For the past month or so Dave and I have been volunteering at The Flicks; a community film house catering to tourists and the local expat community in Phnom Penh. For most of the time since the 31^st July we’ve been busy selling tickets, making popcorn, and sitting around reading lots of books. This has been absolutely wonderful and helped our budget to stretch that little bit further, but “Hello reader, today we ate scrambled eggs on toast then worked until 10pm then ordered takeaway and went to bed” x 31 doesn’t make for a particularly interesting read now does it?

Phnom Penh is a city that manages to be completely chaotic and also perfectly laid back at the same time. Once you get the hang of the fact that no one walks anywhere and that the city all but stops between the hours of 11 and 2 to avoid the hottest parts of the day, it’s a perfectly pleasant place to live. I imagine that’s why there’s such a large expat community here. For the most part it’s Americans and Canadians but we’ve met a fair handful of French and English people too. Most people are here to teach English for a year or two or have moved out with a partner and their children, so we’ve had quite a few regulars coming into the cinema during our time here. Most comment on how different Cambodia is compared to when they visited 5/10 years ago, largely because of the huge amount of Chinese infrastructure going up here. This has been a bit of a recurring theme throughout South East Asia and tends to be received differently depending on who you talk to. In Vietnam most people were very against all the “meddling” from Chinese businesses, and certainly in Cambodia the expat community in general also seems very against it. This is largely due to the fact that Chinese investors appeal to Chinese people and Chinese businesses, meaning the money that would normally flow into the local community becomes concentrated in a circle back and forth through China. Chinese tourists stay in Chinese hotels, shop at Chinese shops and eat at Chinese restaurants, all of which are owned and run by Chinese people, who in turn send the profits back home to their families in China. This, in our opinion, comes from what we discussed a few posts ago, about how Chinese tourists tend to be older and visit other countries through state approved organised tour groups, so it’s sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Some towns around Cambodia such as Sihanoukville have sadly lost their small town seaside charm in favour of Chinese cash. Corruption is rather more blatant here in general. One morning the water pipe burst at the cinema and despite it being the water company’s responsibility to fix it, the chap they sent out wanted $40 to get the work done. If you’re white here you sort of have to accept that the majority of the time, things are going to cost you a little more than they normally would, even if you’re an expat. We’ve just been chalking it up to the Authentic Genuine Cambodian Experience and trying not to let it jade us too much.

 

Last week, we’d rather had our fill of not doing very much at all and decided to head out to explore a bit more of Cambodia’s rather dark recent past. The Khmer Rouge ruled Cambodia for just 4 years from 1975 to 1979 but absolutely decimated the country’s population, economy, and development. The leader, Pol Pot, had a vision of extreme social engineering in which the country would be transformed into a communal farming society, shunning city/modern life and technological advances in favour of traditional farming practices and life. One of the most famous prisons used during their rule is S21, locally known as Tuol Sleng after the school that once stood there. Dave had visited before during his trip to Cambodia in 2012 but since then they’ve added a particularly insightful audio guide, so we decided to take the short walk down for a visit one afternoon. Tuol Sleng was one of between 150-200 detention centres throughout Cambodia and it’s estimated that 20,000 people were tortured and killed there. It’s an exceptionally sombre experience, particularly as it is very clearly an old secondary school. The prison is left largely as it was found when the Khmer Rouge fled Phnom Penh after Vietnamese soldiers stormed the city in 1979. This means that bed frames, shackles, prison cells and barbed wire are all as they would have been during this time. The first building you enter consists of 4 floors, most of the rooms contain bed frames and shackles where prisoners were held and tortured. Pictures have been placed on the walls in each of the rooms to show how the prisoner’s body was found when the soldiers first arrived. In some the buildings, you can see the shoddy “cells” that were constructed as more and more prisoners arrived at the prison. Some are simple woods structures with boards that are now collapsing, others are made of brick walls which are now leaning and falling over. Holes were cut between the rooms to allow easier access between the rooms and in order to fit more cells in. As we wandered through the rooms, a huge storm rolled in, providing a rather appropriate back drop to our visit. Thunder rumbled and the rain fell in buckets as the audio-guide took us through room after room of pictures of victims faces, explaining the different methods used for torture. The final room is filled with skulls, all from victims of this terrible place. Visitors are able to make offerings and donations to a small Buddhist shrine which has been set up in this room. As you leave the centre, a small shop has been set up with books and local handicrafts, as well as two stalls at which two survivors of Tuol Sleng were seated, selling books which detail their experiences. Of the 20,000 people who entered Tuol Sleng, there were only 12 known survivors.

