Day 7: Huế

First Impression of Central Vietnam

Today I woke up at 5:43am in a Night Bus. Within it, we drove since yesterday evening from Hanoi, which is in the north of Vietnam, to Huế, the "Forbidden City" of Vietnam and former residence of Vietnamese emperors.

The first impression I got when I woke up was the beautiful nature of Central Vietnam. We were closer to the equator than in Hanoi, so the nature was more tropical. The cities and villages looked much cleaner than in the north. The houses appeared more traditional what reminded me of the mountain regions in the north. But what impressed me the most was the mere huge landscape with the mountains in the background :)

View along the Perfume River

At 8:30am we arrived at Huế. Then something unexpected happened: We were literally thrown out of the bus in an area where the ground was made up of big stones like at bombed ruins. Of course, we asked the driver why and he just told us that he cannot park at the official parking spots otherwise he would get trouble with the police. For me it seemed like he didn't have a valid drivers license or the whole drive was illegal what we didn't know. But nevertheless we found a (licensed) taxi driver who drove us through the old city of Huế to our hotel ^^

Our lunch (Spring Rolls and Hog Roast)

First: Huế looks a lot more cleaner than Hanoi. Second: It's not crowded. One reason were the missing street hawkers. But the disadvantage (just my opinion) is that Huế appears like an artificial city just for tourists and not for locals. But maybe this was just my imagination because the first city of Vietnam I got to know was Hanoi :D My first conclusion: If you want to make holiday in Vietnam, then you should go to Huế. If you want to know how Vietnamese people really live, then go to Hanoi ;)

Our rooms in the hotel were a little bit moldy what's normal if you think about the high air moisture and the irregular use of air conditioners in the rooms.

Spring Roll

For lunch we took a local restaurant which offered spring rolls. They are similar to "Nem" but the biggest difference is that you have no meat in spring rolls. Vietnamese people know that there are a lot more differences but I didn't have the space to explain everything in detail :D
After that we went to the "Emperors Palace" which is THE place of interest in Huế. For that we walked along the "Perfume River" (viet.: Sông Hương). Its bank had a relaxing atmosphere because of all the plants and sculptures which graced it ^^

Fountain on our Way to the Emperors Palace

At the "Emperors Place" I experienced that you have different prices for entering point of interests between locals and foreigners. Of course, the reason is understandable, it's just unusual from the places of interests I've been so far. And I had no problem with it because my father is Vietnamese, so I paid the same price as locals :D

Living Ruins

So, how to describe the palace? I think the best description is: "Living Ruins". Many buildings in this area had to be reconstructed or you could just see their ruins, because the are was bombed during the Vietnam War. When I walked through the palace, I could really sense the old and mighty atmosphere this place had once.
During our visit, the weather was finally awesome. No clouds with pure sunlight :) After the days before with all the rain, it was like a miracle. So we took our time to discover most of the buildings.

Inside the Emperors Palace

The Theater

Unfortunately, I teared my left ankle in a hole on a lawn which I couldn't see. Maybe the luck from my bell was just enough for the awesome weather ;)

The Emperors Clothes

I think we made in the palace so many pictures like never before because there were just so many things to see. For example, we saw an old theater which is still in use. And the clothes which were worn by the ancient emperors.


There were also artificial lakes which looked like made in a form of Zen-Style.

Artificial Lake (Zen-Style?)

So after hours of exploring, we went out of the palace to a restaurant called "Khong Gion Xua". On the way there, we passed a school for martial arts where we stopped and took some pictures. For me, as beginner in martial arts, it was a pleasure to see how well disciplined these students trained. The restaurant itself looked like a house in an ancient Vietnamese style. By ordering our dishes, something funny happened: They had a dish called "fig salad". At this moment I forgot the meaning of the word "fig", so I asked the waitress. But she also didn't know which was a little bit suspicious, but okay ;) So I ordered it. Now, I know that fig is a fruit, but there wasn't any fig in the meal I got. It was a salad made of cucumber, paprika, onion, peanuts and crab meat. Yes, I actually wrote it down :D But anyway, it was delicious ^^

Martial Arts Students on our Way to the Restaurant

After the dinner I left the group to go into a internet cafe. No, not what you think! I stayed there for 2 hours to write on this blog. It was really cheap, because I just had to pay 7.000VDN which is about 2.50€. By walking back to the hotel, the whole city laid in sleep. It was about 11:30pm and no one was on the streets. This was the first time I saw the streets of a Vietnamese city empty. On the way I saw a female fortuneteller who sat at the main street. For me, this is another proof how deep-seated faith in Vietnamese culture is. And for the record: I also believe in some spiritual things which I chose for myself. In my belief, The Divine lives in everything and especially in us humans with our power to create :)
After getting home, I just treated my teared angle and went to bed.

