Haiphong

The bus ride from Mong Cai to Haihpong takes about six hours and first goes through some picturesque scenery—rice fields, tea trees on hillsides, jungle in the distance, farmers homes—and then passes through an industrial town black from coal dust. The scenery improves, however, when a bay comes into view on the left.

The bus stops at a very crowded ferry landing. You will have to get out of the bus, buy a ticket for 500 dong, and then get back on the bus when it is on the ferry. Try to keep in mind where your bus is and to get on the same ferry, as there are several ferries running back and forth and swarms of people walking and on motorbikes. It’s easy to get lost in the crowd. If you don’t get on the right ferry, you’ll meet up with your bus on the other side.

The ride from the ferry into Haiphong is about forty-five minutes and passes some resort hotels just past the ferry landing before the land becomes more familiar—rice fields and duck farms. The Haiphong bus station is in town, not far from Dien Bien Phu, where there are some hotels. If you want to walk from the station to a hotel, you can manage it. If you take a taxi, make the driver put on the meter. The charge shouldn’t be more than 15,000, if that. To walk, just go back the way the bus came and you’ll come to a circular; stay to the left around it, and Dien Bien Phu is the street on the opposite side. Turn left on it, and in two or three hundred meters you’ll come to some hotels which look expensive. The one I stayed at, however, Kim Thanh, had a great room on the 5th floor, room 502, for 165,000. There is no elevator, but if you don’t mind the hike you will be away from the street noise, on a floor that overlooks the rooftops, and feel like you are in a penthouse. There is only one other room on this floor, and it probably won’t be occupied. The fifth floor is where the maids do laundry and give offerings before a Buddhist altar. (Kim Thanh Hotel 67 Dien Bien Phu. Tel: 031.745264; email: kimthanhhotel@vnn.vn.)

To get to some good restaurants, turn right when you leave the hotel, then right again at the first corner, and continue on to a park, which is a walk of a few blocks. If you cross the street through the park, then turn right you’ll see some hawker stalls, where you can eat and have a glass of draught beer, total cost about 30,000 dong. If you want to eat at a restaurant, don’t cross through the park, but turn right before the park, keeping the park on your left, and you’ll come to some seafood restaurants which have fish, shrimp, and crabs in aquariums. A crab dinner will set you back as much as the hotel room. Price is determined by weight. On your way to the restaurants, you might have noticed an Internet café just around the corner from the hotel which has a wireless connection, free with a drink. Mango juice is 18,000.

A word about Cat Ba Island and Halong Bay, major tourist destinations. According to an English language newspaper, almost 1.5 million tourists go there a year. I went there one day, taking a slow ferry, which is cheaper and more enjoyable, because a person can go out on the deck, even sit on the bow, thinking I would return to Haiphong the same day, but I got stuck on the island because the high speed ferry, which I had planned to return on, departs from a different location. Cat Ba is a great place if you want to be around drunks, screaming kids, western tourists, or want a “massage.” My hotel room cost twice as much as the one I had in Haiphong and it was a dump. I knew I didn’t want to stay on this island more than an hour when I saw a restaurant advertising spaghetti and pasta, with only westerners reading a Lonely Planet book out front. But I was stuck on this Island from Hell. I got the next ferry back to Haiphong at 5:40.

About the only thing of interest to me on the island happened after I arrived when, while having an iced coffee on the sidewalk outside the Blue Note Bar, I watched a woman across the street slit the throats of two chickens. The way it is done is like this—first pluck the feathers from a section of the neck while holding the bird by the feet with one hand and by the throat with the fingers of the other; next, while continuing to hold the chicken by the legs, bend back the neck with the same hand that is holding a knife and draw the knife across the plucked section, severing an artery; allow the blood to flow freely into a bowl you have placed on the ground. The bird will kick a little for twenty or thirty seconds before submitting to its fate. To aid in its plucking, put the deceased bird in a large bowl and pour hot water over it. Be sure the water is not too hot to cook the meat. Establish a plucking pattern, top to bottom or bottom to top.