URBAN DOMAIN 2024

Vietnam Yellow – Day 11 – Hoi An

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By Leah and Claire

This morning we woke up in Hue for the last time with excitement for the day ahead. After a delicious breakfast which consisted of more crepes and fruit in the gorgeous Romance Hotel, we loaded the bus and started our three and a half hour trip to Hoi An. Fortunately, the heavy rainfall did not bring our spirits down. 
Two and a bit hours into the bus trip, we stopped at a nature site right next to the beach to experience the stunning cliffs of Marble Mountain. After a long, tiring walk up what felt like 10000 stairs, we were amazed by the beautiful views of beach and town. After a quick lesson and demonstration of safety and rope techniques professional abseilers use, we enjoyed a simple but yummy lunch of a baguette with tomato, cucumber, cheese, and fruit. Then it was finally time to climb up another set of steep steps to use our new ‘pro’ techniques to a safe, yet thrillingly scary abseil down a 25 metre vertical cliff. It was hard to walk down an acute angled cliff after the rain soaked the rock making it very slippery. Many of us had the thought of slipping and falling straight down ‘to our death’, but thankfully we all survived with smiling faces, wanting to do it again. With only a couple of slips by Matt and Zeb, (on the steps, not the cliff!), we made the long journey back down the slippery steps to board the bus for the second time, just to discover an elevator just around the corner of the mountain!


After about 20 minutes of driving, we had to get off the bus because the roads were becoming too narrow for this particular bus, which caused us to split up into two smaller mini busses to take us to the hotel in the pouring rain. We arrived at Van Loi Hotel to check in and relax in our rooms until heading out to the streets of Hoi An to explore the area and markets that were kept safe from being bombed during the Vietnam war. We discovered shops that tailor clothing and jewellery for a reasonable price, as well as different bags and shoes that were made by the Vietnamese to be sold to the locals to enjoy. When it began to rain once again and the sun went down, we all ran through the rain to come together in a little restaurant for dinner. We paid for our dinner tonight and majority of the group feasted on delicious pizzas and pastas while others ordered fried rice and sweet and sour chicken to share. 
After dinner, we were given an hour of free time to roam the streets of what is known as the most romantic city in Vietnam. This was shown when origami-like lanterns were being sold to be placed in the river and float away during the night. The lanterns above the streets were absolutely astonishing, and we didn’t hide that when we all pulled out our cameras to capture the moment. With still much time to spare in the night markets, a few of us in the group decided to get temporary tattoos on our backs, arms and behind our ears. After we had enough walking, we slowly strolled back to the meeting point where we were surprised to see Vietnam Grey walking across the Hoi An bridge. It was a happy moment to see other friends and fill each other in with what’s been happening and all the fun times we’ve been having so far. We said our goodbyes and walked back to the hotel to relax before heading off to bed. 
We’re all excited for tomorrow and what has been planned, but it will be hard to top the day we just had. 
Hope you are all having fun back home and missing you all but not to worry as this experience has been amazing so far. 
Signing off, 

Leigh and Ross 
Ps. Happy birthday Mum. Sorry I missed it, but I hope you had a great day. Love you lots 💕 -Leah 

TLC Temples – Day 11

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Today, we started off with another drive up into the hills.This time, we went to visit the Luang Prabang Elephant Camp. Here, we learnt about the elephants in Laos from our guide Joy. There were once over 4,000,000 elephants in Laos; however, this number has been rapidly declining. Today, there are only a few thousand left in the wild. We all felt very fortunate to have the opportunity to spend time with these amazing creatures. We were able to ride, feed and wash some of the elephants that had been rescued, including a 4 year old baby elephant. The elephant handlers were extremely enthusiastic, especially when it came to taking photos of us riding the elephants. Many of us now have as many photos from the elephant ride as we had from the last ten days! 

On the way back from the Elephant Camp, we visited a Hmong Village. This village holds as many as 400 people with approximately 80 families all up. Many of these families will be made up of eight or more people, but there is only one house per family. Many of these children within the village haven’t had the opportunity like we do to have a proper education and have to work from a very young age. To see so many children trying to sell things to us was quite confronting. 

After venturing back to the hotel we were split into groups of 5 for the Great Race around Luang Prabang. We were staggered 15 minutes apart in our departure time. In the race, we became well acquainted with the steep stairs of Mount Phousi. We climbed up into the clouds to take a selfie only to descend back down the other side to continue our journey. Apologies to anyone who will receive a postcard from a very rushed and pressured student. This was one of the many tasks that we were faced with in our race the finish line. 

This evening, we went to a traditional Baci ceremony, in a nearby restaurant. When we entered, we were asked to sit on a mat before some elders from villages near Luang Prabang, who performed a number of blessings on our group for good fortune and health. Next, the elders tied bracelet blessings around our wrists, moving from student to student while 2 local boys played traditional Laos music. It felt very special to have been able to participate in this ceremony. Then, a dance troupe performed a series of traditional dances for us. The dancers were all about the same age as us, and they wore various traditional costumes for each dance.

Tonight we also came celebrated two birthdays – Jackson’s and a belated birthday for Molly. The two birthday cakes were a welcome burst of sugar for us all. 

