Santa died for somebody's sins but not for mine

Instead of the usual blow-by-blow account of what I’ve been up to I’ve decided to have a general discussion about some of the weirder aspects of Vietnamese life. A wander down the street in Saigon where my friend Stu lives provides endless insight into the ways of the land and I never tire of walking down it. Life happens on the street here; house doors are left wide open for all and sundry to see, families inhale their Pho, watch blaring televisions, feed their babies (more on this later), go to school, drink and play cards. So here are some of my observations made over the past week:

a) a) People here use scooters to carry just about anything you can think of. Pane of glass carried with no gloves on the back of a moped? Sure! Stacks of geese in bags? You betcha! A family of four including a casually carried newborn baby? Piece of piss. You can almost hear Partridge’s take on it with Crash Bang Wallop Part III; “Look at these idiots, I don’t think they follow health and safety regulations in VIETNAM”, “SHIT! That guy’s asleep at the wheel, with a pillow!” (I have seen this). It’s remarkable really, almost like a twisted, polluted ballet in which the pedestrians, taxis and mopeds interweave with no rules and no speed limits (like in Germany) and yet you never see any accidents. Glory be!

b) b)Women are paranoid to Madonna-like proportions about getting a tan. They do not want to be brown, they want to be white. Which means that even in 35 degree heat and humidity that makes the sweat spring from every pore (I swear I can hear it) they will wear gloves, a jumper, a scarf covering the bottom half of their face, trousers and even cleated socks with their flip flops. As well as the ubiquitous conical hat. They shout at white women in the street to cover up, they cannot understand how we would want to be darker, when you cannot even buy moisturiser or shower gel without whitening cream in it here.

c) c)Which brings me onto my next observation: overfeeding. Being thin is not in, in Vietnam. It’s still classed as a sign of poverty here, hence pencil thin women drink protein shakes to get a rounder figure, and babies are fed to within an inch of regurgitation until 10pm every night to act as some gluttonous exterior sign of wealth- “We have money, look how much we can feed our child! Count the tires! Just count ‘em!” Consequently you get some hefty little bruisers about yey big cruising the streets of Nam.

d) d)The women are direct. To the point of eye watering honesty. I have been told on several occasions, and with a disgusted down tugging of the mouth, that I’m “too thin”. And that’s not even been the worst of it. It’s become an almost daily occurance for a gaggle of women to laugh and point at their noses, and then at me. Yes, it’s really f***ing funny that you’ve got noses cute as buttons and I look like an emaciated Captain Hook. Thanks guys. Thanks.

e) e) Men let their hair and nails grow. There have been several, rather disturbing sightings of men with long nails, really long. The kind of nails you’d go, “Oh my God, look at that man’s LONG nails!” We’re still not entirely sure why, although it could be another nod to, “Look at me I don’t have to work in the fields, I can grow my nails long”. Either that or women here have a serious penchant for Nosferatu-esque accoutrements. The curly facial hairs are also gag-inducing, and I’ve been put off my food on several occasions now as one of those pesky coiled, wirey hairs got a little too close for comfort.

f) f) And finally, and this one’s a bit of a rant, Religion. Namely Catholicism. Since the French came and conquered they left behind some great stuff, namely baguettes, Laughing Cow and their peerless architecture and town planning. Not so great has been the imprint of the ever-pervasive and ever-growing iconoclastic religion. Take the street I’m staying on for example. People here are not wealthy, they live in pretty small houses, almost all of which double up as a shop, garage, restaurant, bar, you name it- the Vietnamese are nothing if not business savvy. So imagine my horror when I walk down the street, and see two huge white Catholic churches, that must cost half the country’s annual GDP to build, in the midst of being erected. Hop on a cruise down the remote Mekong Delta, there’s nothing but water, mangrove, small canoes, rice-laden boats and! A Catholic church shining like a beacon of monstrous incongruity. Glance into each house as you pass and tally up the number of Buddhas and the number of Christ and Mary images- it soon becomes obvious who’s losing the battle for wall space. But I guess it’s happened for centuries, since the biggest genocide in history was carried out in South America by the Spanish. It just seems even more out of place and anachronistic given the current crisis of faith that even the Italians have mustered.

