Come & Go Vietnam Blog

A question that I’m often asked by clients, and a question frequently asked on Tripadvisor, is “Is it OK to take photographs of people in Vietnam?” Certainly for photography beginners/amateurs, street photography, and the thought of approaching a complete stranger & taking their picture, is an intimidating prospect – however, Vietnam’s buzzing street life and its photogenic people are simply begging to be photographed.

Saigon street seller

Personally I love street photography and there are few things I enjoy more than taking my camera out for a wander around Saigon, and Saigon-based professional photographer Adam Martin wholeheartedly agrees with me.

“For street photography Vietnam has it all – everything except sex happens on the street!” says Adam. “Life is on the street, so you can watch things that normally are hidden from view taking place in public. Repairmen of all sorts reworking something that in the west would be thrown away, people eating on little plastic stools, buying chicken’s feet or pig’s ears etc. It all happens!”

And this lack of privacy, and the very public nature of Vietnamese life, means photographers have a lot more freedom than they would in the west.

“You can see virtually every aspect of Vietnamese life on display by just walking around a place” Adam tells me. “You can stroll into temples and pagodas and take photographs without being hassled. Most businesses find it a novelty to be visited by a camera-toting tourist and if you go about things the right way no one seems to mind you taking their picture.”

This was certainly true on a recent visit to Mo Cai in the Mekong Delta, where I came across a group of women

Coconut husk workers, Mo Cai

processing coconut husks. Not only did they not object to me wandering into their yard to photograph them, they insisted on posing for pictures and seeing the results, and I spent a very enjoyable half hour chatting with them & taking pictures.

Which brings us onto the real thorny issue – when taking photographs of people, do I ask for their permission or not? Personally I’m in two minds about this – asking for permission, and getting a no, can mean missing out on a good shot, however I can feel a bit intrusive & rude taking pictures of people without asking first. The man in this shot got pretty shirty when he saw me taking his picture. For beginners it can be a lot safer & more comfortable to use a long lens & take pictures from a distance, though the results can lack the intimacy that comes from a subject feeling comfortable with having their picture taken & looking directly into the lens, as in my favourite picture of the Lao villager & her baby. Adam is equally undecided.

“Permission is always good but then there are times when that just isn’t going to work” he tells me. “I like to sit and watch a scene from a distance and if I can, I use a long lens to capture it without the subject being aware and behaving in a natural fashion. I often prefer this. However if you want to get right amongst things and take portraits than it is important to seek some kind of permission from your subject. But often then the subject ‘poses’ for the camera. Make sure you keep shooting after the initial shot when the person becomes themselves again and wherever possible show the image to the subject. In the end the best shots are usually natural, showing people going about day to day life, doing their normal stuff and street photography is about capturing that moment in time and the pictures tell the story.”

Ethnic minority kids, Mai Chau

Very good advice, and easily executed in a country where people, especially younger ones, love having their pictures taken & seeing the results. Certainly in rural areas where people may not have seen a digital camera before, photographers quickly become the centre of attention and the locals will end up queuing to have their pictures taken. I also find that simply smiling at everyone puts them at ease & makes them more receptive to being photographed.

Adam also has good advice about the best locations for street photography in Vietnam.

“My favorite places are older neighborhoods and street markets” he says. “Also boats that have come up from the Mekong and tie up in canals around Saigon. Parks are great for early risers as they are quiet places to be and there may be all manner of stuff going on from Tai Chi through to sword and fan dancing.”

He also advises looking at cities from different angles, both high up and low down on the street. “There are quite a lot

Saigon lottery ticket seller

of buildings in HCMC that have great views from rooftops or viewing platforms which give another way of seeing the metropolis. And if you are really willing to get amongst life on the street then it is imperative that you spend time on the back of a motorbike getting around and being one with the locals.”

As for equipment, personally I find my newly-purchased 50mm lens is perfect for street photography & for getting up close to subjects, and indeed since I bought it I’ve hardly used my other lenses. But for Adam, equipment isn’t a big issue.

“Any equipment is good equipment if you have an idea how to use and understand it” he says . “Photography is all about capturing light and using it, and the other major part of it is composition. Think about how the final shot will look to the viewer, the person who wasn’t there. I have seen great shots from everything from disposable cameras to iPhones and with all the latest trickery in many cameras no one should be getting dull shots!”

