Saigon, farewell, aufwiedersehen, goodbye....

Yes, that was another 'Sound of Music' related element for you, and quite an excellent one, in my humble opinion. If anyone hasn't seen that film, consider your new awareness of it my Christmas gift to you. You're eternally welcome.
So here we are in Saigon, and today is the last day of our Vietnam adventure. We had a (distinctly urine free) bus trip here from Mui Ne, which felt like it lasted forever but was actually over in the blink of an eye-if a blink lasts 6 hours, that is. We had some fun pit stops along the way, one of which was more than a little worrying when, upon returning to the bus, one of the wheels appeared to be missing. I'm no expert, but I recall a wheel being quite a key element to the movement of a bus. So we had to hang around a Vietnamese service station for a while, which was nice. All the Germans on the bus were, of course, watching the mechanics go to work on the wheel-clearly, the love of watching any kind of construction or engineering remains firmly in tact even when they are so far from home. Finally we arrived at around 8.30 in the evening and dandered off to the hostel, where we were greeted with a banana and iced tea which delightful, as I was once again on the advanced stages of rumbling tum syndrome. After a dinner of noodle soup and a wander around, we crashed into a nice long sleep.
The next day was spent doing a little walking tour of Saigon. It is really a very big city. And humid, so very humid. Unfortunately both of us seem to have inherited the family trait of hair that doesn't withstand humidity so well, so over the day, our hair increased in volume (outwards and upwards) until we looked a bit like we were wearing small beefeater hats. But it was just our hair. We saw lots of old buildings which were, you know, old and stuff-very nice! The walk ended with a drink in very extravagant style; in a rooftop bar for which were completely and utterly underdressed. We paid through the nose for a beer and a coffee (I sounded a lot like my dad when we got the bill: "How much?!") but the view was spectacular so it was almost, maybe worth it. We took as long as humanly possible to drink our drinks and then sat for while longer, probably an inappropriately long time, just looking at the view. The rest of the afternoon was spent just meandering, checking out the city and burning nicely in the heat. All of these effort-heavy activities were carried out with one specific purpose in mind: to get as hungry possible. Strange aim, right? Wrong! There was method in the madness, for once in my life! That evening was the Mack Daddy of activities: a 4.5 hour long street food tour of the city, courtesy of my dear sister and aunt.
As pick up time rolled around, I could have chewed the leg off a chair, to be quite honest, but I abstained and waited patiently for all the goodness to get in my bellllly. We were picked up by two young chicas on motorbikes (I think this was the highlight of the whole experience for Fin) and zoomed off to our first stop, where we met the other people on the tour, i.e. Australia. The mother and son pair we sat next to were quite a treat, the son revelling in the stories his loving mother was telling about how often they had been asked if they were a couple. It was especially good for him as he is in that stage in life where everything, ever, is awkward. Fin should count himself lucky that he is not 16 and embarrassed by life (and his big cousin) anymore , which I did not hesitate to remind him. That comment was met with a look which said 'You will never stop embarrassing me'. Our first dish was a soup called bun bo hue: pretty much beef noodle soup but more delicious than you are probably imagining right now. I won't go into great detail about the whole tour, but other culinary delights included BBQ goat breast, grilled frogs, prawns, clams in a magical broth of ginger, chilli and lemongrass, quails (Fin thinks they were bats. I chose to ignore this remark), scallops and coconut jelly. However delicious all of these things were, the memory of them will forever be eclipsed by the single weirdest thing I have ever tried. Let me help you imagine it: think of a duck egg, a boiled duck egg, and put it there in front of you on the imaginary table. Then tap the top and open that bad boy up. Take a peek inside and yes, there is some yellow and some white bits. So far so good. But wait a second, what, pray tell, is that dark grey bit lurking in the middle? Grab your spoon and have a poke around-any ideas yet? Look closer and you will see the teeny tiny beginnings of a beak, some things which look uncannily like feathers and some little wing like shapes. Oh yes yes, nothing other than a baby duck, which in normal circumstances would not be wholly abnormal to find in a duck egg, but when you hope to eat the egg, it is quite an unpleasant surprise. I probably should have refused to eat it, but I was feeling very gung-ho so I did indeed have a few spoonfuls of it. The taste was very bizarre and quite impossible to describe. The texture was like putting hardboiled egg, pate and a little bit of raw spaghetti in your mouth at the same time, then chomping the Dickens out of it and forcing it down your food pipe. Fertilised duck egg, it transpires, is not my favourite food. That was more or less the end of the tour: we were taken back to our hostel where we fell into a food coma and had nightmares of being killed by legions of duck embryos.
Yesterday was spent recovering from the previous evening. We skipped breakfast and went out for a wander in the sun, ending up in an afternoon viewing of 'The Hunger Games', which was actually very enjoyable. I will say one thing, though: the Vietnamese are chatty Cathys in the cinema. Those of you who know me well can imagine how much I loved that (i.e. not at all). The evening was spent drinking beer, people watching and eavesdropping on a very posh chap and his Vietnamese girlfriend. Apparently, his mumm-ehhhh laaahhhves her (to us normal people, his mummy (!!) loves her). Before we knew it, we were tucked up safely in bed, listening to the other girl in the dorm snoring like a bulldozer.
Today, our last day, will be spent shopping and getting our final fix of Vietnamese grub, until we part ways tomorrow. I won't get too nostalgic on you but I just wanted to sum up this month: Vietnam is beautiful, crazy, loud, delicious, intriguing, aromatic, and so much more. We've both loved it and have agreed that it's a place to come back to and explore other parts. I cannot recommend it enough, but it feels like it is on the verge of something huge (and not necessarily good), so get your butts over here before everyone else in the world beats you to it! Fin has done well to put up with me and I'm pretty sure that without him, I'd be lost somewhere in some random city, buying something from every person who tried to sell me stuff.
In a word, this month has been-drumroll please...VIETNAMAZING. HAHAHAHAHAHA! See you in Thailand!