Digital Wanderer

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Vietnam — 16, evening in Ha Long

2011-06-05

Why is April 30th a major holiday in Vietnam? Because it's Reunification Day, when  in 1975 the North Vietnamese, commonly known as the "Viet Cong," captured the capital, Saigon, which at that time was ruled by an American puppet government.

And why is May 1st a major holiday? Because it's Labor Day, and the country is socialist (after all).

Unsurprisingly, during these days Ha Long hosts the so-called Ha Long Tourism Carnaval Festival, basically a Brazilian-style carnival. The event is serious and colorful, broadcast in prime time on TV, the whole nine yards. We saw a rehearsal during the day, a bit closer to the evening. Anyone who has seen the pretty good cartoon "Rio" doesn't need an explanation.

IMG_5990 

Floats

A large parade float featuring a bright yellow dragon, decorated with red panels and stylized clouds, sits on the road. In the background, a modern building is visible against green hills.

Little dragon

A parade or carnival in Vietnam, presumably in Ha Long, 2011. A group of people, mostly women in bright traditional long dresses and conical hats, march down the street against the backdrop of a green hill with buildings and parade decorations.

Cool retirees

A group of Vietnamese women in bright traditional ao dai dresses walk down the street against the backdrop of a forested hill. One of the participants in a turquoise outfit waves welcomingly.

More of them

A group of elderly people in matching yellow t-shirts, caps, and green sweatpants marches down the road, holding small red flags of Vietnam.

Fitness enthusiasts

 A parade float in the form of a yellow-orange Eastern dragon on decorative pink and blue clouds moves along an asphalt road accompanied by people. In the background, a green forested hill, parts of a cable-stayed bridge, and other carnival structures are visible.

Another little dragon, pushed manually for some reason

A parade float decorated with large yellow-pink flowers, green butterflies, and volumetric clouds drives down a street lined with walking people. In the background, a green hill with a white building is visible.

 

 Four young women in summer clothes walk along a city street against the background of a parked black car and trees. They are wearing jeans, short shorts, and a leopard print dress.

Girls

 Several young Asian women in casual clothes are strolling down the street. In the right foreground is a girl in a red top, black pants, and a white shirt tied around her waist.

More girls

A young Asian woman in a white t-shirt, black pants, and sandals with a white cardigan tied around her waist walks down the street, touching the back of her head with her hand. Two other girls are walking next to her on the left, and green vegetation and metal structures are visible in the background.

More girls

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More girls

A group of young girls in summer clothes walks along an asphalt road against the backdrop of trees and a metal structure. One of the girls in the center cheerfully lifts her leg while walking, smiling.

More girls

 A large group of young Asian women walking down the street in summer clothes, in the background are green trees and bushes.

More girls

 A ceremonial procession walks down the street: men in blue traditional Vietnamese outfits play drums and other instruments, while a group of young people in bright pink robes with yellow sashes carry golden ornamented staffs. In the background, buildings and green-covered hills are visible.

And some guys, for a change, and a club at work

A long procession of people in bright pink and other traditional clothes moves along a wide street. In the background, green hills with houses and a large suspension bridge under a cloudy sky are visible, and festive decorations hang over the street.

Participants

 Two large red drums with yellow yin-yang symbols on floats stand in the middle of the street during a parade. People crowd around them, some in costumes, and green hills and banners for Ha Long Tourism Week 2011 are visible in the background.

Drums

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On stilts

On a street table are metal trays with an assortment of street food on skewers: fried chicken parts (wings, legs, feet), shrimp balls, and sausages. Nearby are two bottles of sauce. 

Grub for the grill, or rather on the grill

A yellow-gold 240 ml tin can of WONDERFARM «White Fungus Bird's Nest Drink» stands on a white parapet against a red-brown floor.

White fungus and bird's nest

I don't know what it is, but it says: "White fungus - bird's nest". White fungus is a kind of mushroom, and bird's nest, I hope you know yourself, is the material swallows use to glue their nests together. Something is literally floating in the drink, and the taste is weird.Close-up of a translucent white fungus with wavy folds, glowing from within with a warm yellowish light.