Adam’s love of street photography in HCMC comes with one minor caveat – the increasing amount of thefts in the main tourist areas of the city, with cameras being a prime target for the motorbike ‘cowboys’. “In Saigon snatch & go theft is common and that makes taking pictures in this city a little trickier but this really only applies to the District 1 areas, where tourists are. So, you do have to be aware of your surroundings.”

Personally I always make sure my camera strap is around my neck and that I’m not standing right on the edge of the pavement to take shots, which would make me an easy target for thieves. So far I’ve been safe, and indeed HCMC is way, way safer than most western cities, but taking the usual precautions doesn’t hurt.

So whether you’re using a top-of-the-range DSLR, a little point & shoot camera or just your phone, take Adam’s advice and get out there on the street & try to capture some of this country’s bustling, varied & crazy street life. Whatever the results, they’re unlikely to be boring!

Thanks to Adam Martin for his help with this piece. When he’s not taking photographs for his Asian Images site, Adam can be found running off-the-beaten-track motorbike tours for Saigon Unseen, and assisting visiting film crews at Asia Film Fixer. Contact him on asianimages_adammartin@yahoo.com. 

A new year, and once again Halong Bay is in the news. Following last February’s fatal sinking, and the Bay’s nomination for the dubious New Seven Wonders status, 2012 began with the bizarre story about the local authorities ordering all boats operating in Halong to be painted white “to improve the bay’s image”. Such was the hilarity that greeted the announcement that the officials have since backtracked – but rather than admit they were wrong (which is simply not an option to the Vietnamese) they made even bigger fools of themselves by claiming that they weren’t regulating exactly how white the boats needed to be, as long as there was a bit of white on them somewhere. Glad that’s been cleared up then.

In order to get an accurate, on-the-ground (or on-the-water) view of the current situation in Halong, I spoke to Armand Cheveux, Business Development Manager of Bhaya Cruises, one of Halong’s best known & most reputable cruise operators. Armand told me that whilst visitor numbers to Vietnam as a whole went up by 16% in 2011, overnight tours in Halong Bay only grew by 8%, and it is as yet unclear as to whether this slower level of growth was due to safety fears or due to people cutting their costs & doing day tours instead. In my opinion it may also reflect the fact that that 16% figure is not entirely made up of tourists, but as the landing card with its useful demographic information has now been scrapped, we may never know!

Certainly safety is a big concern for tourists visiting the Bay. “We receive more questions related to safety, for charter groups or private boats” says Armand. “On board as well, most of the guests pay more attention than before to our safety briefing, and ask questions about the accident and the general situation in the Bay.”

Armand tells me that since the accident, stringent safety measures have been put in place to make Halong a safer place for tourists to visit. All boats have been checked and only allowed to set sail again once required safety modifications have been made, and the authorities have also issued a list of regulations for all boats to follow, a copy of which is displayed on the boats at all times. Combined with regular harbour checks and a new satellite tracking system (www.halongtracker.com), boats are now more tightly controlled, so hopefully the days of unlicenced boats straying off their regular itineraries are now over.

I also asked Armand about the New Seven Wonders controversy, and whether it was greeted with the same cynicism in Halong as it was elsewhere. As a Halong Bay operator, Armand is actually quite positive about the issue.

“We haven’t felt the controversy here” he says.  “Everybody has been really excited about this challenge and of course the opportunity to bring the light on the bay in a good way after the bad publicity brought by the accident in February and difficult weather conditions in general.” For Armand and his Halong Bay colleagues, it’s all good publicity. “Halong Bay deserves to be in any selection of natural wonders” he says,”even if the group realising the selection or organising it might be subject to controversy.”

Whilst the vast majority of tourists love their trip to Halong Bay, one regular complaint is that the Bay itself is polluted, with garbage floating in the water a far too common sight. Armand admits that much still needs to be done to improve the environment of the Bay and to educate both tourists and locals on how to keep the Bay clean, and that measures are already in place to achieve this.

“All operators can do improvements in the way they deal with water sewage and implement new systems to clean/filter the water being pumped out to the Bay” says Armand. “It is a huge investment for most companies, but there are systems being developed to help clean the water such as chemical pools & chemical toilets, and these systems will be mandatory for all new boats put in the water in the years to come.”

