The Elephant Camp

This blog is for my Grandchildren.

Dearest Avery, Michael, Cassidy, Jessica, Savannah, Maile, Dylan, Hunter, Holland, Ella, McKenna and Caroline, I miss you all but especially so when we visited a very special place in Northern Thailand. Check on your globes where that is so you can picture what I am about to tell you.

Two days ago Granddaddy and I and our two friends were picked up at our hotel in Chiang Mai in Northern Thailand and driven by van to a place about one hour away. We were on our way to an elephant camp. We left the city behind and before long we were in the Thai countryside with flowers blooming everywhere and Buddhist temples scattered along the road. When we reached our destination, we got out of the van next to the Ping River and crossed a very rickety bridge that shook and trembled with our every step. Our guide, Ruchi, had said C’mon let’s go, but immediately was way ahead of us and after a minute or so of inching slowly along the bridge while holding on to the ropes on both sides, I figured out that if you walk faster, it is easier to keep your balance. So by the time we reached the other side of the bridge, we were balancing quite well. At the exit of the bridge there was a sign that said “No more than 12 people can be on the bridge at one time.” I looked behind me and at least 25 or 30 people were walking single file all on the bridge at once. But the bridge did not collapse, happily for us.

We were in a true jungle. There were about eight elephants knee deep in the water and as we walked further in, there were more in an large enclosed pen. A small stand was selling bananas and sugar cane for feeding to the elephants so we bought some and hand-fed them. They would grasp the sugar cane with the tip of their trunks and plop it into their mouths with one fluid sweep. I noticed another sign that said “When feeding the bananas, please give one bunch or half at a time. This keeps the elephants from losing patience.” We thought that was pretty funny but we didn’t want to find out what would happen if an elephant lost patience, so we stuck with the sugar cane.

I learned something interesting at that moment. Ruchi told us that Asian elephants (with the smaller ears) have a lip on the bottom side of their trunk tip so that they can grab hold of something just like you would with your hand. African elephants (with the big ears) don’t have that lip so it must be harder for them to pick things up. Imagine having to pick something up if you didn’t have a thumb. These Asian elephants were able to grasp things with amazing precision.

After we fed them for a while, the trainers signaled for the elephants and immediately the elephants knew what was coming. A bath in the river! Elephant handlers or trainers are called mahouts and maybe some of you have heard that word before. Each mahout has his own elephant and they usually start out together very young. So the young mahout (maybe 12 or 14 years old) is assigned a baby elephant (I think about three years old because they are with their mothers until then) and then as the years go by they grow up together. The ideal situation is for them to grow old together, but usually the elephants live longer than the people and so more likely an elephant will have several mahouts in his or her lifetime. Ruchi told us that when a mahout gets married, his wife understands that the elephant will always occupy a more important place in the mahout’s life than she will.

The mahouts jumped onto their elephants and they walked one at a time into the river where the mahouts scrubbed them with big stiff brushes while they sprayed water at each other and at the mahouts, and some of them lay down in the water and put their legs in the air. And some of them just sat down and sat there enjoying their bath. And you know, because you’ve all seen elephants, that they smile just like people do, especially when they are happy. I’ll only be able to show you a couple of pictures of this happy scene, but I have lots of pictures and will show you all of them when we get home.

Then we moved on to a performance area where we took a seat with just a few other people and pretty soon about ten elephants with their mahouts paraded out onto the grounds. Don’t forget that this is not like going to the circus at Reunion Arena. This was in the jungle and the seats were very simple and the grounds just bare dirt. The elephants gave a demonstration of how they help their masters by doing very heavy work that men alone aren’t strong enough to do. First, each elephant would drag a large log (a whole tree really) from one side of the space to the middle. Each elephant did this until they had a pile of logs which they then proceded to place in a big pile just like Lincoln Logs! The amazing thing was that two or three elephants would pick up one log by placing their tusks under the log and then holding it with their trunks and walking with it to the place where the pile was to be. Sometimes, instead of the log falling onto the pile nice and straight, a log would end up catty-wampus or on an angle. No problem. There was another elephant at the end of the pile whose job it was to push the errant log into its proper place. At the end, the pile of logs was as neat as it could be. All the time I was wishing you all were there because you would have loved it. And the elephants were smiling and waving their trunks in the air.

Then they demonstrated how they raise one leg so the mahout can have a step to step on for getting on top of their backs. Or they would put a back leg up so the mahout could stand on it to get down. But the best part was the elephant painting. The mahouts set up an easel and the most talented of the painting elephants took some paint brushes and painted a real painting, choosing the colors and the brush and making the brush strokes with its trunk. Ruchi said they have been known to actually paint flowers! The paintings were for sale but we never did have an opportunity to buy one. Look up elephant paintings Chiang Mai on the internet and see what you find.

Then it was time for our elephant ride. We climbed up some steps so that we wouldn’t have to climb the elephant and stepped into a howdah which is the little two-seater car that is strapped to the elephant’s back and off we went. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it was a lot harder than I thought it would be to hold on and keep my balance. I kept thinking I was going to fall out of the howdah. That would have been so embarrassing! The first thing they did was go downhill and that’s the hardest part. After they leveled off it was a piece of cake.

Pretty soon we were old pros and a group of about 15 elephants each with its mahout and two of us greenhorns were lumbering through the jungle, sometimes on very narrow passageways and sometimes uphill or downhill. As I said, downhill is the hardest because you think you are going to be thrown forward, but we weren’t. Finally, we got to the river and the elephants walked through the water back to the camp. The whole thing took about an hour. We looked for gibbons (large monkeys) along the way but we didn’t see any.

The end of our visit to the elephant camp was a ride on a large bamboo raft down the river. The raft was propelled by a rower with one pole and we each had a turn at poling down the river. It’s not so easy because you have to stand up and move the pole from one side to the other just like on a canoe but it’s much wider and the bamboo slats are very uneven. I only tried for a minute or two, but Granddaddy was a pro in no time! It was a long ride, at least another hour, and we had time to reflect and be lazy and wonder at how beautiful the graceful beasts are and how much like humans they seem. While I was floating down the river, I imagined the following story.

About a thousand years ago, in an ancient Thai village, when the elephants roamed free and life was even more simple than the life I just described, there was a very kind and benevolent king, King Michael, who was the ruler of that part of the jungle. His people loved him very much because he took care of them and was careful to be sure they always had enough to eat and work to do building grass huts and growing crops. The animals in the jungle loved him too and the elephants and the gibbons and the beautiful colored birds would all flock to the village to be near him. King Michael had three beautiful daughters, the Princess Avery, the Crown Princess Jessica, and her Royal Highness the Princess Cassidy. Because the elephants were always there visiting and had nothing else to do, the princesses would ride all day on their backs across the river and up and down the jungle paths.

