Frugal's Homepage

Finally connected

2006-12-23T16:52:00.000-04:00

The saga continues. On Wednesday I called Eastlink again to see if they couldn't do something for me. I was lucky and the supervisor I got was someone I used to work with. He tried to do what he could but it turned out he still couldn't get anyone out before Friday. That was fine, at least this time I was booked for Friday.

Friday afternoon came and I started waiting. Around 3:30 I started to get worried that they wouldn't show up so I asked my mother to call them and confirm, they said it was definitely on for that day. She called again at 4:30, was told the same thing. By 6:30 we still hadn't seen anyone so she called again, she spent ages on the phone with them and in the end it was found out that the work order was lost. Now I have some theories that it was the same installer as the last 2 times, he knew it'd be a long job and it was getting close to when he wanted to wrap up for the day so he "lost" the order.

At this point I was really feeling defeated. I was really feeling like switching to Aliant but the main issue was that I just wanted internet and phone hooked up and there was no way they'd be able to get that done before next week.

They said they were going to try to squeeze me in today but I wasn't too optimistic because I'd been told that before. My mother called them early in the morning and she called me back later to tell me that they had gotten me on for today. I was still in, "I'll believe it when I see it," mode. Fortunately, they did finally show up, it was a long job but I am back up and running with phone and internet.

Cut off (or, The Utilities Curse)

2006-12-20T11:00:00.000-04:00

Sigh, I mentioned moving in my recent post. What I didn't mention is that while the move has gone smoothly for the most part, I've had a horrible time dealing with utilities. First, it was NS Power, my landlords are new and didn't realise that I could just call NSP and tell them I was moving to that address and put the power in my name, so they called to have the power disconnected. I was delaying calling NSP because I was trying to push back my move in date (and start of my lease) to the middle of December. NSP turned out to be surprisingly quick in disconnecting the power though, so there was no power at my flat at the beginning of the month. My landlords are new landlords so I don't blame them for not knowing that I could just take over the account and it was my own fault for not calling earlier.

What followed was a comedy of errors though. Because the power was turned off I had to turn the main switch for my power off for them to turn it back on. We looked for the main switch and couldn't find it, well we thought we found it but that was just the switch for the furnace. This was on a Friday, NSP said they'd be out on Monday (the 4th), it was cold over the weekend so I headed over on Monday evening to see if it was back on because I wanted to get the heat on. Of course it wasn't. To make things even more fun, it was a big snow storm that night and on the way back to my old place I saw all the power on my street go out, and it stayed out for a good 3 hours or so. To make matters more fun, the next morning I found out that my phone had died for some reason (it was on fine during the power outage and when the power came back). I called Eastlink from work the next morning, at first they said it was an outage in the area and would be back up shortly, it was still out later in the day and by that time the outage had been fixed so they had to send out a service tech the next day (Wednesday).

I didn't dare call NSP Monday night because I knew there were lots of outages so I called them the next day, they said they'd be out on Wednesday and again told me to turn off the main switch. I explained how we couldn't find the main switch so they told me to pull all the fuses, which should work as well. So I went back to my place that night and pulled all the fuses out. To add to all the fun, I was putting in a lot of overtime that week, because of that I was able to take Wednesday off. This turned out to be fortunate because when the Eastlink techs showed up they did some work but it didn't fix the line, they did some more looking and determined there was a problem that required another crew to come out and install some equipment to fix the problem, I finally got my phone back early in the afternoon.

Once I got my phone back I called NSP to see if they had been out, they couldn't check yet (the crews don't report in until the end of their shift) but they told me how to check on my meter if they had turned on the power. I went over to my new place and saw it wasn't turned on yet. I waited until later in the afternoon and checked again, still not on. By this time I was really getting worried about there being no heat in the place. I called back NSP and they again told me about the main switch, I explained again that we couldn't find it but I'd pulled all the fuses, they said there was still some load on the meter and couldn't turn it back on and it would be Friday when they could be out again and that I'd have to there when they did it because if there was still a load that time they wouldn't go back again. I argued with them for awhile, they finally agreed to send a tech out that night but they wanted to charge me an after hours fee. I fought over that and finally had the fee waived. My mother and I had to wait in a cold (by this time it was 3 degrees C in the flat), dark flat. They showed up, saw there was still a load on the line but he could turn it on because I was there (they just can't do it if I'm not there). Turns out that my main switch is in the other tenants basement, which makes things fun. Finally I had power though.

I put that behind me and focused on my move. Eastlink was set to come out on Friday (the 15th) to install my cable, phone and internet. They showed up around 2, he did a bit of work and then told me he couldn't do the install because he couldn't ground the cable line. This was a bit odd because there was cable there already and it was grounded off the meter for my electrical service but apparently they're no longer allowed to ground it that way. He told me he could put a ground post into the ground, which would interfere with the shared driveway so was out, or drill into the basement and connect to the electrical service. Of course that means the other tenant's basement (see, I told you this was fun). Fortunately they were home, we went into their basement but couldn't get near the electrical service because there were too many boxes in the way, and the installer said he'd still need permission from the landlord so he couldn't do it.

