There is something about the curiosities of travel that opens your eyes to different ways of thinking. The contrast to our normal life and routines highlights the human condition, those traits we share with people who live in an entirely different culture. While the similarities are a comfort to the traveller, it is the small diferences which excite the senses, such as a family of four riding one small scooter, the constant merging and dividing of traffic, the electricity poles covered in cables like ivy, the music vendor of wheels, blasting out music as he wheels around the streets. And all this just in the car ride from the airport.
Flying into Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) the hazy yellow lights illuminate busy streets and shanty towns, then suddenly you're in a taxi which is inside the flow of scooters, some with babies wedged in between the parents, sleeping peacefully. They weave in and out, riding on the footpath when the road is full, carrying mattresses, crates of beer, pigs, chickens, car tyres, and using the seat for canoodling when parked next to a lake. Crossing the road is a daunting experience. The first attempt is the most difficult because it takes faith in the scooter riders to go around you. It is a Moses-like feeling as you stride out into a busy road and emerge safely on the other side, despite the traffic never having stopped.
As a foreigner you assume they all know what they're doing, but we were told later than there are over 25 deaths per week just in Ho Chi Minh, and an enourmous number per year in all Vietnam. When you see people riding one-handed while talking on their mobile, it's not hard to see why. We saw about five accidents ourselves, a couple in front of our eyes, so any appearance of safety is an illusion. The protocol when riding in traffic is to avoid the people in front of you, but ignore everything behind you. It is their responsibility to beep their horn and let you know they're behind you. You also don't have to give way (or look) if you're turning right onto a busy road, it's other people's responsibility to miss you. All this adds up to noisy and chaotic streets, but it's part of the colour and excitement of Vietnam.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Vietnam videos
One of the major roundabouts in Ho Chi Minh city during a quieter moment:
Smoke coming out of the Cu Chi tunnels used by the Viet Cong. The smoke from cooking fires was passed through several chambers to dampen it down and make it harder to spot:
Friday night is group dancing night in Ho Chi Minh:
More dancing - you could probably teach yourself to count to four in Vietnamese using this video:
When I ride my bicycle on the pavement in Sydney people yell "It's a FOOT-path". I don't think they would enjoy walking around Vietnam:
This blind musician was playing some nice sounding Vietnamese blues. It got stuck in our head for most of the day:
Hoi An markets - they were more interesting than those in Ho Chi Minh, and actually seemed to have some locals buying food, rather than just tourist junk:
We got up early for the Hoi An fish markets, which turned out to be a small space with a lot of yelling and pushy women. Some good looking fish though:
Drifting through Ha Long Bay:
The streets in Hanoi's old quarter are so narrow that even scooters can cause a traffic jam, with a few pedestrians trapped in there as well:
Sarah braved a scooter ride in Hanoi (you wouldn't get me on one). You can see her adjusting her helmet as she departs:
Morning is exercise time in Vietnam, either badminton, happy sack, volleyball, or dancing. Check out this guy's wiggle:
Smoke coming out of the Cu Chi tunnels used by the Viet Cong. The smoke from cooking fires was passed through several chambers to dampen it down and make it harder to spot:
Friday night is group dancing night in Ho Chi Minh:
More dancing - you could probably teach yourself to count to four in Vietnamese using this video:
When I ride my bicycle on the pavement in Sydney people yell "It's a FOOT-path". I don't think they would enjoy walking around Vietnam:
This blind musician was playing some nice sounding Vietnamese blues. It got stuck in our head for most of the day:
Hoi An markets - they were more interesting than those in Ho Chi Minh, and actually seemed to have some locals buying food, rather than just tourist junk:
We got up early for the Hoi An fish markets, which turned out to be a small space with a lot of yelling and pushy women. Some good looking fish though:
Drifting through Ha Long Bay:
The streets in Hanoi's old quarter are so narrow that even scooters can cause a traffic jam, with a few pedestrians trapped in there as well:
Sarah braved a scooter ride in Hanoi (you wouldn't get me on one). You can see her adjusting her helmet as she departs:
Morning is exercise time in Vietnam, either badminton, happy sack, volleyball, or dancing. Check out this guy's wiggle:
Saturday, December 08, 2007
Choo-choo trains in Cairns
Most of the photos can be viewed at Flickr (I don't have Sarah's from the start of the weekend)
If you don't count the nine months spent in my mother's womb I recently turned 31 in effin' queue (Far North Queensland). It was my first trip to that part of the world and was prompted by its proximity to Sarah's temporary hometown of Port Moresby. In fact, it takes about twice as long to get to Cairns from Canberra which goes a long way towards explaining why North Queensland is much closer to PNG in landscape and climate than the southern parts of Australia. Cairns would be the spitting image of Port Moresby if there were more dilapidated buildings, violent crime, smoke from burning garbage, and less backpackers. I think I have stumbled on to the secret breeding ground of the backpacker. Cairns is teeming with them and their associated cheap hostels and drinkeries. Such a tourist town is it that it's hard to spot anyone who doesn't appear to be either a tourist or to work in the hospitality industry.
