Group spooning & Farts

When things go bad, they just dont stop there - they go from bad to worse. 

 

I hop on the bus to experience what would be the worst ride of my life. Apparantly the bus company had overbooked people and I am having to squeeze into a 5 bed seater. As I mentioned before, the sleeper buses in Vietnam are nothing like the fully reclining, super comfy leather seats they advertise in their brochures. I go to my seat and there are already 4 people sitting there. Great! I am sandwiched between two couples. We are sleeping right next to each other with barely any space to move. 

 

Yuuuuuuuuuuck! Everyone stinks. Oh God!

I take my deo (luckily I had it in my bag) and want to lift everyone's hands and spray it away.....but instead spray it on my mattress and the so called quilt and on myself and breath through my clothes & the quilt!  Ewww.

I couldnt take a picture of my bus mates, but I googled and found this picture - this is how it literally was - Me sandwiched in between the big guy & the girl wearing glasses to his left.

 

The quilts given to us on the bus is more like a long towel. The aircon vents are broken and it is blasting cold air so I try to cover myself with the quits given. I can barely cover my top. While I am freezing and trying to fit into the mini quilts, I look at the BIG guy next to me with his girlfriend - he is also struggling trying to cover himself......and he can only cover his right arm and right leg! HILARIOUS! It looks like an elephant trying to cover itself with tissue paper!

 

I have lost my card, feel terrible receiving a gift from my receptionist, petrified hoping no one misappropriates my card but I cannot stop bursting out laughing seeing how the big guy can only cover his right arm and leg. Everyone in the bus is looking at me and but I still cant stop laughing. There is no place to keep my hands to my side so I have to keep my hands behind my ears (like how you keep in your hands when doing ab crunches). Ridiculous.

 

In the middle of all this at about 1 am, when things seem to have quietened a bit,  I hear the biggest fart! I swear, no kidding. And it smells HORRID! It is the big guy next to me. F*&^%$#%^*&^K!!! I know this is gross but I can feel the hot air through my legs! How disgusting!

Oh god please, I want to die - RIGHT NOW! To top it all, he thinks its cute, smiles and holds his girlfriend's nose! WTF. What about the rest of us!

 

I try to get up to get some fresh air so I decide to go the toilet on the bus. There is a white guy sleeping on the floor (its pretty common to overbook people). So I look at him down sleeping so uncomfortably and try to be positive. But I regain my senses and realise, hey its much better to lie on the floor than having someone fart on your legs!! Its 1 am, the lights are off and I dont want to wake him up so I get down, hold on to the rails and I am diagonally crossing seats doing matrix stunts - the bus is moving fast so I am standing in a nice V to hold on to the rails and at this most awkward moment, the guy sleeping on the floor opens his eyes. Oh god.... A-w-k-w-a-r-d. I pray he doesn't recognise my face in the morning. I finally get to the toilet and Ta-Da...I am greeted by a puddle of awful smelling urine and poo. GROSS!!

 

I cannot get myself to stay there another second so head back doing my matrix stunts crossing seats.  As I try to get up to my seat, the boyfriend (the non farting one) of the girl to my left asks "You dint go? what happened?

Me: "I dont think the flush works"

Him "Oh.....but mine went down" 

 

Ewwwww! I dint ask you explanation! 

 

 

White guy sleeping on the floor

 

Big farting guy next to me half covered with his quilt

 

2 hours later I can see someone hugging me - and it is the boyfriend (the non farting one) - WTH! He is hugging his girlfriend but because we are so close to each other, he is hugging me too. Ewwww! I lift his hands throw it away back on his face!  I cannot wait to get off the bus. Finally there is a toilet break for 30 mins. The toilet facilities are very basic - like there is a small tiny wall to separate the men's and women's giving ample view for people to have a peek at each other while doing their business. Oh my god, can this get any worse?!

 

I talk to my australian friend explaining my seat and what had happened and we both cannot stop laughing while people eavesdropping are also chuckling. She then points me to the big guy who is eating sausages and eggs! "DUDE! Please STOP it! I cant take it anymore! No food for you till I get off the bus" (I silently yell to myself)

Oh god! I sure wanted the "local experience" of traveling in Vietnamese buses - but Hell, who would have thought I would have to sleep next to smelly farting backpackers! 

The journey was 14 hours - needless to say I did not get a wink on the bus!

 

Booze Cruise - Halong Bay - Days 5&6

I woke up next morning and got on the bus for Halong bay - The four hour journey is nothing like driving on the scenic Great ocean road in Melbourne. The road is full of bumps and potholes. So we get off our buses near the harbour and get the first glimpse of Halong bay - the view i Uh-mah-zing! Absolutely gorgeous!

We sat on a small boat to be taken to our cruise ship. I sit there with a big smile on face with a sense of accomplishment! A feeling of finally doing/seeing something that I've been wanting to do/see for months! The photos just don't do justice for the amazing place that Halong bay is.

Limestone formations on Halong Bay

 

 

A house on one of the Lime stones

We are told the rules of the cruise - No drinking with right hand - if you are caught, you have to slam the whole drink in one go - imagine drinking water from a 1 litre bottle! Second rule is not to utter the words "mine" and "ten" - or you have to do ten push ups. We have our lunch and our kayak boats are ready. I team up with my Swiss friend and we kayak around the bay and through some cool caves. Its pretty damn amazing (minus the random nappies floating around on the bay)

Our Kayaks

 

View from the cave

Kayaking through the caves

We come back for dinner and the real fun begins - drinking games on board! 2 packs of cards are scattered all around and you are required to pick a card and do what's told on the card. Some of the crazy activities include drinking with straight hand (i.e. no bending elbow), doing belly shots, mixing all drinks and slamming them one go- (ewww...beer+vodka+rum+whiskey = vomit), and a whole bunch of other games. To make the most of the happy hour, I bought 2 cans of Coke and got dirty looks from everyone for free :( I sat there praying the whole time hoping I don't pick cards that require me to do silly dares - I have'nt prayed that hard even for my Year 10/12 scores! Nervously, praying to every god I could remember, I drew my first card - It was a 7 of hearts - which meant I had to be the troll - i.e sit under the table and do nothing until someone pulls out another troll card. Phew! not that bad. I sat for nearly 30 mins. As I got up, our table was almost empty. Most of them had left. Damn! My other cards included shouting "F%^& you" at every one and daring someone to do something. All in all it was fun but it was way too much drinking my little liver could take - so we girls came back to our rooms and talked for a bit and fell asleep. Next morning we got ready to head back to Hanoi. We met some cool people on the bus, reached Hanoi at 5 and I had a bus to Hue at 5.30. So I quickly said my byes to my new friends and actually felt pretty sad leaving them.

I got on the famous Vietnamese sleeper bus for my 14 hour journey to Hue. I thought I had experienced the worst bus/train journeys having traveled 2nd class on Indian trains - boy was I wrong! The Vietnamese sleeper buses are mother of 2nd Class Indian trains.

Sleeper buses in Vietnam

The seats are so narrow that there is barely any space to even keep my bag on the side - I wear my eye mask and go to sleep. At about 1 am the bus stops and I remove my eye mask and I m greeted by a smiling toothless Vietnamese man sleeping literally next to me, except on the floor! WTH - when did he come and how the hell he find the space to sleep! Geez!

Again not complaining for the price I paid to travel the whole country but its not quite what you expect especially when the travel agent shows pictures of a spacious bus with comfy leather seats.