The Perth Project

Hello, What’s Your Name?
A three week adventure around Viet Nam

“Don’t run across the road Nic, it shows them fear and your more likely to get mowed down” I yelled from the other side of the road in the Old Quarter of Hanoi, where I had accidently left my loving wife of 3 days behind. This would be become a bad habit of mine throughout Vietnam and particularly Hanoi, as I wrongly assumed she was always by my side. When in fact she was looking at the millions of bags and shoes that line the shop fronts. When this happened I would both cross back over the road and then lovingly bring her over in my hand or I would coax her to cross the road by herself. The problem with the second option is enviably she would get half way across, the traffic would increase in all directions and she would then stop dead in the middle of the road like a deer stuck in the headlights of an on coming vehicle – surely to meet a gruesome end. Eventually some Vietnamese driver would take pity and slowdown just enough for her scamper across the road. Then as my beloved wife had just crossed the road, her deep scorching glare would instantly burn into me reminding me never to do that again or my testicals would be cut off and would be used as fish balls at a local food stall.

See, today didn’t start to well and her patience have worn thin; little did she know the rest of the day that followed would only push it past breaking point. I woke up to my alarm at about 7ish and I was eager to explore this legendary city and to get some yummy Vietnamese food in my tummy. The room was bright from the sun outside and the noise of the rooster waking the world was sounding. In hindsight this should have been a warning. I lay in for about 20mins then decided enough is enough and woke Niki up, “come on sleepy head lets get started early to beat the heat”. In the 24 hours we had been there, I d never been so hot in Asia before and the humidity was enough to shower in. So my logic was sound. It was about 7.30ish; my wife got up and dressed all ready for the day.  However just as I got dressed my delightful parasitic friend reminded me that I might escape him when I’m sleeping but when I was awake, my butt belonged to him. I curled over with cramps and unfortunately told Niki I had to go back to sleep, I don’t feel too good. She accepted that well, I only wanted an hour and hopefully we would then go out. Just as I was drifting back asleep, I heard Niki turn on her phone to check the time and her messages.

It was quiet, too quiet. Something wasn’t right?

The next thing I heard from a rather annoyed wife was- “OH MY GOD PETER, YOU IDIOT! Its only 5.30am, you’ve put your clock forward the wrong way, and I’m going to kill you!” My response, “ohhhhh that’s why the rooster was crowing, it seemed a little late in the day for it”. With that she got back into bed, tugged at the blanket forcefully and went back to sleep. Oh did I mention it was my birthday as well!

Rule No. 2 of being married – Let your wife sleep in on her honeymoon

We decided to spend the day walking around Hanoi and booking a few tours for the next few days. Our first stop was at the ornate Ngoc Son Temple, located on a small island on Hoan Kiem Lake. Costing 5000 dong, the small temple offered an insight into the spiritual heart of Hanoi. The embalmed remains of a gigantic tortoise, which apparently still live in the lake today, resides here and is well worth checking out. The tortoises represents a legendary story of how the Vietnamese fort of invading China from its land and how the mighty emperor’s sword who defeated the Chinese, was returned to the gods by a giant tortoise who lived within the lake.

Fading due to the heat and lack of food, we made our way to Tamarind Cafe. Tamarind offers a great vegetarian menu with reasonable prices. The vibe of the place is chilled, the service not too bad by Hanoi standards, however I found some of the clientele were a little snotty – please and thank you’s go a long way! Niki had a beautiful clay pot whilst I had a delightful dish of handmade  nachos, you’ll have to go there to try it for yourself. Niki and I were hoping to head to Halong Bay the next day and we wanted to book a tour. We had seen Ocean Tours and ET-pumpkin online and they both looked great. We ended booking with ET pumpkin as they offered a boat that appealed (more on that next post) to our budget more, however we could of easily have gone with either company and would recommend checking out both companies to see which one meets your needs.

By mid afternoon we retreated to our hotel for a small siesta and along the way bought tickets to the 8pm water puppet show at the Municipal Water Puppet Theatre, the 6pm was sold out. Make sure you book early in the day to get the session you want, also perhaps pay more to get front section seats. This isn’t because you cant see from the other section, in fact you can see well but because rude tourists stick their camera high in the air to record the show,  thus obstructing your views – I thought you were meant to put it at eye level and rotate your hand, not move it from left to write like your doing the Grease lighting mega mix!

Our siesta was meant to last about an hour, 3 hours later we awoke to an hour before the performance and hunger pains – well I was hoping they were hunger pains. We got dressed and ran out the door, stopping for a quick meal at Pho 24 restaurant (so good), then straight onto the puppet show. I was excited about this, this was one of the top things that I wanted to see on our Vietnam adventure and my birthday was a great time for it. We arrived 5 minutes before it started and packed into a cramped auditorium. I have to say that the international tourists were the mostly badly behaved people there, talking during the show, arriving late, screaming kids, cameras flashing and moving in all directions. Whilst their Vietnamese counterparts sat quietly, oooinnnggg and arhinnnggg at the right moments (It was Vietnam school holidays).  Besides all this, the performance was genuinely amazing. The traditional oriental music was soothing to the soul and the twelve stories that were portrayed within the performance all related to different aspects of Vietnamese life. As we travelled these little stories would often drift across my mind as we passed rice fields, small towns and climbed into the mountains.

