Saigon

Sorry for the lull in posts, for the past few days I have been completely unable to get onto my blog.



When I last left you, I had bought my moto, Penelope, and ridden it to Can Tho in the Mekong Delta region of southern Vietnam.



An early morning greeted Brad and I as we headed out to catch a few photos of the floating markets in the surrounding villages around Can Tho. After snapping some, we hopped back on our rides and headed north to Saigon. The road was packed and insanely chaotic but we arrived to the outskirts in one piece. After we found a map and figured out where our couchsurfing host lived we slowly made our way through the metropolis overrun by millions of motos.

Exhausted and dehydrated we were greeted with sudden hospitality by Natasha, our Aussie expat host and also by cold beer. Neglecting to drink water to hydrate, we continued drinking the local brews and then went out on the town. After meeting some more couchsurfers visiting the city, downing a lot more beer and eating dinner we made our way to a dance club that wasn't much more than a pub playing loud music. We made it back early in the morning and needless to say, weren't feeling so great the next morning.


The next day, Natasha and her daughter, Amy, joined me on the back of my moto for a tour of the city. I first drove us to a furniture store where Natasha bought a new couch and then an hour out to the other side of town where a beautiful park was purported to be. Of course since Tet- the lunar New Year, and for most the only holiday of the year equivalent to Christmas and New Year in one- was the following night, it was closed.


No matter, some more driving the three of us on my moto, and a quick stop to pick up a 2 kg bag of potatoes and we were home. Nothing has made me feel more like a local than driving a moto with 5 pounds of potatoes between my legs and three people squished into the space for two. It was a great day.


That night we had dinner downtown with some of Natasha's friends. This is the point when Brad began feeling sick. After a couple days and his fever hadn't broke, we took Brad to the hospital, got blood work and fortunately found out it was only the flu.


For Tet eve, Natasha, Brad, two other couchsurfers and I went out to a local restaurant. After a quick glance at the menu I knew I had my first chance to really experiment with some weird foods. So after some deliberation we decided on 5 dishes: Scorpians, cobra, crocodile, ostrich, and bull penis. Scorpians taste like horrible goo with an unchewable exoskeletal shell. Crocodile is good, ostrich is great (I already knew that), bull penis tastes like bad beef, and this cobra was too fishy in flavor and texture for me.


After our eclectic dinner we watched some fireworks and headed home although the streets were so packed full of motos that it was impossible to get a taxi to even take us for nearly 2 hours after the fireworks were over. It was really that unmovingly congested.


The next day Brad, Eduard- a Spanish CSer that was with us the night before- Amy, Natasha and I all piled into a taxi to go out to Natasha's vietnamese family's home outside of Saigon. (Its complicated, she was adopted and found her real vietnamese family after moving there 8 years ago.)


The previous night we had made a special request for lunch: fresh snake. Upon our arrival we were not disappointed. A 5 foot long live snake in a mesh sack. After our lunch of fried chicken and beer the real fun started. As cousins and obscure relations watched, Natasha's nephew-in-law cut off the head of the snake with scissors and held it vertically, draining the blood into a glass which already contained some red wine which Eduard had brought. After it was a 50-50 mixture, the glass of warm frothy goodness was handed first to me.


Fresh snake blood is warm and creamy and really not bad tasting. I had a couple sips and didn't cringe once, but despite the unexpected good taste, I got a bit queasy when thinking about what I was tasting on my lips.


Then the snake was gutted and its organs harvested for our gastronomical enjoyment. Apparently a snake has two hearts, one red and one blue. Because I have a big mouth, the still beating, larger, red heart was reserved for me and I gobbled it up with a beer chaser. I was told that eating snake blood and heart is good for strength of both a physical and intimate nature. I guess I wasted it.

The rest of the snake meat was cooked and truthfully was delicious, if tedious to tear away from the bones. It tasted like slightly chewier chicken. After we had had our fill we joined the family for a few hours in a nearby park/amusement area including a boat tour on a gorgeous lake and a quick ride on some bumper cars!

When we returned exhausted that night and Brad and I looked into our big day ahead as we were going to ride about 8 hours up to the mountainous town of Dalat, we made new plans. Choosing to include Natasha and Amy we decided to head east to the beach and spend a few days before heading up to Dalat.

The traffic the next morning was insane. Cars and buses hardly inched forward while a plethora of motos- including my own, again with 3 passengers- weaved through the traffic with more than a few close calls. After losing Brad more than once and finally reaching the beach resort town of Mui Ne, we couldn't even find accomodation due to the influx of domestic tourism during the Tet holiday which can last 2 weeks! Eventually we found an overpriced hotel and collapsed exhausted.

Over the next few days we enjoyed ourselves lounging and living the good life, sipping wine and eating western foods. We visited sand dunes and watched kite surfers. It was very relaxing. Finally on Monday morning, Natasha and Amy caught a bus back to Saigon and I headed north to meet Brad in Dalat.

My experience with Natasha and Amy was quite incredible. I'm sure without their friendship and hospitality we would not have had such an incredible time in Saigon and would have moved on much sooner.

I'm sorry I'm falling behind in my posts! Hopefully I will catch up tomorrow!