Can Tho #2

It was so funny to feel this excited to get to Can Tho! The very first time we were here, a few years ago, we hadn't found the market, and we found a Baskin-Robbins and that seemed to tell us what we needed to know about Can Tho, and how wrong we were.

This time we were at the Victoria Can Tho, which is just a wonderful, beautiful, elegant hotel. As lovely as the hotel itself is, the service is just that great too. When we arrived and mentioned that we'd stayed there before, they said "Welcome home!" and proceeded to tell us what had changed since the last time we were there. They always called us by name, and greeted us with smiles and a sense of having all the time in the world. The pools were immaculate and always stocked with plenty of towels. The breakfast was the best of the Victoria breakfasts, our top-floor room was large and beautiful, with a terrace overlooking the pools and the river, and we just couldn't have enjoyed that part of our stay more.

So for us, the return to Can Tho meant three things, besides the hotel:

1. eating banh xeo for lunch at the little restaurant on the circle (which we did on our first trip, and twice on this trip) -- banh xeo with shrimp, and fresh spring rolls, and wait staff who seemed to be slightly amused by us;
2. eating again at our wonderful seafood restaurant (which again, we did twice), on which more in a sec, and
3. returning to the market

One notable change since our very first stay in Can Tho is the completion of a pedestrian bridge that allowed us to walk out of our hotel, along the riverfront, and over the bridge into the area we wanted to visit, which included the market. Last time we had to rely on the shuttle boat the Victoria operated every 10 minutes, from the hotel to the ferry on the other side, but now they only run it on the hour, and I guess that's only for people who want to ride the ferry. The bridge makes it so easy.

So many things to remember about this stay, in no particular order:

Dinner at the seafood restaurant was many things. The food was uniformly great, and the service was quick and friendly. The first night, our waiter and we could not communicate, so another young man, tall and slender with a shy smile, came over to help. He had a bit of English, and tried to make it all go smoothly, which it did. One funny thing is that the beer is served at room temperature and they put a gigantic ice cube in the mug to cool the beer. They also bring a case of beer to the table, typically, and set it on the ground next to the ubiquitous trash can. They are always bewildered that (a) the beer is for me, not Marc, and (b) that I only want one. So that tall slender man recognized us as we arrived the second night, and came hurrying over to say hello, and to note that we came back. He was so adorable -- they all are. The second night I order half a kilo of prawns, never dreaming that would mean THREE GIGANTIC SEA MONSTERS. Poor Marc, who had his own meal (a giant elephant fish fried in pork fat), had to decapitate and semi-peel them for me while I looked away. The darling young man who was waiting on us that second night said that he would like to go to New York but he has no money.

After breakfast that first morning, we walked over the pedestrian bridge and across the riverfront park to the market, and what do you know -- the same old woman who'd clutched my arm and smiled at me a few days earlier during our unexpected Can Tho visit spotted me again! She was walking toward me, and her face lit up and she pointed her finger at me, saying something as she walked quickly toward me. Again she grabbed my arm and smiled at me in the same way. I have no idea what it's about, but of all the wonderful, beautiful, memorable things about this trip, she may be the best one. The second morning I was torn about staying by the pool while Marc went to the market, or going with him; the only reason I'd go was for the chance to see her again, but I decided I probably wouldn't, so off he went, and back to the pool I went. We spent so much time in and beside pools that we're both very tanned/a little burned. Marc always turns brown, and quickly, but I don't usually color as much as I have this time.

And speaking of color, throughout Vietnam the women cover every part of their bodies so they don't get sun -- because they don't want to darken their skin, we've been told a couple of times. But it's so hot!! They don't just wear long-sleeved thin shirts, they wear sweatshirts, fleece hoodies, often gloves, and often face masks. They must find it so bewildering for very white women to come here and lie in the sun, uncovered, specifically to darken.

On our last night, as we approached the pedestrian bridge we saw that it was even more crowded than usual -- just thick with people. The riverfront was, too, and there was a giant red tour bus in front of one of the megalith, charmless hotels that are beginning to line the riverfront. It was so crowded and unpleasant that we just went back to our hotel. The same thing that's happening around Danang already appears to be cropping up in Can Tho, as giant horrible hotels are starting to accumulate, and gaudy, neon-lit dinner barges are lined up, and crowds of tourists are so thick you can hardly move.

