All I want for xmas...

Well, Coles Myer (aka the group that owns pretty much the entire goddamn Australian retail sector - kmart, stationery superstores, supermarkets etc) has EITHER reached new highs of cutting edge self-referential reverse-psychology black humour-themed advertising nous...

OR

...desperate new lows.

It's a tough call.

What do YOU reckon?

Bet the rats are relieved.

Well xmas is tomorrow and I should be writing my thesis but, in the interests of festive procrastination, I thought I'd share a little gem from a smoothie bar I went to in the States a few years ago. Not sure I am too keen on their take on 'local flavours'.

I really get a ridiculous amount of pleasure out of these sort of typographical cock-ups - and if I can combine it with a little festive Yank-bashing then all the better :-)

Knee-jerk patriotism Noo Zulland-style

In honour of the nausea-inducing events of the last fortnight in Sydney (yay for race riots!). I thought I had better keep up with the one-eyed Joneses and post up my own little patriotic rant. So here goes - be warned - it's pretty 'out there'.

Was in Highpoint shopping mall on the weekend (fondly referred to by locals as 'knifepoint' for not entirely unobvious reasons), attempting to buy a BBQ and outdoor table and not kill anyone as a result of my soaring 'fuck-i-REALLY-don't-want-to-be-in-a-shopping-mall-2-weeks-before-xmas' stress levels.


Was just getting ready to ankle tap the next person who tried to push past me when Tezza, Barbara the new Swaustrian flatmate and I spotted a beacon of sanity in the distance. The New Zealand Natural icecream franchise!

Along with randomly watching my first ever televised All Blacks game when I was in Vietnam my patriotic weakness in Australia is being an, ahem, 'regular' customer of this store - only to be found in nasty shopping malls. This is definitely patriotism - not cos' I am a guts.

So, was looking forward to getting my usual Noo Zulland icecream drink fix (the profoundly named 'Chillo') when something caught my eye.

Wait for it....

A bottle of L & P!!!

:-D

[dances little patriotic jig]

Tezza and the Swaustrian can confirm that I was somewhat overcome at seeing, for the first time since I moved here 2 years ago [goddamm, it's been 2 years!] this little Coca-Cola Amatil-owned slice of New Zealand iconography.

For those not from New Zealand with no idea what the hell I am talking about - just go here and watch the funniest goddamn nostaligia-inspired television advertisements ever made. Do it - do it now.

And yes, even though L & P was never my favourite drink I bought a bottle - and am now waiting for the perfect summer's day when I can leave it out in the sun on the deck, open the lid, let it go almost but not quite completely flat and imbibe to my little patriotic heart's content. Just need to add some sand/chlorine and sunburn to the equation and I would be right at home.

Merry Chrismukah [with props to the OC and La Nadine] y'all.

Fly by wire.

Went to the St Kilda night market last night (home of cute stalls, funky t-shirts and many 'pseudo alternative' types, a semi-dark (beige?) art in which I occasionally dabble).

For some reason this year Melbourne has had an unprecedented fly invasion – and it was especially evident at St Kilda last night. Everyone (me and flatmate included) was walking around madly swatting their arms around their heads, looking like they were in the grips of some sort of psychotic episode.

Not sure what it is about badly grounded electric lights (or plastic flowers?) but the flies lurrrrrrrrved the set-up shown here.





Felt like Alfred Hitchcock should be somewhere with a megaphone yelling ‘cut’.

EXTRA ordinary!

As if being jumbo-sized wasn't enough!

Sushi and pro-capitalism

The Japanese place where Tezza and I occasionally have lunch is getting all political on us!

Vinastyle in Melbourne town.

It's been a couple of months since I came back from Vietnam but every now and then I find myself doing something that puts me right back into central Saigon.

One such trick I have been working on is the art of putting as much crap as is humanly possible on to a scooter, regardless of stability, legality etc. I have dabbled with multiple small suitcases, multiple large bags of fertiliser etc but the other day it was time for a new challenge.

In a fit of thesis-writing enthusiasm I went out and bought a new printer/scanner/copier/washing machine combo thingy with which to print the screeds of indispensible knowledge that I am no doubt going to be churning out over the next few months.