Next time, I will tell you about our last point of interest in Huế and the "Full-Moon Festival" in Hội An.

Day 6 - Hanoi + Drive with Night Bus

Hanoi

We woke up at 10am which was very late compared to the last days (normally our days started at 7am). Because of that we only had time to get ready for the check-out at the hotel and a small breakfast. Carina and I did catch a cold, so we started with salt sticks and hot tea. By the way, this was very delicious at this moment :D

My mother, my father and my sister started their day with "Bánh mì", the vietnamese bread. It is similar to Ciabatta (Italian bread) but it's made without salt. Because of that, it tastes like nothing for us ;)
When the others were outside for breakfast, Carina and I created a new morning ritual: From that day on, every morning we both rang my bell from the "Golden Mountain" of Bangkok (see this previous post) to get luck for the whole day :)

Random Photo after we got out of the Hotel

After the check-out, we went into a restaurant for lunch where they only sold noodle soups. A little advice for every future traveler: Only eat in restaurants where the locals eat. Then it's guaranteed that the quality is high and the prices are low. Otherwise the locals wouldn't eat there. And by the way, the noodle soup there with shrimp paste (I think it was called like "Nam Tam") and mince leafs was really delicious :)

Note: Since this day, I got not completely healthy during this journey. Sometimes I had a cold, sometimes I just had to cough heavenly. But this didn't keep me away from getting new experiences and answers :D

Mosaic of the Turtoise from the Story

Later we went again to the Lake of "Hoàn Kiếm" and visited the temple on the little island. My short summarize of the story of Hoàn Kiếm: In ancient times, Lê Lợi, the hero of Vietnam got a sword from the gods to free the country from the ruler of the Ming Dynasty. After he finished this task, he went to the lake of Hoàn Kiếm to thank the gods.

At this moment, a giant tortoise came out of the lake and asked him to give her his divine sword because it belonged to the gods and he don't needed it anymore. So the hero gave back his divine sword and from that time, the lake was called "Lake of the Returned Sword" or in Vietnamese: Hồ Hoàn Kiếm (Hồ means lake, I think). I also read other versions of this story, but I like this one the most ^^

Little Pond on the Island ^^

Back to 2012: The temple itself was filled with a very religious and calm atmosphere. From my point of view, religion / faith is in Vietnam much more important to every local than in Germany. Vietnamese people really respect all sacred buildings, maybe this was the reason that the temple was so calm. It felt like being on an isolated part (in the center of the city!) which invited me to relax :)

Pagoda and Visitors in front of the Temple

Afterwards we went all together to more shops, but we only bought a few souvenirs ;)
Then we continued our journey and got in a night bus to Huế, the "forbidden city" of Vietnam and former residence of the Vietnamese emperors. Because the drive was about 14 hours, it had beds instead of seats. The night buses are very popular among tourists, because you can travel very cheap. It cost 350.000VDN (= 14€) for a distance over 800km.

Bus to Huế

Carina and Me in the Night Bus

The trip itself was really ... let's say it this way: You have to like adventures :D You need also the patience to stay long in an uncomfortable bed and you need to have no problems with bad smells or noise too. Or you can just fall asleep very fast and deep wherever you are. Luckily for me, since I was on a Heavy Metal festival, I have no problems with either of these things ;)

The others were a little bit knocked out on the next morning, so I used the time to think a little bit: For me, the trip was a bit strange, because when you have too much time, sometimes you start to think about your life. I mean this was good, I joined the journey to get the time to think about my life. I just didn't expected that I would do this in such an area and time. Maybe the right time to think about the most important things in life is only when you didn't await it ^^

So I thought about the questions like what I really want to achieve in life and how I can move on after this journey. Or better said, the answer just popped suddenly out in my mind. And like always, it was the most easiest answers of all. But because this is something very personal everyone has to find out by him- or herself, I won't tell you (my) answer ;) I can just say that this evening will always be a milestone in my life. Curios what can happen if you are somewhere in Vietnam, in the middle of the night, in a uncomfortable bed of a loud bus :D

Somewhere in Hanoi at the evening

At 1am we had a stop about 45 minutes at a roadside. So we went out of the bus and ate a bit of the corncobs we bought earlier. After that and a little stretching, I went back in the bus and and felt asleep within a few minutes.

