Visiting Old Friends and Enjoying The Bush

Oh hello there, this is Isabel. She is one of 12 kangaroos that lives out here in the bush with us and the friendliest but occasionally her family will stop in to say hello. We have gotten to know her quite well over the past few days here a few hours outside of Perth. We are staying with a friend of Michele's and her family while we adjust to a new continent and prepare for a long journey into the outback.

Everything here is so different from Vermont! Not necessarily the people or lifestyle, but all the landscape and wildlife. I don't think I could recognize 1 species of plant or animal. Obviously there are the kangaroos but also unique birds, lizards and trees. For instance the grass tree. It starts as a tuft of grass but as the grass dies it compresses into a brown stump from the top of which more grass sprouts. It might take a few 100 years but they can get pretty tall!
I would compare the climate to that of the American Southwest. The mornings are cool but as the sun gets higher in the sky temperatures soar. And unlike Asia it is pleasant dry heat- not humid.

Our new Holden Frontera, complete with livin' the dream decals

A few days ago we made another big step towards our departure for our road trip- we bought a car.
It's a 4 wheel drive so that will be handy if we ever need to take some adventurous detours! The next week in Perth we will be outfitting ourselves with all the equipment we will need to be self sufficient in the desert.
Stay tuned!

Nick and Isabel during one of the Kangaroos frequent visits

Did you know a group of kangaroos is called a mob?
That's a scary name for something pretty cute!

Sunset over the bush

Flying To Australia!

A few days ago we arrived Down Under!
We had an early morning flight out of Ho Chi Minh City to Malaysia, where we would wait over 7 hours for our next flight to Perth. We passed the layover doing school and watching movies in the TV lounge near our gate. It was pretty uneventful.
The sun was rising as we descended over a new continent. Unlike Asia none of us had ever been here and there was so much to anticipate!

During the flight we were repeatedly reminded by the cabin crew to declare any items we were bringing into the country so as soon as we cleared customs we went to declare our Vietnamese honey, Cambodian pepper, Vietnamese candies and Vietnamese snake wine.
Our honey was refused because there was too much of it and it would endanger the local bee community. The pepper corns passed but no one was quite sure of what to think about the baby cobra in a jar. After a lot of hemming and hawing the border police were called and told us that this item would have to be confiscated. We waited for the officers to fill out heaps of paperwork while they explained to us their reasoning. Baby cobras are considered endangered and Australia makes it a policy to refuse them to combat animal trafficking. Oops. Oh well, We all agreed it was probably good that none of those things ended up where they weren't supposed to be and now we have a good story.
  

Ho Chi Minh City

The last city in Asia.

Ho Chi Minh City was a pretty big milestone for us. We would fly to Perth in a few days time but between now and then we had lots to do!

Squeezing into the tiny entrance of a tunnel

Inside the tunnels

Our first full day in Saigon (Two names for the same place) we took a bus out of town to the Chu Chi tunnels. During the Vietnam war, Vietcong soldiers a civilians alike lived in an extensive labyrinth of subterranean tunnels that spread 100s of kilometers. The chambers were hand dug with hand shovels with excavated dirt removed in small baskets. People ate, slept, preformed medical procedures and planned and executed attacks from the safety of the tunnels. While we walked to the tunnel entrance we could spy disguised ventilation holes in the forest. A notch in a clay rock here or a hollow tree there. At an inconspicuous spot in the forest our guide stopped. He bent down knocked on the carpet of leaves in the forest until he hit something hollow. A few strokes of his hand cleared away the debris to reveal a tiny panel- maybe 12 inches by 16. He lifted it and underneath was a black hole, and who knows what else was down there.

It was a tight squeeze into the tunnel. Once we got down there you have to crawl on your hands and knees or squat-walk. The ceiling was 3 feet at the most and the only light came from tiny electric bulbs every 5 or 10 yards. We had to duck to avoid all the bats.