Problem was that it wouldn't fit on the front flat bit of the scoot where I normally cram stuff that needs to be carried 'en route on scoot'. My scoot has a pretty large top box at the back but it wouldn't fit there either. There was, however, just enough space between the top box and where I normally sit to perch the (rather large) box.

Next issue was figuring out how to attach the bugger. I haven't got as organised as carrying rope or bungee cords with me in my scoot (I prefer to go for the completely disorganised chaos approach) so I was in need of some rope. Being just about to leave uni I went and raided Tezza's office to see if he had any rope-type materials. Alas, Tezza being an academic he was sadly lacking in any practical materials such as rope - we grabbed some scissors and a canvas bag left over from the open day and wandered back to the scoot with some vague ineffectual intention of cutting the bag into a rope of some description...which would have worked SO well.

Luckily for the egos of all concerned, my scavenger instincts took over as I spotted a rather convenient dumpster full of old uni crap sitting near my scoot. So, after a few minutes scavenging I emerged triumphant with a telephone cable that was perfect for the job of dodgily lashing a too-large printer to the back of a too-small scooter. At this point Tezza's boy scout training kicked in and he did a most respectable job of tying said printer and scooter together - leaving me to crawl through diabolical traffic in 30 degree heat for nearly an hour ....felt just like being back in Saigon!

All the young things are doin' it!

My mate Trent who lives nearby has made the most marvellous discovery. There is a genuine old-skool lawn bowls club within staggering distance of both our houses.

It is so old skool that the bloody thing was set up in 1896 - and they seem to have forgotten to raise the price of their beer since then.

So Trent and I rocked on up after work tonight and spent a seriously relaxing and entertaining few hours playing silly beggars in the sunshine, bowling badly in barefeet with beer in hand - it was pretty damn cool.

We were the only ones bowling (everyone else was inside looking after their beers) but soon enough the president of the club came wandering out and started teaching us how to do it slightly less badly than we had been doing it.

As the sun set over the immaculately manicured greens (that I spilt beer on but managed to hide lest I suffer the wrath of the skirted, doc marten-booted greenskeeper who seems to take her job rather seriously!) our game got even worse as the beer got to work - but it was even more irrelevant by that time than when we had started.

So if you're looking for an entertaining, relaxing outing, I thoroughly recommend raiding your local bowls club [and you can stop sniggering now!].

:-)

[Phyrric] victory is mine!!!

Right - I THINK I have emerged from the other side of kit-set furniture hell more or less intact. The same can't be said for yesterday's endeavour - a cheap, nasty but more or less functional bookshelf.

Was going allright until I got to the bit on the instructions that showed the back board and a picture of a nail and hammer with the inspiring instructions: 'tap tap 004c x 40'.


So, I duly tap tapped 40 nails in, turned the blasted thing over and realised that I was somewhat off the mark with approximately 20 of em.

Ah well - the joy of bookshelves is that you can put stuff on them to cover up the nastiness, which, in my case, constitutes about 20 nails that are poking through the backboard.

I will not be repeating the kitset exercise for as long as I can possibly manage but, for the record, I came, I saw, I tap tap tapped x40 and [more or less] conquered.

Now if you'll excuse me I have to write a conference paper and moderate some essay marking - which will no doubt be mountains easier than wrangling nasty kitset furniture!

Sofabed: 1 Mad Hatter: 0

Continuing in the domestic ranting theme, the last few days have been kitset furniture hell.

It's a simple enough recipe: take one nasty kitset sofabed, one moderately domestically challenged gal - combine with a pinch of allan key and adjustable wrenchy thing and set to steam.

After a suitable length of time [let's just say it was a leetle longer than the advertising promised], the Mad Hatter tightens up the last allan key thingy that you tighten and stands up to admire her handy werk.

Cue: anguished groan as the Mad Hatter realises how royally she has fucked it up.

You would think, that with a four piece frame, two of which are impossible to put on the wrong way around and the other two of which have a very definite right and wrong side, there wouldn't be too many problems right?

