Calling Da Nang Home

Da Nang is a fantastic city, it is vibrant, emerging and has everything you could want in a Vietnamese city without the craziness of Saigon or Hanoi. As a tourist it has a few key sights to visit and that’s about it but as a resident there is so much more to the city than you could absorb in a brief stay.

My little friend Noodle

There is the beach which is empty and abandoned during the heat of the day but at dawn and dusk is filled by people swimming (wading thigh deep in the ocean), playing sports, exercising and just generally chilling out and enjoying the beach. There are the fishermen who occasionally store there boats on the road when big surf comes through, who haul in their nets by hand after lounging in their hammocks all afternoon and then sell their catch by the side of the road in buckets.

Fishing boats 

Friendly fishermen

There is Big C where people go through your trolley as you shop just to check out what the westerner is buying, pinch at your cheeks or arms and where you are bombarded with loud music promos,  flashing lights and even more sounds leaving you feeling a little shell shocked as you face the mosh that is the checkout line. This is contrast to the markets which are not hugely different you still stand out like a sore thumb and  instead of light and sound displays the smells, yelling and sight of the meat market will shock you.

Fresh chicken

There is the riverside bars and restaurants that are an amazing place to spend your nights. The city and its people are truly amazing. I have never felt unsafe only ever uncomfortable  and awkward. The street food is delicious, the seafood by the beach doesn't get any fresher and the people are fantastic. Of all the places to live in Vietnam, Da Nang has to top the list it has everything you could want in Hanoi or Saigon but is nowhere near as busy and is right by the beach, doesn't get much better than that.

Chilling out by the river at the Golden Pine

Rocking out at on the radio

My Quang, one of Da Nang's specialty street food dishes

One of the most beautiful ways to view this amazing city is to drive up Son Tra and take a trip to the white Lady Buddha which stands guard overlooking to city. This beautiful statue is the biggest statue in Vietnam can be seen from Hoi An.

White Lady Buddha

Son Tra

The beautiful temple is surrounded by amazing carved statues and has a very spiritual feel, I left feeling very much at peace. There are many Vietnamese visitors who go there to pray and leave offerings, I personally  felt like I was intruder on their rituals but they were friendly and helpful and I am very grateful for the experience. The surrounds of the Lady Buddha are just as spectacular as the Buddha herself Lotus pools, statues and the wisps of incense  smoke trailing air all enhance the amazing views of Da Nang. It is a must visit if you travel to Da Nang.

White Lady Buddha

The view back to Da Nang from White Lady Buddha

Surrounds of White Lady Buddha

Lotus flower

Lotus flower

Snake and Crickets, because you have to eat something crazy while in South East Asia.

Eating crazy food in Asia is just one of those things you have to do, you won’t like it, you don’t really want to but you have to cross it off the I traveled Asia list. It’s up there with ride a motorbike, get your nails done or a massage for a dollar and eat at a street stall. I have to admit when going to have snake for dinner was suggested every part of me wanted to say no and the only reason I found myself sitting there was because I just had to do it for the experience and because there was no way in hell I was going to do it alone later.

So off we headed psyching ourselves up and no one looking particularly excited. We drove miles out of town and pulled off onto a little dirt road to arrive at a concrete compound that was the snake restaurant, this was definitely the tourist type of restaurant, it was genuine Vietnamese. On offer was snake, lizard, frog and insects, YUM.  

First up was preparing the snake, this involved taking its head off  and draining the blood out. After the trauma of watching them kill the snake we were then offered the still beating heart and a bottle of vodka infused with the blood of the snake, needless to say none of us girls were going to eat that, my gag reflex was working overtime.  Andrew decided to be the brave one and swallowed it whole and beating.  The vodka was put away for later when a significantly larger amount of alcohol had been consumed and another round of beer was ordered, we were all to sober to experience this.

Once we had all recovered briefly from the snake heart our plate of crickets was brought out as the entree  The look on all our faces said it all and we all apprehensively picked up a cricket with our chopsticks, took in a big brave breath and crunched down. For all of you that know me well you know that I am irrationally freaked out by cockroaches, give me a spider any day  but a cockroach will send me jumping on the table, even the word make me shudder. A cricket’s legs look remarkably like a cockroaches and crunching down on the spiky little thing with its spiky little legs is an experience I hope to never have for the rest of my lifetime.

