Rose very early – flew [from] Chiang Mai to Bangkok then on to Hanoi – arrived 1215. Fought through bureaucracy – got taken to hotel– Changed/freshened up…
Quite a fight it was too, on arrival at Hanoi. I cannot remember all the details of it, but it was to do with filling in a form upon which you declare the address where you are going to stay.
Given that we were to be staying at several places in the space of a week and I had the local tour agent, Vidotour’s, address, I presented the form with that. Not good enough. If we were staying at several addresses I needed to list several addresses.
So I tried to write several addresses on a tiny form. The official claimed he couldn’t read my handwriting. “Do you know who I am?”, I felt like saying, but didn’t. He was quite cross and suggested that I had deliberately written illegibly.
So he called a more senior official, who suggested that the name and address of our local tour agent, Vidotour, would do. Good idea, Sir.
Welcome to Hanoi, Sir, have a nice cup of tea (Indochine Restaurant, later that day)
I should add at this point that we had a marvellous time in Vietnam; that hoo-ha on arrival was the only inhospitable moment during our stay.
In fact, the ability to get a temporary pass to enter Myanmar from Thailand at that crossing, just for the day, had been reinstated just the day before we arrived. We thought it only polite that we should take advantage and pop in.
Mae Sai monks
– on to a jade factory in Mae Sai then on to Doi Tung Temple etc…
Doi Tung Temple above and headline image at the top of this piece.Vistas on the way down from the temple.
Arrived at the Chiang Mai quite late – changed – went around night market and got a light bite there – then returned (saw end of the cricket!) & slept
We stayed at the Dusit Princess if I remember correctly.
[I have been pulling my journal notes together for Ogblog using a dictation app – no prizes for guessing what some of this piece looked like before I corrected the dictation]
Rose quite early – left Lisu village.
The taller of the sweet children was a bit tearful saying goodbye to us
Headed north. Long drive – stopped for coffee on Mae Kok/Myanmar border.
Then on to Akha village [see headline picture and below]
I seem to remember that Chinese lunch being especially good, with high grade barbequed meats as a centrepiece, but we obviously did not find Mae Salong (now renamed Santikhiri), or at least the part of it we went to, photogenic.
Then Chinese lunch in Mae Ta – on through the market and then to Mae Taeng elephant ride fiasco followed by bamboo rafting.
I described the elephant ride as a fiasco, because I recall really feeling uncomfortable about the elephants, especially my one, who seemed unhappy and hungry. Mine kept wandering off to the side of the track to try to grab a nibble, only to be roughly discouraged from doing so by the dude at the front of the elephant. I note that if you Google “Mae Taeng Elephant Park” 25 years later, you find a lot of bad reviews and references to cruelty. I’m not surprised based on our experience.
Unusually for me, I found the raft trip afterwards more to my taste than the elephant ride, whereas I was expecting to feel more comfortable on land!
In the Lisu Village – Kongburi negotiating while I display the body language of indifference
Then on to Lisu Village – quaint Lisu Lodge – just us [staying the night]…
…the music and the giant flying roaches.
Showered washed and walked around village – got sold to – ate – got played at – then to bed.
I really should expand the story of our stay at the Lisu Lodge. It was a lovely but fairly rudimentary place back then. It is a fancy-schmanzy eco lodge now. Good luck to the place.
The Lisu people were sweet and gentle and very welcoming. They did seem especially keen to sell us their trinkets though.
We were the only guests that night.
Janie and I particularly remember the meal. We have just the one photo of me being served the food (above).
We had been looking forward to our private dining experience. However, we were joined more or less throughout the meal by a local who serenaded us with his traditional stringed instrument, which was probably a relative of the pipa or Chinese lute. He played pretty well and at first it sounded really nice, but after a while we were craving a little more privacy and a little less noise.
Then, out of the blue, came a giant flying roach (or beetle) which noisily landed right behind us and startled us both. The musician calmly stopped playing and gently removed the beetle in his hands. Daisy and I gave the musician a round of applause for removing the giant insect, which he took to be applause for the end of his set, so he bowed and left, taking the pipa and beetle with him.
Thus we spent the rest of our meal in quiet, tranquil privacy.
All of our photos from the Thai leg of the journey can be found on Flickr through the link here and below.
Very photogenic – see headline picture, above and below. In truth quite a touristic place, even back then.
Return to town – fabulous seafood lunch on Soi 24 Sukhamvit – top rate.
Then home straight on to Oriental Hotel and shopping plazas – light supper in River City Shopping Centre – then home for early night.
I look a little under-dressed there for the Oriental Hotel, but oh my gosh I still have that holiday short-sleeved shirtDaisy looks like the sort of lass who likes her grub.
All of our photos from the Thai leg of the journey can be found on Flickr through the link here and below.
Writing up our first major independent travel holiday, 25 years later, in March 2021, is no easy task. While I did take notes on this trip, which helps, I did not keep the sort of comprehensive journal that was my habit on earlier big trips and became my habit again later.
Further, Janie and I have both mislaid our printed itinerary for this adventure, although I know I did have a copy of it as recently as 2011 when we were arranging a return visit to Vietnam; infuriating.
Still, we have a wonderful collection of annotated photos, which helps. I also still have our trusty mid 1990s copies of the Lonely Planet Guides to Thailand and Vietnam, well thumbed and helpfully folding open easily on the more oft-used pages.