But that's cos' you have over estimated the abilities of someone who is completely lost in the trees of nuts, bolts and screws and diagrams etc - rather than looking at the big picture. Sure enough, one of the ends of the sodding thing was on the wrong way around resulting in me starting all over again, swearing like a trooper and cursing the evil monkeys with design software that invented kitset crap.

Grrrrrrrrr.

Going to my zen place now, I may be gone for some time.

Full service will be resumed shortly.

So, ah, where was I?

Ah yes - came back from living in Vietnam, got buried for a little over a month in mundane real world stuff and am now just about ready to seek refuge in the soothing world of cyberspace monologuing once again ;-)

So, will start back into things gently - with a brief commentary on the adage that you can't teach an old dog new tricks.

This has come about because I used a dishwasher for the first time in my life today. "How could such a geek like you not have used one of these indispensible pieces of electronic equipment?" I hear you cry?

Well the answer is threefold: Firstly, I grew up in a houseehold with 2 older siblings and a mother who maintained that she had three children so why would she need a dishwasher. In retrospect, I heartily agree [child labour laws are for pansys ;-)], although I suspect that the dishwasher would have been a more cost-effective move than the three kids. Secondly, when I moved out of home the classy abodes we rented never had such luxurious fripperies as dishwashers - so there was no change in the status quo.

Thirdly, even if there had been a dishwasher present, I probably would have failed to learn to use it - because, as everybody knows, there are many varying levels of geekdom. There are task-specific geeks - such as computer geeks, language geeks, magic role playing geeks etc. And there are the more well-rounded generic geeks who spread their geekiness across a wide range of nerdy activities.

I would like to think of myself as a more or less generic geek - but everyone has their archilles heel - in my case it is domestic electronic appliances. Computers? No problem. Televisions, video recorders/players, dishwashers etc? Serious issues. Just like I am physically incapable of filling out a form correctly, I am also incapable of operating even the most basic household appliances - rice cookers are an especial flaw.

So, when I recently moved into a new and rather more modern pad than my previous homes, I found myself sharing the kitchen with a near new dishwasher. I have been in the house for nearly three weeks now and there has been an increasingly uncomfortable silence growing between us as I consistently sneaked over to the sink and quickly washed my dishes by hand before retreating out of 'Dishy's' space. It took the more mature of us [me!] to break the silence today - by asking a mate what pellet thingys I should be buying and following her instructions to the letter: "get dishwash pellets, open door, put dirty dishes and pellets in machine, close door, turn on". It all started off smoothly enough but at the end [i think] of the cycle, Dishy got his revenge by stopping work mid-cycle [yes, even machines go on strike in Oztraylia] and beeping at me....incessantly.

After asking some mates on messenger how to fix it and getting no useful responses [standard response: "you don't know how to use a DISHWASHER?!!!"] I went for the jugular and turned Dishy off and on again. It stopped the beeping but I am pretty sure he will just do it again next time...bastard.

So now, the standoff has transferred from being betwen me and Dishy to being between me and Dishy's manual - which is sitting glowering at me in a drawer. I am a firm believer that instruction manuals are for wusses but I think I should probably get over that particular personal phobia and get the better of this appliance...soon.

So, after ranting to myself for a while I have come to the conclusion that I have no insights to offer on the adage about teaching an old dog new tricks [will get sued for false advertising - it wasn't brief either!] but have this to offer on old stubborn dogs teaching themselves new tricks: 'we're fucking useless at it!'.

Peace out :-)

Haere ra Vietnam.

Well tonight it's 'hen gap lai' (but not 'tam biet') to Vietnam. I'm getting on the 9pm jetplane and heading back to Melbourne town to whence I came.

The last 3 months have passed in a blur - haven't really begun to process this experience yet I think - but initial impressions are that it has been pretty bloody amazing.



As one of the staff members at the university I have been based at said to me 'you'll be back - this place has a way of getting under your skin' - and of course he's right. No doubt about it.

:-)

Cambodia's greatest hits #3.

Siiem Reap airport provided my brother and I with a number of giggles other than entertaining duty free signs (see the last entry).