Much phoning to Eastlink ensued, which is really hard to do when you have no phone at home and no cell phone. The short version is that I've had numerous broken promises of call backs and I'm really getting tired of being asked, "don't you have a cell phone?" The most annoying part is that all the time they were trying to get something earlier for me, they never booked an install for me for the time they could get (which they could always cancel if they did get someone out earlier) so everytime I called they kept getting me a later install date. Finally I just settled on booking something for today (Wednesday), my mother took the morning off so she could be there for the installer.

I was hoping that would at least get me internet installed but I was still sceptical about the phone getting hooked up. I got a call from my mother and she told me the installer had been back out and had now declared that there was no ground wire on the electrical service so he couldn't ground off the service. The good news is that my landlords are incredible and when my mother called them they were more worried about me not having phone than the work that need to be done, they called their electrician and he went out right away to put the ground wire on. The bad news is that now I'm pushed back to Friday to get installed, I still have no internet or phone at home. I'm now going to start another round of calling to Eastlink but I'm not expecting much at this point. I'm really annoyed because the installer made it sound like we might need an electrician to add the wire and we couldn't check it the last time he was out. Now he's making it sound like he told me I would need an electrician out before he came back, which he definitely didn't make clear to me. The other thing that really bothers me is that if I actually had my phone service hooked up and then lost service they'd have to be out within 24 hours to fix it because it's an emergency service but it's apparently completely acceptable to leave me with no phone service for a week when it comes to getting it installed.

If Eastlink had have booked a new install for me the first time I called I would have been booked for Monday, if the installer had have clearly told me I absolutely needed an electrician out there I could have had one out on the Friday or the weekend, and everything would have been installed 2 days ago. Instead, I'm left waiting with no service for 2 more days. Hopefully this is the end of the utilities curse.

Ages since I've posted

2006-12-19T16:58:00.000-04:00

Wow, I can't believe how long it's been since I last posted something on my blog! Honestly, there hasn't been too much to report and who wants to read a blog about someone's day to day life?

There have been a couple of changes in the last year. I'm still working at the same place, it's been super busy lately which is good and bad. The big change has been that I just moved to a new place. My lease for my old place was up the end of this month and I got lucky in finding a really good place. The only problem was that it was available for Dec 1st. So money's been a bit tight with paying double rent this month but I'm pretty happy with the new place and I have a lot more space.

The only other moderately exciting thing with the year has been that I've been getting tired of being single and have been trying to meet and date more girls. Back in the summer I finally cracked and started trying online dating. It's been good and bad but overall it hasn't been too bad and I have made some new friends at least. I'll leave the sordid details up to your imaginations. ;-)

Updates

2005-12-09T14:20:00.000-04:00

Well it's been awhile since I've posted any news so I thought it would be good to give some updates.

The big thing that's been dominating my time lately has been getting ready to move. I'll be moving a week from today so I'm trying to tie up the loose ends. I've done most of the shopping for the apartment so that's good but I still have a lot of packing left to do.

I've registered for another photo course in the winter. It will be advanced photo this time. I found that doing the intro black and white this term was fun but I don't think I'd want to do it again. I'm feeling like I've reached a point where I've pretty much gotten what I can out of the continuing education courses and it's time for me to work on something more advanced.

The big plan is to apply to join Viewpoint Gallery and to try to get some exhibition quality prints ready. I have a lot of material from SE Asia that I like and it really feels like a much more cohesive body of work than a lot of my past shooting so I think it could be useable for this. I've also been finally starting to see a definite style emerging in my work, even in the few things I've shot since I got back so I think it's a good time to start talking about my photography and explore the opportunities for showing it. It's also a great way to start pushing myself further.

The downside is that it means I'll probably be spending most of the class time working on past work rather than shooting new stuff. But it is winter so that tends to be a downtime for my shooting anyways. That will be my next challenge though, to start getting out and shooting on a more consistent basis.

Changes

2005-11-17T09:06:00.000-04:00

Not a lot of posting lately but not all that much going on that would be worth posting.

But recently there's been some changes.

The first is just a minor one. I had been allowing anonymous comments to be posted on my blog. I liked the idea that people didn't have to register with Blogger just to post a comment. Well that's ended due to spammers posting links on my pages. I've deleted the spam links and I've set it so you have to be a registered Blogger user to post now. Yet another example of a small group of people ruining something for the rest of us.

I've been playing with Joomla (formerly Mambo) for handling my site. There's some things I don't like about it but it has a lot of power for managing things so I think I will switch to it at some point. When I do that I'll be able to use their comments system which should allow me to let people post anonymously yet still give me the ability to block spammers by their IP address.

The big change though is that I'm moving out in December. I found a pretty nice apartment that's within my budget for rent so I'm pretty happy about that. It looks like I'll be moving on Dec 16.

Visa Problems

2005-08-03T16:03:00.000-03:00

Man this is annoying.

I ordered a new scanner from Vistek. First, it was backordered, not a big deal it happens.

Now today I first get an email that it's now in stock (great) but then another email from a sales rep telling me my visa card has been declined.

So I call Vistek and confirm my credit card info but it still doesn't go through. Then I get to call Scotiabank and find out what's up.

Turns out it's a problem from when my card got renewed.

