Vietnam Trip November 2008

Not much to say but: IT WAS AWESOME!
Take a look yourself...
Coconut man - always refreshing!
Ben Thanh Market

The old French post office - and Ho Chi Minh

Notre Dame - another French relict

Saigon rush hour

Turtle pagoda in HCMC

Two Vietnamese women with their traditional straw hats Rice paddy in the countryside

Cao Dai temple 70km north of HCMC: a very special religious mixture of Christian, Buddhist and Muslim elements. Colorful and exotic... Cu Chi tunnels in the jungle around Cu Chi: this is were the Viet cong fought against the Americans and hid. Lush forest, no chance for the foreign attackers to defeat the brave Vietnamese. Here: how to get into the tunnels...

Mekong delta trip: the river is the center of life - transport, fishing... ... and living...
... and trading...
Cute school kids on one of the Mekong islands

Short tour with canoes

Tourist tour : )Days in paradise: Phu Quoc island off the Cambodian coast, yet Vietnamese

What more could you ask for? More cute Vietnamese kids

Happy Buddha and happy Mel

Some old minority folks - the guy with the hat even spoke French (that tells about his age...) : ) Our motorbike friends and myself

Now back to Germany and so close to Christmas and Austria!

I know it was not the last trip to this vibrant and interesting and more than overwhelming country. Simply great!

I know what I did last summer...

A short summary of what happened in the last months... of course not everything was documented (which is good sometimes ; )

The surprise trip: no one except the organiser knew where we were going. Destination 1: Emden, East Friesland, "Matjes" festival (matjes is young herring)

The "adventurers"
The North-German way to celebrate a 30th birthday for unmarried men: dress in a ridiculous way and sweep the floor in front of the town hall until a girl comes to kiss you free. To shorten the waiting, drinking is allowed ; ) Very funny to watch!
Where is the bus?
Flat land

Meyer dockyard, Papenburg - they just finished the biggest ever German-built cruising ship. This is its sister ship...
2 weeks at home in June: spending time with family and old friends from university...


Celebrating the new "Masters"
Department trip to Volkswagen factory in Wolfsburg: oldtimer museum - Beetle de luxe
"phaeno" science park: also fun for grown-ups
As usual: Hanover zoo - 2 cute wallabies
Mr Giraffe
My favorite: Mr Lion

Baby elephant

A beauty!
Baby capybara - cute.
Baby gorilla, climbing.
2nd home trip: our own zoo also got bigger, approx. 600% : ) They were really sugar sweet!
Last lunch with my family and Susi who came for a visit
Next Hamburg trip to see a great photo exhibition. Me in front of "Deichtorhallen", in the background: HafenCity, the city's largest construction project ever. Apart from apartments, offices and shops, this entirely new neighborhood is gonna host "Hamburg Symphony", the new opera house which costs a fortune (they started taking money from private donors as the cost is something like double the original budget)
Old and new - Speicherstadt and HafenCity to be
My friend Ania and myself at Jungfernstieg
One of the numerous canals that run through the city Another old building, somehow antique
Hamburg from the top of St Michaelis church, a nice 82 m above the ground. Here: "Outer Alster" (one of the 3 rivers running through the city which forms a little lake) The harbor, among the 3 biggest in Europe.
Sunset in the red-brick town - time to go back to Hanover : )