Vietnam: Beautiful country and nice people.

Quite some people have visited Vietnam for holidays. I think I have never come across anybody who didn't like it.

The people are very open and friendly. The cities are dominated by scooters. You can even just wave your hand and somebody on a scooter will ask you if he can take you somewhere. Make sure to negotiate the price beforehand.

The Vietnamese culture is very related to the Chinese. Even though the history of Chinese in Vietnam was not very pleasant. You still find Chinese characters on the walls of temples even though the Vietnamese have their own writing.

Vietnamese food is said to be very tasty. I enjoy especially the Vietnamese specialities, like snake and dog. It seems also cat and mouse are specialities, but I have not found restaurants in the big cities serving this anymore. Another favorite is a rotten shrimp paste that you eat together with various dishes, e.g. with pork intestines and womb. Many foreigners do not like that sauce, because it has a horrible smell, but it actually tastes good. Only thing I didn't find out until now: Why there are hardly any "real" vegtables in Vietnam. What I get served as vegtables always turns out to be just some fresh twigs and leaves. The Vietnamese know exactly which twig is good for what and tell me I need to eat more of this leaf or that twig so that my yin and yang are in balance. Very interesting. But after 2 weeks I really start to miss the Chinese vegetable dishes.