 We went in a few different tunnels.There was one that had a small room just large enough for 3 or 4 people to squeeze in back to back. It was designed so that soldiers could fire at the feet of the enemy in all directions without being exposed. Another underground cavity was the war planning room, the largest space by far. Manikins were seated at a large table and in the dim light it's pretty creepy. There was a small hospital and officers quarters too. It was really interesting, and we are glad none of us our claustrophobic! The largest stretch of tunnel was 30 yards and by the time we resurfaced we were pretty stiff! It's incredible to imagine all the challenges that would come with basically adapting the lifestyle of a burrowing rodent.

Michele lowers herself down into a tunnel

Another part of the Chu Chi tunnels was the above ground hazards. Booby traps. I don't know how the Northern Vietnamese thought up so many methods of impaling and disemboweling. There were rotating trapdoors that opened up on bamboo spikes and iron blades that when triggered by a trip wire would swing out of the canopy into American troops. 

We continued with our Vietnam war history theme the next day at the War Remnants Museum. There were old planes and vehicles on display but also a photography exhibit on the war. There were images of soldiers in battle, civilians fleeing attacks- every aspect of the conflict preserved in film. We also saw evidence of Agent Orange. This was an extremely toxic defoliant sprayed all over Vietnam's lush trees to expose enemy troops. The chemical seeped into the earth, poisoning rivers and choking all life. It turned dense mangrove forests into wastelands and it effected innocent people too.

Even 4 generations after Agent Orange (Named for the colors on the barrels it came in) was deployed Vietnamese children were still being born malformed and suffering. Old men and women developed chronic skin problems and all kinds of diseases. It was horrific. Because Northern Vietnam ultimately defeated the Americans, the museum was a story told from their perspective which was interesting. 

The same day we went to the Ho Chi Minh Post Office, an attraction for it's interesting architecture. We went for much more pragmatic purposes. We wanted to mail home some souvenirs and scraps we had picked up since Cambodia. When we got there we were told that at the present weight of our package we had to ship it by air and that mailing it by the much more economical boat was not an option until we passed 2 kilos. We were just under so we tried to think of ways we could make our little package heavier. There were some outrageously expensive souvenirs strategically located by the door for people like us, but we had another idea. We rushed out into the square in front of the large yellow colonial style building, searching for loose pieces of asphalt or concrete. I had to ask one gentleman to move so I could grab a rock from just behind his foot but other than that no one looked at us too weird.
Even after all that work they still wouldn't let us ship the package. Even though we technically met the requirements they realized what we were doing and they wouldn't let it slide. We left them with the rocks and walked away.

Ho Chi Minh Post Office

Rush hour

Vinh Long Island "The Most Relaxing Place on Earth"

Nick takes the wheel of the riverboat during our tour of river life

Picture a gentle breeze just strong enough to sway a hammock and blow the heat away. The roads are too narrow for cars so it's quiet. It's warm and sunny but you are in the shade of tropical trees. It's like a sleepy paradise on the river island of Vinh Long in the Mekong delta. A few hours after our arrival Justin christened it "The most relaxing place on earth."

We were on Vinh Long for 3 days. It served as an intermission between the big cities of Can Tho and Ho Chi Minh. Michele had booked a home stay with great food, other guests and more than enough hammocks to go around. It also had free bikes that you could borrow for a ride around the island. On our first day on Vinh Long Mom, Nick and I went on a ride in the morning, before it got to hot. Like I mentioned earlier- the roads are quite cramped, about the width of a sidewalk. This would be ok if they didn't drop off 3 or so feet on each side and it was only bikers and pedestrians on the concrete path. In fact this was not the case and there was heavy motorbike traffic. Groups of 5 or more motorcyclists would zoom by, beeping loudly if we didn't put our back tire a hairs breadth from the edge. It was pretty nerve wracking! I'm not really sure where all of these people were going either. We got a little turned around and accidentally went down a dead end road only to encounter hordes of oncoming traffic. It probably took us twice as long as it should have to get back to our home stay.
That was the last time we went biking.

We did a lot of homeschooling during our time there. There wasn't much else to do, that was the point of our visit.