First up was our disbelief when we landed and taxied past the 'PMT Air' plane. I kid you not - have even copied the logo from their www.pmtair.com website as evidence. Not sure how I would feel about flying with them to be honest.



And then, another engrish charmer from Vietnam Airlines, who we were flying back to Saigon with: a calm reassuring stewardess intercom voice came on halfway through the flight to let us know that "Ladies and Gentlemen, we are currently smashing through a patch of turbulence, please fasten your seatbelts" .... so we did.

Cambodia's greatest hits #2.

Bottle of water bought while in Siem Reap.....maaaaaaaaate.

Cambodia's greatest hits #1

Well, it's T minus just under 2 weeks until I am back in Melbourne trying to remember how to do my own washing cooking and cleaning and I've got a fair bit of knuckling down to do between now and then so no time to do my usual roving correspondent piccy taking.

So, with no further ado, here are some highlights of both Cambodia and Vietnam, starting with this sign from Siem Reap airport's duty free shop.



P.S. If Labour doesn't win tomorrow's election I am gonna be seriously pissed...but I reckon she'll be right.

Oh all right then...

Maybe just one Ha Long Bay piccy - apologies for the overcast sky not cooperating - will have to learn how to photoshop properly and get the better of nature ;-)

Vietnam (brief) debrief: Hanoi and Ha Long Bay and back to work.

After Cambodia and a Saigon stop-off we headed up to Hanoi and out to Ha Long Bay for a few days each.

In Hanoi we stayed with some lovely friends and their two evil cats in their gorgeous apartment on one of Hanoi's many lakes - I blogged up Hanoi last time I went there so I won't bore you with a repeat.

And Ha Long Bay was bloody marvellous, mostly because we paid a little more than most people do to get a great 2 day tour. For $55 US per person we got 2 days/1 night on Ha Long Bay, sleeping, reading and lazing around on the gorgeous boat, being fed (mostly) good food, getting a tan (as much as a whitey like me can tan) and swimming in the world's most scenic outdoor swimming pool.

None of the photos I took do the place justice so just add it to the list of places to go to before you die if you haven't already been there, done that (or 'BTDT' as my supervisor says).

My brother left from Hanoi for Paris on Sunday and I flew back to Saigon (a true Vietnam Airlines special - a 3.5 hour delay on a 2 hour flight!). Now, I'm back and knuckling down to do some work before leaving Vietnam at the end of the month. Will have to relearn how to cook, clean, transport myself and all those other boring proletariat chores when I get back to Melbourne - will be a shock to the system!

Cambodia debrief #3: Siem Reap (Angkor Wat)

Warning: another ridiculously self-indulgent amount of photos follow. I won't hold it against you if you don't finish!

Flew from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap in the morning and was in the taxi heading to our hotel by lunchtime. When I realised that our taxi was following a 4WD with a mokey on a lead sitting on the roof (South East Asia's not a great place to be an animal lover in, unless by 'love', you mean 'eat'), I knew we were in for a fun/crazy time. (Apologies for crap quality photo - taken through window of taxi in a hurry - better to have some blurry loch-ness monster-type evidence than none at all).



Like the masochistic tourists that we are, my brother and I checked into our hotel and hit the Angkor temple circuit within an hour of touching down in Siem Reap. [For those who are a little blurry on place names (like I was), Siem Reap is a town in Cambodia - it is also the gateway town to the Angkor temple complex which was done around the 9th-13th centuries. Angkor Wat is just one of the temples within the Angkor complex which covers a pretty vast area].

One of my Saigon mates is a photographer who is a bit of a pro at avoiding the tourists at Angkor - which, providing you have the right advice, was remarkably easy to do. It just involved us getting up at ridiculous times of the day - those who know me know that '5am start' is not in my vocabulary - but that's what we did on 3 consecutive days.

Between my brother and I we took god knows how many photos of the temples (more than a CD's worth!) so I won't torture you with them all - much better versions are available on postcards and coffee table books.

...but that said I can't resist doing a few of em' and a few 'Mad Hatter TM' piccys from the back of a motorbike (I'm honestly not sure how I ended up with this transport fetish - not healthy at all).

