Mui Ne/Nha Trang

Here I am sitting in an internet cafe with a Spanish girl yelling at her boyfriend on Skype in one ear (he is showing her his bedroom - maybe he isn't keeping it tidy enough...?!) and a Chinese man playing computer games at top volume on the other. Children run up and down unplugging wires at random... welcome to Nha Trang.

Mui Ne turned out to be utterly sensational - and that's not just in retrospect. I really did end up having the best time, as so often happens when you expect to have the worst time of your life. Once I got over myself and stopped letting my toe depress me, we made some really excellent friends and some pretty amazing memories. One night I ended up being pushed into a swimming pool wearing a full-on silk dress and holding a watermelon martini... very "Great Gatsby". One night, we sat out on beanbags on the beach and watched the stars before having a night-time swim. On our last night, we stayed up all night playing drinking games at a 24 hour bar and then went for a sunrise swim, which was just the most incredible thing ever. The way the mist and the light combined into something ethereal and Sublime in the purest, Wordsworth-style Romantic form of the word, was really something that will stay with me forever. I can't properly describe it because this angry Spanish girl is really distracting, but rest assured it was stunning. Unfortunately none of us took any pictures, but it is imprinted on our minds forever.

So I was really sad to leave Mui Ne - gutted, actually, by the end. Thanks to Igor, Mark, Brody, Andy, Katie, Lewis, Jamie, Adam and Claire (and those Russian girls who were really nice but whose names I can't pronounce or spell) for all the good times. There were many and I will never forget them.

Our bus journey to Nha Trang was very hairy indeed. Our bus driver was an absolute subscriber to the Indian school of driving, which is essentially "Do whatever you want, but hoot before, during and after". So although we had stayed up all night, because of the constant horn-hooting action neither Charlotte nor I could sleep, which meant that we had to stay awake and wince every so often as he nearly ran another road user over. I did point out that if he didn't drive down the middle of the road, he wouldn't have to hoot his bloody horn so much, but that obviously wasn't well-received. In fact, I was nearly left behind at one of the toilet stops... charming. I was only offering some constructive criticism.

We did eventually get there, although I left my book on the bus - I'm sure everyone will sympathise with what a tragedy it is when you are genuinely really interested in a book and then are forced to stop halfway-through. I am about to go and look up the rest of the plot on wikipedia actually because I can't take the not knowing - it's that that hurts the most. I did have a genuine moment of petulant sorrow actually - it was an excellent book and I mourn its loss. I really have to start that Arab history book now.

We have had a good few days in Nha Trang so far. Compared to the quiet, seaside idyll that was Mui Ne, Nha Trang is seedy and crazy - more like a chilled, beachside version of Bangkok.

Just so you all know, (I feel like I have to share because I'm in this internet cafe alone so there's no one else to tell except everyone who reads this, and really, I am not a nosy person but I am looking on in disbelief) the Spanish guy has just lifted up his top to show his girlfriend how fat he is getting, and she is looking very disapproving. I am struggling not to laugh.

Anyway yes, Nha Trang is good. It's pretty unpleasant at night, a bit sinister, but a nice place in the day and there is plenty to do when we choose to get round to it (right now, we are sleeping off our last few nights in Mui Ne still so haven't ventured out too late into the night). Plans for the next couple of days involve museums and beaches and cocktails, and then Charlotte's friends are coming to join us for a bit which will be lovely. Then we head up the coast (via Hoi Ann and Hue) relatively rapidly because our Thailand flight is on the 11th May and to be honest, we haven't as such got very far yet... we were supposed to be in Hue right now, I think, according to our vague original itinerary - but itineraries are made to be broken, after all. Charlotte and I have got this brilliant unofficial arrangement now where, because I have a tendancy to be really organisational and militant about booking transport and getting hostels ("we need to do this... if we don't do this we will have nowhere to go/stay/eat/etc.") and she is far more chilled, I am allowed to provide gentle reminders but they must be phrased in a way that doesn't make it an obligation (i.e., instead of "we need to do this", it becomes "if we feel like it today/if we have a minute, we could possibly do this..."). So our lives have become far more relaxed as a result, which is very nice indeed, and I am learning that obligations are boring, which I feel will stand me in really good stead back in the real world actually because, let's face it, obligations when you're 21 generally are quite boring, and I should recognise this and have fewer of them.

I am more than halfway through my travels now. This both devastates me, and devastates me a little bit more. It's all going to fly by, and I'm not sure I want that to happen at all, much as I am missing home. Talking of missing home - the Royal Wedding... ahh. How proud Charlotte and I were to be British. I had a big mug of tea (served in a pint glass?!) straight afterwards. The boys ruined it by chatting about how fit our new Queen-to-be is, but I had a tear in my eye at the romance and beauty and pageantry of the occasion. (William's outfit was rubbish, though.)

Anyway, I am very bored of this Spanish girl prattling on, so I am going to stop here and go and meet Charlotte so we can eat Pringles and watch some Vietnamese TV that we don't understand. (It wouldn't be as good if we understood it, though.)

Miss you all very much, loads of love
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