Hoi An

Hoi An (in the middle of coastal Vietnam) was simply stunning. Relaxed,historic,great food and very romantic. Plus full of amazing + cheap taylors.Needless to say we got several pairs of trousers and a jacket made up. I could have stayed longer than the 4 days we did.
Only downer was watching Arsenal get beaten. Still we were in a beautiful old wooden bar with top tunes, dancing travellers and great company ....which of course is better than the usual lonely and sticky pubs I ve watched many an Arsenal defeat in at home.

Vietnam

We arrived in Ho Chi Min City (Saigon is what everyone actually still calls it though) after a harsh 13 hour bus ride from Cambodia. It was very clear straight away that Vietnam is much more developed and richer than Cambodia and the women have a very determined sense of chic... which includes a surgical style facemask. Yes indeed they all seem to want white skin so badly that the sun is kept off their faces by these fashionable and colourful masks - its very bizarre to see !
We went to the War Museum and I learnt how terrible Agent Orange was, and how brutal the after effects are, amongst lots of other grizzly facts about what they call, the American War. After that we needed a drink and of course Lizzy was just about able to remember where the best Cocktail Bar in town was - on top of a roof terrace of a posh hotel over looking the city called Saigon Saigon.Nice. I must also mention that the number of mopeds has to be seen to be believed - crazy and not a little scary when you're amongst it !

Next up was the picturesque hill station of Dalat.Up in the mountains and rather colder than we had been used to, this charming place is a bit like the Alps in Spring. We couldn't resist the Easy Rdiers Bike Tour of the area and spent a wonderful day learning about the countryside's ways and sights with Jean and Ting our lovely guides. We saw silk worms making silk and then the factory where the people finish the job. We visited flower farms , coffee plantations , a huge Pagaoda (a Buddist Temple) and learnt so much about Vietnam, its history and culture on our trip on the back of these mean machines with these incredibly gentle and warm hosts.

Kampot and Kep

We went to the South coast in Cambodia for several wonderful days and were lucky enough to sample the famous Kep Crab from the Crab Market as well as explore the very chilled Kampot.I think that Cambodia is one of the most incredible places we have been (which is not what I was expecting) - the people are SO much fun, the history is tragic and its so poor ....but nonetheless very inspiring. We also met some wonderful people and it was really nice being in a nice group of fellow travellers again - this part of the world has been much more sociable for us than most of Indonesia! Amongst these we met lovely couple - a Arsenal fan called Jeremy (!) from new Zealand via London and his girlfriend Helen.

Obama !

OBAMA ! We watched the incredible scenes on CNN this morning (we are in Kampot, on the coast of Cambodia) and I must admit to shedding a joyful tear or three. Let"s hope the optomism is well founded - but to be honest it simply couldnt be any worse than what Bush has put us through. But for Cambodians it seems to have little significance as it may not affect their daily lives - especially in this one-party country.

Malaysia,Cambodian Temples and Pol Pot

Í' m a bit behind with this blog so please forgive me not posting anything about our 4 day return to Malaysia - this time the Peninsular part.In a nutshell .... Melaka was great with nice Portuguese colonial buildings (similar to Cochin in India) and KL wasn't so interesting although the Petronus Towers were very impressive indeed. I ll post some pictures soon.










We are in Cambodia at the moment. The temples of Angkor Wat were incredible - absolutely stunning. The area is vast and on the 3rd day of temple hunting we drove for over an hour from Siem Reap to see a very cool one with some really magic carvings. The more famous temples such as Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom are very nice too plus the one they filmed Tomb Raider 1 in - Ta Promh. The jungle has grown into the temple and its very atmospheric!

We had some good party action at the Angkor What? Bar(oh what a pun!) on Halloween. Siem Reap is lots of fun with party action, bars and great food in a small area. But the very harsh realities of Cambodia are never far away...









The history is terribly depressing - we went to Pol Pot"s torture chambers today in the capital Phnom Penh and then to the Killing Fields. Everywhere in both cities there are amputees from landmines begging- its heartbreaking and often they are teenagers. Incredibly despite all that the people are very charming indeed - the nicest we have met anywhere, I think. They smile and laugh and are lots of fun. There are very few older people - Pol Pot killed about 2 million people 1975-1979 so the Cambodian population is very young.

Lizzy and I have sponsored a Education Youth Project for Street Kids by buying a brick for the building here in Phnom Penh. Read about it here if you can.......

http://www.friends-international.org/projects.html#mithsamlanh
http://www.friends-international.org/BuyBrickOnline.html