Eventually, His Majesty decided that since the elephants were spending so much time in the village, they could help the villagers cut down trees and carry logs so that the villagers could build log houses instead of grass huts. And in return he would be sure they had plenty of bananas and sugar cane to eat. But the elephants didn’t know how to do the work. So King Michael appointed three villagers, Br’er Dylan, Br’er Hunter and Br’er Holland, to be mahouts to train the elephants to work. Pretty soon the three mahout chiefs had recruited lots of other junior mahouts in the village to help and in time they taught the elephants how to carry the logs from the deepest parts of the jungle to the village. And then they taught them how to stack the logs to build houses that were much more sturdy than the grass and thatch huts that the villagers were used to living in. The three princesses were a little annoyed, because now the elephants didn’t have as much time to play as before.

As time passed, the village grew more prosperous and people from neighboring villages wanted to come there to live. Three lovely maidens from a nearby community came with their parents to reside in the now prosperous village. Their names were Savannah, Maile and Ella. They were not princesses like Avery, Cassidy and Jessica—they were only poor children whose parents were peasant farmers. When they arrived at the village, they wanted to help their parents build their new house and so they asked the young mahouts to show them how to direct the elephants.

Dylan helped Maile, Hunter helped Ella, and Holland helped Savannah and before long they were having a lot of fun riding the elephants while the elephants pulled the logs. They even taught the elephants how to pick up babies with their trunks and carry them gently to the river’s edge for a bath. Maile and Ella had a baby sister named Caroline and Savannah had a little sister named McKenna and the babies loved to be lulled to sleep cradled in an elephant’s trunk while Maile, Savannah and Ella kept a protective watch over them.

One day the three princesses were riding on a raft down the river while a boatman poled them over rapids and through eddies and another servant fanned them with banana leaves. Maile and Savannah were on the shore directing their elephants when they noticed the princesses sweltering in the summer heat in the middle of the river. Hello! they cried. Come over here and help us cut logs for houses, they called. The princesses were shocked! They didn’t do the work of mahouts, they thought, and so they continued down the river. Finally, Avery sat up on the raft and said to the others, “This is really boring—riding back and forth on the river, but if we help those girls we will get to ride the elephants just like we used to and we can have fun again.”

The others were not convinced, but after some discussion, they decided to give it a try. They were princesses, after all, so it wouldn’t do to just pitch in and work like common ordinary villagers. They would watch for a while and then maybe if they felt like it…

So they ordered the boatman to pole to shore and let them off of the raft. After disembarking, they stood and watched while the villagers and the elephants worked.

Br’er Dylan, who had recently been promoted to chief mahout, said to Her Royal Highness, the Princess Cassidy, “Ma’am, if you’ll just jump up on this elephant and help her pull her log, I’ll be able to go into the forest and cut down another tree.” HRH was quite indignant, but what could she do, so she did as he instructed. Then Princesses Avery and Jessica were instructed to do the same. At first, they couldn’t quite get the hang of it, but Dylan, Hunter and Holland, and Maile, Savannah and Ella were laughing and joking and making a game out of what the princesses had thought of as work. And with the help and gentle instruction of the mahouts and the girls, the princesses began to get the hang of it. So pretty soon they were all talking and laughing and working and the time was flying by.

Just then King Michael happened by in his royal coach and saw all the children working together and the elephants behaving like well-oiled machines and he was puzzled. Are those my daughters working with the peasants and the mahouts, he thought. My goodness, they are my daughters and they are having so much fun! I have never seen them laughing so hard. Because he was such a wise king, he quietly moved away and did not intervene or interrupt the progress of the work.

At the end of the day, the girls and the mahouts took their elephants to the river’s edge where they allowed the elephants to bathe in the river and wash away the day’s grime and the aches of the long haul. The mahouts showed the princesses how to take grass brooms and sweep the dirt off the elephants’ backs while at the same time giving them a gentle massage. The children bathed in the river as well, and they felt refreshed and cool.

When it was finally time to go home for the evening, the three princesses looked with wonder at their new friends. Princess Jessica said, “I must say I never knew it could be so much fun doing so much work!” Princess Avery and Princess Cassidy agreed. Savannah smiled and said, “Having something important to do is the most fun one can have.” Maile came forward and said, “And if your work is helping other people it is even more fun.” And Ella, the youngest of the three, said, “And if you are having fun, you will do your job well, and doing a job well is the best fun of all.”

The years passed and the village grew and King Michael had descendants that carried on his tradition of love and kindness and the children in this story grew older and married and taught their children how to work and the village grew and grew and today it is called Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, and sits on the banks of the mighty Chao Phraya River where the elephants once roamed.

Good night my babies, I love you all, love, Grandmommy

Oh My! Chiang Mai

Friday, March 30: We are on the airplane going back to Bangkok after our three night stay in northern Thailand. We considered not going at all because while on the Ginger we heard several horror stories about the air pollution in the whole Chiang Mai area as a result of some out of control fires. We had heard that the pollution index was over 300 where a safe level is 59 and 200 is considered dangerous. They said it was so bad you could see the particles in the air and they got into your eyes and mouth, not to mention that you couldn’t see any of the sights and that it was getting worse instead of better because of lack of rain or wind. We thought maybe as an alternative we could stay in Hanoi a bit longer or even fly to Singapore for a few days. But as you can imagine, changing our itinerary at such a late date would not be easy. So in the car on the way back to Hanoi, we used our trusty cell phone and called our connection in Bangkok to get the scoop. I was appointed spokesperson, and believe me you never know how much they understand not to mention the poor quality connection, but I spoke to “Kiki” who said she hadn’t heard any such thing but she promised to check and call us back. I told her we were all around 70 years old and we couldn’t risk the health problems we would be exposed to with such bad air. Two hours later, we were almost to Hanoi and still no call back so we called again. Kiki said she called their office in Chiang Mai and they said the air was no problem, military helicopters had sprayed water, the winds had come up and all was well. Of course they are going to tell you that because they don’t want to lose the business or have to deal with a change in plans. But based on her information, we decided to go as planned and hope for the best. We weren’t very optimistic though since even the internet had confirmed the bad air scenario, although that my have been somewhat dated news.

When we got to Chiang Mai, we were met at the airport by cute and bubbly Ruchi, our first female guide. After all the initial introductions had been made and we were loaded into the car with our truckload of luggage, Ruchi said she had to confess how pleasantly surprised she was to see us because she was expecting these old people to emerge from the plane and we were so young! I didn’t explain that I had exaggerated our ages just a wee bit so as to make my point with the agent in Bangkok. Anyway, I guess they understand more than we think we do.

As for the air, it was absolutely no problem. Ruchi said that it had indeed been terrible for a while but it was getting better daily and we would be able to see everything we came to see. You couldn’t see or smell pollution, in fact the city was the cleanest we’ve seen so far with no litter in the streets and in general seems more prosperous than Vietnam and certainly more so than Cambodia. I for one was glad we hadn’t canceled because I definitely wanted to see a bit of northern Thailand. She took us to the hotel, a lovely zen/feng shui compound where we would spend a couple of quiet days.