Our snake dishes were up next, snake in leaf and fried snake. The snake in leaf looked perfectly harmless and kind of like the beef in leaf I had eaten a few weeks earlier if I hadn’t known that it was snake it would have been fine but no I knew it was snake, snake that had been alive and slivering until very recently.  It tasted like sand in leaf more than anything, turns out the just crush up the snake bones and all so you end up with snake sand and its not really nice at all, even wrapped in a leaf.

We all left the restaurant a little traumatised and headed straight for the golden pine shots were needed!!!! Many shots! The night continued and we had all recovered and were having a good time, then someone remembered the snake blood vodka. No amount of alcohol could dispel the fact that blood, real blood was mixed in with that vodka and it is quite possibly the worst shot of anything I have ever done, it messed with your head and tasted terrible anyway. Yuck!

So I did it I have eaten my fair share of weird and terrifying foods in Asia. I have eaten jelly fish, sea snail, frog, cricket and snake. I’m almost relived knowing that I have survived the creepy food portion of the things you must do in Asia

A White girl in Da Nang

Being a white girl in Da Nang makes me somewhat of a celebrity the locals stare at you and everyone wants to say hello. I have been told I am beautiful more times than I can count which is great for my ego but I have also had just as many inappropriate comments by young and old Vietnamese men. I am such a novelty to the Vietnamese people that today while I was riding my motorbike a guy on the back of another bike got out his phone and filmed me as I was riding along.  I have loved the chance to talk with the locals at work and out on the street the people are really friendly and genuine which is a refreshing change to other Asian tourist towns. I do worry that it won’t last for long, not with all the new beach side development which will be a huge shame to see such a wonderful city change.

Settling In

This weekend I finally settled in and am starting to feel like I actually live here. I have my own motorbike, have just moved in to my apartment found some expats my own age. There is nothing like driving in Asian traffic there are no rules and no one seems to be aware of anyone else on the road but somehow it works. The trick is to take it slow and look around you, there are no such thing as lanes and even traffic lights don’t really apply, all this on top of the fact that I now have to actively think about which side of the road I am supposed to drive on makes it all a little crazy. But I love it I could ride around all day weaving in and out it just makes you feel alive.

My motobike

My apartment is a the perfect sized 1 bedroom apartment its big enough to not be cramped but small enough to not be lonely. Living here is now achievable I still miss home but I am loving this adventure and I’m excited to see how it all turns out. 

Bedroom

Bathroom

Kitchen/dining

Lounge room

Lanterns, Dragons and Bicycles

On the weekend I headed to Hoi An to catch up with Alison and just chill out after an exhausting week The weekend in Hoi An was exactly the break I needed to remember why I love Vietnam so much. The beautiful ancient town is bustling with people and it has the most amazing restaurants but the thing I love the most about Hoi An is that the food stalls have English and Vietnamese writing on them. I no longer had to just nod and hope I was getting something I could eat. It was great to have a little taste of normal especially after being homesick. My favourite street stall in Hoi An had to be the fruit shake stand they made the most amazing mango shakes for just 15 000 dong (about 70 cents).

I spent the weekend riding around and just loving the place I could not get the smile off my face. Hoi An has the best atmosphere and it is shopping heaven. As it turned out it was the perfect weekend to be in Hoi An, it was the Luna festival of something and there were dragons and drumming everywhere. We headed down to a great little restaurant overlooking the river. There was happy hour (2pm - 9pm) where the cocktails were $2 instead of $3 and the food was great.  

Exploring on my bike

Vietnemese shop keepers

At the markets

The ancient Japanese bridge

Kids Practicing their dragon dancing

The lantern covered bridge over the river

Then the dragon came! We could not have had better seats to watch the whole thing unfold. You could see the crowd as it began to cross the bridge, following the dragon along and stopped directly in front of us. The dragon began dancing to the traditional drumming and danced right through the restaurant. We were impressed and thought that was it, boy where we wrong. They stacked two large wooden discs down on the street and the dragon continued its dance right on top of the discs. A group of men then lifted the smaller disc to shoulder height, at this point we noticed a pole hanging off the second floor balcony with money attached. The dragon was nowhere near high enough to reach the money so another group of men proceeded to lift the larger disc up to their shoulders. Still not high enough to reach the dangling money the man who was the dragons head jumped atop the shoulders of the guy acting as the dragon back. It was crazy but o so cool. The dragon danced for what must have been at least 20mins before moving on.  It was an experience I will never forget.

