Taipei, Hualien, & Taiwan's Food

I obviously saw more than just Kaohsiung and Tainan while in Taiwan.

A few highlights of my time in Hualien and Taipei:

Hualien:

A few hours on a very comfortable train from Tainan, I ended up on the east coast of Taiwan in the lovely little tourist city of Hualien.  I stayed there in what was quite possibly the nicest hostel ever (check out the Mini Voyage Hostel if you ever go!) and that was the highlight of the city itself.  Aside from a plethora of restaurants and shops and a lovely waterfront park, the city of Hualien doesn’t really have too much to offer.  The real highlight of the region lies a short bus ride north of the city…

Taroko National Park:

The number one tourist destination in Taiwan, Taroko National Park on the gorgeous east coast of the island draws visitors in with its large marble-walled gorge.  Stunning.  Great hiking trails lead to caves and waterfalls, and a small yet confronting cultural exhibition on the local aboriginal Taroko people rounded out the day with a little education.  Girls had to weave to be recognized as women.  Boys had to hunt and bring back the head of a human to be recognized as a man.  Yikes.  I like the idea of a Bar Mitzvah a lot better.

I had one day in Taroko and did a handful of trails, though I really would like to have had at least another day or two to see more of it.  I feel another trip coming on…

Taipei:

I had 3.5 days in Taipei which seems to be only a fraction of the time I should have allocated to explore this great city.  My interesting accommodation of a “cabin hotel” – a combination of a capsule hotel and a hostel – was centrally located so I was able to maximize my time exploring with less time on transport.  I visited various temples (of course), lots of markets, and even the city’s gaybourhood.  It was nice to see a whole row of gay bars and same-sex couples holding hands.  While homosexuality is accepted (or not accepted) to varying degrees across Asia, Taipei was definitely the first place I found to be properly gay-friendly.  I took an excursion out to Tamsui – the last stop on the metro line – to walk along the water and watch the (very cloudy) sunset.  I also explored the Huashan 1914 Creative Park - an old industrial area now home to restaurants, galleries, etc.  Just like the Pier 2 Art District in Kaohsiung, the creative park needs a bit more buzz and a few more fun tenants.  The Su Ho Memorial Paper Museum was interesting but could have used a little pizazz.  On the flip side, the Miniatures Museum of Taiwan was so exciting that it kept me inside for a lot longer than I was anticipating.  The museum is filled with tiny models of famous buildings, homes, and more, and the detail on each piece was so insanely great that I had to study each and every piece very carefully to make sure I didn’t miss anything.  Fantastic.

Taipei 101:

I headed out one morning to hike up Xiangshan – also known as Elephant Mountain.  Just a short walk from a metro station, it was amazing how this big nature reserve was right in the city.  From the top were glorious views of the whole city, but most notably of Taipei 101.  After heading down the mountain, I decided to head up what was once the world’s highest skyscraper in what is still the world’s fastest elevator.  The views from the top were great, though I prefer the views from the mountain as they actually include the unique looking tower.  The most interesting part was the display on the wind damper – a giant metal ball that is suspended from the highest part of the interior of the building.  The ball decreases the building’s sway during heavy winds or earthquakes.

National Palace Museum:

Communists aren’t exactly known for maintaining culture, so when the communists forced the nationalists out of mainland China and onto Taiwan, they took all of China’s art with them.  Like, seriously all of it.  Well, at least all of the good stuff.  And they put it all in the National Palace Museum.  There are paintings, statues, ceramics, calligraphy, bronze, lacquerware, jade, religious objects, books, furniture, weapons, all sorts of vessels, and more from every era in Chinese history.  Looking at those sort of antiquities usually makes me bored after a while, but this one kept my interest a lot longer than usual.  The only bad part of the museum:  all of the Chinese tour groups.  Maddening.

So much food:

Ok, Taiwan.  Obviously I was going to talk about the food.  Because I love food.  But, surprisingly, I had the hardest time eating in Taiwan of any country along my journey so far.  That is mainly because most people speak no English and most meals seem to contain pork.  Sigh.  I thought I’d go the easy route and just say that I was vegetarian, but you can’t do that in Taiwan because then restaurants will refuse to give you a whole list of other non-meat things too.  What?  Why?  It’s because people in Taiwan who become vegetarian do so for religious reasons, and those same religious reasons dictate a list of other items that you can’t eat.  Like spring onions.  Those are apparently a no-no for vegetarians.  Ahhhh!

But, I eventually found my groove thanks to help from friends and strangers that I met along the way.  And once I did, I was super pleased with the food that I ate.  Breakfast was often an omelette or this omelette-crepe combination thing that was delicious when dipped in soy sauce.  I ordered what turned about to be a “flaky scallion pancake” one morning without any help from anyone.  Yay!  Lunch was random food and dinner was often at one of the night markets but the list ended up being quite extensive.  I had chicken skewers, fried chicken, chicken curry, and the Taiwanese version of chicken shawarma.  I also had a crepe with chicken, corn, and cheese – though the cheese was more of a cream sauce than actual cheese.  I tried bamboo leaf dumplings which are basically rice and a few other things compressed into pyramid shapes and covered in bamboo leaves.  They are big and filling and heavy and I ordered way too much.  I tried beef with thick noodles in Hualien and some friends ordered Taiwan’s famous beef noodle soup for me in Taipei – just a few nights after they took me out for Sichuan cuisine which is very popular there.  Japanese food is also very popular due to Japan’s colonial legacy but I opted to save my Japanese dining for Japan.

What’s that smell?  It’s stinky tofu!  It’s prepared first by fermenting tofu, then allowing a child to vomit on it, storing it in a dirty gym sock for six months, and then finally cooking it up however you prefer – grilling, frying, steaming, or whatever.  At least I’m pretty sure that’s how it’s made.  You’ll smell its awful aroma at every night market.  I finally broke down and tried some in Taipei.  Never again.

My absolute favourite meal was at a chain called Ba Fang Yun Ji Dumpling.  They have locations all over Taiwan and I ate there… five times in ten days.  I ordered their garden vegetable dumplings, garden vegetable pot stickers, and noodles with orgasmic black sesame sauce.  Yummy!

