of gold, and exhibited multiple statues of important "dead guys" (as I would say). At the foot of the statues, incense burned, people bowed their heads in respect or prayer, and offerings were left as gifts.

Later in the day Linh, Rebekah and I did as the Viet Namese do - we sat out in the street and ate ice and fruit!

The following day (today), we visited the museum of ethnology! In the picture you can see how humid it is outside- I opened my camera for two seconds, and my lens fogged over...

The museum has a very interesting outdoor exhibit displaying the houses of indiginous peoples. Apparently, as we move south for our program, we will encounter more houses in traditional styles.

The houses were INCREDIBLE! Huge, with tons of craftsmanship. It makes sense...it was ignorant of me to assume that these houses wouldn't be "advanced." I really enjoyed "starfishing" on one of the sleeping mats, as someone I know would call it!

Fertility must be a big deal in many indiginous cultures here. One of the houses had boobs carved into the ladder which, in order to get to the main level of the house, you had to grab onto for support!

A tomb was surrounded in X-rated carvings. Carvings of people having sex, men with erections, and pregnant women surrounded the tomb, as well as a couple of animals that signal fertility. There were also broken food plates. It is said to promote a strong afterlife and one that "lacks nothing."

Later in the day we went to a water puppet show, and then to a night street market. It was all very interesting!

 

*These farmers really couldn't stand the heat!