Don't have enough time to update on the past few days. But just wanted to let everyone know that tomorrow morning we will be taking the 6.45AM bus to Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
We should be arriving in Phnom Penh at around 13.00PM, and hopefully there it will be just as easy to keep writing my blog as it has been so far in Vietnam :).
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Friday, March 27, 2009
Pictures
Having no luck to upload any pictures to my blog so uploading to Facebook instead. Actually a lot easier to upload to there anyways...
The pictures I have uploaded so far can be seen here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019691&id=1365461415&l=d01f80bdc8
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019692&id=1365461415&l=c30801a602
The pictures I have uploaded so far can be seen here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019691&id=1365461415&l=d01f80bdc8
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2019692&id=1365461415&l=c30801a602
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Arrived in Ho Chi Minh City!!!
We took the train at 23.00 departing from the main trainstation of Hanoi. We would be sharing our hardsleeper cabin (6 beds) with an older Vietnamese couple. (and as we found out even before departing with some cockroaches as well....).
The train departed on schedule but after about the 30 minutes there was some noise and the train used the emergency brake system to come to a full stop. The train had hit someone! It actually took us a short while to figure out what had happened but when looking out of our window the body was right in front of it.... Luckily it was dark already so we couldn't see it too clearly! Quite quickly a pretty large crowd gathered outside of the train. We could see one of the train staff grabbing a bedsheet and covering the body. Within about 20 minutes; even before any police arrived; the train started moving again. We thought it might just pull up a little bit but we actually continued our journey. It was a very strange feeling/situation, on one hand it was quite sad to see someone pass away just in front of your window on the other hand was glad the train went on (in Holland that would have never happened, as I think they give the driver some time off and a psychological examination).
So the journey continued and from that moment on we did start to have contact with the older couple who during the whole ride took very good care of us (like we were there children I guess, making sure we had enough to eat, sharing their food and drinks with us, arranging for us that we would have better beds etc.) It was really too bad we couldn't communicate with them, but by their gestures and smiling we felt very welcome on the train.
A few cabins ahead there was a Vietnamese couple with 2 children, the youngest one was a very cute boy called Lam and older one was 6 years old and a lot less cute. When I saw the youngest one in the hallway I reached out my arms and he directly came running into my arms! Was really a lovely kid, when I pulled him up he directly put his head to rest on my chest. I spend quite a lot of time carrying Lam through the train, many times when I would put him down he would come running towards me again to be lifted up and carried.
At around noon a mother and her 18 year old girl came on the train and the girl did speak some English. She thought Casey and me were reporters as we kept taking so many pictures :D. Althou they only stayed on the train for 1.5 hours it was nice to have her do some translating toward the older couple in our cabin. Unfortunately at around 14.00 Lam and his family also got out of the train...
From then on think we mainly 'communicated' with the older couple and tried to rest a lot. Also enjoy the beautiful scenary that we were passing through. Lots and lots of rice fields and later on during the trip nice views of the sea at one side and a mountain area at the other. Also the view of the 'real' people of Vietnam living in their villages not spoiled by tourism. Glad we didn't miss out on these things by taking the plane instead!
Only thing is that they should do something about those cockroaches....like they never ever removed the rubbish...so the number of roaches did get a lot of worse...even I did kill quite a lot of them when hunting for them with Casey's head-lamp and slipper :D.
We arrived Ho Chi Minh City with a short delay; around 5.15. We helped the older couple to carry their stuff outside to where they were picked up by some relatives. Then we took a taxi towards the backpacker street of HCMC. Most of the hotels were still closed at this time so after quickly checking one of them we decided to get something to eat first. After we finished our breakfast we went back to the same narrow street were we went earlier to check another hostel. We went in to another one and after checking the price and checking the room we decided to take this one for one night (15US$). Think we both didn't really feel like walking around too much as we were both quite tired and Casey started to develop a cold and flu.
Now it is 16.00 and so far we have just been resting, taking a shower, eating our cup-pho (vietnamese rice noodles) on the hotel room. And Casey has been taking her 'tasty' chinese medicine so hopefully she will be fine soon!