Last summer I noticed that my visa card was going to expire in 2005 and that I might still be away when it expired. So I called Scotiabank and asked them if they could send me my renewed card early. I had explained the situation clearly on the phone and the person I talked to seemed to understand and said they'd mail me out a new card with a new expiry date. So a few days later a new card arrived with the same expiry date, doesn't do me any good. I figure they messed up and just sent a replacement card.

So I had to call them back and I got a ruder rep on the phone but explained the situation and they said they'd fix it up. Sure enough, this time I did receive a new card with the proper expiry date. I figured that was the end of this saga.

Turns out I was wrong. When I was away they sent another new card (to my home in Canada). I figured this was just because it would be around my normal renewal schedule. When I got home I checked out the card and all the info was the same, the same expiry date and the same number. The only difference was the 3 extra digits on the back of the card (since they're different for every card even if the card number is the same). So I put that card aside but didn't activate it because I didn't have any need.

Turns out that was a mistake, since I didn't activate that card they've put a hold on this one (which makes no sense because it's a perfectly valid card that doesn't expire for another 2 years). I found this out when I called them today. Even more annoying was the rep said that it should have a different expiry date. She said, "your old card should be 07/07 and the new one will be 08/07." I said, "no, the old card was 06/07 and the new card was the same." Then she sort of argued with me a bit that they wouldn't issue 2 cards with the same expiry date. Of course I didn't have the other card with me so I couldn't really pursue this and I just told her I'd call back when I found the other card (which I fortunately had held on to).

Still, that's a lot of mistakes all from one fairly straightforward situation. And it's a lot of wasted time on my behalf to try to get their mistakes fixed up. I'm also a little worried about when this happened and what other charges may not have gone through (which could result in late fees for me for something that's not my fault).

Busy

2005-07-11T15:43:00.000-03:00

Been pretty busy since I got back. There's not really a whole lot to report which is why the blog isn't getting updated as regularly as it once was.

I'm almost done my course so that should free up some time for me after that. It's been pretty tough getting in to get work done. I hate to say it, but that was one advantage to the weird hours I worked before. During the summer the photo department is closed on the weekends and where I'm working M-F 9-5 it means I can only get in on weekdays in the evening.

I'd like to do some work on the site and also get a new scanner so I can put up some photos from my trip. I'm holding off on the scanner until my course finishes because I don't want it to distract me from doing work for the course. Once I get the scanner I should be able to get some photos up pretty quickly. Other site work is going to have to wait. I'd really like to update the last of the old out of date content and I'm also planning to use Mambo for managing my content. The big thing I need for that though is to find a good gallery for it that will do what I want it to. Or, find out if I can add in some of the mambo features to my own gallery implementation.

1 Month Already?

2005-06-19T23:20:00.000-03:00

Wow it's really hard to believe that I've already been back for a month. So much has happened. It's unreal that I've already finished my first week of work. I don't know how I managed to luck into getting a new job that quickly and the place seems really cool and the people are great so I'm excited about what it has to offer.

I've also hit a point of thinking more about if this was really where I saw my life going and trying to figure out where I did see myself at this point. In a lot of ways it feels like things have gone in a completely different way than I'd thought but at the same time I look back at what I have accomplished and experienced already and figure I'm not doing too badly.

The next big phase will be moving out. Fortunately, I have the luxury of having the time to look for something good. I had been thinking of renting but my mother happened to mention buying a house in passing and that has gotten me thinking of that as an option. It'll all depend on what's available.

Employment

2005-06-09T00:10:00.000-03:00

Well it's pretty incredible but I haven't been back 3 weeks yet and I've already had an interview and a job offer! It's really cool to get something so quickly since I've had long periods of unemployment before.

I've been offered a job at the North End Community Health Centre. It's nice to be doing some more work with a community-based organisation. It's a mix of technical and admin support so it sounds like there should be a variety of work to do.

A big plus though is that it's a regular Monday to Friday 9 to 5 job. I think this will make a huge difference to my quality of life here in Halifax.

Settling In

2005-05-26T09:47:00.000-03:00

Well not a whole lot to talk about now that I'm back. Most of the last week has been sent just adjusting to the jet lag and lack of sleep.

Last night I started my colour photo class so that was pretty cool.

I've pretty much adjusted from the jet lag but still get really tired at odd times sometimes. I'm trying to make the most out of the time that I have now to get some stuff done. I have to sort through all my photos that I took while away. Unfortunately, my old slide scanner won't work with the G5 so until I get a new slide scanner there's not likely going to be any pictures posted. It's one of the top items for me to buy but I'm trying to wait until I find work first so that I don't blow all my savings while I'm unemployed. The good thing is that I do have some money saved so once I find a job I can get the scanner right away.

I'm hoping to get a router in the near future which will allow me to setup my linux box again. I have some plans for how I want to develop the site and it will be good to have the linux box back up and running so that I have a test platform again. At the moment, I'm really looking at moving the site to use Mambo for content management. I'm trying to find out if I can get a good photo gallery that will work with it. Gallery seems to do a lot of what I want but it's not database backed so I'd have to do a fair amount of work I think to get it to work with my photo database. Ideally, I'd like to find something that already uses a database which could be modified to include more photographic information.

