Wilting

I've been trying to suck it up and not be a baby about it, but man is it ever hot in Saigon these days. So hot, in fact, that I've developed a case of swamp lip. Not familiar with it? Profuse sweating of the upper lip? Yeah, but I have it super bad because my lower lip does it now, too. Gross, right? It's so hot that just walking down the street makes sweat roll down your back. Two showers a day are an absolute necessity. Air conditioning is mostly a luxury, so there's really no relief.

I usually handle the heat fairly well - I've had a few months to get used to it now - but I've really been feeling the effects of it the last few days. I've had zero energy and, as a result, haven't done a whole lot of, well, anything really since I arrived in Saigon. Sure, I had a massage by a blind masseuse the other day ($2.50/hour!), but that didn't involve a whole lot of effort on my part. Other than that, I've mostly just been hanging out, reading, doing a little shopping, drinking fruit shakes like it's going out of style, that kind of thing.

I did manage to go to the War Remnants Museum today (formerly called the Museum of Chinese and American War Crimes), however. Outside the museum are US military planes, tanks, helicopters, and bulldozers which are pretty interesting to see so close up. Inside the museum are two floors of weaponry, ammunitions, propaganda posters (from countries and groups imploring the US to stop their illegal war on Vietnam), and maps. The most heartbreaking exhibits, though, are the photographs, specifically the ones showcasing the effects of Agent Orange. Hearing about the atrocities of war are one thing, but seeing photographic evidence of it is another thing entirely. After awhile it gets to be too much, too intense, and I knew it was time for me to leave.

I'll post pictures in the next couple of days, after I buy batteries for my camera. I bought four batteries on Thursday. Today is Saturday and they're all used up. You'd think that must mean I took a ton of pictures, but you'd be wrong. I must've bought crap batteries because the first pair lasted until today; the second pair lasted for less than 10 pictures. Argh.

Sad decisions

There's been a change of plans to my change of plans. I went to the Chinese Consulate this morning to apply for a Chinese visa since I wasn't able to get one in Hanoi. I could get one and I could have it by tomorrow, but it would cost me $150. That's a lot for a visa! The most I've spent up til now for a visa is $100 for India, but even that was an anomaly; normally a visa is $30 or less.

I'm sad, bummed, and disappointed. I'd been looking forward to seeing friends both old (met in high school) and new (met in Thailand). I don't think I officially mentioned here before, but I'd also planned on going to Korea. The new friend that I met in Thailand offered up the extra room in his house if I was ever in the area and when I realized how close Seoul was to Beijing, I figured I'd be a fool not to go.

But, to use a really professional sounding term, I did a cost-benefit analysis. The high cost of the visa, the multiple bus and trains through China, the high cost of living in Shanghai, Beijing, and Seoul, and the nearly $400 one way ticket back to Cambodia just didn't add up. Or, rather, it added up to a lot more money than I wanted to spend for a two week diversion. Even considering that I'd have (free) places to stay in all of those cities, I'd end up spending well over what I spent the entire time I was in India in less than half the time (5 weeks in India vs. 2 weeks in China/Korea).

The new plan is the old plan. From HCMC I will head into Cambodia, first stop Phnom Penh. From there I'm not exactly sure what direction I'll head, but I'll figure it out along the way.

Frogs and funny faces

Last night, after spending the day at the beach, Marina, Rhian, and I decided that we wanted to check out the restaurant next door to the hotel we're staying at. We'd looked at the menu the day before and were intrigued because some of the items available were, let's say, less than traditional.

I should've taken pictures of the actual menu just to prove that I'm not lying, but I didn't so you'll just have to take my word for it. You could choose from all kinds of seafood (lobsters, crabs, prawns, eels), civet cat, oxtail, java mouse deer, venison, plus your normal ol' beef, chicken, and pork. I wanted to try something a bit off the wall, that I hadn't had before and might not have an opportunity to have again any time soon. I was worried that Marina and Rhian would chicken out and order their fallback choice of fried rice with egg and veg. They surprised me, though, and we ended up with quite the selection.

