Hanoi - beer

Surprisingly, Hanoi is a beer town.

You can get draft beer ('bia hoi') from all sorts of shops and street corners, which is fresh beer sans preservatives from that morning that's been parceled out to all sorts of containers around town, to be drank that day. Here's one such container:

And one such bia hoi drinker:

And a few smart aleks at the bia hoi joint across the street from us wearing pointy hats and drinking their brews:

We also went to Legend Beer brewpub and tried their three ales - not bad:

As well as Gammerbeer brewpub, where we felt pretty uncomfortable, truth be told. The wait staff (and the other customers) there just stared at us the whole time we were there - it's more of a local place, I think. Beer wasn't bad though:

Indeed, Hanoi folk love their beers:

Tawandang German Brewery

For Halloween night, we went to Tawandang German Brewery in Bangkok. The wait staff was generally dressed up (witches, vampires, ghosts, and the Joker seemed to be the themes), which fit right in to the general eclectic nature of the place. It's a brewpub shaped like a barrel that seats 1000+ serving German style beers brewed on the premises and catering mostly Thai food and a few Thai style German dishes to constant entertainment (gamelan orchestra, dixiland jazz, lounge acts) and karaoke. The staff behind the bar spent the whole time filling tube shaped towers of beer and carrying them like rifles to the various tables.

The food pictured - Thai spiced pork knuckle, deep fried morning glory, extra long crab-filled spring rolls.

Here's a link to their site - a quick internet search will also give you some youtube videos and such - you sort of have to see it to believe it.

http://www.tawandang.co.th/

Oh, and the beer was good (the lager was actually the most notable of the three - I prefer more hops than these sweeter German styles), but man did the atmosphere work.

More food from Singapore

Some roast chicken and 'four seasons beans' at a place famous for roast chicken (it said 'spicy', but I'm so used to hot Thai food by now I added some chili to make it as spicy as I hoped), and some spicy Japanese ramen noodles with the local brew.

One of the best things to do in Singapore is eat!

Ho Chi Minh food and drink

A few shots of food and drink of various sorts in Ho Chi Minh City.

Bird's Nest canned drink (economical!), pork (like spam but flavored with citrus and other tasty seasonings) wrapped in banana leaves at the grocery store, some food choices at the grocery store food court, La Rue beer at a restaurant.

Prices at the fancy beer garden

So here I am playing Vanna White to one of the local beer gardens' price list.  This is a fancy beer garden, next to a BTS stop, in a crowded night market, with a regular expatriate and professional class crowd, and the beer is brought to you by folks dressed in logo wear for the beer brands (lots of official signage in this place).    Everything considered, those are some very reasonable prices.

And I've still never tried Federbrau.

kudos to 'Chelle for catching me in perfect display of beer prices pose.

  

More things you can see in Bangkok toilets

So aside from strange foreigners taking pictures of who knows what, in Bangkok toilets you can also see things like:

1. Signs warning you that if you leave your bag unattended a thief might steal it.  The sweating guy is the thief, not the victim (is he sweating for fear of being caught?  or is it evil sweat?).  And even though this was the men's room, it still warns you about your purse, which is a very comprehensive warning.

2. Plants drinking Chang beer.  Is there any living thing in Bangkok that doesn't drink Beer Chang?

Cambodia - Dead Fish bar and grill

Have you ever checked into a hotel, and asked to be in room 23, and everyone at the hotel immediately looks at each other with a knowing look in their eye, and then an old guy behind the counter who you didn't notice before says in a gravelly voice "room 23 - why, that's the room that nice family was killed last year... by an axe murderer!"?  No, I haven't had that experience either.  But I would imagine if I had it would feel a lot like going to the Dead Fish bar and grill in Siem Reap.

Now, to be fair, the strange feeling was probably partly because we were the only people in the place (it was huge).  And it only half looked like it was open, despite the large amount of wait staff.  Maybe it gets busy later on in the evening?  Maybe tour buses come back from the temples and the place is hopping?  Who knows.  All I know is the servers there were all acting like there was a big dark secret they didn't want us to know - like, if we stayed much longer, we were all... DOOMED!

So we stayed for a drink (Sam had a great cocktail called an Angkor Sunrise - very well mixed and highly worthwhile if you ever find yourself there, I had an Angkor draft beer that was fresh and tasty), and then skeedaddled.  No sense in getting killed by an axe wielding maniac on our first visit to Siem Reap.

Oh, and it had a crocodile pit in the restaurant.  Sweet.