Who got the cake? Shit… off to the shops, quick!

He's got a city named after him, his face is on every denomination of bank-note in the country, and 40 years after his death the people in Vietnam still fondly refer to him as "Uncle Ho". Whether you think he's one of the most important people of the last century, or a war-mongering traitor you have to admit that Ho Chi Minh has left a deep imprint on the lives and memories of the Vietnamese people.

It would be his 119th birthday today and for the last few weeks there have been posters and banners everywhere, even if there's not exactly a party atmosphere. You can't escape his beguiling smile and natty beard. You can read a bit more on Ho Chi Minh here, but it is Wikipedia, so most of it is probably made up.

"Were you with a lady last night sir? Did she want it sir? Ooh, suit you!"

After the slightly bonkers few days in Dalat we got to Nha Trang, which is apparently "the third most beautiful bay in the world". Well, we couldn't really tell for the first few days as it pissed down rain. Myself and George did manage to get a game of beach football with some locals, and I scored a nice chip from the halfway line, mainly just 'cause I was too knackered to run with the ball. After the rain cleared up we spent a few days just lounging by the beach and getting dumped around in the massive surf. There was one poor guy in the water wearing a hat (bald) and prescription sunglasses (blind) who got picked up by a huge 6ft wave and dumped, sans hat and shades onto the beach.We had a bit of a search but to no avail. Then the poor bugger lost his watch to another wave, and I think he lost another pair of shades the next day aswell. Poor sod, his missus didn't look too happy, I think he got an earful when she got him off the beach.

From Nha Trang we got a night bus – a very bumpy 12 hours – to Hoi An, which is a really nice old town with Unesco World Heritage Town status. Hoi An is packed with about 200+ tailor's shops, so Elaine and Vicki were in their element. George got a few suits made but I held off, as I don't really need suits – I have one that I've worn twice since I bought it. I eventually gave in and got a few shirts and some linen trousers made, which worked out pretty cheap, cheaper than getting off the peg stuff in H&M or Flopman. Because the place is protected, there's loads of great old buildings and loads of lovely signs and type, which brought out the design nerd in me… George & Vicki left a few days before us, they're off to Hong Kong and then home to Lincoln so we're back to travelling alone again. We'll be stopping in Hué next and then on to Hanoi, so more soon.

As ever, check out the photos on Flickr and leave some comments!

Saigon... shit; I'm still only in Saigon... Every time I think I'm gonna wake up back in Bray.

Actually I'm not in Saigon any more, but I'm also not in Bray, so I know it's not all a dream. We started off in Saigon, or Ho Chi Minh City (or Ho Chi Minger as I like to call it) where we met up with Vicki and George, a couple  we'd met in Malaysia. We spent a few rainy days just shuffling around Saigon, there wasn't much on as it was Reunification Day on the 30th of May, which is when Saigon surrendered to the Viet Cong and North Vietnam in 1975 . There wasn't much celebrating in the defeated and renamed city. Exiled Vietnamese call the day Ngày Quốc hận, which roughly translated means "National Defeat Day" so you can tell why the place wasn't partying. It is a bit mad to see Hammer & Sickle banners and the big, red, Communist flag flying everywhere, but then there are also tonnes of shops and bars which gives the place a slightly surreal Communist-consumer feel.

Seeing as there were no museums or such-like open we decide to go for a massage, which to say was interesting would be doing it a disservice; I had a tiny little Vietnamese lady with barely any English straddle me like horse, walk up and down my back, pummle and pound my back, legs and arms and massage my bare white arse with her toes. I thought it was quite fun, but the other three all felt slightly violated.

After that we headed to Dalat, a mountain town where they grow flowers and coffee mostly. I bought some chon, which is coffee beans that've been shit out by a weasel, which gives it a nice flavour. All four of us went on a tour around the Dalat countryside in a mini-van as the girls didn't want to go with the local motorbike guides called Easy Riders. The problem was, I think, that the people in Vietnam are a lot more in your face than in Cambodia especially about buying things, and we got trailed to our hotel by a group of these Easy Riders looking to get us on their bikes, so they had pissed Elaine off right from the get go. Dalat was a bit mad at first but it was really nice to be up in the mountains away from the heat.

