Utopia (despite the 4.50 a.m. wake-up call!)
Last week I went to Trạm Tấu, the second most remote district in Yen Bai, high in the mountains of north Vietnam. To be honest, I was dreading it, as every time I mentioned that I was going here, people would give me a concerned/worried look and tell me that I was very brave. I think it’s always better when you are expecting something to be terrible, because it is nearly the opposite to what you expect – this was most definitely true in my case.
We travelled in a big green Russian army jeep packed with every article of warm clothes that I have! It took us about three hours on roads which wound up and around the mountains, with hairpin bend after hairpin bend. Numerous signs depicting falling rocks and cars falling off the cliff caused my muscles to remain tight for the majority of the drive, but I felt better that our driver was an older man, so not in need of impressing me with his ‘need for speed’!
The first and only thing that struck me was the amazing scenery. I cannot think of words to describe the colours and shapes, which were stunning, and which no photo could ever do justice. Lush green paddy fields, forests, bubbling streams …. It was idyllic.
We arrived early evening and were taken to the education authority offices to meet the vice directors. They were responsible for us during our stay and were incredibly hospitable. They ate with us at every meal and made sure that there was food that I liked i.e. not just dog meat! They also arranged for me to have a bath every morning, although their bemused look on their faces was amusing! We ( me and another English teacher from the College) were staying in a room at the education authority but there was no bathroom there, just a toilet. Actually, I don’t think anybody has a bathroom, because in this area there are hot springs. It’s nothing so picturesque as a rock pool full of bubbling hot spring water, but the town has a public bath house and the water is from the hot spring. There are lots of little cubicles with a big tap, a big bowl to stand in or sit in (?) and two saucepans, I think to assist in washing hair. The water is lovely – very hot and soft, as my hair and skin felt lovely after bathing in it. I was also the only person there because no one else would ever dream of washing at that time apart from the weird westerner! It wasn’t even open, but the key was given to the person who collected me so that she could open up.
Everybody bathes in the evening, as I mentioned in one of my previous blogs, but I don’t start the day right if I can’t have a shower of some kind. Therefore, they kindly arranged for someone to collect me and six thirty to take me to the bath house. You might think that that it very early, especially for me. However, I had been awake on and off since 4.50 a.m. Why? Because that’s the time that the national anthem is broadcast through loud speakers to everyone living there, followed by the news and then some singing – I’m not joking!
The work we did was very productive and I was very impressed with the level of teaching here. We conducted a one-day workshop and then spent the rest of the week observing lessons and giving feedback. The teachers were very keen to learn and were trying the ideas we suggested in lesson that we observed. We travelled to a few schools to do observations, and I absolutely loved it. We were on the back of a motorbike, on dirt tracks, with the most magnificent scenery you can ever imagine. We passed young boys riding on the back of buffaloes, and H’mong people (an ethnic minority in this area making up 70% of the population) with their amazing traditional costumes working in the fields.
By Friday, I didn’t want to leave! On the Thursday night, all the teachers came to our room as they had organised a ‘sweets party’ – fruit, sweets, cakes, and soft drinks. They also presented us with some gifts. I thought someone said that they had bought us some chickens, but I didn’t believe it at the time. However, after I left I looked in one of the boxes and saw what looked like two chickens. I said to my friend, ‘so they really bought us two chickens, but they are dead, right?’ I was wrong. These chickens were very much alive! One of them was a black hen, and very rare, and they slept with us in our room until one thirty, when we finally couldn’t take the noise they were making and dragged the box outside. I did feel guilty, as the chickens were in a very small place for a very long time. They travelled all the way back in the car with us (and stank the car out!) but amazingly the hen laid an egg! On Sunday my friend invited me to dinner – we ate the cockerel (and it was delicious!) My friend is keeping the hen at her mother’s house as it lays an egg everyday, and being so rare, she wants the hen to have some chicks.
The trip back was slightly hair-raising! We had to stop in the nearest town as the driver was not happy with the brakes on the car. In the end it took four hours to fix, but I didn’t complain, as the alternative would be driving with dodgy brakes, and as it was all downhill, I felt that it was quite important to have good brakes! Unfortunately, it meant that we were driving back at night, and it had started raining – the worst conditions for driving. Somehow, the two other people in the car managed to sleep but I was sat bolt upright doing some back-seat driving. The driver lost control of the car once, and we went swerving from side to side a fair few times until he got it under control – luckily it was not at a point where there was a sheer drop! I was very happy to be back in Yen Bai in one piece and I had a lovely lie-in the next day with no 4.50 a.m. wake-up call!
