Saigon

When you've been traveling for as long as we have, sooner or later you're bound to have a conversation like this one. 

Lenny: Is this Wednesday or Thursday?
Me: It’s Wednesday.
Lenny: No, it’s Thursday.
Me: No, it’s Wednesday.
Lenny (looking at calendar): Oh, you’re right. It’s Wednesday. Where were we before we got here?
Me: Saigon.
Lenny: We’re IN Saigon!

Yes, traveling can scramble your brain, especially when things don’t go as planned. As I mentioned in my last posting, getting our Vietnam visas ended up to be a bit challenging. We had planned to fly to Saigon on Tuesday, Feb. 6th, so when we applied for our visas through what we thought was a reputable website the previous Thursday (with an assurance that they would be delivered within 24 hours), we assumed we had plenty of time.

But when Monday rolled around and we still hadn’t received them, we began to get a bit panicky. Thankfully, a wonderful concierge, Anh, at the hotel we were planning on staying in in Saigon, got our visas in a few hours. So the following day we headed to the Singapore airport where we encountered our next challenge.

Me and Anh

Vietnam visas are good for 30 days. Which means that 30 days after you arrive, the government wants you gone. And apparently they want proof you are going to leave prior to letting you in the country. We learned this fact when we tried to check in for our flight.

“I’ll need to see your outgoing flight,” said the man at the counter. Lenny explained that we were planning our trip as we went along, so we didn’t know where we were going after Vietnam or when we were leaving but we would be out in less than 30 days.

“I can let you board your flight but I have to warn you,” he said, “that when you get to Vietnam, they may not let you in the country.” He explained that we could sign a form stating that we understood this, and then take our chances. Lenny felt confident they would let us in (based on his internet research), so we signed the form and waited to board our flight. A few minutes later, however, we decided to buy some cheap tickets out of Vietnam to anywhere (we chose Cambodia) just to be on the safe side.

Flying into Saigon was a strange experience. As a child growing up in the 60’s, I never dreamed I would intentionally visit this faraway land that was the source of so much sadness and pain. Yet here I was. And as the plane landed, I couldn’t help but imagine the thousands of soldiers who had landed at this same airport 50 years earlier and never returned home.

As it turned out, we breezed through customs and immigration, and were never asked about when we were leaving. So a few hours later we canceled our flight to Cambodia. We did wonder if perhaps the government would somehow be alerted to this and come after us but this never happened!

As I mentioned before, Singapore was a beautiful, peaceful city and I always felt safe there. So I wasn’t prepared for what awaited us in Saigon. Upon exiting the airport we had to find a cab. We had been told that there were lots of fake cabs that would rip us off so to only trust two companies. Thankfully we found a cab from one of the companies pretty quickly and off we went.

Within 30 seconds I already knew this was going to be my least favorite destination on our trip (I have since changed my mind). There are 13 million people in Saigon, and 9 million registered motorbikes. This was immediately apparent as our driver wove through the streets of Saigon, honking his horn every few seconds. To me it seemed like pure chaos. I looked at Lenny and could tell he thought it was exciting!

“We’ll have to do one of those back of the bike tours where they take you to all sorts of interesting restaurants all over the city on the back of a motorbike,” he said, gleefully.

“No fucking way,” I responded.

Somehow we made it to our hotel, the Park Hyatt, which was built on the site of the Brinks car bombing. The hotel was lovely, but it seemed strange to see a marble plaque outside the building with the image of a car being blown up.

After unpacking our stuff, we headed out to dinner. We had decided to walk to the restaurant, which turned out to be our next challenge.

We soon discovered that many of the streets don’t have stop signs or traffic lights (some I believe are roundabouts but it’s hard to tell). They do have crosswalks but absolutely no one pays attention to them. So if you stand at the corner and wait for traffic to stop you will stand there forever. Essentially you just have to walk into the street and trust that the cars and motorbikes will stop. I was thankful when we got to a street with a traffic light. Until I discovered that most motorbikes don’t stop at red lights. And if the streets are too crowded, the motorbikes go up on the sidewalks! One way streets? Yes, there are plenty of them. But often the motorbikes go the wrong way!

