lynn in love with vietnam: day 4 Hoi An

Hello Dears! Hopefully I can catch up on my daily blogging of our awesome trip!

Day 4 was a busy day in hot, hot, HOT Hoi An. Hoi An is a lovely interesting international port, meaning it has influences from many other countries, mostly France, Japan, and China. We starting out with breakfast by the river. The Hoi An River feeds from the ocean and is only 6 km long. We drove into the city to explore. You can tell right away that this place is a vacation stop for both the Vietnamese and neighboring countries, mainly Australians. It's teeming with tourists who are all after their most famous service: custom made clothes.

Hoi An is known for their silk and skilled tailors. I was a little dubious about the quality of both the fabric and skill at first, but was amazed at their craftmanship! It was hard to pick which store to visit, but our tour guide, An Loc, advised us to go to Yaly. Yaly first showed us how they made their silk from silkworms. They then shuffled us upstairs into a hot, musty showroom, where we can browse through catalogs from clothes or design our own. We then pick out fabrics from bolts that surrounded the room. I was a little scared by the bizarre designs they had on display, so I ended up designing a simple little Anthropologiesque little shift dress with a flowered collar, and a blue vintage looking wool coat. A mere FIVE hours later, I came back for a fitting. Oh my, how I loved my pieces! The craftmanship was impeccable, and I now had two unique pieces that was custom made for me at a fraction of the cost in less than 24 hours, no less! I decided to also have a spring jacket made in pink Thai silk. My only regret, was that I didn't have more pieces made! Next trip I guess!

We walked through the rest of the "old town" that was rich with history. I forgot my camera at this point, so don't have many pictures of the town, but imagine French appearing buildings and narrow streets, except with Japanese and Chinese houses interspersed and Vietnamese motorbikes trying to run you over. It was quite quiant. As the dusk came, the other thing that Hoi An is known for came to life. The streets were filled with lanterns glowing colorfully against the purple sky. If you come to Vietnam, I would recommend Hoi An, absolutely, yes!

yes! those are water buffalos laying in the shade.

silkworms!they spin a cocoon of yellow silk
they then seperate the cocoons into threads!
i'm pretending to weave... it looks just like that scene in Wanted (horrible movie, i know)

we took a little break midday for a massage at our spa Zen! I think everyday, I'll post a silly picture of my sister and I!



ok, so alot of you have asked me to post picture of the food we're eating. Sorry guys, I'm not much of a food photographer, but I thought I'd indulge you a couple....

here is one of the crabs I found wandering all over our river...

...and this is what I had for dinner. cheers!