'Lonely Planet' has horror stories about Nha Trang. Kamikaze hookers roam the beaches at night, holding your crotch in a death-grip while they relieve you for your money, local youth gangs tazering hapless tourists, massage parlours emptying your wallets while you enjoy massages, cabdrivers scamming ruthlessly - no surprises here - and so-called "guides" hang around in temples to offer you a helping hand. A very interesting place this is. We are well-prepared.

Off the bus around seven in the evening we are again assaulted by cab- and moto drivers to take us to a hotel. However we already have reservations - not really, but what do they know - and walk towards the backpackers area. As has happened most of the time until now, the chosen hotel from the guide-book is not sympathetic, so we check in to another place nearby. The only reason to stop at Nha Trang is for us to take the train to Danang. Well, to Hội An actually, but there is no train station there, so we'll have to backtrack 30km by bus. It is good to take other transport for a change. We have one full day to spend in this party-town of Vietnam.

Nha Trang has supposedly one of the most beautiful beaches in the country and countless tiny islands just off the coast well worth visiting for a day. Vinpearl - the local Disneyland - is also here, and the best diving can be done in this area. I'll try to book a daytrip this evening and go out on the boat for the day. The train doesn't leave until 19:26. We get some cash, have dinner. Nothing fancy. Although... Michel is determined to go to the local supermarket for shopping, so we follow suit. He becomes ecstatic when he finds a milk shop and stocks up on Vinamilk. And the supermarket... my god! I have never seen such slow service. We had about six items and it took more than five minutes to pay. Each item was tagged, put into a shopping bag, sealed with red tape. Michel wanted a drink separately to drink along the way. This was sealed with red tape separately. Just crazy.

However, I couldn't forget this kamikaze hooker thing so I leave all my money behind except for a few thousand dong and decide to explore the beach with Remko. Michel stays in bed... sick. We walk up and down the beach, even acting a bit drunk, but nothing happens. No hookers, no tazers, nothing. This really is a disappointment. I want to be tazered! No. I demand it! I want to laugh when they only find 4000 dong in my pockets and have to make a run for it with that. Dammit. Stupid book!

Remko is tired as well, so I am left all by myself. Let's walk around the block then, maybe something interesting'll happen. Nothing really. All I get is a few moto drivers doubling as pimps at night. Loved it. As I walk down the street three of them start following me. The first one pulls up, "You want pretty girl?" No, thank you. "Marihuana?" No, neither do I want that. Giving up, he leaves. Right afterwards, the second one pulls up, asking them same, getting the same reply, leaving as well. Then the third. "Boom-boom, sir?" I wonder why they do this, I mean obviously if I didn't get anything from the first one, I don't want any from any of the others either. Logical, right? But this little f***er is persistent. And keeps following me around, asking the same thing over and over again. In the end I get annoyed by him and a slightly aggressive "I said no!" makes it clear for him I'm not interested. Such a boring town. I'll just go to sleep.

The next morning I wake up around eight, I ache for some activity before we head out to the islands to tan. Decide to go running again. Love it so much. Of course it starts to hose again. Dark clouds move in from the sea and the wind is so strong it hurts my eyes. I practically have to shield them. For more than an hour I run up and down the beach, enjoying the refreshing rain and the liberating feeling of running. My knees barely hurt. As I'm soaking wet anyways I go for a quick dip in the sea. Vietnamese girls giggle and wave at me, looking at the crazy European tourist who isn't sheltering from the rain, running. Yes, a true idiot he is :)

Well drenched, we have breakfast. Unfortunately the weather doesn't seem too good, so the boat trip and beaching is skipped. Now we can visit the city's only highlight, the Long Son pagoda. You can clearly see that Vietnam has been occupied by China for over a thousand years. Their pagoda's and art very much resemble that of China. A welcome change from the Siam and Khmer temples. The pagoda is built on a hill, and on top is a big sitting white Buddha statue. It is a memorial for the monks who died in self-immolation protesting the government's actions against the order. We have to fight off several annoying youths who offer to be our guide for a fee and tail us for quite a while. Meh. Also Meh: the view of the city is supposed to be great from the top if the weather were clear. But it's not. Although it's not raining anymore, the sky remains overcast.

There is one more thing I want to visit in this city. The gallery of one of Vietnam's most famous photographers, Long Thanh is in Nha Trangh. He does all photographs in black&white with an analogue camera and no touch-ups whatsoever. It was really beautiful. He had the most striking images, with the composition, the lighting just perfect. I just love how he did portraits. Simple portraits, as if in a single fleeting moment, but the expression on his subjects' faces so evocative, so narrating you could stand in front of a photo for hours and just wonder. He was there in person, bald, with glasses. Loved it so much more than anything else we could have done in this town.

Dinner, pedicure, massage and onto the night train. Only slightly better than the one we took in Thailand. The cabin had six beds, three on each side. We had the top bunk, the cheapest. Hardly any space to sit up, I bumped my head, my knees, my arms, everything trying to get into a comfortable position. I fell asleep to the laughter of my Vietnamese roomies as they watch my struggles to fit in. b******s :)