My first couple days in Saigon I dreaded walking to our destinations. But I soon discovered that if you simply walk into the street with some sense of authority, they will stop. I have no doubt that accidents happen but we never saw one. Somehow they make this work. And when I read a review of the back of the bike tour where someone talked about “this ballet on wheels,” something clicked. I suddenly felt like I could ride on the back of the bike and not be afraid - despite the fact that I had never been on a motorbike and had only been on a motorcycle once, about 40 years ago. And so we signed up for the tour.

I have to say, this was one of the highlights of our trip. Motorbikes are surprisingly quiet, so I was able to talk to my driver the entire time. I learned all about her life and she learned all about mine. Interestingly enough, we had both read the book The Alchemist and both enjoyed it! As the book says, the universe conspires to bring you what you want. The woman (I never did understand how to pronounce her name), was 29 years old. She grew up in the Mekong Delta and longed to go back there. But the work was here and so she was stuck in Saigon, at least for now. She told me about yoga and how it can change your life. And how it wasn’t just the exercises, it was a way of life. And actually, she didn’t even do the exercises but somehow she was still fascinated by it. She also told me that while she grew up eating dogs, as many Vietnamese do, she no longer eats them.

Meanwhile, Lenny rode with a young man in his last year of college. He was bright-eyed, innocent and intelligent. When he finished school he wanted to go back and help his community. 

He and my driver were openly affectionate, as we discovered many Asians are. No, they were not a couple, they explained. He was like her little brother. They joked and laughed the entire night, as did we. We went to five or six restaurants, some of which were in alleys. Entire families sat in the alleys cooking for their families, neighbors and the occasional customer. 

The food was good but not exceptional to us. Still, the experience was priceless. And as we made our way back to the hotel at the end of the tour, I actually reveled in feeling the wind on my face as we wove through the now somewhat quieter city streets. It was an experience I will never forget.

In our week in Saigon, we took several more tours. We learned that there are 30,000 miles of tunnels under Vietnam. The Vietcong and their families lived in these tunnels during the Vietnam War. Babies were born there, many of which either did not survive or had problems from gestating and living in darkness. Families would take turns living in the tunnels, which offered some safety from the bombing, but many of them died, either in the tunnels or in the surrounding jungle. It was quite a chore to try and remain hidden. Their motto was, “Cook without smoke, talk without sound, walk without marks.” They actually had shoes with soles that made it appear they were walking in the opposite direction.

Our tour guide through the tunnels cried at one point as she told stories of people who had lived through the war and sustained injuries. 

She also told us about Operation Babylift, where babies with Vietnamese mothers and American fathers were taken to America. Americans were told that these were orphans. But in reality, many of them were not. Their Vietnamese mothers were told that the children would be chastised for being mixed race and so it would be best to give them up for adoption. Years later some children returned in an attempt to find their mothers but in most cases records were not kept.

At the end of the tour she said we would be watching a propaganda film about a woman soldier who had killed numerous Americans and was hailed as a hero. Vietnam is controlled enough that they are required to show the propaganda film at the end of the tour. But not so controlled that the tour guide couldn’t tell us that the film was propaganda.

“We feel we have freedom,” several Vietnamese told us, “But we know not to criticize the government.”

We also learned about some differences between North and South Vietnamese. In the North, the oldest son takes care of the aging parents. In the South, the youngest son does. In the North they hire people to cry at funerals. In the South they hire bands to play music, as it is considered a celebration of moving on to the next life.

In our week in Saigon (this is what most people call it even though it’s technically Ho Chi Minh City), we ate at lots of good restaurants, got a few massages (yes, massages are cheap in Vietnam, too), toured a factory where they made beautiful lacquered works of art, and took a boat ride down the Saigon River. All the boats have eyes to frighten the monsters that many Vietnamese believe live under the water.

I don’t know that I will ever go back to Saigon. It is a noisy, crowded city. But it touched me in unexpected ways and I am so glad I got to experience it.

To see photos and videos of our back of the bike tour click here.

To see photos and videos of our time in Saigon click here.

Singapore

Drinking a Singapore Sling in Singapore!

When you live in a city, vacationing in another city isn't quite as appealing as heading to a beach. But as my husband says, it can't all be sun and sand, and so on this trip we have tried to have a little bit of everything.