Armand also informs me that a limit has been imposed on the number of boats operating in the Bay, and that new boats can only be launched as replacements for old ones to ensure the number of boats does not increase. Finally, he tells me, operators need to work closely with the inhabitants of the Bay’s many floating villages to ensure that they are all singing from the same hymn sheet in terms of garbage disposal & recycling.

“The operators should include in the contracts they have with local floating villages and service providers in Halong Bay an ethical statement on the behaviour to adopt towards the environment, the necessity of cleaning the Bay, and the necessity of developing clean ways to deal with water sewage and garbage” he says. “The operators should also include garbage selection to facilitate recycling.”

So after a controversial few months, it seems that, white paint notwithstanding, the awareness of the need to keep Halong Bay clean & safe is finally hitting home with authorities, residents and boat operators alike. Halong Bay is arguably the jewel in Vietnam’s tourism crown, so let’s hope that its beauty and reputation are maintained and that it continues to enchant visitors for years to come.

Thanks to Armand Cheveux of Bhaya Cruises for his help with this piece. To find out more about Bhaya, visit www.bhayacruises.com or email Armand on cma@bhayacruises.com. 

This blog regularly bemoans the lack of creativity & original ideas in Vietnam’s tourism industry, so praise the Lord for the Quang Ninh People’s Committe, who have come up with a barnstorming new idea for improving the image of Vietnam’s best-known tourist attraction, Halong Bay – paint all the boats white.

Thanh Nien newspaper reports that “under the decision issued on Thursday by Quang Ninh’s People’s Committee, all tourist boats, except dragon boats, will be white with brown sails. Boats which fail to follow the decision by April 30 will have their licenses revoked.”

Although the news has been greeted with some cynicism and negativity – one boat operator complained that it will cost his company almost $50,000 to repaint his fleet, whilst one wag on Facebook commented that it would make the boats easier to find on the seabed after they’ve sunk – I think it’s a marvellous idea. Why bother with environmental protection, enforcing safety standards and ensuring a great customer experience, when you can achieve all this by simply painting all the boats white?

It’s an idea that should be rolled out to other areas of our tourism industry as soon as possible. Taxi problems at Tan Son Nhat airport? Paint them all white! Dishonest cyclo drivers hanging around Ben Thanh Market? No problem, paint the cyclos white! A new tourism logo? How about a plain white space instead!

With such brilliant, unorthodox thinkers working in our industry, I look forward to seeing Vietnam’s tourist numbers shoot past the 10 million mark by the end of June. Our worries are at an end.

A white boat, positively reeking of honesty & reputation

Last night, as I so often do, I went out for oc (shellfish/snails etc) on the street, this time at 149 Bui Vien in the heart of the backpacker district. Sitting on a plastic chair, drinking cold beer, eating clams & crab claws & watching the world go by is one of the great pleasures of living in Vietnam, and a highly affordable one in a city where restaurant places are getting increasingly silly (such as a new creperie charging $15 for a crepe, for example).

So last night I’m sitting on my plastic chair, swigging my Saigon Red (one of the world’s worst beers but for some reason, the oc experience just doesn’t feel right without it), chewing on some dried squid & enjoying some good company, watching the never-ending sideshow that is Bui Vien. And several times our table is approached by women selling snacks out of baskets that they have detached from their shoulder poles. Shrimp crackers, peanuts, quails’ eggs & the like. Tasty stuff to supplement our seafood feast. During the 45 minutes we’re there, at least half a dozen of these women approach us. They’re not annoying – they’re polite and take no for an answer when we don’t want to buy anything.

But the big problem is, THEY ARE ALL SELLING EXACTLY THE SAME THING!!! And the chances are, if we say no to the first two, we’re going to say no to the next two as well. And that sums up not just the Vietnamese snack industry, or the travel industry, but Vietnamese business altogether – why risk being original & doing something new, when you can copy what everyone else is doing and be sure to make some money, even if it’s not much?

If any one of these women had been selling, say, wet wipes, or Tic Tacs, or fresh yogurt, or strawberries, they would have made a sale – but no, they’d all gone out into the street (a street populated at that time largely by foreigners) with identical baskets of food, & were all faring as badly as each other.

Wander along Bui Vien & visit the dozens of travel agencies there, & the same principle applies. They’re all selling the same tours, often booking people onto the same buses, all trying to undercut each other to the point where they’re making as little as 50 cents per person on a Cu Chi tour. Try to book something different – a trip to Sa Dec for example – and you’re out of luck. Why sell Sa Dec when none of your competitors are selling it? Surely that means noone wants to go there?