Next time, I will tell you about the difference of the north and the center of Vietnam.

Day 5 - Second Day At Grandparents House + First Day in Hanoi

a cow on our way to Hanoi

At forenoon, we used the time to choose things from our luggage which we would need on our upcoming tour to the center of Vietnam. At this point, we realized that our planning had some faults because we had to leave more things at the grandparents house than we thought, especially clothes. But in the end, we mastered also this task :)

Phồ Yên - Hanoi
After lunch we got into a taxi with large capacity which drove us to Hanoi. The drive itself was about 1.5 hours. Compared to our visit six years before, a lot of things changed. The roads were much better this time because they were real built roads. Six years before, there were only paths. We also saw more houses and shops than before.

Hanoi
Like we remembered, Hanoi is a busy, loud and a little bit dirty city. But let's see what else we discovered:
When we arrived, we took two rooms in a little hotel near the lake "Hoàn Kiếm" which is also called "Lake of the returned sword". It has a little story which I will tell you in the next post :)

Streets of Hanoi

Fashion Store in Hanoi

After the check-in, we went out to discover the streets of Hanoi. One thing is very curios (for me as German): Depending on the street, every shop in this street offers the same kind of product. So for example, we went through a street where only Buddha statues were sold.

 From our hotel we started to explore the fashion stores in our street. To summarize the offer, here a quote from Carina: "Kitschy, blink-blink and many clothes are dowdy" ^^

Maybe the most funniest discovery we made :D

After this discovery, we had lunch with Thảo, the daughter of a friend of my father. She learnt German for going abroad to Germany and I have to say that she spokes good for someone who learns this (complicated) language for only six months. At lunch we ate "Bún" which is a noodle soup with glass noodles, pork and local herbs. You can say, it's the basic food in Vietnam. At least it was for us :D

Church in Hanoi

Inside the Church

Then we explored more shops. Since this time, Carina used her ability to bargain. For example, she bought a scarf out of silk for 200.000 Đồng (VDN) instead of 400.000 VDN. Information: When we were in Vietnam, one Euro was about 26.000 VDN. So you see, the prices weren't that low in Vietnam. We also visited a church but I cannot say if it was catholic or protestant, maybe some of you know it ^^ The church itself was really crowded, so we just went in there for some minutes.

After looking into some more stores, we went to the lake Hoàn Kiếm. What I really like about this lake are the many trees and benches for relaxing. Because it was dark, we saw many colored lights in some trees and also the bridge to the little island with a temple at the lake was lightened in different colors. 

Lights over Hồ Hoàn Kiếm

Streets of Hanoi during Night

Because it was already night, we went to the night market near our hotel. But sudden rain made shopping impossible, nevertheless it inspired Carina and me to a spontaneous singing of songs like "I'm singing in the rain" of Fred Astaire and "Always look on the bright side of life" covered by Monty Python.

At this point I want to thank Carina for being at this journey. Otherwise the journey wouldn't be so great ! :)

My summary of the day: Like expected, Hanoi changed a lot in six years and is now more modern and western. Sadly it remembers me highly of Bangkok. Maybe it is the destiny of all big cities that they will all look the same. I don't know what I expected but in the end of the day I was disappointed of the city. I never felt joy during our first visit here, except during the singing, of course :D

Next time, you will see what happened at the second day in Hanoi.

Day 4 - The first day at grandparents house

Family is preparing the food

Vietnam - Grandparents Home

The 4th day started early at 5 am. The family organized a little party because we arrived. The typical family parties in Vietnam are very similar to the ones in Germany: You have to eat and drink the whole time and talk to all people. In Vietnam it's also tradition that the main guest, in this case my father, had to clink glasses with all people and I ,as his first son, had also to do this. In the end, I was surprisingly fit while my father had a big headache :P

Beef with rau muống (dt.: Wasserspinat)

So I got to know a lot of relatives and friends of my family. But I have to apologize: I forgot already most of the names. But I will never forget the kindness of everyone even I couldn't talk Vietnamese. But one name I remember: Dúỏng, a friend of the family who is a doctor and went for one year to Germany. He told many interesting stories and one lesson for me: From his point of view, the most important questions in everyone's life are: Who am I? Where am I?

