A visit to the head office of the Commonwealth Bank gave me no joy. I had wanted to change Dong to US Dollars by a wave of the magic bankers wand but found out the only way to do it was to withdraw Dong from an ATM and bring it to the bank with my passport. Useless in the end as the hotel accepted payment in Dong anyway. Cash is the preferred currency here so who can blame them. All the people who trade in the street have a big wad of money in their shirt pocket or trousers and its common to see them counting their big wads.
Made my last visit to the dentist and received my shiny new choppers which are a work of art and very comfortable . Back home and a bit of fancy footwork and I booked a place in Hanoi and booked a flight. I leave 3pm tomorrow and am going to the Tu Linh Palace hotel on the recommendation of Thanh. A bit sad to see Thanh, Khangx, Mun and Mister Mister for a while. My stay here has been very comfortable and the staff so helpful it's been a pleasure. Good to meet Montreal Johnny too. 
We went out for drinks tonight and met another bright spark, Danny from London who works in the middle east doing concreting work. Sure are some fascinating characters in this town.
The pictures today are of the back street behind the main street, you walk along there and look into the back rooms of houses and businesses and even though its only a couple of metres wide there are signs everywhere advertising rooms. Some of the living rooms of the houses are selling drinks so when you walk past the family is sitting there watching TV and there is a little bar in the doorway with bottles of drinks for sale.
The state controlled TV is what you'd expect, lots of soaps and B grade movies which are in English but have voiceovers in Vietnamese. The voiceovers are done by either men or women and they do every characters voice in the same monotone. There seems to be no leeway in catering for western tastes in TV, it's strictly for the Vietnamese.
Sleepless night last night so I'm off the air. See you in Hanoi.