The next day we toured Chiang Mai, saw a couple of amazing temples, had a lovely lunch in a truly authentic local restaurant with no tourists, walked around the local market for an hour or so and then had an evening dinner and traditional dance performance at an all teak restaurant with hot and cold running participants including a two-manned yak. Oh, I forgot to mention, only Mary and I went to the dinner and dance--the gentlemen were wiped out and took to their beds. Now who is the weaker sex again?

Sailing Along on HaLong Bay

We are back in the van on our return trip to Hanoi having spent the last 24 hours on board the Ginger Junk in Ha Long Bay which is part of the Gulf of Tonkin. I think I mentioned that we had high expectations for this sojourn and we were not disappointed. I was prepared for hot weather, but it was cool and comfortable since there was very little sun. But we were able to see the karsts (limestone pinnacles) with no problem in spite of the haze. In fact, although I have nothing to compare it to, I think I prefer the hazy weather because it makes the water and the karsts look so other-worldly.

We boarded around noon yesterday onto a tender which attaches itself to the junk moored a little ways out in the harbor. I was expecting a sleepy little village but this harbor is very busy with hundreds if not thousands of people milling about and so many boats of all types that one wonders how they will all fit into the bay. We had to descend some treacherous steps to get onto the tender, but made it with Thien’s help and then waited for the others. I could write for hours about the group of 18 that we were ship-mates with but suffice to say it was a most congenial group. They were all American except for a couple of ladies from England and Scotland and while we try to avoid going where the Americans go, I’ll make a big exception in this case. It didn’t take long for us all to become great friends and the variety of people was so interesting. A couple and their darling little boy from Austin but living in Singapore for a few years. He’s with Dell. The English/Scot ladies, widows maybe, were delightful and so interesting. Dierdre, the Scot, volunteers in Sri Lanka as a caretaker in an elephant camp once or twice a year. Then there was the college professor and her husband and sister. The sisters were born in Baltimore, so great rapport there. Two vivacious and lovely ladies traveling sans husbands, one from Columbus, Ohio and one from Rye, NY. They had some great stories to tell. A really nice couple from California that Mary and Neil may see again since they live near their Coronado house.

After we boarded, we were ushered up to the Salon for a brief orientation and description of the vessel and voyage to come. The staff was made up of five or six 90-pound Vietnamese guys, all very sweet and helpful. Then we were shown to our staterooms which were quite lovely considering we were on the high seas—two comfy beds, closet, marble bathroom with shower and big windows looking out on the incredible vista. A quick stowing of gear (must be ship-shape you know) and then up to the upper deck, a spacious expanse of teakwood with comfortable chaise longes and chairs. There we started to get acquainted with the others. Once we were out of the harbor though, the sights began. As you can see from the pictures (which I hope I can post), we sailed among the karsts sometimes so close you felt like you could reach out and touch them. Although I had seen many pictures on the internet, this was another case of you have to be there. The mountains are much larger than they looked like in the pictures and the grandeur is yet another example of the wonders of this earth. To get a sense of the scale, look at the boat against the karsts. I think the guide said there are 3,000 karsts in the bay, some with names but most with only numbers to identify them.

There were two shore excursions while on board, both requiring about a million steps to climb up in order to see the views from all sides. It’s worth the screaming calves, knees and thighs to make the trek. We also went into a huge cave where we could disembark and walk around. One can imagine that centuries ago people lived in these caves to protect themselves from the elements, but it must have been pretty spooky without the electric lights that today light your way.

Mealtime was great fun—gourmet lunch and dinner the first day. The crew had set the tables according to the parties—four seats at a table for us, three for the Singapore couple with child, and two for the other twosomes. But at lunch we pushed the tables together so that we all could sit together and by dinner the crew had picked up on our desires and had arranged the tables the same way. We were in bed by ten so as not to miss tai chi at 7:00 AM.

The next morning, after tai chi (you can see the tai chi “master” but I have spared you the pitiful attempts of our group to follow him), we had another shore excursion to see some more of the amazing variety of these island pinnacles, after which we were served a lovely lunch buffet and back to the marina by eleven where our faithful guide Thien was waiting. This is a must do for anyone visiting Vietnam.

Our Second Day in Hanoi

Sunday, March 25: We left the Metropole again this morning for the three hour van ride to Ha Long Bay for the much anticipated overnight on the Chinese junk called the Ginger. Unlike the Victoria Express, the Ginger gets great press and the people we’ve run into who have been on it have all raved. Gourmet food and wine, lovely teak staterooms and of course the breathtaking scenery makes this one of the highlights of our trip. I wrote the previous train saga on the first part of our morning ride and now I still have an hour or so to tell you about our second day in Hanoi.

Around ten yesterday morning, we had re-organized our luggage for today’s trip to a warmer clime, again planning to store the larger bags until our return. We decided we would hire pedi-cabs again, but held out little hope of our same crew being available.

But lo and behold when we emerged from the hotel, there they were smiling and waving. It was like old home week. We indicated that we would be engaging their services for the better part of the day and that elicited bows and beaming faces. I climbed into the same cyclo as before and we headed for the Hanoi Hilton. I had seen the War Museum in Ho Chi Minh City on the last trip and could have skipped this replay, but the others wanted to go so we went. It was grim, though not as grim as the War Museum which is only about the Vietnam War and the atrocities that occurred then. This place, dubbed the Hanoi Hilton by the GIs, had already been a prison for more than a century and there were graphic descriptions of the horrible conditions and torture that the prisoners received at the hands of their Chinese and then French captors. Only one small part was devoted to the American War and there were pictures of our soldiers before, during and after their detainment, a young and handsome John McCain among them. Talk about propaganda! The information on the walls went on and on about how well the Americans were treated compared to the previous occupants of the prison, how they received special clothing and food, warm blankets and even playing cards and other entertainments. The faces in the pictures told the true story, though, and a prisoner of war is still a prisoner of war. In the other parts of the prison there were life-size re-enactments of people with ankles shackled to their cots unable to move and of the guillotine and other instruments of torture, some of which were not described but the images conjured up were bad enough. In the American area, no talk about torture or death, just what a picnic it was for our guys. Although it is called the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, the Communists still have their hold on the country and they tell you what they want you to know, true or not.

Afterwards, our drivers took us to the Cathedral where Mary and I remembered having been dropped before for our foray into the Old Quarter with its maze of shops and restaurants and of course the usual street scene of cooking, trading, commerce and god knows what else. We had lunch at a seafood restaurant where I ordered oysters with cheese (to the horror of my mates) and the waitress said you want one? Yes I said thinking she meant one order, but she brought me one oyster. It was a normal sized oyster on a huge shell with a tiny egg, maybe a quail’s egg, and some lovely cheese sauce. I know it sounds hideous, but it was so delicious I ordered four more. With the corn and crab soup as a starter it was enough. Neil is even more adventuresome than I am and tried to order the swimming (or streaming) bladder and cockles soup but the waitress gestured that he wouldn’t like it so he switched to something a little more conventional.