Back in Canada!

2005-05-19T13:52:00.000-03:00

Well I've made it back home now. The next few days are probably going to be too busy with recovering from jet lag to worry about much else. I'm somewhat optimistic but we'll have to see what happens with the job hunt.

Back in Laos

2005-05-13T04:03:00.000-03:00

Well I've been pretty slack on blogging but I'm back in Laos now. It feels a little strange to be back in a country where things are more familiar after travelling for a month.

Cambodia was pretty good but I did get a bit worn out from all the temples. My motorcycle driver was really good though and he helped me see a lot of cool places.

Honestly though, I found that Angkor Wat itself was kind of disappointing. I think part of it is that it's so hyped that your expectations get raised too high. The other thing is that it's completely overrun by tourists which really takes away from the experience. I found that I enjoyed a lot of the other temples much better as I found them much more atmospheric and they tended to not have as many tourists.

What was particularly odd about Cambodia though was their complete aversion to their own currency (the riel). I'm used to having prices quoted in other currencies (such as USD or Baht) but they honestly seem to prefer to deal in USD or Baht in Cambodia. I went to a money exchange place and tried to exchange $50, they told me they didn't have riel but they could change it into smaller bills. After that I gave up on trying to use riel, I just paid in dollars and got back riel in change.

I also have to take back everything bad that I said about the aggressive sellers in Vietnam, they have absolutely nothing on the sellers in Cambodia. Particularly little kids would come up to you and keep pestering you to buy something for really long times. I saw some people have the same kid harrass them for well over 10 minutes.

Well now I'm back in Laos. Only a for a few days and then it's back to Canada. I'm not really sure how I feel about that.

Holiday in Cambodia

2005-05-07T06:21:00.000-03:00

Yes, I am now living out the title of a Dead Kennedys song.

So far Cambodia seems a lot poorer than Vietnam, not too surprising. Also, just in casual walking around for less than an hour I saw at least 4 amputees, signs of the huge amount of land mines that have been laid in the country I imagine.

Mostly just relaxing today but will head to Angkor Wat for sunset. I guess if you enter after a certain time they don't count that day on the pass you buy so you basically get a free sunset which is pretty cool.

It's really hot here but it's a dry heat again like it is in Laos so it's not bugging me as much. Going to try to do an early start tomorrow to avoid the heat and hopefully the crowds. We'll see how that works out.

Saigon

2005-05-06T08:39:00.000-03:00

Well I've made it to Saigon. The 7hr bus ride wasn't as bad as I thought. Unfortunately, I forgot my Tiley hat on the bus so that sucks a bit. I wasn't too attached to it but it was nice for keeping the sun off me so I need to track down some option here in Saigon if I can.

Saigon is busy but not as bad as I feared. Don't really have much time to check it out though since I leave tomorrow morning.

Still a bit tired but a lot more rested. I'm looking forward to spending a whole week in 1 city since that means I won't be moving around as much. I'm worried it's going to be really hot in Cambodia though which will suck. The forecast shows it being mid-30's every day and over 40 with the humidity but I'm also seeing more thunderstorms in the forecast so hopefully that means the rainy season is starting which will mean lower temp.

Extra day in Dalat

2005-05-05T08:21:00.000-03:00

Well I've been really run down lately from the travelling and lack of sleep. Vietnamese get up super early (5-5:30am as far as I can tell) and start driving around on their motorcycles honking away at that time. So every morning I get woken up at around 5 and then try to catch some more sleep before I get up (usually around 7 these days so not exactly sleeping late here). My hotel in Dalat is fortunately the quietest I've stayed in so I've been sleeping better. I was beat this morning so instead of going to Saigon today I decided to spend a day just relaxing in Dalat. Means I won't see much of Saigon but I had a decent day and feel a lot more rested.

In 2 weeks now I'll be back in Canada so that's a bit freaky. I'm looking at jobs a little bit but it's tough to work on covering letters when you don't have your own computer. I have mixed emotions about what being back "home" will mean. In a lot of ways it's a fresh start and it's good and bad because of that. One of the first priorities is going to be finding a job. Hopefully I can find something that won't completely dominate my life like call center work has in the past.

In Dalat

2005-05-03T09:14:00.000-03:00

Well between being a bit worn out and then not having an internet connection for a few days I've gotten behind in the blog posts.

Hoi An was nice but very hot. I didn't see any of the historical stuff but did do some shopping and had a ton of clothes made. I ended up having to buy a huge "North Face" backpack to carry it all. I say "North Face" because I have doubts if a $19 bag is really the real thing. Sometimes it is from the actual factory, sometimes it's knockoff. Seems pretty good and it's carrying all my stuff so I'm not complaining too much.

I then headed up to Danang to fly to Nha Trang. I was expecting to not like it much and just relax a bit on the beach but it turned out to be pretty nice. Not as hot as Hoi An and not as over-developed as I had feared (well it's developed, but they seem to have done a few good things with the city planning to make it not so bad).