Still, I wasn't that excited about going to Singapore. While there were things I liked about Hong Kong, it had been my least favorite destination. Some of that may have been due to jet lag and adjusting to a drastically different time zone. But the noise, people and traffic got to me after a few days.

And so I was pleasantly surprised when I not only didn't dislike Singapore, I actually loved it! The first thing I noticed about Singapore was that it had a sort of surreal feeling to it, like Pleasantville or Willoughby, an ideal town from an old Twilight Zone episode. I couldn't quite put my finger on why, but eventually I realized that some of the surrealism is due to the fact that not only is the town eerily clean, but there aren't many cars on the road compared to most cities, and the cars they have are almost all fairly new.

I soon learned that this is because it costs a lot of money to have a car in Singapore - $50,000 for a permit which is good for 10 years, and charges for driving which get higher after 10:30 at night.

Of course it is a well-known fact that Singapore has very strict laws in regards to littering and graffiti. So that explains a lot of the cleanliness. And while I am not a fan of big government, there is something to be said for strict cleanliness laws. How hard is it to throw something in a trash can or not spray paint a wall? (Interestingly enough, they have an excellent street art exhibit at the Science and Art Museum which we toured one day.)

But it isn't just the cleanliness and lack of traffic that make Singapore a truly pleasant place to visit, it's the architecture. In Marina Bay, the area we stayed in, quaint old buildings sit amidst towering, beautifully designed skyscrapers.

Perhaps the most famous building is the Marina Bay Sands Hotel, which is actually three buildings connected by a boat-like structure at the top that contains the world's largest rooftop swimming pool. Lenny and I took the elevator to the roof where we enjoyed gorgeous views of the city.

The domes you see are the Cloud Forest and the Flower Dome, both of which we visited in our 6 days in Singapore.

We also took the hop on hop off bus, took a boat ride around the bay, enjoyed a fabulous complimentary tea (check out the photos on the photos page) at our hotel, ate at many fabulous restaurants and walked around the spectacular Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands. This computerized screen that changes as children (and some adults) run and jump on it is one of several interesting features at the mall.

Once again, we stayed at two different hotels in the city, the Mandarin Oriental and the Fullerton Bay Hotel. Both were lovely. We started this several years ago when we were going to Paris. We couldn't decide which hotel to stay in and so we spent 3 nights in one hotel and 3 in another. It's a great way to experience different parts of a city, and allows us to make one less decision!

On our last night in Singapore we ate at Lau Pa Sat which is a hawker center. Hawker centers are essentially open air food courts with numerous stalls selling inexpensive cooked food. This one happened to be excellent. Our only regret was that we didn't discover it until our last night in Singapore! It truly was one of the few bargains in the city. After dinner we witnessed a spectacular (free!) music, light and water show called Spectra outside the  Marina Bay Sands Hotel. Watch the videos on the photos page to get a better feel for how wonderful it was! 

Our last two days in Singapore ended up to be a little challenging as we scrambled to get visas to go to Vietnam, our next destination. But it worked out fine, thanks to a helpful concierge named Anh who you'll read about in my next posting about Vietnam!

To see more photos and videos of our trip to Singapore click here.

Langkawi, Malaysia

It is said that if you consistently feed a wild animal, eventually it will lose the ability to hunt. After more than two months "on the road," I told Lenny I believed I had now lost the ability to cook. And clean. And grocery shop. For some reason he didn't seem too concerned!

On January 21st, we made the four-hour journey from Koh Lanta to Satun, a town at the southern tip of Thailand. Once again we rode in a beautiful, spacious van, and once again we boarded a ferry. But this ferry was drastically different from the one we had taken in China. No seat-belts this time, no helpful attendants (we lugged our bags up and down the stairs as they stood by smoking cigarettes), and if there were life vests, we didn't see them. No "in case of an emergency" announcements were made as we ventured out into the ocean under a dark and foreboding sky.

But the trip was fine, and an hour and 15 minutes later we arrived in Langkawi where a car picked us up and took us to the Four Seasons. As some you of you know, we love the Four Seasons, but unless we can get a great deal, often we stay in an entry level, garden view room (I know, poor me) and such was the case this time. But the room was nice and it was a short walk to the beach. Plus they gave us bikes!

