… but they might be the most photogenic. I got a little obsessed with the little hairy blighters while in Vinh Long, the rambutan capital of Vietnam (probably).
Oh, and they taste nice as well, very much like lychees.
[And apologies to email subscribers who received a draft version of this post without any pictures in it.]
Can Tho market, Mekong delta, Vietnam
Every town and city in Vietnam has at least one metal street, where you can buy engine parts, rivets, girders and other metal things I don’t know the names of. Can Tho’s metal street is actually two fairly short, very narrow intersecting alleyways, a stone’s throw and a million miles from the scenic waterfront. Sparks fly. Buzzing and clanging sounds fill the air. Tiny, cramped booths offer all manner of hardware for sale, and men – it’s nearly all men – saw, weld and solder in open-fronted workshops.
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I could post a whole series of pictures of men playing checkers in the street – and perhaps I will at some point – but for now, here’s just one photograph from Can Tho.
Cantonese Congregation Pagoda, Can Tho
When I come to look back on this trip, some of my best memories will be from Chau Doc. It’s a riverside town, sitting on the banks of the Bassac – also known as the Hau – river, a branch of the Mekong (which gets very complicated round these parts). Many families depend on fishing and river trade for their livelihoods, and whole communities live in stilt houses that hover perilously over the water. These neighbourhoods look ramshackle and fragile from a distance, and life here is certainly far from luxurious, but there’s a tangible sense of community in these narrow alleyways. I guess that you have to get along with your neighbours when you live so close together, and the climate obliges you to spend much of your time outdoors. Hammocks are suspended in porches, a mirror image of their opposite neighbours, just feet away. The exterior walls are made of corrugated metal, but the homes inside are spotless and the people houseproud.
The alleyways themselves are built on stilts and sway slightly underfoot.
Loitering at the dry land end of one of these alleyways, camera in hand, I suddenly found myself with a new friend. The nice man above gestured for me to follow him. He showed me his home, and introduced me to his neighbours. The camera creates wonderful experiences for me sometimes.
More pictures from the very splendid town of Chau Doc, in the Mekong delta in southern Vietnam.
Don’t tell everyone, but Chau Doc is one of the finest places in Vietnam. Near the Cambodian border, it’s a riverside market town with a mix of Vietnamese, Khmer and Cham people. The buzz about the town is recognisably Vietnamese, but is tempered by a distinctly Cambodian laidbackness.
You can taste the blend of cultures in the food. The town’s signature dish, bun ca (a fish noodle broth, sold in Saigon as bun ca Chau Doc) is Vietnamese street food with a Cambodian twist. I ate some every day. Cyclos are a common sight and, unlike in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, where they are now mainly the preserve of newly arrived tour groups, in Chau Doc they are commonly used by local people as a way of getting from A to B.
In some places, you have to work quite hard to get people pictures, but not in Chau Doc, where the people are some of the warmest and most hospitable that I’ve come across. I’ll be posting some more pictures soon; this first post concentrates on the people in the market and on the streets.
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I’ve interrupted my Mekong trip to make a quick detour back to Saigon, so that I could say goodbye to some good friends who are leaving Vietnam to go home to Scotland. One of the best things about the expat life is the friends you make. One of the worst things is having to say goodbye to them. Ian and Helen, this one’s for you.
These portraits were taken in Chau Doc, my first stop back in Vietnam on this trip. It’s a market town in the Mekong delta, just over the border from Cambodia, and a fantastic place for people photography. This super-friendly mother and son not only were very happy to be photographed, but also insisted on me joining them for a sit down and a cup of iced tea.
A few portrait pictures from Koh Dach island. A short tuk-tuk drive and a ferry ride from central Phnom Penh, in the middle of the Mekong, it’s a little rural oasis within sight of the city. It reminded me a little of the island in the Red River in Hanoi – I had the same feeling of sudden welcome escape. I would have liked to have spent a good while wandering through the villages on the island, but my visit was cut short by the inevitable afternoon thunder storm.
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Without an H 