So! Let's start with the classic 'tree in temple' shot from Ta Prohm - a super atmospheric temple complex that is infested with tourists at all times other than the sneaky time we went. For a better shot just look at the cover of the Lonely Planet for Cambodia ;-)



Followed by another 'tree in temple' shot from Ta Som temple (at least I think it was Ta Som - after 3 days they all tend to blur into one a bit!).



...and a few 'between temple' scenery shots.





And a few shots of Angkor Wat itself:



...and some of the very funky Apsara carvings within Angkor Wat.







This place, called Preah Khanh (excuse spellink) was one of my favourites - hardly any tourists and literally falling over in places but absolutely spectacular - I just love how nature every now and then says 'right - you've had your fun, i'll take that back now thank you' :-)







We were at Preah Khanh near dusk and these two, ridiculously cute kids (Cambodia specialises in em') came tootling past us on their way to visit one of the guards with their cute, furry god-only-knows-what-creatures on their shoulders.



But this kid with a football up his shirt at Ta Som temple also gave them a run for their money in the cute stakes.



All templed out yet? Well by Day 3 we were in danger of getting temple fatigue so we hired a tuk tuk guy who said he was 21 but looked about 10 to take us to two places 30km and 50km out of Angkor respectively.

The first stop, Banteay Srei, is about 1 hour's drive away and ridiculously over-touristed from about 7.30am onwards so, mad sods that we are, we headed there for before 7am - would have been earlier except for the flat tuk tuk tire on the way.

At that time of day my vision is a little blurry and I think my camera was feeling empathetic - but I like the colours in these anyway (and no blog is complete without a rice fields and water buffalo shot in it somewhere).





Banteay Srei is tiny compared to most of the other temple complexes but is beautifully carved and looked great at the time of day we got there.



After which, it was time to hit the unpaved road section of our trp - and to wish that we had taken motorbikes instead of a tuk tuk (which we nearly jack-knifed on a bridge) as we spent an hour travelling on a diabolical dirt road that turned our back's into a chiropracter's wet dream.

But what awaited us at the end, after a seriously sweaty 1/2 hour uphill hike through what looked like New Zealand bush, was well worth it. Some devoted loon carved an entire river bed - it goes on for at least 500 metres and is quite amazing - and the waterfall cool-off afterwards was very welcome!





OK - enough torture - I guess this is the digital equivalent of the much dreaded holiday snap slideshow - but at least this one is optional - if you made it to the end I am impressed!

Next stop was HCMC for an evening of clothes washing and sleep and then we headed up to Hanoi to do a little Ha Long Bay-ing which will be posted up asap...and yes, I promise to do shorter posts with less pictures from now on!

Cambodia debrief #2: Vietnam to Phnom Penh

So where to begin? Between my brother and I we took some ridiculous number of photos between us so this will definitely be another gratuitous photo-fest. But hopefully they are at least of passing interest to my loyal readers (all 2 of you) ;-)

We left Saigon on Friday 2 September - which warrants a photo in itself cos' all the people in the city had disappeared and been replaced by Vietnamese flags. The quietest I have ever seen it - apparently Tet Festival is the same.


Unlike Noo Zulland, which is at the arse end of the universe, the countries in South-East Asia are all conveniently close by - so, 45 minutes later, we were in Phnom Penh. We met up with a Cambodian mate who works at the French embassy - and, within 4 hours of arriving in town, found ourselves having an extremely messy (but entertaining) night, gatecrashing the farewell party of one of his colleagues. Was yet another twilight zone moment, dancing to old French pop songs with pissed Frogs in the middle of Phnom Penh!

Amongst other things, we did the obligatory tour of Toul Sleng (aka the S-21 prison where the Khmer Rouge got up to some pretty atrocious shit) which was pretty hard going but well worth seeing in person. Nothing like several rooms full of people's photographs staring at you to personalise genocide.

Our touristing in Phnom Peng got a little more light-hearted when we were travelling on motorbike with our mate (the ones in Cambodia are extended to take 3 people and are brilliant fun) and the famous Cambodian rain started up. We had raincoats on but they were a little irrelevent when our bike died in about 80cms of water outside the royal palace and we ended up wading through the COMPLETELY flooded street.




