After feeling the heat in Saigon for a couple of days it was time to get somewhere a little quieter, so I headed out to Vũng Tàu to catch up with an old friend from my Georgia teaching days, Brigid. Brigid also worked for Teach and Learn with Georgia and in addition, she worked at one of my favorite hostels in Tbilisi, Friends Hostel. Although we'd met in passing and were friendly during my first semester, when I often spent the night at Friends while seeking some urban refuge from my village life, we really bonded when I returned for my second semester to live in Tbilisi and ended up moving into an apartment with some other teachers that was around the corner from Friends. So it was great to see her, hear about her adventures (while I went west to Chile and then Hungary, she'd headed east to Mongolia and then UAE), and take in some chilled out beach bum vibes.
It was also nice to meet her adorable if somewhat rebellious kitten, ლუდი (Ludi, which means beer)! Oh Georgian, how I miss speaking/reading you.
Getting to Vung Tau from HCMC is actually not too bad as long as you have a friend who has already taken the trip and can help your dumb, couldn't-find-her-way-out-of-a-paper-bag ass out via a few very helpful and patient phone calls. The Mai Linh bus company's office is behind the art museum, near the Ben Thanh market, and the deluxe "limousine" (8 person van, very clean/comfortable) ride is still only 100k VND (~$4.50). So I sprang to ride in style since it takes a couple hours to get out there. Worth it!
Once there it took a couple more phone calls (bless Brigid and her infinite patience) before I realized that the Mai Linh driver had actually dropped me off immediately in front of where I needed to be and I had then walked actually, in trying to find her apartment building, walked away from the very place I was supposed to be. Typical. After showering, acquainting myself with her sweet digs/feisty kitten, and catching up for a while, we decided it was time to eat and I jumped on the back of her scooter for an evening ride around Vung Tau. This was a great way to orient myself in the city and I recommend anyone to anyone that visits: try to have an awesome friend who will take you on a sweet back-of-the-bike tour of the city and then who is also so beloved by her students/students' parents that she will treat you to FREE and LEGITIMATELY good (not just for-Vietnam-good) pizza. Probably the best I've had in Vietnam, and I've tried my fair share of pizza in Vietnam. Hanoi has some decent to good ones, but this blows them away. Just look at that cheesy, crunchy beauty up there. Mine, all mine!
Getting the lay of the land.
Later on, we found ourselves very easily entertained by Ludi and an ice ball. It's the simple things, you know? Also, Brigid's couch is brought to you by the fine people of Bayerische Motoren Werke AG, aka BMW. Should I be trying to get paid for posting this picture here? How much will a sponsor pay for a blog with a readership of (optimistically) about six?
Later, much later, the next morning in fact, the sun rose.
It was lovely.
And with the right camera settings, apocalyptic!
Despite our wild iceball party we'd still managed to get to bed at a reasonable hour so waking up wasn't too tough, and we even had time for some morning coffee and Milo (a first for me... not half bad!) before we headed off on her scooter. We stopped about halfway to the school, and I indulged in a beautiful/delicious cappuccino. I have decided cappuccinos are my litmus test of a fancy cafe. Not counting the places where obviously what they do is cà phê đen/sữa (black/milk), nồng/đá (hot/iced), you have four options, maybe there's yogurt, so just pick something already. I'm talking about places in Vietnam that do espresso drinks. Cappuccino is in many ways such a simple drink that I feel like it's pretty hard to mess up, most places do it decently. Some places have given me a latte instead and I don't begrudge them that because I'm not a huge snob or anything, but I tend to gravitate towards places that serve up a frothier, drier cappuccino. So while I don't remember the name of this cafe I will say that it served a fantastic cappuccino and Brigid is a regular and spoke highly of their smoothie selection as well. Mmmmm. Cappuccino. What were we talking about?
