Hello Hanoi

Day 3

Theme song: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...

If you've ever had a panic attack, you'll dread the sensation of even feeling slightly stressed. The tightness in your chest, the inability to think coherantly, the desire to run into open space away from people - being unable to remember a four-digit code you used sucessfully two days earlier.

I still can't remember my pin and thinking about it just makes me start to panic a little so instead I'm living off my credit card and cash reserves. Successfully so far! Thank god for signature technology - once that dissapears, they'd better replace it with fingerprint/eyeball recognition or else I'm screwed.

So it was probably a good thing that I spent two hours in a Chinese tea house in Singapore, drinking tea and eating mooncakes. Tea solves all problems.

Day 4

Hanoi is a crazy city, true, but I think once you've been to Egypt any other cities attempts at being loud, chaotic, overwhelming and chauvanistic just pale in comparison. In fact, people here will actually take 'no' for an answer and be satisfied with a chance to practice their english instead. It's quite nice, once you actually stop looking at maps upside down and walking into traffic...

Went to a water puppet show last night - brilliant. Look it up on YouTube. Best thing I've seen in ages, much better than Transformers 3 (which I saw on the plane... would have considered it a waste of a few hours except that I couldn't really have utilised it any other way).

Off to Halong Bay tommorrow! YAY!

On the road again

Day 1:

Theme Song - Barber's Son (Jack London)

Stepped out of my house and straight into East Berlin - the driver ran over gutters, brushed side mirrors and made various illegal and life-threatening moves in an attempt to get me to my bus 2 minutes earlier than it would have otherwise taken. Dissapointingly (or perhaps for the best) the bus driver seemed aware of Australian road rules and was bent on sticking to them. Would have enjoyed travelling across several lanes of traffic inside the tunnel at Sydney airport...

A quick flight with Sci-Fi movies, a born-again Christian who believes the moon landing was a conspiracy and a woman who left her 18 and 19 year old children alone for three weeks, truly believing her alcohol cabinet will still be full when she returns (thank god for duty free) and I landed in what is my favorite airport in the world - Changi.

Day 2:

Theme Song - Backstreet's Back (Backstreet Boys)

Had forgotten that Singaporean stores seem to have a neverending love affair with boy bands, particularly the Backstreet Boys. Walked for four hours along Orchard Road, through Centrepoint, Paragon, OC, Ngee Ann City, Wisma Atria and Ion Orchard and I swear I heard their entire back albums as well as some supiciously new stuff.

Had also forgotten my pin number for my ATM card. I took that as a sign to go home, shower and regroup before meeting up with some friends and hitting the Quays. I'm sure my pin will come to me after a few drinks...