Even though I live in Vietnam and am technically not a tourist, (I am though) I still think tours are a good way to see different things. I oscillate between wanting to experience new places in the authentic local way and just wanting to take a cheap easy, "foreigner special" tour. So that is what we did. We took a nice air conditioned bus to the delta city My Tho. As we sat on the comfortable bus watching the rice fields pass us by, I noticed that Jason, Ian, and I were the only ones on the bus talking. The tour was made up mostly of Australian and Japanese tourists and I wondered at what people thought of our random pop culture babble. At our first stop we were encouraged to mingle while they served us tea with honey and kumquats, and some rice wine. They also played some traditional music on traditional instruments. This is where we first met Juan the South African muay thai fighter. He was pretty cool and hung out with us the rest of the tour. From there we took a small four person boat down a tributary to a an island where they make coconut candy. There they let us take pictures with a very large snake.
I did not want my picture taken with it. Ian and Jay made a new pal in the friendly reticulated python. Afterwards they took us to another island where we had lunch and a few beers. For entertainment they decided to hold a cock fight for everyone. Don't worry this was just a sparring match and neither of the roosters died. Juan told us stories of his fights and parties in Thailand where he was well connected. He also suggested that we should come out to South Africa for some beers and barbecue. Apparently South Africa is known for it's barbecue. After lunch we drifted back towards My Tho and the highlight for me was the children swimming in the channel retrieving some watermelons that had fallen off of a boat. Even Jason reached down and plucked one from the river. It was a pretty cool Vietnam experience.
Hey, do you ever have to work? JD
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