Also just dropped off all our dirty clothing, the hotel provides laundry service so tomorrow morning we will have it back all cleaned up again :D.
The train departed on schedule but after about the 30 minutes there was some noise and the train used the emergency brake system to come to a full stop. The train had hit someone! It actually took us a short while to figure out what had happened but when looking out of our window the body was right in front of it.... Luckily it was dark already so we couldn't see it too clearly! Quite quickly a pretty large crowd gathered outside of the train. We could see one of the train staff grabbing a bedsheet and covering the body. Within about 20 minutes; even before any police arrived; the train started moving again. We thought it might just pull up a little bit but we actually continued our journey. It was a very strange feeling/situation, on one hand it was quite sad to see someone pass away just in front of your window on the other hand was glad the train went on (in Holland that would have never happened, as I think they give the driver some time off and a psychological examination).
So the journey continued and from that moment on we did start to have contact with the older couple who during the whole ride took very good care of us (like we were there children I guess, making sure we had enough to eat, sharing their food and drinks with us, arranging for us that we would have better beds etc.) It was really too bad we couldn't communicate with them, but by their gestures and smiling we felt very welcome on the train.
A few cabins ahead there was a Vietnamese couple with 2 children, the youngest one was a very cute boy called Lam and older one was 6 years old and a lot less cute. When I saw the youngest one in the hallway I reached out my arms and he directly came running into my arms! Was really a lovely kid, when I pulled him up he directly put his head to rest on my chest. I spend quite a lot of time carrying Lam through the train, many times when I would put him down he would come running towards me again to be lifted up and carried.
At around noon a mother and her 18 year old girl came on the train and the girl did speak some English. She thought Casey and me were reporters as we kept taking so many pictures :D. Althou they only stayed on the train for 1.5 hours it was nice to have her do some translating toward the older couple in our cabin. Unfortunately at around 14.00 Lam and his family also got out of the train...
From then on think we mainly 'communicated' with the older couple and tried to rest a lot. Also enjoy the beautiful scenary that we were passing through. Lots and lots of rice fields and later on during the trip nice views of the sea at one side and a mountain area at the other. Also the view of the 'real' people of Vietnam living in their villages not spoiled by tourism. Glad we didn't miss out on these things by taking the plane instead!
Only thing is that they should do something about those cockroaches....like they never ever removed the rubbish...so the number of roaches did get a lot of worse...even I did kill quite a lot of them when hunting for them with Casey's head-lamp and slipper :D.
We arrived Ho Chi Minh City with a short delay; around 5.15. We helped the older couple to carry their stuff outside to where they were picked up by some relatives. Then we took a taxi towards the backpacker street of HCMC. Most of the hotels were still closed at this time so after quickly checking one of them we decided to get something to eat first. After we finished our breakfast we went back to the same narrow street were we went earlier to check another hostel. We went in to another one and after checking the price and checking the room we decided to take this one for one night (15US$). Think we both didn't really feel like walking around too much as we were both quite tired and Casey started to develop a cold and flu.
Now it is 16.00 and so far we have just been resting, taking a shower, eating our cup-pho (vietnamese rice noodles) on the hotel room. And Casey has been taking her 'tasty' chinese medicine so hopefully she will be fine soon!
Also just dropped off all our dirty clothing, the hotel provides laundry service so tomorrow morning we will have it back all cleaned up again :D.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Hanoi (Monday & Tuesday)
Monday:
In the morning we went to the Ho Chi Minh (the old leader of Vietnam) area (museum, living place and a place where you can see his dead body). Unfortunately when we arrived there we found out that all those places are closed on Mondays... So that was bad luck...but we still walked around the area in the burning sun (39*C).
Afterwards we went back to the lake/old district to book tickets for the water puppet show. Only tickets still available were at 21.15, so got the tickets for this show. We went back to the hotel for a nap and then out again for dinner and the show. Didn't really know what to expect from it, but it was well worth the visit! Really amazing to see the performance. (I made some movie clips so can share with you all later). Basically they have some water basin in which they make the puppets perform some traditional vietnamese legends. But the puppet performance has a lot going in, the puppets really perform lion dances or play instuments or swing around with their hands or .. or .. you just got to see it ;). Then back to the hotel...