Although we were both excited to get to Hanoi again, we were really sad to leave the Mekong, and to leave Can Tho, and also because our trip was winding down and it's been so wonderful. Our hearts felt heavy about the changes we see happening to Can Tho; we'd hoped that it would be restricted to the Danang/Hoi An area and leave the Delta alone, but Can Tho, at least, seems like it is falling.

Chau Doc #2, Nui Sam

Even though this was a Victoria Hotel, and looked similar in basic ways, in other ways it was like the second cousin who lives out in the sticks. The room was a bit shabbier, the pool didn't always have towels available, and the breakfast was crummier. But the scenery was beautiful, because the hotel is up a mountain ("nui") surrounded by emerald green rice fields. Since we're here in the drier season, it's probably less green than usual, and the skies were hazier and dustier, perhaps due to a few fires we saw burning, but it was still beautiful. There was no good way to get from this hotel back to Chau Doc without taking a cab, and since we'd just come from there we decided to eat dinner the first night in the hotel. Swim all afternoon, relax, eat dinner, and have an easy evening.

Of course we hadn't expected much, but the hotel food was not even up to that standard. I don't even remember now what we had; I think I had a green papaya salad (oh yes, with dried beef) and I don't remember what Marc got but it was unimpressive. The best thing about that first half-day at Nui Sam was the view, and especially from the pool.

Our only planned activity was to go to Tra Su Forest/Bird Sanctuary, which is the main thing visitors do in that area. The flaming sunrise woke us up around 5:40, and I dashed around trying to get the best angle to see it: from our terrace, down to the pool, up to the restaurant gazebo, but it didn't matter because my camera is just not good at capturing those colors. Even in my memory, even if I exaggerate what I think it looked like, I know it was still even better than that. So sunrise, paltry breakfast, and then we walked just uphill a little to a large pagoda complex to look around. The funny thing we saw there were stacks and stacks of bottles of water arranged around the columns in the temple area, each stack bound with red ribbon. No idea. After that we hopped into the cab for the trip to Tra Su.

Most people sign up for a guided tour from the Victoria (either down in Chau Doc or up Nui Sam), but we decided to wing it, which is our usual way of doing things. I was a bit nervous, this time, because (a) zero English, and (b) it seemed there were a variety of actions, motor boat, row boat, climb the observation tower, and I was afraid we wouldn't know what we were meant to do. Luckily it was so easy, and also pretty quick. Our darling cab driver, who was dark and square-ish and didn't seem all that friendly at first, helped get us into the excursion. We noticed, as we were riding in the back seat, that everyone was waving to him, and calling out to him, so we figured he was a friendly and well-liked guy. When we got to the park, he escorted us to the ticket counter and helped us get the ticket, and then he just kind of waved his hands -- go there, over there -- and he'd indicated where he would be waiting for us. So we went there, over there, and climbed steps down to a boat launch where a motor boat (that could easily hold 6 or 8 people) took us into the canals. The water would undoubtedly be higher and more dense with foliage during the wet season, but on the other hand we weren't in that boat getting rained on.

Eventually the boat pulled up to another spot and the driver kind of shooed us out of the boat, pointing in a vague upward direction. We looked confused, I imagine, and someone kind of waved a hand or pointed a head toward another place, where we saw long rowboats. So we went there, and a guy looked at our ticket, called out to a woman, and the three of us went down the steps into the rowboat.

Oh how beautiful it was. Gliding through the canals, birds of all kinds surrounded us. Trees full of white egrets, egrets in groups flying up from a floating spot out into the surrounding trees. The woman pointed at something -- a series of large boxes, I guess they were for breeding? -- and we just floated along enjoying the quiet and beauty of the place. I took a selfie video shot of us and caught her in the frame, which seemed to prompt her to pull out her phone to video or photograph us. It was funny, maybe? So hard to know.

