They think it's all over..............it is now!

Hello to all,

welcome to what is the last edition of my blog. I'll explain why later on..........

Those English amongst the readers will know that my Blog title refers to perhaps the most famous sporting words ever said on English TV; the 1966 World Cup Final as England scored their 4th goal against West Germany. A topical title being used for my last blog. And to make another topical link, those outside the UK may know that in September there is a vote in Scotland to decide whether Scotland will leave the UK. Tying those strands together and providing some context, here is a famous story about the 1966 World Cup final. In his autobiography , Denis Law , the most iconic Scottish Footballer of his day revealed that he played golf , rather than watch the game,on the afternoon of the Final , so uninterested was he as to whether England would succeed. An amusing, but pertinent insight about the relationship between the Scots and the English.

A few weeks ago I made a major acheivement in Vietnam. I became a Platinum Member of Vietnam Airlines. I've breezed through the Titanium, Silver and Gold levels, and now I can wallow in the comfort of the highest standards that Vietnam Airlines can offer. At Check In, Security, and Boarding I look out for the VIP Channel and stride purposefully through.  In reality perhaps there should be two additional channels; 'Genuine VIPS's' and 'Pretend VIP's, Imposters and Hangers On'. You know which one I'll be in.

Here's 3 photos that make me chuckle.......and they say everything about Vietnam. Firstly here are a pair of tennis shoes I bought and have worn about a dozen times. I am sure that they are not actually  genuine Mitre and whilst the top of the shoes look pretty new, the sole has completely worn out and gone rotten. But what did I expect for 10 Dollars !





The next is an Ice Lolly I bought. You can see from this that you are not wise to rely on the photo on the packaging. Clearly that photo is of somebody elses Ice Lolly, or perhaps an other brand altogether. I suppose that I should be grateful that it was an Ice Lolly at all so I'm not complaining.

And my favourite is the cover of a DVD of one of the latest blockbusters:' All is Lost' with that Hollywood Superstar Robert Radford. Magic stuff to make you smile, and it was only about 60 Pence.

So to my news. I am retiring......well maybe semi-retiring. As you know, Karen's health has been an issue in the Hanoi climate, so we are going to live in our house in Spain. Mazars have been good enough to tell me that they will try to use me as a Training Consultant in Europe. And to be fair, my job is pretty much complete in Hanoi. The office has recovered , the workforce is stable and the business is progressing. So it's been a wonderful 2 and a half years. New places, new cultures, new people, new food, ............new everything. Anybody who has not been to Vietnam should put it high on their list of locations to visit. I have learned so much and I'm sure it's changed me for the better.

Our house in Spain is on the Costa De La Luz, near Cadiz and after a few months in UK we'll be moving there in the new year. For anybody on this distribution list who wants to stay in touch , or come to see us, our emails are kps1958@live.co.uk and karen@resources4.co.uk . Our front terrace will always have a cold beer waiting for anyone who wants one.

So onto the next chapter.........

Thank you so much to everyone who has read and responded to this blog.........you have no idea how much staying connected to you has meant to me.

Very best to all

Kevin

Oh, and by the way, I have a pony tail now........

The sound of leather on willow.....in Vietnam !

Hello to all,

you may know that I can track the page reads to my blogs (Google Blogspot provide all the stats). Since I started ( 19 editons ago !), the blog has had nearly 8000 page reads , and not just just from UK , but all over the world. Up to now the best read edition was 'Vietnam for Eurovision' , probably due to its title and people finding it by accident on searches for Eurovision. But my last post 'There'll be seagulls over the streets of Cambodia' had a massive viewing spike a couple of weeks ago........400 reads in one day and all from the same viewing source. How curious. Well this was NOT the Head Office of the Cambodian Birdwatchers Association. What it was , was another Brighton and Hove Albion fan stumbling across the Seagulls Bar in Phnom Penh and putting it on the club's Fan Forum ( NorthStandChat). Somebody else then found my posting, put a link up , and hey presto I had 400 page reads in 24 hours all from the same link. Isn't the internet amazing...... . I very much doubt that any of my fellow Brighton fans will ever look at my blog again though ( LOL).

Today is a pisser.....literally. I was just getting ready to take Sally out for her walk, and then looking forward to Saturday afternoon tennis, and suddenly down came the Big Rain. My advice to the UK Water Boards is just to move some of their resevoirs to Vietnam, we'll fill 'em up in no time, and we'll give you a good price.

So to my headline..........only a number of readers will realise that this is a Cricket analogy. So what's the story? Well in 2012 Hanoi won the bid to host the 2019 Asian Games. According to Vietweek ( an English language newspaper here),  South Korea spent 1.62Bn USD and Qatar 2.8Bn USD in hosting these games in the past. Vietnam have committed 300m, and the newspaper goes on to say that Dubai, Taipei,Kuala Lulpur, New Delhi and Hong Kong all withdrew from the race ( mainly for financial reasons). Vietnam are now considering a 'withdrawal plan' .......I am guessing because of the cost, which I further guess will be in excess of 300m USD. There are 36 sports competed, of which 28 are Olympic and 8 are popular Asian sports. Of the 28, facilities would have to be built/adapted/improved for such sports as American Football, Baseball and.........Cricket. Yes Cricket in Vietnam. I shall be glued to my TV in 2019 looking for the quizzical expressions in the crowd ( if there is one) when the Vietnamese try to understand Cricket. However there will be some interesting variants of 'How'zat'!!

Two photos to finish.......'Selfies' seem to be flavour of the month at present. So here's a kind of a 'selfie' of Sally who somehow wormed her way onto the bed yesterday. She looks very contented.