Alison and I 

Dragon Dancing at the resturant

Dragon tamer

Dragon Tower 

Hoi An has amazing food and it is also cheap. I have found the most amazing dessert shop that sells amazing little cakes for $2 or $3 each. I ended up eating there twice over the weekend. 

Dessert 

The most delicious cakes ever!

I returned home Sunday with a renewed love of Vietnam, glad that I am living in Da Nang rather than Hoi An because I got that sick of the phrases “you buy, you buy” and “come look in my shop”. I may not be able to read the menus but at least I don't have to deal with hawkers. 

Hoi An Lanterns

When its not always sunshine and lollipops...

Da Nang is great place to live, you are not harassed by hawkers that try to get you to buy what ever it is they are selling like you are in Hoi An or other towns on the backpacker trail but when you first move here it can be incredibly lonely.  There are very few expats living in Da Nang and seeing another westerner is a rarity. Don't get me wrong that is why I came here I wanted to experience what it was like to live in Vietnam not in Australia, I just didn't think I would ever feel as alone as I did my first week of work, I truly hadn't considered it and that is probably why it hit me so hard.

My first day of work there was much confusion of what I was doing here and what work I would be doing. It seemed to be completely in my hands this overwhelmed me as I had no idea about the environment I was working in, what the skill level of the lifeguards was and was unable to communicate with most of the people I came into contact with. This just left me feeling so incredibly alone that I just wanted to go home. This situation was not helped in the slightest when I out went for dinner and asked for a table for one the waitress responded with "just lonely", I replied yes just lonely and desperately fought the urge to burst into tears all over again.

Tuesday was a significant improvement, after talking to the aussie expat that was the driving force behind Da Nang Beach SLSC it turned out I did actually have things to do and I felt a whole lot better about my abilities to actually complete the assignment. All was well I had even found an apartment to live in things were looking up. Then Wednesday morning hit me like a tonne of bricks and all I wanted to do was go home and hang out on the couch with my family and friends. I regretted my decision to work as a volunteer rather than go backpacking and spent another day in tears. I'm not normally a crier and the possibility that I would ever feel like this had never crossed my mind, I am a happy, bubbly person and I can handle just about anything by putting on a brave face but it appears that when I do fall apart I do it really well. Nothing like being alone in a foreign country to find that one out!

By Thursday I had resolved that I had to pick myself up and get on with it, going home was not an option especially during week 1. I jumped online and read about culture shock, homesickness and a few south east asia travel blogs and this lead me to believe that this would pass if I could look to the short term rather  and distract myself. So I began a countdown to when I would see my family and friends next and made plans for a weekend in Hoi An.


I worried about putting it out there how depressed I felt and I did feel depressed the only thing I could liken it to was grief. It was so intense that the word home or family put a catch in my throat and tears to my eyes. I think it is important to put on here just how bad I felt both for myself and for future reader of this blog. The one thing that truly puled me out of my slump was reading that other travelers had been through similar feelings and that they got through it so hence I have shared my story. I still miss home so much but I can't live there forever and it's time for me to get out there and see the world, home will still be there and my family and friends will still love me when I get back.Now is the time to open a new chapter of my life and I have come to realise that it is not as easy as it sounds but that is what makes it all the more worth while.

UPDATE: I have now found a great bunch of friends and am absolutely loving life here, it does pass it's just part of the adventure. Life isn't always perfect but life in Da Nang is coming pretty close.

Hi I'm Steph

Hi I'm Steph, I am headed to Vietnam to complete a 12 month assignment as a Lifesaving development officer. I will be helping to set up Vietnam's first surf lifesaving club from nipper right through to establishing a management structure as well as training lifeguards for both resorts and local government. During my time in Vietnam I will be exploring all over South East Asia and here is where I will be posting my adventures.

I'm a 23 year old girl from Stanwell Park, NSW, Australia. I have just finished a degree in Civil Engineering and have taken a year off to take up the opportunity of a life time to use my lifesaving skills in Vietnam. I have amazing family and friends who I will miss a ridiculous amount but am excited about the adventure that awaits me.