One day however, we did take a long tour of some cottage industries of the delta. Most of the six hours were spent in the boat looking out at life on the Mekong. We visited a farm where medicinal mushrooms and honey products were produced. The mushrooms were grown in a shady greenhouse in paper wrapped parcels with the nutrients they needed. Then they were harvested to be used in teas. 

We walked through a flower garden to get to the bees. I'm not sure if sure if the hive we saw was a token tourist attraction or not. We saw other light blue boxes around, identical to the one we saw but it's possible they were empty and the real production was elsewhere. Without smoke or netting or anything, the lady showing us around slid out a section of the hive. We were hesitant to get any closer despite her encouragement. Where we come from, you don't go up to bee hives and walk away unscathed. 

"Don't worry- Friendly bees."

We all laughed nervously.
Nick and I each held part of the hive but quickly gave it back.

We walked back to the main building to sample Lotus tea with farm pollen and honey. It was pretty good and while we drank it we snacked on banana chips and candied ginger. We ended up buying both of those products for snacks later on and some honey too. 

We also took a paddle boat ride through canals that often slice through what dry land there is. Our tour guide/boat driver thus far handed us off to a middle aged women who took us on a nice cruise to give us another look at river culture. We also got to try on those classic Vietnamese non la hats too. 

Our last stop was a candy shop/snake winery/ rice paper manufacturer.

We didn't hear much about the rice paper but we did get to sample a lot of the tasty products, see the coconut cream press and watch puffed rice puff. Michele had always wondered how that stuff was made and now she knew.

Snake liqueur was also for sale. Ranging from tiny perfume sized bottles with newborn serpents to vast jugs with full grown boas coiled up, for less than 70$ a large dead snake with a scorpion in it's mouth could be all yours.

There was a small pond at our home stay stocked with the largest catfish you've ever seen. The owners gave us some simple bamboo poles and leftover shrimp to use as bait and Nick and I went to see if we could catch something. We didn't have any bites at first, so we propped up our poles and went to play soccer with the siblings who lived at the home stay. Our game was interrupted by Justin yelling something about a fish and a pole and how we better get over here right now! The five of us kids rushed over to the ponds edge where the water was being frothed by an immense fish- about 2 feet in length! It took everyone's strength to keep the pole out of the water, but we didn't have the power to get the monster on land. The bamboo pole which was rigid by human standards resembled a candy cane now. Other guests all over the compound were watching or filming the whole episode. After about 2 minutes of yelling and sweating and overall chaos the catfish unhooked himself an lived to swim another day.  

Cai Rang Floating Market

When I planned to come to Vietnam, I made a list of things I wanted to do. Floating market was at the top. Between scanning the Lonely Planet and TripAdvisor, I stumbled across Cai Rang, the largest river market in the Mekong Delta. Can Tho, the. City it’s located in has a good location in relativity to the rest of my itinerary so I started looking for bus tickets. I was disappointed when we arrived in Can Tho and I heard the market would be effected by Tet. (Read all about Tet in the post below) Mom and I decided to skip the market, much to my dismay, because we figured it wouldn’t be worth it. But later, I just kept thinking about the market and saying how I wished how we had gone. I mean, this was our last chance to see anything like this! Eventually we went back on our decision and planned to set our alarms for early the next morning.

Sunrise over the river

Cai Rang officially opens at 4:30 am and winds down at 8. It was totally reasonable to squeeze in getting there and back before our noon bus out of town. We woke up at 4 am, and a half hour walk in the dark later we were down at the river. For 20$ (A bit more than we had hoped to pay) we hired a boat. From our location on the river it was a 25+ minute ride to the market. It was still dark when we pushed off the dock, but the large boats at the market were bathed in yellow morning light by the time they came into view. Everything was wholesale, so we could only really watch the happenings. Vendors would dangle a sample of their wares on a tall stick so you could see what they were selling. Boats doubled as houses so along side pineapples and vegetables laundry was drying in the morning breeze.
We could definitely see that the market was smaller than usual. Maybe twenty vendors were there, a fraction of the normal number.