So let’s go!
12 March 1996 – Left London on time! Event free flight.
I told you the notes are quite light. I’m pretty sure we flew Thai Air. Last class it would have been, but on Thai Air that wasn’t too bad.
13 March 1996 – Arrive Bangkok on time (6:20 am). Went to BelAire Princess [now BelAire Bangkok] with drunken guide Kai.
A rare example of an unfinished lyric. Deservedly so, though. Not enough possible laughs in this tacky little idea. Nice, sordid pun on the song title though.
DON’T LET MY SON GO DOWN ON YOU
(To the Tune of “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me”)
VERSE 1 – QUEEN
I can’t lie,
No more over Charlie;
All these Windsors,
Seem to chase a bit of fluff;
I’m grown tired,
Of the papers here before me;
Making fun, of our soap opera stuff;
Too late,
To save my Chuck from screwing;
He took a bitch,
Could not resist her muff;
She was on heat,
Camilla had no contest;
Charles prefered her showing up to throwing up.
CHORUS 1
Don’t let my son go down on you,
(Don’t let the son)
Although it sounds obscene, it’s something royals shouldn’t do;
Here is Elton John singing Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me, with lyrics.
I can see why I wrote this and I can see why, in all probability, it didn’t make it into NewsRevue. One or two good lines though.
IT’S MENS HEALTH WEEK (To the Tune of “It’s Good News Week”)
INTRO
BBC ANNOUNCER: And now, as part of the BBC Mens Health Week., a documentary for men with testicular cancer and gonorrhoea; “Great Balls of Fire”.
VERSE 1
It’s Mens Health Week, BBC’s new festival, about an enlarged testicle, That looks odd when you streak; It’s Mens Health Week, Prostate gland is getting big, and balding men won’t wear a wig, To hide their ugly peak.
MIDDLE EIGHT
Have you seen the shows? What did they say? Men under stress. One in ten at least is gay. (One in ten at least is gay)
VERSE 2
It’s Mens Health Week, BBC’s huge influence, will tackle British impotence, Of which we seldom speak; It’s Mens Health Week, Phone the helpline, read the book, but don’t look down and take a look, In case you are a freak.
MIDDLE EIGHT 2
Have you courted help? Which way to turn? Claire Raynor’s crap. So’s that cow Anna Raeburn. (Not that cow Anna Raeburn)
VERSE 3
It’s Mens Health Week BBC afflicting men, with fears about their little friend, Which dribbles when they leak; It drips all week, Alan Yentob’s master plan, to paint himself as superman, And spare us from repeats, and spare us from repeats, yes spare us from repeats.
Below is a video of It’s Good News Week by Hedgehoppers Anonymous:
I didn’t often write lyrics for news items such as major art exhibitions, perhaps for good reason. I don’t think this one made the cut…
…which is a shame, as it has a lot going for it.
Coincidentally, I got to this lyric quite by chance on the day that Daisy and I are off to see the new Giacometti at the Tate (16 May 2017) – naturally to be reported on Ogblog very soon.
I could give Cézanne a go on the baritone ukulele; that would be fun.
CEZANNE
(To the Tune of “Suzanne”)
VERSE 1
Cezanne takes you down to the Tate near the river,
You can hear the crowds go by, you can spend the night there queuing;
And you know that he was crazy, but that’s why you want to be there,
Cos he painted Mont Sainte-Victoire, in the shape of a large phallus;
And just when you mean to savour, the large pictures of the bathers,
Then he gets you with his missus, sitting in a yellow armchair,
Cos he always was pretentious.
CHORUS 1
And you want to ease your bladder, and you’re dying for some space,
But you dare not leave the circuit, cos you queued all day and mustn’t lose your place.
VERSE 2
And Degas was a painter, who was daft obsessed with water,
And he spent a long time watching, all the ladies in the bathroom;
And when he knew for certain, that those ladies couldn’t see him,
He said “artists should paint bathers that’s a good excuse for peeping”.
So Cezanne painted bathers, they’d not yet invented ravers;
In eighteen ninety something, they hadn’t learnt to party much at all.
CHORUS 2
And you want to ease your bladder, and your vitals are so sore,
And you’d die for a Pissaro, or an artist who had once learnt how to draw.
VERSE 3
Now Cezanne takes the stand, at the Tate near the river,
He’s the nation’s new obsession in the hyped up exhibition;
And the show makes heaps of money, from an unsuspecting public,
Who wouldn’t know the difference, between garbage and grand masters;
So don’t you try to tell them, that the merchandise you sell them;
Is a massive con that’s bigger, than his painting of card players,
Cos Cezanne turned them silly.
CHORUS 3
And you want to say you’re cultured and you want to be refined,
But you don’t know arse from elbow, the impression that you give is that you’re blind.
I tried a variant of the lyric a few days later, merely changing the third verse opening couplet to refer to a newly launched fizzy drink named Shazam (see below). I can find no references to that particular fizzy pop on-line, which must make that substitution an even more obscure story. Now, of course, everyone thinks of Shazam as the app to help identify a tune/song.
VERSE 3
Now Shazam tastes real bland, like a pee in the river,
It’s a fizz without a mission like the Cezanne exhibition;
Here’s Leonard Cohen singing Suzanne with the lyrics on the screen:
