you buy from me?? you promess

Get the number! get the number!! was Jono (the Irish) telling me, as the bus which just crashed us flew off... Yes Vietnam is famous for the bus crashes and as part of the trip, our bus was involved in a nice one. It must have been around three in the morning on the bus journey between Hue and Hanoi. Jono had is sleeping mask on and most of the bus was asleep. We entered a dangerous curve with a white line (don't overtake) separating the sides of the road.... behind us arrived a bus full of really weird guy like pirates:: their driver decided to overtake of course.... at the same time on the other side of the road we see a massive truck coming>>> so instead of braking and not fully complete the overtaking process, the pirate driver made some signs with the hand to tell our driver to drive off in the ditch.... yeh right bangggg on the side >> the whole wing of our bus was gone, but noone was hurt. As we went off the bus to get some explanation from the artist, the guys from the pirate bus grabbed metal sticks and screwdrivers pointing them at us as they started the motor before fleeing. That is the moment when we had to write quickly down the number of the bus,,, We then had to wait for a good 1.5 hours for the police <<< but that wasn't disappointing << after 1.5 hours then arrived one policeman on a scooter hahahah! we couldn't believe it,,, just surreel. Anyway the positive thing of the experience was that I got to know everyone on the bus and I met two swiss on the 1st of August (I am traveling as a swiss dueing this trip and it is our national day) so we had a few crisp to celebrate.
Every tourist traveling from north to south in Vietnam told me that the famous Halong Bay experience was completely ruined by the crowd of tourists around and that they would have thought twice if they would have known blablabla.... Well, that is a lie!!! Halong Bay is just hoooooo so many tourist aaaaaaa, ooooo woaaaaaaow look iiiiiii uuuu my git !! wowowowowowo heeeeeee look there woaaaaawwwww........absolutely amazing. It is true that when you first arrive there and you see the crowd you get shoked and that when you jump on a boat, the amount of boats going in the same direction makes you think of the pictures of the D day when the americans and the english landed in Normandie. But there are enough islands to hide all these boats and the landscape just blow you off!! It is a place to propose someone !! After that we went to the next biggest attraction in north Vietnam::: Sapa. And once again that was full of tourist but really splendid,, I had the impression of being in a geography book on the chapter on rice fields in south east Asia. During your treck in the mountain there are always little girls from various local hill tribes following you there in general they are (black hmong) and they are trying to sell you some bracelet or bags or whatever,, 'you buy from me, you promess', the difference with others is that they follow you the whole treck so if you do a one day treck they will be one day with you maybe 5 of them just a few meters behind, they ask you but a really gentle and cute way so that everyone buys from them... These people have nothing but they look happy. That is probably the most important thing I have noticed during this trip: you don't have to be rich to be happy and actually, a lot of poor people are much happier than rich ones... So I really enjoyed north VietNam although it is extremely touristy.
After this, I went back to Hanoi to pick up my visa for Myanmar and get a flight the day after to Vientenne the capital of Laos... but as often the visa wasn't ready on time and I had to change my flight for a flight going to Luang Prabang (Laos as well), which was shit because I wouldn't have time to go to Vientenne anymore bouhouhouhou. Laos is coool,,, it is a big calm after the hectic Vietnam. so laid back and beautiful mountains are everywhere covered by green forrest blankets and separated by the curves of the Mekong. A fantastic place for meditation, a pity I don't do any!! I went to the different temples and chatted to some of the monks::: that is really interesting >> as in other south east Asian countries, every elder of a family can be monk for a few years, this way, they get some free education, but when you speak to them they are just like normal young people wanting to learn computing and english, they say swear words without problems and have no tabou, From Luang Prabang I tool the bus to Vien Vang to go tubing!!! and that is really cool!! they drop you in a river with a tube and you let the currant get you down. Normally it takes about 1 hour to get down bur there are a few bars where you can stop in between with big swings to jump in the river. I met a french bloke and we did the tubing in about six hours......... yeye at the end the jumps on the swings were not all very glorious..... but it was a really good fun afternoon.
I am now on my way to the 'Gibbon experience' at the border with Thailand>> everyone I met told me they had a great time doing it,, it is basically being in treehouses for three days at 30 meters above the ground trying to watch some monkeys,,,,, well I'll tell you all about it after,,, it'd better be good as I will spend my birthday there * the 18th of August just in case *
sa ya,
read me there.