Don’t forget dessert!  Super tall soft-serve ice cream cones are readily available everywhere, and I was polite enough to stop and get some each time I passed by a stand.  I also had some hollow doughnut-like things (it sort of looked like big bubble wrap but made from happiness instead of plastic), tea with ice cream in it (it somehow worked), pancakes with peanut, pancakes with sesame, and what I can only describe as the world’s most awkward dessert burrito which featured ice cream, peanut shavings, and basil.  Gross.  There were plenty of desserts featuring taro (purple sweet potato) and red bean (a sweet bean that is common in East Asia) and my favourites were the taro and red bean cakes.  I had a matcha (powdered green tea) cream cake one night too!  The absolute champion, however, was shaved ice.  I went to the famous Ice Monster where I ordered a tapioca milk tea shaved ice.  It wasn’t ice.  It was an iceberg.  It was big enough to feed at least half of the island.

Where there’s food, there are drinks too.  I had a lot of green tea and also tried soybean tea and sweet soybean milk.  Bubble tea, however, is Taiwan’s biggest contribution to the world of drinks.  Bubble tea comes in all flavours and has big tapioca balls or small tapioca balls or no tapioca balls but only a fool would order no tapioca balls unless they ordered the bubble tea with leaf jelly instead!  Leaf jelly is like cubes of tea-ish flavoured Jello in your tea and it’s great.

I didn’t really have any western meals with the exception of my obligatory terrible Mexican food in Taipei, a mediocre quesadilla from an American expat at the night market in Kaohsiung (but he was hot so I’ll overlook his lack of Mexican food skills), and a macaron ice cream sandwich at the Dream Mall in Kaohsiung.  It appears the Dream Mall was appropriately named.

Ok, this blog has gone on long enough.  It’s time to talk Tokyo.  But first, let me take a selfie.

To see more photos of my time in Hualien and Taipei, follow this link:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10100347179261801.1073741902.3000370&type=1&l=74df4c89d1

Kaohsiung, Tainan, & Taiwan's History

I’ve already introduced Taiwan, but I sort of left off most of the history part which I realized while typing this blog may make sense to go over… quickly.  The Ming Dynasty (China) sort of dabbled in Taiwan before Europeans arrived (as they always did) but the Ming didn’t really control the island. The island was first recorded by Europeans as Formosa – a named bestowed upon it by passing Portuguese sailors.  It was the Dutch, however, that first colonized Taiwan in the early 1600’s, though the Spanish tried really hard but failed to stop them.  Some dude named Koxinga – a Ming loyalist – defeated the Dutch a few decades later and Taiwan sorta kinda ruled itself for a while. I mean, the Ming sort of ruled it but they were really busy trying to stop the Qing Dynasty from taking everything of theirs so I can’t imagine too much attention was paid to Taiwan so the island was quasi-on its own… until the Qing Dynasty invaded and took over.  It appears nobody on Taiwan liked the Qing Dynasty, just like nobody on Taiwan likes the Chinese today.  China then lost a war with Japan and was forced to gift Taiwan to Japan in 1895 (Japan had been eyeing Taiwan for ages).  Taiwan tried to be independent at that point, but the Japanese were like “fat chance” and forcibly took control.  Taiwan wasn’t really happy with Japanese rule, but as I’ve already pointed out in my previous blog, the Japanese did do some good things for Taiwan.  Japan gave up its claim to Taiwan in 1945 after World War II and Taiwan entered a state of limbo not knowing what would happen to it.  When the Chinese government was kicked out of mainland China by communists, they set up their exiled government in Taiwan and have continued to rule Taiwan to this day.  Over the decades since then, a distinct Taiwanese identity has developed separating the island from China more and more as time goes by.

Got all that?  Ok.  Let’s move on to the first half of Taiwan.

A few highlights of my time in Kaohsiung and Tainan:

Kaohsiung:

Based on my observations, I was the first ever white tourist to fly into Taiwan via Kaohsiung.  In fact, I saw only 4 other western people during my time in Kaohsiung.  I counted.  I saw 2 white guys at the night market, 1 white American guy working at the night market (an English teacher having a little fun making quesadillas for the locals), and an African-American lady walking up a hill to a fort.  We both smiled and nodded at each other with a look that can only be translated at “what the fuck are you doing here too?”  But I think more and more of us should be going there.  Kaohsiung is Taiwan’s second biggest city with nearly 3 million people and I found it an absolutely lovely place to visit.  Someone once told me that Kaohsiung is the Melbourne of Taiwan, but I think that’s incorrect.  It’s not quite there yet.  Instead, Kaohsiung to me is the Brisbane of Taiwan.  It’s liveable, it has some cool things, and it will probably keep getting better as time goes by, especially as the city works to tackle pollution that has plagued the city (and also been the source of its prosperity).

Museums:

The highlight of Kaohsiung was the National Science & Technology Museum with its exhibit on the industrial history of Taiwan.  Most of the statistics were quite old – indicating that maybe Taiwan is past its heyday – but it was interesting nonetheless.  Did you know that Taiwan was once the footwear manufacturing capital of the world?  Did you know that Taiwan was once the tennis racket manufacturing capital of the world?  And, most recently, a 2011 statistic put Taiwan directly involved with the manufacturing of 90% of the world’s laptops.  Crazy.  Most of the other exhibitions had limited English signage but they seemed to be geared toward children anyway so I pretty much left after the industrial history hall.  Other museums I visited include the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts with its excellent rotating exhibitions of funky modern art, the Kaohsiung Museum of History which had very limited English but was still pretty interesting, and the Former British Consulate at Takow which informed me of the history of the British in Taiwan (they never colonized it, but they had a big presence for trade.)

Elsewhere in Kaohsiung:

A loop around the Lotus Pond was a great walk including stops at the Spring and Autumn Pavilions, the 24 metre statue of the Supreme Emperor of the Dark Heaven, and the famous Dragon and Tiger Pagodas.  Once heavily polluted, the Love River has been cleaned up and green spaces have been installed along the river for residents to use recreationally – and for tourists like me to stroll along.  Cijin Beach was a short motorbike ferry away from the main city.  It was too cold to go into the water but I got to briefly explore the ruins of the old Cihou Fort nearby.  I ate well at the Ruifong Night Market, and the Pier 2 Arts District – while still in need of some more tenants to move in – had some really awesome sculptures, cute stores, and various delicious-looking restaurants.

Most importantly – and this is critical – Kaohsiung has not one, but two… Costco stores!  This city gets an A+ in my book.