There'll be more on Vietnam soon, leave a few comments on the auld blog and check out the photos on Flickr

With his smiling, beatific face, looking like some kind of bastard love-child of Mr. Miyagi and Colonel Sanders, Ho Chi Minh graces the least valued currency in the world. At time of writing the Vietnamese đồng (VND) is worth about 0.0000421111 VND to the Euro, so 1,000,000 đồng is about €42. Although the Zimbabwean Dollar may have higher denominations of banknotes (the third issuing of the Zimbabwean Dollar had a denomination of Z$100,000,000,000,0000 [that's 100 trillion]) the curreny is suspended until June 2009. Also the Somaliland shilling is of a lower value than the đồng, but Somaliland isn't recognised as a sovereign state so the đồng is the least valued official currency currently in use.

It's a bit crazy to use, and heading to the ATM to take out 4m đồng is a surreal experience. Even the locals knock off a few zeros when they write up a bill for you, but we're living like millionaires! Damn, hell ass millionaires!

Happy Star Wars Day! I hope you're all running around with your lightsabre and trying to do the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs…

Just on another nerdish note, I think I've managed to fix the blog so it'll work properly with other browsers instead of just Firefox. So if your on a Mac or PC you can use Safari, or if you're a poor unfortunate stuck on a PC then you can use Google Chrome or Internet Explorer 8, only the new version though, sorry! And if you are using IE, why? I also optimised the blog for anyone who has an iPhone (that means you Mam) or Blackberry, so you can keep up with all the bloggy goodness wherever you are!

Glayvin!!!

For our last day in Siem Reap, Elaine and I did a cooking course in Le Tigre de Papier, which helps support local kids in the area. We were taken on a tour of the local market to show us how to pick fresh ingredients, then it was back to the kitchen for some serious cooking heat. I made a delicious papaya salad (with one tiny, spicy chilli in it) and amok curry. E made a veggie curry, minus the fish paste and chicken stock, so it was basically water…

We got to take home the recipes we made so everyone's invited to dinner when we get back!

More photos on Flickr

So I'm coming to the end of a month in Cambodia and it's been one of the best places we've been so far. I haven't blogged in a while as I've been too busy enjoying myself! We've probably spent a bit longer than first thought in Cambodia, but it's a great country with loads to see and do. Case in point; Elaine and myself were only supposed to spend about 3 nights in Siem Reap,the jumping off point for visiting Angkor Wat and the other temples, but we ended up staying for 10 days! The temples in Angkor where absolutely amazing, we had a great tuk tuk driver called Mr. Bunna who brought us around for three days to some amazing sights. It was hot and dry and sweaty but it was so worth it. Saying that though, we didn't hit the main biggy of Angkor Wat until late in our second day of touring and by then we had seen temples that were (for me) less crowded and just as interesting to visit, so I was a little underwhelmed by its swarms of Chinese tourists and blocked off areas.

Some of the highlights were getting blessed by a monk, he tied some cord around mine and Elaine's wrist and we thought maybe he was marrying us, but it was just for good luck; being followed down from a hill-top temple by a gaggle of kids whose only English was "you give me 1 dollar!"; seeing the amazing detail and artistry in Banteay Srei and getting a dose of some much needed rain. I liked Angkor so much I cycled in on my own one day and spent the day snooping at the bas reliefs in Ankgor Wat which we had kind of missed the first time and getting looks from the locals at the mad whitey cycling a bike in 40° heat. We also got to see part of Khmer New Year and on our last day in Siem Reap we did a cooking class. Mmmm Khmer curry...

From there we went to Battambang and I got an invite from my moto driver to go to a Khmer wedding, which was insane! All the old guys kept coming over to me and toasting with the hair-on-your chest 7% beer on the tables and I had to do about 20 "bottoms up!", so I was very merry in a short space of time. From there we went to Sihanoukville, which was a bit of a kip really, but it was handy to get our Vietnam visas.

Cambodia has been great, a real mix of experiences, some happy, some horrifying and some surreal, but all very worth it. Also someone leave some comments, I can't tell if anyone is reading this bloody thing!

More photos on Flickr.