I spent 2 nights there and then took the bus to Dalat. I wasn't really prepared for how the place would be. It's ridiculously hilly, you can be walking on a street and look over into the 3rd or 4th floor of a building right next to you! I went to Stop and Go cafe which sounded like a basic backpacker type place from Lonely Planet's description of it but it turned out to be this old french villa with an interesting owner who's an artist and poet. It felt a lot more like I was just visiting his house rather than being at a cafe. Tomorrow I head out on a tour with one of Dalat's famous "Easy Riders", should prove interesting. The guide was very nice he talked with me a bit but let me check in to my hotel and relax and waited for me (a few hours at least) before giving me info on the tour, I really appreciated that compared to how aggressive some people are. I'm contemplating hiring one of them to drive me down to Saigon on a motorcycle so I can see more of the highlands but I'm not sure if time will permit. I leave Saigon on May 7th in the morning so I really have to be there no later than the 6th so that doesn't give me a lot of time.

In Hoi An

2005-04-28T00:29:00.000-03:00

Well I've arrived in Hoi An which means I've survived crossing Hai Van Pass. It's a pretty freaky ride over the mountains but the scenery is really cool. I think it'll be nicer when the tunnel is completed, most of the heavy trucks and busses will go through the tunnel but you could probably still go over the mountain and enjoy the scenery without the traffic.

I had a chance to see some more sites in Hue yesterday and it's nicer than I initially thought. The old citadel is a huge site and was really interesting. I think I was expecting more of an old city feel, which Hue doesn't have. But there are still plenty of things worth seeing.

After crossing the mountains I've also arrived in Vietnam's tropical zone so it's much hotter than in the north (more like the weather in Laos).

Haven't explored Hoi An yet so I can't really comment on it. I am however staying at the nicest hotel so far on the trip and it's only $14/night! I think I could have negotiated even cheaper than that but that's still a good deal.

One of the big things to do in Hoi An is get clothes made and I suspect that I will have some made when I find a nice shop. Some people I met at my hotel said they were recommended a good place to go so I'll see what I can find.

2 Wheeling in Hue

2005-04-26T08:52:00.000-03:00

Well I haven't been too impressed with Hue but I've met some really cool people so that's made up for it a lot. It just doesn't seem to have as much nice stuff to see as in Hanoi. However, I did go on a really cool motorcycle tour today that was a lot of fun. We went around to a few of the temples in the city and then also saw one of the tombs for emperors from the Nguyen dynasty. It was really cool riding around on the back of the motorcycle and we got to see a lot of back roads and areas that I wouldn't have seen otherwise. I've been taking lots of photos so I'm excited to see the results.

Tomorrow I'm taking the bus to Hoi An in the afternoon. I've heard it's a really nice city and it's also got lots of good tailor shops so I think I may get some more clothes made. I think getting at least 1 more suit will be good but I'll have to see what the prices are like.

So far the trip has been going really well and I've been having a lot of fun.

Leaving Hanoi

2005-04-24T11:15:00.000-03:00

Well tonight I leave Hanoi for Hue. I've really enjoyed my time in Hanoi. I spent 3 days in the city itself and then did some trips to areas nearby. On Thursday I went to the Perfume Pagoda. It's a nice trip out of town, you drive for awhile and then get a boat to go to the mountains. There are a lot of temples around and we only visited a few of them. Apparently, the biggest one is on the top of one of the mountains and is a full day's trek so we didn't go to it. A joint venture is building a cable car so I imagine that in the near future it will be overrun by tourists. It was really nice to walk through the mountains and see the scenery though but our guide's english wasn't very good and he didn't explain very much.

On Friday I went to Hoa Lu and Tam Coc. Hoa Lu was the old capital in the north over 1000 years ago but those remains are long gone aside from some excavation work. There are 2 nice temples that we visited though and the guide was able to cover more of the history. Tam Coc is a beautiful area in the mountains surrounded by rice paddies. We went in small boats (2 people in each boat) and rode up the river for a few hours. It was very peaceful and the scenery was quite nice.

However, the highlight of the trip has definitely been Halong Bay. It's simply an incredible place in terms of scenery. Plus, I was really glad that I "splurged" on the trip and went with a better company. The boat was really nice and the service was incredible. We ate so much good food and got to see a fair amount of stuff for a 2 day trip but it was all very relaxed and I didn't feel rushed at all. Plus, the group was really good and I had some really interesting conversations with 2 of the other travellers on board. It was also my 28th birthday so it was a pretty cool way to spend my birthday and was worth every penny.

Vietnam Observations

2005-04-20T12:07:00.000-03:00

Well I've been in Vietnam for a few days now and I figured I might as well take advantage of the free internet access at my hotel and post some observations.

First of all, while vietnamese are still generally really polite, they are definitely way more aggressive about trying to sell you things than lao people are. As soon as you walk along the street you will have tons of cyclo and moto drivers trying to take you somewhere. There are also lots of ladies carrying around fruit that really try to push it on you and usually some people trying to sell you t-shirts or books. What gets to be a bit annoying is that they all really try to get your attention and sometimes won't take no for an answer. I have a couple theories on this. I'm thinking that with years of propoganda about western capatalists maybe they just think that we're so obssesed with spending money that as long as they can get your attention you'll have to buy something. Well it's a theory anyways.

