A miscellany of bits of info and thoughts for my last blog – thanks for reading and hope it inspires you to visit Vietnam – a pretty amazing country. You don’t have to use the Explore way of travelling, but it has certainly been an experience!
WEDDING CUSTOMS
We saw lots of couples/girls having their photos taken in their wedding finery – lots taken around various beauty spots prior to the wedding and then displayed at the wedding!
There were 450 guests at our guide’s wedding and that was a small one!! We saw a row of huge specially built venues in one seaside town for such occasions – big business. The guests don’t bring presents, but envelopes with money in them. You record who gives what and then give the same amount to them when they marry. As our guide said – invite lots of already married friends!
A COMMUNIST COUNTRY
As we saw the evidence of a country poised between 3rd and 1st world in so many ways, it was hard to see how communism exists alongside the headlong flight to consumerism. Everyone has phones, most houses even in the remote hill villages have satellite dishes, zillions of motorbikes have replaced the now outmoded bicycle and posh shops jostle amongst the street stalls in every city. But the ubiquitous flags (out for New Year) are there because the Party tells you to put them out, in Hanoi the loudspeakers drone on for half an hour every morning and evening (can’t imagine anyone listens to them) and the Government is totally communist. But another guide said that voting is just a ritual when you put a cross against 3 photos on the sheet – no idea who they are or what they represent – and that anyone can say what they like – as long as its not too loud or prolonged. Hmmm? Another source within the group said that loud dissenters are imprisoned and tortured.
Life changed for the better, they said, when collectivism was abolished a while ago and now anyone can buy their own land and build a house (everyones dream) and you can see them following the West headlong into capitalism – not sure what happens when people get fed up with communist rule. Education, education, education is the aim everywhere and the schools and colleges are bursting at the seams.
BIRDS
Horrible to see the lovely singing birds in tiny cages in the markets and none left in the wild – a twitchers nightmare.
GREAT TRIP
Final thoughts – fantastic fresh food, experiences, scenery, villagers, paddy fields, history, headlong race into the first world (for Vietnam – Cambodia moving at a much slower pace), no stomach bugs, avoided souvenir shopping, Chinese New Year flowers and celebrations, reminders of man’s inhumanity to man, smiling faces – and managed to escape the bikes without getting mown down every time we crossed the road.
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