She turned the boat around and returned us to the place we'd started, and when we climbed up we weren't at all sure what we were supposed to do. I knew there was something about an observation tower, and finally we found it and Marc climbed to the top and said the view was really beautiful. I waited down below and watched the goings-on, which is always my favorite thing to do. After a bit of confused wandering, we finally found our way back to where we started, and there was our driver, waiting for us instead of waiting where he'd parked the car. I pulled up my translation app and got the Vietnamese word for 'beautiful,' which made him smile. As always I wanted to learn how to pronounce it, but I couldn't make him understand that and I think he just got a bit annoyed because I'd already showed him the word several times enough already.

Then we swam, relaxed, took a cab back down to Chau Doc for dinner at our second seafood place, and turned in kind of early. Again the flaming sunrise woke us up, and after a paltry breakfast it was time to take the long taxi ride back to Can Tho.

Chau Doc #1

Now begins our Victoria Hotel tour, the first of three in a row. Marc got us a room in the Victoria Chau Doc because it's the only hotel in Chau Doc with a swimming pool. We were on the third (of 3) floors with a terrace, overlooking the river and the pool. The room and hotel are standard Victoria, which means colonial style, very dark wood, and we had to keep reminding ourselves that it's not British-in-India colonial, but French-in-Vietnam colonial. Just as at the Victoria Can Tho, there is a large loom in the lobby with a woman weaving fine cotton scarves, and traditional Vietnamese musical instruments scattered around.

We didn't know what to expect from Chau Doc. If we came here in 2011 we didn't really know it; we didn't always know where we were stopping, so maybe we did and maybe we didn't, but nothing seemed too familiar. Our hotel was very near the market, which of course made us so happy, and between us and the market was a big riverfront park, with lots of statues (mostly of fish, but also of people) and benches and a strange light-canopied walkway. At night, the park is filled with families, and the little kids drive these small motorized cars, like maniacs. Even the tiniest of kids drive them, but we finally figured out that some are radio controlled, so the dad walks next to them steering and stopping. Groups of boys kick soccer balls, and large groups of kids in karate uniforms practice. And as is standard in Vietnam, there are pieces of exercise equipment all through the park. Marc got on one and dubbed it the nausea-inducing device, which made me laugh.

The hotel seems to exist primarily and almost solely to service huge buses of tour groups. They arrive en masse, dozens at a time filling the lobby with fanny-packed people in giant sneakers and more dozens of suitcases. We think they arrive, sleep, eat a very early breakfast as soon as the restaurant opens and are then whisked away on a boat somewhere, and then return and leave. One hundred percent not our way to travel; in fact, it would be our worst nightmare. But it did mean that the pool was mostly empty during the day, and breakfast could be leisurely as long as we weren't there at 6am.

We didn't want to eat at the hotel and Marc went out scouting restaurants for dinner while I lay by the pool, a system that works for us both. He gets to wander around looking at menus in peace (a task I don't enjoy). He'd asked for recommendations at the front desk, and the woman looked at him in bewilderment: why don't you eat here? He pressed, and finally she drew a spot on the map of a restaurant she said she didn't really know much about. When he tried to find it, the location didn't even exist. Finally he found a place -- Bay Bong 2 -- and when he was there it looked like an interesting restaurant. When we both got there later in the day, it was completely packed like a cafeteria, no places to sit, and extremely rude waiters who dismissed us with the wave of a hand. I became entirely overwhelmed and just felt like I couldn't possible manage it, which is a terrible feeling. I feel like my overwhelm limits us and takes away opportunities we might end up enjoying, but it was too insane. So we wandered around hoping we could recognize a place to eat, and nearby we found a small restaurant with giant fish tanks facing the street, and a young woman dashed out with a menu that included both pictures and some English, so we found our spot and it was wonderful. I'm never sure about ordering shrimp or prawns because most of the time they're big and come with head and legs and whole body intact and I cannot deal with that head because just dealing with things that look like themselves alive is too much for me whoo boy. Marc is always glad to remove the heads and peel them, but I don't want to add that effort to his own enjoyment of his dinner, but still I went ahead and ordered fried shrimp and it was headless and WONDERFUL. Marc ordered baby clams, also super great.