The most famous of Phnom Penh’s attractions is Choeung Ek Genocide Centre, commonly known as The Killing Fields. Located around 15 kilometres to the south of Phnom Penh it is the most famous of the mass execution sites set up by the Khmer Rouge. Approximately 1.4 million Cambodians were killed at these sites from 1975 to 1979 and buried in mass graves. The site is very well put together, with an audio guide taking you round the majority of it, pausing at various points to explain significant locations or historical events. A walkway has been set up since Dave visited in 2012, ensuring visitors do not accidentally step on remains which still surface from the mass graves to this day. The buildings which once stood here have all been dismantled as people sought resources after the fall of the Khmer Rouge, but signs have been set up to indicate where the trucks stopped, where the people were held, and where weapons were held. The mass grave sites have been roped off for the most part, however some still remain outside of the current site, buried under decades of earth and covered by lotus fields and water. The centre has chosen to leave these victims to rest there. The land used to be an orchard and as you walk around it is full of life, fruit trees are everywhere, butterflies swoop and glide around the fields, flowers are blooming where the mass graves are, chickens and birds hop around and chase after lizards. In the centre, a large Buddhist Stupa has been constructed to house some of the thousands of bones that were uncovered here. Mostly skulls are laid out over 8 levels but there are some leg and arm bones as well, marked by scientists explaining the cause of death and the age of the victim. As you reach the end of the audio-guide, you are encouraged to consider the world around you and the events currently taking place in Russia, China, The Congo, and other locations. Who is to say that it couldn’t happen where you live?

Having decidedly had our fill of historical sites and monuments to victims of genocide, we decided to take the week off and head to Mondulkiri province in the North East of Cambodia to see some of the more positive locations Cambodia has to offer. Not only is the weather much cooler there owing to the whopping 700m elevation, but it is also home to one of the finest elephant sanctuaries in all of South East Asia – The Elephant Valley Project. Up at the crack of wotsits on Monday morning, we braced ourselves for another near death experience on the roads of South East Asia in a minivan. Surprisingly, the 6 hour journey wasn’t actually that bad. Sure, it was bad by English standards, but it was one of the better journeys by road we’ve had out here. I think we only overtook a car on a blind corner maybe 2/3 times – practically saint like! Our home for the week was the fabulously named Mondulkiri Pizza Bungalows in the provincial capital of Sen Monorom. A small hotel set up with 3 small “lodges” as rooms, as well as a cracking pizza restaurant. After having spent almost a month sharing a house and a bathroom with other volunteers, this place was absolute heaven. It was also cool enough that we turned the fan off in the room a few times. The hotel was home to two gorgeous dogs named Lucy and Serena who quickly became firm friends, sleeping outside our door during the night and dutifully bounding up to greet us whenever we came back. Even Dave loved them.

