New country, new haircut!

Well, the heading says it best. Tomorrow, I'm heading into Cambodia early in the morning. And, being its been over a month since my "new look", I thought I needed a fresh shave to rid myself of the "shaggy" look I was developing.... It's been hot the last few days, and that was motivation enough to get shaved one more time before this trip winds down. Maybe I should be thinking ahead of the weather that I'll be returning home to instead???

Recapping the past few days.....

Sunday was my last day in Saigon. Since I had done the basic touristy activities, I didn't really feel like I had a true grip on the city and its people. Being a city of 8 million that was made up of over 4 million motorbikes....what better way to be a local than to take part in the traffic chaos? I'll say this: the only thing scarier than crossing through the traffic was DRIVING in it. I wandered off on my two-wheeler in hopes of getting a glimpse of some of the real people that made the city what it is today.

After about 45 mins of cruising in one direction, without the aid of a map, I crossed the Saigon river and stopped for some shots on the riverside. I noticed some kids playing on the sidewalk, so I grabbed a soft drink from a street vendor and had a seat to watch. It became apparent I was far outside the "backpacker area" of the city because the kids all ran over and greeted with a friendly hello. They knew little more English than the greeting, but we managed to spend an hour playing around, taking pictures, and interacting. The mother, communicating with her hands (knowing no English), apparently was even trying to line me up with her daughter. Yeah, imagine how she tried to communicate that to me with her hands....talk about an interesting conversation! The kids were great, but eventually I had to head back toward my hotel for fear of what may happen to my sense of direction once darkness set in....

Tonight (Tuesday), I just arrived in the Vietnam/Cambodia border town of Chau Doc, Vietnam. This completed the two-day tour of the Mekong Delta area that comprised yesterday and today. I never imagined the Delta area to be as massive as it was.... The network of canals and river channels that made up the region offered a spitting image of Venice, only this place would make Venice look like a tiny speck on the map.

The images of this area seen during wartime, however, are far different than what is seen today. It's certainly becoming a very commercial and bustling region--large billboards along portions of the river, new and colorful multi-story hotels within the island cities, and many new bridges mid-construction that will tie together lands otherwise separated by the waters.

Over the course of the tour, we visited a cocunut and coconut candy farm, a riverside shop where rice noodles are made, a floating market where locals exchange produce and other goods, and I even managed to get my hands on a snake (see image below). The highlight was definitely the overnight homestay, however, where 8 of us opted to pay a bit extra to have the chance to eat a Vietnamese dinner with a local family and stay in the riverside bungalows they built for such company. It was nearly a 45-minute boat trip from the hotel where the other tour-goers stayed, so we certainly had the chance to slow down and get away from the newer, more commerical parts of the region. Being just a few feet off one of the Mekong inlets, the sounds of geccos, mosquitos, and other Mekong creatures were quite soothing to fall asleep to....and the local people we had the opportunity to interact with at the market at 6:00am this morning certainly provided a more local feel for the area.

I'll leave you with a few photos: the kids of Saigon, and the images of the Mekong. Enjoy, this is my last post from Vietnam...to Cambodia!

Cole Train

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#1-4......Faces of Saigon
#5..........Little old man on the Mekong who was making bamboo baskets
#6..........Woman rowing her way to the morning markets on the Mekong
#7..........A shot of our bungalow balconies looking over the canal
#8..........Sunset from our ferry on the Mekong
#9..........Cooking up some spring rolls at our homestay
#10..........Sunrise the next morning from the bungalow
#11.........Drinking fresh coconut water on the tour
#12.........The process of making rice noodles
#13.........One of my many little gecco friends
#14.........Me and my python