Apparently one legacy of French occupation in Cambodia is a seriously shit drainage system - Phnom Penh regularly floods but by everyone's reaction you would think it was the first time. So, we abandoned ship off the bike and waded to slightly higer ground and stood with a bunch of wet monks (whose email addresses we got when they requested copies of the photos) and watched small Cambodian children swimming down the road and people pushing stuck vehicles through the floodwaters.




All quite entertaining really.




At this point anyone remotely sensible would have retired to a cafe or something but no, we carried on touristing in the rain.




So, one royal palace and an abortive mission to the national museum later we had just about done Phnom Penh...except for dinner. Our mate took us out to the suburbs to a fantastic place called Hen Lay. I don't really know how best to describe it - maybe an aircraft hangar with food and live bands would be a good start. This place, on the river, was absolutely massive.



And, not content with one band or piped music, there was the house band and a full-on cabaret of about 6 singers who did songs with backup dancers and costume changes and everything. This place was so big that there were concert-type video screens at either end for those people who couldn't see the stage!




My brother, who was still a tad jet-lagged and disoriented after flying from Paris the previous day, got even more disoriented when mobbed by the 'beer girls' when we sat down - their job is to thrust a card with the name of their beer brand in front of your face and say the name of the beer as loudly and insistently as they can. Not too bad when there's only one of em' but when there's about 10 the effect is quite entertaining!

We spent a little while hanging out on the waterfront in Phnom Penh as well - watching this dude who was doing his best South-East Asia Ray Charles impersonation...


...and enjoying the fried bug sellers - fried tarantulas are seriously cool!


And then it was time to head on to Siem Reap and get some temples and culcha in us.

Stay tuned for the next installment.

Cambodia debrief #1: Let the silly pictures commence!

Well my brother and I have 'done' the tourist trail in Cambodia - 2 days in Phnom Penh and 3 in Siem Reap (where Angkor Wat and associated temples live). We did 3 consecutive 5am starts and lived to tell the tale.

To say that Cambodia (especially Angkor) is the schiznit would be a pretty vast understatement - that place kicks ass!

Many many silly piccies and gratuitous temple shots will follow as soon as I have a decent internet connection. But to get the ball rolling - this is a shot of the back of a tuktuk in Siem Reap - beautifully combining my two nerdy passions of engrish and public transport.

Squint, read carefully and enjoy :-)

Voting Noo Zulland style.

Well my brother arrived from Paris yesterday morning and we embarked on a high-speed intro to HCMC before leaving for Cambodia today. As part of the touristing we went to the New Zealand consulate to lodge overseas votes for our upcoming election.

My mate has the expression 'Vinamoment' to describe those uniquely surreal Vietnamese moments that seem to happen pretty regularly here (almost every vietnamese company is 'Vina-something or another' e.g. Vinamilk, Fonterra's equivalent). Well this was one of those - but it was actually a New Zealand moment in a Vietnamese setting - seriously bizarre and quite entertaining.

We found the consulate and went in, finding a big kiwi bloke who wandered up and said 'oh, you want to vote?'. Overseas voting only began 2 days ago so I think we may have been some of the first, which is never a good thing.

Pretty quickly transpired that he didn't really know how it worked - there was a Vietnamese chick who sort of did but she also seemed intent on covering up our unique voting numbers on our papers with a black sticker - not really sure what that was about.

Anyway, we sat down in the 'official voting room' and muddled through the paperwork for my brother - who went behind the designated official 'voting bookshelf', did his thing, put it in the overseas ballot envelope and posted it into the box (we even got a photo of him doing it in case the press called).

My one should also have followed suit but at that point the consul, who had wandered in earlier and said hello, called the Vietnamese chick away on some 'urgent business'. Leaving me mid-voting process, sitting opposite the big kiwi guy and wondering what to do - as he clearly didn't know.

So, in time honoured Kiwi style, we engaged in chit chat. Turns out he has been in Vietnam for 12 years - and, when my brother said he had lived in Paris for 14 years the guy responded with 'wow, and you still vote? I gave up on that years ago!'....