Our first day we didn’t do very much of anything other than sleep and appreciate the coolness of the air. The hotel is nestled down by the river, under passion fruit trees and bamboo canes, the perfect location to curl up with a book. The next morning was yet another early start, we headed down to the pick-up point, the aptly named Hefalump Café which serves as a base for the Project but also gives local Bunong minority people a chance to learn hospitality skills and sell handicrafts. We headed off at around 7:45am and joined 6 others – 3 Frogs, 1 Kiwi, 1 Ozzie and a chap from Bristol – for a day of seeing elephants be elephants. Our guide was a local man called Touen who we quickly discovered had a fantastic command of English, as well as a delightfully dry sense of humour. He explained about where the money goes and how they run the centre. It was great to hear that not only does the EVP support elephants but also supports the families of their staff and the local community, running an ambulance service to Phnom Penh as well as providing school supplies for children. There are lots of “white people guilt” projects around in this part of the world but the EVP genuinely seems to have its head and heart in the right place. We were led through dense rainforest to a small clearing by a river where we waited for around 10 minutes before suddenly two huge Indian elephants came plodding through the forest with their Mahouts, entering the stream in front of us and giving us our first glimpses of these majestic creatures. Most of the elephants at the project are either on loan from their owner families who have moved to the city or they are bought/rescued from other facilities. Elephants who are on loan are rented by the EVP for a contracted period of time, at which point either the contract is extended, or the EVP will try and raise funds to purchase the elephant from the owner. We met a total of 4 elephants throughout our day at the EVP, hiking through dense rainforest to observe them in their natural habitat. The EVP prides itself in not allowing touching, riding, or washing the elephants, but you can get about as close to the elephants as you would feel comfortable given that most of them weigh around 3 tonnes. We met Sambo, an elephant who used to give tourists rides around a temple in Phnom Penh, at the medical centre. Her feet are damaged from walking on the concrete every day for 30 years so she has to have medical treatment every day, involving standing in a bucket of Epsom salts and being fed copious amounts of fruit – some of which ends up on her back as she takes water in her trunk and sprays it over her back. We also met Ruby, Doe and Darling. The centre has 10 elephants in total, 9 females and 1 male, though the male cannot be seen at this time of year due to his aggressiveness during the breeding season. I have no words to express how phenomenal and beautiful these animals are. Our day spent with them was absolutely magically, following them through the forest just watching them play and eat and be elephants! It is a day I will never forget for as long as I live and if you are ever in this part of the world, you must absolutely go and visit.

Our final day of cool weather we took a tuk-tuk tour around the local area to visit a waterfall and see some cracking views out over the rainforest. Our guide picked us up around 8:30 and we headed off to see Bou Sra waterfall. Like many of these places it has a short section of shops after you pay your entrance fee, but we decided 9am was a little early to be sampling passion fruit wine. Heading down the steep path to the waterfall we enjoyed the peace and quiet, the rumble of the water in the distance and the sounds of the forest. The day was a cloudy one and a light drizzle had settled in but we didn’t mind, you take every opportunity to be cold that you can get when you’re here! We soon reached the bottom of the waterfall where the tranquillity continued, for all of 2 minutes before a group of local young people turned on their huge speaker and pumped out “bangin’ tunes” for all to hear. That’s just what we need we thought. Why enjoy the natural sounds of thousands of gallons of water cascading down while birds sing and bugs chirp? Absolutely it requires some enthusiastic techno music. Needless to say, we took a few pictures and quickly made our exit, deciding that 10am was definitely an acceptable time to try some passion fruit wine – yum. Clambering back into the Tuk Tuk our driver pointed out some of the local plants and trees and chatted about deforestation and farming. His English wasn’t brilliant, but we could pretty much follow the gist of what he was saying. Our next stop was a coffee plantation nearer town where we stopped for an early lunch of rice and noodles (makes a nice change!) and we watched as a big black cloud made its way closer and closer to us. We made our exit and headed to our next spot, trying to outrun the rain. As we reached the Sea Forest viewpoint, the heavens opened, and we were treated to a cooling shower before it passed as quickly as it had arrived. The forest here stretches out for miles, as far as the eye can see, and further. You can probably see right into Vietnam on a clear day and if your eyesight is good enough. We mucked about with the various viewpoint props they’ve got set up there before heading back to the hotel, bidding our driver a fond farewell. No sooner had we settled back in the room, the rain started. The rain didn’t stop until we left the following morning. Relentless. This meant that sadly we had to have pizza for dinner as there was no way we were going out! What a shame.

The next morning, we said our farewells to our canine pals and Mondulkiri province. It was great to get out of the city and stretch our legs a bit after almost a month of being cooped up at The Flicks. We’re working this weekend and then heading down to the coastal town of Kep on Monday where we hope the rain might ease off a little. The countdown to the Singapore Grand Prix starts now…

I’m currently sat on the terrace of The Flicks Community Movie Theatre in Phnom Penh where we have been volunteering for the last week and where we will be for another two and a half weeks or so. Katy has sadly picked up another cold and a huge storm has rolled in and scuppered my plans for going and getting nice things from the local bakery, so in the meantime I thought i’d write a quick blog entry to keep you all up to date with where we are and what we’ve been up to since our time in Saigon.

