The one full of exciting bus rides and dragons

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We decided to actually visit Da Nang this weekend (as opposed to the many weekends that we planned to but didn't manage to leave). I am very glad that we did because this was one of the most enjoyable and fun weekends so far. Many, many exciting things happened to us: bus rides full of chairs in the aisle and sassy old ladies, walks across the Dragon Bridge, lazing by the beach, so many naps, great views of Da Nang from where we stayed and a sky restaurant.

Bus ride from Hue to Da Nang

Lights of Da Nang

We went with a friend from Hue and took the local bus from the bus station. I want to say it left straight away but was not actually moving until 30 minutes into the journey. It crawled and halted and took on passengers and squeezed them in all sorts of seats and places. This continued for a while. Since this was the first ride, we were mostly okay with it. This was a very fun bus ride (although not as much as the one back). Meagan was by the window, angled sideways because she is too tall for almost everything here. The view was great, full of greenery, mountains, and water. They had the air conditioning on and the window open, a fantastic combination to stay cool.But as soon as we reached the entrance of apparently what is a very long and dusty tunnel, all open windows were shut. It was a long, long tunnel through the mountain and it felt like a marvel. Once we exited the tunnel, we could start seeing the lights of Da Nang in the distance.

Penguin bin

We reached the bus station, alighted and were promptly surrounded by many many taxi and moto drivers. We got outside and took a Mai Linh (they go by the meter and are one of the most reliable and efficient cab services I have ever used anywhere ). We were about a 30 minutes ride from our hotel and it was a fun ride through the city, the shops and lights. We checked in and then went to a place called Luna's Pub, which was great: fun music, great food and drinks. We then walked to a second, much noisier bar, which was fun too. Something that I have seen in Hue and saw here as well was a wall full of random messages from guests. Some of them are cute, some make you go aww cute, and some are just weird as heck. "XYZ was here in 2002" - great, "Call me at 23$$45566" - umm ok, "I got Yellow fever in Vietnam" - Giant sigh (I did not even know what that meant till Meagan told me).

Stay

One of the views

The hotel was great, not too far from the restaurants, the waterfront, and the beaches. It had many advantages but the best thing was the view of the city from the large glass window and the fans that we asked for which made the curtains billow. They also had a decent restaurant at the roof, with a lovely view of the city, including the famous Dragon bridge. I thought it was good value for money and if you are ever heading to Da Nang, feel free to ask me for the name and other details!


Day 1

From our walk

In the day we mostly lazed, had coffee at a family-run shop outside the hotel and made friends with the 4 kids (one was a babe-in-arms). The best part was the granny pointing at the naked baby's private parts (she was a girl) and showing 3 fingers, indicating 3 girls. It was not weird at all but it was surprising. The other kids came and spoke to us, running away shyly ever so often. The baby had the cutest (unintentional?) Mohawk. We then visited the Phong Van Dong beach, walked by the waves, and then head out for lunch. Our evening was great fun. We started with dinner at the Waterfront Restaurant and luckily there was a concert going on right outside.

Dance class

We enjoyed the meal and the music and started walking back towards the Dragon Bridge, excited for the 9 pm fire display. On the way we saw sculptures, girls and women participating in a dancing class (set to Spanish music). I have to say I have rarely seen public spaces being used so well and openly as in Vietnam. The fact that men, women, babies and teenagers are all out, walking, enjoying themselves, safe, is so thrilling to watch. It makes me believe in public spaces in a way that I haven't for a while. We reached the Dragon Bridge 30 minutes too early and thus began the most exciting part of our evening, one that deserves its own section.

Dragon Bridge

The mouth

Learn more by reading about the Bridge at this link. We were told about the fire display and walked on the pedestrian pathway on the bridge (I have seen this in Hue and now in Da Nang and may I saw how awesome it is that a space for vehicles does not exclude people who are walking. It is fantastic). We reached the mouth of the dragon and decided to sit down for a while. A girl came and chatted with us (between Meagan's American/white looks and my Indian/brown looks, people are always asking us where are we from and striking up conversations. It is mostly great, except the few times some of the men have been cheeky or salacious, making us a little warier of engaging. Kids are great though). She was a student, selling Pepsi for a competition and she asked us how we liked her country. The police shuts down the traffic about ten minutes before the display and it was at this time we moved to the center of the bridge, right in front of the mouth of the dragon. They kept moving people farther away for safety. When we had arrived the number of people was already in the hundreds and by the time the display started it felt like thousands. They stop the traffic right by the dragon and not at the beginning of the bridge as I mistakenly thought. The display started.