For breakfast, we clipped onto a Pho boat. Pho is a Vietnamese breakfast dish, a pork or beef broth with a bit of meat, noodles and greens. The man selling it served multiple customers at once from where he sat, with all the individual crafts tossed high by the choppy river swells. It was pretty impressive, and the soup was good too.

Floating Kitchen

Vendors on the water

On the long ride back to our dock I could barely keep my eyes open. We had been up so early! Yes the market was a bit smaller than usual but we still got to see an iconic aspect of Vietnamese culture.

Celebrating Tet- Vietnamese Lunar New Year

Chuc Mung Nam Moi!
That’s how you say Happy New Year in the Mekong Delta, where we were during Tet this year. The celebrations officially last a week or so, and began the night we arrived!

Trotter Soup

The first night is the most important. For dinner we tucked into the traditional Tet dish of trotter stew. The broth reminded me of a syrup- with its gelatin consistency and red color. Clam, tripe, quail eggs, shrimp, mystery meat and of course- a pig foot were all suspended in the soup. It was delicious and washed down with a sweet honey tea.

Crowds on Tet Eve

After we all had our fill of soup we followed the crowds to a stage draped with flags and traditional red (the lucky color) where different groups performed slow and fast songs alike. I was recovering from a stomach bug and the crowds and pickpocket attempts convinced Justin and I to head back to the hostel. Michele and Nick stayed up longer.

Vietnamese fireworks are like nothing we had seen before. While Justin and I enjoyed them from the safety of the hotel room Nick and Michele were a bit too close for comfort. For 15 minutes explosion of light and color burst right overhead.

From what they told us a few went off on the roof of the building where they were being lit without even going up first! Another rocket veered off into the side of a near by building! You know how firework shows have a finale? The whole New Years show was the finale. Justin counted 5-10 fireworks going off per second!

The next morning we noticed all of the trees for sale. A little research informed us that buying kumquat trees and special trees whose flowers bloom only around the holiday are good luck. Despite the fact that we only had one more day in Chau Doc and we certainly weren’t bring a tree with us, we picked up a kumquat tree covered in fruit. Oh, and a small flowering tree.

After New Years Eve, the biggest thing about Tet that effected us was the vacationing. Hours of businesses changed and there were less taxis. It is custom for children to go spend the holiday with parents or relatives in ancestral country homes so cities like Can Tho were very quiet. This was a bit disappointing when we went to the floating market 9 out of 10 of the venders were not present. Most restaurants were closed which made finding meals frustrating and the ones that were operating that week were understaffed. And we can’t forget Tet tax. All of our bills increased 5-20% because workers would rather be home with their families.

We observed some other traditions as well. For example, when we were at a home stay the children of the owners received red envelopes of money from their elders. (Unfortunately Mom and Dad didn’t honor this custom) All of the homes and businesses we saw were spotless. This is because the weeks leading up to Tet are spent cleaning out the old year to make room for the new.

Happy year of the pig!

Overall witnessing Tet was really cool. Yes, it was inconvenient at times but we learned a lot about the culture and got to have some fun ourselves! 

The Enchanting Forest of Tra Su

Our boat chugged through the carpet of water plants, the wake making the green surface ripple. My mind kept tricking me into thinking that the top of the water was solid. It looked like you could just get out and walk across it. We could hear the calls of exotic water birds in the distance. The twisted roots of half submerged trees arched to form a tunnel were similar to mangroves, but more erect. Occasionally I would catch a blur of pink- lotus flowers. The motor behind us slowed us we slowed at the waters edge. We stepped out onto dry ground, uncommon in the swamp.

We spent a half day at Tra Su forest, a bird reserve on the Vietnamese border. I think it was more crowded than usual due to Tet holiday and the vacation, but that didn’t take away much from the experience. From the motor boat we walked a short way to rowboats, where women in blue uniforms would take partners on a tranquil cruise through the unique landscape. We clambered into the small wooden craft and in one smooth motion were off towards the shadowy pathway of water before us. From where I sat I could spy egrets and herons. And just in case the wild water fowl had stage fright, visitors could be assured the could catch a glimpse of something with feathers when they were paddled past the domesticated geese in their enclosure. Suddenly we were turning around. I guess I don’t blame the staff for taking us more than 100 yards, my arms would be tired too- but it wasn’t exactly what I had imagined. Justin offered a bit more money, which his rower eagerly accepted, to get us a few feet farther.