So what did we end up with? Sauteed frogs with chili and lemongrass, grilled hedgehog, and our "safe" dish was fried noodles with squid and prawns (we wanted to make sure we ordered something we knew we'd like, just in case the first two were horribly inedible). Verdict? The frogs were delicious - spicy and not at all greasy like they tend to be. I had to teach the girls how to eat them (I'd had frogs legs before, but never the whole frog) and they were too spicy for their liking, but they actually liked them, too. The hedgehog was also spicy. It has a gamey flavor, somewhat similar to lamb, and eating it was kind of like eating ribs off of very tiny bones. It was a bit tough, but I don't know if it's always like that or if it was due to preparation. The noodle dish was mostly great. The squid was probably the best squid I've ever had, but the dish lost points for using instant noodles - not a problem if I'm expecting them, a disappointment if I'm not.

Afterwards, we were in the mood to go out. Actually, we'd decided before dinner that we were gonna go out because it was our last night in Nha Trang. We all wore new dresses and were looking pretty (if I do say so myself!). And then the silliness kicked in. All of a sudden we needed to get photographic evidence of various funny faces that we could make. We even asked the guys sitting at the other end of the table to pull faces with us. For some reason, they didn't think we were completely bonkers and they actually joined in. It was a really fun night and our latest night out in a long time. I don't think we got back to the hotel until after 1am and then we did the girl thing and stayed up for awhile after that talking.

We were up bright and early this morning, though, sleep be damned. We checked out of the hotel and stored our packs. Marina and Rhian went to Vinpearl, an island in the South China Sea reached by cable car that has a water amusement park. I opted out. Partially because we're getting on an overnight bus later and a shower beforehand probably won't be an option, partially because it's nearly a day's budget entrance fee, partially I just wasn't feeling like it.

The bus leaves tonight at 8:30pm and arrives in Ho Chi Minh City at 6am. In HCMC, I'll be getting back to my couchsurfing roots as I have a host all lined up. I'm excited about it and think it will be a good way to wrap up my time in Vietnam.

The update

Hmmm, so where did I leave off? I guess I never finished up telling about Hoi An, did I? I was hoping to post pictures of all of my beautiful new custom-made clothes, but it looks like that's not gonna work because of the flash drive issues that I'm still having. I ended up getting a brown, shimmery silk dress with a Chinese style collar and a row of dragonflies embroidered under the bust (embroidery not shown in pic); a cotton summer dress; a dray gray silk kimono with tiny flower embroidery; and a corduroy coat with green silk trim. I love all of it! I'll be shipping the silk dress and coat home, but the other items will stay with me and have already gotten some use. :-)

I also did a cooking class on my last night in Hoi An. It was only so-so, unfortunately. The food was good - fish in banana leaves, shrimp spring rolls, beef salad, wontons, and white rose (a Hoi An specialty that's pretty much a dumpling) - but it wasn't nearly as hands on as I'd have liked. We basically just chopped and mixed and didn't do any actual cooking. The course in Chiang Mai was much better.

Quy Nhon was very quiet. I'm pretty sure that I was the only foreigner there right up until my last night. I'd found a guesthouse called Barbara's Kiwi Connection that had a dorm with a bathroom en suite for 50,000 dong (about $2.50). It was already a great price. What made it the deal of the century was that I was the only person in the room for 2 out of 3 nights; I had a huge room with a hot water shower all to myself. I spent two days doing exactly what I said I was going to do. Nothing but lying around on the beach or beachside with a book. I did manage to upload all those pictures that had been hanging out in my camera, but that's the only productive thing I did. I ended up having dinner with my new roommies on my last night. A Swedish girl named Madeleine, a New Orleaner named Ryan, and I went to a seafood restaurant that we'd heard raves about. It was truly a place for locals. No one there really spoke English and although there was a menu, it had the most basic of English words on it and no prices. The three of us just pointed at a few different things and hoped for the best. We had two beers each, salad, grilled shrimp, steamed crab, and a tuna steamboat (hot soup is brought to the table along with a plate of fish and vegetables and you cook it yourself). It was very tasty. And cost less than $6 per person!

The day I came to Nha Trang, I was to meet up with Rhian and Marina who arrived from Hoi An the same day, just a few hours earlier. I stepped out of the cab in the center of town wanting to find an internet cafe so I could find out where they were staying. Purely by coincidence, they were standing right there and we'd met up before my bag was even out of the cab. Today was spent at the beach, tomorrow will be more of the same. On Tuesday we plan to catch an overnight bus to Ho Chi Minh where we will celebrate Rhian's birthday and where I will (hopefully) get a Chinese visa lickety split.