Tainan:

I travelled slightly north from Kaohsiung to Tainan – a city of nearly 2 million people that was once the island’s capital.  Tainan was noticeably quieter than Kaohsiung but a very pleasant place to explore.  While my 2.5 day tour around Kaohsiung was done in a bit of a rush, 1.5 days in Tainan was sufficient for exploring the sights, though I wouldn’t have minded an extra day just to wander and explore some of the shopping streets.  I visited a Matsu Temple (Taoist) and a Confucius Temple, the famous Hayashi Department Store (originally opened during Japanese rule), as well as the Chihkan Towers – originally a Dutch fort that changed hands four times throughout history.

Anping:

Anping is an area of Tainan that pretty much has similar things to what I found in the centre of Tainan.  I visited another Matsu Temple and the remnants of an old fort.  The Fort Zeelandia Museum inside the fort mainly focused on the Dutch era of the island.  The Former Tait & Co Merchant House – one of several merchant houses in the Anping area that were established by Western powers – had a splendid old “tree house” in the back.  The “tree house” wasn’t a house up in a tree but rather an old building that has been taken over by a wild-growing banyan tree.

National Museum of Taiwan History:

A short taxi ride outside of the centre of town was the National Museum of Taiwan History which went over – in great detail – every single moment in Taiwan’s history from prehistoric times to the present.  It was seriously a play-by-play.  After realizing that I’d need to pick and choose what I looked at if I had any hope of getting out of the museum by the following week, I quickly skimmed through and spent most of my time in the areas outlining the Japanese occupation and the modern area – though the latter was the one display that could definitely have been expanded on.

Night markets:

In both Kaohsiung and Tainan – and in Hualien and Taipei that will be featured in the next blog – I visited a plethora of night markets.  These markets are usually huge, usually packed (as was the case with the extremely crowded Ruifong Night Market in Kaohsiung), and always awesome.  The markets for me were centred on the food – and there is a lot of food – but I will discuss that in the next blog.  What I want to mention here is that the markets also have games for kids to play – sort of like a carnival – and they also sell things like clothes and backpacks and accessories and household goods and porn.  Yes, porn.  There will be a stall full of thousands of DVDs full of hardcore Taiwanese erotica right next to a stall featuring a game clearly designed for children.

+1 point Taiwan.  I love it.

I have one more installment on Taiwan.  But first, let me take a selfie.

To see more photos of my time in Kaohsiung and Tainan, follow this link:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10100344448224821.1073741901.3000370&type=1&l=f95bd5f8a2

Introducing Taiwan & Japan

Taiwan is Asia.  But Taiwan is not Asia.  Even after visiting Japan, Taiwan is my favourite country in Asia.  Taiwan’s charms lie in the fact that Taiwan is an Asian country.  But it is not an Asian country.

I’m confusing you.  Let me explain.

Taiwan has all of the good things about Asia without all of the bad things about Asia.  Let me give you some examples:

Scooters dominate the streets.  Asia.

There are rules that the scooter drivers actually follow.  Not Asia.

There is street food everywhere.  Asia.

You will not get a parasite from eating the street food.  Not Asia.

There are lots of souvenirs you can buy here.  Asia.

You will not be harassed to buy souvenirs here.  Not Asia.

The locals are happy to assist if you need help.  Asia.

They won’t expect anything in return for this.  Not Asia.

It’s surprisingly affordable to travel here.  Asia.

Going cheap doesn’t mean going dangerous.  It’s completely safe here.  Not Asia.

Taiwan is the perfect combination of Asian culture and western conveniences.  Taiwan’s language and cuisine are distinctly Asian, but low crime rates rank it as one of the five safest countries in the world – a completely different situation than most of the rest of Asia.  Despite the language barrier – the Taiwanese speak much less English than people in South Asia or Southeast Asia – it is completely safe and completely easy to be a tourist here.  The best part:  the price is right.  Sure it’s more than Southeast Asia, but Taiwan is easy to travel on a budget and this is one of the reasons why I love it so much.

Whether or not Taiwan is Asia is up for debate.  But there is one thing that became very clear to me while visiting Taiwan:  Taiwan is not China.

Now, for those of you who don’t know the details of the China-Taiwan relationship, basically, communists took over China a few years after World War II, but they were unable to capture Taiwan, which – at the time – was recently given back to China from Japan after the war.  Taiwan is now a democracy and independent by any definition, but their 23 million citizens are not represented in the United Nations and many other international organizations… because China says so.  China doesn’t like that they were never able to capture Taiwan.  At present, nearly everyone I spoke to – and the vast majority of opinion polls – indicate that Taiwan just wants their independence formally recognized by the rest of the world, but China keeps threatening Taiwan with war if Taiwan gets the recognition they want and deserve.  It’s a fucked up situation and completely unfair to Taiwan’s citizens.

Even with no knowledge of the complex relationship between China and Taiwan, you can look around and just see that Taiwan is not China.  Taiwan is lovely.  Taiwan is clean.  Taiwan is safe.  Taiwan is democratic.  China is… none of those things.  China is big and powerful and they use their power to bully others.  It’s not nice.  In fact, the worst part about Taiwan:  all of the Chinese tourists.  Now, I know a few Chinese people and they are very lovely – but they are the ones that are in the mindset of leaving China or at least enjoy interacting with people from other cultures and are educated enough to see through the propaganda that China serves them on a plate for every meal.  Chinese tourists travel in groups.  They are loud.  They are pushy.  And they think they own the place.  It’s a product of most of them being only children and having their parents’ undivided attention.  They think they’re special.  They’re not.  And to those Chinese who think that Taiwan is or will be a part of China again one day, I have two things to say:

1.  Taiwan is not China.

2.  Fuck you.

Taiwan gets its class and much of its culture from Japan, which is why I’ve combined Taiwan and Japan into one introductory blog.  Japan ruled Taiwan from the late 1800’s until the end of World War II.  During that time, the Japanese implemented reforms to eradicate some of the bad customs from China, such as foot-binding, and they built infrastructure to Japanese standards.  Most importantly, this included sanitation and healthcare.  Taiwan’s international rankings much more closely resemble Japan’s than China’s, and Taiwan just feels a lot more like Japan than it does like China, despite the Chinese language and more Chinese-type cuisine.

If Taiwan is Asia but not Asia, then Japan is… well, Japan is not Asia at all.