Sarah and I made the very sensible decision to bypass the hoi polloi by outspending them at a resort perched on the edge of the Daintree rainforest complete with a jungle camouflaged swimming pool, a restaurant in the trees overlooking the river below and individual bungalows surrounded by rainforest and the off foraging bush turkey. It's such a relaxing place that I went off into a reverie just thinking about it.
Our only outing on Saturday was to Mossman Gorge where we lowered ourselves into the surprisingly cold water in a secluded part of the river which rolled through the thick forest where creepers climb the trees in an effort to find sunlight. The roots of the trees in the rainforest tend not to exist solely under the ground. The look as though they have grown up from the ground and attached themselves limpet-like to the tree, or else they look like flat anchors spreading out from the trunk, making you wonder how trees usually stay upright without such support. Without doubt the gorge would be more spectacular when the waters are flowing fully, but there aren't many better places to be when the thermometer climbs over thirty, apart from in your exclusive pool resort having a nap and reading the paper.
Sarah and I have developed a bad habit in recent times of getting up early while on holiday. This is not by choice, but usually revolves around stupid, stupid airlines. This trip was no exception. As Sarah's work denied her request to fly back to Port Moresby early on Monday morning, she had to leave early Sunday morning instead. I guess I could be understanding about the fact that Sarah's managers cut her weekend short because there was a conference on Monday that she was organising, and half a dozen staff members were away on emergency flood relief, but it was my birthday and I don't have to be understanding, that's one of the good things about birthdays. So a pox on Sarah's managers for making me spend my birthday alone.
The result of all this was that I was in the unusual position of getting up at 5:15 on the day of my birthday to drive Sarah to the airport. The positive aspect was that the drive to the airport, from Port Douglas to Cairns, is rated as one of the best drives in the world, which we experienced as the sun rose over the water. It was quite a topsy-turvy day – getting up early, driving along a beautiful stretch of Australia's coast, saying goodbye to Sarah at the airport, then hopping on the Kunanda Scenic Railway, a train which winds its way through the hills outside Cairns, passing under mango trees and through 15 tunnels along the way. I wish I could say that the train sped along, generating a cooling breeze, but it seemed to be affected by the heat as well and chugged along at a leisurely pace through the 36 degree heat. If anything it felt hotter in the higher altitude of Kunanda, and after a quick jaunt past the tourist shops, and a brief wander through the residential area dotted with beautiful flame trees, I retreated to the shade of the pub near the station with a cold pint while the staff spruiked the next load of passengers with the offer of mango daiquiris.
The best part about going to Kunanda was the trip back down to the coast. I had a dim idea about a cable car at Cairns but I didn't fully appreciate how cool skyrail is. It travels 7.5 kilometres back to Cairns, but the beauty of it is that the trip doesn't go through the trees, but above them, giving you the sensation of being a bird above the canopy. It is an alpine form of transport in a lush, verdant landscape. Rather than bulldoze a path for the cable cars to travel through, they flew each supporting pole in my helicopter. It's an impressive idea which seems to have been executed well. Both the train and the cable car stop at Barron Falls, a spectacular looking waterfall (even more so in full flow).