At 23.00 we booked a day tour at the hotel for going to the Perfume Pagoda. Not an easy job to arrange this as the normal staff were not sitting in the lobby, only the very friendly but not very intelligent security staff/new front desk person... But after some time of many misunderstandings he decided to call the regular front desk staff and then it was an easy arrangement from then on. The tour would depart around 7.45-8.15 the next morning.
Tuesday:
Had to wake up quite early to be downstairs on time for the tour. Before going on the tour had breakfast in the hotel (me: banana pancake casey: egg/ham sandwich + black extremely strong coffee). At around 8.30 the minibus arrived to pick us up, luckily most of the other participants were already on the bus so didn't have to circle around the city for too long before heading to the destination. It was a bus ride of about 2 hours, then everyone had to change onto 2 rowing boats. About 1 hour along the river with a beautiful view, some similaries with the landscape of Guillin.
There are 15(?) pagoda's on the perfume pagoda complex grounds but because the limited time we would only be able to visit 2. The first one would be a pagoda located in a cave. We had the choice to take a cable car or go for a 2KM hike up the mountain. Even thou it had rained and the tour guide had warned us it would be slippery we did decide to take the walk. Quite glad we did as it was intersting to see the local pilgrims heading to the pagoda and also enjoy the vietnamese style music played by the many stalls on the way. The pagoda was quite interesting, think I have only seen one other pagoda inside a cave before (in Xi'an).
Then once again the option to take cable car back or go for the 2KM walk again. Once again decided to walk. This time a bit regret doing so as it was indeed slippery.... While decending the stairs I did slip and fell down several steps. Luckily no serious damage! So went on going downwards at a bit reduced pace to ensure would not fall again. Arrived at the 'meeting point' safely and we went to have lunch with the tour group.
After lunch went to another pagoda which was very near to the restaurant. This time a regular style pagoda (actually not sure why they call it pagoda as I thought pagoda should be shaped in a stick shape? It is more like a regular temple complex). Anyway was still worth visiting, as it was a really nice, old style temple. Unfortunately not enough time to see the temple complex in more detail. The tour was quite rush, as the tour would have to be back at Hanoi centre at 7PM. So we head back to the boats, on the way saw more of the local foods. Saw the shells of the 'balut'/enbryo egg (will still need to find one to see the inside more clearly and maybe try to eat it??) further they had the snake wine with real snake inside, and many local mountain animals of which some I have no clue what they were. At least saw beavers and squarels.
The tour dropped us off at the hotel, and the very friendly staff allowed us to use a room which was not booked yet to let us take a shower and change clothes. Soon will be leaving to catch the train at 23.00 heading to Ho Chi Minh City (29 hours by train). Hopefully there will be internet possibilities again so I can further update everyone :D.
In the morning we went to the Ho Chi Minh (the old leader of Vietnam) area (museum, living place and a place where you can see his dead body). Unfortunately when we arrived there we found out that all those places are closed on Mondays... So that was bad luck...but we still walked around the area in the burning sun (39*C).
Afterwards we went back to the lake/old district to book tickets for the water puppet show. Only tickets still available were at 21.15, so got the tickets for this show. We went back to the hotel for a nap and then out again for dinner and the show. Didn't really know what to expect from it, but it was well worth the visit! Really amazing to see the performance. (I made some movie clips so can share with you all later). Basically they have some water basin in which they make the puppets perform some traditional vietnamese legends. But the puppet performance has a lot going in, the puppets really perform lion dances or play instuments or swing around with their hands or .. or .. you just got to see it ;). Then back to the hotel...
At 23.00 we booked a day tour at the hotel for going to the Perfume Pagoda. Not an easy job to arrange this as the normal staff were not sitting in the lobby, only the very friendly but not very intelligent security staff/new front desk person... But after some time of many misunderstandings he decided to call the regular front desk staff and then it was an easy arrangement from then on. The tour would depart around 7.45-8.15 the next morning.
