… That happened during my visit to my grandmother - on my mums’ side - at the cemetery today.

No, I did not see a ghost, nor a zombie, but it was amazing. I couldn’t believe it with my own eyes.

If you choose not to believe it, then fine. I’m not forcing you to believe it.

Well, my relatives and I were lighting candles and essence, like we usually do. Then we started lighting paper money in a bushfire we made in front of the grave.

During that, this piece of burnt paper flew out of the fire, and landed on my mum’s head. She didn’t even notice it until I told her. I couldn’t believe it, she was about 3m away from the fire. It was probably 1 in 1,000 chance that piece of paper would fall on her head.

I don’t recall any significant wind power to blow that paper, but it must’ve been. I was really surprised how it just landed on my mums head.

My dad was like, ‘She was feeling her head in spirit’.

My mum hasn’t visited Vietnam for 30 years and all, maybe that’s why?

… That happened during my visit to my grandmother - on my mums’ side - at the cemetery today.

No, I did not see a ghost, nor a zombie, but it was amazing. I couldn’t believe it with my own eyes.

If you choose not to believe it, then fine. I’m not forcing you to believe it.

Well, my relatives and I were lighting candles and essence, like we usually do. Then we started lighting paper money in a bushfire we made in front of the grave.

During that, this piece of burnt paper flew out of the fire, and landed on my mum’s head. She didn’t even notice it until I told her. I couldn’t believe it, she was about 3m away from the fire. It was probably 1 in 1,000 chance that piece of paper would fall on her head.

I don’t recall any significant wind power to blow that paper, but it must’ve been. I was really surprised how it just landed on my mums head.

My dad was like, ‘She was feeling her head in spirit’.

My mum hasn’t visited Vietnam for 30 years and all, maybe that’s why?

Hey guys. Sorry I didn’t have the time to do a blog last night, it was pretty busy, and as soon as I got to my hotel for the night, I crashed to sleep.

Yesterday was the last day of our tour, and it was pretty much like every other day. Bus rides, temples, and more temples.

The day started at 5am, again, when my tour guide told us we were leaving at 9am. But I just couldn’t get back to sleep. So I spent those 4 spare hours sitting on the hotel computer, going on Facebook, Tumblr and Flickr. Oh, and also eating breakfast.

When 9am finally came, we were on our way to a religious museum, and then lunch. Then we were off to a zen garden for our last activity for the tour. The tour ended at around 2:30pm since we needed to go to Hue Airport before 3:30pm.

After goodbyes, checking in, and going through security, we waited at the boarding lounge for at least one hour because we simply got there way too early.

Oh, if you were wondering, we were catching a flight back to Ho Chi Minh City from Hue.

After the flight, we went to our hotel, found some cockroaches on the floor, ate dinner, told the hotel supervisor to get their asses together and clean our room. Then after all that - which was probably 10pm, we slept…. until 4am. I was bloody woken up by mum who turned on the hairdryer right next to my ears. I was pretty pissed off, of course.

We obviously did wake up early for a reason, because someone was coming to pick us up at 8am to take us to Tra Vinh - my mum’s birthplace.

After getting in the car, and sleeping for about an hour and a half, we’re now eating lunch at some random restaurant. I better not get any stomachaches because of this.

We’ve still got about 2 and a half hours until we reach Tra Vinh, so that’s just more time to sleep in the car.

I don’t really know what I’m going to do at Tra Vinh. Probably visit lots of relatives since we are only staying over for a night.

Well, thats ‘bout it! I’ll try my best to get a video blog through my YouTube account by tonight. Ciao!

I’ve almost broke the 1,000 photo mark for my Flickr account, and I would like to thank all of you for taking the time to view all my photos.

If you’re all wondering, some of the photos have this white-ish blanket thing on the side of the photo. Don’t worry, it’s not a watermark, it’s just a reflection of the shades from the bus.

I know, it pissed me off as well when I saw it, but I guess all we have to do is move on!

http://flickr.com/photos/le-hieu

Hey guys, day eight of our trip to Vietnam has come to an end, and today was way, way better than yesterday. No 8-hour bus rides today!

Today started with a trip to Phong An, where we took a ride with this boat, in this wonderful scenery to a sand castle (not really a castle, it’s just a natural cave made out of sand). I took photos of this ‘sand castle’ on my camera but unfortunately, I can’t upload photos from my camera because; I forgot the USB cable at home, and there isn’t any SD slots on this computer - or any computer. But, I’ll upload them when I get back to Australia.. in 13 days.

