Snapshots...

Well, the times here are not too eventful sometimes. However, there are still opportunities for nice pictures. Especially during raining season you can catch exceptional situations:

This picture was made with the iPhone 6 and not photoshopped. It looked exactly like that.

As well there are amazing sunsets, which we can see from our office:

Or amazing cloud formations:

Or the sunrises can be very beautiful, too:

Sometimes, when I'm on the way to customers, then I stop at the street and get some coconuts for the office. It's always delicious and refreshing to have fresh coconuts in the fridge and to drink the coconut water. This is how they sell it on the streets:

And here some random nightshots which I took recently:

Dong Khoi

View from Sheraton Hotel

Nguyen Hue

Opera

My parents were visiting me in HCMC for 4 days recently. So of course I showed them around. And we went to the Cu Chi tunnels. This time, the guide somehow forced me to walk through the tunnels, which I actually wanted to avoid.

Well, I will have some more visitors coming this year. I will them all advise to go through the tunnels. This is a really good work out. Even though I just did something like 50m down there, I could feel my legs still after 3 days. Interesting experience.

Back to Europe (again)!

Almost one month without an update here. I'll try to update more frequently in the coming weeks.

Well, for my birthday I try to be at home every year. Fortunately I could take one week off and went back home to Germany. In terms of temperature, it was basically no difference compared to Vietnam. We had up to 36 degress centigrade. However, it still feels a bit more fresh, since the humidity is much less.
I took some little drives with my motorbike in the area. It was really nice, driving with a bit more power and a bit less chaos...

In order to cool down a bit we made a little trip to Switzerland, to Samnaun, to be precise. I always somehow wanted to go there. First of all, due to the landscape and secondly due to the shopping possibilities. Fortunately there were not many tourists and it was really quiet and peaceful. Exactly what you need after some time in chaotic and hot Vietnam.

Samnaun is a duty free area, where you can shop alcohol, cigarettes, perfume, jewelery and other stuff pretty cheap. You just have to watch how much you bring back into the EU, as there could be customs checks at the border to Austria.

Samnaun belongs to the Silvretta Skiing area, which is a huge skiing area in the alps and to which Ischgl, Austria belongs as well.

We went for a beautiful hike in around 2500m height:

Unfortunately as usual, holidays are over way too fast. Before leaving I had a little birthday party. During the party I stepped into a little piece of glas with my barefoot heel. However, I didn't feel anything until the next day. Just a little pinch, and I tried to remove it by myself. Didn't work out. So I flew back to Vietnam with the souvenir in my heel. Nevertheless I wanted to get rid of it and I dicided to go to a hospital in Ho Chi Minh City as soon as I arrived back. Fortunately I immediately could go, and they removed the glas from my heel. Even though the equipment was rather old, evertyhing was clean and all needles and instruments sterile, as far as I could tell.

There is still a little wound in my heel, but everything is healing without complications. Of course I had to pay immediately at the hospital. The bill was around 21USD. I think that's fair.

So, next weekend my parents will be here in HCMC and I'm really looking forward to welcoming them here!

Boat "Trip"

Recently I've been invited to visit a river cruise boatin the docks, which was close to be completed. The boat is foreseen to be operating in Myanmar. The design of the boat is inspired by the old Mississippi River Boats.
It was quite interesting, and I guess I will not get a chance soon again to see a boat like that.

See here some impressions:

The ship yard

The river boat:

In- and outside the boat, still some work to be done:

Upper deck

The Bar

Bridge

Everything hand crafted

Anchor winch

Engine room

And here are some pics, how the boat was being transported to Myanmar. The boat cannot go off shore, it would not be able to do the journey on the ocean. That's why a special vessel was ordered which took the boat inside of his "belly" to transport it to his final destination.