We're finally in SE Asia proper, or at least the route trodden by most "backpackers". We decided to start in Cambodia so we could get our Vietnam visa easily, plus it was the cheapest place to fly to from Kuala Lumpur… We're actually playing a bit more fast and loose with our travel plans, as opposed to how certain we were about our itinerary in the States and New Zealand. I suppose it's the fact of getting used to travelling, but I think it's also that we wore ourselves out trying to fit so much into a set amount of time and you can only see so much.

Phnom Penh is a bit of a contradiction, as is most of Cambodia – the people are so friendly, but they also want your money, there's amazing evidence of the glorious Ankgorian era everywhere and also the brutal legacy of Khmer Rouge. It's very odd to walk around a city and not see any people over the age of 50 or so.

During our stay in the capital we went to the Killing Fields and Toul Sleng Genocide Museum, where thousands of people were tortured and killed by the Khmer Rouge. It wasn't sonething you'ld really call a nice day trip, but it's a massive part of the history, society and culture here, so it was warranted. I felt slightly self-concious as a tourist to be walking over mass-graves and looking at the caved in skulls of innocent victims. Our guide was really appreciative that we had taken the time to learn about the history of his country and what happened to so many people, and however emotionally draining the experience was, it was worth it in the end.

in stark contrast to that was the Royal Palace, an improbable mix of Angkorian and French colonial architecture. We sweated buckets walking around but got some breezy relief afterwards in our tuk tuk. Ah the tuk tuk, moto-driven chariot of the Walking ATM (AKA a tourist). It's quite odd to be such a tourist, everyone wants you to buy from them or eat their food, or ride in their tuk tuk, as long as you have the Almighty Dollar handy.

More photos on Flickr

Ah the Pehrentians! After being blissfully cool and mellow in the Cameron Highlands we head up to the east coast for some sun, sea and sand. We met a really nice couple from England, George and Vicki, and because of how late we got onto the Little Island (the other of the island pair is surprisingly called the Big Island) we had to book into a "dorm", which also housed the hotel restaurant's toilets, a load of bed-bugs and quite a few mice. I, of course slept like a log (bar having something small and mouse shaped crawling on my foot at one point) but E was a bit frazzled from a sleepless night, so the next day we moved into a suite in the best hotel on the island!

The islands are really good for snorkelling and diving, so myself and George went on a snorkelling trip around the two islands. I got to swim with a 2m Blacktip reef shark, some amazingly beautiful fish and coral, but the best was when a huge turtle swam about a foot away from me. He'd been eating stuff on the sea floor, then as he came up for air he was right beside me and we swam together for about 100m until he'd had enough and went off into the blue. I'll never forget it and I'm actually kinda glad I didn't have have a camera with me, it's something only I get to remember, and you all have to be jealous!

The rest of the time we spent on the beach playing football or Frisbee, there really wasn;t much else to do. So I am now a deep mahogany colour, which is quite nice.

More photos on Flickr

After the heat and hustle of KL we decided to head for the Cameron Highlands, a region high up in mountains. The bus trip was interesting, a surprising amount of Westerners traveling with their kids (all with mad names like Everest and Calypso, damn hippies) and unsurprisingly one of the kids spewed chocolate ice-cream all over his dad due to the bus bouncing over the twisting mountain roads.

We stayed in a really nice place called Father's Guest House and our rrom had an amazing view out over the hills and valleys around the town. The air was blissfully cool after KL although we did have to put up with a lot of rain, but what are you going to do? When the rain did break we went on a tour of some of the tea plantations and flower and buterfly farms that are dotted through out the hills. The Boh Tea plantation was great as we got to see the tea pickers selecting the best tea leaves – the Boh Selectas! Ho ho… I also got to hold some Leaf frogs and geckos in the Butterfly farm, which were not as slimey as I thought they might be. It's amazing how a frog can evolve to look like a leaf, nature is weird!

We really loved the place and got to meet some nice people – I talked to a guy called Taj from Canada who had been coming to the Camerons for about 15 years, probably to smuggle drugs out (which he told me he'ld been caught doing before and subsequently barred from the US as an "undesirable alien"). Elaine wonders how I get to talk to these people…

More photos on Flickr