Ahhhh......Tet......



We have just gotten past the Tet (or Lunar New Year) holiday here.


Tet is where about 90% of the foreign population begins a mass exodus out of Vietnam....usually to a place where they don't celebrate the Lunar New Year so....uhhh....fervently (e.g. - Korea, The Philippines , Thailand, etc.).


Those of us who are married to Vietnamese remain behind.....like an Allied soldier watching stranded the beach as thee last and final evacuation boat departs Dunkirk......


The Tet ritual generally goes like this - Two days before the Lunar calendar New Year's Day, EVERYTHING and ANYTHING closes down! This includes major supermarkets as well as the old lady next door who sells groceries out of her living room. Thusly, in the week before Tet, supermarkets are jammed and prices escalate markedly (and they usually don't retreat back down after Tet either).


The MAJOR supermarkets, electronics stores and other large institutions GENERALLY open back up about four days after the Lunar New Year’s Day……whereas all of the smaller shops (about 90% of retail and services in Vietnam) generally open “…..when they feel that it is a lucky day for them to do so” from what my wife tells me.


This can be anywhere from the day AFTER Tet to a couple weeks later…….depending on what the Fortune Teller has told the owner of the specific shop in question.


Given that the Vietnamese have soooo few public holidays (like, maybe three or four) during the rest of the year, this kinda makes up for it!


You just basically PRAY that shit like your computer, your hot water heater, your fridge, etc. etc. does NOT decide that Tet would be a great time for it to also go and take some time off…..


And you’d also best have a skooter at your disposal, because, during Tet, taxis have developed a holiday tradition of A) – Generally being nowhere to be found and B) – putting a bag over the meter, sorta like giving the taxi meter its own personal Tet Holiday time offa work……which then results in the taxi driver quoting you a rate of about four times the cost of what the meter would say to your destination.


Ahhhh…..Tet…..


Anyways, my Tet this year revolved around taking several hours outta the day and riding around with Tam, Emily and Tam’s parents and visiting every known relative and friend within a five mile radius around the city of Hai Phong. I had asked why these folks just don’t come and visit us, and my wife said something about how they are the most junior in the family hierarchy….so it is we who must go around and do all of the visiting.


Now, this entire visiting thing is NEVER actually arranged in ANY manner whatsoever! Nobody calls anybody….people just kinda flit from relative’s house to relative’s house and half the time, there is nobody at home. Since they do not have voice mail on their landlines or cell fones here, no messages can be left and nothing is organized. A 60% success ratio of finding relatives at home is generally considered a good job on your part.


So, on the forth day of Tet, a couple Vietnamese friends of mine and a couple Tay and Viet-Kieu friends and myself all decided to accept an invite from my friend Anthony's girlfriend Van for a couple fun days on Cat Ba Isalnd.  So we piled onto a JetFoil and took the hour ride to the island. 


As far as places to escape from Hai Phong go, Cat Ba Island is one of my favourites!  It's not two hours on a skooter or three on a bus or train (like Hanoi or Bai Chay are).....it has decent Tay food and decent beaches that are clean and are not overrun by hookers and hawkers (like Do Son).  It has enough services in the main town (Cat Ba Town - the town the boat is approaching in the third pic below) and the island has a beautiful interior that is easily accessible by using a rented skooter.  And it was ESPECIALLY nice being Tet and that the island was almost deserted!  


Fun, quick yet relaxing boat ride from Cang Ben Binh (Hai Phong passenger port)....

....into Cat Ba Town, where a minibus was waiting for us at the port to take us to Van's house for an amazing seafood luncheon....

Followed by off-road skooter riding to do a bit of hiking in Cat Ba National Park.....

Van doing a balance beam act......

Hien and her son Cong on top of a rock formation.... 

A painful earthen stairwell that took us to the highest elevation on the island

I haf noooo idea WHERE these deer came from.  Did not know that they were indigenous to Cat Ba Isalnd...

We call this "Dogwood".....

All was good, though, because none of us violated regulation number 3.....nobody in our party attempted to make any changes to the exiting landscape.....now the ENTERING landscape, well, THAT was another story.....but the exiting landscape, we left it alone and allowed it to leaf freely.....

So, the next day....we woke up in our hotel in Cat Ba Town and I grabbed a cheese omelette for breakfast....

....and after my dish was delivered to me, I was waiting for Leslie Nielsen to walk out and rip out a line straight from "Airplane!"

....and then, we hired a private a tour boat (no, NOT the one that sank eight days later) for, like, 700,000 Dong (or thirty-five bucks) to cruise around Ha Long Bay forra few hours with a stop at Monkey Island.

First stopped off at a fish farm house (they're these tiny houses that float on the Bay that people live in with tanks surrounded by fine mesh netting where they raise fish) to grab some lunch to cook up.  All seemed to be well until they saw ole' round eyes....then the price magically went up to 600,000 Dong for a four-pound fish (it wouldn't even cost that much PREPARED at a nice seafood restaurant)....so we went on and decided to eat after the tour.

....and who said that the Vietnamese don't know how to multi-task?  I'd say cuddling your child whilst rowing your boat with your feet and waving at tourists is a pretty Goddamm good example of multi-taksing, if ya ask me......

"LOOK, Ba....Tây on a boat!"

.....and then.....some of them DON'T multi-task....

ALWAYS good to have the guy piloting your ship taking a nap whilst your ship is somewhere in the middle of Halong Bay......think I can now see HOW and WHY that boat sank last month.....

Then we headed off towards Monkey Island....

.....this is where shit got weird.....

We got off the boat at Monkey Island and we walked around the beach and looked around a bit.  

Apparently, it's some sort of nature reserve that isn't supported by ALL of Vietnam.....

I couldn't really shoot a pic of this sign with one hand, so I put my beer down on a flat rock and snapped a pic of this sign.

And I turn around, and....WHAT THE FUCK????!!!???

Jesus....THAT freaked me out!  Well, at least it wasn't good beer....

Then, I hear a shout from down the beach a few hundred feet where my friends had gone, and apparently, one monkey jumped from a tree and, on the way down, grabbed a can of Coca-Cola straight from the hand of my friend Suzanne and shared it with his offspring..... 

...well, the amusement ended shortly thereafter, when Hien's young son, Cong, and our friend Van, started teasing the monkeys.....

....this was not a wise move as they both got attacked and bitten.....

Van got gouged in the thigh, and Cong got bitten in the foot.  Needless to say, the boat ride back to Cat Ba Island was quite tense.....I mean, most of us had seen the first ten minutes of the film "28 Days Later", so we kept a close eye on them.....

They turned out allright, though....couple shots....no rabies....no tetanus.....but still, it was freaky.

Back to teaching....Tet is done.....

....more soon!

-E-