Fire balls

The dragon emitted a few fire balls. Then a few more. One of the two sets of children following us mimed something but we didn't understand. Suddenly the dragon roared and spewed giant water rays at people, causing everyone to scream and start running to the other side of the road, trying to save their gadgets and selves from being drenched. Imagine this, suddenly being drenched by giant, giant water rays from the dragon's mouth. It was PHENOMENAL. I am so glad we had no idea. Even though I cribbed a little about water being thrown at me without my consent, it was one of the funnest things so far. We moved to the side, this happened a few more times, and wham suddenly the traffic was coming at us. We exited smoothly, having become much better at maneuvering ourselves through traffic and walked below the bridge and back to the hotel. We spent more time at the rooftop, enjoying the view (and using the very, very fast Internet they have, with a different connection for each floor).

Day 2

Breakfast, beach, nap, coffee, lunch and one of the most amazing bus rides EVER. It deserves its own story.

Bus ride back: The best always happens at the end 

So we head to the bus station. We all need to use the bathroom and we use the very fancy and clean public bathrooms. You start by taking off your shoes outside. Then you walk on a carpet and put your bags on a table on the side. Then a very courteous and nice lady hands you rolled-up toilet paper for your use. Then you wear one of the pairs of slippers kept for your use. Then you walk into a very clean bathroom, do your business and walk out. If you are like me, you enjoy the accidental acupuncture the outside mat gave me, and stand on it for 3 minutes, creeping a few ladies out. It was one of the cleanest bathrooms I have ever used and my first thought was, how can this be scaled up. I concluded it couldn't be. Anything that involves having to hand toilet paper over cannot be scaled up. What do you think?

One of my many pictures
on the slow crawl

We board the bus, we take our seats. More people board the bus. It is a 15-seater and it is not quite full and by full I mean, we are not all packed like sardines in a tin. We know what this means. It means the bus will go on a slow cruise/crawl mode until every seat and more is filled up. It will stop for any possible passenger. The conductor will try and entice anyone and everyone onto the bus. We joke that the driver doesn't even have his foot on the accelerator; rather some people are just pushing the bus from behind. So many interesting things happen on this bus journey, I don't even know where to start.


First the conductor stuffs the 15-seater with over 40 people. He does this by a complicated game of moving and shifting people around like chess pieces, putting chairs in the aisle and making place where there is none. Meagan escapes this fate by faking an injured knee (she really is too tall for those seats, even I was cramped and I fit in mostly everywhere in the world!). The conductor does try to push her knees out of the way but she says kongkongkong (nonono in Vietnamese). It works. Every time we slow down to allow more people on board after we hit the 30+ mark, I slowly shake my head at them to indicate this is a bad idea, there is no space. The modus operandi seemed to be to get people on board and then speed up so they had to sit and fit somewhere. I am pretty sure I convinced one family not to get on board, the lady smiled at me. I also wanted to smack the conductor on the back of his head when he was running by my window and say let's go in Vietnamese, but Meagan said she would not accompany me when I got thrown off the bus. At one point a lady with ducks in a handbag boarded - the ducks were kept in the luggage compartment at the back of the bus and I think nobody would appreciate this story more than Dennis and Kelly (who have seen lambs in a hand bag on a plane. Nothing beats that). A sassy, snappily-dressed old lady also got on and she was clearly not very happy. Another lady threw up the ENTIRE journey and while it was very sad for her, after a while it was just funny. Meagan and I couldn't stop laughing. Apparently bags of vomit were ejected out from the bus.

It was also raining heavily and the roads had flooded and for a while it did feel like our little bus would submerge. Luckily we only splashed poor folks on motorbikes with giant waves of water. People on bikes were covered in plastic bags, raincoats and towels and even had babies tucked inside. Each time someone had to exit, it was a giant ordeal, with back and forth, removing chairs, people standing up, the conductor getting left behind. But the best exit was by the sassy granny. She apparently yelled in Vietnamese: "How do I get out of this shit? Bring me a ladder". She was at the back of the bus and I think a joking suggestion was made she exit from the window (which was how her bags went out). She walked to the front of the bus, smacked a bulky man sitting on a chair in the aisle twice, till he got out of her way (also I think she called him fat or the equivalent of four people, poor man). She then got down and walked away with her bags. She was AWESOME and we all laughed because she said what everyone was thinking. It was hilarious.

The rest was mostly tame and we got back and it has been raining and the weather is wonderful. I wanted chai, pakoras and Maggi and courtesy the Indian restaurant owned by a Nepali man in Hue I got the first two. All in all, it was quite a weekend and exactly the getaway I needed from the stress and confusion that was last week. This week promises to be quite something in terms of work and we are nearing the only one month left mark here with rapidity.

This is what this week will feel like.
All of it.