We set off at the relatively civilised time of 8:45, bidding farewell to Hillary Saigon Hostel and it’s lovely owners, and made our way across town to the the tour office where we had bought our tickets from. We had chosen Giant Ibis Buses as the tour company to take us across the border to Cambodia; not because they are good, but because by reputation they are the least terrible of the poor selection of options available for getting through a border checkpoint renowned (even amongst border checkpoints) for it’s bribery, corruption, bureaucracy and generally sketchy conduct.

We did consider flying but, alas, it was more than 4 times the cost of the bus so despite the convenience we just couldn’t justify it (that, and our Vietnam Visas said we would be leaving via the land border, no doubt if we’d tried to leave via a different port of exit some unscrupulous customs officer would have spotted an opportunity to extract a bribe from us), So the bus it was! We piled on and shortly after 9:30 we were on our way, heading out of Saigon towards the border to leave Vietnam (sad face).

About an hour before we got to the border the attendant on the bus came round to collect everyone’s passports, the money for the visas (or in our case, copies of the e-visas we already had) and money for the “service fee”, $2 each or $5 for anyone paying for their visa on arrival. Having researched getting across the border at this crossing quite extensively, we knew to expect this but still, handing over our passports to an anonymous employee to add to a pile of 30 other passports out of sight at the front of the bus went against -not only the advice of Her Majesty’s Foreign Office- but every instinct we had. Once we arrived at the border the first job was to get stamped out of Vietnam. For this, all of our passports, as well as a proportion of our ‘service fee’ was handed to a fine young member of the revolutionary communist border control who openly pocketed the money (from each according to their ability…) then stamped each passport before handing it back to our attendant from the bus who the read aloud the names for us to go and collect. From there we went through to the no mans land between the two border checkpoints, but no before we passed another, older member of the revolutionary communist border control who sat at an old school desk and whos job it was to look at our passports and check that they had been given an exit stamp, even though he was sat in full view of the booth where we had just been handed our stamped passports… Whatever.

Whilst waiting to get our passports back we got chatting to a dutch family who jokingly observed that we had all of this to look forward to on a regular basis after Brexit. Pah! As if the French would come up with a bureaucracy as efficient and straight forward as this!

Next we got back on the bus and drove a short distance to a restaurant attached to an absolutely gargantuan duty free shop, but not before our attendant came round to collect all of our passports again along with our completed entry cards for Cambodia. Whilst we enjoyed some lunch in no mans land, our bus was swapped with another bus that had come from Phnom Penh for some reason and we then boarded that new bus for the ride from the restaurant all the way to the Cambodian border checkpoint, about 30 meters away. Here our attendant brought us all in to the large, pagoda shaped building and handed over the remainder of our “service fee”  before handing us back our passports in turn so that we could proceed through Cambodian customs.

An hour and umpteen unnecessary steps later, we had entered Cambodia. Now we only had the long drive up to Phnom Penh left to go. The trip was scheduled to take 6 and a half hours door to door, but it was already 2pm and having only just entered Cambodia that was starting to look very optimistic. Indeed it was optimistic, we finally arrived in Phnom Penh just as the sun was setting and arranged a tuk-tuk to take us to our hotel just south of the city centre.

For a couple of days then we did little other than lounge around the hotel killing time until we could move in to The Flicks, where we are now. The Flicks is a ‘community movie theatre’, an independent cinema which operates within the grey areas created by vagaries in Cambodian copyright law. The ‘cinema’ is run by Ramon, a highly extroverted and slightly manic dutch expat who has owned The Flicks for the best part of 10 years now. Each day The Flicks shows between 3 and 6 films, some classic films, some new releases, the copyright law which allows these ‘community movie houses’ to exist permits any films to be shown so long as the rights haven’t been purchased by the big cinema chains operating in Cambodia. The law also forbids the selling of tickets to see the films, instead a ‘cover charge’ of $4 is levied per customer and they are free to remain all day and watch as many films as they like.