This lack of diversity is one reason why so few tourists (around 5%) come back to Vietnam – why come back a second time when you’re going to be offered the same stuff you were offered last time round? For the sake of our tourism industry, we all need to diversify & find original stuff to offer our clients to keep them coming back. Singapore opens up new attractions every year and attracts over 12 million tourists as a result, and this in a city with little culture or street buzz to talk of – Saigon has had nothing new to offer visitors in years.

We were selling Ben Tre tours in 2009 when everyone else was sending their Mekong Delta tours to My Tho & Vinh Long. Now they’re all copying us, & we’ve moved our itinerary further down the river to avoid them. They’re still selling shrimp crackers.

One of my projects for 2012 is to pick a particular street in Saigon, & wander its length taking pictures of anything interesting. On Monday I had a meeting with my web designer at the newish Bootleg DJ Cafe at the eastern end of Le Thanh Ton St, so decided to kick off the project there & then.

Le Thanh Ton (named after a 15th century emperor of Vietnam) runs north-east to south-west, starting at the junction with Ton Duc Thang & finishing opposite the New World Hotel. The eastern end is famed for its range of bars & restaurants, including the legendary Sheridans Irish House as well as the city’s best Indian restaurant (Ganesh) and several bars of a somewhat dubious nature aimed at Japanese businessmen. I took lunch here, at newish Chinese restaurant Room 18 which, with its stylish interior, friendly service & value for money prices, is a favourite haunt of mine, before wandering south-west.

Heading further south you take in such famous sights as the Hotel de Ville and the Rex Hotel (there was also a beautiful old French colonial mansion here, by the junction with Dong Khoi, but after being fully refurbished it was disgracefully bulldozed to make way for the city’s newest white elephant, Vincom Centre).

Once past the Norfolk Hotel things get more interesting as hotels & office blocks give way to shophouses & street life (on Monday for some reason there were literally hundreds of shoe repairers working on the pavement, never seen that before) before you arrive at the famous Ben Thanh Market. From here I looped back the other way on the opposite pavement, stopping en route at the chic new Cosmo Coffee venue, where I had an iced coffee on the terrace – a very nice spot & the prices are reasonable but the service was a bit surly.

As is usual in Saigon, the most interesting sights weren’t buildings or monuments, but people going about their daily business and those little quirks that make Vietnam so fascinating – flowers & incense tied to a truck bumper, a shoe repairer in a cowboy hat scowling as I took his picture, a woman making banh chung for the Tet holiday on the back of her bicycle.

Watch this space for more Streets of Saigon soon!

Coming to Vietnam & want to avoid the touristy stuff? Or coming back for a repeat visit & want to do something different? Here’s our list of 30 fun & non-touristy things to do in Vietnam…

1. Go to a rural wedding – you can’t beat rice wine shots at 6am
2. See Vietnam the way the locals do – from a motorbike, with a Vietnam Vespa Adventures scooter tour or an Easy Rider tour of the central highlands
3. Join the locals on a tiny plastic stool for bia hoi on the pavement in Hanoi
4. Spend a day relaxing & eating seafood at Bai Sao beach in Phu Quoc, the most stunning
   

   Bai Sao beach

   beach in the country

5. Think about swapping that internal flight or long road journey for a relaxing, scenic ride on Vietnam’s ramshackle but charming trains
6. Get out of the tourist areas & visit some authentic wet markets, eg Tan Dinh in HCMC
7. Get up early & join the locals for morning exercises in a local park, or around Hoan Kiem lake in Hanoi
8. Eat oc (shellfish/snails) on the street at night
   

   Stilthouse, Mai Chau

9. Spend the night in an ethnic minority stilthouse in Mai Chau
10. Smile at everyone you meet – it really does work
11. Escape from the modern world at Jungle Beach, a hand-built eco resort on a private beach near Nha Trang
12. Befriend your hotel’s security guys – they’ll be your best friends if you have any problems with rogue taxi drivers
13. Do a cooking class on the beach at Mui Ne Cooking School, the most idyllic cooking class location in Vietnam
14. Go for a blind massage
15. Find & join in a game of da cau (shuttlecock) in a park – not as easy as it looks but it’s good fun
16. Act like Andrew Zimmern & try some bizarre food – minced snake, grilled scorpion & field rat are on many restaurant menus
17. Spend the night in a jungle lodge at Cat Tien National Park, home to many endangered species
18. Cross the road in Saigon or Hanoi – a real sense of achievement when you make it intact
    

    Saigon traffic

    to the other side!

