By Lucy

Yay, daylight savings! It’s funny what a difference an hour makes. They don’t have it in Asia – the sun doesn’t really move around the sky, near the equator – so now everyone is only 11 hours behind me. Yay math!

It does change how I organize my day. I prefer to contact people in the morning, but now it might be too late for some people, and I have to contact them in my afternoon instead.

Monday, cruise day! Let’s blow this popsicle stand.

Dress, pack, head downstairs for breakfast. There were some people sleeping on the benches on the lobby, with their bags and everything. Too late for check in? Too cheap to pay for the night? It left me with nowhere to sit, so I stood outside.

The bus texted me. They can’t navigate the narrow road the hostel is on, could I walk to the corner?

Sure. How big is this bus?

I waited on the street corner for ten minutes. The guide called me, and when I waved he ran down the road. The bus paused long enough for the guide to sling my luggage under the bus – which is why I keep my valuables on my person – and for me to hop onto the step, and then it took off again. Gah!

I fumbled my way down to the first available seat. The grumpy old man next to the window put himself in an awkward position; he wanted to nap, but every time his arm or leg brushed mine, he shot upright. Since I later deduced he had relatives on the bus, I imagine he had tried to get a seat to himself, which was silly of him. Always assume the bus will be full.

Eventually we were on the highway to the coast.

We stopped at another bus stop. This time, the cafe was on the second floor, so we were instructed to go up the stairs, chill in the cafe, and come down the exit stairs at the appointed time. The bus driver also handed out lanyards with the bus’s license plate number on it, so he could track down any stragglers.

They have lots of statues of Guan Yin here, but then ancient Vietnam was matriarchal. They have many stores about warrior women/ queens, like the Trung sisters. Their creation myth also features a woman as the creator; Au Co, a Tien. Which, like the Maori Atua, has no proper English translation.

We passed by rivers framed with mangroves, which was pretty cool.

It clouded over as we pulled in to Ha Long.

So, Ha Long is actually the name of the city. I’m not even sure you can really call the cruise to Ha Long bay, either, because it’s not really a bay, but I suppose you have to call it something. Ha Long bay is one of those touristy things everyone does, and there’s a variety of options, from day cruises to luxury yachts. I picked something medium priced. It takes so long to escape Hanoi traffic, I decided to go for the overnight cruise, rather than rush.

I also don’t think I’ve ever slept on the water before, so this was kind of exciting.

I got lost at one point – I still don’t understand this “every bus has multiple cruises on it” thing – but eventually I ended up at the right place. A man with pretty good English came out and introduced himself as Leo.

I’ve noticed most Vietnamese people try to introduce themselves by their proper name, before giving up and giving themselves an English nickname for you to remember. Leo fully admitted that he just calls himself that because it is his astrological sign.

Flop on a chair. Breath.

This place is wild. They don’t have docks, they use dinghies to bring us to the boat. They have this paved slope they pull the dinghies up on to for us to board.

On our cruise, we ended up having a Myanmar family of 10 or more people, 2 German couples, one South African girl, and a Russian mother and kid.

Now aboard the boat, we got the keys to our rooms and went to sort ourselves out.

My room was nice, really swanky. Fake swanky, though, because the boat was unmistakably a fixer-upper. But I was confident we’d survive the night and that was the extent of my concern.

I glanced out the window and noticed we were passing a pearl farm.

At 12:30, we came down to the dining room for lunch. French fries (no ketchup or salt), salad, sauteed vegetables, fried pork, various curries. They also served some crab cakes stuff back into the crab shell, which make it look like they were serving whole crab for a hot minute.

After lunch, most of us wandered up onto the sundeck, misnamed in this case, because there was no sun and it was quite cool with the sea breeze. I snapped some photos, and Ilga snapped this photo of me and then I ran back to my cabin to change into jeans for the rest of the cruise.

We passed some little altars set up in the cracks of the rocks. Leo explained later that they are offerings to the sea god, for good fishing.

Around 3, we arrived at Ha Long Bay. The cruises all take a J shaped route from the dock to where they anchor for the night, to better let us appreciate the scenery. Which was, admittedly, gorgeous.

Back on the tender!

First stop was Ti Top island. The island is named for Russian cosmonaut Gherman Titov, who visited it in the 60’s. We only stopped here for 40 minutes, for some reason, which isn’t enough time in my opinion. There is the option to climb up to the peak and take photos from the little structure at the top, but it’s 300 meters and I’m still recovering from the jungle hike. Also, the stairs are usually a zoo of people. I walked up to the first viewing platform and snapped some photos, then headed to the beach.