After visiting that, we had lunch. It was probably the most disturbed lunch I have ever had. There were these kids everywhere trying to sell DVDs and ‘souvenirs’ for us to buy. And boy, they were desperate as hell. They followed us every we went, and we were even followed to the tour bus.. Thank God that they didn’t come onto the bus with us though. Even the tour guide was a little bit scared of those kids and was trying to running away from them.

After that 'weird’ lunch, we went on a 5-hour bus ride to Hue, which was probably just as cruel as the 8-hour bus ride yesterday, but we did stop at random places, like a religious temple, and some souvenir shop.

When we finally arrived at Hue, which was probably 4pm, we moved into our hotels, then ate dinner, then went to this Vietnamese performance (where I also caught photos and video on my camera) which was pretty awesome. Probably because I was high from the alcohol I drank during dinner (giggles). Their singing was great, but their enthusiasm was rock bottom. When they finished singing, they just sat there with crossed arms and with big frowns. Like, what, the heck? Aren’t they supposed to be happy they’re singing? Oh, this performance was on the river, so we were floating.

During that performance, we did light candles and let them go on the water which was awesome, took really cool photos.. but it’s on the camera. Damn! Now I really regret not bringing my iPod!

After the performance, we walked back to our hotel, I went onto the computers, logged onto Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and Tumblr. And now, I’m typing up this post for you all to read. Muahhahahaha.

Tomorrow’s our last day of our tour, and basically everything will happen tomorrow in Hue. We will be departing for Ho Chi Minh tomorrow at VNT 6pm and will be arriving shortly after 7:30pm VNT.

We will be sleeping over at Ho Chi Minh for the night, then we will be heading for Tra Vinh (I think it’s called) on Monday morning… which is another 4-5 hour car ride. FML.

Well, that’s all I gotta say, for now.. I’ll talk to you guys later! Remember to check out my photos, my video blogs, and my tweets (of course!). If you want, you can add me on Facebook!

Ciao!

Boy, what a week has it been. Traveling all over Vietnam; Saigon, Mui Ne, Phan Thiet, Da Nang, Hoi An, Hue, and we’re now at Kwang Binh.

Day seven of our trip to Vietnam was pretty simple. All we did was sit in he bus all day as we looked outside at the blue skies.

Of course, we did have breakfast, lunch and dinner and the occasional stopover for toilets and snacks, but that’s about all we did all day.

Today, we’re waking up early to go… somewhere I don’t know the name of (again) and yeah, once again, I’ll blog about it later tonight.

BTW, I love this hotel. Ciao!

Almost a week has passed since we’ve been on Vietnam land, and looking back, it’s been memorable and jampacked.

The day started off with a sleep-in (finally!) and woke up at around 6am, but on a bad note. See my previous blog post to see why it was a pretty bad morning. Anyway, we ate breakfast, then we checked out of our Hoi An hotel.

Then we went to this mountain where there were lots of stairs - very, steep, stairs - and lots of religious statues. It needed endurance and power to climb this mountain.

5 people stayed back in the bus, and about 7 people didn’t want to climb to the very top. About 10 other people managed to climb to the very top successfully. Including me (haha, in your face)

After the mountain climbing and the whining of sore legs, we went to this rock statue factory where we saw lots of… rock statues and people making them. As always, I was surprised at how accurate and steady they make the statues! I would’ve fucked the whole rock up if I tired to make one!

After that, we ate lunch. Wasn’t that great though. All I ate was salad. And no, I’m not a vegetarian.

After that, we took a little nap, then went to the most boring shopping centers ever. I don’t know if it’s even called a shopping centre. Probably a market. Anyway, all we did was stare at our drinks, and drink (duh).

Now we’re back at our hotels, and we’re waiting for something to happen at 5pm VNT so we can go somewhere.

Now I did take lots of photos - and I really do mean lots - so check ‘em out on my flickr account. flickr.com/le-hieu

I also made a video blog where I wrap up the weeks happenings in 90 seconds. It’ll be either uploaded tonight or tomorrow morning. When YouTube gets its ass together and let’s me upload instead of returning an error.

Alrightio, it’s almost 5, so I better go. Blog you all later!

Sorry about the delay to post this… post. I know it’s probably half past 11 when I posted this, but this was the first opportunity I had to finally blog.

Anyway, I’ve had a huge and long day today. With yet another early start… cough3amcough. We woke up that early because we had to catch a bus to catch a flight which leaves at 6 in the morning.

With all that check-in and customs crap all over and done with, we left to meet our tour guide and group outside the airport. We ate breakfast, then we went to a mountain where you go into this little cablecar and ride up the mountain, etc.

