Today, being the last day of our vacation, we decided to take it very easy. Our flight to Bombay was at 6.20 pm which meant we needed to be at the airport at 3.20 pm. We were flying back on a budget, no-frills airline (Viet Jet Air) which required us to pay $41 for each of our checked bags (carry-on bags were free). Llew had been trying to get this payment made online for the past couple of days but was simply not succeeding. This meant that we would need to reach the airport just a little before the counters opened, to make the payment in their office.
Accordingly, we had asked for our private taxi to arrive at our hotel at 2.30 pm to make it in time to carry out this errand. We decided to complete all our packing and get ourselves fully organized before we set out to find the last item on our agenda: A Visit to the famous Train Street that fascinates all visitors. Actually, we had not even heard of this feature as the edition of Lonely Planet that I had been using was probably not current and this phenomenon is relatively new. My friend Delilah, who is taking a similar trip to Southeast Asia in November, told me about this and asked me to investigate it, on her behalf. As it turns out, our guide Thom had mentioned this to us on the first day of our arrival in Hanoi. Not having researched it enough, we decided to save it for the last day and to cover it only if time permitted.
Last Breakfast in our Hotel:Accordingly, we finished most of our packing but for the last-minute gifts we’d be taking for family and a couple of friends. That done, we went to the second floor for breakfast and since this was our last day in Vietnam, both Llew and I decided to have Beef Pho (Pho Bo) for breakfast together with Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk and fresh fruit (dragon fruit and water melon). Breakfast done, we went back to our rooms to pick up our maps and carry a bottle of water with us. It was our intention to walk to the Train Street from our hotel—a walk, we were told by the Receptionist, of about 15 minutes.
Walking Through Hanoi’s Old Quarter to find Train Street:As it turned out, it took much longer than fifteen minutes as it was drizzling throughout and I was quite afraid of slipping on the wet streets. We also lost our way and, despite the map, had to ask for directions several times before we finally arrived at Phung Lung which is the street on which the train runs. This is, in fact, the very heart of Old Hanoi—so do not expect antiseptic tourist white-washing anywhere. This area is gritty, rough and ready and 100% local. We passed by an island garden that had a large sculpted monument in the center. We passed by little shops filled with tourist merchandise such as coconut and ginger candy, pandan cookies, mung bean cake with matcha (green tea) flavor. We soldiered on until the train tracks came into view. But without a tourist guide or a book to help us along, we were quite lost as we did not know what to expect.
I had done some reading in my hotel and discovered that the interest in this feature derives from the train track that runs so close to hundreds of human settlements—in fact, these homes are just inches away from the tracks. The train follows no time-table and is known to be late by as long as an hour and a half. When the phenomenon gained attention, an enterprising local lady decided to create a coffee shop on the tracks with a second-floor balcony seating patrons to sip a coffee or beer and view the fascinating spectacle below. Other entrepreneurs followed suit and a small portion (right at the end) of Train Street developed into a hip segment filled with foreign visitors especially at the times that the train is scheduled to pass by. Apart from reading about this, two days ago, I also stopped at a tourist office along the way because I was certain the staff inside would speak English. I was right. A very helpful man inside directed me precisely to the spot to which I should go. However, he checked the train timetable and confirmed what he believed to be right. There are no trains in the morning during weekdays. The only train runs in the evening after 9.00 pm. On weekends, he said, the train runs about four or five times a day. Of course, this meant that we would not see the train pass, but at least we could go to the spot where most visitors gather to see it go by. Touts swarm around to attract you to their coffee shops—of which there is a whole chain, some fancier than others. Llew and I merely took pictures at this spot and since we were still so full with our substantial breakfast and did not even have the room for coffee, we used our maps and retraced our steps back to our hotel. This was a long and very tiring walk and, being that we had been going non-stop for nearly two weeks, my energy levels were at depletion point.
Last-Minute Shopping:
However, there were some last few items we needed to buy: Now that we live in Bombay and will return home to the fury of the Indian monsoon, Llew wanted to buy one of the large, poncho-like raincoats he has been seeing all the motor-cyclists wearing here. We had not succeeded in buying one yesterday, but we thought we’d keep some time for buying it today. I also wanted to buy some candied dry ginger which I use in my carrot cake with dried ginger. Finally, we needed to buy soft candy for my brother Russel and, on our way back, we stopped at the Win Mart and picked up something we thought would work for him—mochi (or sweet mung bean cakes filled with cream). We also entered one of the specialty shops that sell tea, coffee, candy, mung bean cake, etc. and picked up a packet of assorted candies for him in mango, coconut and pandan flavors. Looking for the dried candied ginger, I was delighted to find a salesgirl who spoke really good English (because she went to school in Singapore, she said) and using her services, we were directed to a general store that would possibly carry the raincoat Llew wanted to buy.
, this place was another fifteen minutes away and by this time, we had been on our feet and walking for about three hours. I was truly exhausted! We asked her to call us a cab, which she did and, pretty soon, we were at the spot. And Lo and Behold! They did carry the raincoat Llew wanted in a variety of colors. He chose one in Burgundy and we soon bought it for $10. Sadly, they did not have my candied ginger and although we tried one last stop before giving up (they had a version of ginger in honey), eventually we did not find it.