Sometimes ignoring them works really well but you have to be careful about how you ignore them. Not making eye contact seems to help keep them from starting in on you. When they spot you they start yelling "hello" to you. If you really ignore them then sometimes they'll figure you didn't hear them and keep yelling (or honking their horn or making other noise). Shaking your head sometimes works but not often. The key seems to be to make it clear that you did hear them but you're just not aknowledging them, hard to pull off.

A technique I've developed for dodging the moto and cyclo drivers has been to walk with a purpose. As long as you have a really clear destination in mind and focus on that you seem to be a little more immune to them. But if you're just wandering or have to pull out the map, then it's all over. I was extremely sucessful in this earlier today but that time my purpose was to find a moto driver! I was walking around with such a clear purpose of trying to find one that none of them went for me. Finally, I stopped and reached for my guidebook, as soon as I touched it a moto driver was on me.

Related to this is something I've noticed in Laos as well, there is tons of copying of businesses. In Laos you would see it more in that if a shop opened up then pretty soon 2 or 3 more shops trying to look as similar as possible would open up nearby (frequently next door). So you'd get a lot of places where there'd be 3 or 4 cell phone shops in a row for example. In Vietnam, it seems to have gone even further, they will blatantly rip off even the name of the place to try to confuse you. This is especially true of tour companies that get good reviews in Lonely Planet. There must be at least 100 Sinh Cafe copies in Hanoi. There's a rip-off Kangaroo cafe. And possibly my favorite one, there's a Fansipan Tours right next door to the real Fansipan tours! You really need to make sure you know the exact address of the place you're going (in the case of Fansipan, it was something like the real one is 24a and the fake one is 24 on the street). I'm not sure if this is a lack of business knowledge where people don't understand that you should try to make your business stand out to attract customers. You could also get into cultural differences here, particularly being a communist country where people are encouraged (and taught) to follow as a group rather than pursue individual ideas. I suspect the yelling thing started this way too, a few people started doing it and got more business so now everyone does it. I try to make a habit of not buying anything from these people in hopes that it will discourage the practice.

I also have to say that cyclos are really cool. I'm not sure which is cooler, tuk tuks or cyclos, they're both cool in their own ways. Either way, 3 wheeled vehicles seem to be way cooler than 4 wheeled ones. For those not in the know, a tuk tuk is a vehicle common in Thailand in Laos. It's basically a motorcyle front end with a covered carriage in the back with seating for about 4 people. They tend to be hand-built but there's a certain amount of uniformity in the design (although they all are different). There is actually a tuk tuk dealership in Udon Thani though. A cyclo (or pedicab) is essentially a bicycle back end with a seat in front of it. The rider pedals on the back end and you sit in the seat on the front. I've heard the ones in Saigon are smaller, the Hanoi ones could fit 2 people if they squeezed in a bit. They're pretty comfortable and a neat way to get around. What's odd is that there's nothing if front of you to obstruct your view. Makes for an interesting ride in traffic sometimes but it's pretty cool to just sit there in the open and take in the sites.

The final observation for today is traffic; there's a lot more of it here in Hanoi. It's definitely not as bad as Bangkok though. However, like Bangkok, it's produced a different effect. The traffic is extremely chaotic and drivers are certainly not "good" by western standards but there's a sort of un-written set of rules. I suspect that traffic has been an issue here for longer than in Laos so I'm seeing a similar situation as in Bangkok, the traffic is crazy but everyone driving in it knows how to drive in the crazy traffic. It definitely seems less dangerous than Laos where no one knows how to drive, let alone in traffic.

Similar to Laos, no one seems to look behind them or use their mirrors. With various different speeds of vehicles on the roads this can create problems. The solution seems to be to use your horn, a lot. I seem to have come up with the situations you use your horn:

If a slower vehicle is ahead of you

If pedestrians are on the road ahead of you

When entering an intersection (don't bother actually looking for traffic)

If pedestrians or vehicles are on the side of the road not blocking your way but maybe they will

If you haven't honked your horn in the last 2 minutes; better make sure it's still working in case you'll need it

Seriously, the honking is crazy here. But this creates a new problem; people are used to filtering out the honking. The solution seems to be to honk louder or longer or to do a series of honks. Of course everyone ignores those too. For the most part it usually seems to work but I've been on motos where the driver will honk at a group of people standing in the middle of the road and they just stand there oblivious until he's right on top of them.

Sorry about yet another massive blog post. I've been debating including more posts on the main page but with the average length of my posts being pretty long that doesn't seem like a good idea. Incidentally, at Sneddy's request I've added an xml feed for my blog using blogger's atom feature. It's not exactly the way I'd like to do it but this is now done automatically by blogger so it's the easiest way for me to set it up for the moment. I might look into better options once I'm home. Those who don't understand what I'm talking about in this paragraph needn't worry, it won't affect you.

Turning 28

2005-04-19T08:38:00.000-03:00

Well I hadn't really mentioned it before but my 28th birthday is coming up soon (this Saturday). In more recent years my birthdays have usually been no big deal. The last really cool birthday I had was my 21st when I took the overnight train to Moscow with Leanne and spent the day in Moscow just because we could. That was a total blast. Hard to compete with that I know but for the last few years my birthdays have usually been more down or just been doing a few things with friends. I've never been a big party guy and I'm not good at trying to organize parties either so I would never really pull off doing much of anything.

