Vietnam: Train Trip to Hue

I board the 23:00 train south to Hue.  I'm gonna be cruisin' in style with a soft sleeper ticket.  When the boarding gates are opened I join the asian train scramble to get on board.  (One does not simply walk onto a train in asia - you scramble).

Or if you're the boss, you swagger.

I'm sharing a cabin with a Vietnamese family and a friend, and I notice my train ticket doesn't say "Foreigner" on it like tourists usually get.  The viets speak very little english - and one man in particular who seems especially keen to talk - has zero English capability.
It's fun to communicate using hand signals and drawing on paper for a while - though he is a little in my comfort zone.  He's very touchy feely, and has absolutely no problem sitting on my bunk and touching my stuff.

That's probably his foot sticking out of my blanket right there.

Eventually we get underway, the cabin door is shut, and the lights are turned off.  I'm impressed by the little footholds that fold down so that you can climb up onto the upper bunks - you can see one in the picture above next to my sexily socked foot.  The train altogether has a really cool 60s eastern bloc vibe going on.

It's cool because it doesn't have a k on the end.

The man on the bunk above lets out an amazing sneeze which I'm sure showered the cabin.  The woman on the bunk opposite me has a great sleep - I have never experienced so much loud snoring in my life.  All that aside - I had a rather good nap, albeit with some pretty strange dreams.

That's not raindrops on the window.  That's sneeze.

Morning comes, and it's a beautiful day so I go back to sleep.  An hour or two later, I'm woken by a hustle and bustle and my roommates are rushing to get off the train at Vinh.  You have to be quick because they only seem to stop at the train station for about 2-3 minutes before it leaves again.  No new customers come in to the cabin so we are left to enjoy the rest of the trip and a trolley cart breakfast in peace.

Get yo hands offa my chicken!

It's roughly 9:30am and I'm due to be in Hue at 10:50 so not long to go!  Naturally, four hours later I arrive at Hue.

German efficiency this most certainly is not.

Vietnam: Hanoi in Pictures

I don't want to leave with the lasting impression that Hanoi is all about dead fish in West Lake - it's one of the best cities in Vietnam.  So here's some pics to go out with.  Enjoy :)

Vietnam: Last days in Hanoi

So I'm walking past the Catheral in the old quarter and do a double take.  It's Antoine and Elisa a French and Chilean couple whom I briefly met in Shanghai!  I take them to my favorite Bia Hoi spot in the old quarter, and then proceed to wander down to Hoan Kiem lake.  In a nearby square we randomly get invited to have food and drinks with some vietnamese people sitting on a picnic blanket..  Communication is hard, but is overcome with hand gestures, and a large bottle of grape rice wine.  I like this town.

One chap in particular won't take no for an answer (he didn't speak english) and so forced us to eat some BBQ chicken feet using Vietnamese insistant torture stare technique which I can only assume he learned in the secret intelligence bureau.

Protip:  If you drink out of the shot glass with a piece of grape still in it - you get fucked up faster.  Nice to know.


On my last day here I decide to go check out West lake - it looks big on the map and I haven't been there yet.  On the way, I stop and have a street haircut for 50,000VD and suddenly become 10x as handsome.

Watch out ladies.

Arriving at West Lake I think it's very nice.  There are couples out in the lake on swan paddle boats.  Cafes skirting the rim.  Fishermen wading out with their lines.  The lake has a very french romantic feel to it.

Well isn't that  lovely.

It's a shame about the dead fish and cigarette packets floating in the water.

Fishing...

...with explosives.

Vietnam: Hanoi Army Museum

I should probably jot down here that I had a visit to the Army Museum in Hanoi.  It's a fairly jovial affair compared to the museums in Saigon and has an impressive collection of planes, helicopters and vehicles if you're into that sort of thing.

Into acting like a douche that is...

Yep.  I'm a douche.

Outside in the center of the courtyard is a badass monument  made from bits and pieces of downed enemy aircraft, and has a photograph on the front of it of a woman dragging the wing of a downed plane out of the water.

Pictured: Badass.

Basically, this is a museum for boys and their toys.   There's also a pretty neato tower that you can climb up to get a good view of the museum and the surrounding city.

Yep, I said neato.  Fuck you.