Red trousers Vietnam-style

Fitting #1
On the way to our first “fitting” of the new clothes there is a downpour of biblical proportions – the first one we’ve been caught out in since we’ve been here. It is very, very wet but it cools things down nicely.
Pam’s dress is fantastic, I’m not convinced about two of my three pairs of trousers. That distilled description was definitely too vague and Vietnamese styling has slipped between the cracks of my careful specification. Everything needs some alterations anyway so we leave them behind again to be corrected. There doesn’t seem to be a problem with this, the clothes just get shipped back to whoever made them to have seams sewn in or panels let out.
Fittings #2 and #3
Up early today for another fitting. There are more things to correct, so we leave them again. It’s too hot for souvenir shopping so we rent a motorbike and head off to the beach, this time minimally dressed for swimming.
The beach is busier today with Vietnamese couples – all decked out in their Sunday best – who’re here for the festival. It is funny to watch them – they haven’t come to swim or sun bathe but to “cruise the beach”. The girls certainly aren’t sunbathing because they believe that pale skin is a sign of good breeding so do all they can to cover every single exposed piece. Those who do swim do so in their clothes, jeans and all. The general feel is like the “Ben Sherman” brigade back home on a Saturday night – these young Vietnamese have come to look good on the beach in their going-out clothes. They look most impractical and we feel underdressed in our swimwear.
The sea is warm and clear and the waves are powerful. We express our creative selves by building a sand-mermaid on the beach much to everyone’s apparent amazement. Most of the passing children are enthralled and apart from a few trouble-making teenagers who delight in “helping” us add larger breasts to her, they are patient and quietly enthusiastic. We celebrate our artistic success with some pork dumplings from a little stall.

Light on the water

Back in Hoi An, fitting session three is conclusive and we end up mostly happy with our purchases. Pam has got two very nice ball-style dresses; one of which I feel I practically designed since it has an embroidered dragon on the back and matching trim on the front at my suggestion. The trousers I ordered with the embroidered dragon in a style on display in the shop have turned out really well – but the less said about my three-quarter length beige efforts the better. It was only an experiment really.
Later we accumulate some souvenir crockery – Vietnamese bowls, spoons and chopsticks. Again we find the prices are extraordinarily inflexible. Either these prices have been dropped so low by the intense competition here that there’s little room for profit (seems likely given the way they behave) or else these people are so hardened to bargaining Westerners that they just refuse to budge on the price and find from experience that we’ll pay anyway. Whatever, the prices aren’t so bad to start with and we get an 8 piece and a 4 piece set for a total of £15. How can I complain?

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