Right, what have I been doing? I'll start from the latest and work backwards...

Yesterday I went on a trip to Cao Dai Temple in... somewhere nearby, and the Cu Chi tunnels. There are probably 50 different tour outfits in the surrounding network of streets around my hotel and they all do the same trip for the same price, it's difficult to know which to choose! I stuck lucky with mine though as the guide was actually a veteran from the war so he was a really interesting guy and told us loads of stories. His mum was Vietnamese and his father was Singaporean and he was actually born in America before coming to Vietnam as a baby, so in the war he was fighting on the side of the Americans, and commanded a squadron somewhere close to the Cu Chi tunnels. As he put it, he was fighting against his people. His whole family emigrated to Australia but he stayed in Vietnam to work as a tour guide, he says, because he loves his country. He also called himself Mr Bean!

The temple was ok, I mean, I'm not a huge fan of visiting buildings for the hell of it, so when we were herded off the bus I, being awkward as usual, decided the temple looked boring, so I toddled off in the other direction. I ended up in the monks' living quarters, and as this was just before the noon-time ceremony, they were all getting ready to go in. I don't know if I'm just developing a cynicism for everything but I have a feeling this ceremony, which they do at the same time every day, is at least partly for the benefit of tourists. Anyway, I was befriended by a very tiny monk, he was definately under 5 foot, but he ws very nice and could speak some English. Unfortunately every question I asked him he misinterpreted as me asking where the toilet was, so in the end I gave up and let him direct me to the toilet. I did actually go in the Temple for the ceremony which was pretty good really. The Cao Dai religion (this is my understanding of it so this may not be entirely accurate) is a combination of Buddhism, Christianity and Confucianism, but seems to be mainly ancestor worship, I'm not sure where they all tie in together. The ceremony included some singing and banging of random instruments which was actually really good and quite hypnotic, most of the singing have heard in temples has been positively awful. The monks and nuns (I'm assuming, we didn't really get much information about what was going on) all wore white robes (very clean, I would not fit in with this religion, I would forever be getting my clothes dirty) and sat in rows with the oldest at the front and the youngest at the back. It was funny watching the little kids sat in the back row as they didn't have a clue what they were meant to do and looked quite bored and confused.

The Cu Chi tunnels were built by the South Vietnamese during the war to escape/booby trap the Americans. The booby traps were quite gruesome and like something straight out of Indiana Jones - lots of collapsing platforms with bamboo spikes underneath, some were very imaginative. The tunnels themselves were a bit of a let down as you could only go down 100 metres and they'd been widened for the tourists (as Mr Bean says, "American have big arse!"). They were only 3 foot tall though so there wasn't a lot of room, and even though it was such a short way most of our group whimped out and only two of us went the whole way along. You can fire guns there as well. I wanted to fire an AK47 but you had to buy 10 bullets for $1 each so I passed on that. I do have a picture of me pretending to fire a gun though. :)

Other than that I've mainly been wandering round enjoying the Tet celebrations. There isn't really much going on. Thy have a huge flower display in the centre, which also has fruit diplays and pretty lights and stuff. It seems to be the trend for the locals to get dressed up in their best clothes and go and pose here for cheesy photos. They also have cows or buffaloes or whatever it is in a variety of different formats - flowers, tin cans, straw, bamboo, metal, converted dustbins... I've seen lots of dancing dragons. Most were a bit lame and they just consisted of guys putting on a dragon costume and running round in circles. The other day though I was with a girl I met at my hotel and we struck lucky as we arrived just in time for a really cool display. I think the lads practised the Vietnamese martial art and they were pretty acrobatic - there was lots of jumping across high things and climbing a wobbly poles. The Vietnamese give "lucky money" at this time to those younger than themselves, and they also give money to these dragons. They believe the more money they give the more prosperous and lucky the coming year will be.

Today - jumping backwards and forwards in time here - I went to Cholon or China Town. Most shop and things (apartfrom the tourist places) are still closed because of Tet so there wasn't that much to see - the market was closed and whn I tried to go to a pagoda I got a hand held up to block my way and a "no!". But there were lots of people around, I got stared at again, and didn't see any other westerners all day. I had to do the "hello" and waving thing again everywhere I went. Oh, I did find a mini street market, and there were more animals. I saw some pretty horrific frog butchery (those with a delicate constitution should probably stop reading). Firstly the frogs were tied in pairs with those plastic tie things (really tightly), then they were freed and bashed on the head with a spanner before having their heads snipped off with a fairly blunt pair of scissors, which made their headless bodies wriggle around, kind of like a chicken does I guess, and then their twitching feet were chopped off too.

I'm very tired and I have to get up early in the morning to get the bus to Dalat. I'm a bit citied/motorbiked out and apparently Dalat has lots of countrified things like waterfalls and rice paddies (though I've already seen countless rice paddies - and ironically transport when I'm there will be by motorbike - hello motorbike). This will be my first "winging it" transfer as I have no accommodation booked, though it's a very small town and I have a list of hotels. So goodnight Vietnam. I also need to pack, hmm.