Long time reader...

(PICTURE: Putting a face with a name...)

Huyen and I recently had the pleasure of meeting a long time reader of Ahoy Hanoi -- Marcus!

Marcus has been a frequent commenter on the blog for quite a long time. A couple of weeks ago Marcus let me know he was gonna be in Hanoi so we made plans to meet up. Marcus, like me, is an expat. Marcus has been living in Europe for I think around a decade (correct me if I'm wrong Marcus). He has lived in both Paris and currently in Germany. Marcus has an unbelievable skill for language and speaks four languages fluently. He also is a jack-of-all-trades and besides his career in Germany, finds the time to run film festivals. He was actually running a German film festival in Hanoi the week we met up with him.

One of the cool things about meeting blog readers is that I can finally put a face with their name. When Huyen and I arrived at the bar to meet Marcus, I started to write him a text message letting him know we were there. Well, just as I hit send, a friendly voice beamed out, "Huyen!" Sure enough, Marcus recognized us (or at least Huyen)!

One interesting anecdote from that night: Marcus told Huyen and I that he is becoming a German citizen. In order to do this, he has to give up his Vietnamese passport. Upon hearing this, I could sense some anxiety in Huyen. Marcus quickly calmed her down though and said something to the affect that, "Even though I won't have a Vietnamese passport anymore, I'll always feel Vietnamese."

Of course Huyen and I have talked a hundred times about moving to America but the idea of her having to drop her Vietnamese citizenship never crossed our minds. I'm not 100% sure how this works with America. I'm assuming if you just have a green card then you never have to get rid of your country's passport. However, if and when Huyen becomes a citizen, I'm fairly certain she will have to declare herself to be only American. I can imagine that that is very tough psychologically.

Anyway, it was great to meet Marcus and hopefully we'll see him again in the not to distant future.

Eat your greens...

I've been working part time at a private school recently and was quite entertained when I saw this:


(PICTURE: That's water spinach in a urinal.)

I guess some kids everywhere in the world don't like to eat their veggies.

Quan Lan: Odds and Ends

Here's a bunch of odds and ends from Quan Lan Island:

The island had the oddest looking pineapples I've ever seen:


At the port to go to Quan Lan were dozens of fishermen and little raft-taxis bringing people to their boats:


Check out all the shrimp in the truck behind these two vendors:


This was my favorite "guest house" on Quan Lan. This place is called Robinson and only costs about $8 a night to rent this "three sided tent" right by the water:



On a very serious note, on the last day I saw a familiar site -- the local war memorial. The girl on the first day told us that Quan Lan had around 4,000 people living on it. Huyen and I drove the whole island and it seemed that 4,000 was a huge stretch. I'd say the real population was a fraction of that. Regardless, there are a lot of names on this memorial for such a small place. It was another reminder of how everyone in Vietnam -- even those on a remote island -- paid a terrible price in the war with America:

Broken Door

As I mentioned the other day, immediately after checking in to our guesthouse on the first day in Quan Lan, we had to go to the Army office to be extorted. Huyen and I basically threw our stuff down in our room and headed out. After being extorted, we headed out to explore the island and didn't return to our guest house until the early evening.

When we got to the guest house we went straight upstairs to our room. I placed the key in the door, turned the key and quickly realized that something was wrong -- the door wouldn't open. I tried the door a couple more times but it wouldn't budge. Huyen went downstairs and got the landlady who also gave the door an unsuccessful try. She then hollered towards her husband to come fix the door. He gave it his best shot but alas, it wouldn't move an inch.

At this point I realized it was going to be a pain in the ass to open the door. It was by far one of the heavier, sturdier doors I have ever felt. I asked the landlady if we could go in the opposite room to wait. She agreed and let us in. After a few more moments I started to think how this situation could make for an entertaining blog so I whipped out my camera. After another twenty minutes or so it just became annoying. Finally a locksmith of sorts came and nailed the door handle with basically a sledge hammer and a screwdriver. The door finally opened but I could tell the problem wasn't really solved. I quickly grabbed our bags from the room and told the landlady we would switch to the room across the hall.

Well, I'm glad we switched rooms. The guest house ended up being full and later that night Huyen and I were woken up around 11Pm to loud bangs. Turns out the people who took that room got locked out. The locksmith had to be woken and basically broke the door.

My favorite part of this whole experience though was when Huyen overheard the male owner of the house (the man smiling at me at the end of the video) say in Vietnamese: "I told my wife not to let foreigners stay here." Somehow the lock breaking was my fault because foreigners apparently don't know how to open doors.

Quan Lan: The Good Side

(PICTURE: Some pretty shells on the beach.)

Over the last few days I've made a considerable effort to bad mouth Quan Lan Island. My goal has been to help dissuade potential visitors from going there. This may seem harsh but if I could save one person from being extorted by the Army, swindled by a guest house owner or robbed by the locals, I'll feel I've done a noble deed.

Now that said, there are obviously some good things about the island. For one, the beaches were nearly empty which made the island quite romantic. Secondly there were some good people on the island. Specifically, I really like these guys who invited me to play volleyball with them:

There were also some really cute kids. In fact, Huyen and I kept jokingly saying to these kids in English, "Please be nice to tourists when you grow up."

Quan Lan: Robbers

(PICTURE: Huyen standing in the doorway of our ATI beach bungalow.)

Before we went to Quan Lan, I read a review of ATI Resort from a foreigner who wrote about having all of his possessions stolen and the authorities/resort doing nothing to help him. Well, Huyen and I were booked to stay at this resort on our last night so I was extra paranoid about someone stealing our stuff and especially the ring! All day and night I carried a backpack with anything of value; there was no way I was gonna be robbed on the first night I met Huyen and then again on our engagement night!

After a long day at the beach and a celebratory dinner, Huyen and I went back to our bungalow around 8:30 PM. It was already pitch black near our place but we were able to see a man approaching us with a flashlight. The man, who was probably in his sixties, turned out to be a security guard. The guard walked from bungalow to bungalow checking up on things. I wish I had some pictures of the whole resort complex but I don't. Basically from the two farthest bungalows to each other was probably 150 meters. It was a long distance for one security guard to cover by himself. On top of that, the resort wasn't fenced in. Actually, during the day a bunch of locals and tourists strolled up around the bungalows while we were hanging out on the beach. In fact, a group of eight tourists hung out on our porch because they thought nobody was staying there. The point is, security wasn't so tight.

Well, sure enough, at 11PM Huyen woke me up because there was a lot of commotion outside. A whole bunch of Vietnamese tourists in the bungalow next to ours were looking for the security guard. Turns out someone robbed their bungalow and took off with all their stuff (which I'm assuming includes the very expensive cameras that they were taking photos with on the beach during the day).

In case I'm not doing a good job in helping you put two and two together -- this resort is clearly cased out by the locals and robbed on a regular basis. This was the cherry on top for why I will never go back to Quan Lan.

Quan Lan Island: Jellyfish

If the people and garbage doesn't dissuade you from going to Quan Lan, perhaps this will: The beaches are covered with jellyfish!

Actually, I should say, they are covered with the BIGGEST JELLYFISH I HAVE EVER SEEN! The good news is that supposedly the jellyfish don't sting. The bad news is that if you're scared of jellyfish (like me) they are really freaking scary.

The locals aren't scared of the jellyfish at all though. In fact, Huyen and I watched as a bunch of local boys picked up jellyfish from the beach and threw them on each other. To be honest, with my affection for the locals combined with their abuse of marine life, I was hoping the jellyfish did sting when I witnessed them tossing the creatures at each other.