Feeling rather relaxed and enjoying the cooler air, Niki and I decided to stroll along Hoan Kiem Lake back to our hotel. We watched the  local Vietnamese idoly chatting, eating ice-cream and ballroom dancing along the rivers foreshore. Niki and I were laughing, her patience slowly returning. As we walked I noticed a shady character, quite clearly high on drugs, cut in front of us sharply and continue on his way. It was weird but couldn’t quiet put my finger on it, then with a sudden tug, I realised what was happening. I was being robbed! Geez these Vietnamese were bloody opportunistic, trying to get us off buses, hounding us on streets, pricing us higher on items, dodgy taxi metres and now this. As soon as I felt the tug on my bag, I turned left so quickly that I don’t know how the man next to me managed to pull his hand off me even quicker. Ironically our eyes met half way between me continuing onto my bag and him gazing off as if nothing happened, I almost expected him to start whistling a little tune. I instantly grabbed Niki and stopped whilst this other man walked on 10 metres and sat down. My bag pocket was open, however luckily I had nothing stowed in there. Niki and I picked up our pace and went straight back to the hotel, not before I eyeballed the potential thief as I walked past him. It was pointless to say anything at the risk of him pulling a knife on us, I wished him bad karma under my breathe though!

Back at the Especen hotel, my beloved wife broke down and sobbed. She had had enough! The heat and humidity, the opportunistic touts, the crazy roads, the whole culture shock to her and now a potential robbing, she wasn’t enjoying Hanoi at all. On the other hand I thought this was exactly what it would be like, having travelled through China a few years before. I felt it was my fault for giving the thief the opportunity and I promised I wouldn’t let my guard down again over the next 3 weeks. With Niki down in the dumps and me feeling still not well, I thought it was a good time to be heading to Halong Bay for some relaxation. Happy Birthday Peter…

The Word For Today

Sin Jow: A communication essential for all travellers.  The Vietnamese word for Hello.

Lonely Planet Vietnam Guidebooks On Sale

Popularity: 50% [?]

Hello, What’s Your Name?
A three week adventure around Viet Nam

I’m sure when I said to Niki 7 months ago “lets go to Vietnam for our honeymoon”, she had no idea was she was signing up for. I think I’m hugely to blame for that. For instance before we arrived she would talk about lazily sleeping on the beach, sipping cocktails, eating fantastic gourmet Vietnamese food, perhaps even sipping delicious French influenced coffee. You could see in her eyes the blue waters lapping against the perfect white sands of the South China Sea, she had dreamt and imagined Vietnam into perfection – I never thought once to maybe suggest it wouldn’t be so relaxing. However the only thing I saw in her eyes as we stood at an intersection in central Hanoi on our second day was fear, absolute bone shaking fear, shadowed by trembling tears in the background and a deadly look  burning into me saying  “Peter where the hell is my relaxing honeymoon you bastard?!”

Rule No. 1 of being married – Don’t take your new wife to Ha Noi for their honeymoon.

Niki and I arrived into Hanoi after our two week long stay in Bali for our wedding in Ubud. We did the usual budget flights with Air Asia and arrived to a small airport in the middle of farmland. You know you’re in the sticks when you see a couple of cows grazing at the end of airstrip.  Our first introduction to Viet Nam and to the dodgy operators that we had read about would be a slow and steady local bus we took to the city centre. The main benefit of the bus was easily being that the cost was a mere $3 instead of the $30 the taxis were after. As we travelled towards Hanoi we gained a small glimpse into local life, with bikes carrying cages of pigs, cows grazing on the side of the road, big concrete flyovers merging into dirt tracks and slow boats working along the mighty Song Hong (Red River).I was watching our route on the map, a bit of annoying habit of mine, and I knew that we were getting close to our drop off point. However it was hard to keep track of which road was what with road names changing every hundred metres, so when we stopped earlier than I expected and a bunch of touts got on the bus to tell us the bus stopped here, it was game time. Niki was quick to get up and begin getting her stuff, however something wasn’t right. None of the locals were moving and I’m sure I read somewhere months ago that it stopped in town. The touts were yelling at us that we had to get off and they would take us on their bikes into town, they even tried to pick up Niki’s bag. When we said “we weren’t moving and that no one else was moving” they got even more demanding. The two other tourists on the bus were also being hounded. Eventually they got the point and jumped off – just for us to go 2 blocks over and be nicely dropped of outside the Opera House to more opportunistic touts! – At least I knew where we were now and a 15 minute walk later we came upon the hotel we wanted to stay at, unfortunately though they must not have known we were coming as they had shut up shop months before (Spring Hotel).