For dinner the second night he'd scouted the area past our hotel in the other direction and found two options, the second of which was a bigger version of the place we'd eaten the night before, with huge fish tanks featuring all kinds of possibilities, from lots of kinds of fish to a few kinds of shrimp to a variety of clams and even geoduck clams, and lots of turtles, and oysters YES PLEASE. It was so good we ate there two nights in a row. I got the fried shrimp both nights, and I wish I'd counted how many were on the plate, but it was maybe twice as many as you usually get when you order fried shrimp. The first night, one of the women came over and showed us that we were supposed to dump the shells and trash in the small trash can at our table (lesson learned!). Marc got clams and grilled squid the first night, and shrimp and baked oysters and a salad to share the second night. The oysters were just amazing, topped with crunchy bits of peanuts maybe, and else something that was so delicious I smile just remembering it. The food was great, and the people who worked there were friendly and helpful. The restaurant was right next to the river and we all -- patrons and wait staff alike -- watched the ferries arrive and leave, arrive and leave, arrive and leave, always interesting. I finally watched my clock, and it took five minutes for the ferry to dock, all the motorcycles and cars to leave, a new load to come on board, and the ferry to leave again.

When we were paying for our second dinner, the woman who was taking our money seemed like the kind of woman who'd be your best friend, one you would just talk about your day with, confide your worries and fears, hear hers, share gossip, and always be glad to spend time with. She smiled when I showed her my translation of 'delicious' and once again I completely failed to grasp the pronunciation, even though I tried and she laughed. They always seem surprised when we say hello and thank you in Vietnamese.

We weren't in a huge rush to get to the next hotel up the mountain, so we leisured our morning away and then hopped in a taxi for the 4.1-mile journey to our next Victoria Hotel in Chau Doc, up Nui Sam.

Sa Dec

In Sa Dec we stayed at a very small place -- really, the only size place there is in Sa Dec -- called Minh Diem (pronounced ming dim). This was our cheapest room, at $12/night. That makes me laugh so hard. We've come to know that the more expensive a hotel or restaurant or meal is, the less likely it is to be great, and that cheaper places and meals are more likely to be exactly what we want. Still, this was excessively cheap even for us. We'd planned to stay two nights, but when we saw the hotel, we decided to stay only one night and add a night to Chau Doc. It was OK, with a great air conditioner; too great, actually, because we froze during the night. The hard bed only had a thin covering that barely covered the top of the bed, so if either of us turned over, we pulled the cover off the other. The little family who owns or operates the place was very sweet, with only the tiniest tiniest bit of English. Still, we didn't come to Sa Dec for the hotel, we came to return to some of the places we'd seen in 2011, when we stopped there during our wonderful Mekong "cruise," and walked through the market and to the local sights with sweet, sweet Mr. Wong. So we dropped our stuff off and headed to the river.

In Sa Dec, the main thing to see, apparently, is the former home of Marguerite Duras, known here as the woman who wrote (and lived) "The Lover," a book I didn't read and a movie we tried to watch but bailed on within the first 20 minutes. We'd seen it the last time, along with the "ancient house," and didn't feel a need to dive into either place again, although we did pass them in our wanderings. But it was the riverfront we sought, and the market. We always want the markets, and at this point we can recognize the differences between them, and even sometimes identify their locations when a photo shuffles up from our thousands and thousands of photos of our travels. As soon as we found the market, we remembered it all. Oh yes, I remember this, Mr. Wong explained the difference between river rats and crabs and those that live in the rice fields when they flood. Oh yes, I remember this, all the variety of clams and cockles (called baby clams on menus). Oh yes, I remember walking here. Oh yes, I know the photo Marc took of me and Mr. Wong. Oh yes. It's so wonderful to know a place and return to it.

Since Marc almost exclusively caters to what I need and want when we travel, I pushed for us to have the kind of dinner that he wanted for a change. It isn't at all that I don't want to eat street food (I do!), or grab something from some guy with a cart, but it is that I get a terrible sensory overload and sometimes get overwhelmed in the markets, with the crowds of people trying to get their shopping done and the motorcycles coming in all directions in the already crowded aisles, and the loud conversations, and the occasional vendor shouting about her pineapple, or whatever. But in this market, the connection between the big market and the night market was open and breezy, and along a quieter sidewalk. Marc wanted to get some chicken from a guy who was selling chicken and fetal duck eggs, rotating on spits over a charcoal fire. I think the people there were amused by us; they stood and sat and watched us eat, and we didn't feel uncomfortable at all but I was aware of them. The chicken was just great, but we satisfied ourselves with a couple of pieces and then wandered off in search of the next bit of dinner.