That was the worst thing I have ever experienced. You could barely see anything and we were only 200m above ground level. And by the time we reached the top of the mountain, it was absolutely freezing. I did tweet that I was starting to miss the hot weather back in Ho Chi Minh and Mui Ne.

After that, we moves into the best hotel ever! It had everything I want in a hotel! Swimming pool, spa, WiFi, etc.! But unfortunately, we’re only staying here for one night.

After the hotel checkin, we ate lunch, then went on a little shopping spree and a little tour around the city for the rest of the afternoon.

Oh, did I say that it was raining all day? Fuck, don’t get me started! Everyone was running everywhere as soon as it started raining! Sales assistants ran everywhere selling raincoats and umbrellas. Motorcycles beeping everywhere, others running just to get shelter. Gosh, it better not rain tomorrow!

After the shopping spree and tour, we ate dinner and now we’re back into our hotel rooms watching a game of soccer. I believe that it’s Vietnam vs Singapore? Everyones making bets and playing cards downstairs while I’m laying here blogging and trying my best to sleep as soon as possible.

What’s planned for tomorrow? I don’t know, really… I’m just going with the flow, here.

I’ve uploaded about 100 photos today for you all to see, just check out my Flickr photostream to see my most recent uploads. I did say I will be getting Flickr Pro. This will be done when I have access to a computer because I have tried via both my iPod and my phone and both seem to be returning an error before payment.

Hopefully, there will be WiFi in the next hotel we’re going to because I have a feeling I will take lots of photos! Everywhere I’ve been does have WiFi, which is a good sign, I guess.

Catch yas later!

PS; Go Dane Swan in the Copeland Trophy!

Afternoon, apologies for not posting a blog yesterday afternoon. The Tumblr downtime pretty much fucked us up. We did write a draft, but now I’m 400km away from that draft.

Well, anyway, we’ll start with Day Three. Pretty much, all I did all day yesterday was lay down on my bed and sleep. In the morning, I went to the local fish market to get some lunch. Then caught some sleep. Then went to the other local food market to get some groceries. And then, took another nap. Then went to a restaurant half asleep to eat.

Today, however, was pretty jam packed. We had to wake up at around 2am this morning to catch a bus to take us to Ho Chi Minh city. ‘Why?’ do I hear you say? I don’t know.

After a four hour drive to Ho Chi Minh city, we moved into our family friends’ hotel, assuming that we were staying there as well. But I did kinda complain that it didn’t have any WiFi.

After meeting our family friends and all, we went to the local shopping centre. You don’t know how many times my parents told me to look out for pickpocketers. I was holding at least $1.5 million dollars, (VND - that is) and I don’t see why they gave me that much money and yell at me to be careful.

After shopping and spending about 50,000 on taxi fares, we moved into our new hotel that has WiFi! In fact, I’m using their WiFi to blog here right now!

I’m only staying in Ho Chi Minh for 1 night so we don’t have much time left. 6am tomorrow morning, we’ll be at Ho Chi Minh Int'l airport checking into our flight to Northern Vietnam called, Que. I’m assuming that’s where my mum’s family live.

So yeah, that’s what’s happening tomorrow. I’ll try my best to blog tomorrow but don’t be surprised if I don’t.

Of course, I’ll be tweeting and taking lots of photos for you to see. I’ll blog you guys later!

Another day has passed us by already. Well, not already since time goes really, really (and I really do mean really) slow. Even when you’re having fun, time just still goes slow. Now I’m just wondering if that’s a good or a bad thing.

Since yesterday’s blog post, I went to this beach called ‘Bien Cat’ which pretty much means sand beach, where you slide down sand dunes, which is fun.. for the first time only.

After that, I drank lots of coconut. I haven’t even drank coconut before, and suddenly, I drink it now! I’m not saying I don’t like it, but I guess it’s somewhere new to experience new… stuff!

Now after that, we went to this resort called ‘Sakara’ near Phan Thiet/Mui Ne, and we drank some… alcohol. (gigglz) And had a splash in the pool there as well. It wasn’t the best pool, and not the deepest either. Obviously, I like deep pools - don’t take this the wrong way and think that I murder people by drowning people just because I like deep pools.

We went home quite early, because one of my relatives had to study for her exams which she had today. Early meaning 8pm. Which meant an early sleep, I slept at around 10:30pm and woke up at 5pm, when I was planning to wake up later. But guess what? My parent’s woke me up this time. They started chatting in the middle of the night, which woke me up. I kinda got a little pissed.

