[monumentum]

Day #16: Nha Trang by day (15-May-2010)
Guess I hadnt mentioned that I met this Vietnamese photographer Mai Loc, who claims to be very 'popular' around the area, & he brought me around Nha Trang today. He manages the Sao Mai Hotel, & can be considered a friend of Chung's. So there, he brought me to the Po Nagar Cham Towers, the Nha Trang version.

I could easily consider this Nha Trang one much more superior than that of Mui Ne's & Quy Nhon's. Not only in terms of the area, but also in terms of the remnants after all those years of weathering & war. This one had many more intact structures left than the 2 I'd previously seen. Of course, with this, came the hordes of locals & tourists alike, all swamping into cramped buildings like the one above. Yes it does look like a grand structure, but you'll see how small the interior actually is.

The walls of these structures are surprisingly thick, reason(s) of which I'm unclear. Even the passages leading into the temple itself could easily be considered narrow to accommodate 2 people passing each other at once. The interior was hardly sufficient for the 3 altars, on which sat the Queen & Princesses who'd been enthroned to be Goddesses. Thanks to the number of visitors, adding to the 2 or so monks in that tiny space, it was practically a tangle of limbs & rubbing of sweaty skin against each other.

Anyway, the interior of this 'shrine' (for it's certainly too tiny to be considered a temple), was only brightened by mere candlelights, & a weak flame from the 'light' in a wall. Photography was difficult, despite being permitted (I asked!). The constant unwelcomed nudges didn't help to provide the sharpness either. So here, these were the best I could do with my shaky hands:

The interior was so dark my eyes took some time to adjust back to the glaring sunlight outside.

Being on higher grounds than its surroundings, the Po Nagar Towers overlookes a sprawling area across Nha Trang.

Inscriptions & more inscriptions in Chinese characters & Vietnamese. Someone be kind, & please translate the Vietnamese version for me? I'd done some reading up on the Chinese version, but could make nothing (at all) out of those jumble of words. I'd deliberately blown up the size from what I'd upload usually, just so that someone would come by miraculously to help me with this. Being on budget is always like that in a foreign country. It'd be so different if I could afford a personal guide to take me around, & get me into the learning mode of these stuff.

Having said that these particular Cham Towers overlooked a considerable area beyond them, these were the rather aesthetically pleasing views you'd catch from high above, along the compound's brick walls of the towers. It was difficult to clinch a spot along these low walls, for local tourists hoarded every inch, competing for shelter & a place to sit on.

(Above) The maginificent main entrance of the Cham Towers which loomed before its visitors, right facing the gates of the temple grounds. I imagine it to be a far more sophisticated structure during its glorious era. But now, having been ran down to a state like this, just looking at it was already somehow imposing.

The Long Son Pagoda was another place that your probably shouldn't miss if your laid foot in Nha Trang. So many calories burnt in the climbing-walking process, I agree, but kindly treat it as a pilgrimage, like Buddhists are usually fond of. It was a place with elaborate sights so tantalising, to your camera lenses & eyes alike. Despite inferiority to some other temples I'd seen & would see, it was a place for someone with eyes for details.

This isn't a place where you'd measure magnificence (At least not when I was there, for the majority of the temple was undergoing some sort of facelift). Instead, I'd say it's a place of intricacies. Whether it is massive Buddhas being carved out of stone, or fine paintings lining the temple walls (depicting retribution & other Buddhist religious teachings), details like these formed the very core of this temple, inside out, which is why you shoud visit it. Just hopefully that by then the temple would've finished with its revamping project.

The temple wasn't only a spectacle in itself. Having been constructed on a hilltop, it boasts a view that was rather comparable to that of the Po Nagar's perviously. & there, more relations with the Chinese culture - The crematorium. Each unit of 'pigeonhole' below held an urn of a deceased, the lid of which bore the engraved details of the deceased. Little protruding cups held offerings of joss sticks & sometimes fresh flowers. All these - an exact replica (or was it the other way round) of the Chinese's.

Evidence of the temple undergoing some form of reconstruction. It was still rather colorful though. No depravation.

Of course when you weren't set on paying a lot of money, no one is gonna do you much favor. So here, I was left on my own again with no form of transport at noon. Standing on your own 2 feet isn't a bad thing though. You had freedom in that sense. I wandered around Hoang Hoa Tham (If I didn't remember wrongly) looking for lunch, & came across this noodle stall where I ate this beef noodles. The meat looks very rare eh? I don't remember how I got that down my throat. OMG. It's gross & sinful all the same. Yea, that's where I sat writing the postcards I'd sent back home.

Oh finally I bought lens paper to clean my miserably dirtied lens! Anyway this was at the post office. You apply glue onto your stamps with a PEN! Yes, a pen. How often do you get to perform such ingenuity? I wonder what they used to make that glue. It somehow attracted insects as well (That's a dead ant you see there below). Lovely. I wanted to stick a finger in that & pop it in my mouth, but later decided against it. It looks like caramel, doesn't it?

Itchy hands, itchy mouth, I couldn't keep myself off food. Ermmm.. This photo gets you thinking about...? Ok don't get it wrong. Sweet banana in REAL caramel this time. I regret not having taken photo of the stall selling it. It was so rare. Nothing like I'd seen. Any number of bananas on sticks soaked in dark sticky liquid in a basin. Great stuff for the taste buds. One piece was sold at 2k VND. Worthy buy indeed.

That was practically all for the day. Damn I spent almost the entire afternoon at the post office waiting for the glue on the postcards to dry. What engaging activity indeed uh?! & missed the opening hours of Alexander Yersin Museum. Oh man. Nice planning there. But I got to go back to the hotel early - an aircon one which I'd changed to this morning.