New beach, new city

It's been days since my last post, but that really wasn't my intention. I'm in Nha Trang now and would have posted sooner, but for some reason after my last post in Quy Nhon, I couldn't access Blogger at all. I couldn't even go to any website that had blogspot.com in the address. It was weird.

Anyway, this isn't my official catching up post; I'll try to do that later today. Right now the girls and I are getting ready to check out of one hotel and into another that's slightly cheaper. We'll have breakfast and spend the day at the beach and then I'll be back with more.

To tide you over, I have uploaded all pictures - Halong Bay, Hue, and Hoi An - so go check them out!

Beach time

I'm still having issues with getting my pictures uploaded. I'm pretty sure I have well over 100 that still need to be posted - from Halong Bay, Hue, and Hoi An, with Quy Ngon soon to follow. I have a connection right now that is good and cheap, so I'll see what I can do about fixing that soon.


I also have a shopping spree update (yay!), but I want to wait until I have pictures to go with it. What good is show and tell if you can't show?


I arrived in Quy Ngon (pronounced hwee and then your best approximation of the French 'no' - if you try saying it out loud and you think you sound like an idiot, then you're probably saying it right!) Wednesday afternoon around 1:30pm. I'm here by myself for a couple of days before I meet up with Rhian and Marina again in Nha Trang. I plan on doing a whole lot of nothing over the next few days unless it involves drinking fruit shakes, laying on the beach, or reading a novel. Perhaps all three at the same time. :-) Posting may be sparse around here for a couple of days as there won't be much of interest to post about: "I laid on the beach. The next day I did the same thing."

Shopping spree in my future?

I made it to Hoi An last night (Sunday) around 5pm. I met up with Rhian and Marina again and the three of us are staying in a triple at Grassland Hotel for $5 per person per night.

Hoi An is kind of known for shopping. There are tailors all over the place making custom clothes. There are three ways you can shop here: 1) Go to the clothing store and buy something off the rack, 2) Go to a tailor, show them a picture or pictures of what you like, and have them make it for you to your measurements, and 3) Custom design an item to your specifications: you pick the material, design, everything. Depending on what you're interested in, even custom items can be bought fairly cheaply and you can have them in 1-3 days time. For example, I can get a simple, cotton summer dress, custom made, for about $15-20. Rhian and Marina have been talking about all the things they'd like to buy here almost since I met them. I, on the other hand, figured I'd maybe buy one dress.

Last night after dinner we walked around to a couple of the shops to get an idea of designs, fabrics, and prices. I think I might be in trouble. :-) I'd still like to get that simple, summer dress, but now I'm thinking that I might also want to get a silk robe and another, fancier dress (that I'd have to ship home because I'd have no use for it now). If I didn't have two gorgeous suits at home already, I'd also probably want to get one of those. Today we'll walk around to the shops and do actual shopping and buying. I'm looking forward to it because I haven't really done any clothes shopping for myself yet except for a tank top I bought in Laos. Having clothes custom made seems like such a posh thing to do, and yet my bargain hunter sensibilities are on high alert to the deals that are to be had here! I'll keep you posted and hopefully I'll have some pictures to share soon of my new items.

Now with pictures

I'm in Hue (pronounced hway), arrived this morning around 7:45am on a sleeper bus from Hanoi. The sleeper bus was different from any other overnight bus trip that I've taken so far in that the seats were more like beds than seats. Rather than just reclining a bit, my seat actually laid nearly flat which helped with the sleeping quite a bit! I don't think the driver stopped even once, so we made good time. Once here, I broke a cardinal rule of mine and went with a tout to the Ngoc Binh Hotel. I still wasn't fully awake and figured it couldn't hurt to at least look at the room. So, I'm splurging a bit and spending $9 for the night. I get my own room, hot water shower with awesome water pressure, satellite tv, and breakfast included.

I've also decided to make the best use of my time in Hue and join a tour. It's a one day tour that I've split into two parts to cover two days. This afternoon I'll do one part, I'll do the other part tomorrow morning, and then I'll take a bus to Hoi An tomorrow afternoon where I'll meet up with Marina and Rhian (they went to Hoi An straight from Hanoi last night). I know what's on the tour agenda, but I don't want to ruin the surprise. Besides, I have a couple hours until it leaves, so I figured I'd show some pictures since they are mostly uploaded now.

