April 6th Hue and Out to Hoi An

I thought Luc was a fantastic host. But that changes later.

6AM I got up as early as I could. The heat is still brutal. I took a cold shower. Luc, his friend and I shared morning coffee. It was 15,000 VNDs, which was more expensive than all the street coffee I have had in Vietnam.

10AM Luc took me to the imperial palace. I paid for my ticket (55,000 VNDs) and his (35,000 VNDs). The palace was less than impressive, resembling a much smaller replica of the one in Beijing. Luc tried to explain some of the relics to me but it was better listening to the bunch of guides speaking Chinese and English around.

Imperial Palace

11AM We went to one of the tombs as I had requested. Luc's moto bike was out of gas. He told me he had not any money so I paid for his gas (30,000 VNDs). We finally got to the tomb, which was next to the summer palace. It was hot and not much of a palace. I would have rather stayed inside any room with AC. The tomb was also disappointing. Like the Chinese ones, they are not excavated and also built at a smaller scale. However, I know at least two that were, though they are empty inside.

12PM We sit down at a restaurant. We did not get horse or dog meat like Luc said we would. I was disappointed. Luc instead ordered eel and some vegetable dish with garlic. He also coerced me to play a drinking game with him, to which I reluctantly agreed. The two dishes, one coke and three beers totaled to 280,000 VNDs. That surprised me but I paid.

Lunch, but for 280,000 VNDs, I should have had better.

1PM After lunch I wanted to get a hold of the internet but we couldn't find any cafe with AC and internet. We searched for a while and I thought of bringing up hunting in the afternoon, which was Luc's earlier suggestion. He then calls his friend and said the friend cannot do it today. We then met another couple. The man is about 28 and his wife is just a couple of years younger. We tried to look for another cafe but I told Luc privately that I cannot pay for everyone. Luc said you pay half and I said okay.

All the cafes did not have power in the afternoon. For some reason, power outage seems frequent here. We had a couple of cokes and orange juice and lemon juice. The internet did not work so I wanted out. We finished and the bill came out to be 160,000 VNDs. I paid 100,000 VNDs, which was more than half.

2PM The original plan was to visit Luc's school but I was not getting a good vibe from Luc and his friends. He said I would have to wait at his school for around 2 hours until his class ends before he can take me to the bus station. I said forget it and let me just move onto Hoi An. Luc helped me buying a ticket for a van to Da Nang at 40,000 VNDs, which was the local price. I am finally out of Hue, which I did not enjoy.

4PM I talked to Ly, a student on the bus and arrived at Da Nang. We had to part since I needed to go to Hoi An. The ticket office will not sell me a ticket and made me buy it from the driver. The ticket price was 10,000 VNDs and they wanted to sell it to me for 20,000 VNDs. I started having an argument with the driver and told him that Hmongs and Cambodians would not do this. They finally gave in but also gave me a very uncomfortable seat on a wooden bench 6 inches wide for an hour.

6PM I got to Hoi An and stayed at Tran Phu is the main road and there were many restaurants and bars there. Over the Cam Nam Bridge is the Cam Nam Island and there was a guest house behind the Four Seasons Hotel for just $5, which is the cheapest in Hoi An. Everything is a little more expensive here. At 9PM, I finally found Thanh Binh II for $10 with AC.

PS. I gave Luc Cao my first negative CS review. I realized it was common for Hue students to take advantage of travelers and they just make them pay for everything. This has been reflected numerous times and I just glanced past the tidbit about Luc on his profile when I looked at it. Luc's profile no longer existed on April 28th, when I last checked.