...and yes, the person saying this was also the person wearing the 'returning officer' badge who was helping us to vote.

So, after about 10 more minutes he disappears off and comes back grumpily cos' it seems the consul has stolen the Vietnamese chick in order to help him pay for some plane tickets for his upcoming holiday this long weekend...which, of course, is seriously urgent business.

So, the returning officer, after a few more minutes thumb twiddling, eventually says, 'well, you've ticked the boxes, why don't you just leave it with me to put in an envelope and post into the box for you......?'

Hmmmmmm....... thinks I, while pissing myself laughing at the ridiculousness of it all.

'Um, OK, seeing as the sole chick who can do it is otherwise occupied with planning the consul's holiday, sure what the hell...she'll be right mate, right as rain!', says I.

So, I'm pretty sure I voted...but if Aunty Helen doesn't get back in I am singularly blaming the Vietnamese consulate in HCMC!

Right - time for some Cambodia - we've got a plane to catch.

Hen gap lai :-)

Well my big bro flies in from paris for a visit tomorrow and the next day we embark on a mad touristing mission to Cambodia and then back to hcmc and then up to hanoi - should be manic and fun :-)

Coincidentally, Friday (the day we leave for Cambodia) is also the Vietnamese national day - a national holiday when the entire freaking country travels or buys and waves flags (or both) ... of course I would have to realise this AFTER booking our flight for that day.

Wish us luck for getting out of the country in one piece!

Tee hee.

On the highway on the way to uni today my xe om guy and I passed a middle-aged Vietnamese guy on his motorbike. Nothing whatsoever unusual in that but his t-shirt which read "Norwood High School Post-Prom Party. May 23, 2003" brought a smile to my face.

You've got to wonder: All this time his family thought he was a good family man working hard in Ho Chi Minh City every day but for the last 2 years he's really been leading a secret life as a college sophomore in the states....must be a hell of a commute.

If only it were that easy!

Ok this is a (rather crappy) picture of one of my favourite Engrish purchases ever.

I went on a little stationery binge a while back (as I am wont to do) and I was looking for a blank notebook. Well, sitting near the back, looking a little lonely was this beautiful baby - all styled up like a proper Collins diary - with the words 'Race Relations Handbook' embossed in gold on the top right-hand corner in a very proper way.

...and yes, it's blank on the inside.

...and no, I'm not going to make any further comments about that for fear of lynching.

It also has a world map on the inside with, amongst other gems, the new capital of Tasmania - 'HOBRAT' proudly marked.

As my friend Teacher Rebecca from Taiwan would say, 'Book This Is Yes Cool!'.

And, of course, it set me back the stunning amount of 15,000 dong (that'll be $1 US ma'am).

:-)

Hmmmm...some more....

It's funny how quickly things become 'normal'. I realised two things today that, in Australia, I would have been blogging about within seconds.

1. About 2 weeks ago I stopped holding on when travelling to and from uni (or anywhere else for that matter) on the back of a motorbike. If told, when first arriving in Vietnam, that within a few months I would be happily perched on the back of a motorbike at silly speeds while wearing only a bicycle helmet (and clothes!) and not feeling the need to hold on, I would have looked at you pretty strangely and scoffed about not having a death wish. I guess that hasn't reeeeally changed - but there is very little that holding on will do to protect you should shit happen - going down with the ship, so to speak, does not offer much protection! And anyway, my hands are better used sitting on my knees and looking Vietnamese (ish) ;-)

2. About 3 weeks ago, when my mates were visiting from Taiwan, we were heading out to a mate's place before hitting the town - and a school kid crashed his motorbike into the side of our taxi. I have distinct memories of seeing the side of his face smooshed against the window. In Oztraylia, Noo Zulland et al this would have been a BIG deal - and us whiteys in the back of the taxi did squeal and do a bit of 'oh my god'ing. But then the taxi driver leaps out of the car, roars around to the side of the cab and starts yelling at the kid for breaking his wing mirror off!