After lunch, we walked the street for a little while but it was clear that Mary and I had to ditch the guys in order to do some uninhibited shopping. So we sent them off with their drivers to a temple and then to the hotel for a nap while we roamed the shops of the Old Quarter with our drivers hovering nearby. I spotted a very interesting parchment type wall panel in one of the shops with some lovely old painting and Chinese writing and quite frayed around the edges. Would have bought it in a minute but didn’t think it would survive the suitcases. How much, sez I? $39 says the clerk. Is it old? Yes, very old, she says. How old? Sixteenth century she says. Now that was a buy. $39 for a four hundred year old antique maybe from the Ming Dynasty. Too bad we had to pass it up. I think this was on the same level as the “genuine fake” handbags we picked up in Bangkok on the last trip. Or the 100% plastic pearls we’ve been warned about by our guides. It looked good though, and we are not purists.

We made it back to the hotel with barely time to post a blog and change for dinner at a lovely and authentic Vietnamese restaurant called Lac Viet, which we learned was the ancient name for Viet Nam. The restaurant is housed in a beautiful old building that is open to the elements in certain areas, with three or four stories, each room with a different theme indicated by the paintings on the walls: the Library, the Ai Dao room (the traditional long dresses worn by the women), The Days Past room and a few others. The extensive menu made of wood and parchment paper was mind boggling so we asked the waiter to bring us whatever he thought we would like and we loved it all. We had farmer’s roasted pigeon, chicken in a clay pot, and morning glory with pork (a lovely green vegetable that none of us had ever tried before), as well as some wonderful appetizers. Perish the thought that we should go to bed hungry.

The Train to SaPa

We have met the enemy and it is called the Victoria Express train. It’s after the fact by a couple of days now and the vivid memories are fading, but I can’t miss the opportunity to tell you about the overnight train from Hanoi to SaPa. In retrospect, it doesn’t seem so bad, but at the time it was something to be dreaded and endured and definitely not savored. To drive by car to SaPa from Hanoi takes about twelve hours over some bumpy terrain, too much wasted time, so everyone takes this train which leaves around ten and arrives at six in the morning. It had been described as an Asian Orient Express, provided you travel in the “soft sleeper” car and not in the hard seat or hard sleeper cars. Only those staying at the Victoria Hotel in Sapa are permitted to buy tickets on the first class soft sleeper so the aura of mystery is enhanced and the air of exclusivity preserved.

At first, when we were planning the trip, there were no separate cabins available and the four of us had agreed to stay in one cabin for four, but after a little internet research I determined that was not in our best interests and so we prevailed upon our agent to apply a little pressure and sure enough we were able to reserve two cabins in the “deluxe” car. Thank you, Lord, for the alternative would not have been possible.

Thien picked us up at 9:00 PM and we were whisked to the nearby train station where we had to schlep over several sets of tracks and down long expanses of station before arriving at our car. Luckily we had stored our major luggage at the Metropole and only had carry-ons. Thien accompanied us to our cabins and then took his leave. I think he slept in the fourth class car, i.e., sitting up on hard wooden seats, so by comparison we were in the lap of luxury.

Let me describe the lap of luxury. Two narrow bunks on either side of a small cabin with pillow and blanket on each. The cleanliness of the bedding was questionable but I must admit it didn’t smell so they must wash it between passengers. In between the bunks was a small table with trash bin and a vase of fresh roses (a little perfume on the pig?), and no place to sit up for reading or writing. Community toilet and sink at both ends of the car, basic but usable. No putting on jammies or brushing teeth—too difficult. For Tom and I the bunks were barely long enough, but poor Neil was literally squished into the space with no wiggle room. Sometimes there are advantages to being short.

So we went to bed. Now let me preface the next part by saying I’ve only been on a sleeper car once or maybe twice in my life and I remember being lulled off to sleep by the gentle movement of the train and the soft drone of the engines. Not so the Victoria Express. Promptly at 10 we lurched out of the station and within five minutes the banging started. All night with only intermittent breaks it sounded like a machine gun volley or perhaps like the grand finale of the July fourth fireworks display at Beaver Creek. We still have no idea what it was but it continued unabatedly all night, sometimes with loud pops and sometimes just a continuous staccato. And the lurching didn’t stop either. For an “express” train it sure made a lot of stops along the way, with each start-up practically hurling me to the floor. So much for gentle movement. Of course Tom, as always, slept through the whole thing.

So it was that bleary-eyed and groggy we pulled into Lao Cai station and began the hour’s drive to Sa Pa and the rest of our stay there was glorious.

But alas, it was necessary to return to Hanoi and repeat the whole experience. I guess better the devil you know holds true here because somehow the return trip wasn’t as bad. The banging continued but maybe I had acclimated because I actually slept a little bit. We arrived in Hanoi at five A.M. and with early check-in we were back in our rooms by six, the train having been survived if not enjoyed.

But enough of this whining. We are such spoiled brats. In retrospect, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

Sapa and the Hill Tribes

Note: I am on a roll in the Hanoi Metropole with the first access to internet for some days. What you see below was written in Sapa several days ago--I am trying to keep up with the blog even though I can't publish it right after writing it. Result: It's a little confusing for ME, and must be doubly so for you. I am going to post this without pictures because once again the clock is ticking and I'm out of time. Will try to post pictures without text later tonight.

Thurs., March 22:

Now I don’t want to hear any lip, even in your thoughts, from any of you about contradictions, inconsistencies or outright mistakes in these ramblings, because while I started out quite calm, determined and organized, I now barely know what day it is, let alone what we did two or three days ago when I last jotted down my thoughts. Also, for the nitpickers and historians among you, please remember I am not checking my facts, but just tellin’ it as I sees it. And hears it from the guides, which I have figured out is not always 100% accurate.

Yesterday and today we have been in and around Sa Pa (emphasis on the second syllable), so beautiful in the mist, bonding with the hill people (as long as we buy at least a little), and the children, ohmygod the children, they steal your heart in a moment, wretched little urchins that they are. Today we visited two hill tribe villages, which house the Dao Tien and Flower Hmong peoples, and the little waifs peek from behind trees and bushes as we walk in with our guide Thien, and when you smile and wave they emerge and giggle. I’ve been showing my camera and asking with my eyes if it’s okay to take their picture and for the under ten year olds there is never a problem but the older ones don’t like it. The little ones pose and smile tentatively and after I snap the picture I show it to them. Their little faces, snotty and dirty, light up when they see themselves and they giggle so adorably and they seem so happy with such a simple thing that you want to give them a hug but don’t dare.