All of that just to post a picture of a cappuccino! The real reason I was up with the sun and Brigid and Ludi was that I volunteered to go in with her and trail around her school for her morning lessons. It was really cool to meet her class, second-graders made up mostly of expats' kids. They seemed pretty bright and their classroom was a delight. Super cheery and personal. They asked me a bunch of fantastic somewhat-personal questions and then played a couple games, then practiced the Christmas dance they were learning to the subtle, lulling tones of "Feliz Navidad". Great stuff. I sat in on one more class of hers', an IT class, which was also interesting. I think teaching in international schools, which is what Brigid does in Vung Tau, has definitely presented itself as a very viable option for me down the road. I'm forever in her debt for letting me hang around for a while and get a feel for what she does there!
The front office at Brigid's school helpfully ordered me a taxi to a travel place that rents bicycle, who then called a lady who rode me on the back of her motorbike to yet another location where I was able to hire a bicycle for the afternoon. Hilariously convoluted but in the end I was successful, which might in fact turn out to be an accurate description of my time Vietnam. First I passed this very quiet park...
Thỏ Trắng = White Rabbit.
Terminator... okay. But 6D?! Why?? This is like the park in Tbilisi all over again. WHAT DOES THAT EVEN FUCKING MEAN.
Also, bumper cars. Internationally beloved neck trauma inducement, ahoy!
Next I stopped for a little ramble on the beach, although ultimately I was not feeling that beachy so I didn't linger.
Big whale, little city. Actually, I did not know this while I was in Vung Tau but while reading about the city to write this post I stumbled across this nugget on Wikipedia,
"Being one of Vietnamese whale worship site, the Lang Ong Nam Hai Whale Temple hosts a skeleton of a whale, being respected in the name of Nam Hai General. Nam Hai General, a whale god is said to govern the ocean and protect people from evils, monsters, and disasters."
Interesting.
Next I headed up to the big Jesus statue on one the hills of Vung Tau because beggars can't be choosers when it comes to looking for cheap/free fun on a weekday afternoon in a small city in Vietnam. It was a good of the stretch of the leg and the view was wonderful even if the statue was ... exactly what you'd imagine it might be.
The first of many, many stairs (811 in fact).
And then... deer. Are they indigenous to Vietnam? Huh! They were. Imagine that.
A plethora of sponsors from all over the world paid to have their names engraved on stone park benches that littered the stairs and scenic viewpoints on the way up. There were a surprising number from New Jersey.
These are just a few. Dear New Jersey, Maybe worry about yourself? Sincerely, a former native.
Philly, whatup!
See, the south, I expected.
France too.
Scandinavia, checking in!
The worst continent. (YEAH I SAID IT)
Non-American North Americans making an appearance.
Surely there are better places these benches could be placed, that might allowed for relaxing scenic views. Or use them as an impromptu sermon pew set-up, that works too I guess.
Fun with park benches. Vung Tau! (Only joking. I really, really did like it here.)
Some pastoral shit:
I mean look at that view. Why would you want to sit on a stone bench looking at other stone benches when that is out there?
Approaching the Jesus.
And I climbed all of them!!
Looking back where I once trod.
More sponsors, this time paying for plaque, which were plastered on the side of the pietà, including (hilariously)....
A travel agency. Really, guys?
The twelve apostles, in Vietnamese.
Roadside dragon...thing.
Getting back on the road after getting my fill of blaspheming for the afternoon, I passed a few interesting Buddhist temples as well.
Sadly, closed. Probably for lunchtime.
Looking out at the bay of Vung Tau, I was headed to a Vung Tau landmark to the left of that big Star Wars looking monument...
The "White Villa" or sometimes referred to as a palace, as seen from the road.
From the back. It is also on a hill.
Wartime relics.
....Narnia?
From the front, or seaside.
Love me some tiny tree and garden architecture.
Inside the villa are ceramics salvaged from a shipwreck off the coast of Vung Tau.
This one. I'm guessing these particular ceramics are not to scale with that ship. Just a hunch.
The Hon Cau Antiques. They're mostly Chinese, from the late 17th/early 18th century.