(A look at the hallway between the cells at Hoa Lo Prison, aka the Hanoi Hilton.)

(The picture on the left is of John McCain being treated for his injuries.)

And, on a lighter note, here's some of that amazing Halong Bay scenery.

(Mysterious looking, huh?)

Hoa Lo and Halong Bay

Just a warning ahead of time that I'm about to talk about some amazing pictures...that you won't actually get to see for a couple of days or so. Sorry about that! I've either lost my flash drive or it was stolen (most likely it was lost) and until I get a new one, it's going to make uploading pics kind of difficult. Luckily my pictures aren't totally lost since they're on Flickr, and I should be able to pick up a new flash drive "cheap cheap" (as everything in Vietnam is declared!).

The British arrived on Monday night, a bit later than they expected after a 25 hour bus trip from Vientiane to Hanoi. We'd originally planned on leaving Tuesday morning for a trip to Halong Bay, but their late arrival meant that we didn't really have the time that we needed to plan, so we spent Tuesday running some errands in the morning and then we went to Hoa Lo Prison Museum in the afternoon. Since the weather wasn't great anyway (overcast since my arrival last Friday and on the cool side), we figured we'd leave on Wednesday for Halong Bay and only spend one night there instead of two.

Hoa Lo Prison, aka the Hanoi Hilton, is where American POWs were held during the Vietnam War, although it had been in use since then late 1800's when the French built it. Most of the focus of the museum was on the French colonial time when Vietnamese prisoners were held captive and these sections didn't hold our interest for very long. Some photo captions and artefact descriptions were in English, but not all, and there wasn't a lot of information given so we were left with more questions than answers. I'm sure those particular exhibits have more meaning for the Vietnamese than they had for us.

The exhibits that focused on the American War (as it's known here) were more interesting. I knew going in that I was going to get a completely different perspective from what is taught in US schools. No disappointment there. After the last presidential election, we all heard from John McCain plenty of times on the torture he received while he was a POW (he was held at Hoa Lo). At the museum, however, there's a picture of McCain receiving medical treatment with a caption testifying to the great level of care and attention given to the prisoners. There's also a number of pictures of smiling American prisoners sitting down to a huge Christmas dinner, playing chess and sports, receiving care packages from home, and otherwise not looking particularly unhappy to be prisoners. As I continue my travel in Vietnam and go to other places that tell the story of the American War, it will be interesting to get more of the other side's point of view.

After the prison museum, we needed some light heartedness. We decided to go to the grocery store for dinner and snacks for the boat trip, and then go back to the hotel where Rhian and Marina were staying to watch a movie and call it an early night. I had checked out of my hostel to stay at the same place as the other girls. It was four of us in the room, including Holly, another British girl Rhian and Marina had met on the bus to Hanoi. Kind of like a slumber party - as soon as the lights went out, that's when the talking and giggling began, lol. But, as we all are adults, we knew that being up and ready for our 7:30am pickup the next morning meant that we had to get some shut eye.

There was a bit of tension between us and the front desk staff the next morning, but that story will have to be saved for another day. After breakfast, we checked out of the hotel room, leaving our luggage for storage and just taking a small day pack with us for the trip. We took a van about three hours away to Halong Bay and then transferred to the junk (aka boat, but I'm not sure why it's called a junk). Actually, before we got on the boat, there was more tension because there was a question of whether the boat would be able to leave or not. It was kind of misty and very foggy and pier management wasn't allowing boats to leave. That's understandable, but the tension came about because there were rumors that we wouldn't get our money back. Long story longer, our boat was able to depart - yay!

This is when pictures would be really helpful. The scenery was absolutely amazing. There were huge limestone cliffs and random islands jutting out of the bay all over the place. Those of you on my SPOT email list received this link with my GPS coordinates. Pretty cool, huh? While some people were complaining about how crappy the weather was, I was snapping away on my camera because I thought the mist and fog made everything look very mysterious and romantic. After lunch on the boat, we stopped off at Hang Dau Go (Cave of Wooden Stakes), a cave that was quite possibly the coolest cave I've ever seen. It was massive and had a number of very large rooms to walk through. The stalactites and stalagmites were lit up with pink, purple, green, blue, and yellow lights and while that wasn't exactly authentic or natural, it certainly made everything look pretty! We had dinner on the boat, too, and then we spent the rest of the evening playing cards with Andy and Katherine, a Canadian couple living in China that we'd met earlier in the day.

