Vietnam: Chau Doc and Can Tho.

Crossing the border to Vietnam immediately showed in better roads, more fields, more canals, more houses and new set of letters (latin with lots of accents to indicate tone). The border formalities were quick enough and soon we were in the border town of Ha Tien. As we had bought tickets all the way to Chau Doc for "VIP minibus", we expected to change into something nicer from the bumpy-jumpy local bus we had taken from Kep. However we were hurried on to moto-taxis to take us to the local bus station. The rucksacks travelled quite smoothly in front of the driver, the logistics weren't even that impossible as some of the loads you see on scooters here. The VIP minibus turned out to be a very very old local bus with non-existent shock absorption and leg space, and the journey took four hours instead of the promised two. Oh well, I slept half of the journey anyway.

From the bus we saw the rice harvest in full swing. The Mekong delta is the rice bowl of Vietnam, and there seemed to be canals and rice fields everywhere you looked. People were drying the harvested rice on netting by the roadside, bagging it, and loading the bags on scooters, pickups, tractors and boats everywhere. Later on we've learned that the rice gets transported to factories to be cut (de-chaffed) and sold to the government. The chaff gets used for fueling furnaces, so nothing goes to waste. Hopefully I can upload some pictures of the rice harvest later on with a speedier internet connection!

EDIT: rice harvest pictures finally added on 26th April!

 Rice is ripe for harvest!

Some of the harvest is done by machine...

 ...and some by hand.

 Hand-harvested rice needs some more hand-treatment...

...until the seeds come off and can be dried in the sunlight.

Rice ready for the factory for de-chaffing.

Rice is now bagged and lazily waiting for its ride.

I'd be happy too with so many bags of rice!

And the bags just keep piling up!

Happy boat is full of rice!

After harvest, the remaining stalks are burned for nutrition for the next crop.

(c) for all pictures Dr Pepper and Boyfriend.

 

Chau Doc was not very touristy town, but a tour organiser called Vang managed to pick us up from the bus stop regardless. He pitched his hotel deals in a very un-pushy way, which appealed to us and we decided to check out his recommendations. The guesthouse was good value for money, and the tour he organised was amazingly good. We spent a morning touring the river by boat, seeing the floating market (traders who come up from Can Tho to sell fruit and veg), floating village, fish farm, Cham village and a bit of the canals. He accompanied us to the morning half, and his commentary and English were great. In the afternoon, two moto drivers took us to the countryside where we switched drivers (so that Boyfriend was driving me) and did a long (20km?) tour of the rice fields and villages, finishing up at the Nui Sam holy mountain. Probably the best tour we've taken, informative and interactive, and we could decide the pace. For the folks wondering how to find the tour guide to this tour in Chau Doc: Vang can be contacted from 0946 604110.

This far in Vietnam, huge majority of kids who see a Westener have automatically shouted "Hello!" and waved smiling. It makes me feel happy and welcome. This is a bit of a contrast with Cambodia, the hello was often followed by "One dolla?", drastically reducing the happy factor of the innocent hello.

From Chau Doc we took a bus to Can Tho, the biggest city in the Mekong delta. The bus this time was absolute luxus with free pick-up and drop-off at any hotel, air-con, complimentary water, and quarter of the cost of the previous ride. The company is called Phuong Trang and relatively new, and we plan to use them for all the next bus journeys if they got a bus running to where we go!

Can Tho has been a bit of a disappoitment, as the floating markets we came to see here were about the same as in Chau Doc, only a longer boat ride away. Also, we were sold a tour with "English speaking guide", who turned to know about ten words of English. I guess we were just contrasting it with the awesomeness and informativeness of the tour in Chau Doc, making it a disappointment. On the positive side, the tour took us also to a rice noodle factory, which I found very interesting, and a fruit orchard and through the mangroves. The town itself has a lovely feel to it with its many canals, artificial lake and the river, and we've happily spent an extra day here resting a bit from the hectic week of sightseeing in Kampot, Kep, Chau Doc and now here.

And then a quick note on fashion. In Cambodia it was common to see women wearing pyjamas. As in long-sleeved, button-up cotton outfits with Hello Kitties or other cartoonish prints. In Vietnam, similar outfit seems to be the trend, but not as blatantly a pyjama. Maybe you could call it a cotton shirt and trousers in the same print, and this is usually teamed with the traditional conical straw hat. A lot of Western trends can be spotted here too, but there has been a glaring lack of Angry Birds, whereas in Malaysia every kid was wearing a t-shirt with them. Got to love the cultural differences.