I wanted a swim, but it was so cold that I couldn’t force myself any deeper in the water than knee-high.

Five minutes before we were supposed to meet the guide, the skies opened up.

Cue bedlam.

I had my rain jacket with me and I was already damp from my attempt to swim, so I didn’t care much. I helped Leo corral everyone towards the boat, as there wasn’t much in the way of shelter and everyone was scattered.

Now for a pit-stop; the Myanmar family wanted to be returned to the boat. Lame! That’s a lot of money to waste because it started raining.

The next actual stop was called “Surprise cave”. The apocryphal story is that the French discovered this cave 200 years ago and named it that because it was surprising how big it was.

More stairs. Yay.

The cave is actually pretty cool, especially as an amateur geologist. It also brings to mind Wookey Hole Cave, in Britain. Me and Leo talked a lot; he had some stories, lore, etc, but no one was really paying attention to him, so I had to keep wrangling them for him. We gave up on the Russian mother and kid entirely; it’s not like they spoke enough English to understand him anyway.

You can see from ripples on the ceiling how the cave was shaped by higher sea levels thousands of years ago.

There’s a few features; the Gate to Hell, because it’s sinking; the lucky turtle; the dragon and the dragon’s baby; the money rock, so called because when you shine a flashlight on it, it sparkles! Leo said the stalactites grow 1 centimeter every decade.

I ended up talking a lot to Ilga and her husband, although his English was better.

Back on the tender!

Dinner wasn’t until 7, so they had a tea arranged on the sundeck. We all went up there and snacked and talked a bit. The number of new fruits I’m trying on this trip is a bit unexpected, like guava.

The superyachts really gross me out. No one needs that.

At 6:30, we had a “cooking class”, that was just making spring rolls. Riveting! Then dinner, as the lights of the other boats winked at us across the water.

“What happened to the South African girl?” Someone asked.

Oh yeah! She had gone to her cabin after lunch and never emerged. We never saw her again, not even when we disembarked. I wonder if they med-evaced her.

Ilga managed to get out of me that my mother is German. I’d been avoiding mentioning it because I wasn’t sure how good my German was, but with her gentle prodding we discovered it’s actually pretty good. They’re from Baden as well and they’d heard of wanderjahre (also called wandergeselle or “on der walz”). The man also charters a boat once a year, so I exchanged numbers with them.

The Russian boy is a fussy eater. He rejected most of the food at the table, but I noticed him watching Minecraft videos on his phone. I ran to my room and grabbed my Switch, which he had never seen before, but kids pick up games pretty quick. I managed to bribe him to eat dinner for rounds of Mario Kart, but I also had fun playing games with someone.

After everyone started heading to bed, I did too. First night sleeping on a boat!

Actually, the boat ended up moving around that time. I’m not sure why, but we kept spinning around the anchor. It didn’t bother me but I could imagine some people found it upsetting.

I slept pretty good. Maybe too good. I woke up from a dream that I was back at Gunyah.

Went up onto the deck. It was dangerously close to being sunny today. Breakfast was lovely.

The main activity for the morning was kayaking, so we took the tender over to this floating dock.

Problem! Everyone else is a pair except for me! There was the option to kayak by myself, but I’m good, thanks. The other option was a boat with the Myanmar family, and we were all going to the same place, so why not.

Back on the boat! Time to pack up and “check out”.

Since we headed right back to the dock, it took much less time to get there. Back on the tender, walk across the road to the cruise station. Hang out until the bus comes by.

Leo comes over and thanks me for helping him with the other guests.

On the bus, I ended up seated next to a British guy, who was chatting with a Russian couple he met on his cruise. Turns out the three of them are headed to the airport, so we all agreed to grab a Grab together, since my hostel is near the airport (called Noi Bai). Much cheaper for me!

I’d had an attack of the “what if this is a scam again”. The price for this place seemed too good to be true, but I had to find out in person.

The Grab driver dropped me off in an alley. Clutching my bags, I walked carefully down the alley.

It was real.

I walked up to the ornate hardwood door and stuck my head in. There was some old people playing cards – they did so every day I was there – and none of them spoke Vietnamese. One got up and led me around the corner to an office.

Now, I never got the hosts name. He had a sign saying “Bob’s House” above the door, so I called him Bob and he never corrected me.

