THE SCAMMERS SCAMMED!!

Hanoi, Vietnam

Unfortunately we had to leave the Rambuttri village in Bangkok, (it had a swimming pool on the roof so it got a better mark on the Prestige-O-meter), get up at 3 A.M and flew into the big bad city, Hanoi.

We had already pre-booked a hotel on the internet so as soon as we got out of the plane we headed towards the exit. Unfortunately (you hear that a LOT in my blog) we needed to line up at customs to be checked, registered(obtain a visa) and stand in line for 4 hours!! We picked the shortest line (naturally) and thought (wrongly) that it would be fastest. It turned out all the other lines had finished before we had even got half way and there were only 10 people in our line and 30 in theirs!!

After that fiesta we had to find a cab (actually, this one wasn't to hard and it only cost us 35,000 dong) (nobody will exchange Kiwi dollars so we have to trade in Australian dollars for that dong so 1 Aussie dollar to 18,000 dong We had ,at that point, 6.5 million dong!! Crazy eh?) Then we began the long trip to our hotel where we will encounter Scammers, a fake story and (epic music) Dry potatoe chips on a stick!!!!!!!!!

Any way, while we were driving along, trying to find the hotel A dong, we suddenly slowed down and turned to slide back into an alleyway in reverse, there we stayed until a man called Andy came to find us.  He said (say it out loud in a booming voice) 'I'm sorry but all rooms in A-dong are full so come with me to a hotel with every-thing the same quality" so the Taxi driver let him in the cab and drove us to this "better hotel" When we got there, mum decided to have a look on the I-pad about this hotel (now before you read the next bit, can you tell me what the scam was, who took part in it and where potatoe crisps fit into it all? (answers at the end) and the first comment there was: Scammed!! 2nd: SCAMMED!!! 3rd: I've been @#$%#$& SCAMMED BY A @#$%&!#$!!! So you get the point so as soon as we figured out the scam we headed off in  a taxi to find this A-dong  hotel.

To make a long story short,: we found it.

It turns out that we still had a room there(NOT full)
Fantastic place and fantastic location! (A-dong that is, not the last place)


-If at first, you fail , try,try Again.
-Anonymous



Answers: Well, on the way back from the air-port the driver was talking on the phone. We thought he was calling his company to say where he was going but in fact he was calling his little buddy ,Andy, and saying "I have a couple of suckers in the back, I'll stop for you outside the pizza place and you can take them "The Lemon Hotel"  (should've  known that with a name like that it would end up a sour deal!)

P.S I was hungry so we bought the potatoe chips on a stick so yeah...

-A scam-wise child

P.P.S I am quite out of date so watch this space.....!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fungus1/9080146805/

THE SISTER STRIKES BACK!

At the Berjaya shopping center ,yesterday, we saw a roller coaster (inside a shopping mall, cool eh?)  Just looking at it made you feel sick but guess what?! It was closed for annual maintenance.

The next day we flew into Thailand (with a sea so shallow, you have to wade out 200 meters just to be able to crouch down and a very long walk to any half decent restaurant). The place was called great bay.

We walked along the beach to the pier and hired  a cab to a beach with white sand and clear waters.We arrived at the beach ,Haad rin, where they have a huge  festival called the full moon festival (no prizes for guessing what they celebrate) where all the young, university aged students go to hit the booze hard, party the night away and fill the beach.

At the beach we found the best lime shakes you've ever had and a great place for mum to "sit" (she forgot her togs) and for us to swim. 

When we went back to our hotel ,via taxi, we were tousled around so much it made all the roller coasters that we've been on so far tame and that's saying something!

We also had to use our first squat-toilet where you flush the toilet by chucking water down the toilet. You also had to put your toilet paper in a bucket after you were done with it. Very charming indeed.

W.hen we got back to our hotel we hopped straight into the pool. A brother and a sister came walking around the pool while we were swimming then mum tries to make them laugh by "pretending" to pull the brother into the pool. After about 5 seconds the boy starts crying while mum is still "pretending" to pull the brother into the pool (guess Kia-Kaha wasn't enforced back then). After that the brother walks out of mum's arms reach and starts bawling his eyes out then the sister takes a wild leg-kick at mum "I was just joking" says mum as the little girl tries to do the same again. After all that mum doesn't even say sorry!

THE SISTER STRIKES BACK!!!

