vietnam

July 3, 2014

NovatouriEND

christinelouise Asia, NovaTOURient, Travel Talk 2014, Asia, Cambodia, final thoughts, India, laos, malaysia, NovaTOURient, singapore, thailand, video, vietnam

Planned route:
India: Delhi → Goa → Mumbai → Gujarat → Saurashtra → Pushkar → Jaipur → Delhi → Agra → Varanasi → Kolkata

Thailand: Krabi → Koh Lanta → Koh Phi Phi → Patong → Phuket → Koh Samui → Koh Phangan → Koh Tao → Hua Hin → Pattaya → Bangkok → Chiang Mai → Mae Hong Son → Chiang Rai → Chiang Khong

Laos: Luang Prabang → Vang Vieng → Khammouane → Vientiane

Cambodia: Siem Reap (2 weeks of volunteer work) Battambang → Koh Kong → Kompang Son → Kampot/Kep → Koh Thonsay → Phnom Penh

Vietnam: Saigon → Nha Trang → Hoi An → Hue → Hanoi → Sa Pa

Final route:
India: Delhi → Vagator → Arambol → Hampi → Mumbai → Udaipur → Jaisalmer → Jaipur → Amritsar → Rishikesh → Agra → Varanasi → Kolkata

Thailand: Krabi → Koh Phi Phi → Patong → Koh Samui → Koh Phangan → Koh Tao
↓
Myanmar: Kawthaung
↓
Thailand:
Chumpon → Bangkok → Chiang Mai → Pai → Chiang Mai → Chiang Rai → Chiang Khong

Laos: Pakbeng → Luang Prabang → Vang Vieng → Vientiane

Vietnam: Hanoi → Hue → Hoi An → Nha Trang → Saigon

Cambodia: Phnom Penh → Sihanoukville → Siem reap

Malaysia: Kuala Lumpur → Taman Negara → Cameron Highlands → Georgetown

Singapore: Singapore

Thailand: Bangkok

When I started planning for this trip, I was in a bad place. Dumped by a boy. Stuck, both in school and in general, desperate to get it overwith so I could escape. I think my trip was just that – an escape.
I so desperately want to find my passion in life, be ambitious about something, but how could I possibly do that without knowing myself? To be honest, I have always felt that I was in between every personality trait – shy but social, smart but dumb, trusting but cynical. One thing I always knew for sure, was that I am selfish and dependent, and I hoped that this trip would force me to throw that away with my extra luggage.

In some way I guess this would be an Eat, Pray, Love-kind of experience. And by that, I mean I would deal with my issues, develop some strong personality traits and gain more confidence. Then I would discover my passion in life, and go back to accomplish something.

While this all sounds very unlikely, it was what had helped me in the past. Everytime I have been away from home since my parents divorce 4 years ago, I’ve become a little more independent, a little less shy, and a little more sure what I wanted to do in life: travel. Being away for 4 months however, was something I had never done until now, and it didn’t feel right as soon as I actually left. Maybe it was our choices of countries (where people could sometimes be rude, the food awful, and the cities dirty and loud), but it could also be because my travel partner and I turned out to be incompatible.

Of course, this all just sounds so negative, and of course this experience hasn’t been at all. I’ve gotten to see amazing places – many that I want to return to – and met some great people, and that is what I wanted all along. I finally got over the guy who dumped me, which gave me a lot fewer lonely nights and fits of anger.

Basically, I had some great highs and awful lows that made me see things only a tiny bit clearer, but I am on my way. I learned that I enjoy the simple things in life, like a sunset or a little kid waving at me, because deep down, there is a war in me, and I never know which side will win. Some days, I think I am a fun and outgoing person, always seeing the best in people. Other days, I don’t dare talk to people, and I think I am destined to live a life of sadness and loneliness. That is why I rely on the only ones that understand, my best friends. Away from them, I felt hopeless and less “free”, and I know that this is something that I have to get used to as we start to move in different directions.

This post will probably forever be a mess, like my feelings about my trip. There is so much I want to say, yet nothing I can think of. It was the experiene, but not the time of my life – at least not as often as I wanted it to be.

113 days away from home
18 things crossed off my bucket list
13 books read
7 countries traveled (if you don’t count Burma)
Not nearly enough hangovers.