He showed me upstairs to my room. It was smaller than I expected, and the mirror was dirty, but I was ok with it. Private bed and bathroom, plus a desk. It was also super quiet because there was no one else on my level – the grandparents slept downstairs and the other guests and Bob were in another building – so I was more than happy with it.

I spent the rest of the afternoon on my computer. Having some alone time after so many weeks of enforced socialization is heavenly.

At 7, Bob called me down for dinner. The whole hostel was having a potluck in the courtyard. He offered everyone shots of homemade rice wine, and I accepted a shot to be polite.

There was a Filipino girl who was trying desperately to get back to Dubai, apparently unaware of how dire the situation was there. She showed us a picture of where she worked, and I gasped; the Burj Kalifa, the tallest building in the world, which was hit by an attack from Iran. I doubt she’s gonna get work even if she gets back to Dubai somehow, but unlike the others at the table, I know where her desperation lies. She needs to make money for her family.

There was also a Malay. She refuses to eat much, saying she’s on a diet, but she keeps doing shots with Bob. When we ask what she does for work, she says “I organize parties” and looks down at the ground.

There was a French couple who were here on vacation from their working holiday in Australia. An elderly Scottish woman who Bob insisted on calling “mama”, named Annette.

And a quiet Russian man who declined all alcohol.

It was a lot of fun and more of an authentic experience than the cruise, but at 8, I called it. Dinner was too late and gave me the grumblies.

Thanks to the time change, I had to stay up ’til 11 for a Rotary meeting.

I’ve been getting the low heart rate alerts earlier and earlier in the day. It occurs to me that Vietnamese cuisine doesn’t really have salt in it and I’ve been sweating enough to have to clean the crust off my Fitbit. I wonder if I should buy salt pills (they exist) or a salt shaker. That’s probably not helping me.

I got up in the morning, dressed and wandered down to the courtyard. I figured I’d walk to the Vinmart and grab some breakfast, but Bob was in the courtyard. He waved me down and invited me for coffee.

I expected something kind of gross, but he had some packets of instant coffee with sugar and powdered milk in them already, and they were actually pretty good. He also had some little cakes, but I could already tell it wouldn’t be enough for me.

I half-expected the others to be up already, but they weren’t. Everyone slowly drifted in as we sat and chatted. The Russian man finally introduced himself as Vlad and expressed an interest in coffee culture.

Eventually I had to excuse myself.

You can tell white people aren’t common around here, because everyone turned to watch me walk past.

I wandered down to the mart. I grabbed a bag of chips – I hate relying on chips, but I couldn’t find Gatorade and it’s close enough – and a pack of pads. I had half a mind to buy a single roll of toilet paper, if I could find any, but they only had 12 packs. Well, I’d buy one of those if I needed to, but lets go back and ask.

Bob didn’t have any toilet paper, but he handed me a box of tissues and said he would buy some soon. Well, it works, I suppose.

A neighbor who was visiting was eating the green mangoes off the tree, dipping them in salt. She offered me a slice. I ate it out of politeness; it didn’t taste unpleasant, per se, but it seemed wrong to be eating the mangoes before they were ready.

Vlad was still sitting at the table, now surrounded by neighbors dropping by to chat with Bob.

I wandered over, “Want to go get coffee at lunch?”

“Oh, sure.” He said.

I went back upstairs, showered, and played video games for a bit. Then I got my laundry organized and tidied my things up a bit, before heading downstairs. I tracked down Bob – everyone had disappeared – and threw my things in the wash. Then I knocked on Vlad’s door.

Annette is in the same room as him. She emerged from bed as well, looking weak and sipping on a mug of hot water and ginger.

Me and Vlad started walking down the road. “Where do you want to go?” He asked.

“Oh, I just wanted to try the egg coffee.”

“I know of a shop… but it’s two kilometers away.” He said.

“Two?” I laughed, “That’s not far!”

“Oh, good.” He says, looking relieved. “You never know…”

“Yeah, I know, Vietnamese people don’t walk anywhere.”

“Right?”

We walked down to this coffee chop (it was not two kilometers, it was like 700 meters). He ordered in halting Vietnamese and paid for both of us… not that that’s much of a flex, when a coffee is a dollar. They don’t sell food at this coffee shop, unfortunately.

The egg coffee was good, actually, like homemade eggnog with coffee mixed in.

