This update is a day late, because we experienced computer problems back home that prevented us from sending this yesterday. Many thanks to Frank for going over to our flat and fixing the problem. Frank, you’re our hero!
Remember that I said we’d be taking the VIP bus to Hanoi? Well, the VIP bus turned out to be the VUP bus (Very Unimportant Person). Not only was there no toilet on board, but the seats offered very little leg room and didn’t recline at all.
Still, at least we had air-conditioning for the 22 hour trip. Oh, sorry, did I say air-conditioning? Well, yes, there was air-conditioning, but they turned it off after the first hour and refused to turn it back on again.
It would take too long to describe all the things that were awful about the bus journey, so I’ll just run through the lowlights.
Apart from the general lack of comfort on board, the discomfort was compounded by the appalling state of the Lao road from Vientiane to the border. We actually reached the border by 01:00 Sunday morning, but it’s closed at that time and doesn’t reopen until 08:00, so the bus driver parked the bus in a car park somewhere and we sat there for 5.5 hours, packed in like sardines, with the temperature slowly rising and not so much as a whisper of fresh air coming in through the window. I firmly believe that Laos is a country without wind.
The discomfort was surpassed only by the abject boredom. Sitting in total darkness, tired and uncomfortable, you start to imagine how a hostage might feel. Eventually, unable to tolerate the confinement any longer, I clambered into the aisle and lay down upon a collection of rucksacks, using someone’s sweaty shoe as a pillow. Sarah then somehow managed to fall asleep across the bus seat I had vacated.
Finally, we left the car park at 06:30 and arrived at the border crossing at 06:45. Another adventure ensued, as we traipsed through the pouring rain and mud in our thin shirts and sandals to make it to the dingy, candlelit shack that served as the Lao immigration office.
This place was lit by literally a one centimeter high candle. Vietnamese people scurried around on all sides, coughing up pleghm and spitting on the floor. The Lao official insisted on 4000 Kip per person before he would give us our passports back. Why? Who knows, but we’re quite attached to our passports and had no desire to relocate to the Lao/Vietnamese border for the rest of our days, so we paid up and reclaimed our passports.
An hour later, we were back on the bus, but only for a couple of minutes, since now we were at the Vietnamese port of entry and it was time to do the whole song and dance again.
We schlepped through the mud and rain once again, this time to a concrete building. What luxury! The man at the first desk directed us to go around to the side of the building, where a second man pointed at a form and sent us back to the first desk. There, we picked up immigration forms, filled them in, and then went back to the second man.
He stamped our passports and then demanded his slice of the pie, this time $1. Why? Who knows, but we’re quite attached to our passports, etc…
Some people didn’t have the money and thought this would cause the Vietnamese official to give back their passport anyway, but no such luck. Their passport simply went back to the bottom of the pile, as the official shrewdly knew that when faced with the prospect of not getting your passport back, one way or another you’re going to find a way to come up with the necessary cash. Lent money was exchanged between the various travellers, passports were handed back, and we continued on our way.
The mudslide that served as a road eventually turned into tarmac on the Vietnamese side and the scenery slowly changed into one of rice paddies and women wearing the familiar conical hat.
We were forced to change bus just before entering Vinh, and were now herded onto an unspeakably uncomfortable minibus run by a diminutive little man for whom the bus could simply never be considered full. As we continued our journey, he continually had the driver stop the bus as he tried to persuade locals waiting along the road to travel on board this bus for an unspecified fee.
Eventually, we were packed in so tight that we had to mutiny and refuse to take on more passengers.
Toilet stops were virtually non-existent. Occasionally, the bus would stop so that either the driver or the little man could buy a snack, at which point all the travellers poured out of the bus, ran to the nearest wall (belonging to a house, petrol station or whomever — by this point, none of us really cared), pulled down their pants and did whatever it was they could no longer wait for the arrival of civilization to do.
To cut an already long story a little bit shorter, we eventually arrived in Hanoi around 18:30, some 23.5 hours after beginning our journey. We were filthy, smelly, tired, aching, starved (since there was no opportunity to eat at any time along the way — Sarah and I had brought along muesli bars for this contingency, so they came in very useful).
Unlike the scorching heat of Laos, it was cold on the outskirts of Hanoi and pouring with rain. We jumped in a taxi with a Scottish couple and headed downtown into the old quarter. After our first choice of hotel turned out to be full, we marched through the rain to a couple more before finally finding one to our taste.
Today, we spent the day walking around Hanoi in the rain. During our walk, we bought ponchos to fend off the rain, and Sarah even bought a conical hat to wear as a kind of personal umbrella. It’s actually very effective. I also bought a $4 sweatshirt, as it’s pretty cold here and my T-shirts don’t quite make the grade.
I saw some shocking sights on a food market today, that made Laos look like a sanctuary for mother nature’s creatures. I’ll spare you the details, in case you’re squeamish, but suffice it to say that I witnessed the killing of animals right in front of my eyes. Sarah was unable to watch, but in a macabre way it does offer insights into the mindset of these people. Some of their values are so very different to ours in the west, yet in many ways they hold the same things dear. I suppose that’s what makes a trip like this so fascinating.
This evening, we went to a theatre presentation of Hanoi’s famous water puppets, which was really, really enjoyable. The music was great and the puppetry work was fascinating and quite unlike anything I’ve seen before.
We have another day looking around Hanoi tomorrow, before setting off for a one-day trip up the river to the Perfumed Pagoda on Wednesday. On Thursday, we embark on a three-day trip to Halong Bay and Cat Ba Island, which should prove absolutely fascinating if the rain lets up.
We’re ending up spending more time in this area than we’d originally planned, so we’re going to have to cut out a large part of Vietnam and fly directly to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) on Saturday night, just a couple of hours after we get back from Halong Bay.
Anyway, that’s it for now. We’ll write more again soon.