Warning To Us All

E@L can stop writing now. The Bludger tells it all.

It's probably best to start from here to get the background briefing or you could jump to his most recent trip - the one he regaled us with at lunch last week-end... There are few more posts to come.

The Bludger blogs of his trips to Vietnam in search of romance. He is most emphatically NOT a sex-tourist, you are thinking of E@L there, but just someone who met someone he liked and who seemed to like him and not surprisingly he wanted to follow up on that.

Here we have a beautiful country, fascinating culture, great food, welcoming people. What could possibly go wrong? Ah, that's right, she's just a poor girl from a poor family...

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It's almost like The Bludger has been reading all the Expat misadventure books ever written (and E@L's blog) concerning the depths and dangers one's erect penis can drag one to in Asia, and then decided to follow the DON'T part of their advice, rather than the DO.

He's a good friend of E@L from the Sydney days, and he does not make things up. In this case he wouldn't have needed to.

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E@L knows of several couples, friends of his, European and Asian, who have been in long and mutually loving relationships. He knows of dozens more who haven't, but hey.

E@L

Call Me Jeffrey Bernard

E@L is unwell.

A nibble on a tepid char sui bau, which I complained about, in Legends restaurant at the BigC supermarket (not my choice) in Hanoi and three days (so far) of gastro-intestinal flushing have ensued.

Now I know The Eagles meant by, "Don't look back, you should never look back."

My daily dose of medications has risen to 22.  (Not counting Cialis as that is not daily.)  I'd rattle if it wasn't for what else is in my jejunem, ileum and colon.

We won't even mention what happened in my trousers when I was walking back to my Hanoi hotel from my first coffee in 3 weeks...

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Currently in Macau, groaning.  And not from the special pleasure of those special massages you can get here, allegedly.

E@L

Faceless In Hanoi - Clueless in Singapore

Facebook is banned in Vietnam I was told today when time after time in our office I was presented with a "Problem Loading Page" message.

Interesting, because on Monday and Tuesday when I was in HCMC I had no problem harrassing friends with meaningless profile updates and annoying them with innumerable inane gliberties (new word!) in their comments boxes. Here in Hanoi we are closer to the communistic/fascistic heart of the antient Indo-Chine, where digital surveillance and censorship surpasses the more, um, manual kind in HCMC witnessed four years ago by E@L, your ever-trusty correspondent.

Up here, the enbalmed Dr H still runs things from his glass tomb, directing the guards into political action on the internet with a subliminal gesture of his perpetually gray, wispy, Kung-Fu-guru-like goatee.

One of his recent and arbitrary edicts was to stop friends (and friends of friends) from arranging parties and nights out or from having a hub that directs their closest virtual acquaintances to all of the pictures, interesting links and short thoughts, hidden tattoos and personal financial information that they haven't got the time or wanna make the effort to blog about or leave it on a seat in the train. (n.b.: Blogger is obviously not banned.)

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Pretty much the way Singapore's increasingly (perhaps) moribund LKY mentors his son on how to do and say (relatively) stupid things in public. Does anyone remember The Son of MM's comments on what would happen if there were more opposition members in Parliament? I personally have forgotten but I know it was outrageously dumb, allegedly.

But the other day I was stunned to read this interview and weep with laughter at the awesome irony fail of the arguably clueless PM!

What do you mean, oh guru of political deconstruction? you ask.

I mean, read this excerpt and then read it again ignoring the red bits to see what, um, I mean...

You seem to be sensitive to the issue of what's called nepotism.

We are very sensitive.

Tell me about this sensitivity.

The whole of our system is founded on a basic concept of meritocracy. You are where you are because you are the best man for the job, and not because of your connections or your parents or your relatives.

And if anybody doubts that I as Prime Minister am here not because I'm the best man for the job but because my father fixed it, or that my wife runs Temasek because I put her there and not because she's the best woman for the job, then my entire credibility and moral authority is [sic] destroyed because I'm not fit to be where I am. (Interview for sale at CharlieRose.com)

Exactly. What we are reading is not all that far from the N-word!

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See how easily I get subversive arrested distracted when I talk about censorship?

E@L


p.s. this post will be linked to on my completely anonymous (HA!) Facebook page, and even though I can't get to Facebook myself, I know the MDA can.

Unedited Vietnam

(From iPhone Notes)

Tri Than Trang Bong. Vietnam road sign.

Rice paper wraps enormous heaps of herbs they keep coming.

Getting comfortable in car? Cannot.

Why are we driving at 35km/hr on country road? Ah... Everywhere along the road for 100km are villages conjoined into one long strip of impoverished, restful (hammocks) and yet suicidal motorcycle riding humanity. 

Mattress on back of motorcycle, no time to take photo.

Graves in middle of rice paddies. (more in the North than in the South)

Girls, old women in horrible colours pant-suits,  pyjama style

Rows and rows maybe 50yds of large soft toys.  In Tay Ninh provence = mid-nowhere. WTF?

"Tough white noodle soup."

"Laydy's Fashion"

Furniture street in Hanoi, shop-ladies sitting silent, still, disconsolate on their glossy chairs, staring at nothing, waiting for customers that come only so often and not today.

Traffic chaos, insane density of motorcycles interweaving but not crashing, makes you believe in selfish altruism.

Sushi two nights in a row. WTF?

E@L

Would Naomi Klein Approve?

No logo is better than this logo.

(I'll leave the ambiguity there for your innocent amusement and eternal delight.)

E@L