On my birthday night I went to bed early in preparation for another 5:30am departure. It's a lot easier to get up early in the tropics than during a Canberra winter, which my taxi driver was attempting to recreate through the power of air-conditioning. It is freezing at Cairns airport as well, as though they feel the need to prove that you can be cold in a hot part of the world. As I sit here shivering, waiting for my plane to be depart, which has been delayed, oh a mere six hours, I really hope that the part they are flying in from Timbuktu is crucial to the successful flying of the plane and not just something to make the toilet flush properly. The Chinese passengers that I am waiting in the terminal with have the unfortunate habit of hawking up a goobie and spitting into the bin. I guess I should be grateful that they are not expectorating all over the floor. Qantas very kindly shouted everyone breakfast from the one food outlet in the terminal. Their thinking seems to be that one plane load of pissed off people is a lot less damaging that the biggest aviation disaster in Australian history. If I wasn't getting this flight free through my parent's frequent flyer points, I would be tempted to ask for my money back.
Just to switch tense on you again, I am back in Canberra now, the flight home from Cairns taking twelve hours in total. One of the stewards on the Cairns to Canberra leg asked me whether I wanted anything because I had kind of a blank look on my face. Sitting in a departure lounge for six hours will do that, I though to myself. He gave me a free Mars Bar. To compound my day of travel hell, although I was rescheduled on a later flight to Canberra, just as we had all boarded, and everyone had shoved their luggage into the overhead locker and sat the hell down, an electrical storm rolled in, and those namby pamby ground staff decided that getting me home on time wasn't worth being struck by lightning. Then a thunder storm rolled across out flight path anyway, making the captain delay us further. After a 50 minute delay we had a stroke of “luck” and got that sucker into the air. So not the most relaxing journey home, but it was another memorable birthday flight to add to the list. I must remember that my birthday falls right in the middle of storm season.
If you don't count the nine months spent in my mother's womb I recently turned 31 in effin' queue (Far North Queensland). It was my first trip to that part of the world and was prompted by its proximity to Sarah's temporary hometown of Port Moresby. In fact, it takes about twice as long to get to Cairns from Canberra which goes a long way towards explaining why North Queensland is much closer to PNG in landscape and climate than the southern parts of Australia. Cairns would be the spitting image of Port Moresby if there were more dilapidated buildings, violent crime, smoke from burning garbage, and less backpackers. I think I have stumbled on to the secret breeding ground of the backpacker. Cairns is teeming with them and their associated cheap hostels and drinkeries. Such a tourist town is it that it's hard to spot anyone who doesn't appear to be either a tourist or to work in the hospitality industry.
Sarah and I made the very sensible decision to bypass the hoi polloi by outspending them at a resort perched on the edge of the Daintree rainforest complete with a jungle camouflaged swimming pool, a restaurant in the trees overlooking the river below and individual bungalows surrounded by rainforest and the off foraging bush turkey. It's such a relaxing place that I went off into a reverie just thinking about it.
Our only outing on Saturday was to Mossman Gorge where we lowered ourselves into the surprisingly cold water in a secluded part of the river which rolled through the thick forest where creepers climb the trees in an effort to find sunlight. The roots of the trees in the rainforest tend not to exist solely under the ground. The look as though they have grown up from the ground and attached themselves limpet-like to the tree, or else they look like flat anchors spreading out from the trunk, making you wonder how trees usually stay upright without such support. Without doubt the gorge would be more spectacular when the waters are flowing fully, but there aren't many better places to be when the thermometer climbs over thirty, apart from in your exclusive pool resort having a nap and reading the paper.
Sarah and I have developed a bad habit in recent times of getting up early while on holiday. This is not by choice, but usually revolves around stupid, stupid airlines. This trip was no exception. As Sarah's work denied her request to fly back to Port Moresby early on Monday morning, she had to leave early Sunday morning instead. I guess I could be understanding about the fact that Sarah's managers cut her weekend short because there was a conference on Monday that she was organising, and half a dozen staff members were away on emergency flood relief, but it was my birthday and I don't have to be understanding, that's one of the good things about birthdays. So a pox on Sarah's managers for making me spend my birthday alone.