Tuesday:
Had to wake up quite early to be downstairs on time for the tour. Before going on the tour had breakfast in the hotel (me: banana pancake casey: egg/ham sandwich + black extremely strong coffee). At around 8.30 the minibus arrived to pick us up, luckily most of the other participants were already on the bus so didn't have to circle around the city for too long before heading to the destination. It was a bus ride of about 2 hours, then everyone had to change onto 2 rowing boats. About 1 hour along the river with a beautiful view, some similaries with the landscape of Guillin.
There are 15(?) pagoda's on the perfume pagoda complex grounds but because the limited time we would only be able to visit 2. The first one would be a pagoda located in a cave. We had the choice to take a cable car or go for a 2KM hike up the mountain. Even thou it had rained and the tour guide had warned us it would be slippery we did decide to take the walk. Quite glad we did as it was intersting to see the local pilgrims heading to the pagoda and also enjoy the vietnamese style music played by the many stalls on the way. The pagoda was quite interesting, think I have only seen one other pagoda inside a cave before (in Xi'an).
Then once again the option to take cable car back or go for the 2KM walk again. Once again decided to walk. This time a bit regret doing so as it was indeed slippery.... While decending the stairs I did slip and fell down several steps. Luckily no serious damage! So went on going downwards at a bit reduced pace to ensure would not fall again. Arrived at the 'meeting point' safely and we went to have lunch with the tour group.
After lunch went to another pagoda which was very near to the restaurant. This time a regular style pagoda (actually not sure why they call it pagoda as I thought pagoda should be shaped in a stick shape? It is more like a regular temple complex). Anyway was still worth visiting, as it was a really nice, old style temple. Unfortunately not enough time to see the temple complex in more detail. The tour was quite rush, as the tour would have to be back at Hanoi centre at 7PM. So we head back to the boats, on the way saw more of the local foods. Saw the shells of the 'balut'/enbryo egg (will still need to find one to see the inside more clearly and maybe try to eat it??) further they had the snake wine with real snake inside, and many local mountain animals of which some I have no clue what they were. At least saw beavers and squarels.
The tour dropped us off at the hotel, and the very friendly staff allowed us to use a room which was not booked yet to let us take a shower and change clothes. Soon will be leaving to catch the train at 23.00 heading to Ho Chi Minh City (29 hours by train). Hopefully there will be internet possibilities again so I can further update everyone :D.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Hanoi
We went to our room and took a shower. Afterwards took a nap, we woke up around 15.00. Before going out we decided we would be staying one more night at the same place so we wouldn't have to waste time searching for another place. (and at 15US$ a night it ain't that bad anyways...).
At the hotel lobby I exchanged 100US$ into Vietnamese Dong, and became a millionaire instantly :D. 100US$ got me 1.7 million Dong! Now the plan was to get the train tickets for the trip to Ho Chi Minh City. The girl at the hotel lobby helped us to check how much it would be but the ticket agent she checked with charged a lot more then we expected to be paying. So we decided to go to the train station to get the tickets ourselves. Before heading to the train station we had something to eat: "Bun Rieu Cua" which is some local style soup noodles with crab meat. Tasted pretty good, but might have also been affected a bit by the fact that I was really hungry by that time already ;).
Afterwards took a taxi to the train station, when we were about half way the taxi was stopped by the police and the driver had to get out. We were left alone in the taxi for a while until the police informed us to get out of the taxi and they arranged another taxi to help us finish the journey. Not sure what was the reason he was pulled aside (I guess it might be because he was not wearing seatbelt). At the train station we went up to the counter and got the train tickets for departure the coming Tuesday. We will be departing at 23.00 and be staying in a hard sleeper compartment (57US$ per ticket, not bad for an almost 30 hours train ride).
