Building the Seed Bank
So this is a testament of my days of hard labour. The seed bank is now close to completion but it needs three weeks of drying before we can coat it with limestone and tapoika. Then it will be finished and the seed saving may begin! Thank you everyone who donated a little something to this project; every little helps!
On The Roof of Indochina 3143 m
To begin from the beginning.
The Trainride From Hell; wasn't really that bad. Mostly because I sat next to a very sweet Vietnamese girl. Well, that wasn't very surprising; since I was the only westerner in the carrage, but anyhow. She didn't speak one word of English, but we used sign language and she helped me to bargain with the saleswomen on the train; who would otherwise have charged me double the prize. The saleswomen; that is a very charming fact of local trains. They don't sell candy or soft drinks, they sell freshly boiled eggs (still smoking) and sticky rice, not to mention the small apples, sugarcanes, weird berries (my Vietnamese friend bought some and offered me one, it totally numbed my tounge for five minutes. She ate it with chili, I was impressed) and other nice, and to me exotic goods. In return for her favours I offered her one of my earphones for my i-pod and we listened to Nordman and Carla Bruni and she seemed to enjoy it. So, besides bruised buttocks, it was okej. The landscape was rather enjoyable too, although not as incredible as I had heard.
To get to Sapa from the trainstation in Lao Cai you have to take a minivan the 10 km or so into town. By sheer coincidence; who joins me in my totally over crammed bus? If not Andrew. It was rather nice to see a familiar face (and to actually speak to someone in English). We were both thinking about taking a trekk in Sapa. And we had the same one in mind: Climbing Fansipan, the tallest mountain in Indochina, with an altitude of 3143m. High that is. But we both also new it would be far too expensive.
We went into a travel agent to check the prizes though, no harm in asking, right? And as it turned out, a group was just about to leave and we could join them for as little as 950,000 dong (420kr, 45euro) for a three day trekk. All included. Not too much to consider, so we asked them to give us twenty minutes to run down to the hotel and get our gear and check out. Then we were on our way.
This would be obsticle number two. Not that it wasn't a nice trekk, and we had a lot of fun. But, Christ (excuse the language), it was hard. So hard. Well the first day wasn't very hard, just a three hour, rather easy, trekk and then we were in camp and had a nice dinner made by our porters (yes we had porters).
It was the second day; the day of the actual ascent that nearly killed us. The day begun with a rather steep 4,5 hour climp up to the top. A hard climb and it rendered us pleased, but exhausted at the top. The altitude really got to us too, eventhough it wasn't that high you could really feel the air getting thinner and we had to catch our breath more often. It gave me a slight headache aswell, but we joked it off, blaming eachother for using up all the oxigen. Haha.
The really tough part was the descent. 4,5 hours (yes it took the same time as the ascent, maybe that could give you an idea of how hard it was), climping, crawling, roping and jumping. I was absolutely knackered when we were halfway, and literally close to tears when we had a third to go. When we reached the camp I was actually too tired to notice. The last day was okej, a four hour descent that hurt our sore muscles but left us alive at the pick-up point for the bus back to Sapa.
Maybe, by the sound of this, you think the trekk wasn't good but we had a really nice time. Much due to the company. Our group consisted of eight people. Besides ourselves, the others were all Vietnamese. They spoke very good English though and we had a great time over dinners and campfires. Playing Vietnamese singing games and chatting cheerfully. Wonderfull people all of them! It was also a pleasure sleeping outdoors, well atleast the second night. The first night we almost froze to death in broken and old sleepingbags, but that improved dramatically.
Sapa is the coolest plase in Vietnam by the way, some trivia for you.
Tonight I'm going to treat myself to a nice dinner. I have deserved it! If there were any place to get a Thai massage around here I would be there right now. I can hardly walk for the ache in my muscles; it's massive.
I hope the spring is on it's way to all of you. I really miss you, I am a bit homesick today. It comes and goes, but you are in my mind always. Kisses to you all!
Honneybees in Hanoi
I had a good time anyhow. You always find something else to do. I've spent a lot of time with the Southafrican and Zimbabwean couple (I say couple, but they were only friends, very clear on that). Really nice people; we had a great time over luches, walks, coffees and dinners.
Today I actually had a bit of an adventure. I met a Vietnamese guy at the restaurant where I had lunch. He was studying to be a tourist guide and he asked me if i wanted a litle tour of town. It was an offer I couldn't refuse; so I didn't (refuse) and he ended up taking me to The Snake Village (I write it in captive letters just because it sounds so cool; The Snake Village). And we enjoyed a meal consisting of stir-fried snake, snake springrolls, snake risewine (you know the brown bottles you see with kobras in them) and he also treated me to some local delicases which included honeybee risewine (with bees in it, but maybe you got that) and ginseng risewine. Of all those, surprisingly enough, it was the ginseng risewine which tasted the worst. Bla! The snake though was actually quite tasty.
Tomorrow I'm leaving Hanoi for Sapa, in the far north west corner of Vietnam. I have a 12 hour hard seat, no AC trainride to look forward to (thank you Tet! No tickets to either fast trains or soft seats). It will be an adventure though!
