Rainy Hues

Hey there blog fans! So. We ventured from Hoi An (which was rad, even though it was pouring down rain) to Hue, which was rad, even though it was pouring down rain. Our tour guide in Hoi An is actually from Hue, so he came with us on the 4 or so hour bus ride to Hue and showed us around his cool town. Note: Hieu (see? Correct spelling!) is like, super rad. Funniest Vietnamese guy you'll never meet.

Ok, so our tour of Hue involved an initial stop at the emperors tomb. Here's where like the forth emperor of Vietnam (of the famed Nguyen dynasty) isn't burried. Turns out, when emperors died, they were burried in a secret location, and those who knew of the body's whereabouts (i.e. the grave diggers) were slain. Apparenty this was quite an honour, too. Ahem. Screw that.
There was this massive plaque with a bunch of chinese characters on it. See? Massive.
And the grounds were pretty picturesque.
The tomb was guarded by some dudes who Emma could beat with her eyes closed AND her hands tied behind her back - so they didn't give her any grief.
And emperor Tim was worshipped by his loyal subjects.
So then we went and got ourselves a feed at this rad noodle bar, where a massive feed, a coke and a dumpling cost around about AUD$4. We really broke the bank and shouted Hieu lunch there too. He then took us down to the perfume river to jump on a dragon boat.
Which happily floated (the engine didn't seem to make much of a contribution to the forward momentum of this watercraft) to this neato pagoda.
For those of you who remember, and those of you who are familiar with the album cover from Rage Against the Machine's self titled album, in the late sixties there was a monk who burned himself to death in HCMC in protest of the treatment of buddhists in Vietnam. Anyway, that particular monk is from this temple/pagoda. The car that's in the background of all the photos of him burning (which so happens to be the whip he drove from here to HCMC) is on display out the back. Kinda creepy if you think about it. On a lighter note, the view was nice.
They also had a really large bell.
So then we made our way to the citadel at the forbidden purple city. This joint was where the emperors used to live and get up to all sorts of emperorial activites. We took a few photos, but it's kinda like a ruined city (thanks to the american war) so it's not overly exciting. They did have moats though, with a bunch of fishies that went absolutely crazy for food.
And the front gate is pretty elaborate.
Anywho, that's about it for Hue. Stay tuned for posts about: Hanoi!

t+e