Black Chicken Day
We headed to the War Museum by way of the unspectacular cathedral to find that (surprise, surprise) it was closed - well what person in their right mind would expect a museum to be open on a Friday? Instead we went with the moto-touts to the Ethnology Museum which presented loads of information about the lifestyles of the various tribes within Vietnam in a slightly confused, haphazard way. The fish-trap seller's bicycle did provide a great example of just how much you can fit on a bike or moto in Vietnam...the laws of equal-and-opposite forces don't really exist here. Until then we had both been unaware of the dramatic differences in the apportionment of rations during the American War - based entirely on how close to the inner circle of The Party you were. Differences could be as much as four or five times, even for essentials such as rice and sugar.
Outside there were reconstructions of various tribal buildings, including a Bahnar house complete with rather high ceilings requiring a harness to be worn to dust the corners and a grave adorned with graphic and rather-pleased-with-themselves fertility symbols!
En route to buying our tickets to that night's Water Puppet show we were befriended by two local students, apparently trying to find something to do with their Friday night. Martin and I were very suspicous and involved our minds fully in the task of trying to suss the con. My first theory was they intended to get us drunk and then take us to an illegal gambling den. Later on during the meal we got onto the subject of South-East Asian men (married and unmarried) going with prostitutes. Tom seemed rather keen and with phrases like "Sure sure why not?" splattered around liberally we thought we might have clocked them.
The meal consisted of a black chicken for starters - a whole black chicken, claws and head still attached. Literally a black chicken (a medicinal delicacy found only in North Vietnam) minus feathers and cooked in extra medicinal juices for your life's fulfillment! After overcoming the initial "what the hell am I eating" thing it actually tasted fairly alright, even if it was a bit of a hassle trying to find the flesh. Martin actually helped finish Tao's off, but eating the head was beyond either of us. Tom however relished the opportunity to try and munch three at a once!
*** VIDEO ***
Course two was a huge seafood hotpot, also with loads of veg, beef, tofu and tofu-skin which was actually very good. And then it came - the con - the price of the meal! Bearing in mind we were in a restaurant one step-up from a street-kitchen and although we had eaten a lot of seafood, GBP45 for the four of us seemed a little excessive. That explained why the waitress had come back three times to discuss the bill with our two "friends" before finally settling on this amount! With only minutes to go until our show and with arguing getting us nowhere we split it 4-ways, paid and left the other two there - supposedly we would meet them again after the Water Puppet Show. With hindsight we should have just left what we though was fair and gone, but it is a beautiful thing! However we were told later that black chicken would probably cost us 150,000 - so at 200,000 ut ciykd gave been worse, but then the hotpot btween four at 270,000 and the drinks at 30,000 instead of nearer 10,000 I think prove that it was a con. Even so we went less than GBP1 over our daily budget even after I upgraded from my beloved Casio watch!
The control the operators had over the Water Puppets was really impressive, especially the things like simulating swimming and dragons breathing fire, the Phoenix's swimming, the King going fishing, water-snakes, angels and boat-races. When the operators appeared at the end they were a definite bunch of random arty-types!
After the show we quickly found ourselves a stake-out in the shade of the trees on the other side of the road. Waiting for ou learned (they did actually know their stuff) economist-friends would unsurprisingly have taken an eternity though so we headed home.
Outside there were reconstructions of various tribal buildings, including a Bahnar house complete with rather high ceilings requiring a harness to be worn to dust the corners and a grave adorned with graphic and rather-pleased-with-themselves fertility symbols!
En route to buying our tickets to that night's Water Puppet show we were befriended by two local students, apparently trying to find something to do with their Friday night. Martin and I were very suspicous and involved our minds fully in the task of trying to suss the con. My first theory was they intended to get us drunk and then take us to an illegal gambling den. Later on during the meal we got onto the subject of South-East Asian men (married and unmarried) going with prostitutes. Tom seemed rather keen and with phrases like "Sure sure why not?" splattered around liberally we thought we might have clocked them.
The meal consisted of a black chicken for starters - a whole black chicken, claws and head still attached. Literally a black chicken (a medicinal delicacy found only in North Vietnam) minus feathers and cooked in extra medicinal juices for your life's fulfillment! After overcoming the initial "what the hell am I eating" thing it actually tasted fairly alright, even if it was a bit of a hassle trying to find the flesh. Martin actually helped finish Tao's off, but eating the head was beyond either of us. Tom however relished the opportunity to try and munch three at a once!
*** VIDEO ***
Course two was a huge seafood hotpot, also with loads of veg, beef, tofu and tofu-skin which was actually very good. And then it came - the con - the price of the meal! Bearing in mind we were in a restaurant one step-up from a street-kitchen and although we had eaten a lot of seafood, GBP45 for the four of us seemed a little excessive. That explained why the waitress had come back three times to discuss the bill with our two "friends" before finally settling on this amount! With only minutes to go until our show and with arguing getting us nowhere we split it 4-ways, paid and left the other two there - supposedly we would meet them again after the Water Puppet Show. With hindsight we should have just left what we though was fair and gone, but it is a beautiful thing! However we were told later that black chicken would probably cost us 150,000 - so at 200,000 ut ciykd gave been worse, but then the hotpot btween four at 270,000 and the drinks at 30,000 instead of nearer 10,000 I think prove that it was a con. Even so we went less than GBP1 over our daily budget even after I upgraded from my beloved Casio watch!
The control the operators had over the Water Puppets was really impressive, especially the things like simulating swimming and dragons breathing fire, the Phoenix's swimming, the King going fishing, water-snakes, angels and boat-races. When the operators appeared at the end they were a definite bunch of random arty-types!
After the show we quickly found ourselves a stake-out in the shade of the trees on the other side of the road. Waiting for ou learned (they did actually know their stuff) economist-friends would unsurprisingly have taken an eternity though so we headed home.
Labels: Vietnam
posted by Ian Matthias at
10/30/2006 03:59:00 pm
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