The noise, the noise

Sunday, September 25, 2011
Hoi An, Vietnam
Another rainy day in Hoi An. Marley and Sally booked into an upper level place called, wait for it, the Hoi An hotel. Very nice place on the Tran Hung Dao road. Walked over to sis place and met them at Dao Tien cafe which is run by a farmer from up near the Murray. Maybe I mentioned him in an earlier blog. Before I met Raine and Ron I walked down a few alleys near the river and took some shots. Indescribably beautiful place. Earlier when I was walking past the market to sisters place a woman, Tam, sprang out and asked me if I wanted my ears cleaned. I had actually been thinking about this as there are often signs proffering this very thing. I said yes so she left a young child in charge of the shoe store and took me up a gritty alleyway to her base which was basically a box in a wall.

Cleaning the ears turned out to be removing all the hair from my ears and she was very thorough I must say . She used a double line of cotton twisted in some way to catch the hair and rip it out. Then to get to the innermost recesses she used tweezers. As she did this we talked about our families and life and she told me about her brother who was killed by the Americans. He was a VC soldier. While she was telling me this she was doing shooting motions and making bullet noises. She was about 10 when the war was on. Her other brother suffered some war related injury as well and needs an operation which he cant afford. Her husband is a builder as are her two sons and they earn abour $125 a week. One of them still goes to school and this costs a great deal for just one day a week. I asked her as it was a Communist country why isnt it free. She shrugged.
Of course she talked me into more and I enjoyed a foot massage as well and it was so good. My feet are sore and my ankles swollen from all the walking.
Back to Raine and Ron. We were sitting at a cafe and I went for a stroll down the street to look for a new hotel to stay at when two women popped out of a shop and enticed me in. Strange that you can walk past dozens of shops with people constantly asking you to buy and all of a sudden you weaken. I needed to buy some presents for people so perhaps my defenses were down a bit. By the time I walked out I had 6 silk scarves, a bowl and plate and chopsticks, 2 seperate bowls, some presents for my granddaughter Tilly, a flowery pair of shorts for her, a Vietnam top, an iPho Tshirt, and a pair of crepe (I guess) harem type trousers . Who knows if I did good.

Back to the hotel and we all piled into a taxi for the Blue Wave out Cua Dai road. Beautiful lunch with Marcus and Lynne, sis and Ron and Barb. Back to town and called on Sal and Marl to get some money and then cyclo back to my place. Oh yes, a few days ago I asked the concierge to order a cyclo, he couldnt understand me. Cyclo, you know a bike I said, with a passenger in front... "Oh a Cyclo", yes I said a Cyclo. And I did pronounce it Sicklo.

Out again at 5.30 to Mango Mango which is just up the street from me. We sat upstairs at the balcony and looked out over the river and drank $2 cocktails. The staff numbered nine and as we didnt eat they stood around like stunned mullets. Its quite usual for the staff to outnumber the patrons I have noticed.
Just a short note on tooting. All vehicles use their horns quite a bit here and at first I couldnt understand it, coming as I do from a country town where its a rarity. The rationale behind it is this...for cars one honk means lookout I'm behind you and coming up fast, next honk means move over. This is for passing moto's and bikes. Sometimes its meant for someone coming towards you who is going to turn into your path, it means, here I am don't turn yet.
Cars passing cars--the first honk is, watch out I'm behind you , move over so I can pass, second honk, you haven't moved over yet, 3rd honk lookout I'm passing anyway, next honk I've almost passed and I'm going to cut in front of you as there is a huge truck bearing down.

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