Hey everyone. It's "the aviator." After a couple years of silence, I'm finally breaking into the blogosphere, and in the best way I know how--writing a travelog of our most recent adventure.
I must first disclaim that blogging has not been of keen interest to me. I think after seeing Julie and Julia actually the entire idea of a blog seemed--to put it mildly--not interesting to me. But alas, I love to write, and indeed this isn't just "Current Caitlin" but an account of our family's adventures of which I am of course a part.
So then, we went to Singapore, Vietnam, and Cambodia. What an adventure. It actually started with only a shell plan and nothing solidified until the day we left thanks to another new adventure to us, space-a travel. For the uninitiated, basically the military has flights going all over the world all the time and they have seats on a space available basis. This particular one went to Singapore from where we would pop up and over to Vietnam and Cambodia--free. I think this is the best deal going in the military today, hands down. It's not bad that we literally walked across the street from our house to the terminal and boarded a flight. I rather like it, actually, as it adds an unusual layer of excitement on the trip you're about to take--not knowing where you're going until the morning of!
I knew it would be balmy in Singapore but I didn't know that it was essentially a stone's throw from the Equator. Steamy would be a more apt description--and we went in November! I had heard amazing things about this tiny little city-state, and we were both very excited to see its cleanliness and lavishness. But perhaps living in Tokyo for a year and a half has ruined the appeal of cities for me, for I couldn't see past the street after street of shopping malls, restaurants, shopping malls, and restaurants. Amazing. But not really. I think the very basis of my excitement for traveling is to see things, not to shop. I like to experience the culture, not some sort of blend of Malay & Chinese who are hardly either anymore, and are instead similar enough to Americans that you might forget where you are if you weren't in a car. I travel to broaden my horizons, and certainly not to go to Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf for my morning coffee and TGI Friday's for lunch.
Imagine, then, my excitement to hit Vietnam. Having watched the Vietnam special on Top Gear about hundred times, I was just so eager to see what it had to offer us. And although we wouldn't be traveling south to north on scooters, it would nevertheless be an otherworldly experience I was sure--and it was.
We hit Hanoi first. I expected an explosion of scooters on the streets that descended on every intersection in mass chaos, and it was all that and so much more. But you get used to it, I think? The city itself was remarkable, though, with still a hint of French influence and great culture besides. Really the only thing I wanted to do in Hanoi was see the Hanoi Hilton and do a day trip to Ha Long Bay. The Hanoi Hilton was a total propaganda piece. Amazing, really, that they're still so good at it all these years later. Indeed, it was originally a French prison for Vietnamese dissidents and the former was quite nasty to the latter, but it is most famous for its "housing" of American POWs during the Vietnam War. But rather than acknowledge their awful treatment which the world knows to be true, they portray the POWs as though their near decade long imprisonment was a vacation with pictures of them smiling and having a great time while playing basketball, enjoying thanksgiving dinner, and even receiving presents from Santa on Christmas. I know the U.S. may somewhat begrudgingly admit to its more unsavory history vis a vis the Indian removal and slavery, but at least we own up to it. Vietnam still boldly proclaims that they adhered to all of the Geneva Conventions during the war. I say bull crap.
On a lighter note, we day tripped to Ha Long Bay, which is absolutely deserving of its new status as one of the seven wonders of the world (but the Grand Canyon should have stayed). We went on a perfect day, perfectly clear yet misty enough to provide some drama to the whole thing. It was just breathtaking being out among those multitudinous limestone formations and caves. Suffice it to say, it is a must-see. I couldn't help but notice that on the way back on the bus, there were a total of 7 languages being spoken--Japanese, Vietnamese, French, Finnish, Chinese, and Slovakian, but nearly everyone spoke at least conversational English. I bet the French hate that. And as an unilingual American, I hate it too.
Jetting to Da Nang, we were expecting beachfront paradise but instead only got the three worst weather days of the trip, a beautiful, cavernous but essentially deserted hotel, and a lot of money spent on some questionably fashionable tailor-made clothes. We got accustomed to the hotel but spent our days in Hoi An, the Saville Row of Vietnam, so says Jeremy Clarkson. Copeland travel tip--blow off Da Nang proper and stay at one of the many beautiful Hoi An resorts and enjoy what might be the only tourist town in Vietnam that eschews the brand new high rise buildings and by city ordinance keeps the French colonial influence throughout. And be a bit more choosy in your tailor.
Vietnam was in the end simply wonderful. I arrived full of speculation about the goodness of the people having read all the possible scams that have been pulled on tourists but they proved otherwise. We only encountered wonderful hospitality, and enormous grace when we were not doing somewhat as the Romans. We would go back, maybe even before we leave Japan.
Cambodia, however, was an altogether different experience. We went to see one thing--Angkor Wat. And it was well worth the effort. We actually experienced warmer hospitality and less invasiveness regarding Miles (I think he might lose it if he hears clucking and another Chinese or Vietnamese woman moving toward him), but despite the marvelous temples in the Angkor complex, the absolute destitution of the entire country, even in the most touristy of cities like Siem Reap, sort of weighed heavy on us for our entire visit. It was most pronounced on our bus ride (not recommended, even if it was only $22 total) to Phnom Penh, where we were traveling between this country's two largest cities on roads that were not paved in parts and never more than two lanes, passing tiny farm towns with naked kids scurrying about and literal one-room shanties that housed what I presumed were families of four, six, ten? Who knows. It was eye opening, but still beautiful somehow.
The truth is we only went to Phnom Penh to save on a plane ticket back to Singapore. It was missable, and the only touristy thing we did was visit the Killing Fields and S21, the places where the Khmer Rouge killed tens of thousands of Cambodians during their brief, misguided reign of terror (and idiocy). I'll simply say that a very tall stupa full to the top with human skulls surrounded by mass graves and bone and clothing fragments still strewn about is incredibly sobering indeed. How do things like this happen? Maybe we'll never know, but at least we can PLEASE try to stop it if it ever starts again. By the end of these two weeks, however, we were fairly worn out on poverty all around us, and I think feeling fairly guilty that we were spending on one night in a hotel what the average Cambodian makes in two months. I guess we would go back to Cambodia, but next time not as tourists but as a relief workers or something. It's just hard to be a tourist in that country.
That rounds out that adventure. When we arrived home, again we walked across the street to our silly mutts who were oh so excited to see us.
Pictures on Facebook.
