Nanning to Vietnam....Shalina tells the story.

well.......................we have made it to Vietnam, Hanoi successfully, but it took some doing :P lol
we left our hostel in Nanning as the owner made us feel about as welcome as mold would be in his hostel, it was not great. we got ourselves sorted and found the train without any problems. we were on the train with the understanding that it would take around 14 hours, a hard sleeper, so we had prepared ourselves. this however was our first mistake........................
we left at 6.45 and the first train stop was at 10.30. an angry sounding Chinese man got on the train and was inspecting everyones passports. he seemed to take great offence to mine and Sarahs passports being all correct and with the right visa, even though he spent a good 10 min going through it determined to find a mistake. we were then told to get off the train with our bags so that they could be inspected, because apparently when they did it at Nanning station, it was not good enough???? this took about half an hour before we were allowed back on the train. the train however did not move again for nearly 2 hours!!!! by which time we were both in great need of sleep and starting to get slightly concerned that we may never see our passports again??? they did however return in one piece and we were on our way. not for long though..............roughly an hour later we were again stopped at a station, told to get off the train and take our passports with us. this was made even more entertaining by having to walk across the train tracks in order to get to where we needed to be, and with Sarah not having her contacts in, she was stupidly relying on me to guide the way???? this time we just handed our passports over for around 20 min to get it stamped, so roughly 1.30 we were on our way. we were woken up again though at 4.30 by the man telling us we had arrived???? only 4 hours before we were ment to :P we got off the train, not at all well rested and looked around to see how we were going to get to the hostel? a taxi was called and we were dropped straight outside the hostel :)
we had one further issue to overcome yet though........................when we rocked up at 5 in the morning, we found ourselves locked out of the hostel, and no clear way of how to get in??? lol. we found two other girls trying to get in also, and the street outside was covered in backpackers, so we did not feel that bad and could do nothing other than laugh. we did manage to get in after realising that the bell we had been pressing was not our hostel, but in fact a house!!! :P thankfully we did not have to deal with an irate Vietnamise person screaming at us at 6 in the morning, as we would not have been able to appologise successfully in Vietnamise :S so maybe they were out??? lol. anyway we eventually got some sleep before waking up again at 9 for our free breakfast. not the easiest starts, but it has been ace since arriving, so well worth it :)
we were dead all day, just wondered round near the hostel, but last night was Chinese new year, so we had the luck of celebrating two new years within a month!!! awesome! :)
they had free beer at the hostel, free champaign, (which looked strangely like snakebite?????) free shots of vodka (it was not nice vodka :S) free fireworks display and celebrations on a very international scale with the people inn the hostel :) it was an ace night, and well worth the hassle of getting here :) the city is dead today as everyone is at home with family, but that is a good thing as it means we can clear our heads without feeling guilty about missing anything :P
hope you are all well :) xxxxxxxxxx