This year I'll be spending my birthday in Vietnam which is nice in itself. To top that though, I'll be spending my 28th birthday doing a boat cruise in Halong Bay. The site for the boat is Tropical Sails. Looks like it should be a really fun time. Then the plan is to head to Hue Sunday night, probably on the overnight train.

So far the trip is going great. I ended up adding an extra day in Hanoi because of when I could book the boat cruise. I spent most of this morning going to tour operators to book my cruise and day trips. In the afternoon I went to the temple of literature which was the first national university in Vietnam. It's a really nice old confucian complex, took a lot of pictures.

Made it to Vietnam, 2nd attempt

2005-04-18T23:56:00.000-03:00

Well I had written a nice long blog post about getting to Vietnam last night but then blogger had problems and I lost it so this is my 2nd try.

I arrived in Hanoi Sunday night. I was a little worried about being able to get out of Laos. During Lao New Year Mai and I went to Vang Vieng for a couple of nights. We went tubing down the river and my passport and wallet got totally soaked. I had them in a ziploc bag but it opened. Most of the stuff was rescued no problem. Some nice lao people helped me dry everything out on a charcoal grill (including all the money I had on me). The big problem was that the date stamps for my lao visa and extension had washed away. I was worried I'd have problems when I left the country. To make matters worse, being Lao New Year the immigration office was closed so I couldn't fix it before my departure.

In the end it worked out alright. I picked the friendliest looking immigration officer at the airport and he just asked me a few questions about the dates but then let me through no problem.

Hanoi is a bit different. It's a lot more traffic than Laos and people are more aggressive about trying to sell you things but most aren't too bad. I know the traffic is worse in Saigon and I think the sellers might be worse as well so I'm glad I'm starting here and working my way south, might help ease my way into it.

It's a lot cooler here (mid-20's vs. high 30's) but it's rainy so the humidity is pretty high. In the morning it's really nice for walking around though and it's nice to be able to stay out all day and not get exhausted from the heat.

Some people have asked if I notice much of a difference between Vietnam and Laos. Yes I do. Laos is much more Thai/Indian influenced. Vietnam is more Chinese influenced. I'm really like the change of influence because I've always been more interested in Chinese architecture and design. There are also lots of uniquely vietnamese things as well so it's a nice change. Probably the easiest way to explain the difference is that in Laos (and Thailand and others) you get the tall skinny Budha statues with the pointy hats. In Vietnam (and China and others) you see more of the fat Budha statues. I know there's a joke about young Elvis and old Elvis in here somewhere.

In terms of Budhism, Laos and Thailand follow Therevada Budhism which follows only the original Budhist writings. Vietnam received it's current form of Budhism via China and is the Mahayana tradition which uses later writings as well. There's your trivia for the day.

Plan to stay in the general Hanoi area for a few more days but this will probably be my last full day in Hanoi. I'm going to take a 2 day trip to Halong Bay and also probably 2 day trips. 1 will be to the Perfume Pagoda and the other to the Tam Coc/Hoa Lu area. I've heard that the Perfume Pagoda is busy this time of year because it's a pilgrimage time so I may have to pass on that. After that I will head to Hue. Might fly, might take the train. From there I plan to head south towards Saigon. There's a lot of things I want to see along the way so I'm pretty excited.

The plan comes together

2005-04-10T03:05:00.000-03:00

Parts of the plan have changed for a variety of reasons.

For reasons I only vaguely understand, it's vastly cheaper for me to fly to Hanoi instead of Ho-Chi Minh City (Saigon). I did some looking in Lonely Planet and it looks like the majority of stuff I want to see is in the north or central regions so this works out well. I've decided to add a week to my trip to Vietnam so that I'll be able to cover more stuff. I'm flying to Hanoi on May 17 or 18 (still some issues with booking the flight so I don't know for sure yet) and will spend 3 weeks travelling in Vietnam. I will then fly out of Saigon to Siem Reap so that I can visit Angkor Wat and other temples in the area. I should be able to spend about a week there which will be really nice. My concerns about the cost turned out to be somewhat unfounded. It worked out to be only about $20 more to stop in Siem Reap vs. flying direct from Saigon to Vietiane!

I'm really excited about the trip, it looks like I should be able to see a lot of cool things in Vietnam and also really explore the Angkor Wat area. I'm a bit down about coming back to Canada and Mai is really sad. I know I have to though because I don't have a job here and I need to start making a life for myself. Right now it looks like that's not possible here.

I've also registered for the colour photo class at NSCAD. I have the same teacher who taught me advanced photo so that's really cool. He talked me into shooting colour print film instead of slides and that's what I've been shooting here (Fuji NPS rated at 100). From my prints here I have mixed opinions of the results. Not sure if it's the negatives or the printing (my major complaint about negative film). Still, I do have some nice results and it'll give me tons of stuff to print when I get back (shot 12 rolls so far).

