8th to 9th February, 2025

Here we are again, still in Vietnam and still in Hoi An. We have kept up our round of table tennis, darts and, oft times, the gym (been a bit lax there lately) and have now added pool, carom billiards and pétanque to our repertoire. The weather has been less sunny, which has meant sitting by the pool a less attractive proposition, but we have ventured out a bit more to explore the sights (and shops) of Hoi An.

Anyone who has followed my blog at all will know that we do love a market, so we set off to visit the day time one in Hoi An.

The Japanese Bridge is a big tourist attraction in Hoi An. I refer to my extensive historical research (Wikipedia): “During the 16th century, Japanese merchants began to establish residence in the port city of Faifo (now Hoi An) and established their own enclave. In 1593, one group of merchants began building a covered bridge to cross a neighborhood canal. They finished construction in 1595 and improved access between the Chinese enclave on the other side. In 1653, Japanese residents built a temple atop the bridge as a way to, according to legend, placate the earthquake-inducing monster Namazu. With the 17th century withdrawals of Japanese merchants and Dutch East Indies Company from Hoi An, Chùa Cầu and its surrounding neighborhood remained relatively preserved.”

OK, that was the day market, but all good tourist hotspots have to have a night market and Hoi An is no exception. Val and I asked at Reception if there was anywhere in Hoi An that had live music only to be met by ‘not that we know of’. They did, however, have one of their porters, Hien (I think that is the spelling), who was sent for, who very kindly told us of a place that has Vietnamese music and dancing, which sounded interesting.

We arranged with our trusty Grab driver, Duoc, to pick us up at 6pm, take us to a supermarket en route for some essential supplies (supermarket is being a bit generous, but they had what we wanted) and drop us off near the market, which is on a small island on the other side of the river next to the old town.

We found a bar with music, indeed, we found lots of bars with live music and I am thinking of organising a works outing for the staff at our hotel where we can roam the various venues on a sort of pub crawl so they are better informed as to nightspots in Hoi An.

We wandered back to where Duoc had dropped us off and he was there to take us to our next venue, the dance hall. It did not look much at first, indeed we had a bit of difficulty actually believing it was there at all until we opened the car doors and heard the music. And what a find it was.

I would describe it as a bit like a club for ballroom dancing. There is a live band and members of the audience sing (really well, I would add). The repertoire is all Vietnamese music and, if anyone likes the song they are going to sing, they go to a large vase of flowers, take one and hand it to the singer, who can end up with quite a bunch.

We were a bit tentative as it was obviously a venue for locals, who were, I would add, dressed beautifully in almost formal dance attire. The dancing was really good too, some cha-cha-cha, a bit of salsa and quite a lot of tango to mention just a few. We walked in, the only non-Vietnamese there, and immediately a couple of ladies came up to us and welcomed us in. Val was instantly sat next to a few other ladies, one of which spoke good English and the next thing is she is off dancing.

You might be wondering what I was doing all this time. Well, obviously I was snapping away with the camera, but I was persuaded to take Val onto the floor. As you know, I am not that well-trained in the light fantastic, but I did manage to avoid her toes (particularly important on this trip!) and we were acclaimed as ‘very cute’!! It was a wonderful time and we could not have been more or better welcomed.

OK, only a few more days to go here in Vietnam and I will do one more post before we go, but that may be from Thailand, our next stop.