On my trip to Vietnam, I visited Ho Chi Minh City and then flew to Da Nang, which lies in the center of Vietnam. Da Nang had been in the news for the last ten days. It faced one of the most severe typhoons in Vietnam, 1 week before Sudhanshu and I were about to arrive. As soon as we walked out of the Da Nang airport, signs of the damage were clearly visible. For a change, the only joyous thing we see is the hundreds of children dressed in their school uniform, white shirt and red checked shorts, not more than 5 years old, walking in a straight line outside. Their teachers are with them, and just like any other school teacher, they, too, are shouting, and these children are responding. We do not understand their language, but it sucks to be in line on the road and walk towards one of the most beautiful beaches in the country.
A long pole with the Vietnam flag is facing me, which has survived the typhoon somehow. But there is a bitter silence in the city that both of us can feel. It is hard to describe, but imagine you walk out of the airport, or any other public transport terminus, and there is no one to ask you about where you want to go. No one to say, "I will drop you, only 100 thousand dong." It is just the passengers, on their own, who have to navigate to their destinations themselves because the people who had the job of carrying us have left the city to save their lives. We see a three-wheeled rickshaw turned upside down, a large tree blocking half of the road, shops whose shutters have blown tens of meters ahead, and numerous damaged houses. We started our first mission in this foreign city to find the hotel. Google Maps shows a few meters ahead with a lot of red signs on the map. From the airport, it was just shy of 2 kilometers, and as our tradition is to walk in all the cities when we are together, we decided to do so. However, this time, we were helpless.
Streets of Da Nang
While walking on the road, 95% of the shops in Da Nang have Korean names. All of them are displaying a Korean menu outside their shops, and all of them are closed. Some shops have their large steel Hangul signs dropped to the floor. Amidst this Korean world, we found our hotel. A large, 4-star property that had cost us just 900 INR per head per night. It was a steal deal because of the typhoon. An Indian couple (probably in their late 30s) is already at the reception, and as soon as they make eye contact, the guy asks, "India?". A huge guy with a disproportionate figure donning an even larger t-shirt with a French beard tells us that he is from Ahmedabad and has come here for 5 days on vacation. He got too comfortable with us, to an extent, we did not want him to be. After having us go through his name and business and sales prospects, he tortured us with his itinerary and his feelings towards Vietnam. All this time, I kept looking at the receptionist to ask me about our reservation. But his etiquette stopped him. Behind us, a lady from the hotel staff comes in a blue shirt and gives us a water bottle. I looked into her eyes, transmitting SOS and hoping she would save me from this guy who had found one Indian apart from her wife to talk to. "Do you have a reservation?" she asks. Four words that ran through me like rain on a hot day. "Yes!" I said. "Please come here.", she signalled towards the reception, and I told the guy to catch up later. We did not reach the hotel on time that day, but later in the night, we both were hoping we would find him sitting on the stairs, ready with three bottles of beer, and inviting us to his room.
The plan was to quickly change and leave within one hour for the beach, for which Da Nang is popular. We had not eaten anything since morning, and since Vietnam is infamous for its non-vegetarian cuisine, we knew it would take time for us to find something good. The quicker we leave, the better the odds. The window in my room opened to the city side. There were stacks of houses, most of them white and single-storeyed, but the streets were empty. The city had an apocalyptic vibe. I went to Sudhanshu's room after changing my clothes. He had forgotten his shorts and asked me if I had another pair, which I did not. We decided to buy it on the way somewhere when I realized I forgot my wallet in my room. I went back and opened it, but somehow the lock chain of the room was set as it is when someone is inside. It could only open as much as the chain allowed, a space used by people to have formal and quick interactions with someone. I grabbed the chain from the inside, but as it was purposefully built, the chain should not open with an open gate. I tried many times but failed. I went to Sudhanshu's room and called the housekeeping to help. He is amazed to see the chain locked from the inside. He did the same thing I did, and then Sudhanshu followed. All three of us had no idea how to open the chain and were discussing the options when Sudhanshu said, "I think we can open up these chain screws." Yes, the chain lock was fixed on the door with threaded screws. He observed it by going to his own room and seeing how the chain is fixed. He then ventured on a mission to find a sharp object with which we can open the screws from the inside, and what else would work better than a nail cutter? He had found the correct object, and in front of the housekeeper, he started showing him the ways a thief can successfully enter the room. He unscrewed the chain, the metallic panel fell on the ground, and the door opened. The housekeeping staff picked it up and started fixing once we were inside. "Don't tell this to anyone else, please", he said before leaving and handing us the nail cutter.
On our way to the sea, we started to hunt for a place to eat. We already had a tough time in HCMC with the language, but here, it was worse. Da Nang is a small town, and except for locals, no one was here. All the shops were shut. Only open shops were the equivalent of what we have "dhabas" in India. They were selling fixed meals and none of them was vegetarian. Most of them were seafood-heavy. To my right, I see a school whose tin roof has fallen down. Below, there is a wall that has graffiti on it. A large dustbin is against the wall, and a tree trunk has broken the dustbin into two parts. We had already walked around 2 km when we found a shopping mall. Here, Sudhanshu bought shorts for himself, and I looked for a place to eat. Unfortunately, this shopping mall had only clothing shops in it. There was no food court, no food stalls, nothing. We again started walking towards the sea and looking all around for some food. After walking some distance, a bakery caught my eye. Maybe here we can find something. All our stars aligned here. The bakery was open, the bread was all fresh, and most of all, the shopkeeper knew English. We asked for her favourite bread as the shop's variety had overwhelmed us. She gave us the softest bread we had both eaten in our lives. Cylindrical in shape, with a width of around 75% of a sub and liquid cheese filled inside. If you press the bread hard, the cheese would come out in a cylindrical shape like a tube. We bought it and started eating on the way, but as soon as we finished, we wanted more. We came back to the shop and bought four more pieces of the same bread for us. Partially because it was heavenly and partially because we did not know where our next meal would come from. Before leaving Da Nang, we would have at least ten more of these in the subsequent days.