Nick takes a turn paddling 

When our short and sweet boat trip was over, we climbed a tall observation tower to look out over the rest of the reserve. It was at least 6 stories high and illustrated how large the forest is. Narrow channels of water weave through soggy land for miles, and we could only guess what strange creatures could live in such a remote place.

Crossing Into Vietnam

Nick rides in the front of the speedboat to Vietnam 

For Vietnam I was in charge.
I was initially the only one who had interest in the country, so Mom and Dad promised that if I planned the trip, booked the hotels and haggled over prices, we could go. Mom helped me out a lot too. She was vital to figuring out visas and a spot on navigator. After a few days in Phnom Penh it was finally time to put another stamp in the passport...

We crossed out of Cambodia via boat. It was a 5 hour ride total, and border crossing was smooth. I think everyone was glad to see a country by water for a change. Over the roar of the ferry engine we could it on the back of the boat and zoom past fishermen and raised houses. Farmers and freighters.

It was dark by the time our boat chugged up to Chau Doc, a city near the border. During the trip we had tried to wrap our heads around the currency conversions. It’s roughly 23,000 Vietnamese Dong to 1 US Dollar. When we were told prices, a 35,000 dong soda or 1,780,000 for a few nights in a hotel for example, we often did a double take. We checked into our hotel and Mom and I put our heads together to plan the days to come.

The flag lined streets of Chau Doc

A Somber Stroll Down a Sad Path of History

*****WARNING- THIS POST CONTAINS A SUMMARY OF ACTUAL HISTORICAL EVIDENCE OF EVENTS THAT SOME MAY FIND DISTURBING ******

Mass Graves now overgrown ar the Phenom Penh Killing Fields

For our last day in the Kingdom of Cambodia, we took some time to pay tribute to the victims of the genecide cult, the Khmer Rouge.

During the “cleansing” of the newly agricultural communist society (1975-1979) Cambodians who had soft hands (showing they were not farming peasants) intellectuals, creative thinkers, suspected traitors, even people who wore glasses were exterminated in “killing fields”.  Their corpses were shoved into pits and mass graves and left. The reign of the Khmer Rouge ended in a die off of a quarter of the nations population, due to mistreatment of its people on top of over 300 killing fields similar to the one we visited in Phenom Penh.

The faces of S21 prisoners, pictures taken upon their arrival
at the compound.

Pol Pot, a French educated Cambodian communist believer was the head of the Khmer Rouge. His forces grappled with the Cambodian Army, eventually over throwing it and taking over.
On the first day of his take over, the past was erased and with the rising sun began day 1,      year 0.
With in no more than a few days, all major cities were drained of inhabitants, who fled a supposed bomb threat. This was of course a lie, spun to get people out to the country side,
where they where forced to work from dawn to dusk, farming rice. Many lawyers, doctors and teachers from cities were handed shovels and told to begin farming with no experience. There were too many tasks put in front of a small group of  laborers stretched too thin, and rice production fell behind schedule. Supervisors were afraid to admit this to higher ups and instead made up for the loss by taking food away from people in the fields and selling it. This caused masses to starve to death or die of exhaustion.

Tourture cells of S21 prison

     Pol Pot became paranoid and everything got worse. Suspected criminals were dragged to S21 prison, a school in Phenom Penh transformed into a torture center. They endured agonizing  punishments and horrific atrocities until they gave names of other traitors and told the truth. Those who didn’t die in the process “confessed” to working for the KGB and the CIA, organizations they had never heard of. The names jerked out of prisoners like their finger and toe nails then brought new innocents in in droves, all to eventually give more names, in a vicious cycle. The worst part was that not just men but women, teenagers and young children suffered within the complex.  This was supported with common use if propaganda such as “to remove grass you must kill the root” and “having you is no gain, losing you is no loss”.  Expressions like these illistrate the absence of humanity.  Everyone “confessed” during torture eventually.