After we finished at the trainstation went for a walk through the city. We had dinner and later ice-cream, and then went back to the hotel. On the way to the hotel a guy on a motorbike stopped me and asked if I was interested in buying books. He showed me he has a copy of the lonely planet Vietnam; but already carrying that one from the library. Did ask him wheter he had a copy of the Cambodia version. He said he could arrange it and asked another motordriver to go get it. A few minutes later the motordriver got back with a copy of LP Cambodia. They asked 250.000 Dong for it. With some negotiation got the price down to 70.000 Dong (+/- 30HK$). BTW copy is something you have to take literally, they really copied the original lonely planet.
Went back to the hotel to drop of some of our stuff and went outside again for some drinks and some more food.
Now back in the hotel again, it's 23.30 and hopefully will be enjoying a good sleep very shortly.
(will try to post some pictures tomorrow, as today I tried a few times but uploading kept failing for some reason :( )
At the hotel lobby I exchanged 100US$ into Vietnamese Dong, and became a millionaire instantly :D. 100US$ got me 1.7 million Dong! Now the plan was to get the train tickets for the trip to Ho Chi Minh City. The girl at the hotel lobby helped us to check how much it would be but the ticket agent she checked with charged a lot more then we expected to be paying. So we decided to go to the train station to get the tickets ourselves. Before heading to the train station we had something to eat: "Bun Rieu Cua" which is some local style soup noodles with crab meat. Tasted pretty good, but might have also been affected a bit by the fact that I was really hungry by that time already ;).
Afterwards took a taxi to the train station, when we were about half way the taxi was stopped by the police and the driver had to get out. We were left alone in the taxi for a while until the police informed us to get out of the taxi and they arranged another taxi to help us finish the journey. Not sure what was the reason he was pulled aside (I guess it might be because he was not wearing seatbelt). At the train station we went up to the counter and got the train tickets for departure the coming Tuesday. We will be departing at 23.00 and be staying in a hard sleeper compartment (57US$ per ticket, not bad for an almost 30 hours train ride).
After we finished at the trainstation went for a walk through the city. We had dinner and later ice-cream, and then went back to the hotel. On the way to the hotel a guy on a motorbike stopped me and asked if I was interested in buying books. He showed me he has a copy of the lonely planet Vietnam; but already carrying that one from the library. Did ask him wheter he had a copy of the Cambodia version. He said he could arrange it and asked another motordriver to go get it. A few minutes later the motordriver got back with a copy of LP Cambodia. They asked 250.000 Dong for it. With some negotiation got the price down to 70.000 Dong (+/- 30HK$). BTW copy is something you have to take literally, they really copied the original lonely planet.
Went back to the hotel to drop of some of our stuff and went outside again for some drinks and some more food.
Now back in the hotel again, it's 23.30 and hopefully will be enjoying a good sleep very shortly.
(will try to post some pictures tomorrow, as today I tried a few times but uploading kept failing for some reason :( )
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Arrived in Hanoi
We left Hong Kong last friday at around 11.40. Took the bus to Sheung Shui and transferred to the train heading to Lo Wu. Passing the customs went very smooth, luckily there were not that many people crossing the customs so almost didn't have to que up :).
After passing the customs went to get the train tickets to Guanghzhou East Station, the train left shortly afterwards. When we arrived in Guanghzhou East we already saw Casey's relative (who helped us to get the train ticket to Nanning), besides helping us with the train tickets she also helped us getting some food and drinks for on the train! She probably will never read this but still big thanks to her! From Guanghzhou East we took the subway to the main train station.
We arrived at the main train station quite on time, had about 1.5 hours before the train would depart. We just spend the time in the waiting area people-watching and having some of the food.
The train departed at 16.52, we shared our soft sleeper cabin with a chinese couple and their 3,5 months old baby. After we departed did play with a chinese girl staying a few cabins away from us. But at around 8 most people went to take a nap. Think I also went to sleep quite early; around 9. The next morning we arrived at Nanning at 5.47.
When we got off the train we went to the ticket office, we expected it would still be closed but luckily it was open already. At the que for the ticketing we met up with some other foreigners who were on the same train. One of them was Brian (US) who later decided to take the bus to Hanoi. Another one was Mikael (Sweden but living in HK) who did get on the same train as we did to Hanoi. We decided to get the hard sleeper tickets; which turned out to be a pretty good choice as we would end up having the whole cabin for ourselves. (guess in total there were less then 20 passangers taking this train!).
