November 16th: Climbing in Huu Lung
Day 34
We had our first company today – 3 European climbers fresh from Yangshuo. The land owner returned and another debate over cash ensued. It was funny to hear another group, now with a German accent, going through the same pantomime and arguments we just made. One guy was pointing at the sky to indicate the sun traveling from east to west, to indicate days, and pointing at the 3 of them to show that they were a small group. Trying a new tactic, a young girl named Stella was trying her best to read phonetic Vietnamese, telling the landowner she was a poor student and had no money. Vietnamese is a tonal language so nothing is comprehensible if the tone isn’t correct. Not understanding any of the arguments, the landowner had returned to her previous argument, broken fruit trees, pay 200,000VND. Even our previous agreement went to the wind.
After a group effort of pairing up and body language, we had an agreement of 25,000VND per person per day. The landowner left looking satisfied, but maybe it was just the infectiousness of the loud cheer that we gave when we struck a deal that caused her to smile.
We explained our previous ordeal with the land owner to the new group and we wondered how it was that after bargaining with us for 2 days she returned to the 200,000VND fixation. However, we have told her through our translator, that if she charges an individual rate, she will make more in the end. Climbers passing through are more likely to stop and climb several days if they don’t have to pay 200,000VND every day.
We had yet another fantastic day. We’ve moved on to 6B’s and 6C’s and I on-sited every one. The grading is definitely an ego booster, maybe a half grade soft. 6C’s usually take me a couple of tries before a send. Enjoyable nonetheless! The rock is varied and the holds are still new and rough, so you have great friction. After only 4 climbs we were exhausted, but at 30 meters each you feel as though you’ve done ten. Many of Hong Kong’s climbs are quite short and bouldery, while here you need a quiet mind and good endurance.
We stopped and bought some eggs today. Cher is a language master and has made great use of her Vietnamese numerical vocabulary. Chicken eggs are 3,000VND a piece and duck eggs with a fetus inside are only 2,000VND a piece, and luckily we only brought 2 of the duck eggs without any insight. We are brave but after finding a bloody half developed duck baby, we fed them to the locals dogs.