Our work at The Flicks essentially means running the cinema on a day to day basis; selling ‘covers’ serving drinks, queuing up and starting films and making popcorn using the very exciting popcorn machine on the bar! Ramon comes and goes, regaling us with amusing stories of previous volunteers and mad customers he has, as well as occasionally asking us for ideas on how to improve The Flicks then telling us how he’s tried the ideas we come up with before and that they didn’t work. The work is easy and enjoyable and involves a lot of sitting around between the films as well as eating the excess popcorn from the machine.

In exchange for our labour, arduous as it is, we have a room in the flat beneath the cinema, and are allowed to watch as many films as we like for free as well as enjoy “a reasonable”  number of free drinks from the bar. As well as ourselves, there are currently two other volunteers, Yassin from Germany who was here when we arrived and Kat from London who arrived a couple of days after ourselves. We divide the shifts up amongst us meaning that we all get a few days off each week, not that there’s a huge amount to do in Phnom Penh, but we had always intended these few weeks to be a relaxed time where we would allow our surplus to grow.

So yes, that about brings us all up to date. We’ll be moving on from Phnom Penh towards the end of August so we’ll probably make a blog post then to cover our time here, but other than that, expect us to be a little quieter for a while.

Ciao for Now.

We’d ummed and ahhed about how to get from Da Lat down to Ho Chi Minh City. Given our roller coaster ride up from sea level we weren’t especially keen to get into anything with 4 wheels, especially given the Vietnamese penchant for overtaking on blind corners and driving head-first into oncoming traffic. Like Dave said in the previous post, the driving over here has done wonders for my fear of flying and given that it wasn’t too pricey and was only going to take 30 minutes, we opted for our old friends at Vietnam Airlines to take us down to Saigon. Sadly, as our flight was at 8am, we were too early for the airport shuttle bus and had to settle for a taxi driver with a death wish to take us to the airport. You know it’s bad when two Brits get out of your car and don’t say thank you. The flight itself was about as pleasant as it could be. As it was such a short flight, we didn’t get much above 3000 metres and it was odd to think that we’d been higher than that while on land in South America.

Saigon, or officially Ho Chi Minh City since 1976, is the most populous city in Vietnam and has a bit of a Marmite reputation; Simon from Tree House Hostel said it was lacking in character. I’m not sure whether it was the lack of a 6 hour terror infused journey from hell, or just the fact that getting from the airport to downtown is remarkably easy and cheap, but our first impressions of this supposedly soulless city were largely positive. Sure, the traffic was bad, and there’s a lot of construction going on, but that could describe any city in Vietnam. Hopping off the airport shuttle, we headed towards our guesthouse, the lovely Hillary Saigon Hotel run by two sisters, Huyen and Trang. The guesthouse was situated down a small street stall lined alleyway, bustling with motorcycles, locals eating street food, and market stalls selling everything from live crabs to flip flops; I don’t think half these people had ever seen a white person before, let alone two as wide and tall as us! After being warmly greeted at our guesthouse, we headed off to find some lunch while we waited for our room to be ready. We walked up to the main backpacker street and were immediately glad that we decided to stay a little further out, the sheer number of bars and clubs was way too much for two grumpy gits like us. Nevertheless, we found a perfectly pleasant place to have lunch called Bookworm Café, run by an English chap from Crawley who was the sort of person who likes to make jokes about being married and how awful it is (ball and chain, trouble and strife, that sort of thing). Still, we gave him the benefit of the doubt and the food really was very good, with a wide selection of local grub as well as old UK favourites. We reminisced about our second week in Thailand when we saw places offering fish and chips, roast dinners or English breakfasts and how we thought “who could possibly want that when there’s so much lovely food here?”, and there is a lot of lovely food here but after almost 3 months, sometimes it’s nice to have comfort food as an option.