Thien, a guide for seven years, seems a little dismayed that the pristine quality of the tribes has been somewhat ruined by the tourists. Ten years ago they farmed and did their handwork and tended their animals as they had for centuries but the last decade has brought the Western world en masse and now they realize they can make more in an afternoon than they can in a season of rice farming. In the more commercialized villages you are immediately surrounded by women asking your name, age, how many children you have, where you come from, etc. etc. Sounds like they speak English but in reality they have a set spiel and don’t much vary from that. You buy from ME, you buy from ME, over and over. Very cheap, very cheap.

But the two tribes today were relatively untouched and I felt like a reader of National Geographic as we walked up the dirt roads with sows and piglets, water buffalo and goats littering the paths, plus the children peeking out as described above. As we approached the settlement, we started to see adults milling about, women all in traditional clothing and men in--well actually you don’t see that many men, but the ones you do see are mostly dressed in pants and shirts western-style. We ask where are the men and Thien tells us that they drink into the wee hours and sleep most of the day. Or gamble at low tables with stacks of money which we saw in the town. Can it be true that the women do all the work?

I hope to post pictures of the houses which are so ramshackle they look like sets from Porgy and Bess but turn out to be fairly substantial because we approached one and after some sweet talkin’ by Thien to the old woman embroidering in the yard we were invited in. Dirt floor, side room with primitive beds and sacks of something like flour, low table and bench and big TV in the corner. The children promptly put in a CD of some Chinese dancers and we were gestured to sit on the bench and invited to watch the video while the old woman (she’s 56) and the two kids sat in rapt attention. Then she poured tea from a earthenware pot into dirty looking glasses and I swear I would have died of dysentery before refusing her hospitality, but Thien said some words and she didn’t seem insulted that we didn’t drink it.

After a while we took our leave and according to Thien’s guidance gave her a dollar (one per couple) which she graciously accepted and we bowed and smiled and thanked and honestly it chokes me up to write about it. All the while the children, who by now are our bestest friends, don’t want us to leave. This particular village is 18 families, 200 people. The young people don’t marry anyone within the village, but they can only marry within their tribe so you can only imagine how limiting that is. Our hostess had six children, all married, one of whom had joined the army and that’s how she was able to afford the fine house she lived in.

The second village we visited was even more isolated than the first. Very few people were around and about, all napping according to Thien, but the ever-present urchins and animals were everywhere. We finally found a couple of women in front of their house and I don’t think the one had ever seen a Westerner before. This family was Catholic of all things, and apparently the local priest comes once a week to minister to them as well as the other believers in the area. We weren’t invited in as before and the young woman looked very uncomfortable. When we offered a dollar it seemed that she had never seen one before. Thien gave her Vietnamese dong and took our dollars in exchange. Then she smiled nervously, but I did feel like an intruder on their privacy. Thien said not to worry, easiest couple of dollars they ever made.

Friday, March 23:

I was able to check email on the hotel computer, but my own will not work so thanks to all who wrote. This morning we had a trek planned to visit a Black Hmong village (there are ten separate tribes in the area), but it rained earlier so the roads were muddy and we opted to stay with the car. We went in the opposite direction from yesterday and the views back toward the town with the mist shrouding the mountains and the rice paddies below flooded with water and glistening in the morning light, it was a sight to behold. We drove as far as we could into the village and saw goats perched precariously on the hillsides and Black Hmongs going to work and school. They are called Black Hmongs because their headdresses are black and much of their native garb is black as well although punctuated with colorful sashes and neckpieces. Every other woman has a gold tooth or two and I suspect it is a mark of status although I don’t know. Must ask Thien. There are also Red Hmong (red headdresses), Flower Hmong (much more colorful overall), Red Dao (more red than the Red Hmong) and the others I haven’t figured out yet. We will see another raft of hill tribes when we get to Northern Thailand and it will be interesting to see if they are very similar or different. These tribes originated in China or Tibet and were driven into Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand where they settled but they don’t really have a country of their own. I can’t even imagine living like they do, and yet most (not all) seem pretty happy. They smile a lot and if you watch them interact with each other they are very loving and gentle.

Oy Hanoi!

Note: I am having trouble uploading the rest of the pictures for this post and so I'm going to post it with only one. I'll try to add them later.

Our first full day in Hanoi. Because of scheduling problems, our days in Hanoi are split up. We had one day yesterday (Tuesday, Mar. 20) and then took the train to Sapa. But just a few words about that day. Our new guide, Thien, picked us up at the airport—this has gone perfectly in each case—and delivered us to the Metropole around 5:00 the other night. Uneventful evening, but yesterday was a really fun day. No guide was scheduled—Thien would pick us up at 9:00 that night to deliver us to the train to Sapa (more about that later.) So we had all day on our own. Considering ourselves experts on the city having spent a few days here before, Mary and I played tour guide to Tom and Neil and didn’t feel the need to avail ourselves of any further professional. First, we left the hotel and secured the services of four cyclos or pedi-cabs to cycle us about town. At $2 an hour per cyclo, this is the only way to travel in the city. Tom and Neil were a little apprehensive at first (what if we get separated, etc.) but soon got into the flow and we had the best time showing our personal drivers on the map where to take us, doing our sightseeing and then returning to retrieve our patiently waiting drivers to take us to the next stop. This is truly a case where the journey is more important than the destination, because a pedi-cab ride in Hanoi is a wild kaleidoscope of sounds, smells, sights and multiple stimulations that cannot be described. The guys called it sensory overload which is the best way to convey the feeling. First you get into your cab, a one-seater, with your driver behind you chatting in pigeon English and pointing out sights; then you move right into the most intense traffic you can imagine with motorbikes and cars and buses whizzing by in all directions. When you come to an intersection, you just keep going and by some miracle the one or more vehicles that you think are going to collide with you miraculously meld around you instead and its like Moses parting the Red Sea. Sometimes they are so close you can reach out and touch them, but it’s best not to, if you want to keep your upper extremities.

And of course pedestrians are crossing the street everywhere without looking or dodging traffic and somehow they avoid getting killed as well. And no one gets mad, or yells at another for cutting them off or displays road rage or any of the things we are used to when driving at home.

But it’s not just about avoiding collisions and witnessing the traffic up close and personal. The horns honking right in your ear, people talking, lights flashing, and all the visual stimulation of the street scene passing by with its smells of food mixed with other less savory odors is just more than one can take in. Shops of all kinds, women carrying their shoulder poles loaded with merchandise, motorcycles carrying pigs, mattresses or furniture not to mention whole families, people squatting on the curbs cooking and selling stuff, and about a million other sights means that you need eyes and ears on all sides of your head to even begin to absorb it all. Any apprehension quickly melts away and believe it or not you not only feel safe, you feel in control! Like king or queen of the road.

