Where's Jamie?

So obviously I'm in Vietnam. Da Nang is midway between the southern and northern borders.


Hoi An is 35 minutes south of Da Nang. 


It's built on the Thu Bon River delta. Canals were added for easy transportation. It is home to about 120 000 people. Hoi An translates to "peaceful meeting place." It was settled in the 7th century by the Cham people who were an Austronesian ethnic group. Then the Vietnamese and Cambodian peoples came when the Khmer kingdom expanded It was the primary trading port city in all of southeastern Asia until the port silted up in the early 19th century. There is still a French influence here, left over from the colonial days which lasted right up until the end of WW2. I've heard lots of French spoken. The green on the map below is mostly rice paddies. 



 The city proper is anything but peaceful. Horn honking is constant. There are few traffic lights or rules. Honking is an important signal - it is a courtesy to let one know I'm behind you and faster, so stay to the left. Trucks, buses, cars and scooters zoom by the cyclists with inches to spare - trust me I've been there. Yet I have not seen a crash of any kind. 

Thankfully I'm in a low population area which is very quiet - 5 k from the old town and 2 from the beach. I'll gladly cycle/walk long distances to have a safe, tranquil haven. 


No noisy machinery is used in the rice paddies nearby and the geese don't honk. 




In my wanderings today I met two more expats. Hugh and his wife are from NZ. They had a diving school in Sumatra. A massive fire completely devastated the area, so they came here. They have a pub/restaurant, The Happy Monkey, near me and lead dives from the Cham Islands. Sam and his young son Johnny dropped by to welcome me to the neighbourhood. They live two doors down. Sam is a Texan who married a Viet lady and has lived here for 10 years. He writes marketing plans for companies in N America and Europe. 

The cleaning lady did an amazing job this afternoon. .JP3 is spit clean. She changed the bedsheets and duvet. She even swept up all the leaves in the courtyard. After my 7 k walk and 9 k cycle today I was the dirtiest thing in the place. 😜




Comments

  1. AnonymousJanuary 25, 2025 at 4:55 AM

    Enjoyed your history/geography lesson Jamie, as well your daily goings-on. 💓 Lou

    ReplyDelete

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