The train would leave at 18.15 so we had quite some time to spend in Nanning. We started off by having a simple breakfast near the train station together with Brian. Soya milk + dumplings and egg pancake. The 3 of us sat down at the table and later a chinese woman shared the table with us. When Brain helped us by getting the pancakes I put 2RMB; the price for the pancakes under his plate. When he returned he asked us who put it there, I told him it was the chinese woman who was sitting next to him. He really believed it, and looked very thankful to the woman and asked us wheter he should accept the money from her or should say something to thank her. Later we found out he thought the woman payed the 2RMB for "table sharing cost", it was a pretty funny situation (probably won't come across that well thou when reading it here ;)
Anyway, after the breakfast he went his way going to the bus station and we went into Nanning to explore a bit of the city. We went to a big park which was really nice, there were loads and loads of elderly people in the park all doing some sort of exercise. Lots of Tai Chi, Dancing, Badminton etc. etc. After crossing this part of the park we entered some sort of "Nanning Disneyland" (even some attractions with Mickey Mouse logo) was quite nice to hang around in this park althou would not dare to go into any of the attractions (most of them created lots of noise which made it sound like they wouldn't be too reliable...). Afterwards we started heading back to train station while on the way we got some cup noodles for during the trip.
Departed on schedule at 18.15, chatted for a while with Mikael, and later did read a bit in the lonely planet guide book. At 21.42 we arrived at the chinese customs (a lot earlier as expected). We had to get off the train so quickly had to get my stuff together and get off. One of the custom officials checked my passport and found there was some problem. The chop I got when crossing the chinese customs the day before looked like it mentioned I entered China in 2008... then had to put my bag through the x-ray. Seems they saw something "strange" on it so had to open my luggage and get all my stuff out. Not sure what it was but seemed it were my sunglasses that had their interest... Then after waiting a while got back on the train and did get my passport back so seems everything turned out to be fine :).
About 2 hours later we had to pass the Vietnamese customs. Got off from the train again filled out some form payed 2.5RMB for health inspection" and could get back on the train again. Then went to sleep and woke up at around 5AM. About 30 minutes later the train arrived the destination!
Outside there were some taxis waiting, but they were asking 10US$ for a ride to the city centre while local buses would just charge 3000Dong per person (+/- 0.20US$). While deciding what to do we met up again with Mikael. We asked the staff in the train station but was quite hard to get a clear answer, as they didn't really speak anything besides Vietnamese. We got the impression that there would be a bus arriving there at 6.30 which would be able to take us to the city centre. Decided to wait for that bus, when it was passed 6.30 and still not bus had shown up we checked with another staff. It seemed that we would have to go to the busstation which was only a few blocks from there...so some time was wasted but finally we did find get on the correct bus.
We went to an area in Hanoi where many small guesthouses are located. In this area we split up with Mikael as he had to go to one specific place where he booked a tour. We checked around in several guesthouses/hotels and finally ended up in the bamboo hotel. There was only one room left (4th floor/top floor), and that room was not cleaned up yet. So while waiting for the room to be cleaned up have been sitting at the hotel lobby using their free internet to type this post. (room rate 15US$ a night)
Actually half way writing this post I already got the key, but thought it would be better to wrap this post up first althou really really looking forward to have a shower!!!! Outside the weather looks really nice, and seems to be not too hot (according to my watch 32*C now).
After passing the customs went to get the train tickets to Guanghzhou East Station, the train left shortly afterwards. When we arrived in Guanghzhou East we already saw Casey's relative (who helped us to get the train ticket to Nanning), besides helping us with the train tickets she also helped us getting some food and drinks for on the train! She probably will never read this but still big thanks to her! From Guanghzhou East we took the subway to the main train station.
We arrived at the main train station quite on time, had about 1.5 hours before the train would depart. We just spend the time in the waiting area people-watching and having some of the food.