He told me: "If you answer these questions by yourself, you will see what's important in life and you can strive for this." One goal of this journey was for me to rethink my future way, so this inspired me to think about it. My first thought was: I would add one more question: "What do I want to do?" But maybe this is part of who I am.

Family Party

Clinking glasses with good rice wine
e.g. with Dúỏng (center with blue shirt) and uncle Niam (older brother of my father, right besides Dúỏng)

The day was over really fast. After the party it was already late in the afternoon. But nevertheless, I played a bit with my younger cousins. Especially with Thai, who is now 6 years old. After he found out that I could help him blowing up the balloons we brought with, he came to me every second to blow up a new balloon ^^

Cousin Thai with the balloons :)

I had also a very intense conversation with my cousin Tu. The main topic was a discussion about the lifestyles from both of us. I told him a lot about my life in Germany. He also told me about his life. For example, I learned that television broadcasts of sport events in Vietnam are so popular like in Germany and many people watch them.
In difference to the education system in Germany, Vietnamese pupils and students have to pass multiple acceptance tests during their education. In Germany, you have just to write a bunch of tests during your education and none of them is so important like an acceptance test oO

Cousin Thai (left) and Cousin Tai (right)

At the evening we had a little dinner with some relatives and friends. Thank God with less alcohol :D At dinner we got "chôm chôm", a kind of litchi and the so called "Oi Fruit" which is a guava. This emphasizes again the healthy nutrition of the Vietnamese people :)
After that we went to sleep. What an amazing day ^^

Next time, I will tell you about our drive to Hanoi and about an ancient story. Have a good time :)

Day 3 (Bangkok, Hanoi) - Flight to Vietnam

View from the Lumphini Park
- The greenest place in Bangkok -

Bangkok
In the morning, we got ready for our flight to Vietnam. After packing all the luggage, we went together to the Lumphini Park for a last walk. This is the biggest and oldest park of Bangkok. The first things we saw were many pieces of sport equipment. There were also little lakes and some sculptures of animals made out of grass. Most of them were elephants which are sacred animals in Thailand, if they have white skin. So we relaxed in the park from the last two unforgettable but also exhausting days.

Maybe the most curios thing
I saw in Bangkok: a "Hello Kitty" bus oO

We went to the airport via taxi with a large capacity at noon. This was necessary, because we were five persons with luggage for three weeks. At the airport we killed some time by going to many shops and tasting free samples of flavored rice crackers. In the end we also bought two packages because the ones with sesame and coconut were just too delicious.

The flight itself to Hanoi was just about 90 minutes, so we used this time to rest and I learned also the correct address (speaking) of my relatives. This is more complex than in Germany because in Vietnam the addressing depends on where the person stands in the hierarchy relating to your parents. But it was easy to understand when I got the principle of hierarchy in Vietnam.

Good Bye Bangkok! :)

Airport of Hanoi

About 10 people from the family and close friends awaited us at the airport. It was a very warm welcome even for Carina who wasn't part of the family. But in Vietnam family is a very open definition and because we introduced Carina as my friend they included her in the family from the first moment :)

It was also amazing when I realized how much time had passed when I were welcomed by my cousin Tu. Six years before when I was in Vietnam, he was 9 years old. Now he had been grown so much and we could talk together for the first time because he already started to learn English. Some weeks before we also started to chat via Facebook and now we could continue our conversation. After the welcome on the airport, we were driven to my grand-parents house where we will stay the next days. 

Finally at Home !
- My father (center), my grandparents, two cousins (the kids) and one brother-in-law -

First Meal
at my Grandparents House

When we arrived, the family started with collective eating and (the men) with drinking. As the (first) son of my father, I had also to drink much of self-made rice wine from a good friend of the family, uncle bảy. We ate also self-made dishes like tofu and rice with mung beans and peanuts. All the dishes were much better than the same dishes when you buy them in Germany. Sleeping at night was literally hard, because we slept in beds without mattresses. At this moment, I really missed my soft bed at home ;)

Next time I will tell you about the next days we spent with the family and how we got to Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam. Happy traveling! :D

Day 2 (Bangkok) - Temples and Tuk Tuks

Tuk Tuk
- The transportation vehicle of Bangkok -

At this day our plan was to get to Wat Pho, the biggest, oldest and most famous temple complex in Bangkok. We wanted to get there by boat because there's no other option besides Tuk Tuk or taxi which we disagreed because we heard many stories of tricksters who wants to get a high price after driving you. So the official way seemed the best :)

Information: Tuk Tuks are mopeds with a little trailer in which about 3 persons can sit. They're typical for the view of Bangkok.