Opting for plan B instead, we wandered over to the Especen Hotel located down a small alley near St Joseph Cathedral. This great little hotel had clean and spacious rooms starting at about $20us a night. So after two flights, a night in KL, a long slow bus trip, some heavy handed touts and one closed hotel, we were stretching out on a big double bed smiling that we finally made it to Viet Nam. This is about the time the Parasite known as Giardia kicked in and boy did it make its presence known.  I keeled over with cramps, my stomach made evacuation preparations and my brain started sending out emails to other parts of the body to bring them up to pace on a desperate situation. This happy little bug would haunt me for the next 2 weeks and would randomly make me run back to the hotel in need of a bathroom that I could camp out in. With this I make a heartfelt apology to any tourists or Vietnamese that I rudely barged passed on my great escape to the bathroom.

With Giardia on the mind, we rarely ventured far from the hotel on this day, instead opting to wander the authentic alleyways full of local characters doing everything from cutting hair to stirring large pots of Pho, a local flavoursome broth of goodness. We ate at alocal cafe for Lunch and Dinner know as La Place – yes an LP recommendation. The food was divine, with a selection of gourmet Vietnamese meals such as Chicken and Mango rice, pho, crepes and great fruit juices. The walls were covered in propaganda and 1940′s coffee posters. This is defiantly were the “cool” kids of Hanoi hung out, with writers typing away whilst sipping hot cups of Vietnamese coffee. Unfortunately thou, when we came back for dinner Niki found something that looked liked a finger nail in her juice…so what does any normal grossed out person who is absolutely appalled with this do? They pay their bill quietly and come back for lunch the next day – the food was just so damn good!

As the sun set for the day and the dark stormy weather closed in around us, the thunder and lighting made it’s ominous introduction. Within an hour a tropical thunderstorm was upon us and as we sat on our balcony feeling very unimportant in the whole picture of the world, I knew our three week travels through the ever resilient Vietnam would be humbling. Our adventures would take us from Hanoi to the world heritage listed Halong Bay, up to mountainous Sapa to the beach havens of Hoi and Hue, before trekking south to Nha Trang to catch up with friends and concluding in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh). With images of what laid ahead floating through my mind, I got up and made a mad dash for the bathroom…

The Word for Today

Pho (Noun): A Backpackers essential. The cheapest and more hearty dish you can get in Vietnam. Found in most street stalls and budget restaurants.

Lonely Planet Vietnam Guidebooks on Sale

Popularity: 18% [?]

Week 13 of The Perth Project

Friday night saw us check out Matsuri – a Japanese restaurant in the Perth city.

As Matsuri newbies, our first impressions of the restaurant were that it was very busy and popular, yet welcoming. Initially we found Matsuri recommended in the Perth Lonely Planet guide,  centrally located in the heart of Perth’s CBD, and boasting great Japanese cuisine, we just had to check it out.

Upon arriving, apart from some confusion about the name we had booked under (due to the very cute accent of the adorable front of house girl), we were promptly shown to a great table, seated by the front window and handed menus. At first being seated next to the floor to ceiling windows facing a busy city intersection was enough to make you feel a bit like a goldfish in a glass bowl, but as the night went on, we really enjoyed the view of the bussling Perth CBD on a Friday night.

The friendly wait staff, even though very busy were attentive to our every need and our order was taken shortly after being seated. It was quite entertaining to watch the wait staff literally run and bounce energetically up and down the stairs between the kitchen and the dining floor. Those guys must be fit! After making our selection from the choice of entrée’s and set menus, the entrée’s and drinks followed shortly after. Sapporo beer and Choya Umeshu (Plum wine) were our drinks of choice, and the Plum wine was a nice surprise. A much sweeter wine than I had expected, I found it a similar taste to that of a port or a muscato, but slightly syrupy in consistency. I found it complimented the Japanese food very well.

Our entrée’s were very tasty and well presented. The Kakuni (Pork belly in sweet soy sauce with mustard) was beautiful- tender, succulent and so flavoursome. We’ll definitely be back to sample that dish again!

The main’s followed a short time later – Pork Katsu Don set and the Assorted Tempura set. Both mains came with miso soup, salad and bean spouts, and the actual main dish was a good size for a hungry adult. The mains were beautifully presented with the Pork Katsu Don being served in a beautifully ornate Japanese chest box, which not only keep the meal hot, but made it look amazing!

Of course after the mains there was dessert, but being so full from dinner we could only manage one serving of ice cream between us. My spare dessert stomach must of been on holiday. Disappointing I know, but it was well worth the few spoons each.

With the bill at the end of the night coming in at under $70 for two of us including drinks, entrée’s, mains and a dessert, we were pretty pleased. It left us enough change in our pockets to head over to Burswood where we had a flutter on the Roulette table, and after a few hours of fun ended up walking out with enough winnings to cover dinner, our bets and more! Matsuri definitely comes highly recommended as a great place to eat out for a traditional Japanese set menu.

Quokka Rating

DÉCOR:  4 Quokkas out of 5

CUISINE: 4 Quokkas out of 5

AMBIENCE: 4 Quokkas out of 5

EXPERIENCE: 4 Quokkas out of 5

Matsuri Restaurant

Popularity: 6% [?]