The train departed at 16.52, we shared our soft sleeper cabin with a chinese couple and their 3,5 months old baby. After we departed did play with a chinese girl staying a few cabins away from us. But at around 8 most people went to take a nap. Think I also went to sleep quite early; around 9. The next morning we arrived at Nanning at 5.47.
When we got off the train we went to the ticket office, we expected it would still be closed but luckily it was open already. At the que for the ticketing we met up with some other foreigners who were on the same train. One of them was Brian (US) who later decided to take the bus to Hanoi. Another one was Mikael (Sweden but living in HK) who did get on the same train as we did to Hanoi. We decided to get the hard sleeper tickets; which turned out to be a pretty good choice as we would end up having the whole cabin for ourselves. (guess in total there were less then 20 passangers taking this train!).
The train would leave at 18.15 so we had quite some time to spend in Nanning. We started off by having a simple breakfast near the train station together with Brian. Soya milk + dumplings and egg pancake. The 3 of us sat down at the table and later a chinese woman shared the table with us. When Brain helped us by getting the pancakes I put 2RMB; the price for the pancakes under his plate. When he returned he asked us who put it there, I told him it was the chinese woman who was sitting next to him. He really believed it, and looked very thankful to the woman and asked us wheter he should accept the money from her or should say something to thank her. Later we found out he thought the woman payed the 2RMB for "table sharing cost", it was a pretty funny situation (probably won't come across that well thou when reading it here ;)
Anyway, after the breakfast he went his way going to the bus station and we went into Nanning to explore a bit of the city. We went to a big park which was really nice, there were loads and loads of elderly people in the park all doing some sort of exercise. Lots of Tai Chi, Dancing, Badminton etc. etc. After crossing this part of the park we entered some sort of "Nanning Disneyland" (even some attractions with Mickey Mouse logo) was quite nice to hang around in this park althou would not dare to go into any of the attractions (most of them created lots of noise which made it sound like they wouldn't be too reliable...). Afterwards we started heading back to train station while on the way we got some cup noodles for during the trip.
Departed on schedule at 18.15, chatted for a while with Mikael, and later did read a bit in the lonely planet guide book. At 21.42 we arrived at the chinese customs (a lot earlier as expected). We had to get off the train so quickly had to get my stuff together and get off. One of the custom officials checked my passport and found there was some problem. The chop I got when crossing the chinese customs the day before looked like it mentioned I entered China in 2008... then had to put my bag through the x-ray. Seems they saw something "strange" on it so had to open my luggage and get all my stuff out. Not sure what it was but seemed it were my sunglasses that had their interest... Then after waiting a while got back on the train and did get my passport back so seems everything turned out to be fine :).
About 2 hours later we had to pass the Vietnamese customs. Got off from the train again filled out some form payed 2.5RMB for health inspection" and could get back on the train again. Then went to sleep and woke up at around 5AM. About 30 minutes later the train arrived the destination!
Outside there were some taxis waiting, but they were asking 10US$ for a ride to the city centre while local buses would just charge 3000Dong per person (+/- 0.20US$). While deciding what to do we met up again with Mikael. We asked the staff in the train station but was quite hard to get a clear answer, as they didn't really speak anything besides Vietnamese. We got the impression that there would be a bus arriving there at 6.30 which would be able to take us to the city centre. Decided to wait for that bus, when it was passed 6.30 and still not bus had shown up we checked with another staff. It seemed that we would have to go to the busstation which was only a few blocks from there...so some time was wasted but finally we did find get on the correct bus.
We went to an area in Hanoi where many small guesthouses are located. In this area we split up with Mikael as he had to go to one specific place where he booked a tour. We checked around in several guesthouses/hotels and finally ended up in the bamboo hotel. There was only one room left (4th floor/top floor), and that room was not cleaned up yet. So while waiting for the room to be cleaned up have been sitting at the hotel lobby using their free internet to type this post. (room rate 15US$ a night)
Actually half way writing this post I already got the key, but thought it would be better to wrap this post up first althou really really looking forward to have a shower!!!! Outside the weather looks really nice, and seems to be not too hot (according to my watch 32*C now).
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