19. Ride a motorbike over the Hai Van Pass at 5am on a clear summer morning, and see sunrise at one of Vietnam’s most spectacular spots
20. Visit Cholon (Saigon’s historic Chinatown) by cyclo – vibrant markets, magnificent colonial buildings and great Chinese food
21. Try out your handicraft skills at a lantern-making workshop in Hoi An
22. Take a private blessing ceremony at a colourful Cao Dai temple
23. Go trekking in Con Dao’s national park to observe wild monkeys
24. Drive the spectacular coast road from Quy Nhon to Tuy Hoa
25. Enjoy a relaxing couple of hours at a local hairdresser for a haircut, hairwash and head massage – the whole lot will cost less than $2 in many places
26. Get some friends together & rent a private karaoke room with a couple of cases of beer
27. Try night fishing for squid off the coast of Phu Quoc
28. 

    Ben Tre scene

    Visit Binh Thuy ancient house in Can Tho, where the film The Lover was shot – and contribute to its upkeep

29. Visit the UNESCO biosphere reserve of Cham Island near Hoi An – sail there on a traditional ghe nang boat, and stay in a village homestay
30. Get off the tourist trail in the Mekong Delta – avoid My Tho & Vinh Long, & try Ben Tre, Sa Dec or Tra Vinh instead

Interested? We can arrange most of the above activities, so please contact us on hello@comeandgovietnam.com

Big thanks to Kris Goetghebeur, Scott Bowen, Craig Anderson, Tin Bien, Tim Scott, Jake Catlett,  Naya Ehrlich-Adam, Mario Jukic, Irina Kim and Irene Wong for sharing their suggestions.

I was about to write a wish list for Vietnam tourism in 2012, when I thought hang on just a sec there young man, didn’t I do this a year ago? So I decided it might be more worthwhile to look back at my 2011 wish list and see which of my wishes, if any, have come true. So let’s go through them and see, and I think you can probably guess what’s coming here.

1. Visa on arrival

No progress here that I’m aware of. Visas still have to be applied for in advance, and anyone deciding to travel for a weekend away at the last minute will have to go somewhere else. Even people with a genuine reason for last-minute travel – such as this Canadian woman desperately trying to visit her son who was critically injured in a motorbike accident – still have to jump through the requisite hoops. A free 15-day transit visa was introduced this year, but it required jumping through more hoops than the average dog show, and so can’t be considered progress. Wish realisation factor: 0/10

2. Taxi clampdown

I tried to get a taxi at Tan Son Nhat after returning from Singapore recently. There was still no queue, touts are still allowed to mingle freely with arriving tourists, and I was told I could only get a Mai Linh taxi (the only reputable firm in the city) on presentation of a Mai Linh customer card. Luckily I have one; tourists don’t. Newspapers talk of taxi clampdowns but there has been little evidence of it. Wish realisation factor: 1/10

3. More awareness of the benefits of tourism

Little evidence of this amongst tourism industry workers sadly, but at a recent talk I gave to some students at ERCI in Saigon, there was widespread shock and disgust at the amount of scamming tourists are subjected to. The younger generation are starting to wake up, let’s hope they take over soon. Wish realisation factor: 2/10

4. Better care for monuments & historic buildings

Now-bulldozed colonial building, Nam Ky Khoi Nghia

I will only pass one comment here – the building I used to illustrate this point was bulldozed within a few weeks of the original article being written. Wish realisation factor: 0/10

5. More fun-based marketing

Again, fun seems to be off the agenda as far as Vietnam’s marketing “experts” are concerned. Things have improved a little bit – trade show stand design is getting a bit more stylish, and Charming Vietnam ads have popped up at Premier League football grounds in recent weeks – but we are still awaiting a new tourism marketing masterplan with its accompanying logo & slogan to give us a hook to work with. Wish realisation factor: 3/10

6. More boutique hotels in Saigon

Thao Dien Village boutique hotel opened this year, and Sen La Boutique Hotel is currently under construction on the corner of Hai Ba Trung & Le Thanh Ton, though as I haven’t seen the plans, & as they knocked down a lovely French villa to build it, I’m not getting my hopes up. Wish realisation factor: 3/10