Another adventure was trying to find some fod for the jerney; finally I managed to scrape up three baguettes, two cans of tuna and some bananas to cover my three meals. Haha, did I mention that I have to get up at 5 am tomorow to catch the train at 6am? Now don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining; finally something to satisfy my urge for some real hardcore travelling. I'm rolling up my sleves, be sure.
Well, I'll see tomorrow how I feel. I have a feelings my buttocks wil hate me, but what do you do?
Be safe now my darlings!
A craving for space and New Years annoyances
The other day I realized that since I left Sweden (1,5months ago) I have spent approximatelly 5 hours on my own. In realizing this I suddenly felt this great craving to go solo. To have some personal space, to do only what I want to do and most of all to stretch my wings and try them out on my own. So this is what I did.
I might be going a bit ahead of myself here. Before this great discovery I spent two more days in Hue with Andrew. We spent the days biking around town and doing some imperial sightseen. We went to the old Citadel, which is said to have been an amazing imperial city; but which is now mostly ruins due to the Vietnamese War. One thing we saw though was Vietnams tallest flagpole, isn't that something!?
The second day I spent on my own, taking the bike to the tomb of Tu Doc; Vietnam's longest ruling emperor. The tomb was actually more of an estate than an actual tomb. There were palaces, ponds, lush parks and of course housing for the emperors 104 wives and concubines. The actual tomb was made by a 40 ton iron block, which it took three years to transport to the setting, and is inscribed by the emperor himself (who actually named the place; Humble). Kind of ironic when you consider the fact that Tu Doc was so worried about grave robberers so he was buried (with all his treasures) at an unknown location. He took major precatiouns against the discovery of this secret tomb; he ordered each of all the 200 servants who buried him to be beheaded.
Just so you know: New Years is celebrated during a couple of days here and there is no escaping the riswine.
We left for Hanoi on the night bus. I have to admit it, you got me, I'm getting just a little bit sick of night buses. 13 hours and a sprained neck later we arrived in the outskirts of Hanoi at 5.30 in the morning. Since it was to early for the bus to be allowed in town he simply dropped us off to get in to town by ourselves. I hitched a ride with some English guys and found the town closed and deserted,due to the early hour but mostly due to Tet. After an hour or two of wandering around I eventually found an hotel and fell asleep.
The rest of the day I spent walking around, doing nothing really, everything was closed. I'm getting a little bit sick of New Years too actually. I phoned home and had a wonderful chat with the familyand then I sat myself down, reading in a cafe. There I met a very agreable English guy and he invited me out for dinner and drinks that evening with two friends of his. I gladly accepted and we had a really nice evening. His friends turned out to be very nice, a Zimbabwean girl and a Southafrican guy, and we played 'I have never..' and drank too much local Halida beer.
Surprisingly enough (detect the sarcasm), everything's closed today. But I'm going to head down to the train station and see if I can get tickets to Sapa, which I have named my next destination.
I hope you are all alive and well!
Miss you guys and you are in my mind.
Some advice which I read on a wall of a toilet:
'I wish I was what I was when I wished I was what I am.'
Ponder that!
Chuc Mung Nam Moi! - Happy New Year!
The preparations for Vietnams most important holiday; Tet- The Chineese New Year, include cleaning everything in your house (from clothes to floors) notoriously, burning paper money, lighting incense and offering food to the ancestors. All to provide good luck for the year coming.
In comparison my task; which was to find out where to celebrate it and the actual date of the festivites, seemed easy but it proved rather tricky. To begin with everybody was naming different dates, and seemed generally confused of what was the actual celebration. Anyway, I decided to make my way to Hue, the old dynastic capital of Vietnam, a place I found suitable for the celebrations.
Hue has a rather intriguing history, being the heartbeat of Vietnam in the imperial days of the Nguyen dynasty, which ruled (at least in name) til 1945. But it was also from Hue that the emperor provoked the French attack in the 1800s which in it's extent lead to the French colonisation of Vietnam. Furthermore Hue was the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Tet Offensive during the Vietnamese (or as they say here: American) War and was held by the VC for 25 days during which 3000 civilians were murdered and buried in shallow mass graves. Sadly this offensive also destroyed most of the Citadel and the old imperial town.
Today it is a bustling town, third in size in Vietnam, situated on both sides of the Perfume River. And, as far as I'm concerned a good place to celebrate Tet.
We ( me and Andrew) arrived from Hoi An at 1 PM and set out to find a place to stay. A task which at first seemed easy, us negotiating a good deal with a man we met at the bus station. The deal proved itself to be a scam though, the salesman had straight up lied to us, and we left the guesthouse in a fairly bad mood. Sadly I have noticed that far too many people has discovered the benefits of lying. This render you suspicious and lessens the experiences of your trip; having you turn down offers you gladly would have accepted otherwise.