So the thing about Vietnam, at least in places south of Hoi An, is that restaurants are super hard to spot. They often look like they're in a garage, or maybe that's someone's home and they're just feeding family, or it's a woman cooking something on the sidewalk and there are those low tables and stools, blue plastic or red, and we just have no idea what they're cooking (which doesn't bother us, we often don't really know what we've ordered). The cafes are very easy to spot, and there are even more of them in Vietnam than there are Starbucks in the US. Instead of one on every corner, they line the blocks. But they only sell coffee and tea, no food at all. And inside, the chairs are arranged in rows, as if in a movie theater. There are tables on the sidewalk too, set up for long, lingering conversations, just like in Paris. I do love that this is a coffee culture, but boy I wish the cafes also sold a piece of bread or something.

So we wandered, trying to recognize a place to eat, and never could find anything. It was late in the afternoon, and the main intersection at the big market and the riverfront market was filled with motorcycles coming in all directions (standard Vietnam), so at that point we just stopped at a spring roll stand and Marc got four spring rolls for us. He paid for them and reached for the bag, and the woman was nearly upset, because she hadn't yet made the dipping sauce for them. She filled a conical plastic bag and off we went. We also got a bag of sweet bready things, a couple dusted with powdered sugar and a couple just deep friend dough. We'd done what we came to lovely Sa Dec to do, and just like in Can Tho the women smiled very hard at me and held my gaze, and I felt held and seen by them. We weren't in Sa Dec for long, and we didn't really see a whole lot, but it felt like a complete and circle-closing visit to me. The tour groups haven't really found this place yet, and I'm not sure they really will, because it's a small town off the main connecting highways, and who even really remembers Marguerite Duras, or pines to see her home? As we entered the market, we did see one very small group of Western people (so many Germans here, for some reason; the French and Americans are not surprising, but I have been surprised by the number of Germans, and even a group of Israelis).

Before we left town the next morning, we wanted to find breakfast in the market. Marc dashed out early to fetch coffee for me, and apparently there was a great deal of effort to understand each other. He said everyone who worked in the cafe came over and there was a lot of gesturing and helpful smiling, and eventually he got two cups of coffee to take away. Our translation app is great, but you have to know exactly how they refer to something (take away? to go?) to get the translation. After my coffee, off we went and BOY did we find a great breakfast! We didn't really know what we were getting, and I was content to watch Marc enjoy his breakfast, but once I saw what he got -- and once he saw what he got -- we asked for another one, for me. And we learned a new word: com (with kind of O that my keyboard doesn't have) means rice. The dish was a bed of rice and vegetables and pickled vegetables with a fried egg on top. Even though the egg wasn't very hot, and the yolk seemed cooked, when we cut it, the yolk ran into the rice and YUMMMMMM. We got a small bowl of soup and we still don't know exactly what the larger thing was (a piece of meat? a simmered vegetable? a section of banana blossom? even after we ate it we don't know) and the standard accompaniments, including a towering plate of greens and bean sprouts and various condiments. Oh my goodness it was delicious. I've saved the word for 'delicious' in my phone and always show it to the people who serve us, as we pay, and they always smile a huge smile. I've asked them every time to help me learn how to pronounce it (it's thom ngong, with diacritical marks of course), and I can get the 'thom' but not the 'ngong.' It starts way back in the mouth, tongue pressed against the soft palate, and I just can't get that diphthong right but they're always kind.