We only had 3 full days in Saigon until our visas expired, so the following morning we were up bright and early to visit the War Remnants Museum. Focusing largely on the American war, the museum is set over 3 floors, including an outdoor display of various tanks, helicopters and planes. As we made our way up the stairs to the top floor, who should we bump into but Adele, our travel companion from the fantastic Waterfall Tour in Da Lat. We exchanged pleasantries and made the usual “stop stalking us” jokes and she urged us to brace ourselves for the intensity of the museum. Pah! We’ve been to Auschwitz, we’ve experienced the worst of what humanity is capable of, we’re just here for the education. British stiff upper lip and all that. The top floor of the museum sets the scene for the American invasion, discussing the liberation of Vietnam from the French and the events leading up to the war through the use of photo-journalism. A lot of it was things we’d heard before from various trips and tours we’d taken during our time in Vietnam, but the photos added an extra level of reality and solemnity to the whole experience. Descending down to the second floor, we entered a section regarding Chinese and American war crimes, as well as an exhibit commemorating the journalists who had been killed during their time photographing the war. All jokes aside, this part of the museum was harrowing. Seeing the atrocities photographed was horrifying. I’m not going to go into too much detail but suffice it to say that I had to leave before the end of this section. Dave carried on through the part about Agent Orange but the whole experience left me thoroughly shaken. You know that war isn’t pleasant, and you play stupid games where you shoot zombies and make light of killing but seeing that level of inhumanity and cruelty towards anyone, let alone children and civilians…there are no words. You could see the fear in their eyes. 2 million civilians died during the American war in Vietnam. That’s roughly the same as the entire population of West Yorkshire, and almost twice as much as Bristol. We left the museum, taking a brief detour into the exhibition set up outside, demonstrating the brutalities of the prison system during the war, we’d seen a lot of this before in Hanoi but in one of the buildings, a colony*of bats had set up home. We stood for a while and watched them swoop around. There was something truly poetic about the fact that life had blossomed in a place that was built around so much death and destruction.

 

*KB: What’s the collective noun for bats? DF: I bet it’s something cool. KB: oh, it’s colony. DF: Rubbish.

After a well warranted beer and an ice cream, our next stop was the Independence Palace, a short walk around the corner. As we walked and reflected on our experience at the War Remnants Museum, we passed a junction box which was covered in the stickers that you get as you enter the museum. There was something so wonderfully childish about seeing these thousands of stickers stuck up all around the side of this huge metal box, especially as you could see that people were just trying to stick theirs higher than anyone else’s. We didn’t manage to stick ours the highest, which is impressive as we’re about twice the height of anyone else here, but it definitely lifted our spirits.

We were greeted at the palace by a delightfully flamboyant young man who spoke fantastic English and helped us sort out our tickets and audio guides. In hindsight, the audio guide for the palace itself is rubbish and gives no more information than the signs dotted around the various rooms. As we wandered round the palace, we were greeted to insightful audio clips such as “this was the President’s office, he did his paperwork here” and “this was the President’s cinema, he liked to watch films here”. *eye roll*. Still, it was interesting to see where it was bombed and rebuilt during the American war and we also got to visit the bunker underneath the palace. But not before, once again, bumping into Adele for the second time that day. Luckily as she was a sensible person, she did not see this as an invitation from the cosmos to hang around, forcing us into British polite conversation setting number 3, but simply exchanged pleasantries with us before heading off again, wonderful. We were starting to like her a lot. The palace itself is an odd building. I wouldn’t exactly call it a “palace” as the architect had clearly taken lessons from possibly Margaret Thatcher or the same person who built the University of Bath. Put it this way, there’s a reason it’s not on many postcards. But it was not always like this. The building was originally named Norodom Palace, completed in 1873 by the French, named after the Cambodian royal family, and built in such a way as to mimic the Palace of Versailles. It stood until 1962 when 2 South Vietnamese rebel pilots decided to bomb it, so you can blame them for the concrete “palace” that currently stands there. Still, the American war effectively ended there at 10am on the 30^th April 1975 when a North Vietnamese tank drove through the main gate, so its historical significance is undeniable. Our plan was then to head up to the Saigon Central Post Office to send some postcards, but we were so wiped from all the walking that we decided to head back to the hotel for a well-deserved kip.