Today we had the option of kayaking in the morning, something all of us were keen to do. Except that kayaking was to start at 6:30am and none of us were keen on that. We slept in instead and woke up to a bright, sunshine-y day, the first I'd seen in almost a week. After breakfast, we all went to the top deck of the junk to read and soak in some rays. When the boat arrived at Halong City, we got off the boat for lunch and then got back in the van to head back to Hanoi.

In case you hadn't figured it out, there's been a minor change of plans. I'd said before that I was going to HCMC today, the 25th. Obviously that didn't happen. I decided that I'd change my flight and fly from HCMC to Hanoi on March 14th instead. This way, I can work my way south in Vietnam and hang out with Rhian and Marina a bit more. We won't be traveling together the whole time, but since we're going in the same direction instead of the opposite direction, our paths will cross more frequently. I leave tomorrow night on an overnight bus to Hue where I'll spend a day or two before going to Hoi An.

Your interesting title here*

Except for the pictures from the last post, I haven't really explained much about what I've been doing for the last few days that I've been in Hanoi. That's what I'm here to do today!

After I arrived and got settled on Friday night, I set out for food. I asked at the front desk about favorite nearby food stalls (my first night in the city, it was dark, and I have a tendency to get lost - it needed to be nearby!) and was referred to a place next door that makes chicken soup. Chicken soup? I've been eating chicken soup (and pork soup and veggie soup) throughout Thailand and Laos. I wanted something different and decided to take my chances with a place across the street from my hostel serving, well, I have no idea what it was. There were a lot of people eating there, always a good sign, so I just sat at a table and pointed to what everyone else was having. I was served a plate of lettuces and mint, four or five differently shaped fried things, and a bowl with slivers of apple in a more-sweet-than-sour liquid. I also had no idea if there was a particular way I was supposed to eat it, so I just watched and copied what everyone else was doing. It was tasty - and came in at under $2 - but I only recognized that one of the fried things had to have had pork sausage in it. That was kind of it for Friday night. I did try one of the free beers when I got back to the hostel, but that was a mistake. It's free for a reason, I guess, and the reason is that it has a strange vinegar-y taste to it.

Saturday I wanted to get a lay of the land, so I did a walking tour of the Old Quarter. This wasn't a group thing or anything, I was just vaguely following along with a path described by Lonely Planet. That was the day that I took all of the pictures of the markets and such that I already posted. There are way more, though? Have you seen them? I also went to Ngoc Son Temple out in the middle of Hoan Kiem Lake; it's the most popular and widely visited temple in Hanoi. (Which, btw, is about to turn 1000 years old as a city. Pretty crazy, huh?) I also had another meal in which I didn't know what I was eating, but I finally went to an official restaurant that night and ordered off of a menu. How strange to know that I was about to eat spring rolls, sticky rice, beef, and vegetables. Where's the mystery in that? :-) On my way back to the hostel, I happened upon a huge crowd of people and went to check it out to see what the fuss was about. I don't know what the occasion was, but there was a man on stage with a pet monkey doing tricks. Pretty random, but it was interesting, at least. That was Saturday in a nutshell. Lots of wandering around, checking out markets and shops and food stalls.

Sunday was more lazy. Maybe as a break from all of the walking I'd done the day before? I did do some walking, but there was no real destination in mind, so it was more of a stroll than anything else. I had a few long, leisurely meals with a book and some very good Vietnamese coffee. I'm not sure how they make it, but it's served in a tall glass that's only about 1/3 filled with coffee and a small pitcher of hot milk alongside so you can decide how much to add (I add the whole thing). It's kind of chocolate-y for some reason and not like coffee I've had anywhere else before. You can also get weasel coffee, something I'd really like to try! Besides this, I also ran a couple of errands as I needed to buy hair conditioner, toothpaste, q-tips, and gum, and I needed to book a flight from Hanoi to Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) for Thursday the 25th. The only tourist-y thing I did was to go to St. Joseph's Cathedral for the 6pm mass. I'd read that the sermon was projected out onto the street and hoards of people would listen from their motorbikes in the street. I'd never heard of something like that before, so I had to see it for myself. Afterwards, I walked in a direction I hadn't walked before to find a place for dinner. I came to the Thien Quang Lake (the name of which I only figured out later after consulting the map) and it was quite pretty. All lit up and magical looking.