After unpacking a few things, we headed to the beach where we immediately noticed two things - a purple flag indicating "sea pests" i.e., jellyfish in the water, and a massive "sandcastle" surrounded by a group of people who appeared to be making a movie.

We soon learned that a Chinese film crew had taken over part of the Four Seasons beach and were making a movie called "I Love You, Miss Money." This has since become another one of our cute (or some might say, nauseating) catch phrases. 

Lenny to me: I love you, Miss Money. 
Me to Lenny: I love you, Mr. Money.

Langkawi was beautiful, but it definitely was different from any place we had been in, and somehow it felt very far away. The people were friendly, but because it is a Muslim country, there were some things I needed to get used to. On one of our first ventures out, Lenny went into a barbershop to get his beard trimmed. The men there were nice but they asked me to leave, as women aren't allowed in barbershops. I also found it somewhat challenging to watch the Muslim men running around in their shorts and t-shirts while their wives were covered from head to toe in heavy black clothing (in 90 degree weather) with only their eyes showing (most women in Langkawi wear head scarves but not the whole burqa). But as Lenny reminded me, this is their culture and we need to respect it.

The following day we drove up to the highest peak on Langkawi. It was cloudy but the views were still spectacular. 

We had planned on climbing up a tower where we had read we could get the best views. But there was no mistaking the fact that the tower was closed. These signs deterred us from going any further. 

The next day we took a boat tour through the mangroves where we saw walking fish (who can actually climb trees), monkeys and various birds. I had been concerned about mosquitoes but our guide explained that the mangroves in Langkawi produce a resin to combat beetles. The resin seeps from the trees into the water where it forms a coating. This coating prevents the mosquitoes from laying eggs, so there are no mosquitoes!

The following day they were forecasting rain, but since in our experience, rain can be short-lived, we decided to take a sunset sailboat ride. The woman who owned the sailboat assured us we were going to have great weather, but at the time we were supposed to meet her at a restaurant in the harbor, the rain began pouring, not just a little but a lot! 

"Don't worry," she said, as she bought us wine and French fries, "this will pass quickly." An hour later, however, we decided to call it a day.

It was almost dinnertime, so we decided to head to a restaurant someone had told us about called Pia the Padi. The rain was still coming down hard as we got to the restaurant, which was in the middle of a rice paddy.

Lenny and I have had many wonderful experiences when we've traveled, but sometimes we have some that are truly magical. Such was the case this time. Lovely piano music played as the rain fell onto the rice paddy, just as the sun was setting. Jimmy, the owner, waited on us like we were the only ones there, which wasn't hard to do since we were the only ones there! We had a wonderful conversation with him and the food was spectacular! 

In the next few days, we took a nature walk with the Four Seasons naturalist, road our bikes around the property, and explored the island. Everything was great until four days in when Lenny went to take a shower and water barely dribbled out of the shower head. 

Langkawi is MUGGY, so not being able to take a decent shower is a big deal. The management assured us it would be fixed in the morning, but the next morning nothing had changed. They were working on it, they said, and to compensate us for our trouble they would buy us dinner, drinks and dessert at any of their restaurants. We generally don't eat at the Four Seasons, as the food is ridiculously expensive and there are always good, inexpensive places nearby. So this was a treat! We had a nice dinner and went to sleep confident that the next day we could take a shower.

But alas, this was not to be. Once again, we were told it would be fixed the following morning, and once again we were offered another dinner, dessert and drinks! Our diets would have to wait! But when the third day rolled around and we still had no shower (we did have a nice bathtub, so it actually wasn't terrible) we insisted they put us in another room. No other rooms were available, they said, but they did have a villa. 

A few hours later, they moved us to a gorgeous, 2400 square foot, $2200 a night, ocean front villa at no additional charge! And there we stayed for the remainder of our trip. And there we could have stayed for the rest of our lives, or at least a few more weeks if they had let us! I didn't take many pictures but there is a video of the villa on the photos page.

In the next few days we relaxed at the pool (one of the nicest of any hotel we've stayed at), golfed (Lenny golfed while I swam and got a massage), and took the steepest cable car in the world up to the longest free span and curved suspension bridge in the world. 