Yes, Japan has lots of people just like the rest of Asia, and they have a difficult writing system and some questionable cuisine choices just like the rest of Asia (well, at least I find them questionable – they seriously eat raw horse), but that’s pretty much where it stops.  While most of the rest of Asia has dirty squat toilets, Japan has western toilets that clean and dry your butt after you poop.  That’s right – the toilets wash your butt and then blow dry your butt and it’s the epitome of luxury.  Hand dryers are often times built into the sink.  There is efficient mass transit in cities.  There are hardly any scooters.  Eating raw meat won’t get you sick here.  The life expectancy is the longest in the world.  The crime rate is super low (the third lowest in the world according to the source I found on Wikipedia).  They take care of people with disabilities – possibly even better than the United States does.  And the shinkansen – aka bullet train – is so fucking fast it’s ridiculous.  These magic people movers whisk you away at 320 kilometres per hour.  If they had these in the USA, they could get you from New York to Washington DC in under 70 minutes; from New York to Miami in 6.5 hours; or from New York all the way across to San Francisco in under 15 hours – which sounds like a lot, but it would probably take you a week on the Amtrak to do that now.  For the Aussies in the room, you could get from Sydney to Melbourne in well under 3 hours, which is actually quicker than the time it takes to fly when you consider the schlep out to the airports and having to arrive a little bit early.  You could get from Sydney to Perth in just over 12 hours.  On land.  That’s fucking crazy.

In fact, my only gripe with Japan:  you can still smoke in restaurants and hotels.  WTF, Japan?  I’ve been to crappy countries that have banned smoking so I was shocked when it was still everywhere in Japan.  The funny thing is:  you can’t smoke on the street.  Smoking is prohibited outside except in designated smoking areas.  The rationale behind this is that people don’t have a choice to go outside, but they do have a choice when they choose a restaurant.  Wow.

Aside from this, Japan was lovely.  Expensive, but lovely.  It’s the cost that really pushes Taiwan ahead of Japan in my travel ranking, but I would much rather live in Japan than in Taiwan.  In fact, if I knew any Japanese at all, I would quickly move to Japan.  It’s a good life there.  It’s super nice.  And I deserve nice things, right?  That’s why I moved to Australia from the USA.

More details on the places I went in Taiwan and Japan will follow in the next few blogs.  But first, let me take a selfie.

Me on my first shinkansen in Japan

Gap Year Q2 Summary

Blogs about Taiwan and Japan are still to come, but I’m going to jump into the Q2 recap straight away!  Just like the Q1 recap, if you aren’t into statistics and lists, then maybe you should go do something different like ponder existence or something useful like inventing teleportation technology that can be used to teleport burritos to me.

Total time spent:  94 days and 94 nights

Start:  Night of Saturday, October 10 at Kuala Lumpur Airport

End:  Night of Tuesday, January 12 at Tokyo Narita Airport

Continents visited:  1 (down from 2 in Q1)

1.  Asia: 100%

Regions visited:  2 (down from 5 in Q1)

1.  Southeast Asia:  59%

2.  East Asia:  40%

In transit between regions:  less than 1%

Countries visited:  7 (down from 12 in Q1)

1.  Japan:  27.5 days / 27 nights  (29%)

2.  Vietnam:  15.5 days / 16 nights  (17%)

3.  Thailand:  12 days / 12 nights  (13%)

4.  Laos:  11.5 days / 11 nights  (12%)

5.  Taiwan:  10.5 days / 11 nights  (11%)

6.  Malaysia:  8.5 days / 9 nights  (9%)

7.  Cambodia:  8 days / 8 nights  (9%)

In transit between countries:  0.5 days / 0 nights  (less than 1%)

And just for fun – time spent in countries that drive on the:

1.  Left side of the road:  51%  (Japan, Thailand, Malaysia)

2.  Right side of the road:  49%  (Vietnam, Laos, Taiwan, Cambodia)

Border crossings:  7 (down from 16 in Q1)

-  6 border crossings by air

-  1 land border crossing (by vehicle)

Airports visited:  13 (up from 10 in Q1)

Kuala Lumpur, Chiang Mai, Vientiane, Hanoi, Danang, Saigon, Bangkok (Suvarnabhumi), Koh Samui, Phnom Penh, Siem Reap, Kaohsiung, Taipei (Taoyuan), Tokyo (Narita)

Airlines flown:  6 (up from 5 in Q1)

AirAsia, Vietnam Airlines, VietJet, Bangkok Airways, Cambodia Angkor Air, Vanilla Air

Accommodation:

1.  Guesthouses:  38 nights  (40% - all over Southeast Asia and one place in Taiwan)

2.  Airbnb:  17 nights  (18% - in Hoi An, Phnom Penh, and across Japan)

2.  Friends:  17 nights  (18% - in Kaohsiung and Tokyo)

4.  Hostels:  9 nights (10% - in KL, Vietnam, and Taiwan)

Other types of accommodation:  hotels (various locations), a shitty “resort” (Koh Phangan), and one night each on a boat and a bus (both in Vietnam).

Bathroom situation:

1.  Private bathroom:  84 nights  (89%)

2.  Shared bathroom:  9 nights  (10%)

3.  No bathroom:  1 nights  (1%)

And now, for some less statistical lists…

Top 6 Experiences (in chronological order):

Because I couldn’t choose just 5 last quarter, I’m going to choose 6 here too for consistency.

1.  Meeting random travellers – I’ve met plenty of other travellers throughout the years, but it was just so enjoyable to meet and then travel with strangers outside of an organized tour.

2.  Motorbiking in Vietnam – This was totally outside of my comfort zone and I had a blast.  I was pretty good on the scooter and it was definitely more pleasant than a shitty bus.

3.  Learning Cambodia’s history – Even though it was terribly sad, I really appreciated the superb educational experiences at the Choeung Ek Genocidal Centre and the Tuol Sleng Museum.

4.  Being in Taiwan – after being on guard in South Asia and Southeast Asia for so long, it was such a great feeling to be in a safe country with no touts or hawkers (and cooler temperatures!)

5.  Sapporo winter wonderland – The heat was dreadful in Southeast Asia, so a little dose of snow was much appreciated.  Sapporo was a gorgeous city in the winter.

6.  Mazda Museum – Hiroshima is obviously better known for something else, but touring the main Mazda factory and seeing cars being built before my eyes was so fucking cool.  Seriously.

Bottom 5 Experiences (in chronological order):

1.  Getting sick – I spent my first four days in Malaysia with all the classic symptoms of food poisoning (I must have picked it up in Nepal.)  I had to cancel trips to Penang and Langkawi.

2.  Sweating every day in Southeast Asia – 8 weeks.  8 long weeks.  And every day was so hot.  And then hotter.  And it wasn’t even the hot season!  Constantly sweating, I was a literally a hot mess.