I plan to shoot more in Vietnam and Cambodia. I'll need to get more film but should be able to buy some in Hanoi or I can pick some up here. Debating if I'll go back to slides or stick with the print film.

To accomodate the extra time in Vietnam and the trip to Cambodia I had to change my return ticket. I now leave Bangkok on May 18 and arrive in Halifax May 19. I'll have to leave Vientiane on May 17. I tried to arrange the stop over in Japan but my ticket won't let me do it. I'm a little disappointed in that but the extra time in Vietnam and Cambodia makes up for it a bit. At least I know that I couldn't do it so I don't have to live with asking "gee, why didn't I stop in Japan?"

I will miss the first week of my class but that's not a big problem. I think the excuse of needing to miss it so I could spend extra time in Vietnam and Cambodia should get me off the hook.

The Plan

2005-03-31T05:07:00.000-04:00

Okay, I'm starting to get the semblances of a plan worked out. The potential networking contract with the dam company has been put on hold indefinitely. Not having any work to do here is really getting me down and the job hunt is not going well. I think I've reached the point where it's time to head home.

So, with that in mind I've come up with a bit of a tentative plan. At the moment my plane ticket will leave May 5 from Bangkok. I'm looking at spending the next 2 weeks in Lao so that I can see Lao New Year. After that I plan to go to Vietnam for 2 weeks to visit there. I'd like to get to Cambodia to see Angkor Wat but it might be too expensive, have to find out the prices. I'm looking into the possibility of doing a stop-over in Japan for a few days on the way back. Could be a neat chance to visit Sneddy and see how he's liking Japan. Not sure if I can really arrange a decent trip there or not though and it will probably be really expensive so I might pass on that.

When I get back I'm definitely going to try to take a course at NSCAD. I'm leaning towards the colour course because I haven't taken it yet and I've been shooting colour print film here in Lao so I'll have lots of stuff to print. The big issue is going to be figuring out a way to register because I can't do it online. I might have to fax the registration from here. It'll cost a little bit but it's only a 1 page form so shouldn't be too bad.

I also need to re-certify my CCNA when I get back. I've been looking at other certifications and might pursue some. I've even been looking at the Microsoft certifications which I've been really hesitant to go for before. I haven't seen a good IT diploma course that I like so this might be one way to get some more qualifications and save me the cost and time of studying for 6 months in school. Hard to say though because not having any diploma or degree in IT has really been hurting me so I'm not sure if the certs will help that situation or not.

Looking to the Future

2005-03-27T01:39:00.000-04:00

Well the continued lack of employment here in Lao is making it increasingly look like I'm going to be heading back to Canada soon. Lately I've really been missing home so in a way this seems good. On the other hand, I'm really afraid of falling back into the same rut I was in before I came here.

But in general, I'm increasingly feeling that I like what my life could be in Canada more than what my life could be in Lao. I just have that many more options to pursue my interests outside of work in Canada. I have friends and family that I miss, I improve my photographic skills in an amazing creative environment (NSCAD), I can take Taiji, etc, etc.

In Lao on the other hand, I do have some friends but my social life is pretty much as limited as it was in Canada, or worse. There's amazing places to go to take pictures but transportation is tough and the harsh sunlight means you really have to pay attention to the time of day you shoot. I do have a girlfriend here and I will miss her but we both knew that I might leave when we started dating. More and more I'm realising that the life I would want to live here is mostly just the fantasy of having an affluent lifestyle.

The big fear of course is that I'll be stuck in the job market back in Halifax and be forced back into a job that makes me miserable. I know I can't go back to call center work. There's actually a variety of reasons for this, the scheduling issues aside. One of the biggest is that I already have a lot of call center experience and I need to move into something else or else it will really look like that's all I can do. I can just imagine an HR person looking at my resume, "okay, you did some work for a non-profit organization during university, then you worked at a call center, you left that and tried to do freelance work, that didn't work out so you went back to a call center, then you got an international placement as a volunteer, and then came back to work at a call center". Doesn't sound too attractive does it? I need to move into something that will give me some more impressive experience on my resume and will make it look as if I've moved beyond call center work.

Now the big question is when? At the moment I'm riding out the end of my visa and will probably stay a little longer for Lao New Year (Apr 13-15) then travel a bit. My plane ticket currently has me leaving on May 6 but I can change that. I'd really like to be able to come back and take a photo course at NSCAD and they start up in the 2nd or 3rd week of May. It would be nice to come back and get right into doing something. Coming back and starting on a course right away and maybe taiji too will help me not get settled right back into the rut I left behind. I know I'll be jet lagged and tired for a bit so it will help to have something to get me off my ass right away.

The big thing that might hold up this plan, but in a good way, is that I've put together a contract proposal for some short-term contract work. It's a cool networking project so it would be some nice experience. Right now they seem pretty keen on my proposal but they haven't approved it yet. If that goes ahead then it will probably push back my return date. Hopefully I'll know soon because I'd like to make plans. Now that I've decided to come home I'd like to be able to move along with that right away but this contract would be some good experience and it would also be nice to be coming home with a bit more money to help me get settled in. For instance, I'd be able to get an apartment and some furniture as soon as I got a job offer instead of having to wait for a few pay cheques first to save up some money.