On our last day in Langkawi we decided to just hang out at the pool and beach. We finally got to swim in the ocean, as most of the week the purple flag was up - other than one day when the red flag was raised (meaning strong current!). Unfortunately, Lenny got a bit of a sunburn, and perhaps I have to accept some responsibility. I didn't take him too seriously when he mumbled something along the lines of "wake me when I'm O.J. Simpson but before I get to Nipsey Russell" as he drifted off to sleep. But the sunburn wasn't too bad and he recovered quickly.

Next stop: Singapore!

To see more photos and videos of our trip to Langkawi click here. 

Thailand: Land of a Thousand Massages

On the morning of January 7th we took the ferry from Macau to the Hong Kong airport. With comfortable assigned seats and ferry attendants that walk around and make sure you're OK, this was one of the nicest ferries we've ever been on. The only thing that bothered me a bit was that they told us to fasten our seat-belts. I've never been on a ferry that had seat-belts, let alone one that made sure people fastened them. 

But the trip was smooth, and a few hours later we boarded our Cathay Airlines flight to Phuket. Cathay is one of the highest rated airlines in the world, and now I see why - wide seats with lots of legroom, nice flight attendants and free Haagen Dazs! Lenny was so excited!

After landing in Phuket we were picked up and taken to the lovely Nai Harn Hotel, about an hour from the airport. Our room was wonderful and had one of our best views ever.

After eating a good dinner at the hotel, we headed down the street for our first massage of many! Massage places are everywhere here. Nearly all of them are good, and the massages are usually around $10-12.

In the next few days, we swam, snorkeled, ate lots of good Thai food, got out on the water, and explored the small towns surrounding our hotel. Nai Harn Beach is said to be one of the top beaches in Thailand. It is truly lovely.

Besides cheap massages, Thailand also has cheap food. One night we had a taxi take us to a restaurant about a half an hour away called Eat. (Lenny wants to open a restaurant/monastary/bordello and call it Eat, Pray, Love!)

Upon arrival we were told that yes, we had a reservation but they didn't have any tables! As it turned out, the owner had taken our reservation but had neglected to tell the staff. But all was OK. They sat us at the bar and gave us free drinks and desserts to make up for their error.

After a week at Nai Harn we headed to our next destination in Thailand, Koh Lanta. A driver from our hotel in Koh Lanta (Lanaya) picked us up at Nai Harn. The four hour journey in their luxury van was wonderful and went by quickly.

After that we took a short boat trip in Layana's beautiful boat over to the hotel.

Our stay in Phuket had been so nice we wondered how we were going to beat it, but we actually liked Koh Lanta more! The beach was quieter and went on for miles, and while our room didn't have an ocean view it was still lovely. The only slight negative was the rooster next door, who woke us up every morning at 5 - unless the monk chanting prayers on a loud speaker at 4:30 got to us first!

Our first day in Koh Lanta we rented a car and that night we drove to a restaurant about a half an hour away. The food was good but the drive back was not fun. In addition to driving on the left, the roads were not great, they were poorly lighted, and there were many motorbikes weaving in and out of traffic! So I can't say I was disappointed when the next day our car wouldn't start. We called the car rental company and an hour or so later they told us they had fixed it, but when we tried again it still didn't start. And so we made the decision to not have a car and instead take tuk tuks. Yes!

In the week that followed we snorkeled, scuba dived, swam, walked on the beach, and yes, got a lot more massages!

Here we are on one of our snorkeling trips.

Although you can't tell by the photos, we saw lots of beautiful fish! Which got me wondering about the day to day life of the average fish.

Me: So do fish just spend their whole lives looking for food?
Lenny: No, most of the time they're in school.

And just in case you were wondering if we learned Thai while we were here, I'm proud to say we did. Well, at least we learned a few key words - nam (water), hong nam (toilet) and moo uan (fat pig). Moo Uan (pronounced moo wahn) was actually the name of a restaurant we went to. It has since become our pet name for each other, not because we are fat pigs but because it sounds so cute! Here I am with my moo uan celebrating our first anniversary on January 17th!

To  see more photos and videos of our trip to Thailand click here.