So in case you miss my point, the highlight of our day was simply riding the pedi-cabs for a few hours around town. We stopped at the Hanoi Hilton (site of the infamous prison during the war) but it was closed, then went to Ho Chi Minh’s Tomb, also closed, and saw again the various buildings where the beloved Uncle Ho lived and worked during the last years of his life. We rode down Embassy Row and our drivers pointed out the various embassies, saw uniformed police marching in formation, passed parks and monuments, some of the small streets of the old town, the Opera House and so much more. By the time we thought to stop for lunch all the restaurants were closed and we had to wait until five which was just as well since the next adventure was to start at nine. We killed the time by going to a market and quelled our growling stomachs by buying a kilo of peanuts for a dollar and walked through the market eating peanuts and taking pictures. Dinner was at a fabulous sea food restaurant where we had cockle salad, sweet snails (not the same as the previously described ones,), and the best fish rolled in rice paper we’ve ever had. We barely made it back to the hotel to collect our overnight bags, store our larger luggage there, and head for the train.

Hai Van Pass and Hue

Happy Birthday to my brother Charles who is celebrating his 6oth on Sunday. Happy birthday, Chas!

These guides take their work very seriously. Haven’t had a slacker yet. Two days ago, we left Hoi An. Tin and Nam, our driver, were loading our bags promptly at eight, despite an unexpected downpour. The walkways of the hotel were all canopied so we didn’t get wet, though Nam surely did. We were on the road by 8:15 tearing through small villages and almost flooded streets which made me a nervous wreck having experienced a flash flood that stalled and flooded our car during our first years in Dallas. But the van barreled on through and although the waves it created looked like the tsunami, we didn’t stall. We were headed for the Hai Van Pass just outside of Da Nang and it would be a shame if the weather were not clear enough to see. But Tin promised it would clear and it did.

As you’ve gathered by now, I always get suspicious when they say we are stopping at such and such “factory”—it reminds me of the perfume factories in Grasse and the pottery factories in Mexico and Italy or the “jewelry” factories everywhere where you are submitted to a lame demonstration of whatever the product is and then ushered into a showroom and hustled to buy, usually at grossly inflated prices. But the marble factory we pulled into next, like the lantern factory from the day before, was legit. By now the rain had stopped. First, we drove through a village dominated by a mountain which Tin said was nick-named Marble Mountain by the GIs during the war. The town itself is full of marble artists who are carving the most incredible statues of everything from Buddhas to American Indians. Marble slabs are piled up on both sides of the street and every shop or house is littered with marble debris. We passed through the town and then turned into the marble “factory.” Because it was Sunday, there were only a couple of carvers at work, but this was the real deal. The slabs and marble dust were everywhere and the yard outside was loaded with partially finished pieces from small to huge. The workmanship is first-rate and if we’d had the time and the money, it would have been great to buy some fabulous piece and ship it home. But we settled for a couple of small souvenirs—incense boxes and small ring boxes—instead. Note the picture of the two smiling Buddhas above.

Next we traveled on to Da Nang, the location of the famous China Beach infamous during the Vietnam War. Then a site of bloody battle, now it is a serene and quiet expanse of sand and sky enclosed by gentle mountains.

We eventually started to climb into the higher elevations to the Hai Van Pass, one of the highest points in Vietnam. The scenery was spectacular as we hairpinned up the mountain side while drinking in the views and snapping pictures of the bay below. One area of beach had been a leper colony up until the 1930’s because the “unclean” could be secluded nicely from the rest of the population. We stopped along the way to take pictures and at the summit there was a rest stop with some American bunkers left over from the war, souvenir shops and beautiful views of the whole surrounding vista. There were also some highly aggressive “merchants,” one of whom glommed onto me and wouldn’t stop touching me and talking to me in her broken English. She kept saying I like you and where are you from and how many children do you have and how old are you, and don’t you like these bracelets, three for a dollar, blah, blah, blah. At first it was amusing, but after a few unrelentless minutes of being stroked and almost cuddled, it was unnerving to say the least. We each had our own “stroker” and though we had been warned by Tin that this was the drill and not to buy, we finally had to say get us out of here, PLEASE! I don’t know what school of marketing they go to that advocates this hard-sell approach, but it’s not my favorite. As we piled back into the van and it was clear we were not going to succumb, my lady stuck out her lower lip into a pout and glared and glared. I hope she didn’t put some sort of Vietnamese hex on me….I think there is a rash starting to break out on my….

We still had a major site to see before checking into the hotel which Mary and I knew was going to be a good one and which we wouldn’t have time to enjoy. So after a late lunch that was included in our itinerary and not very good, we continued on to the Purple Forbidden City modeled after Tianamen Square and the Forbidden City in Beijing which we will see later in the trip. Home to generations of emperors and their families and harems (one had 142 children with his numerous wives), it is a vast complex which I can’t begin to summarize here. When I post this later, I will try to post a link for anyone interested.

That night we had dinner at a private home in Hue. Professor An, a 60-ish Vietnamese scholar whose wife is the granddaughter of one of the royals, has opened up his home and gardens to visitors like us who, for a fee, get a tour of the gardens and an explanation of the feng shui inherent there by the professor himself, and then a look at the interior of the house which is filled with antiques and memoriabilia from his life. This gave us a glimpse into a typical though obviously upper class version of how people live, and after we had seen various souvenirs of his very interesting life and travels, we were treated to a seven-course dinner prepared by his wife and served by his niece who enjoys practicing her English while majoring in Mandarin Chinese at the university. She plans to be an interpreter. The food was delicious and the ambience authentic to say the least. Again, this seems a clear example of a Vietnamese “capitalist” who decided to market his skills in a special way in order to make a living. I don’t know how often he does this (or what it cost since it was part of our package), but it was most interesting and he and the few other family members we met honestly made us feel welcome. While it was just the four of us, there were three tables that could have seated maybe up to 15-18 people at a time. Quite an enterprise.

Yesterday we went sightseeing in Hue, another lovely Vietnamese city north of Da Nang. First a boat ride down the Perfume River on a replica of the royal water transport to a famous pagoda called the Pagoda of the Heavenly Lady which Tin clearly loved and called it “darling.” We had a 2:40 plane to Hanoi and were pressed for time, but he managed to squeeze in two of the scheduled royal tombs—those of the second and eleventh emperors of Vietnam. The emperors would design their own tombs which could take years and of course covered acres of land and were comprised of a whole complex of buildings.

When the tomb was finished, the emperor and his family would use it as a summer resort until his death when it then fulfilled its original purpose and was closed to everyone except the guardians who protected the now holy site. The second emperor took 15 years to design and build the one we saw and then died almost immediately after it was completed, so the poor chap really didn’t get to enjoy it at all. The second one, tomb of the eleventh emperor, was built during the 1920’s and had a much different style than what we had seen previously. The mosaic work on the inside was amazing. It would have been nice to inspect the mosaics more carefully, but we had a 2:40 plane to catch to Hanoi. Mary and I were so excited to be returning to this most wonderful and quirky city where we had spent several days three years ago. We have just one day there before we board the much anticipated (with some dread I might add) overnight train to Sapa, the mountain town where we will spend the 3-4 days. But first Hanoi.

