Monday 4th November
Ha Long Bay
Wow!  Having been boggled by our excursion to Tam Coc (see previous entry) (Alfred: Think they could have figured that out for themselves) we were a bit worried that Ha Long Bay would turn out to be a bit of an anticlimax. But it wasn't. The pictures speak for themselves (Alfred: But that won't stop you, I'm sure)! The only problem was taking pictures of the enormous cave complex which is lit internally by coloured spotlights which play havoc with any attempt to take photographs!

Ha Long Bay has a total of 1969 islands in it and was voted one of the seven natural wonders of the world by some internet survey or other (Alfred: And fair enough too).  We had a mixed group of Germans, Swedes, Chinese, Australians, Dutch,  Russians and Portugese as well as our own French and Irish/Swiss addition. They asked us to fill in forms with our ages and nationalities. They said it was for the boat. Ages?  Martine had an appallingly bad taste explanation for this which I won't share, youa re welcome to come up with your own theories. (Alfred: Well, OK but there were a few other observations one might make, like it takes about four hours each way on quite bad roads and with a bus driver that immediately reminded us of many Rwandan trips we had taken in years gone by. And the air-conditioning gave Ruairí a massive head cold and the perfect excuse for moaning and sniffling and being 'brave'! At least he sleeps at night - I just sit here on the dressing table watching him grunt and snuffle and imitate a dyspeptic hippo ... OK, I may have stepped over the line there).

As well as the Bay itself, you get to visit a massive cave complex crammed with strange formations (follow this link if you want to see some amazing pictures!) though the coloured spotlights rather detract from the visual experience. The cave was used during the War and then forgotten about until in 1998 a fisherman saw a monkey disappear into the cliff-face and decided to investigate. Today, apart from being a major tourist attraction, it is used by villagers to shelter from typhoons a few times a year (Alfred: Hang on. Look at the pictures. Look at them! And then tell me with a straight face that people managed to FORGET about somewhere like this. Seriously, no way, no way).

  

 The high point was probably a twenty-minute ride in a bamboo boat, the two of us and a Canadian couple from Ottawa. Our teenage driver/rower was a little bit scatty and managed to run us aground in the way in to a very narrow cave entrance with boats and kayaks piling up on each side, then jumped off the boat onto land, which worried me slightly until I realised be was either jumping back on to rock the boat and break it free from the mud or was just plain acting the eejit (Alfred: From the comments being shouted at him by the other boat people, I suspect the latter, though it was all very good-humoured!).

Are you sure that is what you want to order, sir?
Probably our favourite Vietnamese food is pho, a noodle soup with either beef (pho bo) or chicken (pho ga). Of course, that isn't how you actually spell them because written Vietnamese has a bewildering array of accents that hugely affect the pronunciation and the meaning of words. Our guide to Ha Long told us that this can cause some hilarious results. The correct pronunciation of phở is  [fəː˧˩˧]  - fah-ah with a slight downtone after the first -ah and a rising tone on the last one . If you pronounce it like the French word feu (which is pretty much what we have been doing) it means something that can be ordered in a massage parlour but only by a man as it would be impossible to do to a woman. I leave it to your imaginations. (Alfred: Or, indeed, he could have been pulling your ... leg.)


Tuesday 5th November
As Alfred mentioned, I did catch a heavy cold and went to bed early with stuffed sinuses, a Lemsip (never leave home without one) and we didn't exactly rise with whatever the Vietnamese equivalent of a lark is. At breakfast I committed a major faux pas. Martine had said that the soup wasn't very spicy and the chopped chillis were sweet rather than hot. She asked the waitress for more chillis and I chipped in 'Or some hot sauce'. I couldn't see the waitress' face from where I was sitting but Martine said it was pretty much the same as if you asked Marco Pierre White for some ketchup to put on your steak.

Or trip today was to Hua Lo prison, better known to history as the Hanoi Hilton. Prisons are never a hoot but are always interesting. What was fascinating here was the extent to which the Vietnamese were maintaining that they had been exceptionally nice to the Americans. And I mean exceptionally.  Propaganda films and photographs showed them playing games, receiving medical attention, getting parcels and messages from their families and so on, a regular party! And the food! Shots of starving Viet Cong and emaciated peasants were intercut with USAF pilots stuffing their faces with bread and rice and the commentator observing that they were living better than the Vietnamese themselves. (Alfred: You can't help but notice how prominently John McCain is featured - I wonder how recent a phemonenon that is!)

Leaving aside the issue of accuracy (Alfred: Oh, yeah, let's) for the moment, I can imagine that, if I were a Vietnamese citizen visiting this exhibit (and there were some) and I was of an age where I had experienced the war and lost friends and family to bombings etc, I would be pretty livid to hear this! Why were these pilots who had bombed schools and hospitals and churches and pagodas having Christmas parties and playing volleyball and getting little poems from Ho Chi Minh to cheer them up? I can only presume the authorities figure the overwhelming majority of visitors will be tourists but even so, come on, guys!

Warders play Xmas music for homesick pilots

So many different kinds of food!!

'the pilots in pyjamas' - ha, ha, ha!!!

Cards, billiards, music, volleyball, running - how did they find time in the day for so much amusement!!!

Receiving messages and parcels from home

Regular medical checks to make sure everyone is in peak health

John McCain receiving medical attention upon arrival at Hua Lo

Christmas Eve service

Preparing Christmas dinner

What will Santa put in YOUR stocking???

OK, I am running out of ideas for captions

Going-away souvenirs are greatly appreciated as they prepare to depart home.

Anyway, the experience prompted me to come up with this.

The Ballad of Hua Lo Prison (aka Hanoi Hilton)

The Hanoi Hilton has a special place
In writings on the war in Vietnam
Which John McCain did with his presence grace
Along with other guests from Uncle Sam.

And their accounts did tell -I'm sure you know - 
Of hunger, fear and torturers most cruel.
And so I went to see this Hua Lo
And find out if these tales were really true,

But now the scales have lifted from my eyes
For suffering was not these prisoners' fate,
And I - along with you - can but surmise
That life in prison here was truly great!

Despite the heinous nature of their acts,
The Viet Cong treated them with fondest care.
They dressed their wounds, they treated them with tact
And from revenge they always did forbear.

And as for food! They fed them up like kings
(I know because the film says it's true);
While Viet Cong peasants starved on mouldy rice
They gorged on chicken, bread and hot beef stew.

They played guitar, they played at cards and stuff,
Their team at volleyball was much the best.
And if perchance a pilot should feel rough
A doctor came and listened to his chest.

At Christmas they were made to feel at home
With decorations hung upon a tree.
And Ho Chi Minh sent them a Christmas poem
And warders came with flutes and played with glee.

And as went by the years, the months, the days,
And seeing that their captors were so kind,
They came to see the error of their ways
And wondered why America was blind. 

And when they left they rued the awful day,
Instead of smiles their aspects were of woe;
For if they could, they would have liked to stay
With their friends and bosom pals in Hua Lo.