StiStill there is a funny side to all the over-zealous worship, there’s a huge replica of Notre Dame cathedral in Saigon, not by a Seine-like river mind, no, this one acts as a roundabout. And Sophie (who lives here in Saigon) told me about her friend who went to a shopping mall at Christmas to see the nativity display (the Vietnamese are mad about Christmas, with little fairy lights, fake icicles and Santas adorning every building as far as the eye can see). They’d really pushed the boat out on this one though, creating a beautiful touching scene, Mary, Joseph, cattle lowing, some well wise men etc etc, until her eye wandered up to see a huge red and white Santa Claus, nailed to the cross.

I love the smell of Napalm in a morning

Greetings from poolside at the hotel Nam Hai, Hoi An. And wowsers Mctrousers do I wish you were all here to see this. An infinity pool that stretches out towards a turquoise, steady sea, the horizon broken only by distant mountains and palm tree fringing. Plus I have a trusty Mojito in hand, which makes everything infinitely better. What can I say about this special country, with its conical hats that bring romance to any picture, smiling people, lush greenery and food that makes the palate zing to life?

I last left you in Singapore, working frantically to deadline in self-imposed isolation, which I have concluded is the quickest way to insanity known to man. Don’t try it. Ever. Unless you like waking up in the middle of the night trying to catch all your random thoughts in a metaphorical dream catcher wondering if you’ll ever feel sane again. Nevertheless, I managed to make the deadline for the book and felt a soaring sense of elation that I can only liken to how Nelson Mandela might have felt at his release, when I boarded the plane for Hanoi in the North of Vietnam.

The flight was longer than expected, Vietnam is much bigger than I thought. I arrived at night and after a happy reunion with Rosie Foodie Nonce-meister Jonst crashed into a plush bed, courtesy of my companion’s amazing media bartering skills. The first day was spent trawling the motorbike and scooter-laden streets and tiny side streets of Hanoi. The city has a youthful buzz that I hadn’t expected to find. The buildings are crumbling, and have both a Chinese and French influence, with potted plants that descend from the balconies at the tops, but the people are a mix of old and new. Wiry looking women balancing poles with food on either end, which made them look like walking Libra signs, stride purposefully along the streets, while the hip young gunslingers zip about on scooters dressed in modern clothes- some of them pretty damn cool actually. On the whole there’s an air of a country that’s forgotten its horrific past and is finally coming into its own, America in the 50s full of youth, promise and hope.

Rosie was doing a street food slide show for the Guardian Food section, so we were on a mission to find the best street food Hanoi had to offer. The first stop was a coffee shop that’s been around since 1936, which serves up extra strong coffee made with the help of a trusty weasel. They feed little white weasels on the plantations coffee beans, which the little mites then process through their vital organs and then, to put it bluntly, shit out. Apparently the chemical composition of the bean is changed and makes the best coffee in the world. The interior of the cafe itself was like entering Alice in Wonderland world, with its stooped ceilings, overturned bottle crates and miniature stools serving as chairs, and equally mini tables whose tops were etched with messages of love, phone numbers or a rather cheesy Vietnamese photograph. I ordered a weasel coffee with condensed milk, which came in a little ceramic cup with a heart emblem on top. It blew me sideways. The air of faded grandeur added mystique to the experience, making it feel more like a ritual as the locals sat about, smoking and sharing plans for the day to come. A perfect start.

We spent the rest of the day trying local foods that are all made at stalls around the city, local delicacies using ingredients from the local province and loads of herbs, noodles and pork- which I had to abstain from. Worse luck. After a much-needed siesta (or watching Mad Men in my case) we headed back out again for more local food. Sadly my hunger and lack of veggie options all conspired against me and I ended up-horror of horrors- eating at an all you can eat Pizza buffet. Well I was hungry damn it! We finished the evening at an outdoor café perched on the seemingly ubiquitous tiny crates, eating a yoghurt dessert with jellied fruits in the shadows of a rather gothic and impressive church.