Good Morning Vietnam!

It is our first full day in Vietnam. We were met at 9:30 by Tin, our guide, for a walk around the ancient town of Hoi An, a central Vietnamese town about 40 km fromm Da Nang. Tourism has saved the town and it is quite prosperous, at least compared to what we saw in Siem Reap. When Angkor Wat is discovered by more people, Siem Reap should experience a similar resurrection. I forgot to mention that Siem Reap had five hotels about ten years ago, and this year alone they are building 100 more, from guest houses to luxury resorts. Sounds hard to believe, but that is what Tek told us.

But I digress. Sadly, we were hoping for cooler weather, but it remains hot and humid. Forget the makeup, ladies, it drips down your nose the first five minutes. First we walked around the old town, which is reminiscent of Hanoi: tree-lined streets and some very pretty colonial houses mixed in with typical Asian hovels and shops. The destination today was to experience a cooking class with a local lady-makes-good, Miss Vy (pronounced Vee) whose parents had a restaurant while she was growing up. She is under 40 and now has a very successful business giving cooking demonstrations in one of her three restaurants in town. Tin walked us to the first stop where we met Miss Lu, who works for Miss Vy. Lu’s task was to take us to the market to show us the ingredients that would be used in the cooking class. She is a bubbly young lady, very knowledgeable when it comes to herbs and vegetables and we learned the names of some interesting ingredients we hadn’t seen before. I noticed in the stalls that there were bins full of teeny, tiny snails and I asked her what they were for. Well, to eat, of course, she says and takes a toothpick and pulls out of its shell the tiniest crustacean I’ve ever seen and pops it into her mouth. Can I try? says I. Of course, and soon all four of us were enjoying live snails au naturel without garlic or butter or French bread, but with the best taste ever. Kind of a cross between an oyster and a clam but so tender and more delicate. We agreed that a bowlful with a martini would be the perfect before-dinner relaxation.

Eventually, we made our way through the market to Miss Vy’s restaurant. I had asked Tin how many would be in the class, assuming (fearing, rather) that we would be part of an assembly line operation with tour buses parked outside. Not so. We were taken upstairs where Miss Vy herself was waiting with a table spread with beautiful vegetables and a table for four set with bamboo mats and chopsticks. She introduced herself and told us her story, modestly of course, but Tin had already told us that she is the epitome of the Vietnamese entrepreneurial woman who has built a business doing what she knows how to do. She is beautiful and gracious and explained all about the cooking of the region and why they eat what they do. Every Vietnamese meal has elements that are crispy, crunchy, smooth and silky, as well as those that are salty, bitter, sweet and sour, in her words—the yin and the yang. This gives the tantalizing texture and taste cacophony that Tom and I eat every week at home. They eat mostly vegetables, fish gets second place and meat a distant third and only for special occasions. In fact, when someone gets married, you might ask what kind of wedding are you having and they will respond “Two pigs and a cow.” They don’t tell you the number of guests invited or the cost of the expensive designer gown for the bride or the number of attendants in the wedding party or brag about the elaborate venue for the wedding—just two pigs and a cow. Your success is measured by the amount of meat you can provide for your family and guests. So while it is an economic thing first and foremost, it also means everyone is slim and healthy. Another interesting thing she told us was that unlike most cultures, Vietnamese people don’t talk while they eat. In fact, children are chastised if they speak during a meal. The reason for this is that if you open your mouth to talk, air will get into your stomach and spoil your digestion. Makes sense to me.

The lunch was amazing. First she showed us how to prepare Japanese (white) eggplant with some ingenious slicing, soaking and flattening. It was then fried in a tiny bit of peanut oil with garlic, onion, and red pepper and the presentation was just lovely. Then we had a mango salad that we chopped and mixed, we made our own spring rolls, and prepared a blue fin tuna dish wrapped in banana leaves and grilled. She had little lacquer bowls with all the necessary seasonings and condiments and each ingredient was added by each of us according to her instructions. What a great dinner party this would make at home. Gwenna, I can see the wheels turning in your mind right now….

I had asked if we would get the recipes for these extraordinary dishes and she said yes we will give you a notebook at the end. I pictured a couple of pages of Xeroxed recipes, but instead we received a lacquer photo album with color pictures of the various courses we enjoyed as well as at least twenty more dishes, all with detailed instructions. Miss Vy is going to publish a cookbook this year and is going to New York as a guest of the CIA (Culinary Institute of America not the governmental CIA) and I for one intend to keep an eye on her career. She could be an Asian Julia Child!

Afterward we walked around the town some more with Tin. Artisans are hard at work in their shops wood carving, embroidering, making lanterns, painting, and creating all sorts of other handicrafts. Finally, he drove us out into the country to visit a lantern factory. It sounds so touristy when you say it and again Mary and I mumbled together that we probably wouldn’t like it, but yet again we were wrong. Talk about authentic! The so-called “factory” is actually a working farm with one of the buildings devoted to making the lanterns that the area is famous for. Lanterns you say? Who wants lanterns? Well, I would have bought twenty of them if I could have fit them into our already loaded luggage—they are that beautiful.

The workers there must have invented the assembly line because each step of the process was being performed by a different person—cutting the bamboo and shaping the pieces into the proper sized strips for the frames; cutting and making the metal sub-structures that hold the lanterns together; tediously tying rows of string around the frame to keep the strips evenly spaced; and of course gluing the colorful silk to the frame to produce the finished product. Tedious work by our standards, but the workers smiled and chatted and seemed quite content. It was fascinating to watch, and at the end we were invited to sit down and make our own! We each had a “teacher” who showed us how to apply the glue, stretch the silk, trim the edges, etc. and the ease with which they could do it compared to our awkward efforts was humbling. The guys did great, finishing before Mary and me, and with fairly decent outcomes to boot. My finished product is pictured above and I am very proud of my handiwork.

It’s Saturday morning (I think) as I write this and today we have a day at “leisure.” Hah! We plan to take a boat ride down the Hoi An River then have lunch and who knows what adventure will unfold after that?

