Hanoi

I might as well start blogging.

Well. Let's do a sort of reverse chronological blogging order, starting with the end of my trip and ending with the front. After all, i can remember the end better than i remember the start.

I must say that really, 1 month is too short a time to backpacking half of indochina. You really need like a minimum of 2 months to even get into the culture of things in vietnam, cambodia and thailand. It would be similar to spending 3 days in Singapore and saying you've seen the whole country when in fact, you have not visited Causeway Point or Lot 1 or Parkway parade but just been around Orchard Road.

You know, see the tits and the cunt but nothing much in between. It pisses the girls off. Pay more attention to the whole package.

On a side note, I actually like hair on females. Long like wavy, shiny hair. The features come in a close second, hopefully fair, and at least looking a tad better than average. No need to be too tall, and frankly, a personality is much better than 36f boobs.

SO Hanoi. My PDA reads "Hanoi was a city of cockups and scams literally oozing out of every nook and shop".

How true.

Lemme just LIST the scams

1) Taxi scam - Tried to charge us SGD 5 for a 10km ride when from the map, it was at most 2 km walk.

2) Old Darling Cafe - Lousy guesthouse with lousy manager called Davis who kept on bugging us about his TOURS and his lousy claim of having a room for 4 (we had to wait till the previous occupants checked ou before we could even enter the room). And he shouted and sweared at us after i told him we weren't taking his tour. (Ok i kinda lied to him)

3) Halong Bay - Lousy scam of the century. We paid USD 30 for "2 caves, swimming, kayaking and small group with stay on boat". We got 1 freaking tourist cave, no swimming, no kayaking, thousands of vietnamese locals (amounting to a total of 30 peeps), rigid tour guide, and false promises. In the end we were just a transport boat to and fro catba island. In true singaporean style, we complained to the agency, and got a 4 USD refund each.

Fuck we should have gotten more.

4) Taxi Scam No. 2. - WE took a taxi cos we were tired, and the meter jumped faster than it would take for barnabas to hook up and fuck a stranger. It jumped every 300 m when the guidebook (LP) said 8000 d per km. In the end, we paid SGD 4 bucks for a 2 km ride?

5) Hanoi Star Cockup - I lost my receipt. And again, bureaucracy had a huge role in preventing a peaceful resolution of the situation, resulting in my headful of hair turning golden in colour.

6) Vietnamese Visa - SHIT WE EVEN GOT SCAMMED IN SINGAPORE! Vietnam Visas cost SGD 70 bucks. 30 days. We were told we could only get 14 days when we landed in vietnam, and since we were staying longer, we got visas. Lo and behold, border guards told us we didn't need them. Wonderful.

7) 10k dong bread ($1 buck) and 20k water ($2 bucks). After some bargaining, final price 3k for bread and 4k for water. Interesting how prices can drop so much.

8) and even better. The lady who went "10k for bread!". *cue incredulous stares from jesse and proceed to walk away*. "WAIT WAIT! 10k for 2 bread!".

Wow. They sure are learning crony capitalism badly.

On the bright side, Sapa was great. Halong bay was freaking boring as hell, (but i got a nice tan), and hanoi was just freaky and stressful.

oh, and jesse fell off a cliff. Nothing serious in the end. Thank God.

And Alan fell sick. And didn't go Sapa. Looks like he picked up a lot of vietnamese girls in Vietnam (let's see, the guide in Sapa, Shar i think (HEY NO COINCIDENCE HER NAME WAS THE SAME AS MY EX), Huoung in Hoi An, and many many others whose names we did not have). Damn looks like he's a great catch for vietnamese women. (hehehe).

Well, for my next odyssey, i wanna do a tour of the central americas, hopefully with my university friends, whom i hope are nice and warm and friendly. If not i'll kick them in the balls and be a loner and digusting as hell.

Nuoc Cong Hoa Xa Hoi Chu Nghia Viet Nam Muoc Nam! (Some communist propaganda, roughly translated to "Long live vietnam")

lip
ranting