When we arrived at the sea, I was extremely satisfied. At most, there were fifty people, and all of them were local families. A college group of boys was also there in their uniform, and most of the boys had taken their shirts off. The water was as clear as one can imagine. We started walking parallel to the beach. A small mountain on the left side has a white statue at the top. This was a famous statue and a place of interest, as suggested by many blogs, vlogs, and Google. We sat on the beach after the walk, talked to the college boys, and watched the sunlight dimming out as if someone was slowly rotating a regulator. Before it was dark, the rain signaled us to leave the beach by pouring in full flow. We were not prepared for it and ran towards the road. A small food stall had seating arrangements with a canopy over the tables. We went there and ordered two coffees. As I had promised myself before coming to Vietnam, I was regularly drinking tons of coffee whenever I got the chance. While she was preparing a cold coffee for us, Sudhanshu's phone rang. His manager wants him to send a file to him urgently. He had not brought his laptop to Vietnam. In this heavy rain, I sipped the coffee and looked around. My view included a leaking canopy from which water is dripping on the table, wet sand everywhere, even on the tables, and Sudhanshu guiding his brother towards the file by sharing all the passwords and passcodes his company shared with him for access.
We were extremely hungry now. We had walked all day but only ate a couple of breads in the name of food. We considered buying more bread from the same shop, as no other shop was selling vegetarian food. While it was not that late in the night for us, it was the case for the bakery. When we arrived, it was closed, which is quite common for authentic bakeries that open very early in the morning and close at sunset. Our hungry stomachs took us toward the main road, which will eventually lead to the hotel. Since we did not have a vehicle and public transport was halted, we thought to try our luck and if we find anything, good, else, we will sleep hungry today. Luckily, a small roadside stall caught our eye. A mother-daughter duo was frying something in a large pan, and by the smell of it, we figured out it was meat. We asked her to cook anything that doesn't have meat in it, but there was no such option on this stall. "Only meat or seafood", she said, stumbling over English words, reminding us that English is not her primary language. We were disappointed. When you are hungry and see a stall of food, the hunger starts to increase. Now that our demands were shot down without making any eye contact by the mother and the daughter, we thought to try our luck on Vietnam's food delivery app - Grab.
The thing with Grab is that it is hard to operate as they do not have a native English version. It just converts Vietnamese into English using a translator. This had not proven beneficial for us in Vietnam. A lot of the time, we would show people words translated through Google Translate, and they would not understand. Similarly, Grab will show something, but in reality, it would have something else. There was no "Veg" filter on the application. I browsed through the menu at around 8.30 now, and nothing was found that did not have meat. At the end of the menu in one restaurant, I saw "Egg Sandwich" written with a picture of it like a Sub. Now my hunger increased even more. It looked so fulfilling, so big, and I could taste it through the image. Perfect brownish hue and egg pieces dripping down from between! I told Sudhanshu about it, and within a minute, the order was placed. Now we just waited, looking at the road, the canal behind us, the dragon bridge that was supposed to light up in the night but wasn't, and the mother-daughter frying something in a large pan that they ate on a single plate. They started to pack their stall when a biker, with a green t-shirt and a green carry bag, pressed the brake hard in front of us. Every part of his body is covered with accessories like a helmet, gloves, a full jacket, and shoes. We were at a random location in the middle of the road, but the guy got it bang on the point. He gave me two sandwiches, and I handed over one to Sudhanshu. Ah! Finally! Finally, something to eat apart from plain bread. When I unwrapped the sandwich, it looked much smaller and much thinner than the image. And it was not prepared as I was used to. It was an omelet without any onion or tomato, just a plain omelet inside a bread. I took a bite, chewed, and looked at Sudhanshu. This was probably the worst egg sandwich I had ever eaten in my life. It smelled bad, and it tasted like stale, rotten eggs. Still, somehow, we finished our dinner and headed off to the hotel, which was still 1 km away.
One of the key reasons that led us to book this hotel was the infinity swimming pool located on the terrace. Since morning, we couldn't spare some time for it, but now, it was a perfect moment to forget about the food and relax a bit. We swam for more than an hour. From the pool, one could see the shimmering lights of Da Nang, moving vehicles, and one of the best views of the river. The view itself was worth spending some time, even without the infinity pool. A young couple had made three or four rounds of the terrace area in 1 hour. They would come, find the pool is not yet vacant, and go back again. To their unsaid demands, we both came out and went into our respective rooms. I shut the door, took a bath, and lay down thinking we still have one more day in Da Nang, and what will we eat here. Sure, the coffee is as good as anywhere in Vietnam, but what about breakfast, lunch, and dinner? I felt that it's best to eat something now because we don't know about tomorrow. I swung around my desire to empty the minibar at once. But the rate card haunts me like everyone else. Maybe not. I will buy six more pieces of bread tomorrow from that bakery. But what if that bakery is closed? The minibar is looking at me, pleading for a touch that people have abstained from for ages. But maybe something in Ba Na Hills will surely be open. Maybe Hoi An? Eh!! What the hell. I stood up and opened the treasure sitting there in the spotlight, reached out, and gave the mini bar the peace it always desired.
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