7. Traffic-free days

Plans are apparently afoot to transform several areas of HCMC into pedestrian-only zones at evenings & weekends, notably De Tham/Bui Vien and the areas around Ben Thanh market & Notre Dame Cathedral. Let’s hope those plans come to fruition AND are properly enforced. Wish realisation factor: 4/10

8. Nightlife encouraged, not discouraged

Seems like more new bars & restaurants opened in Saigon in 2011 than ever before. Admittedly, most of them are crappy, overpriced lounge bars & pseudo-fine dining joints that will be the flavour of the month for a few weeks before closing down quietly before 2012 is out, but the likes of RED, La Plancha and Room 18 have improved my quality of life considerably in the last 12 months, and it also seems that on the rare occasions I stay up past my bedtime, there are still plenty of places open. We have a winner! Wish realisation factor: 7/10

So what’s my tourism wish list for 2012? Sadly it’s pretty much the same as for 2011, with the emphasis still on visas, destination marketing & cultural preservation. I’d also like to add better shopping in HCMC – at present, I do most of my shopping in Bangkok and unless the equivalent of MBK opens here in the next 12 months, I can’t see that changing.

I must’ve done a lot of travelling since starting Come & Go in 2009 – my 10-year passport, brand new in 2008, is already full and I am currently going through the tortuous & expensive process of renewing it. 2011 was no different with various trips in Vietnam & also to Cambodia, Laos & Thailand, as well as a week in Madrid for FITUR back in January. So here are some of the best experiences I had this year…

BEST HOTEL/RESORT

The beach at La Veranda

I’ve stayed in a lot of places this year, from rough & ready Mekong Delta homestays up to the luxurious new Six Senses Con Dao resort. As is usual in Asia, service & breakfast were generally the two main gripes, but one resort stood head & shoulders above all others – La Veranda in Phu Quoc. Staff who greeted me by name on arrival, charming colonial style, iPod docks, laid-back, unobtrusive service, free frozen yogurt on the beach and a wonderful brekkie all combined to make La Veranda an object lesson in guest-centric resort service.

BEST MEAL

Despite living in Asia for nearly 9 years, European food will always reign supreme for me so despite some great meals in Laos and Thailand, the winner here is a little place called El Txoko de Ander in the grim Madrid suburb of Barajas, where I stayed during FITUR in January. It summed up everything that makes Spanish food, for me, the world’s best – simple, fresh, high-quality ingredients served in a rustic atmosphere. El Txoko serves all my favourite things – good red wine, chorizo, Serrano ham, cheese, salt cod, olives, fresh bread – from a menu that is striking in its simplicity. With ingredients this good, you don’t need marinades or dipping sauces. And the prices were astonishingly low and put Saigon’s mediocre, overpriced dining scene to shame.

BEST PLACE FOR A BEER

As regular readers will know, this blog wouldn’t be complete without me having a beer at some point, but 2011’s most memorable bevvy wasn’t in a bar or club, but in an ethnic minority village on Laos’ Bolaven Plateau. We were well off the tourist track & decided to wander into a stilthouse village to take a few pics, only to discover that we the first foreigners the vast majority of the villagers had ever encountered, meaning we had a crowd of friendly, curious followers. We stopped for some cold Beer Lao at the village shop and enjoyed our beers under the watchful eyes of what felt like the entire village.

BEST PHOTO

Back in 2009 I bought my first DSLR camera, but only in March this year, after a photography weekend with professional photographer Peter Stuckings, did I get away from my camera’s pre-settings & start doing things manually, with vastly improved results. But the best pic I took all year had nothing to do with my expertise (or lack of it), & everything to do with the subject & the time of day. After a long day’s journey in southern Laos, from Attapeu en route back to Pakse, we stopped off at an ethnic minority village to take some pictures. The light was perfect (it was the ‘golden hour’), and whilst most of the villagers ran off & hid from these two tall, scary-looking white guys, the girl in the picture just stood there & stared at me, smoking a big green roll-up, and let me grab a quick pic, and it turned out to be my pic of the year.