Bad omen for the rest of the day ;)

First, we went to the metro station "Hua Lamphong", because we also didn't want to pay extra for the Skytrain and then pay more for the boat. If we had taken the Sktrain, the way by boat had been actually farther. Then it started to rain and because of public works on the street, we couldn't see the boat station and were unsure how to get there. A Thai saw us and talked to us spontaneously. He explained that the whole area where Wat Pho and many other temples lay was closed because of the visit of the king and a Buddhist holiday. This is a popular lie and also travel guides described that only tricksters will talk to you spontaneously (what will be confirmed again later). Normally, Thai people are more shy and reserved towards foreigners.

Then the man wanted to send us to other temples in the south of the city and tried to convinced us to take the bus or Tuk Tuks which he (spontaneously) ordered from the street. At this point, it was clear he lied to us and wanted to trick us together with the Tuk Tuk drivers. So we said quickly goodbye and tried to take the bus. Then we realized that also the station he described wasn't the right one, the right one was in the opposite direction. So our instinct was right that he was a trickster. Now we decided to get to the river via the Skytrain even it was more expensive than the first way.

View from the boat over Bangkok

So at the second try, we took the boat from the central pier. During the drive on the river, we had a great view of the city and saw lots of different aspects from the city: Religion (temples), Wealth (skyscrapers), Poverty (barracks) and Business (industry complexes). For me it was also a good feeling to sit on the bow of the ship and smell the fresh air of the river. The river seemed also very clean what wondered me. I thought because of the industry and tourists, the river would be dirtier. Another prejudice deleted ;)

Big Buddha
at Wat Indrawihan

By boat we arrived at the area of Wat Pho. Then we made the biggest mistake: We went to the entrance of the royal palace which is alongside the entrance of Wat Pho. A man on the guard post at the entrance talked to us (spontaneously) and explained that the visiting of Wat Pho AND the Royal Palace is limited to 3:30pm which was proven by an official sign next to him. In the end we recognized that we didn't read the sign properly because the time was ONLY for the royal palace and NOT for Wat Pho. But we fell for it. So the man showed us a route with two alternative places of interest: Wat Indrawihan which inherits a big Buddha statue (height is about 31.5m) and the Golden Mountain with a temple on the top.

View from a Tuk Tuk

He organized also two Tuk Tuks with official drivers. They all wore the same blue jackets and they had also an identification card which looked very official. The whole route costs us only 40 Baht, so the man said, because this was a special offer of a promo tour which was only at this day. Additionally we only had to visit one store from the organizer of the promo tour and hadn't to buy anything. Because this offer sounded so good, we agreed. As you may have already recognized: This was a trick. How high is the possibility to be at the right time and the right place to get this cheap possibility? But the offer was too tempting for us and we felt for the trick. This is another proof that the human brain switches off when human sees discounts or something similar.

Temple at Golden Mountain
(not the one on the top!)

So we were driven to the first place of interest: Wat Indrawihan with the big Buddha. The atmosphere was very calm because about 75% of the people there were Thais who prayed. Then we had to drive to two stores (instead of one like they promised) and it started to rain again. At this point we didn't know how many stores we would have to still visit, so we demanded from the drivers to get to the Golden Mountain and then back to the next station. When we were at the mountain, we first wanted to cancel the visit after the first minutes because of the heavy rain. But the drivers were not at there Tuk Tuks. Maybe they probably drank hot tea somewhere.

Golden Buddha
at Golden Mountain

Then the rain stopped and we decided to give the mountain another try. It was a little adventure to get the 400 stairs of the mountain up to the temple because they were slippery from the rain. But it was worthy because we got a great view from the top over the whole city. I also bought a little bell as lucky charm. Let's see if it will work on the further journey :D

After that, we decided to walk to the next station (about 3 kilometers) instead of taking the Tuk Tuks and so we tricked the drivers by being driven to two places of interests for free. During the walk to the metro, we also saw a part of the city which wasn't so heavenly populated by tourists and we could see where and how the Thai people really lived. And we went through the railway station which looked a little bit familiar, if you know the typical railway stations in Germany ;)

Entrance of the railway station
- The end of the long road -

In the next blog post, I will tell you about our last day in Bangkok, our arrival in Vietnam and how our family received us in the middle of the night :) Happy traveling! :D

Day 1 (Bangkok) - The streets of Bangkok

Streets Of Bangkok from a bridge

We started the 1st day at 9a.m. in Bangkok, very exhausted from the flight. But that didn't keep my father and me from discovering the streets of Bangkok after the check-in at the hotel. So we started in the streets near the hotel. The 1st thing we saw was that you get food everywhere like we saw it in Hanoi 6 years before. Whether at little cook shops directly on the street or in one of the numerous stores like 7Eleven which we saw in nearly every street corner (no exaggeration!).