Meanwhile, in the process of using our map and trying to find our hotel, we chanced to pass by a beautiful Catholic Church—The Church of Our Lady, Queen of Martyrs. It was set in a lovely, spacious property filled with large, impressive bonsai trees and many statues of Christian saints. We took a few pictures outside and then entered the church to pay a visit. The altar was plain but filled with the most appealing flower arrangements. This was an unexpected bonus as it was the only church we were able to visit throughout our twelve days in the Southeast.
From this point, it was a ten-minute walk back to our hotel and we reached our room and sank down with the utmost fatigue on our bed. The Receptionist told us that check out time was 12 noon but she permitted us to keep the room till 1.00 pm. We found space for our last-minute buys (indeed our bags were crammed and bulging by this time!), used the rest room for the last time in our room and made our way to the lobby. We sat down there for about an hour until our private taxi driver arrived to pick us up and drive us to the airport.
Drive to Noi Bai International Airport and Return to India: Our drive from the hotel to the airport took about an hour. We were glad to arrive earlier than planned as we had the matter of our baggage payment to take care of—we went straight to the airline office at the airport and made our payment. As soon as the traffic assistants arrived at the counter, we joined a very long line. Fortunately, we did not need to stay in it very long as they opened a counter especially for the flight to Bombay and before long, we had our boarding passes.
Yes, we still needed a few more items to buy mainly for friends. I also bought a keychain for Chriselle in place of the usual Xmas ornaments I buy her from every country we visit. She will easily be able to use it as an ornament. Some more packets of ginger candy went into our bags and allowed us to finish up the last of our Vietnamese money (dong) before we went through Security and Immigration. Next, we went into the Duty Free section to pick up our allowance of duty-free booze—not a very vast choice available, and later, we did wish we had picked it up from Bombay airport’s duty-free shops instead.
As we were aware that our budget airline did not serve meals onboard and because we were pretty hungry by this point, we looked for a place in which we could eat. We found sustenance in large bowls of pho with wagyu beef. They were just awesome and completely fit the bill. That done, it was close to boarding time and we made our way to our gate ready to board the flight.
The flight was uneventful and fairly comfortable as the aircraft was barely a quarter full. We were seated behind an exceedingly noisy family—so we simply moved seats after take-off—to a three-seater in the center. This allowed both of us to get some sleep. Llew listened to music through my ear-buds and I blogged through much of the flight. We ordered a beer which we split and with the last few of our almonds that we had carried to snack on, we had ourselves a good meal on board.
The flight length was four and a half hours long and it passed off really well. Once we landed, we cleared Immigration pretty quickly, found our bags quickly and got a pre-paid cab to take us back home. We discovered that in the two weeks of our absence, the monsoon had arrived in Bombay. The air felt damp but cool and we actually had rain as we headed on the road home.
I could not believe how excited I was to come back home to India and how welcoming Bombay felt. And we entered our flat, I was struck again by how much like home this place now feels to us, how easily and effortlessly we have slipped into our Bombay lifestyles and how much we love the privilege of being able to live in India again. Conclusion:Cambodia and Vietnam had been a real revelation to me. Being that I am so Eurocentric in my sensibility and aesthetics, I really did not think that I could ‘connect’ with the countries of Asia as well as I did. Time flew in the beautifully orchestrated, custom-designed trip that was well planned and executed by KimKim whom I will surely use for all our travel needs from now on.
People always ask me what the highlight of each trip is. And of course, I can never choose a single item. So here are a few aspects of our travels that will always stay with me (not necessarily in any order of importance).
1. Walking amidst the ancient stones of Angkor Wat, especially Banteay Srei.
2. Getting inside the Chu Chi Tunnels to experience Viet Cong-style guerilla warfare.
3. Incredible sweet-sour-salty-emami flavors of Southeast Asian food, especially Fish Amok (Cambodia), Bun Cha, Pho Bo, Non Thit Bo Kho (Raw Papaya Salad with Beef) and Nem Nuong Que Hoa (Summer Spring Rolls), all in Vietnam.
4. Walking on Dong Khai’s evocative historical length in Saigon and remembering the Vietnam War
5. The incredibly startling beauty of Ha Long Bay and Lan Ha Bay
6. The unspeakable horrors of the Vietnam War as seen in the War Remnants Museum
7. Seeing the mighty Mekong River from the air.
8. Touring the Killing Fields of Cambodia at Cheoung Ek
. Taking a tuktuk ride on our own in Phnom Penh
. Taking in the treasures of the Cambodia National Museum in Phnom Penh
My appetite for Vietnam has been whetted and, having heard so much about other parts of the country (Danang, Saba, Hoi An, Hue), I don’t believe this will be my last visit there.
Lastly, I will say that I am annoyed that the interface on the Blogger Dashboard has been changed as I hate the fact that my individual paragraphs can no longer be formatted, my sub-headings do not appear separately and the total appearance of the blog post is awful. I will be spending some time trying to learn how to deal with the new interface.
Thanks for following me on this armchair-journey. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed discovering these places.
Until next time…may the road rise up to greet you!
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