3.  Vietnam’s propaganda – The blatant propaganda in every Vietnamese museum really ruined the learning experience.  Some of the outright lies made me question all of the information presented.

4.  Mekong Delta – This day trip from Saigon was long, full of sales pitches, and didn’t show me anything worthwhile.  Visiting Saigon?  Skip this day tour.  Your time is better spent in the city.

5.  Koh Phangan – The Full Moon Party was a must-do, but it was pretty shit.  Aside from that, the attitude on the whole island seemed to need a major adjustment.  The Thai mainland is way better.

There were a few more mishaps than in Q1, but none of this is totally terrible.

Top 3 Places I Could Live (in preferential order):

1.  Taipei – I think Japan would be a better country to live in, but the cities there seem too big or too small.  Taipei is the Goldilocks of cities – it’s not too big or too little.  It’s just right.

2.  Tokyo – I think the massive size would wear on me after a while, but it sure would be fun to live in Tokyo.  There is so much going on.

3.  Fukuoka – Fukuoka was the closest to the right size of all the Japanese cities I visited.  It sort of reminded me of a Japanese version of Portland – not too much for tourists, but cool to live in.

All of the cities in Japan were great and very liveable, and Taiwan’s cities were right up there too.  I need to devote more time to Osaka next trip, and I’d like to check out Nagoya too.  Of all of the Southeast Asian cities I visited on this leg of the trip, the only contender is Bangkok, but it’s just so big, and so crowded, and so hot, and there’s so much traffic.

Top 3 Places to Visit Again (in preferential order):

1.  Taiwan – I’d like to devote more time to Taipei and to do more hiking and exploring on Taiwan’s gorgeous east coast.

2.  Japan – All of it.  Like, seriously all of it.  There is still more to do in Tokyo and I need to explore more of Osaka, check out Nagasaki, Nagoya, and Shikoku, and more thoroughly explore Hokkaido.

3.  Bangkok – I just really want to go shopping here when I have a job and a place to store clothes.

Aside from these, I’d like to do what I set out to do and visit Penang and Langkawi in Malaysia.  But I think I’d like to go back to the other three places first.

Top 3 Accommodations (in preferential order):

1.  Elcid’s apartment (Tokyo) – One of my besties lives in Tokyo and he let me stay with him.  It was so nice to be in an actual real home for a while.

2.  Ai’s Airbnb (Sapporo) – This little studio apartment was well-appointed and in such a cute neighbourhood.  The hostess (Ai) even left Kit Kats and other sweets for my arrival!

3.  Terao’s Airbnb (Fukuoka) – This little studio was warm and comfortable and in walking distance of most of the sights that I wanted to see.

A few other shout-outs:  The Mini Voyage Hostel in Hualien (Taiwan) was quite possibly the nicest hostel I’ve ever stayed in, though the bed was a bit too typically hard.  I loved the Park Side Hotel in Hiroshima because it was next to all of the main attractions and it was the first time I had been in a real proper hotel in such a long time.

And now I’m all done with Asia.  Q3 will feature a surprise cameo in Europe, a tour of the old country, and a jaunt into Latin America.  But first, let me take a selfie.

Elcid and I eating red velvet cupcakes in Tokyo.  He’s a good enabler.

Cambodia

After Vietnam, I headed back to Thailand to explore some more, but I’ve already blogged about that (weren’t you paying attention?)  So now I’m fast forwarding to… Cambodia!  My mate Dave (from Seattle) and I met up with three fellow travellers that I met on my India tour two months prior.

We spent four days each in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap.  I have to admit:  I’m generally pretty good at history, but I didn’t really know all too much about Cambodia.  I knew there was some sort of genocide there at some point in the not-too-distant past, but that’s about as far as my knowledge went.  I honestly don’t recall this being taught in school in the US.  Is this taught in US schools?  If not, why not?

Of all of the Southeast Asian countries I’ve been to – which is now up to eight – I think I enjoyed Cambodia the most (though Singapore is great but expensive and Bali was lovely but part of Indonesia…)  The people were probably the most pleasant in the region.  Yes, they all want to make a buck, but they need a buck and they’re generally pretty nice about it. 

A few highlights of my time in Cambodia:

Killing Fields:

When in Phnom Penh, one of the highlights is the Choeung Ek Genocidal Center.  I am aware that genocide and highlight don’t really belong in the same sentence, but not all highlights have to be happy ones.  This was truly an educational experience for me.  With the museums in Africa and Asia lacking a lot of proper curation, it was actually refreshing to see a place that was put together well and provided extensive information in a digestible format.  For those of you who don’t know, the rough story of Cambodia is this:  in 1975 – some time after the country freed themselves of French colonial rule – a political party called the Khmer Rouge took over the country.  They were communists to the extreme and envisioned a completely agrarian, self-sufficient society.  That was never going to work, but still they tried.  They emptied out cities and forced everyone to go to villages to work in the rice paddies.  And the worst part is that they killed – by some estimates – as many as three million people, which was somewhere between a third and a fourth of their total population.  Many of the victims were political rivals, but these people were so fucking crazy that they also killed anybody that they thought might get in their way, such as urban dwellers, intellectuals (including teachers or anyone who wore glasses), smaller ethnic groups, and more.  In the process, they also tried their best to destroy Khmer culture (for example, you can’t keep a culinary tradition alive if you don’t have food to feed your people…)  The Vietnamese invaded in 1979 and ousted the Khmer Rouge, but they kept their place as Cambodia’s UN representative for over a decade after that because the west didn’t like Vietnam and for some reason didn’t believe the stories coming out of the refugees.  WTF, western world?  The Killing Fields was one of the places where the regime murdered people.  The country was too poor to buy bullets so they killed people anyway they could – mainly by beating or hacking them to death.  They even killed infants by holding their legs and beating them against trees.  Because infants were apparently a big threat.  Mass graves and other parts of the killing fields were on display.  A memorial stupa in the middle contained skulls and bones of many of the victims that had been dug up on the site.  Everyone had their audio guides on and the whole place was eerily quiet.  It was beyond sad, but it was definitely something that I’m glad I did.  The world needs to hear these peoples’ stories.

Tuol Sleng Museum:

Just to ensure maximum sadness, we also visited the Tuol Sleng Museum.  This museum used to be a school which the Khmer Rouge turned into a prison.  There really was no way to win with these people – they would arrest you for no reason, and if you denied doing anything wrong they would call you a liar and kill you, but if you admitted to doing anything wrong, they would also kill you.  It was here where people were imprisoned before their deaths, and when they had too many people here to handle the killing part, that’s when the killing fields were opened.  The museum had pictures of the victims, tiny prison cells on display, and other information that was important for piecing together the tragic history of Cambodia.