We chatted for a bit. His English is pretty good, but not perfect. He asked me some questions about Canada. I asked him more about Vietnam than Russia; every question about Russia that came to mind sounded racist or judgmental, like asking him about the war. He explained that he’s an introvert and not much for talking, which explains his reluctant behavior at dinner and breakfast.

After we finished our coffee, I mentioned that I was still looking for something to eat. As we walked back towards the hostel, he pointed out a place selling food, and we stopped for some. He negotiated with the storekeeper for two bowls of local pho.

Despite describing himself as an introvert, he seemed to be quickly warming up to me. Once we were done eating (he paid again, over my protests), he asked me if I’d be interested in going on a walk to a nearby market.

“Sure!”

There were long stretches of the walk where we walked in silence. It felt normal; no one needs to talk all the time. He was quite curious about my Buddhism, and I was starting to get the sense that he’s a man looking for answers to deep questions.

As we walked, random kids would come up to us and shout “Hello/bonjour!” Once they discerned we spoke English, they would try to have a conversation with us. Vlad explained that since tourists are how people make real money here, kids are anxious to practice their English early and often.

He recommended a few places in China, and it occurred to me that we have very different risk assessments. China is safe to him; the Commonwealth is dangerous and foreign.

We passed a shop selling a coffee that he lamented he’d been having a hard time finding outside central Vietnam. He asked if I wanted one and I said sure, but I insisted on paying this time. He explained some of the language to me as we waited; tha is pronounced “cha”, ca phe means “coffee” (pronounced like cafe), and quat for kumquat. Tha ca phe quat.

It was pretty good, barely tasted like coffee at all. The kumquat sourness cut through the usual overly-sweetened Vietnamese coffee.

We kept walking down the road to his market. I learned that in Vietnam, they all take a midday siesta, so the market was closed when we got there. As we wandered past the covered stalls, one woman was still tending hers. Vlad bought a snack that looked for all the world like a rice crispy, and basically was; puffed rice glued together with sugar. Ban Com.

“Oh, we have something like this in Canada, except it’s made with marshmallow, so there’s strings when you pull it apart.” I said, breaking off a piece when offered. This was nice, actually, the unprocessed nature of the rice meant it had lots of natural flavors besides the taste of the sugar.

“Ugh.” He says, shaking his head. “Whenever I hear something had strings when you pull it apart, I think of cheese.”

We walked back to the hostel, breaking off pieces of the ban com as we walked.

“Why aren’t you tanned?” He asked me, gesturing to my arm.

I showed him the tan line under my watch. He shook his head and rolled up his sleeve to show me his deep tan.

“Well, my mother is a red head…”

He shook his head to indicate he didn’t understand. No gingers in Russia?

When we got back to the hostel, I excused myself and went back to my room to write. Deadlines!

No free dinner tonight. I ate whatever from the Vinmart down the road.

I had to be up at 6 for the Soroptimist meeting. The meeting itself didn’t start for almost 40 minutes and I could barely hear anyone when it did. For the 40 minutes, I sat downstairs in the courtyard drinking my free coffee and eating the bananas that were put out for us.

Eventually I retreated to my room to write and work on things.

I finally managed to contact Nhan’s sister. I can’t stay at her place, which sucks, but she offered to find me a place to stay. Hopefully for the Viet rate and not the foreigner one.

Walked to Vinmart and found some mini pizzas for sale. I took them back to the hostel to cook… but it didn’t have an oven. There was instructions for cooking them on the stovetop, but Bob came over and turned up the heat on me and it burned at the bottom.

His mother (I assume, she spoke no English) came over and tutted over it, before cooking me some noodles and giving me a bowl, along with some bread and an orange. Bob looked sort of annoyed at her for it.

I went and sat down in the courtyard. Vlad was playing on his phone.

“I was debating taking the bus down to the Old Quarter.” I told him. “I haven’t visited the pagoda.” It’s only 15k for the bus, and I only just found out the pagoda is actually Buddhist and very old. I should have visited it when I was downtown.

“If you want something to do, he offered me his motorbike for free. I found this hike nearby.” Vlad replied.

“Really? Why?”

He looked at me seriously for a minute. “This place is very new. He’s bribing us for 5 star reviews.”

I guess that makes sense. It’s so weird here… Bob says this place belonged to his dad and his grandfather before him, but I checked out this place on Google maps. 2 years ago it was a luxury homestay, before appearing to close and then reopen as this hostel. Bob’s not telling us… something.