Skulls of Killing Field Victims in a memorial. This image shows 2 of 17 levels in the building 

Tiny cells of S21 where according to one of
the rare survivors he had to lay unmoving
for 12 days and 12 nights,
asking guards for permission to even roll over

Survivors in S21 were transfured to “new housing” on the otherside of town, to the Killing Fields, where they were brutally murdered. National tunes were blared from tin speakers hanging in the “magic tree” to cover up screams. Today you can see scraps of clothing and bone fragments brought to the surface by shifting soil in those infamous pits, a present reminder of the horrors and blood that once soaked Cambodian soil.

We understand this is a sensitive topic but we think people should be aware of the history of this country. This seemed to be the message around both the Killing Fields and S21 when we visited. We were to learn of the past, respect those who died and then focus on what is to come. Cambodia as a country has rebounded astonishingly quickly from the Khmer Rouge reign. Cambodia today is an upbeat, youthful nation with a bright future, despite its horrific past.

Learning all About Kampot Pepper

We had piled into the back of a tuk tuk and bumped along the dusty Cambodian back roads and now we were rolling to a stop in front of what we guessed was the pepper plantation.

Kampot Pepper is a particular plant and has only been successful grown in a small region of Cambodia. French chefs are big fans and the spicy peppercorns gained fame and popularity throughout the years. What we didn’t know before coming to the area is that pepper is eaten fresh, not just used as seasoning in cooked food. 

Pepper vines grow hugging the side of brick towers, where their leaves swarm over the red surface until the support is barely visible. The towers are assembled in rows for convenience, in big plots. We had assumed pepper grows on a bush, but I guess we were wrong. The peppercorns grow like berries, and aren’t harvested until the plant is 3 years old, they just aren’t spicy enough. 

Kampot Peppers come in red, black and white. Even Justin as a chef did not know the difference then, but we do now. Black peppercorns are green when they are first harvested but after three days of drying they crumple into those familiar black dots we all have in our kitchen. Red peppercorns are green ones simply left on the vine longer until they get that fiery color that is kept even after drying. The skin of them was surprisingly sweet, once you peel it off the intensely hot core that is! Lastly, white pepper corns aren’t anything different, black peppercorns with the skin removed to take the spice level down a notch. 

After we wandered around the pepper towers for a bit, picking off corns here and there to nibble, we went up the hill to the plantation resort. While relaxing poolside we took advantage of our last chances to eat this special spice. Our table offered views of the surrounding valley and far off “secret lake” under the royal blue sky. Michele and I both agreed we felt like we were in California Wine Country. We are going to miss the hammock lifestyle of the Cambodian countryside, off to the big city of Phenom Penh tomorrow! 

Tastes of Kampot

Squid and Kampot Pepper. Kampot Peppers are unique to the area and chefs all over the world prefer them over other varieties. Michele ordered this dish on a daily basis, eating strands of pepper at a time! The rest of us weren’t so tough...

Whether it’s spleen soups, refreshing fruit shakes or much sought after nachos, we all enjoyed the variety of snacks in Kampot, our laid back home for the past two weeks! 

Warm chocolate chip cookies + cool vanilla ice cream= AMAZING!
Our local burger guy tempted us with these treats from back home our
first visit and we couldn’t say no a second time. Or the third!

This is a delicious pork soup at a bustling local breakfast joint
we call “mama’s” Yes we know it’s pork but what part of the
pig- your guess is as good as ours!

The adults got to try Justin’s friend Sean’s  home
brewed beer at a local restaurant 

Justin’s friend Phil treated us to Khmer Pancakes, thin dough stuffed
with pork. It kind of reminded me of a dumpling except eaten with
your hands and 20 times bigger

50 cent cappuccinos were an AM must for Michele
and Justin 

Nachos! Crunchy Chips, and is that... Guacamole??
We haven’t seen that in a while!

Passion Fruit Shakes, and lots of them!

Typical Cambodian breakfast at “Mama’s”
Rice, fried egg and marinated beef