On a happier note, elsewhere in Phnom Penh we visited the Royal Palace, various wats (temples), a bunch of markets, and the National Museum.  And then we took a boat from Phnom Penh up the river and through a big lake to get to Siem Reap.

Temples of Angkor:

I know I’ve seen a lot of temples already and am fully sick of temples, but the temple ruins of Angkor – the ancient capital of the Khmer empire – were outstanding.  In all, we visited twelve different sites.  Some of the more impressive were Banteay Srei, which had ornate carvings on display and was overrun with tourists, and Phnom Bok (recommended by a friend) which is virtually unknown to tourists, sitting high on a hill with great views.  East Mebon had big stone elephants which were great for a photo shoot, Preah Khan was massive, Ta Prohm is being overtaken by the jungle and was where part of Tomb Raider was filmed, and Phnom Krom – also high on a hill – made for an excellent sunset viewing over Tonle Sap Lake.  Angkor Thom was a complex with various temples, including the big Bayon temple and Baphuon, with its 60 metre reclining Buddha built into the back wall.  But the crown jewel is, of course, Angkor Wat.  The world’s largest religious monument, we spent quite a lot of time exploring here.  Like an onion, there are different layers to Angkor Wat that you have to go through to get to the middle.  The next morning after our initial visit, we went back (along with everybody visiting the country apparently) to watch the sunrise over the temple.  It was fantastic.  Later that day we visited the Angkor National Museum which had displays on the history of the temples and various relics of the temples.  It was cool to see, but I wish we had done the museum first to have a better idea of what little things we should be looking out for.

Phare:

Phare is the Cambodian Circus.  It is similar to Cirque du Soleil but I actually enjoyed it more.  The performers all come from disadvantaged families in small villages.  The story they told was easy to follow and the performers made the show quite funny to watch.  If you are visiting Cambodia, this is an excellent way to see a culture fighting to make a comeback.

Elsewhere in Siem Reap, we visited the workshop of Artisans d’Angkor – a non-profit that trains disadvantaged people in traditional crafts – and got one of those fish foot massage/pedicures where the fish come eat the dead skin off your feet.  It was ticklish and weird at first, but I got used to it after a minute or two (and after much giggling!)

OMG Food:

Aside from proper curation at museums, Cambodia also had a lot of top quality western-run restaurants and cafes (serving western food, local food, and inventive new versions of old local food).  I think the high quality of the museums and restaurants is because Cambodia is so poor and has needed more help than its neighbours so many westerners have come here as NGO workers and possibly have stayed.  This is my theory.  I could be wrong, but I think it’s a good theory!  Chicken amok was a local dish that I particularly enjoyed (amok was sort of like a satay sauce).  I had a Khmer Muslim beef curry at a non-profit restaurant and had a taste of Dave’s red tree ant soup (if I could eat nasty worms in Africa then an ant or two in a delicious soup was no big deal…)  But my favourite food of all in Cambodia was… wait for it… MEXICAN FOOD!  I know what you’re thinking, but let me explain.  One night we were wandering home from the markets and we stumbled upon a taco tuk-tuk.  OMG.  Did you read that?  A FUCKING TACO TUK-TUK!  Holy crap!  I had just had dinner but I didn’t care:  I got a quesadilla and it was actually pretty good.  The guy was a local but had been trained by his old boss who was from California.  Then, also in Phnom Penh, Dave and I went to a restaurant called Cocina Cartel to get my obligatory Mexican restaurant for the country.  This place was sort of modelled on Chipotle, and I was surprised to find that it was delicious.  I’ve eaten Mexican food in 20+ countries now, and this is the best I’ve had (outside of the USA and Mexico, of course).  I was stunned, happy, aroused, satiated, and dumbfounded all at the same time.  It was Mexiphoria – euphoria caused by Mexican food.

Cambodia marked the end of my eight weeks in Southeast Asia.  I’ve been sad to leave a lot of places, but I was quite content to finally escape the heat and head somewhere with more reasonable temperatures.  Taiwan, here I come!  But first, let me take a selfie.

To see more photos of my time in Cambodia, follow this link:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10100329746856481.1073741900.3000370&type=1&l=06d9ae21d7

South Vietnam

The area that was once South Vietnam was definitely a lot more interesting and more comfortable than the area that was once North Vietnam, by pretty much every metric.

A few highlights of my time in South Vietnam:

Random travel buddies:

While my travel experience in North Vietnam was pretty easy and lacking any major mishaps, my travel experience in South Vietnam was better and a big part of that was because of my travel companions.  I somehow managed to pick up an American guy and a German couple in Phong Nha and the four of us travelled together for the rest of my time in Vietnam.  I dubbed us the “Super Amazing Travel Squadron” because… well, because I wanted to.  We were super, we were amazing, we were travelling, and we were just a few cool pairs of flight goggles short of being a squadron.  I had heard from other friends that it was quite easy to meet other random travellers in Southeast Asia and stick with them for a few days, sharing accommodation and cutting costs (or spending more but getting a nicer experience), but I wasn’t sure I would meet people that I wanted to spend that much time with (because I’m a picky bitch).  John, Nicolas, and Jasmin proved to be suitable travel buddies and it was great to have company and people to share the new experiences with.

I also met up quite a few times with various travellers from my Halong Bay cruise.  We all seemed to be on similar itineraries so we coordinated a big group reunion dinner while in Hoi An.  It was also great just randomly bumping into them in restaurants, museums, and temples in different parts of South Vietnam.  It made me feel popular.

Hue:

Hue (pronounced like “Hway”) is an ancient capital of Vietnam and its main attraction is a large citadel which houses a palace, temples, library, theatre, garden, and more.  We explored the citadel and its attached museum on our first day in Hue.  On day two, we rented motorbikes (yikes!) and thrust ourselves into Hue traffic.  The start was rocky, but I quickly got the hang of it.  My travel companions and I rode around to three different tombs of the emperors of the Nguyen dynasty as well as a big pagoda and the beach.  In all, we rode roughly 75 kilometres!

