Photography tour

Wednesday 21st: We are not used to getting up at 4.45am, it’s still dark! But as the day unfolds, we realise that it is SO worth it!! Etienne is a French ex-pat who has a wife and 6 month old boy and has established a business for himself after deciding this is where he wants to live.  He is a photographer who realised he spent a lot of time giving photography advice to tourists in Hoi An, so that’s how he found his niche. He had $600 or $800 left in the bank, he set $80 aside for living expenses for a month and spent the rest on a website and flyers for his business which he stood on the street and handed out. Now he runs a sunrise and sunset tour 3 times a week and does a bit of other photography work on the side.

the sun is barely up!

So he picks us up at 4.45 and we pick up a few more on the way to the river to catch the local ferry across to the other side. We stand on the open deck with nothing to hold onto and brace with feet apart for the bumping into the dock when we arrive. All survive unscathed. Before the ferry (term used loosely) departed we had a glimpse of sunrise through the clouds. There had been a thunderstorm during the night and it was still sprinkling rain and was overcast which helped keep the heat down. Etienne explained a lot about different settings on our cameras and different things to experiment with, lighting and composition. It didn’t matter what level of experience we had or what sort of camera we had, we were all treated the same.

We went to the fishing village to watch the fishing boats come in after their night of fishing. Stand back! Don’t get in the way of the fish women who come to the dock to buy the fish. Etienne says you can fight with anyone, anytime, no worries, but never fight with the fish women!! Etienne has built up a good relationship with a lot of the villagers and they don’t mind us taking pictures of them. He pays some of the very poorest, and refuses to give money to a bloke who he says will only go buy rice wine and get blind. He gives money to the little old lady who waits around for someone to drop a fish on the ground and not notice – that’s her food for the day…….. very confronting and very sad to think this is how people live.

my favourite lady

It’s quite light now and we are getting a bit hungry so we head to the equivalent of a café for coffee. On the way, there is a ‘sandwich’ stand, and Etienne asks if we want one. Everyone does so he orders 10, some with chilli, some without. They are a fresh, crunchy baguette, stuffed with assorted meats, and goodness knows what else! Delicious!! Coffee is a different story. So was the Lipton tea…. I should have stuck with the lemon juice.

smelly.... now we know where fish sauce comes from

There are puddles everywhere from the rain and it’s an interesting walk along the dirt road to the  place where they make fish sauce, dodging motorbikes and pushbikes while keeping on dry ground. The smell at the fish sauce was overpowering, it was certainly the place you could find by following your nose, but after while you get used to it. It’s an interesting process, probably more information than we needed, and Carolyn says she will never eat it again! Still more photo opportunities here too. After the fish sauce we visited the cake lady. She makes hundreds of little cakes each morning. She used to get up at 3am when she had a wood stove, but now with modern technology, she gets up at 5am! She has a big pic of the Sydney Opera House on her wall. Apparently they love it over here! Who knew??

Going round in a loop we arrive back at the riverside for a few more pics before heading back for the return ferry. There’s a lot more crowded onto this one, so we don’t have as much room as we Aussies like. There are pushbikes waiting for us when we get back to ride into town, 5k away, which is quite a nice ride along the river till we hit the main road, then it got scary, even though it was still early in the day. No photos here – both hands held the handlebars in a death grip! Once we arrived back to the studio, Trevor and I went for a walk over to the Islet but then remembered we needed to be back at the tailors for picking up clothes, so we headed back to base. The rest of the day is a bit of a blur because we are so tired from our early start. I think it was lunch at Mermaid Restaurant, where they should be giving us frequent flyer points, then at some later time Brenda and I were there having a ggggiin sling. And we were back there with the whole gang for dinner. The waitress, Im, asked me what I would like to drink and I said ‘you tell me’ and she replied ‘gggiin sling’, which cracked the lot of us up.

It’s been raining on and off most of the day but regardless, the ‘Honeymooners’ and the ‘Princesses’ go for a walk round town before heading back and Trevor and I head home. I’m really tired.

Forgot to mention, the Swiss guys from Halong are at same hotel in Hoi An, they got the earlier flight from Hanoi because they didn't hang around on the boat eating lunch like we did. Must remember to tell the real Tina about that.

I went back to try on my shorts and they were terrible with no hope of redemption. Na will have to make another pair from scratch. She takes my measurements again and has a few snappy words with her offsider. Someone has made a mistake.........