Here it is, the dearest white fungus

 A white bowl of Asian soup containing flat noodles, large pieces of fried tofu or dough, minced pork, and greens. Wooden chopsticks are submerged in the soup.

At the market eateries, they serve noodles with seafood for pennies ($1.5 a bowl)

It seems this soup has crab meat — and it tastes like it, too. And you remember how much I paid for such a delicacy at the restaurant.

 A Chinese tea ceremony set on a wooden tray, including clay teapots, tea bowls with a floral pattern, and bamboo tools. A person is holding a wooden scoop over one of the bowls.

A tea company threw a real tea ceremony, for free

The tea is advertised as "Safe tea," which apparently means it's "organic" (something I've written about a hundred thousand times, and won't again). The company, in case anyone suddenly gets fired up to buy some tea, is called VANTAI JOINT STOCK COMPANY.

A smiling man in glasses conducts a tea ceremony, working with small porcelain cups and clay teapots on a wooden tray; a green banner with Vietnamese text is visible in the background.

Tea master

A smiling young Asian woman with short hair in a black blouse holds a pink clutch in front of her, standing against the background of shelves with tea packages and tea sets. 

Ms. Phuong Thao

This girl was making eyes at me, or maybe I was at her, I don't know. She didn't speak English, so the manager girl who was telling everyone about the tea company translated. She also knew English without idioms, so when I told the girl above "So, you're pretty young," she translated it as "You are young and beautiful." That's where all the romance came from, hehe.  She also left her email so I could send the photos.

On the other hand, when I mentioned Latvia to the manager girl, she knew what it was and where it was, and started calling Latvia in Vietnamese — "Badabala" or something like that. Although all the dictionaries tell us that Latvia in Vietnamese is just Latvia. Suspicious. When I asked how she knew about our little republic, the girl struggled with translation but found a good and simple answer: "I like to watch Discovery". A simpler person, more culturally naive than me, would have concluded that the Discovery Channel shows Latvia. I, however, understood the answer to mean that she's just interested in the outside world but finds it hard to say that in English. Who's right, decide for yourselves. 

Pop bands were also performing at the festival, but  I wasn't impressed; I drank some freshly squeezed juice, some iced coffee, and moved on.

Three young people are squatting on a concrete floor around several laid out boards for Chinese chess (xiangqi). Next to the playing board, a candle burns, set in a plastic bottle.

They invited me to play, but I don't know the rules

 A young guy and a girl smile while riding a blue tandem bike along a busy city street at night.

Tandem

 Four smiling people – two women and two men – stand together at night in front of a brightly lit building with a sign "NHA HANG THANH NIEN" (Youth Restaurant). Colorful flags and street tables are also visible in the background.

Thuy, Ngoc, Dung, nicknamed Jay

I met these guys at the festival; they were sitting on a stool and called out to me as I was walking by. By that time, I had already relaxed in the cozy atmosphere of the festival, so I boldly sat down on a stool and struck up a long conversation. As it turned out, they are students at a tourism university and were conducting a survey about tourism in Ha Long. But we put that off for later, and first had a solid half-hour chat, after which they helped me buy the soup pictured above. We agreed to meet up again after they went to another festival rehearsal using fake press passes. We managed to do that, and later I grilled them about the political system and their attitude towards it, whether regular people can travel outside of Vietnam, whether people use drugs here, and other interesting things. Of course, they didn't tell me much right away, and honestly they are too young for such talks anyway, but it was still interesting. They spoke English much better than anyone I had met before, and at first I even took them for Japanese. (Although I could have remembered that the Japanese don't speak English either).

In conclusion, I'll say that I liked the tourism festival in Ha Long, despite the insane amount of people and the fact that this way of spending leisure time is generally a bit alien to yours truly. The most interesting part, meaning the parades and dances, was on the second day, but by that time we were no longer in Ha Long, that's just how it turned out.

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