May 30, 2014

Saigon or Ho Chi Minh City

christinelouise Asia, NovaTOURient, Travel Talk 2014, Asia, Ho Chi Minh City, saigon, vietnam, war museum

No purse, no problem

We get in and, starving, so we drop our bags at Nhog Thao or whatever our hostel’s called, and our roommates, two guys from England, join us. They are all in the mood for Burger King, and I cannot turn down fastfood ever, so naturally we go there without a fight. After dinner, we go to Baskin Robbins and get ice cream for the walk home. We all hang out in the room before passing out.

The next day is our only day here in Saigon. While I am keen on the tunnels and shooting range, Sara doesn’t want to deal with hours of transportation, so we go to the War Museum and it’s awful. Not that it sucks, but there are so many pictures of corpses, dead babies, blown-up men, burned women and children born after the war with severe conditions because of the Agent Orange mist. I have to admit that I cry a few times. The worst picture is a closeup of a man who was victim of phosphorus bombs.

And there is a picture of a man blown to pieces in 2003, when he stepped on a mine. Which leads me to this disturbing fact:

So, yeah. My day has been depressing….until!

For a month now, we’ve been waiting for Maleficent starring Angelina Jolie to come out. It premieres today, so we get our tickets before the trip to the museum, so they won’t be sold out. It is such a great movie, I want to watch it again!

OK, time for bed. We’ve got an early bus to Phnom Penh, Cambodia tomorrow!

May 29, 2014

Nha Trang

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When we arrive at 6 in the morning, having sweated and tried to sleep on the bumpy 12-hour busride, then carrying our bags 1 km down the road to our hostel and being met with a receptionist that doesn’t seem too friendly, I’m not really liking True Friends Inn. The room is small and the bathroom shitty. But when we go down to reception after a long nap and is offered sweet pineapple by a Vietnamese guy that speaks a little bit of Danish, I know we have come to the right place.

Nha Trang is a very touristy beach town. Not that I mind. I do mind that it’s full of Russians looking like they’re in a bad 80’s movie with their perms and floral dresses, approaching us and assuming we’re Russians too.

On our first day we do nothing but chill. We find a nice little sushi place for dinner where like 12 staff members enthusiastically shout “welcome!” at the same time when we come in. So funny.

We get back to our hostel and our roommates, three guys from Canada, grab some beers and start a drinking game in the reception. We go to Booze Cruise Bar and play drunk jenga and smoke hookah until sometime after 1 or 2 AM.

I am standing at a food stall across the street, when Sara suddenly starts feeling really ill. She has been playing pool with one of our roommates upstairs, and apparently she has taken a sip of a strangers drink. I buy her a 20.000 dong water and pay for an incredibly short cab ride home, which is 11.500 but the driver wants me to pay 50.000, and of course I start a fight with him while my roommates get Sara into bed, where she falls right asleep.

The next day we are both very hungover. We decide to just take a beach day, which is nice for a change.

With my sweet pineapple <3

Later, we meet Edda and go for Italian food and then to see the new X-Men movie. It’s decent, although it turns out that our popcorn are caramel popcorn instead of salted popcorn, which is quite a turnoff. I need salted popcorn when I’m at the Movies, and I find caramled popcorn absolutely disgusting.

We hop on a bus at 8 in the morning the next day, and stay on it for 12 hours. My main entertainment is a snoring lady next to me. We stop for food and bathroom breaks and I get pho and a fanclub of like 5 teenage girls working behind the counter where I order, pay and wait for food. They keep staring and giggling at me like I am the unicorn that they’ve always hoped to see. It’s awesome. Sara ruins my moment in the spotlight by pointing out that it’s just because I’m blond.

May 26, 2014

Hoi An

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As we get on the bus from Hue to Hoi An with Edda, the German girl, it starts raining. A lot. We drive for 4-5 hours, before we get to Saltwater Hostel, which opened less than a month ago.

We are really impressed with the place. While its location is so-so – quite a bikeride into town – it looks modern, appealing, and most of all, clean. The cleaning staff really works hard – I leave all of my belongings on my bed one day, and when I come back, my bed has been made, my stuff neatly placed on the bed, and there is a free pack of Mentos right next to my folded pile of clothes! Probably a mistake, so I eat it before anyone notices.
They also have a nice pool, and it’s very social. I recommend it to anyone going to Hoi An!

The day we arrive, they are doing their very first pubcrawl, and since we’re all about making history, we go. We only go to two bars, but I get very drunk. I mostly hang out with a German and an Irish guy, while Sara hangs out with a group of Danish guys that I seriously dislike for their need to be condescending, slut-shaming pricks. I am home at around 2.30, after dancing with an eccentric Vietnamese lady and being hit on a 10-year older English guy becomes too much to handle.