I'm really finding it hard to keep up with this blog because every day we do enough to fill a book.

Yesterday we went to the Genting highlands, (after the spectacular fail on Monday where went to the Petrosains towers and found... it was closed then we went to the park only to find... it was closed then we went to a place called FRIM (Forest Research Institute of Malaysia) where we swam in a lake next to  a sign saying: swim/wade at your own risk, for the waters may contain parasites,bacteria or viruses in the water. If any symptoms appear, go and find a doctor. Reassuring, eh?).  Still it was really hot so swim it was...

Anyway back to Genting which is a huge fun park with hotels, casinos, restaurants etc stuck on the top of a mountain.  weird!.  The first ride was awesome!!






This ride spins round and round, getting higher and higher.

Look at Lockie in this picture:







This ride was called the wave and in this  picture we are going around backwards, and being pulled by centrifugal force to the side.

This was the scariest ride there:







The space shot! You go from on the ground to 50 meters into the air and then come plummeting down from the top!! Only to stop inches from the ground and get shot up again to half way then down to the ground!

Here was the funnest ride:


















You have to lie down in one of those and shoot around going upside down, barrel rolling and looping the loop. as you can see here, I am terrified:

Left: Oscar with a terrified look, middle: Calm dad, right: screaming wimp called Lockie.

Fun-O-meter: 9/10 because of it not really having a theme and  we had to wait  a lot (did you know in the area there is the world's biggest hotel? With 4000 rooms??!!!)

-An extreme child

P.S. To make a comment you have to have a Google account it's not too hard (easiest way is to make a gmail account).

Hello, I'm writing this from a hotel called the Transit place.

We met a very nice man at the train station where he brought the tickets for our 1st train he payed 10 ringgits per person that's 50 ringgits! (The exchange rate is 1 New Zealand dollar to 2.4 ringgits) so he paid 25 NZ dollars for us! We tried to pay him back but he refused to take any money that we offered him. He also gave us an extremely helpful pointer towards this hotel. We are staying 3 nights and 4 days here and are planning to go zip lining.

Now, I'm adapting to the heat; I still sweat like a pig when there is no air-con, but am starting to ignore the heat.

I'm now typing this on the 17th rather than 15th we did not go zip-lining yesterday; we had a half day of RnR (rest and recovery). Today we are drifting between the high-lands or the Petronas twin-towers. The highlands is my favorite because it has roller-coasters, rides and more! Where as the towers are just two poles sticking out of the ground. Unfortunately, last night, we were eating the best satays you've never had, when Lockie, mum and Bruno decided to go home. While we were stuffing our face with satays Lockie was ,apparently, spewing up into the bushes (No spew-land this time) when he got home ,however he asked mum for a nice, healthy cup of... can you guess it? No? Well... Computers!! As soon as he got one one his face lit up with joy:

Yep, magic

Last night ,on the way down to the satay place, we saw a strange tank I walked up to it and looked inside: Eeels were swimming around inside it. All of a sudden an idea formed: Guess the amount of eels in the jar, a perfect market day fundraiser!

There were so many that they would be like Christmas lights to untangle! Besides that, there was another jar, with something slimy, small, sinister, succulent, albino and... froggy! Yes, there was a tank of plump, albino frogs there!!

Unfortunately, we didn't get to see Lockie eating them.

While were on the food topic, listen to some exotic satays:

Baby crab satay: "yum yum yum" says the store keeper.                                                                            
Pork blood satay: "Oooo, chocolate" I say.
Eggplant satay: "what vegetable is purple?" asks Lockie.
Broccoli satay:" ugh! Like it isn't bad enough already" quotes Lockie.
Cauliflower satay: "umm..." says Lockie.                                                                                              Celery satay: "why are there so many vegetables??!!!!!!!!!!" screams Lockie.
Egg with small baby chicken that hasn't developed yet inside: "Yum, omelets" says Bruno.


Also there was the big daddy of all fattening food, worse than KFC (surprising I know!) And it was... (dramatic drum roll)  Bacon! The fattiest bacon that you've never seen! and listen to the prices of these titans:

600 grams for... 72 Malaysian ringgit!!!! (to convert that to NZ dollars, half it or, if you want to be precise, remember that 1 NZ dollar makes 2.4 Malaysian ringgits) So that's 36 NZ dollars!! (but you would get a lot of bacon for that!)


-A regurgitating child