BEST NEW DESTINATION

I discovered a few new places this year. Bizarrely I’d never been to Can Tho or Sa Dec until March this year & loved them both, and last month I visited the Cambodian city of Battambang for the first time & was charmed by its colonial charm and laid-back pace. But my big discovery of the year was the southern Laos city of Pakse. Small, friendly, plenty of beautiful old colonial buildings & temples, and some great riverside nightlife, as well as being a great base for visiting Champasak, Vat Phou and the Bolaven Plateau. Add in cheap accommodation and direct flights to HCMC, & it’s amazing I saw so few foreign visitors there.

BEST OLD DESTINATION

I revisited several old favourites in 2011, including Phnom Penh & Siem Reap, Singapore, & a

Duong Dong harbour, Phu Quoc

city that is rapidly becoming my second home, Bangkok. But the runaway winner here is my favourite place in Vietnam, the tropical island of Phu Quoc. Home to miles & miles of deserted dirt roads, the country’s best beach (Bai Sao), some great beach resorts, fresh seafood & friendly locals, Phu Quoc is exactly how I like life to be. Plans are afoot to ruin it with golf courses, casinos, conference centres & the like, so go now before mass tourism & the powers that be turn it into another Nha Trang.

BIGGEST RIP-OFF

Sadly, travelling a lot means getting ripped off a lot too. I’m generally savvy enough to avoid the cheats but a lot of first-timers to Asia fall victim. Nominees include Singapore hotels (particularly during big events such as the F1 Grand Prix or ITB Asia); flights between Vietnam & Cambodia; Saigon’s dining scene (which got REALLY silly in 2011); Air Asia, for advertising flights for $1 which, once you’ve added on all the extras, end up hardly any cheaper than regular flights; and several resorts in Vietnam for charging upwards of $100 per person for compulsory festive gala dinners. But the winner has to be Saigon airport taxis. No use going into detail – you all know the score – but the fact that the authorities tolerate thousands of tourists, most of them first-time visitors, being overcharged, threatened and abused by the city’s taxi drivers, is absolutely disgraceful and remains a huge stain on our industry. It’s easy to sort it out, so why not sort it?

TRAVEL HOPES FOR 2011

That I have a successful trip to ITB Berlin in March & that my stand is confirmed before Tindersticks tickets sell out…that Vietnam introduces a genuine visa on arrival process & starts marketing itself properly…that tourists can get to & from Saigon airport without being ripped off…that cheats & overchargers, be they hoteliers, taxi drivers or restaurateurs, fail to prosper…and that I have the time to spend a whole week on a beach somewhere!

See below for a selection of my favourite travel pics of 2011…

This week, Vietnam’s media has been full of self-congratulatory articles about Halong Bay being named as one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. People genuinely seem to believe that the award will lead to a huge spurt in tourism and really put Vietnam as a whole on the world tourism map.

But some people, myself included, have smelled a rat. Firstly, Halong Bay’s status on the list is only temporary, with the final list to be announced next year. Why? Well, if tourism officials in the Maldives are to be believed, the whole campaign is just a moneymaking scam for the organisers. Following their own nomination, the Maldives claim they were asked to cough up the following:

•$350,000 for a platinum level sponsorship licensing fee,

•two $210,000 requests for gold level licensing fees,

•a $1million license fee to put the New 7 Wonders of Nature logo on planes,

•a $1million license fee for their national telecom operator to participate for allowing phone voting and,

•a request for a ‘World Tour’ stop in the Maldives for the New 7 Wonders delegates to party and enjoy the country at a cost of $500,000.

That’s over $3m, just to be on a list that isn’t even officially recognised. I wonder if Vietnam, with its annual tourism marketing budget of just $1.5m, is going to shell out that kind of money? I hope not.

And what’s that about it not being officially recognised? Well, UNESCO certainly don’t think so and have distanced themselves from it, claiming it’s just about media hype rather than actual environmental protection. Will any of the above money be put back into infrastructure & preservation schemes? I doubt it.

Thirdly, Vietnam itself resorted to various shady tricks in order to get Halong Bay on the list, with one company in particular (see pic) requiring its staff to send 100 SMS votes each, threatening them with the sack if they didn’t vote.

So, basically, who gives a damn? The campaign doesn’t seem to have generated that much publicity outside the participating countries, and clearly has very little credibility. Vietnam would be better off spending its time, money & effort on cleaning up Halong Bay, educating its local people about business ethics, pollution & environmental preservation, and closely monitoring safety standards on its boats, rather than engaging in pointless cosmetic exercises like this.