Groggy kid, who was in the wrong as far as that is possible in the Saigon chaos theory motor system, got his head together enough to pick up his bike and scarpered before the taxi driver could bill him for his wing mirror...leaving us sitting there going 'oh...ok, well i guess we carry on to our night out'. But what's really worrying is that I had forgotten about it until now - no doubt soon I will be wearing a conical hat and ao dai and eating beef noodles with congealed blood for breakfast ;-)

Good old-fashioned Buddhist theme park fun.

Warning: Self-indulgent photo extravaganza follows.

Yesterday I had the priviledge of being shown another fabulous side of Saigon by a friend who shares my passion for kitsch.

After a late breakfast we hit grabbed a taxi and headed 30 minutes north of Saigon to the Suoi Tien Park - aka Vietnam's Buddha-themed fun park (this is not a joke!).

Pulling up to the gates I knew we were in for a fun day - but I wouldn't have been able to fathom the level of kitsch fabulousness that awaited me in my wildest dreams.


So, after being dropped off near the giant lucky toad we went up the stairs, paid our 16,000 dong entry fee (just under $1.50 $AUD) ...


... and walked into my idea of heaven.



Two things struck me within minutes of going in - one, my mate and I were the only whiteys there (I think we spotted one later that day but I may have imagined it) and two, this was for real!

So much for real, in fact, that there were groups of monks wandering around as part of their holiday tour to Saigon!



Now by 'real' of course, I mean completely synthetic right down to the rocks - but I am pretty sure that the trees and this (the first time I have seen graffittied fruit actually) were real.


'But enough talking about little details!' I hear you cry - 'what about the really BIG stuff?'

Well - there was a fair bit of that too:


We soon spied a colossal head, a giant shrimp and an equally massive coke bottle in the distance - clearly we had to investigate further.


I feel quite embarassed to admit that I didn't know what awaited me but I really should have guessed - in a Buddhist-themed fun park what else would it be but a giant buddhist and marine-themed waterpark?!


Luckily we had bought our togs (cossies, bathers, swimsuits what have you) with us and were ready to swim and attack the Buddhist hydroslide (can't remember when I last did a hydroslide but god damn it was fun!).



Highlights included the amazing labour-intensive detail that Vietnam specialises in:




...and some really cool signs - 'Medials rvice room' anyone?



After swimming and hyrdrosliding we were ready for the next leg of our Buddhist pilgrimmage - wandering out to find that a full-scale Vietnamese Buddhist Pirate spectacle was underway. This show left Disney or Vegas for dead with dodgy pyrotechnics, giant floating elephants and enough stunts to make an occupational health and safety officer want to commit Hari Kari.



We then wandered a little way, past the nice ticket selling lady sitting in her goat/dragon/bull ticket booth...



... and found ourselves in 'Carni' country - with various stalls and sideshow games set up - but, unlike the dodgy bastards at the Melbourne Show the Vietnamese versions are ridiculously good-humoured and fab! Our mate had a go at one which was incredibly popular - where you put on a silly mask, walk forwards and attempt to hit a bell with a stick - sort of pinata gone Vietnamese. The main idea seems to be that you miss and everyone else laughs at you. After two goes our mate was triumphant - for his troubles he won a very Buddhist can of Red Bull.

And even the sideshow ducks looked great ;-)



It was around this time that I started to realise how bloody massive this park was all round - I think by the time we left after 5 hours we had covered 2/3rds of the park (a very fine excuse for going back!). So we wandered past the giant elephants, up the elephant and lion-lined stairs to the the monkey area where I couldn't resist snapping this cute kid:



And this VERY proper line up of Vietnamese ladies who were preparing to have their photo taken by a park photographer - boy do they look pissed that I snapped them first!



Then we wandered along past these equally Buddhist attractions (an especial favourite was the bridge over the lake where the guys were paying to fish - but they were cheating cos' a guy kept feeding the fish and luring them to the surface!), did the obligatory silly 'photosticker' portrait session and escaped before we started dreaming of buddhist swans.





If you are EVER in Saigon - this place is a must. Check out their website by googling 'Suoi Tien Park' - do it now! ;-)