Vietnam

Isabel actually insisted we try the Vietnamese hot pot. Who am I to resist, she has been scared to try anything with meat so I am all in if she is up for trying.

It was actually very good, apart from a little sting from the chillies in the soup.
They basically bring you a pile of vegetables, some raw chicken, fish, squid, beef and off course a hot pot with soup. Then you basically cook your own food in the hot soup and enjoy!

At first we were sceptic on how to actually go about starting this dish, the waiter saw we did not really know what to do and she came by and started tossing things in the hot pot and said "7 minutes wait and eat".

It's the best Vietnamese dinner we had so far.

Topped with good local beer you can't ask for more.

One of the things thats really striking about Vietnam restaurants/street food is the good service even with limited english. For example when the waiter arrived at the table we ordered drinks and she just shouted out our drink order and while she was waiting for us to order food someone else brought the drinks. Then again halfway through the meal I wanted another beer and I caught the waiters eye on the other side of the restaurant and just lifted my empty beer and showed "one more" 👆🏻with my finger and within seconds another cold beer arrived.

The other interesting thing is that they don't clear your table at all while you are there. This is because they actually don't write down what you had, at the end of the meal when you ask for the check the waiter comes by and count the drinks and empty food containers and calculate what you should pay. They either write the amount on a piece of paper or just type it into a calculator and show you. Very old school but it works. Obviously cash is king here and credit card machines are limited to hotels and more upscale vendors.

After dinner we treated ourselves for another massage. The place looked a bit sketchy but the massage was great apart from the the fact that my therapist blatantly offered me a happy ending and was clearly shocked that I said no. Note to self, a full body massage in Vietnam is really a full body massage. I think I will stick with back and neck massages from now on.

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