We wanted some fruit to go with our yummy breakfast, so Marc found a stall with watermelons. Usually we can get the fruit sliced and bagged, so he approached the woman and made his chop-chop hand movements, slicing this way and that and pointing to the watermelon, but she was as glaring and unyielding as everyone else has been warm and helpful. We think she could've understood us but just refused -- and maybe this just isn't the way they sell watermelon. We wanted half of the small watermelon, and finally Marc just grabbed the giant and *very* sharp knife, and she glared at him as he cut it (and his thumb). He cut the watermelon into chunks and put them in a plastic bag, his thumb bleeding pretty badly, and she had no idea what to do with us. What was she going to do with the other half, now? We paid, we think, for the whole watermelon and walked off with her glare burning into us. OK. So we met a grumpy, unfriendly Vietnamese woman, it was about time.

We checked out and hopped in our cab for the 60-mile trip to Chau Doc, which ended up taking 3.5 hours. We hit a huge jam, which turned out to be the very long line waiting to board the ferry to cross the river. The river crossing itself took only a few minutes, but the wait was terrible. A large, beautiful bridge is being constructed and looked like it was in the final stages, so I guess the ferry will soon be obsolete at this junction, and I imagine everyone will be glad.

Can Tho #1

We'd been to Can Tho on our last trip to Vietnam, when we stayed at the Victoria Can Tho. We had our favorite lunch and dinner spots right around the hotel, but we'd not been too impressed with the rest of the city. Marc was able to get us a reservation at a high-rise hotel that seemed to cater to business people and conferences, definitely not our style at all, but we were booking at the last minute and took what he could find -- happy enough since it had a nice-looking pool.

We were on the 28th floor (out of 28) and had a nice view overlooking the river and one of the main drags in the city, and the pool was on the 6th floor, kind of breezy. Even though it wasn't at all our style, we enjoyed the hotel and our large, comfortable room, and spent a good bit of time by the usually empty pool.

But the big surprise was Can Tho itself. Since we weren't staying at the Victoria, we had to wander around the area of our hotel and we discovered the market, finally. Last time we'd only found the night market, and like all night markets it was full of plastic crap, uninteresting. But the food market was just wonderful, on both sides of a curving street and then into the interior....and all pretty close to the night market! The last time we stayed, we didn't venture past the night market so we missed it completely.

One of the best parts of that market for me was the moment a very old woman grabbed my arm and looked up at me from underneath her conical straw hat with the most beautiful smile. She clutched my arm for half a minute and we smiled at each other the whole time. I don't think I'll ever forget her face. This kind of thing happened to me a few times in Can Tho, women from middle age to old, holding my gaze to smile at me, and it always felt personal in some way. It was startling and unexpected, and just marvelous.

For this unexpected stay, we wandered the riverfront, hit the market as many times as we could, and swam. We ate at Nam Bo a couple of times -- the set menu for dinner one night, and breakfast the next morning. During our dinner, a huge tour group of Americans arrived, middle-age to older, and they filled three very large tables and took over the mood of the place entirely. They were loud and raucous, and even throwing things up into the ceiling fan and cheering, like frat boys. It was so gross, they were so gross, and we left as soon as we could. Breakfast the next morning was much better; the place was quiet, the mood was very French colonial, and the food was great. There was a French couple seated at the table next to ours, and he could've been a cartoon of the stereotypical French man: Breton blue and white striped shirt and quirky glasses, and a neat, tidy style.

As we walked through the waterfront park, moving away from the market, we noticed the buildings on the riverfront changing, and at the end it was lined with large hotels, kind of like what we saw between Danang and Hoi An. One advertised poker and baccarat. They are soul-less places, uninteresting, and taking over. The huge statue of Uncle Ho is still there, and I imagine he'll still be there as an "authentic Vietnamese" tourist attraction. I wondered if all this meant this would be our last trip to Vietnam, and I felt such deep sadness about that possibility. But we were off deeper into the Mekong Delta, and I hoped that we wouldn't find the same kind of giant tour groups in Sa Dec.

Hoi An

Our drive from Hue to Hoi An took forever; as Marc said at one point, it felt like we were going in slow motion. Our driver seemed to forget to push the gas pedal, and he also took every opportunity to pull over for us to have a photo of some bit of scenery. It was interesting to stop at the sand bar where oysters are cultivated on old tires, and also very beautiful, with the sky and water merging into the same color. He offered to stop so we could see the bunkers -- French and American and Vietnamese. He seemed confused when we said we didn't want to see them. The best I could say was that they made me sad, because how do you even begin to talk about that war with a young man who doesn't speak much English, who lives in Hue? How do you know what side his family fought on? The Americans left enough pain behind on both sides. When we said we didn't want to see them, he said that he'd driven an American man who came to Vietnam only to see the bunker because his friend died in the war.