Up bright and early again the next morning, we had booked ourselves onto a trip to see the Cu Chi tunnels, about 1.5 hours North of Saigon. A group of around 20 of us were led by our tour guide “Bunny” around a small section of the immense network of underground tunnels used by both the Viet Cong and local people during the war. We were treated to mock-ups of some the particularly nasty booby traps they used against the Americans, and some of our group got to hide out in one of the camouflaged holes. Sadly, although we have both lost weight since being in South East Asia, our bottoms were not yet svelte enough to slide comfortably into a hole designed for tiny malnourished Viet Cong soldiers. Even some of those tiny enough to squeeze in had to ask for a hand getting out again. The authenticity of the experience was made all the greater by the live shooting range situated on the grounds, providing tourists an opportunity to fire guns for a princely sum of £2 a bullet. There was only one gun going off as we wandered around the complex and the volume was astounding. We were awestruck by the idea of how loud it must have been for these people, surrounded by waves of gunfire. Once again, the reality of the horrors of war began to strike a little too close to home for our liking. After a quick trip through the gift shop, it was time to go into the tunnels themselves. The tunnels available to tourists have been made around 30% larger than the original ones, so as to accommodate the aforementioned ample bottoms, as well as our increased height. There were exits every 20 metres and the stretch of tunnel we were about to enter was around 100m in length. Dave decided he was going to sit this one out, and as I descended into the depths below, I began to wonder if he hadn’t made exactly the right choice. Lowering myself through the small square opening into the tunnels, I bent over in half and followed close behind the woman in front of me. The tunnels are lit with a soft orange glow and as long as you don’t think too much about the fact that you’re 4 metres underground, bent into an uncomfortable position, with no direct means of escape, it’s not too bad. I chickened out at 20m. None of our group went further than 60. After 60m, Bunny told us, the tunnel becomes demonstrably smaller, both in height and width, and not many people make it further than that, not just because they’re terrified, but also because they simply wouldn’t fit. This was another advantage to using the tunnels. The Viet Cong were tiny compared to their big burly American counterparts. Indeed, in some of the tunnels they purposefully included tiny sections to prevent any American “tunnel rats” from being able to proceed further. We were given a second opportunity to try a tunnel, with Bunny promising that this one was 20% larger than the last one. Dave decided he’d be ok to give it a go this time. When we got down there and I demonstrated how small the previous tunnel had been, he was absolutely reassured at having made the correct decision. But we both did it, the authentic Viet Cong experience, do not try this at home kids.

Now seems a good a time as any to mention that the traffic in Saigon is TERRIBLE. Think Central London in rush hour terrible. We were starting to understand why bikes were the preferred method of transport out here; weaving and diving through the empty spaces between the cars. As it was, we were in a big tour bus, and by the time we got back to the city it was getting on for teatime. We swung via the bus operator to buy tickets for Sunday to Phnom Penh, stopped by our favourite casual misogynist, and enjoyed a late lunch of a cheese and pickle toastie and a chilli chicken burger. A not so authentic Viet Cong experience, but tasty nonetheless.

 