I stole this picture from Edda. She has a bunch of very silly pictures of me from that night, but I decided my drunk face is enough to share for now.

I wake up the next day very hungover. After a shower and breakfast, I immediately run up to my room to curl up in bed. Then we hang out at the pool until it’s time for a cooking class that the hostel helped us book. We ride on bikes to the local market, where a guy explains the different products we will be working with.

Then we ride out to the countryside with vegetable farms as far as the eye can see. The chef/teacher is fun. He makes us wear ugly hats, throw pancakes in the air and gives us yellow cards when we do somethig wrong. He also thinks I am 17, and says we should get married. Anyway, we make Hoi An springrolls, papaya salad, Vietnamese pancakes, and chicken in claypot.

Ingredients for Hoi An springrolls

While we sit down to enjoy our meals, we are enjoying the view of farmers tending their rice fields or picking basil and mint. As the sun is setting, we ride the bikes along the river back to the hostel, enjoying the breeze and the view. We are so full he might as well have rolled us back, though. It’s around 7 pm, and we pass out right away and don’t wake up until 9 the next morning.

We’ve heard that Hoi An is famous for replicating clothes from pictures for no money, so we ride the hostel’s free bikes into town, have a look at the big market, and then go to a tailor. I give them some pictures, and they give me a minimum price. It’sso expensive, I could’ve bought the stuff in the pictures at least twice. Edda is surprised too, and only gets one of her dresses shortened, while Sara gets a dress and a coat. We have to go back for a fitting at night, so we gp back to the hostel to relax a bit. Then, an hour before her fitting, we go into the town and see the Japanese bridge, all the lanterns and the shops. We sit at a café and have some cake and enjoy the beautiful, cozy little town.

The fitting is over quick, so we just walk around for a while, checking the shops out. When we get home, Sara and I want to get our open bus ticket to Nha Trang confirmed, but the receptionist who calls the bus company is told that we have to show up to do that – something the travel agent selling us the ticket insisted wasn’t necessary. With an hour until their closing time, we hop on bikes and drive the around 4 km to confirm our damn ticket, and then 4 km to go back. I am tired and have a headache, so I have a quick shower, a quick pack, and then I go to bed. Of course, some girls come into the room after midnight and start talking and rummaging through their bags, not giving a fuck that we are trying to sleep. Then, a guy starts puking in the bathroom – loudly! – for like 20 minutes. I wake up around ever 2 hours, pissed.

Our final day in Hoi An consists of a trip to the city to pick up Sara’s clothes, where the ladies at the shop also gets us some bags of coffee each when we ask which coffee is the best, then we ship some of Edda’s stuff home at the postoffice, and have vietnamese lunch at a small family home/café that the clothes ladies have recommended. We have White Rose dumplings, which is a Hoi An specialty. They don’t have a particularly strong taste, but they’re very good.

May 21, 2014

Hot in Hue

christinelouise Asia, NovaTOURient, Travel Talk 2014, Asia, Hanoi, hue, purple forbidden city, Sightseeing, vietnam

After a cute, traditional Water Puppet show in Hanoi, we get on the VIP train to Hue. Or should we say shit train.

Looks like she really enjoyed the show

13 hours later, we arrive at Hue City Hostel. A guy knocks on our door, thinking we are two Danish girls he has met earlier that day, which we obviously aren’t. We run into him at the restaurant next door for breakfast and decide we will take a walk around Imperial City with him and a German girl, Edda, who has a bad sunburn. Halfway there, her skin starts blistering, so she has to go back. The guy, whose name is Laurence, is about to catch a bus, so he can’t stay too long either. So basically we barely see anything but the outside of the war museum.

For dinner we go to Nina’s café, and I have the egg noodles with vegetables and mushrooms. SO delicious.

Wow, many yum, such delish, so food

The next day, we do a daytrip around Hue, where we meeta woman we were walking to on the train. We sail on the Perfume river, see tombs and temples, and check out the Purple Forbidden City. Exhausting, to say the least. Hue’s the warmest place I’ve ever been to. It’s constantly around 40 degrees, and the humidity!!! But it’s beautiful, and people are so kind here.

I’m really bored of uploading pictures, because honestly, they’re just buildings. But they’re so beautiful!

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