I just got back from Vietnam after 20 long days! It's been quite a journey, because I got to cover a fair bit of Vietnam and if not for Project Bac Ha, I really don't think I'll ever head to Lao Cai, Bac Ha because it's really a totally different kind of life there.
It's been a great experience with the rest of the team in this expedition. The weather in Bac Ha was really cold, at some point it went down to 12 degrees or so and everyone was freezing cold! But we all worked really hard to refurbish the 4 kindergardens. Sandpapering the walls, painting the base coats, drawing on the walls and painting them in bright colors. It was really manual work, especially for the guys carrying the equipments and the heavy roofs up the mountains but I'm grateful for this trip because it really widened my horizons and showed me a different way of lifestyle elsewhere.
So basically we headed to Hanoi first and took an overnight sleeper train to Lao Cai (at the Northern part of Vietnam). It's pretty near the China borders and near to Laos too! (Now that I've seen the map)
Then we took a bus down to Bac Ha, where our community service began. We headed to 4 kindergardens in total and did the same routine of revamping the places. Got to interact with the kids as well and they're really simple and innocent. They'd laugh at anything, even if you just go a simple high 5 with them. That can keep them laughing and giggling away for really long :)
In the 3rd kindergarden, the socio-cultural team cooked up a meal for the kids and it's chicken rice and green bean soup. Then we delivered the food to them, and it's really nice to see them enjoying the dishes. Their normal meals only have like lots of rice and vegetables, so meat to them is really a delicacy.
I haven't gotten the photos from Weijie yet so these are some of the representative photos I got from google. Haha. But it's really close to what we saw.
Bac Ha
We actually visited the Sunday Market there twice and the place is really village-y. People do trading of water buffalos, and there're like near 50 buffalos all around us! Then selling of live stocks like chickens, goose, ducks, dogs, pigs, horses, donkeys and all. Something you really don't get to see in Singapore. But at the puppies area I obviously shut my eyes and walk away as fast as I can because it's so sad to see the way they drag the really young puppies around on the ground or just throw them on the floor :'( But I'm glad I didn't see any live killings around. Killings are definitely going on somewhere but lucky that I didn't witness any!
Some of the women of the flower tribe in their traditional costumes. This is exactly what we saw there.
So we stayed at this homestay for our days in Bac Ha and it's a really nice place. Great food and great hospitality. Had a good time playing with the 2 dogs there also, Weijie and I always fed them with our leftover food haha.
Then when our community service finally ended, we headed to Sapa for our R&R. This was when I fell sick :( Really sucks to be sick on an overseas trip sigh! I had a massive diarrhea and vomited as well and my tummy was constantly churning non stop. All these made enjoying the trip really hard.
But nonetheless, the ride to Sapa was about 4 hours or so. And the view there was really nice! It was definitely colder in Sapa than in Bac Ha since it's even further high up in the mountains.
We were there for one night. Everyone was buying Northface jacket there haha. Cheap replicates but they do look authentic. I bought none though!
Left Sapa and headed down to Halong Bay, where my diarrhea madness continued. Had to down so many diarrhea pills to stop the diarrhea since we had to travel on bus for hours. It's gonna suck if there's no toilets on way there :( But I just know it's mega discomfort really.
We stayed overnight on a boat in Halong Bay. It's pretty there, with large boulders (?) ok not really boulders but large limestone features. Got to visit a limestone cave also, but I still love the one I visited in United Kingdom. Then the rest went kayaking while I stayed in the room and suffered in pain sob.
Left Sapa and we headed back down to Hanoi for one last night of R&R with the team. Hanoi was busy and bustling. Steamboat dinner with the team, but I had porridge due to my horrible stomach ache. It was okay at first and it got so bad that I felt so bloated and couldn't catch my breath on the streets :( I was in a mess but luckily b was with me to calm me down and we quickly got a cab to see the doctor at the clinic. Turned out to be some gastritis with some bacterial infection in my gastric. But I'm so glad for the visit to the doctor's. The medicine worked wonders for me. Million times better than the diarrhea pills, panadol, paracetamol, charcoal pills etc that I popped down for the past few days.
Didn't really get to enjoy Hanoi's night time much but I managed to take a walk around Hanoi in the morning we were leaving. The city is really really busy and their day starts really early. At 8 am you'll see shops opening and millions of vehicles on the streets.
On 17th, we went to the airport and the team headed back to Singapore. Bidded goodbye to the rest of the team! B and I extended our trip and travelled down South to Ho Chi Minh City. It was a 2 hours flight away from North Vietnam. Took the jetstar domestic flight and it was super cramp and uncomfortable, with many locals were on the plane. Stuffy as well. Reached HCMC in the evening.
And I didn't know this. Ho Chi Minh City was actually named after Ho Chi Minh.
This dude here.
Haha no wonder we kept seeing his photo everywhere. But locals still prefer to call their city as Saigon. First impression of HCMC upon arrival: Super busy and crowded with millions of motorbikes. It is such a bustling city, so so different from Bac Ha. It's more developed and the people there are more trendy as well. Most girls there are dressed in semi-transparent tops where you can practically see their bras. I was pretty shocked because I thought they're a pretty conservative country. I guess it's the weather that kills. It was extremely hot in HCMC and I prefer Hanoi's weather. Cooling but not too cold! Ho Chi Minh has 8 million people (that's like 10% of Vietnam's total population) and it has 4 million bike. So each person has 1/2 a bike, ok so every family confirm has at least one bike. This explains why Victor, our Vietnamese school mate who went on the trip with us has 3 bikes at home. Haha. Not surprising at all!
Another problem is HCMC doesn't really have a traffic light system. Vehicles go in ALL direction so when we cross the roads, it was pretty scary and life-threatening :/
Spent 5 full days in HCMC, till I got pretty sick of Vietnam already. The place isn't really nice for shopping because when they see that you're a tourist, they jack up their prices immediately. And they don't take haggling of prices as well, things aren't that cheap also so I didn't buy much stuffs. Only 1 bag great for school. Honestly, I don't really feel safe there because of the language barrier and not many people actually understand and converse in English very well there. Plus the scary amount of bikes there and messy roads make walking around a little tedious. But Weijie and I did visit the Independent Palace and Cu Chi Tunnel, both related to the Vietnam-American war. The palace was nothing much but the tunnel was quite cool, since we got to experience crawling in the tunnels like how people in the past did. If you're claustrophobic, it'll feel very horrible in the tunnel as it's really dark and narrow.
And not to forget! We witnessed a snatch theft there. There was this girl who was posing for photos at the roadside of huge crossroads. Then when the traffic light turned green, a motor bike with 2 men on it just went past her at full speed and snatched her bag. It's quite scary to hear her scream and we could see the crime happening right before our eyes but there's nothing we can do too since they were on bikes and they could fled off really fast. I became even more wary of my surroundings after witnessing that shit.
I think when you're traveling, it's always better to carry our bag sling-way or carry a bag pack in front. You'll never know what's gonna happen next.
Okay when I got the photos, I'll post them here (if I'm not lazy enough). Shall slack the rest of the day off. Great to be back in Singapore :)
I still love Singapore best. So cliche haha.
Tam Biet!