As we hit Danang, we were appalled to see the transformation into a Miami Beach kind of place, and it continued all along the river right up to Hoi An. One giant international hotel after another, all along the river. It made our hearts sink, and we didn't know it yet but it was a sign of the changes we'd find in Hoi An.

Our hotel was on the beach, just outside of the main part of town, and we'd been looking forward to it as a respite from Hoi An. But oh it was just awful. The beach was not a nice beach, and it was so crowded -- intimations of crowds to come. The hotel itself was not at all our kind of hotel, and the beachfront restaurants were just gross. We ate lunch at one and were treated rudely, and the food wasn't good. A large table of Chinese were seated next to us, and when they left it looked like the wreckage after a hurricane, with food all over the floor and table and seats, and so much trash and mess I couldn't even imagine where it all came from. So we took a cab into the old town of Hoi An to look around, escape our hotel, and get some dinner.

We expected Hoi An to be a tourist attraction, but we just had no way of imagining what it has become. It's like Disneyland, so full of tourists that you can't even see anything. The little bridge was packed full, the sidewalks were choked, large tour groups from America, France, Germany, and China. We were disgusted. A friend from Melbourne who also loves Vietnam said that the last time she and her family were in Hoi An, three years ago, they'd also referred to it as Disneyland. She said it's less crowded in the mornings, but the stores have transformed into shops for tourists, so we didn't even want to return the following morning.

But we were there and needed dinner, and all the restaurants seemed to cater exclusively to tourists, so we consulted our restaurant app and Marc found an Indian restaurant that seemed potentially OK. After all, those tour groups of giant crowds were there for their "authentic Vietnam experience"! It was a quiet restaurant with friendly, smiling wait staff, and we had amazing food. I got my standard favorite, chana masala with garlic naan and Marc got a fish curry of some kind, and it was the best Indian food we've ever had. The next best Indian food we've ever eaten was in Nha Trang, when we were there in 2005. Who'd have thought? It was much better than any Indian food we ever ate in India.

We'd planned to spend three nights in Hoi An but we were so appalled that we wanted to leave. Marc found a different hotel nearby and got us a reservation, but we finally decided we just wanted to leave Hoi An completely. When Marc talked to the manager, she was surprised and kind of horrified that we were so unhappy. She said of course we shouldn't stay if we didn't want to, and she wanted to understand why we were unhappy. We told her that it just wasn't our kind of place any more, and I mentioned the giant tour groups and she seemed to understand. When I told her we'd been there in 2005 and it was so different, she smiled a sad smile. So we scooted on down to Can Tho for a two-night stay, even though we were planning to be there later in our trip too. Marc was able to change our flight with some difficulty, and with everything we read about VietJet we were a little surprised that it went as well as it did. No problems at the airport, no problem with the airplane or flight, it left on time, and was a perfectly great experience.

Hue

When we came to Hue in November 2005, it was just a day trip from Hoi An. We only really knew about the Citadel, so that was our lone mission. That, plus lunch. It was steamy hot and rainy, and we got there and bought umbrellas (still have one of them) and toured the Citadel. It was very Citadel-y. We are only now really able to talk about the lunch that Marc had, which we think was a dragonfly in some kind of rice sludge. Really, he couldn't even broach the topic for years and years. That was our entire experience of Hue. Still, since we'd given it such a short effort last time, we thought we'd spend a bit more time this trip, probably the last time we'd come to Hue.