Motorbikes:

Our day riding motorbikes around Hue was just a practice round for a much longer trip.  The next day, we headed out on motorbikes for the journey south from Hue to Hoi An.  With stops, the journey ended up taking the full day – we arrived after sunset.   We hired a guide to lead us down the coast and we stopped along the way at a fishing village, the Elephant Spring (where we went for a swim), and various viewpoints around lagoons, mountain passes, and beaches.  We did have some problems… or, actually, just one major problem:  one of the motorbikes died en route.  Luckily we had the guide to assist.  We ditched the bike and piggy-backed for the rest of the drive.  One of the bikes also ran out of gas/petrol toward the end.  Ooops!  Despite the mishaps, the drive down was awesome.  I had never ridden a motorbike before, but I did really well and it was a lot of fun just having the breeze in my face (except for all the pollution…)

Hoi An:

Hoi An is one of the must-do places in Vietnam and is on the itinerary for nearly every tourist.  The town is famous for its suit-making tailors and caters well for tourists with lots of shops and restaurants.  A tourist ticket provides access to five out of twenty-something sights in the town.  The sights consisted of the town’s icon – a Japanese covered bridge – along with temples, various Chinese congregation halls, a museum, a cultural show, and some historic houses.  Nothing really stood out as a must-see sight, but it was interesting nonetheless. 

More exciting than the temples (I’ve seen soooo many temples at this point) was a day spent at the beach.  Our Airbnb was located halfway between town and the beach (20 minutes by bicycle in either direction) so we opted to spend one day on the sand and in the water.  The weather was a bit cloudy, but the waves were strong which made for a fun swim.  We had spring rolls and beers delivered right to our lounge chairs so I won’t complain about a few clouds.  Another big highlight were the ruins at My Son.  My Son was the religious capital of the ancient Champa Kingdom which ruled what is now southern Vietnam until the Vietnamese conquered it.  Many of the structures are still standing despite heavy bombing by the US during the Vietnam War.  Seeing the old temples and buildings and learning about the history was a great excursion outside the town.

Danang:

Danang is Vietnam’s third largest city and we didn’t do all too much here.  We stopped for pictures by the beach on our way down to Hoi An, and we stopped at Marble Mountain on the way back to Danang to catch our flight to Saigon.  Marble Mountain, as you can probably guess, is a mountain… made of marble… which is home to a bunch of cave temples and some great viewpoints north to Hoi An and south to Danang.  Our biggest accomplishment in Vietnam was successfully navigating rush hour traffic on motorbikes in this big city.

Saigon:

While Halong Bay was beautiful, the Phong Nha caves were adventurous, and Hoi An was very relaxing, the highlight of Vietnam for me was Saigon.  Officially now called “Ho Chi Minh City” by the communist government, most locals still refer to the city by its real name: Saigon.  Saigon had some of the most interesting sights in the whole country.  The War Remnants Museum was fairly gruesome in telling the story of the Vietnam War, particularly the section detailing the after effects of Agent Orange.  The museum did have quite a bit of propaganda, but nothing nearly as bad as in Hanoi.  The “Reunification Palace” is the old South Vietnamese presidential palace and was wonderful.  The palace has been kept pretty much as it was when the communists came in and took over.  It shows everything from reception rooms and bedrooms to the command centre for the war and the underground bunker.  I was impressed by the building and it only shows how nice South Vietnam could have been today if North Vietnam hadn’t taken over.

While the War Remnants Museum and the Reunification Palace were my two favourite attractions in Saigon, there was plenty of time to visit a few more.  I felt obligated to see at least one temple while in the city, so I made it the Jade Emperor Pagoda which sits on a quiet residential street and is semi-famous for its turtle pond.  The Ho Chi Minh City Museum details the history of Saigon both before and after its name was forcibly changed to Ho Chi Minh City.  The museum had plenty of propaganda for me to chew on and spit out (I refuse to swallow propaganda.)  The History Museum had many ancient artefacts and the Fine Arts Museum had some really cool works but didn’t have much propaganda unlike its counterpart in Hanoi.  Some of the newer works on display were filled with scenes from the war or were inspired by the war, but didn’t really do so in a propaganda-ish fashion (which sort of helps to illustrate the divide between the mindset of the north and the south.)  I had a drink at the top of the Bitexco Tower – Saigon’s only true modern skyscraper – and took a day trip to the Mekong Delta.  The day trip was… terrible.  The bus ride was long, we barely saw anything, and it just seemed like they were trying to sell us stuff all day.  For those of you going to Vietnam:  skip this.  If you really want to see the delta, go on your own and spend a night there.  The tours from Saigon are pretty rubbish.

Put it in my mouth:

I know this is running long, but it wouldn’t be a blog about a country if I didn’t mention the food.  I ate an inordinate amount of spring rolls while in Vietnam – both fresh and fried.  I had several banh mi (Vietnam’s answer to the sub sandwich) including two banh mi at Banh My Phuong in Hoi An.  This little hole-in-the-wall restaurant was made famous by Anthony Bourdain when he proclaimed it the best banh mi in the world.  I had pho (Vietnam’s answer to a big fucking bowl of soup) and tried the local beer everywhere I went (Hanoi beer in Hanoi, Halong beer in Halong Bay, Huda beer in Hue, Larue beer in Hoi An, and Saigon beer in Saigon).  And just to add some sanity to the mix, I of course had Mexican food in Saigon and western brunch in Hoi An (and maybe I went to the Aussie-run Dingo Deli three times and maybe two of those times I had the breakfast burrito… maybe…)

Despite the propaganda, I really had a nice visit in Vietnam, particularly in South Vietnam.  Sixteen days really wasn’t enough, but I was excited to head back to Thailand to explore one of the biggest, most exciting cities in Southeast Asia:  Bangkok!  But first, let me take a selfie.

To see more photos of my time in South Vietnam, follow this link:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10100326904936711.1073741899.3000370&type=1&l=f0436443d6

North Vietnam

Vietnam – a country that is best known for its war.  What a great claim to fame!  Vietnam was part of China for the first millennium CE but gained independence (for the most part) after that.  The Vietnamese fought and conquered the Champa kingdom which controlled all of South Vietnam a few hundred years later, and were then invaded themselves by the French.  Japan took over during World War II, and after the war was over, the Vietnamese fought against the French when they tried to re-colonize.  When the French were expelled in 1954, communist guerrillas had gained control of the north while loyalists maintained control of the south – splitting the country into two.  Basically, a bunch of shit went down and the communists attacked the south prompting the Vietnam War, which turned out to be a complete shit show.  We all know that.