Everywhere I saw cook shops
on the street

At first we tried some grilled pork meat on sticks from a cook shop on the street, which was very delicious. Then we went along the main road and by doing this we realized how enormous the traffic in Bangkok is. We saw this phenomenon in Hanoi too, but there were motorcycles instead of cars like in Bangkok. Luckily in Bangkok they have many bridges over the roads and traffic lights, so crossing the road was very easy.

Sale! Sale! Sale!
- Shopping center in Bangkok -

After we finished the first walk, we went back to the hotel were we picked up my mother, Sophie and Carina for discovering the city together. So we went again along the main road, discovered some branch roads, exchanged our first Euros in Baht and continued our breakfast on the street. At the early afternoon, we went to one of the main targets for our trip in Bangkok, the local shopping centers. To make one thing clear: This wasn't my idea, I would never visit a city for shopping but I went with ;)

Bangkok has many shopping centers and I can't remember the names of the ones we were inside but that doesn't matter. Because when we were there, we realized how similar these shopping centers were with the ones in Germany. Okay, in Bangkok they were bigger but the prices and the products were nearly the same. I think this is one of the disadvantages of globalization ;)

Shopping center
- Impressive from the outside -

But because we went to the shopping centers, we also used the Skytrain for the first time, the most important public transportation vehicle besides the metro. It is also really fast and in combination with the metro you can go to nearly every point in Bangkok very quick. Apart from the area with the temples like "Wat Pho" were the government will expand the Metro lines in the next three years as we will learn later. Because the tickets were so cheap, first we had always to go to the next service desk and exchange our big banknotes into a lot of 10-Baht coins for the ticket machine. In the end, every drive of the Skytrain cost each one of us about 25 Baht, which is about 0.70 Euros. In comparison to the prices of our German tram in Leipzig, we just payed about 60% of the price we would pay in Leipzig. And it was much faster.


After the disappointment at the shopping centers, we went to one of the night markets in Bangkok at the evening. It was very crowded and so it was difficult for Sophie and Carina to find acceptable clothes. We others weren't the target group I guess because we only saw things for young women. And like our young women told me, the quality of the products weren't good. So this shopping tour wasn't very efficient too. For dinner, we went into a Japanese restaurant with good quality and good prices for tourists. Then we finished our trip at the night markets, because afterwards the rain started to fall very heavy and we decided to go back to the hotel.

Advertisement vs. Reality
- A meal in a Japanese restaurant -

To bring the evening to a good end, my father and me decided to go to the bar in the hotel and to drink a beer. I have to say that the "Cheng-Beer" I ordered was good, also in comparison with German beer like "Ur-Krostitzer" that I usually drink. As father and son we talked about the happenings of the day, the next days of the journey and my upcoming future. The last part was the most important for me, because I wanted to use this journey to find a clear and ambitious direction for my future. It was very successful because it wasn't hard to find out that I want to go abroad for a few years. My father went to Germany when he was 18 and he was able to build up his own family and future in a country which was foreign for him. So he had a lot of useful experiences for me like starting to build up a circle of friends in a new city immediately, because no one can do such a thing alone.

Traffic during the night
Maybe the same like the one at day ;)

One curiosity was a man from the USA who worked for the "Worldbank Group" and spontaneously talked with us. What was strange at the first moment, was in the end a luckily coincidence because this man told us that he was originally from Switzerland, traveled a lot in his job and had 3 children who are also living in different countries. So from his point of view I got a lot of important aspects and things I had to think about regardless if his whole story was true or not. What was the conclusion of the evening? I got some new thoughts which I have to solve for my own and I was confirmed in my way of thinking that regardless what others think, I should follow my goals and should really work with 100% on them. Let's see how this will end ;)

In the next post, I will tell you about our 2nd day in Bangkok and how we were tricked and in the same way how we tricked the tricksters in the end. And please excuse the (not so high) quality of my written English. If there is something you cannot understand, just write me a comment and I will reply as fast as I can.