For our third and final day in Ho Chi Minh City, I’d booked us both onto a Mekong Delta tour. Ideally, we’d have done a 2 or 3 days tour, but we’d just plain run out of time. It’s a good job our Ha Long Bay cruise was cancelled, or we really would have been rushing. We were picked up by Sang from the guesthouse and once again joined a group of around 20 on a particularly uncomfortable 2 hour bus journey down to the Mekong river, where we were to take a short boat ride across to one of the islands. You know how when you’re in London and you stand on one side of the Thames, looking across at the other side and you think “wow, the Thames is really big”, well, the Mekong is REALLY big. Think more Dover to Calais than Southbank to Parliament. We sat down on the boat and tried in vain to listen to Sang speak over the drone of the engine, as we chuffed along towards one of the islands in the centre of the river. Our first stop was a small bee farm, where we got to sample some honey roasted bananas, honey ginger and a sort of honey peanut brittle – yum. We also enjoyed a sample of honey tea, mixed with lime juice. We bought a few bags of goodies to take with us on our journey, not quite having decided whether we were going to devour them then or try and make them last (so far it’s 4 days later and they’re still with us!). The tour companies here seem to just be figuring out that Western tourists and Asian tourists are two very different breeds. For example, a group of Chinese tourists are more keen to shop, to spend hundreds of dollars on things to take back home, whereas Westerners actually want to SEE things on their tours, sure we might buy a few things along the way but our we want to TOUR things on our tours.  We’d been reading about Chinese tour companies a bit, since you see a lot of them here, and our attitude has changed from annoyance to pity after reading some of the accounts of people who’ve been on them. The older Chinese people who tend to go on these trips do so not only because they are government approved, but also because they do not speak the language of the country they’re visiting, and do not feel confident enough to plan on their own. As such they’re reduced to these huge whistle-stop tours where they’re barely given time to breathe before moving on to the next activity. No wonder they all look so miserable all the time. Anyway, I digress. We hopped back onto the boat and wound our way up a small estuary that, much like that corridor in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, seemed to be getting smaller and smaller and smaller the further we went along. We soon spotted our next ride, a much smaller 4 seater operation, paddled by one person at the back and one at the front -phew! The ride was short, but we enjoyed the trip, donning the conical hats provided and taking many a selfie. Eager not to repeat our experience in Vang Vieng, we managed to exit the boat if not gracefully then at least dry! We walked through the jungle for a while, with Sang pointing out banana trees, cacao beans, passion fruit, coffee and coconuts, warning us to be careful as people are sometimes killed by coconuts falling from the tree and hitting them on the head. Having picked one up, I can safely attest that one falling on your head would not be a pleasant experience. They are heavier than they look! We arrived at an area with a small gift shop as well as a wicker shelter with tables and chairs set up. We’d been to places before like this in Peru and Bolivia, and it slowly dawned on us that we might just be in for an example of traditional dance. Nooooooooooooooo. Traditional dances fall narrowly below weaving displays in the list of “Things We Never Want To See Again While Travelling”. Luckily, we were just to be serenaded by some local musicians and a singer that could moonlight as an electric guitar if she so chose, and we got to eat some delicious fruit as well as try banana wine and snake wine. Snake wine is exactly what it sounds like, rice wine that’s left to ferment with snakes in the bottle. Not sure HMRC would take too kindly to us having that in our luggage. It just tasted like rice wine with, as the alcohol connoisseur might say, “earthy tones”. We’ll be sticking to the regular stuff in future. Our group hopped into a few tuk-tuks and were whisked away to our lunch stop. Before lunch, we were taken through a coconut sweet factory. I say factory, it was 20% factory, 80% stalls trying to flog the sweets they were making. We tried various flavours and decided that the peanut coconut was our favourite. It was sort of like a very soft nougat. There are still some left at the very bottom of my rucksack I think, though for how long those will last, I’m not sure… We sat down at a huge table for lunch and two servers brought out 3 huge deep fried elephant ear fish, presumably caught that very morning. Some of our group *cough*Americans*cough* were horrified that this whole fish (head, tail, eyeballs etc) was to be our lunch. Imagine having to eat something that didn’t come with “Mc” at the front of it! Ok I’m being slightly harsh, but for god’s sake why bother visiting different countries if you’re not going to try things! The fish was broken down by the servers into some fantastic spring rolls, and we also had braised fish in a clay pot, as well as various broths, rice and egg dishes. It was absolutely stunning. And because of the fussy Americans, we got to eat twice as much! After lunch, we were given a bit of free time to either go for a cycle around the island or sit by the river. We chose to sit by the river and have a good moan about the Americans. Hmm, this is becoming a bit of a habit. I suppose when you’re second from bottom on a long list of undesirables, your position as ‘not quite the worst’ is one to be held onto fiercely.

We finished off the day with a quick trip to a temple, spending most of our time there chatting to the tour guide and making jokes about lottery tickets and Dave resembling the Happy Buddha statue. Piling back on to the bus we made the long and uncomfortable journey back to Saigon where we fully intended to go for a lovely authentic Vietnamese dinner for our last night in Vietnam. As it was, all the rain we’d missed for the past month decided to pick that night to descend. Rain here isn’t like rain back home – a bit of drizzle, pop on a mac and take your brolly and you’re fine – it’s more like having someone constantly tipping a bathtub full of water over your head every 5 seconds. As such, we settled for an authentic pot noodle instead. A rather anticlimactic end to what had been one of the best months of our lives. Vietnam is such an interesting country. The old divisions from the war are still clearly there, from the cuisine to the attitudes of the various regions. It feels like a country striving to unify itself under a common identity, but also unwilling to move on from the mistakes of the past. I suppose time will help to heal the wounds, hopefully without too much interference from the Chinese. 1 month really isn’t enough time to explore everything it has to offer, and as we boarded our bus for the Cambodian border, we vowed that it was not good-bye, but simply, au revoir.