The following morning we headed out to Halong Bay- a mystical place with calm emerald waters, pierced with limestone boulders jutting out in various shapes and heights, surrounded (at this time of the year at least) by an opaque mist. It was rather touristic though, with hoards from the Merrell and socks wearing brigade jostling to climb aboard their boat. Ours was a rather charming junk ship, with faded strips of orange and navy paint and a miniature pagoda on its roof. The crew were amazing and immediately made us feel at home. Less so one particularly annoying couple from “Tazzy” Australia. It was their first trip abroad after a life of raising “foive kidz” and we didn’t hear the end of that. “Do you hev a big family? “ “Oi don’t agree with thet, when you’re a mother of four boyz…” “Why don’t you girls get married and hev kidz?” ARGH! Do shut the fupp up you silly woman. But the other guys aboard the ship were great, including one spectacularly stereotypical socks-and-sandals wearing German, named Ollie. By the end of the trip we had him belting out Tina Turner’s ‘Private Dancer’ (“Deutschmark!!!! DOLLAR!!! I take American Express!”) on the ship’s deck, as we glided through the calm waters back to shore. The food during the cruise was also worthy of mention, with Asian greens such as morning glory drenched in garlic, crispy fried prawns and heavily peppered and super fresh calamari.

Next morning we hopped on a short flight to Da Nang, where we were picked up and transferred to our hotel in Hoi An. What a magnificent hotel it is too. Beach cabanas of impeccable design, with jasmine scented body lotion and a pool to die for (I may have mentioned this earlier?) The first evening we went into the little streets of the town centre to try and find some fresh local seafood. The streets at night are lit by lanterns, which makes for an incredibly festive and romantic atmosphere. Sadly we ended up in a tourist trap eating dried-up red snapper with a coarsely chopped chilli and lemon grass topping. Nicht so gut und never again! The next day we had better luck though as we met up with a couple of local girls who run a tailoring shop (Hoi An is famous for its tailoring shops which have the ability to copy any dress imaginable) who took us to a local seafood place where we tried banana flower salad, greens drenched in garlic and butter and braised fish in a claypot. Utterly divine and a far cry from the horror of the night before. The great thing about the women here is that they have fantastic senses of humour, they are liberated and open and moving forward in a progressive way. Sadly, apparently the men are known to be lazy drunks, which is why the women are so strong- both physically and intellectually. The women run their own businesses, have children and still manage to achieve it with humour and happiness. Truly inspiring.

Another thing of mention before I head off, was the local food market we visited on bikes yesterday. A rather shabby affair, with low corrugated iron roofs, makeshift stalls and the place where flies abound. And yet, and yet… The women who work there were so full of smiles and looks of curiosity, the children smiled shyly behind their hands all of them wanted to talk to us in the only English they know “Hello” and ‘Yo” (I’m not sure why they love ‘yo’ so much, I even had to slap a child’s hand and say yo! as I passed him on my bike!) But the piece de la resistance came though when I spotted a Karaoke machine in the far end of the market. I pointed to it and the next thing I knew the stallowner was running around like a blue arsed fly trying to locate a microphone. Uh oh. This is it, don’t get scared now. He eventually found one and I was coerced into singing Michael Jackson’s 'Beat it' to a steadily growing throng of locals. This was sure to test their senses of humour to the limit. I made Rosie go first which she managed with the usual amount of aplomb, applying gusto and a generous amount of shimmying. It was so funny to see the locals crowd around laughing and clapping as we made utter fools of ourselves in a scene reminiscent of Bridget Jones in the Thai prison. I’ll never ever forget it…

But that’s quite enough from me, more to come from what is fast becoming one of my favourite countries…