Later: 6:00PM:

Tried to post this tonight, but no can do. The network is kaput for the moment, which I guess we shouldn’t complain about because we are lucky to have it at all. We had a 30 minute Skype with Mark and family this morning—a miracle of technology. So I shan’t be the one to kick a gift horse in the teeth…

Today we took the aforementioned boat ride and saw Hoi An from the water. Very nice and great fun, but not much to report. After, we had lunch in a little dive called Café des Amis where there is no menu. Mr. Kim, the very effusive chef de cuisine/proprieteur immediately showed us his guest book with hundreds of pages of glowing comments in a myriad of languages which in fact raised the expectations a bit more than was due. “Best meal of our trip,” “finest restaurant in all of Vietnam,” “fabulous,” “unbelievable!!!” “j’etait enchante!” “c'est magnifique”, etc. etc. While the comments were a bit hyperbolic, the meal was perfectly acceptable and it was fun to sit on the second floor balcony overlooking the busy port below. Hopefully I will be able to post the picture of the pedi-cab drivers who took us from the hotel to the Post Office and waited (a long time) while we got Sims cards for our phones (which are still too complicated to operate) and then took us to the port and found us a boat for hire. The boatman was the brother of one of the pedi-cab drivers and of course they are all in cahoots and who knows who is who. We had been told by Tin the guide yesterday that about $7 for the four of us would buy a THREE hour ride down the river, but we only wanted to spend an hour and the boatman started at $5 a person. Pshaw, said we, it should be $7 for 3 hours! Much arm waving and stricken looks, but all very good natured and the upshot was, one hour for $8. It was so fun we gave him $10. We are the last of the big spenders.

But the significance of the picture of the pedi-cab drivers is this: they not only took us from hotel to Post Office to boat, but met us on our return hoping to take us somewhere else, and when that didn’t pan out they hovered outside the restaurant (which was very near the boat drop-off) as seen in the picture, WAVED and SMILED to us from the street and then after lunch when we said we wanted to walk a bit before returning to the hotel said “But we wait long time!” We didn’t ask you to, we pointed out, and again tragic looks and something about the loss of income accrued by the wait, but we prevailed and were able to have our walk. A little while later, Tom and I saw our guys hovering yet again and so we acquiesced and back to the hotel we went. Ah, another example of the entrepreneurial spirit, alive and well in Vietnam.

Now I sit unable to post and all packed and ready to leave early tomorrow. We are meeting Tin at 8:00 and driving to Hue via Da Nang which I understand is about a four hour trip counting the various stops we will take. The day is much touted in our itinerary as one of the most memorable we will experience, with a drive through a “sea of clouds” over the 2,500 foot Hai Van Pass, a stop at a fishing village, and a tour of the ancient Citadel in Hue. The Citadel was known as the Forbidden Purple City and was home to generations of royalty. Interestingly, while Hoi An was spared any damage during the “American” war (what we call the Vietnam War), nearby Hue was the site of some of the most brutal fighting during the Tet Offensive.

Angkor What?

A couple of days have gone by since I was able to work on this chronicle. One reason is that we have had no time for such frivolity, and the other reason is that although the hotel touts its WiFi connectability, we have yet to connect. Thus, I’m writing this in Word and hoping to post it at some future time.

Two short flights from Hong Kong and here we were in Siem Reap, Cambodia, home of the Angkor Wat. Do look it up on the internet if you are not familiar with it as it is truly one of the wonders of the world. Covering the size of TWO Manhattans (I believe I originally said one), it is a sprawling complex of early Hindu and Buddhist temples built from the ninth to the twelfth centuries by kings of the Khmer Empire who at the time controlled not only Cambodia, but most of Laos, Thailand and Vietnam as well.

Our guide to this spectacular site is Mr. Tek, a funny little man who is a bottomless well of knowledge about the temples including the history of Cambodia from the days of the Empire to the present. After we got settled into the hotel (with its lovely Zen minimalist décor), he picked us up and asked us if we wanted to see the site of one of the killing fields of Cambodia. Clearly Tek felt very passionate about what had happened between 1975 and 1979 when Pol Pot slaughtered two million of his own people, fully one third of the population of Cambodia. We found out later that he was twenty at the time and personally experienced the disappearance (read: murder) of some of his relatives. At the place where he took us there is a school which was turned into a prison at the time and people were summarily shot and thrown into a ditch. The ditch was later excavated and the skulls and bones of the people put into a monument which stands on the site as a visible reminder of the horrors that the Cambodian people went through during that terrible time.

Then we continued on to the first area of the temple complex which is called Ta Phrom. Over the centuries the roots of the trees have grown under the buildings and literally displaced the stones of the temples pushing them out of place. The roots look like giant snakes creeping under, around, and on top of the buildings and are so integrated they almost look like they belong that way. Evidently when Frenchman Henri Mouhot discovered the temples lost in the jungle in the 1860s, they were all like this, slowly being devoured by the surrounding vegetation. I’m not sure if this particular complex is being deliberately left this way or whether the reconstruction efforts have not reached it yet—I hope the former because it is so beautiful just as it is. We were stunned by the sheer enormity of it and all the while we received a running commentary by the historian Mr. Tek.

Yesterday morning we were met at the hotel by Tek and our driver and taken to Angkor Thom (it sounds like Uncle Tom when he says it), another major site of the temple complex. There is a huge corridor of bas reliefs that depict ordinary life as it was in the 12^th century, complete with scenes illustrating fairly continuous wars with the Chinese, market life, childbirth, hunting, the life of the kings vs. that of the peasants, dancing girls and fish being eaten by crocodiles. The reliefs are all original and in wonderful condition, but you have to have the actions pointed out before it is clear what you are viewing. At least I did. The scenes showing market life show people cooking in huge pots, selling vegetables and other wares and busy daily commerce. He told us how to distinguish between the Cambodian army (long earlobes and flat faces) and the Chinese army (no earlobes and topknots and beards) and once you know that you can more or less figure out who is winning and who is losing any particular battle. Of course marauding armies were a fact of life and the fact that the temples survived the centuries of attacks, as well as a series of civil wars, harsh weather and looters is a testament to their durability.

After lunch at an authentic Cambodian restaurant (authentic means no Americans) we went to the crown jewel of the temple complex, the Angkor Wat itself. Five beehived shaped towers dominate this part of the temple and Mr. Tek was able to recite the height and width of every one of them, none of which I can remember but suffice to say they are very large.

By the end of the second day, we had seen most of the temple complex, me screaming for mercy and Mr. Tek showing little. It was good though because although I balked at climbing yet another pile of rocks, the view when there was always worth it and I'm grateful that he didn't let us off so easily. Our final destination was to the Conservancy where hundreds of pieces are being stored for eventual transference back to the site or to the national museum in Phnom Penh. These pieces were recovered from looters who have brazenly stolen or spirited them away from wherever they were found over many years previously. Tek told us that there is a museum in Paris where many of the artifacts lie--the Cambodian government unable to get them back despite all manner of begging and pleading. This is much like the Elgin Marbles which are in London but should be in Greece where they belong.

As I finish this entry, we are settled into our hotel in Hoi An where we will soon meet our latest guide Tin who picked us up at the airport last night. Thus begins our adventure in Viet Nam, the country that so captivated Mary and I and our traveling companions three years ago.