Whatever.

Onwards to adventure!

I watched Bob explain the bike to Vlad, turning the flimsy helmet over and over in my hands. This bike’s top speed was maybe 40 kms, but that still wouldn’t stop us from being pasted to the pavement by a passing truck. I was more than happy to let Vlad drive; he’d lived over a year in Da Nang, delivering for a Russian bakery, so he was more familiar with Vietnamese roads than I am.

“This isn’t going to save our life.” I said to Vlad, once Bob wandered off.

“No, it’s to keep the cops from bothering us.” Vlad replied, smiling slightly.

Sure, let’s get on a rickety old scooter with a random Russian. Backpacking, amirite?

It was fine, once I stopped being nervous. We drove half an hour to a lake with a little pagoda, then stopped to stretch our legs. Back on the bike.

Then to where we were hiking.

Vlad wasn’t quite sure where we were, and neither was I. It reminded me of those communist worker’s resorts, like Niwa. There were people around working on it, but it seemed abandoned. In hindsight, I wonder if it was in the middle of being built, a resort for foreigners, or if it got halfway built and then abandoned for lack of funds.

The hike, once we found a place to park the bike, was about a 300 meter gain. I quickly realized I was not recovered from the jungle hike – or, possibly, incapable of recovering – but Vlad was ok with stopping as often as I needed.

It probably didn’t help that it was smokey too. It wasn’t smokey on the drive out, but as we climbed, the smoke blew in and obscured the view.

Once we were about 100 meters from the top, I called it. I told him he could go ahead and he did, so I sat on my phone for maybe half an hour. When he came back, he admitted the trail only got rougher after I had abandoned the climb and it was probably smart that I hadn’t continued.

As we walked down, funny coincidence. We were both flying to Ho Chi Minh City on Friday, and Malaysia in April (he was going to Kuala Lumpur, though). We were also both born in ’95.

Vlad’s also stateless. He decided to leave Russia because he doesn’t agree with the war and has resigned himself to probably never going back. Now he just cycles between countries that are cheap and amenable to Russians, while working online. He’s even more of a miser than me; he says he’s managed to get his costs down below 10 dollars a day (although he probably means USD). Although I guess when you are stateless and can’t work anywhere, living on the cheap is critical.

On the way back to the hostel, we stopped and grabbed some banh mi, and Vlad grabbed some peach teas for us. We ate dinner in the courtyard. He doesn’t have Whatsapp, only Telegram, so we exchanged email instead. Then I went back to my room. Later on in the evening, I emailed him the Gutenberg copy of Steppenwolf.

The next day was not great.

Lana had booked a hotel for three nights for me… at 30$ Canadian. That’s double what I want to spend for a night, but it was too late to cancel it. I was torn… I had gone from getting a free place to stay for the week, to paying double what I would have if I hadn’t asked at all. I know she was trying to be nice…

Had my free coffee and banana. Packed up and stored my bags in the hallway.

Around 10, I ventured out for lunch. Not trying cooking again! I knocked on Vlad’s dorm door and stuck my head in, but he wasn’t there. The French couple and Annette had left as well. Only the Malay and Filipino girl were around.

“He left a little bit ago.”

Ah. I walked down the road to the coffee shop we had gone to the first day, but he wasn’t there. I turned around and started to head back towards the hostel; maybe I’ll grab a banh mi on the way…

“Hey!” A tap on my shoulder. It’s Vlad, out of breath.

“Oh, hey! I was wondering where you were.” I looked him up and down. “Did you run to catch me?”

“Yes.” He gasped. “I found… from Da Nang… Come see!”

Ok. I followed him down the road, smiling with bemusement. He recognized me down the road and chased me down? He found some pho from Da Nang (pho and banh mi are very regional in Vietnam). It had some sort of fish in it; he couldn’t explain what it was in English, but I think it’s some sort of cod. It was very good, and of course, saltwater fish aught to be good for my poor guts. The owner’s dog begged us for scraps the whole meal.

We got back to the hostel around noon. Vlad was planning to walk to the hostel, and at 5 kilometers, it’s not impossible. For me, it was too close to my flight to risk having to take a bunch of breaks, so I ordered a Grab to the airport.

Got through customs pretty easily. From my understanding, customs is hit or miss depending on the mood of the day, but usually Vietnamese customs can’t be bothered for domestic flights.

And then I was on the plane and onwards to Ho Chi Minh city.