Monday, today, I was more productive. Maybe as a break from all of the leisureliness of the day before? Lol. My first goal was a stop at the Chinese embassy so I could get a visa. It was a 25 minute walk to the embassy and a half hour wait in line to find out that visas aren't issued to tourists in Hanoi, only in HCMC. Argh. What's up with all of the visa issues I'm having? Luckily it wasn't a wasted walk as all of my next stops were in the area, too. I went to the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, the Ho Chi Minh museum, One Pillar Pagoda, and the Temple of Literature. After all of that, I was famished so I went to KOTO for lunch. KOTO stands for Know One Teach One and it's a not-for-profit project that helps street kids and other disadvantaged kids learn skills that will one day get them off the streets. It's a very successful program, one that boasts a 100% job placement for graduates and I was eager to contribute to it by having lunch there. Unfortunately, I was fairly underwhelmed with the food which was on the expensive side. It's not that it was bad, it was just kind of meh. Oh well. At least the service was good.


Now I'm back at the hostel where I will read and drink coffee for awhile while I wait for Rhian and Marina to get here. Remember them? I'm really excited to see them and hang out with them again and they arrive in Hanoi today. The plan is that the three of us will head to Halong Bay together and we'll part ways again once I head to HCMC. Who knows, though? Since they'll be heading south in Vietnam and I'll be heading north, maybe we'll meet up again somewhere in the middle.

When I Skyped with my parents yesterday, my father said, "So, Hanoi's a beautiful place, huh?" Well, no, not exactly. It's a large and chaotic city: motorbikes everywhere, lots of noise and people. But there are some beautiful parts and there are definitely a lot of interesting things to look at. It's beautiful in a Bangkok way rather than in a Muang Ngoi way.


*Sorry, I just couldn't come up with anything. Suggestions? :-)

Pictures say more

(A somewhat typical street in Hanoi. Bird cages everywhere!)

(The eye is kept busy in Hanoi.)

(Markets have all kinds of interesting and unusual things. . .including bowls of fish, shrimp, and snakehead fish.)

(Hoam Kien Lake is beautiful, even on a cool, gray day.)

(Back to a big city!)

20/02/10

See that number right up there? It had me a bit stressed earlier today. I arrived at the airport in Luang Prabang with plenty of time before my 3:10pm flight. I handed over my passport at the check-in desk to get my boarding pass. . .and proceeded to wait for quite a while, not knowing what was going on or what the problem was. One guy called over a second guy and they peered at the computer and looked at my passport, then back to the computer. Still nothing was said to me and I was running through all the possibilities. Visa all in order? Yes. Reservation made? Yes. At the airport on the right day?? Yes, to that one, too. Finally, the second guy turns to me and tells me that my visa is supposed to start on the 20th and today's the 19th.

Wow. I've looked at that visa who knows how many times and every time I saw 02/02/10. I even showed it to others and asked why it was issued on 11/02/10, but the first date of validity is 02/02/10. When I filled out my application, the proposed travel dates I gave were 23/02/10 to 23/03/10, assuming that once I had the visa, my 30 days would start right away, regardless of what date was on the visa. Then when I saw the earlier (as I saw it) date, I figured I was golden.

In fact, there was no problem at all. A Vietnam Airlines rep called immigration in Hanoi and said I was good to go. I half thought that I'd get to Hanoi and be told that I couldn't leave the airport until midnight, but that didn't happen. Immigration simply told me that since I came a day early, I'd have to leave a day earlier than what was on my visa. No problem with that! Whew, disaster averted!

Ah, Hanoi. I know it's awfully early to make a judgment, but I'm pretty sure I'm gonna love it here. I haven't been in a city of this size in well over a month, since I was in Bangkok. There's hustle and bustle and lots of shops and amazing food smells. Yay, I'm excited! I was also tipped off to what seems like it's going to be a pretty cool place to hang my hat for a couple of days. A British guy I met in LP the first time I was there told me about Central Backpacker's Hostel. It's right in the Old Quarter of Hanoi and opened less than six months ago, so everything's so clean and new. It's $5/night including free internet, free breakfast, and free beer from 8-10pm. Those are the kinds of tips I can use!