Very well, we found a great guesthouse just down the road from the first one, right in the backpacking area. Clean and nicely prized. We went for a surpirsingly cheap and good lunch and felt our mood rise again. The rest of the day we spent exploring Hue and trying to figure out were the action was for New Years Eve and also if the Eve was that night or the following. The answers differed. But as the night fell our doubts did the same. There definitelly was no reason to worry about missing IT; everybody went out on the streets. And they all went around like crazy, honking and running around. We simply spent the night walking around; marvelling at the sheer number of people. Fantastic! Everybody bought balloons to release at the strike of midnight and for some reason everybody also bought cactuses which they carried around. We still haven't gotten an answer to that phenomena.
At midnight there were some fantastic fireworks and then I guess IT was finished for everybody mounted their motorbikes and went home. As did we.
When we got back to the guesthouse we were greated by the personel and some of the guests. The personel gave us a great meal of fruit, candy and sticky rice and loads and loads of rice wine, and we stayed up drinking til the early hours; having a blast.
This morning I uttered some words that I've never said before: "Oh, my head! I think i had to much rice wine yesterday." I was not the only one.
In and out of fashion, Motorcykle Diaries part II
Nha Trang had one night to prove itself as a worthwile destination. Jossan and I were only spending the night there on our way to Hoi Anh; thought we'd split the 14 hour jerney and have us a little party. But I guess it proved itself really well. We had the best time! Hooking up with a group of Canadians whom we met at the restaurant were we had dinner. Jossan did the intro; by ordering the smokiest dish on the menue, she forced them to start conversation sinse they were literally covered in our smoke. Good future tip: Order hotpot! Well, the night went on like the good old times in Koh Pha Ngang; we got far to drunk on cheap buckets (sorry mum and dad) and had a jolly good time at the infamous Sailing Club.
We actually made our way to Hoi Anh the following day. Meeting up with Andrew and taking the night bus (thanks again Conor for the travelling pillow, real life saver). We actually slept okay ond arrived in Hoi Anh around 6 am. We spent the day walking around and looking at tailor shops; for which the town is famous. There are so many! It's ridiculous, but rather amusing. "Madame, you come look in my shop!" Well I actually had a skirt sewn, for Laos (no showing knees or shoulders when teaching) and a blouse and a pair of red, high heeld shoes (very sinnful) made. Classy!
The days we spent here has gone by very fast, we've rented bikes and sone to the beach. We've walked around the old town and had a taste of the local delicasses. Taking it easy and enjoying the 20 cent beer (2kr). Just enjoying ourselves and eachothers company. Yesterday was Jossans last day and we spent it with some real quality time. We went and spoiled ourself with some one-dollar-manicure and pedicure (mine bright green, I have Shrek toes; high fashion!) and Jossan got the hair removed from her legs with a thread and some pain.
The night we spent at the bars, having a laugh. By the way Happy Valentine's everybody! This tradition actually last all the way to Vietnam; Andrew was the sweetest yesterday, he got both me and Jossan roses, so we spent the evening sucking up to him. Haha, no we had a great time.
It wasn't at all funny saying good bye to Jossan this morning. She has been the best travel companion one could ask for. We have gotten along so well it's almost ridiculous; always in the mood for the same things both compromising when not. I'm really going to miss her. When you read this Jossan I just want you to know this: Thanks, for this trip! It will not be our last. I wish you the best of luck in Australia, although I know you won't need it. You'll have the time of your life.
So I'm off solo; well not completely solo, I'm sticking with Andrew for a bit, at least a week or so til we get to Hanoi. After that things are open but that works for me.
Today we had quite an adventure. We got the bright idea of renting a motorbike and going to Danang. Well, when we set off we realised none of us could actually drive. It turned out I was the most experienced driver; having driven John-Michaels scooter two times in Bastad. So I got behind the wheel. My fist discovery was that the bike had shifts, it was not an automatic as JM's. Very well, I thought, if I could pull off getting my driver's licence I should pull off driving a moped. And I did! I drove all the way to Danang; where we discovered we had no real lock. But we took the chance and just locked it with the key and took a walk along the river. When we got back we got on our bike and drove away. After a while I noticed that the brake was a little different and Andrew pointed out that we had much more gaz than when we started. Suddenly we realized: It's not our bike! But it worked with our key. Puzzled we turned around and was greated by a very helpfull bunch of old men. Our bike though was not to be found. At first we thought that someone might have misstaken their bike for ours and we actually considered taking the wrong bike back to Hi\oi Anh. Until the owner showed up, and angrily took his bike back. there we were without a bike, I could just see it o clearly; having to pay for a new bike. We paniked slightly. But were well taken care of by the helpfull Vietnamese men. After a while Andrew thought he'd take a look around the neighbouring streets to see if he could find the bike. When I saw him come back with it I almost cried of relief. We had been on the wrong street all along! Tank God. We had a coffe with the helpfull Vietnamese, and bought them cigarettes as a thank you and then we set off again. The question still stands though: How could we use our key in someone else's bike!?
On the way back we stopped by Marble Mountains. A wonderful, peacefull monastary and view point; serene enough to calm our upset nerves. I can still feel my heart beating.
Now we're off for dinner..
Roses and pink kisses