We travelled in a big green Russian army jeep packed with every article of warm clothes that I have! It took us about three hours on roads which wound up and around the mountains, with hairpin bend after hairpin bend. Numerous signs depicting falling rocks and cars falling off the cliff caused my muscles to remain tight for the majority of the drive, but I felt better that our driver was an older man, so not in need of impressing me with his ‘need for speed’!
The first and only thing that struck me was the amazing scenery. I cannot think of words to describe the colours and shapes, which were stunning, and which no photo could ever do justice. Lush green paddy fields, forests, bubbling streams …. It was idyllic.
We arrived early evening and were taken to the education authority offices to meet the vice directors. They were responsible for us during our stay and were incredibly hospitable. They ate with us at every meal and made sure that there was food that I liked i.e. not just dog meat! They also arranged for me to have a bath every morning, although their bemused look on their faces was amusing! We ( me and another English teacher from the College) were staying in a room at the education authority but there was no bathroom there, just a toilet. Actually, I don’t think anybody has a bathroom, because in this area there are hot springs. It’s nothing so picturesque as a rock pool full of bubbling hot spring water, but the town has a public bath house and the water is from the hot spring. There are lots of little cubicles with a big tap, a big bowl to stand in or sit in (?) and two saucepans, I think to assist in washing hair. The water is lovely – very hot and soft, as my hair and skin felt lovely after bathing in it. I was also the only person there because no one else would ever dream of washing at that time apart from the weird westerner! It wasn’t even open, but the key was given to the person who collected me so that she could open up.
Everybody bathes in the evening, as I mentioned in one of my previous blogs, but I don’t start the day right if I can’t have a shower of some kind. Therefore, they kindly arranged for someone to collect me and six thirty to take me to the bath house. You might think that that it very early, especially for me. However, I had been awake on and off since 4.50 a.m. Why? Because that’s the time that the national anthem is broadcast through loud speakers to everyone living there, followed by the news and then some singing – I’m not joking!
The work we did was very productive and I was very impressed with the level of teaching here. We conducted a one-day workshop and then spent the rest of the week observing lessons and giving feedback. The teachers were very keen to learn and were trying the ideas we suggested in lesson that we observed. We travelled to a few schools to do observations, and I absolutely loved it. We were on the back of a motorbike, on dirt tracks, with the most magnificent scenery you can ever imagine. We passed young boys riding on the back of buffaloes, and H’mong people (an ethnic minority in this area making up 70% of the population) with their amazing traditional costumes working in the fields.
By Friday, I didn’t want to leave! On the Thursday night, all the teachers came to our room as they had organised a ‘sweets party’ – fruit, sweets, cakes, and soft drinks. They also presented us with some gifts. I thought someone said that they had bought us some chickens, but I didn’t believe it at the time. However, after I left I looked in one of the boxes and saw what looked like two chickens. I said to my friend, ‘so they really bought us two chickens, but they are dead, right?’ I was wrong. These chickens were very much alive! One of them was a black hen, and very rare, and they slept with us in our room until one thirty, when we finally couldn’t take the noise they were making and dragged the box outside. I did feel guilty, as the chickens were in a very small place for a very long time. They travelled all the way back in the car with us (and stank the car out!) but amazingly the hen laid an egg! On Sunday my friend invited me to dinner – we ate the cockerel (and it was delicious!) My friend is keeping the hen at her mother’s house as it lays an egg everyday, and being so rare, she wants the hen to have some chicks.
The trip back was slightly hair-raising! We had to stop in the nearest town as the driver was not happy with the brakes on the car. In the end it took four hours to fix, but I didn’t complain, as the alternative would be driving with dodgy brakes, and as it was all downhill, I felt that it was quite important to have good brakes! Unfortunately, it meant that we were driving back at night, and it had started raining – the worst conditions for driving. Somehow, the two other people in the car managed to sleep but I was sat bolt upright doing some back-seat driving. The driver lost control of the car once, and we went swerving from side to side a fair few times until he got it under control – luckily it was not at a point where there was a sheer drop! I was very happy to be back in Yen Bai in one piece and I had a lovely lie-in the next day with no 4.50 a.m. wake-up call!
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