Saturday

Well, Rot lived up to his word and not his name and gave us a lovely day out, very informative and good fun.

We visited a silk making place and learned all about the life cycle of a silk worm and how silk products are made [fascinating, honestly]. Then he took us to a cricket and scorpion farm where they breed them for eating, some of our party of 7 were persuaded to eat the fried crickets but Dave and I declined, though Dave posed for a photo pretending to be brave. We then visited a market miles from anywhere and saw some very unpalatable food for sale, including dog! Those of a nervous disposition DO NOT LOOK AT THE MARKET PHOTO'S. Apparently, some families in Vietnam have a dog as a pet then when it has puppies they eat it and keep the puppies and then it starts all over again!!!

Rot took us to see a waterfall in the crater of a volcano. Rot told us tourists don't usually come here and boy, do I see why. We had to trek down steep paths [which we later had to trek back up] and rock climb over slippery rocks and jump over very big cavernous holes to reach a very wet waterfall. There is no way, had I known what it entailed, I would have done it but, once again, here I am alive to tell the tale and another fear [That of dying of exhaustion] faced and overcome.

Next stop a magic mushroom farm; I learnt how to grow them so will be starting up my own little business when I get home [Wherever that might be]

We then arrived at Rots family home high in the mountains above De Lat. We met his family, learnt a bit about growing coffee and went on another trek to meet a hill tribe family. We saw their wooden house with a hot tin roof, saw how they weave cotton, dye it and make blankets and garments. We learnt some of their language and heard of the primitive way they live [out of choice mind you, the government has offered to support them with housing, education and health care but they are very traditional and chose to live the way they do]

On our return to Rots house his Buddhist sister, with her shaved head and wearing her Buddhist garb had cooked and was serving us a lovely noodle lunch which was followed by some very strange fruit that Rot had bought from the market during our earlier visit. He then gave us a piece of desert which was fruit and nuts coated in a very dark sticky substance. After we had tried it he told us the coating was cows s*** [His words] a special cow which only eats a certain type of grass mind you, and we still don't know whether to believe him or not.

Over lunch Rot told us about lots of Vietnamese traditions, talked about the Vietnamese language and even told us about gestures you should or should not use; for instance, crossing your fingers means 'f*** you' [His words again] so he said when westerners say to him 'Let's hope the weather stays fine and wave their crossed finger at him they are really saying 'f*** you' He also taught us some drinking games so, if you look at the photos of our day out, we are not at a swingers party we are just playing innocent party games.

Tomorrow we are off on an 8 hour bus journey to Ho Chi Minh City. Thank goodness I 'found' a Bill Bryson in our hotel room, he can keep me company.