The problem with all of this is that the north (communists) won the war.  And despite the fact that we all know that, this fact is constantly reiterated to visitors at every opportunity.  In any conflict, each side tells their story and the truth lies somewhere in the middle.  In this situation, however, the propaganda machine is strong.  So strong, in fact, that it really causes visitors to lose all belief in what they are saying.  According to every museum in Vietnam, everyone loved communism but then the USA invaded South Vietnam so North Vietnam had to fight to liberate the south and everyone was happy to be reunified.  Not so fucking fast, Vietnam.  That is not what happened.  Not even close.  Vietnam – you didn’t mention how one million North Vietnamese fled to the south to escape communism.  And you failed to mention the two million refugees who fled South Vietnam after communism was forced upon them.  And what about all those people that you killed?  While I appreciate that the US and its allies did a lot of shitty things with a lot of stupid motives, the way the Vietnamese government describes it is so far from reality that it actually ruined a lot of the museum experiences I had in Vietnam.  It was not the “liberation of Saigon”.  It was the fall of Saigon.  And this is the problem with communist governments:  they control everything.  Even today, the Vietnamese government controls all media and censors the internet.  Political dissent is not allowed (because heaven forbid someone speaks their mind or speaks the truth).  Because of this, everything is very one-sided and none of it is believable after a while.

After the communists won, they pretty much shut themselves off from the world for the next decade and a half, but slowly opened up to foreign investment in the 1990’s.  Since then, the economy has soared and tourism has boomed.  The old South Vietnam has leaped well ahead of the old North Vietnam, mainly because the South Vietnamese diaspora that fled when the communists took over is now pumping money back into the south.  Saigon is growing way faster and has a lot more money than its northern counterpart, the national capital of Hanoi.  And it makes me wonder:  what would have happened had the communists lost?  Would South Vietnam be as prosperous as a Thailand or Malaysia?  Or maybe even as prosperous as a Taiwan or South Korea?  We will never know.  What I do know is this:  this place has a ton of potential, and travelling in Vietnam – despite the bullshit – was actually rather easy and very enjoyable.  Yes, there were a lot of dodgy characters (I’m looking at you taxi drivers), but as with the other countries, if you’re smart about it, you’ll avoid any major mishaps.  Just make sure to check your pockets.  Constantly.

I spent sixteen days in Vietnam and can’t possibly fit that all into one blog so I’m going to divide it up into two blogs based on the old division between North Vietnam and South Vietnam.

A few highlights of my time in North Vietnam:

Hanoi:

Hanoi is the national capital of Vietnam but only its second biggest city.  The biggest city is the much larger and much more modern Saigon in the south.  Despite that, Hanoi is still a huge city with quite a lot of sights to see, though none of them were all too interesting.  I only had two full days there, so I had to cram in a lot and cram it in quickly.  I started with temples – because that’s the big thing to do in Southeast Asia as I’ve mentioned before.  I saw a handful of temples in Hanoi but the most interesting was the Temple of Literature, which was overrun with graduates taking photos.  It was definitely one of the more interesting temple experiences because of that, but the actual temple itself was… not that different from other temples, despite the educational theme.  I’m a bit over temples.  Then there were museums.  The National Museum of Vietnamese History talked a lot about how the Mongols were never able to conquer Vietnam and about how terrible the French were.  The Vietnamese Women’s Museum talked about the role of women in Vietnamese society including their part in the war.  The Hoa Lo Prison Museum (also called the Hanoi Hilton by the American POWs that were kept there) talked about how the French were so terrible to Vietnamese inmates but how the Vietnamese treated the American inmates so nicely.  Right.  All three of these museums had a ton of propaganda (and, let’s be honest, some outright lies) about the Vietnam War, so I’m going to have to rate them low on the museum scale.  Even the Fine Arts Museum had paintings glorifying reunification of the north and south.  I decided to skip the Ho Chi Minh Museum as I was fearful that the propaganda machine there would be enough make my head explode.  The only museum that seemed void of any noticeable propaganda was the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology where I learned about some of the smaller ethnic groups that inhabit the country.

Aside from that, Hanoi was full of dodgy taxi drivers, lots of touts, some scammers, and of course the thing that Hanoi is best known for: crazy traffic.  I must brag that I pretty quickly mastered the art of crossing the street in front of thousands of oncoming motorbikes (and a few cars).

Halong Bay:

I reunited with a fellow traveller that I had met in Laos and we booked a 3 day, 2 night tour of Halong Bay – one of my 103 Things.  The bay is famous for its limestone rock formations and is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We arrived to meet twelve other travellers – Germans and Scandinavians – who would share our boat for the first night.  We cruised around the gorgeous bay, explored some caves, did some kayaking, and took a short hike.  The second half of the tour was on land at Cat Ba Island – the biggest island in Halong Bay.  There we did a longer hike, had some beach time, and enjoyed a few beers by the water.  This was a nice escape from the hustle of Hanoi and I only wish I had more time on the relaxing boat.

Phong Nha:

After Hanoi and Halong Bay, I took an overnight bus south to Phong Nha – home of the largest cave system in the world.  This backpacker experience was just a bit too real for me.  After a few days with lovely German and Nordic travellers, I was thrust onto a long bus ride with about a million 18 – 22 year old Brits.  “Would you rather pull out six teeth with pliers or cut out an eyeball with scissors?”  These people are stupid and probably all have scabies.  The chain-smoking driver didn’t help the situation, and the wake-up music sounded like a Vietnamese Kermit the Frog struggling to sing bad karaoke.  Then I had a loud hostel.  I’m too old for this shit.

But it was all worth it:  Phong Nha National Park is gorgeous and the caves are incredible.  Paradise Cave is over 31 kilometres long, though tourists can only go in the first kilometre or so.  Dark Cave, however, was the highlight of the area.  After zip-lining across the river, our group swam into the cave.  Once inside, we proceeded further into the cave where the water became browner and browner, finally turning into mud.  Pure mud.  I was submerged up to my neck in mud.  It was the strangest feeling:  a weird combination of floating in space and not being able to move.  And the reason it’s called Dark Cave:  it is pitch black inside.  While you’re in the mud.  It’s trippy.  After a rinse, we kayaked out of the cave.  The whole experience was awesome.

The scenery in North Vietnam was beautiful, but I had heard South Vietnam was nicer.  I was excited to go!  But first, let me take a selfie.

To see more photos of my time in North Vietnam, follow this link:

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10100326502103991.1073741898.3000370&type=1&l=e1c38927b1