I must admit, I was not completely upfront in my last post. First of all, during that altercation in the minivan in Nong Khiew, when the husband was trying to wrench his wife out of the van, I became so angry I hit him in the shoulder. Not hard mind you, I mean please, I hit about as well as I throw a baseball—and my old NYC roomies can attest that it is not well from our numerous catches in Central Park. Nevertheless, I have rarely been so angry in my whole life. The disrespect shown towards women in the many countries I’ve visited has sadly been a common theme in my travels, and another unfortunately common thread has also been the anti-Americanism I’ve encountered just about everywhere. The man didn’t seem to care less that some wimpy foreigner had hit him and continued to attack his wife, but I should not have done that all the same. However, I am not one bit regretful that I stood up for the wife, and intervened with words and helped to free her from his grasp. Overall, the event thoroughly upset me and the other farang girl sitting next to me.
The next day as I was stuck in the tiny town of Muang Khuoa and now phone or internet to keep me company, I instead had that of the two girls on my bus from Udomxai. In the end, to put it gently, we didn’t click, which became quite clear right off the bat. We went to the market to get noodle soup for lunch and somehow I brought up my freakish story from yesterday and explained how much it had upset me. In response, I was met with fairly open hostility. I grew up in DC, so I know difference between a discussion, a debate, and a fight, and how quickly they often digress. I was attacked for “judging” a culture I didn’t know, and I’m quite sure it had to do with the fact that I was American and trying to assert my beliefs and culture on another’s, especially as the Kiwi girl mentioned something quite insulting about “how American’s must feel having bombed Laos and now getting bombed itself” which I simply chose to ignore. I can’t even begin to express all the anti-Americanism I’ve encountered this year, but let’s just say it started in Uganda (not the locals mind you), continued in Oz and NZ, and has followed me here to Southeast Asia. And the other few Americans I meet tell me the same thing. People are not afraid to state the obvious often these days: that they don’t like Americans. I just think back to that golden rule of kindergarten: if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. In any case, it may have been the days of travel, the isolation of being stuck in a tiny town with two apparently fresh enemies, my eagerness to go home soon, the horror of the abuse event, but they mixed to create something akin to homesickness and I just lost it. I mean, walking back to the guesthouse through the rain with deep, ugly sobs. Fortunately or unfortunately, the walls were none to thin, and I think the girls realized they had upset me. The Israeli came in to check on me, and reinforce the fact that she had enjoyed our discussion. To be honest, I said, I had not, as I’ve tried to not “take things personally” as she advised, but it’s been a long 9 months (she’s been going for one month—tell me how you feel in 8 more months I told her), and at the end of the day, come on, what could be more personal? I’m American, my family and friends are all American—it’s really some kind of personal if you ask me! In any case, we made amends, mainly because I knew we were stuck together in a small town and it seemed the better of two awkward situations. And as it turned out we would be seeing a lot of each other through the further bus journeys and then Sapa, so that was a wise decision in the end.
But all this background is mainly meant to give you an idea of why I was so grateful for my time in Sapa and the events that transpired there. After sharing the room with one of the girls (hey, might as well get a cheaper room rate out of my still rather unpleasant company), I got breakfast with them, and we started chatting with a British girl sitting alone at a nearby table. She seemed exceedingly normal and perfectly pleasant from so I eagerly asked her to come join us at our table. Then later that day I ran into this same girl, Lucy, (these towns are small!) and we spent the rest of the day waiting out the rain (the rain won) in a lovely little bakery, Baguette & Chocolat (great food and a worthy cause: http://www.hoasuaschool.com/, I love it!), and discovering that we were both jaded backpackers of 9 or so months who had entirely lost our previous motivation.
I was just so happy to have friendly company again, and then some other travel friends of her showed up, and I made plans to do a trek with one of them. There was a light at the end of my “unfriendly travel companion” tunnel—things were looking up. Sharon and I booked a two day one night trek for the following day, and Lucy and I made plans to meet the following evening to catch the train back to Hanoi together. I parted ways cordially with my border-crossing companions, and set off on my trek feeling much more optimistic. 
