Little Paris – crazy house – With the artist Duc
N 11°56'29.9'' E 108°25'58.1''
Date:
26.02.2017 until 05.03.2017
Day: 607 – 614
Country:
Vietnam
Province:
Lâm Đồng
Location:
Da Lat
Latitude N:
11°56’29.9”
Longitude E:
108°25’58.1”
Total kilometers:
22,487 km
Maximum height:
1.500 m
Total altitude meters:
67.529 m
Sunrise:
06:03 a.m. – 05:59 a.m.
Sunset:
5:55 pm – 5:56 pm
Temperature day max:
25°C
(Photos of the diary entry can be found at the end of the text).
We have been in the beautiful city of Da Lat for a few days now. It was officially founded by French colonial rulers in 1912 and survived the Vietnam War with almost no damage. Surrounded by lakes, waterfalls and forests, the climate is mild due to its altitude. A reason for national and international tourists to visit small Paris, as Da Lat is also known, for a few days.
In addition to writing down and archiving our pictures, we visit the few sights in the surrounding area, such as the famous crazy house. A building that can only be found once on our planet in this form. “Somehow you feel like Alice in Wonderland here,” says Tanja. Tropical green plants entwine around concrete caves, gnarled trees and giant spider webs woven from wire. Colorful carpets of flowers combine with roots formed from stone and mortar, winding around bay windows and buildings where there is not a single straight surface or edge. The Vietnamese architect, who made a name for herself with this crazy house without straight lines, obviously realized her boundless imagination with this building complex. We walk along winding paths, narrow footbridges and climb ever higher up narrow stairs, so that we end up clambering over the roofs of the complex at a dizzying height and enjoying a fantastic view of the city. “Just be careful,” Tanja warns me, as the banisters and handrails are extremely low. Just a little carelessness and you can lose your balance and fall 20 or 30 meters. There does not seem to be a safety standard. But maybe it’s also because the Vietnamese are quite small on average, and the handrails and balustrades are high enough for them not to fall over them. The buildings, some of which resemble towers, are not only fabulous on the outside, but also on the inside. No window seems to be the same and no room the same. No item of furniture is repeated. Rooms with bizarre furniture or a giant bird statue from prehistoric times hatching an egg, which in turn has the function of an open, functioning fireplace, can be booked by guests. A world of hobbits and dwarves, where humans can escape from the sometimes harsh outside world. We enjoy the grotesque mini-cosmos, which looks like chocolate melting in the sun and suddenly solidifying on a cold winter’s night.
In the afternoon, we visit a young musician’s small café. Old typewriters, radios, tape recorders, telephones, sewing machines, lamps, alarm clocks, cups, bowls and bottles hang and stand everywhere. The orderly chaos of a true artist makes the small room appear cozy. As soon as we sit down on a solid wooden bench, a white cat jumps onto the seat and meows at us. Small dwarf pinschers bark loudly around the corner to make it clear to us who is the boss here. Duc, the handsome young man with his long, shiny black hair, laughs, hands me an old coffee grinder and shows me how to grind my own coffee with this thing. He lights a joint and asks if I’d like one too. “Thanks, I still have to hack a story into the laptop today,” I decline.
We are just leaving when a motorcyclist enters the café. In perfect English, he asks us where we are coming from and where we are going. We report on our cycle tour from Germany to Vietnam. He soon looks at us in bewilderment. “Unbelievable. Fantastic. A dream,” he says. We order another Vietnamese coffee, the fresh beans of which Duc has us grind again. The motorcyclist, who does not wish to be named, tells us about the difference between South and North Vietnam. “Because the South Vietnamese cooperated with the Americans and were enemies of the North, none of us South Vietnamese are allowed to work in the government or get a job with the authorities. This means that we are still stigmatized today. We are not allowed to become civil servants or police officers. Even North Vietnamese who are married to a South Vietnamese can’t get a job with the state. This is terrible discrimination and the reason why I work here as a motorcycle guide. I didn’t get any other job. My problem is that my father fought for the Americans. After the North Vietnamese won the war, all the South Vietnamese soldiers were sent to re-education camps. They kept my father there for 10 years, treated him badly and sent him home a week before he died. I tell you, I will never forget that and I will never forgive the government. I loved my father more than anything and they killed him in a very cruel way. How can you forget something like that? Even if I love my country, the government certainly won’t.”
We talk to the man for a long time and hear more sad stories until we say goodbye because we are not able to take in all the sadness…
If you would like to find out more about our adventures, you can find our books under this link.
The live coverage is supported by the companies Gesat GmbH: www.gesat.com and roda computer GmbH http://roda-computer.com/ The satellite telephone Explorer 300 from Gesat and the rugged notebook Pegasus RP9 from Roda are the pillars of the transmission. Pegasus RP9 from Roda are the pillars of the transmission.