And finally, just to prove that I did not come to Hanoi for the weather, here's the view from my office yesterday. Hanoi is not the Riviera of SE Asia.



Cheers all ....till next time

Kevin

"They'll be Seagulls over the streets of Cambodia".................

Hello to all,

Since my last post we've been to Cambodia.... but more of that later.

Every now and then you find something that's slightly different to what you'd expect, caused by the local culture. The other day I paid my first visit to Landmark 72 in Hanoi , a new skyscraper which (unsurpringly) has 72 floors and is the tallest building in Hanoi, located several km away from the touristy parts of the city It was exactly as I would have expected......lots of offices , retail and cafe's on the ground floor and so on. And as most people would I asked the person I was seeing there if we could go to the top floor to see the view. It was a nice day  with a blue sky ( very rare here) so I was looking forward to seeing the Hanoi panorama. But I was told that rather than the top floor being a home for an expensive restaurant or bar/nightclub or maybe one of the top  firms in Hanoi, it was unlet. Seems there is no cachet in Vietnam to being at the top. Or maybe its my recurrent Health and Safety issue coming back into play.....who knows.

So to Cambodia. In Phnom Penh there we were coming out of a local restaurant one lunchtime, when my eyes did a huge'double take'. Right in front of me was a Tuk Tuk with a rather large Brighton and Hove Albion (my team !) sign on the back to advertise the Seagulls Bar just round the corner. Well ( much to Karen's amusement or maybe the word should be resignation) , that was our evening sorted. The owner, Rob, is a season ticket holder and hails from Lancing and we had a great chat about life as Seagulls fans.So here's to you Rob mate.....you're now on my list and I will pester you with my blog every few weeks or so.

One photo I have wanted to take, but have never had the nerve or sleight of hand is of the hand of any one of hundreds of taxi drivers here who have one very long ( and I mean seriously long) index finger nail. Why .......I don't know. What they use them for.........I won't mention.

Now to a more difficult subject. We also visited Bangkok to see a specialist for Karen's cough , which had gone on far too long. The plan was then to go to a beach resort for a few days. What we didn't plan though was the specialist saying that Karen needed to stay in hospital there for 2 weeks , due to a condition called Aspergillosis. ( Just Google it rather than letting me explain it). Its almost certainly caused by the humidity and pollution of the Hanoi climate, and we are VERY lucky that we went when we did. I'll leave it at that.

Well that's a slightly strange ending paragraph, but I never plan these newsletters in advance so I guess I'll end here.

Very best to all

Kevin

 

The photos below are Karen in a crowd from the top of a tower in Ankgor Wat,, the inside of the beautiful French Market building from the 1930's in Pnhom Penh, and finally me driving an OxCart, ( just before veering off the road and having to be rescued.)

All that glitters........well it's probably gold.

Hello to all,

and a belated happy New Year. Although it's actually not New Year here for a couple of weeks at a time known as Tet. Over the Tet holidays we are going to Cambodia for a week. I've just been out walking the dog and everything seemed strangely familiar. It's 12 degrees, leaden grey sky, gusty wind and pissing with rain. And the locals are not happy with this 'English' weather ha ha. I have a few dog walking routes here. Today, my route took me past a locals 'cock fight' pictured here (sorry I couldn't get too close 'cos of the dog.....obviously.), then through one of the local graveyards (pictured, and there are so many local customs here including digging the bones up to clean them after a few years) and finally pictured is 'Quat Tree City'. These are grown in abundance for Tet and every household gets one (including us !).

I had a fairly surreal trip in a taxi the other day. It is of course compulsary for taxi drivers here to be using their mobiles whilst driving. It's probably part of the driving test and I  reckon that if they passed a law here forbidding the use of mobiles whilst driving, then the phone companies would go bust. But this driver was engaged in two separate conversations on two different phones. I was thinking of offering to hold the steering wheel for him.

And so to gold. We have read that personal ownership of hoarded gold in Vietnam is the highest of any country in the world. And by a considerable margin. Combined with Vietnam's low Government Reserves, this has led to an initiative to try to persuade people to take and deposit their gold with the State Bank of Vietnam. A Certificate will be issued to prove ownership, and in turn the Government can use the increased gold reserves as collateral to raise money on the International Markets. Just a fascinating situation.

Yesterday we did a City Walk run by the Friends of Vietnam Heritage. Usually I avoid these as they take you from temple to pagoda to temple to pagoda. But this one concentrated on the traditional 36 streets of the Old Quarter and market areas showing all kinds of food being prepared, took us up 'ordinary' alleyways and pointed out some fascinating stuff about day to day life here. A couple of photos from yesterday show the only surviving gate to the city (from the original 16 gates), and then a war mural celebrating the struggle against the French in the late Forties and early Fifties. There are a number of these around the city.

My wife Karen is really struggling with the air quality here in Hanoi which gives her a constant cough. Most expats here monitor a website called www.aqicn.org . This shows air quality in cities around the world. Hanoi sticks stubbornly in the Red ( Unhealthy) or the Purple (Very Unhealthy)

 

 

No apologies for another Dog story. The only other Expat on our street was manipulated into paying 1000 USD to get her dog back the other day having 'lost' him. There seemed to be no concept of returning the dog as a favour to a neighbour, and 1000 USD goes a long way here. A salutory lesson.

And finally.........we watched in horror as a cement mixer truck failed to turn into a street going forwards (because of the wires across the street entrance) , and in a fit of local logic the driver then reckoned that he could successfully manage the manoevre by going backwards. Why is that going to work? But it seemed to amuse all the passers by.

Till next time everybody

Very best

Kevin