It was raining in Sapa, which is perched high in the mountains, but once we drove 15km out of town and down the mountains a bit, the rain lightened and toward the afternoon some blue sky even appeared. Our group of 7 (Canadian Sharon, myself, a couple from Pamplona, Spain, two brothers from Sweden, and a girl form Japan) spent the morning slipping and a sliding down the rice paddies, saved only by the many young H’mong girls in full
traditional dress who held our hands (yes, even the boys) and kept us from certain downfall. The rice paddy terraces lacing the mountain edges were stunningly breathtaking and despite the 5 or so hours of hiking through mud, it was a good day. (The best decision of my life may have been to borrow the rubber boots offered by my guesthouse!) We stayed overnight at a homestay, not completely legitimate, but much more authentic than my Chiang Mai homestay, and the food and beds were very lovely.
The next morning we trekked to another small minority village (all the workers were out in the surrounding rice paddies) and then visited a waterfall and some lovely natural warm springs overlooking the river. After a difficult uphill climb, we were driven back to Sapa, just in time to catch my bus for the evening train. Or so I thought—until I received a panicked message from Lucy via Sharon’s roommate that our overnight train was earlier than expected—6:45pm, and my bus had left at 4:30—15 minutes earlier! I collected my bags and ran for my travel agency, where a nice man arranged a rushed pickup and I was off to the train station in Lao Cai. Who should I spot as soon as I stepped out, but my border buddies, who in keeping with form, were none too friendly—good riddance. Despite some casualness on my part (thinking 6:45 was the report time to the train, not the departure time), I miraculously realized my error just in the nick of time and boarded the train, reaching my compartment and Lucy just minutes before the train wheels moved into gear. Lucy and I laughed about the snafus, caught up a bit on the past two days, and then caught some sleep—as much as we and the other four people in our compartment could before the train workers came knocking on our door at 4am. By 4:15am we were standing sleepily and grumpily on the platform seeking a cab. We found one, bargained quite poorly as we were not fully awake, and made our way to Hanoi Backpackers, a lovely western backpacker place I grew tired of in Oz and NZ, but here it’s so refreshing and social and clean. We waited for check-in, showered, and set off to sightsee before we would have time to reconsider and spend the whole day sleeping.
In the (new to me) hot, humid, sticky Hanoi weather, we strolled the lake in the old quarter before setting off to visit Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum, where his preserved body is own display for thousands to walk by, view, and pay respects. It was a bit of an eerie sight, with a reddish glow caste from the glass coffin over his pale clothed sleeping body, but so interesting to see the strict security, and massive crowds pushing along and butting to get in. Next we braved a moto-ride to an excellent local restaurant for some great food ($2 filet mignon dinner—unheard of!) before walking over to visit Highland Coffee (the chain seems to be the Starbucks of Vietnam, if you will) and Hoa Lo Prison—“The Hanoi Hilton” where American POWs were kept during the Vietnam (American) War, and where Vietnamese political and resistance prisoners were kept before that. Two-thirds of it has been knocked down to create a high-rise (something about that seems wrong), but the rest is preserved and holds some interesting, if slightly biased information, photos, and clothing items, etc.
That night we hung out and relaxed (it had been a looong day!) at the hostel and sampled some locally brewed beer at one of the many street corner bars serving drafts for 20 cents to crowds clustered in red plastic chairs on the pavement. Yesterday was recovery/errand day. Lucy and I booked our open bus tickets—she left for Hoi An last night, and I will meet her there in a few days after I come back from my overnight boat trip to Halong Bay, which is supposed to be a magnificent spot. I also took in some excellen
t local coconut ice cream, coffee, fruit shake (of sorts, many different fruits topped with coconut milk and tapioca, and crushed ice and mashed all together) and an interesting if strange water puppet show. So far Vietnam has been good to me, and Hanoi has proven to be a lovely city, if a bit manic—watch the mopeds!
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