It was an early start to the day, with rain falling all, morning, long and we had to go to the local market to get some groceries for lunch. We didn’t get much, but just enough, I guess. The highlight of the moment was when I walking in this little street, and I bumped the shades while it was still raining, and it bucketed the person next to me with water. She sweared at me in Vietnemese (duh) and I did not understand her, at all. So I just laughed :)

Stayed home after lunch for a couple of hours, until we went to Phan Thiet to shop! We spent VND$600,000 (That’s probably about AUD$50) on taxi fares and VND $0 (exactly AUD$0 *giglz*). And after that, I hopped onto this computer to blog and wrote a 800-word (overexaggerating, but may be true) long blog post.

Facebook now works on this computer! Well that was a little random. But Twitter still doesn’t work on this computer, but I did download TweetDeck to workaround this problem.

Anyway, I better go, I think I typed enough for the past 15 minutes, chat to you all later! :)

Good morning guys! I’m in Vietnam, and so far, I’m loving it!

The 10 hour flight was fantastic. I flew Singapore Airlines, stopping over at Singapore (duh) before heading to Vietnam. And their service is fantastic. They gave us free food, alcohol, etc. The movies were great, we got to choose from a very wide range of movies and there was enough leg space for everyone. I loved it, and I would certainly recommend it to everyone who is heading to Vietnam, or any other country.

Anyway, when the plane touched down at Vietnam, we got through the easy process of going through customs, immigration, etc. When we got outside, the freaking humidity was through the roof and it was HOT! It was 10pm - How could it be hot?!

Into the car, and then after that was just an awesome experience. The traffic was just in-your-face. There were bikes everywhere, cars driving on the other side of the road, people crossing the road when they feel like it, bikes running red lights, etc. No wonder this country is a developing country! No offence.

The plane touched down at around 8:00pm VNT and by the time we got outside the airport was probably 9:30pm. Then came another type of travelling. A 3-hour ride to Mui Ne, where we are going to stay for the next 4 days. That was also (very) tiring, and we didn’t get to sleep until 1am.

4 hours later, our relatives woke us up.. What?! Who wakes us up at 5am?! Now I know why, to beat the heat, of course! We had to do everything before it gets too hot. And boy time goes very slow in this country!

It’s 10:47am now, and I’ve done so many things in the past 5 hours since I’ve woke up. Walked around, visted our grandmother at the cemetery, prayed, visited some more relatives, drove on motorcycles, ate lunch, relaxed, and tried to get away from the sun.

So far, I’ve taken 135 photos, and it will be on my Flickr page.

Now, on the bad(-ish) side, and it’s pretty big. I can’t access Facebook whatsoever. Somehow, it’s giving me some networking error, but it also doesn’t work on my phone. Nor does Twitter on the computer, but twitter does work on my phone. Which, seriously, sunk me because I was planning to upload all my photos onto Facebook, so everyone can like all my photos. LOL JOKES.

As usual, I do have a backup plan, and that is all photos will now be uploaded to my Flickr page instead of Facebook. Tweets will continue as usual, but photo uploading on the go will not be used. Video blogs will start tonight, which will be uploaded tomorrow morning - basically, a video blog will contain everything that is said on this blog post.

Anyway, I’m off, blog ya’ll tomorrow, I think. LOL.

It’s 6am, and the all-nighter was a huge success. Yay!

It was a pretty quick 6 hours, though. All I did was Facebook, watch lots of episodes of “The Apprentice”, watch a movie and listen to lots of songs. All that without any energy drinks nor caffeine, I promise.

The downsides to that all-nighter is that, I’ve got a HUGE headache. Probably because my body is telling me to find a fucking bed and sleep, but yeah, just telling you I have the biggest headache, ever.

And to top it all off, I was so sleepy and my headache was so bad, I slipped over in the shower at around 5am and everybody in my family woke up. FML.

Now, here’s the hard bit. The 9-hour flight.

All I’m bringing is my iPod touch 4G and my sisters’ old-ish phone. No, I’m not bringing my iPad, my HTC Desire, my wallet, etc. So, it’s pretty much a technology-limited trip.

I’ve explained what I’m going to do socially a few blog posts back, and yeah. I’ve lived through a 12-hour flight, it should be pretty easy to live through a 9-hour flight, yeah?

Anyway, this will be the last blog post until I reach Vietnam, or I could go to some Internet Cafe in Singapore and blog there. Who knows.. 

Anyway, have a great Friday. I’ll touch down in Vietnam at around 6pm AEDT! And I’ll hopefully be online later tonight.