The result of all this was that I was in the unusual position of getting up at 5:15 on the day of my birthday to drive Sarah to the airport. The positive aspect was that the drive to the airport, from Port Douglas to Cairns, is rated as one of the best drives in the world, which we experienced as the sun rose over the water. It was quite a topsy-turvy day – getting up early, driving along a beautiful stretch of Australia's coast, saying goodbye to Sarah at the airport, then hopping on the Kunanda Scenic Railway, a train which winds its way through the hills outside Cairns, passing under mango trees and through 15 tunnels along the way. I wish I could say that the train sped along, generating a cooling breeze, but it seemed to be affected by the heat as well and chugged along at a leisurely pace through the 36 degree heat. If anything it felt hotter in the higher altitude of Kunanda, and after a quick jaunt past the tourist shops, and a brief wander through the residential area dotted with beautiful flame trees, I retreated to the shade of the pub near the station with a cold pint while the staff spruiked the next load of passengers with the offer of mango daiquiris.
The best part about going to Kunanda was the trip back down to the coast. I had a dim idea about a cable car at Cairns but I didn't fully appreciate how cool skyrail is. It travels 7.5 kilometres back to Cairns, but the beauty of it is that the trip doesn't go through the trees, but above them, giving you the sensation of being a bird above the canopy. It is an alpine form of transport in a lush, verdant landscape. Rather than bulldoze a path for the cable cars to travel through, they flew each supporting pole in my helicopter. It's an impressive idea which seems to have been executed well. Both the train and the cable car stop at Barron Falls, a spectacular looking waterfall (even more so in full flow).
On my birthday night I went to bed early in preparation for another 5:30am departure. It's a lot easier to get up early in the tropics than during a Canberra winter, which my taxi driver was attempting to recreate through the power of air-conditioning. It is freezing at Cairns airport as well, as though they feel the need to prove that you can be cold in a hot part of the world. As I sit here shivering, waiting for my plane to be depart, which has been delayed, oh a mere six hours, I really hope that the part they are flying in from Timbuktu is crucial to the successful flying of the plane and not just something to make the toilet flush properly. The Chinese passengers that I am waiting in the terminal with have the unfortunate habit of hawking up a goobie and spitting into the bin. I guess I should be grateful that they are not expectorating all over the floor. Qantas very kindly shouted everyone breakfast from the one food outlet in the terminal. Their thinking seems to be that one plane load of pissed off people is a lot less damaging that the biggest aviation disaster in Australian history. If I wasn't getting this flight free through my parent's frequent flyer points, I would be tempted to ask for my money back.
Just to switch tense on you again, I am back in Canberra now, the flight home from Cairns taking twelve hours in total. One of the stewards on the Cairns to Canberra leg asked me whether I wanted anything because I had kind of a blank look on my face. Sitting in a departure lounge for six hours will do that, I though to myself. He gave me a free Mars Bar. To compound my day of travel hell, although I was rescheduled on a later flight to Canberra, just as we had all boarded, and everyone had shoved their luggage into the overhead locker and sat the hell down, an electrical storm rolled in, and those namby pamby ground staff decided that getting me home on time wasn't worth being struck by lightning. Then a thunder storm rolled across out flight path anyway, making the captain delay us further. After a 50 minute delay we had a stroke of “luck” and got that sucker into the air. So not the most relaxing journey home, but it was another memorable birthday flight to add to the list. I must remember that my birthday falls right in the middle of storm season.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
PNG pigs
Pigs are expensive animals in PNG. If you run over you're in big trouble. Most of the time they just root around the road (probably in both senses). I like pigs. They're cute, they sleep a lot, and they have great eyelashes, just like me. Sarah patted a piglet in a Sepik village which immediately went to sleep or played dead. I wanted to eat it, but Sarah restrained me.
Here are some pigs at a roadside market near Dualo pass. They fell fast asleep about 10 seconds after this footage was taken.
Here are some pigs at a roadside market near Dualo pass. They fell fast asleep about 10 seconds after this footage was taken.
Even more photos
I know you didn't get quite enough photos of PNG last time, so here are some that I forgot about. They feature some shots of Dualo pass, a guy making his house, a village near Goroka, Goroka market, and the amazing Asaro Garden.
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