Dec 29th: Our guest house is up a small cul-de-sac. It is too narrow for vehicles, but the bulb at the end contains a cluster of about eight nice little hotels, all about the same size. Ours has possibly 24 rooms on 8 floors.
It's just next to another "historic craft village", a cousin to the one we visited in Da Lat. It's actually a fairly high end craft emporium, and a very entertaining experience even if one isn't going to purchase any of the high quality crafts and artwork, which are available there at very reasonable prices by international standards. Mind you, many of the silk tapestries are handmade copies - we saw two of them in Da Lat already, and these villages exist in seven different cities, so you might think you're buying an original, but later see it in someone else's home.
We're right off the beach, across a beach road that curves gently up in a new moon shape with lovely islands not far off shore. The water is a bit rough for swimming, and I've learned that we've come at the wrong season for calm, clear seas, so we probably won't be doing the snorkeling or island trips until February.
We're right off the beach, across a beach road that curves gently up in a new moon shape with lovely islands not far off shore. The water is a bit rough for swimming, and I've learned that we've come at the wrong season for calm, clear seas, so we probably won't be doing the snorkeling or island trips until February.
There's a Cham temple, and the Long So'n Pagoda. Apart from those we'll just be walking the beach, enjoying the small tourist market, etc. It's a nice interlude and always a soft, gentle restorative experience to be back at the seashore. At first glance there isn't a lot we'll find to intrigue us for more than three days, so we'll leave for Hoi An before we have a chance to get bored. We're in the mood to stay here to bring in the New Year, and then take one of the "sleeper buses" for an overnight trip to Hoi An. The sleeper bus is something most Canadians have never heard of, a double-decker enclosed bus with a lay-down, stretch-out sleeper for every passenger.
I found a copy of Stanley Karnow's Vietnam: a History in the Spot Cafe, which was an inexpensive alternative to the larger tourist trap restaurants but with excellent food. We had delicious seafood fried rice and Vietnamese seafood pancakes there in the evening, and again for breakfast when I returned to read another few pages of the book. It's an amusingly counterfeit text. They don't seem to have any laws against counterfeiting or any sort of copyright law in Vietnam; but the text is genuine even if the photos are poorly reproduced. One of my goals is to locate a local bookstore we've been told about so that I can get my own copy to read during our onward travel. I'm really enjoying Doris Lessing's African Laughter, but I have a bigger craving to read material that delivers insight into the places we're currently travelling, for example the Tragedy of Cambodia that I recently finished.
After breakfast we met "Bitsdewan" - his Couchsurfing name - Bitan Dewan, "Bits" for short, the local CS Ambassador in Nha Trang, for coffee at the Sheraton - the best coffee in town, he says. He's an Indian businessman who studied in Australia for a number of years. He ordered a local "ca phe, banciu" that he'd been responsible for perfecting with cinnamon, turmeric and other ingredients. It was delicious.
I found a copy of Stanley Karnow's Vietnam: a History in the Spot Cafe, which was an inexpensive alternative to the larger tourist trap restaurants but with excellent food. We had delicious seafood fried rice and Vietnamese seafood pancakes there in the evening, and again for breakfast when I returned to read another few pages of the book. It's an amusingly counterfeit text. They don't seem to have any laws against counterfeiting or any sort of copyright law in Vietnam; but the text is genuine even if the photos are poorly reproduced. One of my goals is to locate a local bookstore we've been told about so that I can get my own copy to read during our onward travel. I'm really enjoying Doris Lessing's African Laughter, but I have a bigger craving to read material that delivers insight into the places we're currently travelling, for example the Tragedy of Cambodia that I recently finished.
After breakfast we met "Bitsdewan" - his Couchsurfing name - Bitan Dewan, "Bits" for short, the local CS Ambassador in Nha Trang, for coffee at the Sheraton - the best coffee in town, he says. He's an Indian businessman who studied in Australia for a number of years. He ordered a local "ca phe, banciu" that he'd been responsible for perfecting with cinnamon, turmeric and other ingredients. It was delicious.
After chatting for a while he introduced us to two young ladies from Kazakhstan, one working for an NGO and the other a manager of a tax and legal department for KPMG. The five of us trooped off to one of three "spa resorts" in town, where they have hot pools, a waterfall, mud baths, massage and water jets. I had a long chat with Bits and Deborah joined the KPMG girl in a mud bath. Then Deb and I went with Bits to a Mexican restaurant in a food court, a little food stand with burritos and other iconic Mexican dishes, recently opened by a friend of his who is Mexican - a backpacker who arrived here two years ago, set up a little stall on the beach, and sold that to open the food court location; now he's in the process of setting up a restaurant in Saigon as well.
We took our leave of Bits then, with thanks for a great day and a promise to meet for coffee the next morning to meet another friend, Michael, who owns a language school. Except for one taxi ride that we paid for quickly, Bits would not allow us to pay for anything today - he insisted that if he comes to Toronto, we'll treat him. On the way home, we got to watch an open air performance on the steps of the Nha Trang Vietnamese Opera House, a very grand building. Every Saturday and Sunday at 7:30 they stage a free performance of traditional operatic dance and musicians.
It was a great day - I worried a little when I woke up this morning whether we'd enjoy our short time here, but by the end of the first day, Deborah is convinced that Nha Trang may be even a better choice than Da Lat for settling down in one spot for a month and teaching English. And after a month, she's still very glad we chose Vietnam as our destination this winter.
Dec 30th: We had a good chat with Michael, a friend of Bits who owns a local language school. We have an idea how we'll fit in and what we'll do if we come to work with him or someone like him. He's from Alaska, and we discussed the U.S. a bit - one comment he made, incisively, is that North America generally seems to be in some sort of cultural depression when compared with the people of Vietnam. That observation struck a chord in me and stuck with me.
