I went fishing today. It's not something I'd ever tried before, for a couple of reasons (short attention span, no friends) but I had a chance to take my sons fishing and they were keen to try, so we got up early and went out on the river by Hoi An, with anther father and son, a guide and a cheerful boatman with leathery skin and bright yellow teeth who at first glance appeared ancient but was probably about my age (which varies, of course, as some of you know).
We motored out along the river into the estuary, cast anchor, then the guide and the boatman baited our hooks and showed us how to cast. I got my line into the water, then, predictably, after about a minute could feel myself getting restless. What happens now, I asked, and the response was that just sit there for a couple of hours and maybe we'll get a fish. It reminded me of why I've never been keen to go fishing. I have acquaintances who do it, and they always say that the whole point of it is precisely that it's so boring. It gives you an excuse to do nothing, that sort of thing.
This is just plain ridiculous. I don't need an excuse to do nothing; I'm already very good at it. And if I'm going to spend some time doing nothing I'm much more likely to do it in on my couch with a magazine and the tv on, rather than on a small smelly boat halfway up the Hoi estuary on a hot sunday morning.
We didn't get any fish either, but that's not the point.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Friday, March 28, 2008
I'm finding it very hard to log on to this site (ozsleepy.blogspot.com) from Vietnam, and I'm wondering whether it's because there's something wrong with the site (which is unlikely, it's run by google), or whether... the government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam doesn't like its citizens reading blogs. Sure, I were running a Leninist political system (which, luckily for you, I'm not) I wouldn't let people read stuff that might destabilise the regime, but this blog? Funny signs, food, oblique references to my complex private life?
We're in Hue, which is nice and quiet after Hanoi but - because we've come from Hanoi - seems a bit underdone. Yesterday we all got on motobikes (as passengers) and went off to see a whole bunch of tombs and whatnot. Aparently when you do this the manly way is to hang on to the back of the motorbike, hands behind you. The alternative is to wrap your arms around the rider, but I get the impression that that's a bit girly. The other Dads (we are three families traveling together) did it the manly way. But because I'd already showed my colors as a complete coward by being unable to jump off the roof of the boat a couple of days earlier I figured I had nothing to lose, so I did the wrap-around one. They're not sure what to make of me. I eat a lot, I'm not physically brave, I'm good with numbers and I can give the stock market run-down every morning.
The hotel in Hue has this interesting feature where the two machines that have internet access are in a little corridor off the lobby (a stout frenchman shouted at me here yesterday because my sons were using both machines). The corridor must be above a stagnant pond because sitting here means being attacked by mosquitoes. Perhaps this is a way of rationing the time? I remind myself that Malaria's rare this close to the coast.
In the Army Museum in Hanoi there's quite a bit of stuff about Dien Ben Phu, including a picture, which is, according to the caption, 10,000 french soldiers surrendering. Which gave me a bit of a giggle in a how-many-men-does-it-take-to-defend-Paris sort of way.
(Answer: Noone knows, they've never tried.)
We're in Hue, which is nice and quiet after Hanoi but - because we've come from Hanoi - seems a bit underdone. Yesterday we all got on motobikes (as passengers) and went off to see a whole bunch of tombs and whatnot. Aparently when you do this the manly way is to hang on to the back of the motorbike, hands behind you. The alternative is to wrap your arms around the rider, but I get the impression that that's a bit girly. The other Dads (we are three families traveling together) did it the manly way. But because I'd already showed my colors as a complete coward by being unable to jump off the roof of the boat a couple of days earlier I figured I had nothing to lose, so I did the wrap-around one. They're not sure what to make of me. I eat a lot, I'm not physically brave, I'm good with numbers and I can give the stock market run-down every morning.
The hotel in Hue has this interesting feature where the two machines that have internet access are in a little corridor off the lobby (a stout frenchman shouted at me here yesterday because my sons were using both machines). The corridor must be above a stagnant pond because sitting here means being attacked by mosquitoes. Perhaps this is a way of rationing the time? I remind myself that Malaria's rare this close to the coast.
In the Army Museum in Hanoi there's quite a bit of stuff about Dien Ben Phu, including a picture, which is, according to the caption, 10,000 french soldiers surrendering. Which gave me a bit of a giggle in a how-many-men-does-it-take-to-defend-Paris sort of way.
(Answer: Noone knows, they've never tried.)
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Phone
I didn't bring my usual phone with me to Vietnam; instead I have my old Nokia. First night I was here, in a fit of boredom, I went through all the old text messages on the phone. It's a little time capsule, my social life preserved in minute detail.
Most of the messages were from around a year ago, Easter least year, when I was having an awful time in Melbourne and then ended up meeting A. Who, strangely enough, I got a text from today.
It's like that fun thing at work when they give you a phone that used to belong to someone else and the first thing you do - or should do - is to go through it and scour all the text messages saved on the phone for incriminating detail. I learned to text this way - when I started a new job in Singapore in 2001 I was given a phone that had belonged to someone else, and it turned out that despite being married he had carried on a fairly hectic social life, most of which was organised via text messages. As the new holder of the phone I ended up getting the messages (but not his social life). I learned how to text people back.
A year or so later I met him when I was on a business trip to London. I told him I'd inherited his phone and that I'd received lots of interesting messages. He went pale.
Most of the messages were from around a year ago, Easter least year, when I was having an awful time in Melbourne and then ended up meeting A. Who, strangely enough, I got a text from today.
It's like that fun thing at work when they give you a phone that used to belong to someone else and the first thing you do - or should do - is to go through it and scour all the text messages saved on the phone for incriminating detail. I learned to text this way - when I started a new job in Singapore in 2001 I was given a phone that had belonged to someone else, and it turned out that despite being married he had carried on a fairly hectic social life, most of which was organised via text messages. As the new holder of the phone I ended up getting the messages (but not his social life). I learned how to text people back.
A year or so later I met him when I was on a business trip to London. I told him I'd inherited his phone and that I'd received lots of interesting messages. He went pale.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Vn
The first morning we were in Hanoi we were at the top of the lake, by the Old Quarter, and we were approached by 4 shy young women, who explained in halting but well-structured english that they were university students, and that as part of a class project they had to approach foreigers in the street and ask them questions. Fair enough, I thought, after a split-second of scepticism. (It's Hanoi, not Bangkok. And even if was a scam I couldn't see how they'd work it, and most of those things rely on people being too polite to say 'no'. I don't have that problem.)
They produced a tape recorder and asked us where we were from, how old the boys were, how long we'd been in Vietnam (about 12 hours at thgat point), what we liked and what we didn't like. It was quite fun, and predictably, I liked the attention. But in case anyone from the Vietnamese government is montoring this, here's my two suggestions for making Vietnam better:
1) stop all the racket
2) get some decent coffee
Other than that, I think it's great here.
They produced a tape recorder and asked us where we were from, how old the boys were, how long we'd been in Vietnam (about 12 hours at thgat point), what we liked and what we didn't like. It was quite fun, and predictably, I liked the attention. But in case anyone from the Vietnamese government is montoring this, here's my two suggestions for making Vietnam better:
1) stop all the racket
2) get some decent coffee
Other than that, I think it's great here.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Culture Shock, Hanoi
We had a moment of profound heart-in-mouth culture shock yesterday in Hanoi. We went down to breakfast yesterday in our hotel, and as we were busy chowing down on our rice porridge and noodles, I noticed to my horror that the people at the next table (Spanish? French?) were enjoying a leisurely cigarette. In a confined space. At 7am.
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