Interesting light-up display of historic shipping routes off the coast of Vietnam/SE Asia. When I approached the villa there were no other tourists inside and one old dude working as guide. There were no lights or fans on which was fine since all the windows were open and it was a lovely day but this hilariously overattentive guard trailed me from room to room turning on the power (as can be seen here, where he actually dragged me back to this room that I had already passed through so that he could turn on the power and show me the lights on the map, he then demanded I stop and watch as individual routes lit up before they all lit up at the end) or turning on fans that did very little. He also moved ahead of me a few times to remove placards or fluff pillows, or to point out specific details he insisted I photograph. The guy was a trip, is what I'm trying to say.
Okay I would take a set of those.
The following pictures are just a FEW of the many, many shots I was instructed to take by aforementioned overzealous security guard. At one point I finally just offered him my camera but he insisted that I do it. Here are all of the random things he made me photograph:
(Okay, I do like the movement of the curtain in this one.)
I was like, really? The switch that turns on the fan? You want me to remember this? He insisted.
Things omitted in consideration of the reader's interest level: a door hinge, approximately seven couches, three other bedrooms, a light switch. That poor bored man.
Riding past the same tiny lighthouse Brigid and I had zoomed past the night before.
Large roundabout towards the center of town with some real Soviet-looking statue/greenery happening.
After taking in these two booming tourist traps (/sarcasm) I headed to the Vung Tau supermarket (don't remember which one) and marveled at how much writing/many Russian products I saw everywhere. Vung Tau is no Nha Trang, which is like a Russian haven (more on that later), but there is certainly a palpable Russian presence here. Although Vung Tau was a French colonial town for a while and apparently is notable for being the place where Gary Glitter was arrested for molesting teenage girls in his villa, it also houses a little colony of Russians in some very, very sad-looking Soviet Bloc style housing. We rode past it on the way to Brigid's school and I won't lie, that place could use some TLC. From Wikipedia,
"There has been a Russian village in Vũng Tàu ever since the Soviet era; these Russians generally worked for the Russian-Vietnamese joint venture VietSovpetro. It is believed that these "Russians", or "citizens of the former Soviet Union", were once the most dominant group of foreigners in Vũng Tàu. Some have remained in Vũng Tàu after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. They formed a parish of the Russian Orthodox Church.[citation needed]"
Anyway, Cyrillic. It's around. And the Russians who read it.
God, Lotteria (South Korean export, faux-McDonalds) is so fucking weird and terrible. Every time I see the nonsensical babble in one of their restaurants I'm compelled to document it.
Late afternoon quietly rolled up on me and after picking up some lotion for my new tattoo and just generally enjoying the supermarket people-watching it was time to meet up with Brigid back at her apartment. We dropped my bike back at the rental and then headed up to the lighthouse-sized lighthouse up in the hills to take in yet another gorgeous vista (Vung Tau has no shortage of them).
Street life.
Local park and, I believe, my old friend Tran Hung Dao.
Hey! I've been there!
Lighthouse.
Obviously needed to document the street dog, as well as...
...the sunset, as seen from the back of the bike as raced the sun over to one of Brigid's favorite sunset-view bars....
I'd say we made it just in time.
Tough love. I respect that.
Church with lit up Mary that changed colors. I'm not sure commentary is needed or that I would know what to contribute to the sight.
FOOD. Spicy mango chicken.
Also, this super cool guy inside who brought ONE. FREE. WEIGHT. to the bar. ONE. Which he proceeded to spend about an hour using while playing pool and generally shooting the shit with his friends. It was equal parts baffling and funny.
Such pride and joy.
The next day was Saturday but Brigid had some weekend meetings to attend and I had another Mai Linh "limousine" to catch back into HCMC, and an airplane to board from there. Although I had a couple more hours of wandering around HCMC before returning to the airport it wasn't too exciting-- picking up some souvenirs, giving up AKA eating some McDonalds because I was tired and really wanted french fries. After a week full of mostly wins I was mostly okay with conceding this one gustatory defeat, you know?
Vung Tau, though. It may not have the nicest beach of Vietnam (or so I'm informed, although compared to Jersey's it's practically a sheltered paradise) but it's a pretty chill and quirky little city.
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