We took our leave of Bits then, with thanks for a great day and a promise to meet for coffee the next morning to meet another friend, Michael, who owns a language school. Except for one taxi ride that we paid for quickly, Bits would not allow us to pay for anything today - he insisted that if he comes to Toronto, we'll treat him. On the way home, we got to watch an open air performance on the steps of the Nha Trang Vietnamese Opera House, a very grand building. Every Saturday and Sunday at 7:30 they stage a free performance of traditional operatic dance and musicians.
It was a great day - I worried a little when I woke up this morning whether we'd enjoy our short time here, but by the end of the first day, Deborah is convinced that Nha Trang may be even a better choice than Da Lat for settling down in one spot for a month and teaching English. And after a month, she's still very glad we chose Vietnam as our destination this winter.
Dec 30th: We had a good chat with Michael, a friend of Bits who owns a local language school. We have an idea how we'll fit in and what we'll do if we come to work with him or someone like him. He's from Alaska, and we discussed the U.S. a bit - one comment he made, incisively, is that North America generally seems to be in some sort of cultural depression when compared with the people of Vietnam. That observation struck a chord in me and stuck with me.
Afterward, Deb and I went to the Cham temple called Po Nagar, a pleasant, peaceful place just across the river. We went there and back on a public bus, to avoid a package tour and/or taxi fares, and paid about a tenth of the taxi rates. Some musicians and dancers there put on a very sweet short program for tourists, dancing in the Champa style.
We had supper in a food court of a local mall beside the Sheraton, where Bits has his office suite, and strolled home. We've booked our onward tickets to Hoi An on the overnight sleeper bus on New Year's Day. It'll be another "first" experience, so tomorrow we'll just stroll the beach, the craft shops and the big lotus, and enjoy Vietnamese food, which is a big part of being here. There are so many tasty and interesting dishes.
New Year's Eve: This morning Bits and Simon helped us out with currency exchange. Outside of Saigon and Hanoi, ATM's will only dispense $100 at a time, and charge high bank fees on top of what our home banks will charge - we could lose $7.50 out of each $100. That's another example, of many, of what Vietnam needs to figure out how to change to make the country more attractive to tourists. The recent boost in tourist visa cost, lack of training for the service industry, lack of signage in English and other languages, and lack of tourist information services are all impediments to attracting overseas visitors.
For lunch we sourced a local dish called Bun Cha Ca, a fish and noodle dish. We found the one little restaurant in all of Nha Trang that is most famous for making it. We picked up some photocopied books to read - clever counterfeits but with terrible spelling errors on the front and back covers - one called Understanding Vietnam and the other called Catfish and Mandala, which is also about Vietnam. Both seem excellent, and should sustain us on the sleeper bus tomorrow. Someone stole the Stanley Karnow book about Vietnam (another bad forgery) that I was reading when we went to the Spot Cafe - darn it! I knew I should have stolen it the first day I saw it there. I tried to borrow it or buy it, but they either didn't understand me, or turned down my request.
In the evening Deb splurged on a delicious fancy plate of prawns to celebrate New Year's Eve, and my usual seafood fried rice with vegetables and Tiger beer hit the spot. Dessert on the way home was a bust - don't eat at the Kirin Restaurant. We've had two disappointments there in spite of the friendly tout from Oklahoma luring customers in from the street. We bought some sweet tiny bananas and satisfied our sweet tooth with their fresh flavour. After dark we enjoyed a very good stage show put on in the peoples' square beside the Lotus Tower - singers, dancers, break dancers, drummers and other musicians.
After three days here, Nha Trang is still at the top of Deb's list of places to settle for a longer stay on our way back south from Hanoi.
New Year's Eve: This morning Bits and Simon helped us out with currency exchange. Outside of Saigon and Hanoi, ATM's will only dispense $100 at a time, and charge high bank fees on top of what our home banks will charge - we could lose $7.50 out of each $100. That's another example, of many, of what Vietnam needs to figure out how to change to make the country more attractive to tourists. The recent boost in tourist visa cost, lack of training for the service industry, lack of signage in English and other languages, and lack of tourist information services are all impediments to attracting overseas visitors.
For lunch we sourced a local dish called Bun Cha Ca, a fish and noodle dish. We found the one little restaurant in all of Nha Trang that is most famous for making it. We picked up some photocopied books to read - clever counterfeits but with terrible spelling errors on the front and back covers - one called Understanding Vietnam and the other called Catfish and Mandala, which is also about Vietnam. Both seem excellent, and should sustain us on the sleeper bus tomorrow. Someone stole the Stanley Karnow book about Vietnam (another bad forgery) that I was reading when we went to the Spot Cafe - darn it! I knew I should have stolen it the first day I saw it there. I tried to borrow it or buy it, but they either didn't understand me, or turned down my request.
In the evening Deb splurged on a delicious fancy plate of prawns to celebrate New Year's Eve, and my usual seafood fried rice with vegetables and Tiger beer hit the spot. Dessert on the way home was a bust - don't eat at the Kirin Restaurant. We've had two disappointments there in spite of the friendly tout from Oklahoma luring customers in from the street. We bought some sweet tiny bananas and satisfied our sweet tooth with their fresh flavour. After dark we enjoyed a very good stage show put on in the peoples' square beside the Lotus Tower - singers, dancers, break dancers, drummers and other musicians.
After three days here, Nha Trang is still at the top of Deb's list of places to settle for a longer stay on our way back south from Hanoi.
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