Our little hotel was absolutely charming and wonderful, and located very well -- walking distance to the big market, a longer walk to the Citadel, and surrounded by various things to see and places to eat. When we checked in, completely shattered by the long trip (NYC to Hong Kong to Danang and then a 2-something-hour drive to Hue), I really just wanted to get out of my clothes and take a little rest, maybe a shower, and transition myself and mind to Vietnam. My hair was in braids, and all fuzzed out, my face was creased and exhausted, and my clothes looked exactly like I'd slept in them. In the elevator going up to our room, we were accompanied by a young woman from the front desk, and a young man who carried our bags. He was glancing sideways at me and then he spoke to her in Vietnamese. She smiled and then looked at me and said, "He said your hair is cute and you are cute. And your name is cute too." And from then on, every single time I saw her she greeted me by name. (Marc didn't get the same name treatment.) It was actually the perfect kick-off to our experience with Hotel LaPerle: very warm and friendly staff, personalized care, and awareness and tending to whatever we might need. The room was $28/night, with a big, endless free breakfast, and we have a sense that it'll be the best room of our whole trip, and perhaps the best breakfast, too.

So the first day we wandered over to the Citadel, imagining that we probably wouldn't go in again -- and so we didn't, but mainly because the place was overrun with large tour groups. It was muggy and kind of unpleasant, thick air hanging, white skies, so we drifted back to our hotel for a wee rest. In the neighborhood of our hotel was a gigantic bar called the DMZ Zone, with everything painted in military camo, bombs hanging on the front, and the awning painted with "the McNamara line." We were horrified, but we are very upset still by what the US did to Vietnam, so it's a painful thing to experience. The bar was always filled with Vietnamese and other Asian people, and I don't think we ever saw Americans there.

As always, Marc had identified a restaurant nearby for dinner our first night, and it was just a few steps away from our hotel, but it looked worse than the reviews suggested, so he rambled around and found a better-looking one a short walk away. We had the set menu, meh, not awful but not memorable.

The next day, after sleeping for a solid 10 hours, we were ready to roll. We went to the big market, which is our main mission everywhere we go, in search of a local breakfast. It was too muggy for me to enjoy a bowl of hot pho, but Marc loved it, and we both loved sitting there among Vietnamese women doing their thing, smiling at us -- sometimes kindly, sometimes with humor -- and tickled when I showed them the translation for "delicious" in my app. The woman I showed it to laughed, and shouted at the large group of women nearby. They all laughed, and one woman came over to see what Marc was eating, and then she did a little smiling nod. That's right, it's good.

Our big experience for that day was a walk to the Thien Mu Pagoda, which was much farther than we anticipated, and Marc's flip-flop was wearing a hole in his skin, so we finally grabbed a taxi for the final push. It was a beautiful place, with views overlooking the Perfume River and the mountains that surround the hilltop. It's not uncommon for places like this to have a car or two on display; one of the many Ho Chi Minh museums has a number of his cars. Still, I wasn't prepared for the reason for this particular car to be on display: it was driven to Saigon by a monk who then sat down and burned himself to death to protest the president's treatment and abuse of Buddhists. Vietnamese monks are serious and put their beliefs on the front lines.

The little restaurant we ate at our final night in Hue -- Golden Rice -- looked kind of sad and worn-out, but looks were so deceiving, because it was one of the very best meals we've ever had, anywhere. I got a green mango salad with shrimp and sauteed tofu with chili and lemongrass, and Marc got some kind of eggplant dish with a sauce of lemongrass and ginger, and fried shrimp sitting on some kind of crispy bits of fried bread crumbs maybe, and bits of lemongrass, all kinds of crispy stuff that was so delicious I was stealing spoonfuls to put on my rice, too. Every dish was just perfect, and all four were completely distinct. Even the rice was spectacular, and better than most. We sacked out early, as we always do at the beginning of these trips, with full bellies and tired legs.

We had a relatively early pick-up the next morning for our drive to Hoi An, and the driver was just the kind of English-speaker I prefer. He knew some, but not much, so we were able to sit in silence or talk to each other without a lot of pressure of conversation with him. Still, he pointed out all kinds of interesting things in Hue, like the high school (and Ho Chi Minh attended there for two years in his youth), and various temples and pagodas. On the way out, he drove us to one of the royal tombs, but I'll talk about that in the next post.

At the end of it, I came away with a real appreciation for Hue. It's a charming city, but mainly my sense of it is based on the warmth and friendliness of the people -- the women, mostly. Every single encounter was a pleasure, and that's what I'll remember when I think of our time there.