Road Trip Therapy Time (III): Sa Huynh to Quang Ngai

4:00
Grandma sounds like she's doing well.  She is regretful that she can no longer travel but then she didn't make use of the opportunity when she had it.

6:00
I can't see the ocean from my room, but the 100 meter walk is not too much ;-)

7:00
I've started on my liquid breakfast and have hatched a most cunning plan.  SCREW the booking sites; I'm going to ride to Quang Ngai and get myself a room on my own !

7:30
Time for breakfast...... OH... A buffet breakfast...... right, this is a 'resort'.
It's not one of the best I've had but at least I finally get my Pho Ga for breakfast ;-)

I'm too well brought up to take a picture, but I have to smirk when I look at the about 50 year old Viet woman at the next table.  She is wearing her CURLERS in her brightly dyed hair at the breakfast table ! 

Let's also have a tiny spring roll and a Ban Xeo ;-)
And some Com Chien, Thit Heo Chien (fried rice, fried pork) with some chili peppers, lOl.
Who needs coffee for breakfast if there are chili peppers !

8:00
Still EARLY!  WHAT to do?
I give in and book a room in a riverside hotel on Expedia.

8:30

Libellules, Nhieu chuon chuon, a cloud of Dragonflies !

11:15
It's time to hit the road..... and a nice road it is!

About 1 Gazillion tons of Paper Recycling on a motorized Tricycle

It's hot & the asphalt reflects the truck.

on the sides of the 'high'-way......

.... perfect hunting grounds for these guys

And there it is:  Quang Ngai !

Think of the WORK & PATIENCE involved !

Oh Oh. THAT bridge that I'm riding over is the Trans-Vietnam Highway bridge over the river!   But my hotel is on THIS side of the river.    Let's just do a U-turn right in the middle of the river on Vietnam's #1 North-South thorough-fare.  NO problem!   (To get the comparison right:  Vietnam has 100 Million inhabitants, Canada 35 Million. But try doing a U-turn on the 401 in Ontario and you'd be hunted down as a terrorist.

"You have reservation?  NO!", the receptionist anticipates when I walk to the reception desk.

My "YES" confuses her deeply, but when I say "Expedia", she smiles and says "Oh I forgot!".   THAT already tells me that I'm the ONLY Westerner staying in this hotel, LOL.

She wants to do me good and gives me the key to The Palatial Suite room on the 9th floor.  There is even an ashtray on the table of the settee group by the window.  But I go down again to exchange the key for the room with balcony that I actually booked.   The new room ....

.....is NOT as Grand as the previous one but it doesn't smell like smoke and has a great balcony overlooking the valley. 

I'm going to do laundry, so I need somewhere to dry it !

I LIKE this hotel.  This place was GREAT in the 90s and has come down from there (quite a bit ;-) and now rooms go for a song, just like in the Empire Landmark on Robson in Vancouver (actually, THAT is now being converted to condos!).  
I just LOVE that lingering spirit of 30 year old luxury and disinfectant still hanging on in the fluid-stained and cigarette-burned carpets and 80s hotel furniture.   For me it's a metaphor for life and there is fortunately NO chance that I will run into people who are willing to spend HUGE dollars for an inferior room to this, but with clean carpets and modern bathroom fixtures ;-)

Time to ride to the supermarket!   Where do I put my brick of Dong notes?   I'm not really worried about taking it to the supermarket but instead I stuff them into the pocket of that fancy fluffy white bathrobe in the closet....

Quang Ngai, 260,000 inhabitants in 2013 and given Vietnamese countryside to city migration trends at least double that now.  And not a single black or white person in sight.  I still remember walking into Vinh three years ago and being scared shit-less by being the only white person in a town of 500,000.  Now it has pretty much become routine.  The guy waiting in line at the cashier at Coopmart first looks at me then into my basket.  
WHAT do WHITE people buy? LOL.
Wine, coffee, bread, fake cheese, grapes.  That should do for now to get the energy flowing again.  All that beer drinking is not for me !

14:25
This is the time I believe for 3 minutes that I forgot my laptop power-cable in last night's hotel.  NO, I find it ;-)

15:30
I'm getting an e-mail and a Google Calendar notification.  My flight to Taipei is taking off NOW.   
WTF?
Good thing I advanced that flight from NOW to middle of September ;-)

17:30
I don't have the peace of mind to nap and I need to get some cigarettes.  I can't see any tiny stores from my balcony so I take the scooter intending to drive a loop along the river. 
The restaurants are filling up.  OMG, there is a NIGHT MARKET along the river.  But NOT for tourists!  It's for the locals.  I don't have a camera with me...... need to get out later again ;-)  I find my cigarettes in a tiny store on the main road..... NO tourist prices here, of course ;-)

18:15
Do I go out again?  
Or will another glass of wine knock me out so that I can finally sleep?

There is something I LEARNED in MY Year of the Snake in 2013.  
Whenever you are thinking about whether you should overcome tiredness or depression to experience something new:  
STOP thinking and Just Do It.  
(Oh, I HATE Nike for ripping off my slogan right now)

Is that Michael Jackson?

  

Teddy Bears for sale on the Bridge landing

I must admit that I AM getting a bit peckish now.   
The problem is that all the food stall signs advertise their offerings in WRITING.   Either I have NO IDEA what they're offering OR it is something I don't want, e.g. a Lau Ca (Fish hotpot) is something for 2 to 4 people and not for me who only wants to eat a little bit.  
Soon I get away from the affluent vendors (gas bottles for multiple burners for multiple pots) and enter Poor-Town.   No gas, no burners, just a charcoal grill, and some don't even have that.

I walk by a sign that has a picture of something I know from the Korean movie Gwoemuel (The Host).   Dried Squid heated on a grill and eaten in hand.    
I ALWAYS wanted to TRY that.   
The lady of the stand notices me pondering and points at a chair.  I point at the display board and ask "Muc?" (Squid?) (Thank GOD, I know SOME tieng Viet ;-).   
She nods and I put up one finger.

Unwrapping my dried squid

This is an ART:
NOT too close to the red coals but NOT too far from them either

How did Bourdain put it?
Low plastic table and chair .... CHECK !

Maybe my cook isn't a true artist, because this thing is HARD chewing work.  I manage 2/3 of it and give up.    I get out my wallet and look at her; she lifts six fingers.  And as usual, almost everyone in earshot almost breaks their neck when their heads flip around in astonishment when The White Guy says "Sau Muoi" (60)......... And YES, I AM enjoying the enfant terrible feeling I get from that ;-)

Someone on a scooter is buying something from my dinner lady and notices that I'm not finishing my meal.   He shakes my hand and points at my left-overs.  I encourage him to finish them and he doesn't need to be asked twice.
The same thing happened to me in a local restaurant in Hong Kong 3 or 4 years ago.  The world still MAKES SENSE in these parts......

20:30
It's a balmy 26 degrees Celsius.  The riverfront is lit up like a Christmas Market.  The food stalls are serving FRESH & YUMMY seafood in all its varieties.  And everyone who has a Dollar or two to spare is out here for dinner.

THAT is QUALITY OF LIFE that no Porsche Cayenne or Tesla can EVER offer.

And THAT is why I am HERE and NOT THERE.

Sweet dreams!