Once we returned from dinner we all participated in a circle time. This gave us time to reflect on what we had each learned/taken from the trip. It took a while to go around such a big circle, but it was nice to hear everyone’s thoughts on the trip so far.

Tomorrow we leave Laos for Cambodia, and while we’re all excited, it is hard to accept that we are heading towards our final trip destination.

By Hannah and Josh.

China 2016 – Going “Off-line”

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Dear Families and Friends of China 2016,

Tomorrow we will be spending more time exploring the beautiful city of Xi’an. At the end of the day we will be boarding the overnight train to Shanghi. Therefore, due to the lack of internet, we will be unable to post a blog and will be offline.

Fear not! We will still write the blog and take photos and post them as soon as we are able.

Kindest Regards 

The China Team 

China- Day 10

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When we went down to breakfast this morning, as soon as we walked in, everybody’s eyes instantly went to the fries that were sitting at the buffet. People lunged at the fries, as if they were gold bars, and they were hoping to grab a few. 
The bus pulled up to the Huilin Community Centre after a short 10 minute ride. This was the venue for the next part of our community service. When we entered we were greeted by a group of smiling faces, eager to welcome us with song and dance. After a number of energetic and enchanting performances, we attempted to replicate the hospitality, and we almost hit the mark. Following these lovely performances, we split into groups to interact and engage with the students. Our time with these students was a great experience.
We then sadly farewelled the students and headed for the next part of our big day. Due to the bus driver’s tardiness, Mr. Toohey decided that the best solution would be to take the Chinese Metro. This was an interesting experience, as despite it being the middle of the day, it was as if it was Flinders Street Station during rush hour. We forced ourselves onto the train amongst many Xi’an locals. After one station we arrived at Zhonglu (Bell Tower) station, to begin our bike ride atop the city wall. 
We began our journey at south gate of Xi’an city walls of some dinky dual suspension bikes. At the start of our journey, we were forced to take a slow approach, as we were lead by Mr. Toohey, and penalised if we even slightly passed him. After we reached the west gate, Mr. Toohey decided we could go at our own pace. While some raced ahead, others chose to take a leisurely, scenic ride. It was a pleasant ride, as the weather was brisk and overcast with a slight smog, caused by the pollution. After an hour of riding we completed our loop and ended up, once again at the south gate.
We finished our enjoyable day with an overly plentiful serving of dumplings and some night time shopping.
-Celine, Jack, and Matt 🙂
Technical Issue

Greetings Families and Friends of China 2016,

We have experienced a minor technical issue with many of today’s photos, there should be more to come soon.

Kindest Regards 

The China Team 

Vietnam Yellow – Day 10 – Hue

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By Sophie and Carien 
Today started off with a welcoming breakfast full off western food, like crepes with chocolate sauce, which we were all very excited about, and the usual scrambled eggs. We then headed off on an adventurous bike ride around Hue. Let’s just say it wasn’t the usual relaxing bike ride. Through the busy streets of Hue we managed to cross our first road of constant traffic successfully. Five minutes into the bike ride we took our first stop, which happened to be at a primary school. It was amazing to see the difference, because when we arrived we probably saw a million little kids storming through the traditional but modern school. It honestly felt like I was in a jungle surrounded by little kids, boys and girls, overly excited to see us. It was so much fun talking to the kids and trying to communicate. Even though we might have misunderstood some words, it was definitely a highlight of the day leaving everyone in awe. 


Next, we hopped back on our bikes to ride to a unique place that creates different types of incense. Incense is traditionally used by Buddhism followers who take 1 or 3 incense sticks when they go to pray. If you take one incense it means everything but if you take three each one stands for something different; earth, heaven and the God. Some of us were lucky enough to even get the opportunity to create some ourselves. 
Next we had the chance to take in an incredible view of the Perfume River. Everyone took a deep breath while Hoang shared historical background information on how the last kings have shared the same view as we were seeing. The final stop before heading back to the hotel was to the third emperor’s tomb. Hoang gave us insight to the sentimental value of this historical monument. From his speech we learned that the emperor had over 100 wives. As he could not have a child with any of them (as a result of an earlier illness) he adopted three children.


We discovered he was a very romantic guy, who was down to earth and loved nature and his country. His actual tomb, where his body was stored deep below the ground, was only a small part of the huge environment we had entered. We learned that for a tomb the environment must contain a lake and a mountain. By the lake he had built a resting place and an area that also consisted of a theatre and another beautiful house that held some of the body’s of the kings wives. Ultimately, the third kings tomb was an amazing monument to see even though we nearly melted in the 30 degrees heat. 
After some free time to freshen up we headed out to dinner which Hoang. He as a little cagey and it was not till we arrived that he told us we were having a Royal dinner. Lucy and Liam were nominated as the Queen and King for the night and the rest of us were the princes and princesses. We all got a special gown with all sorts of different designs on it and we can’t forget about the matching hats that summed up the whole outfit. We then elegantly made our way into the dinning hall and enjoyed a night of traditional music and meals with lots of laughter. 


While roaming the night markets along the Perfume River we experienced the fun night life Hue has to offer. It is safe to say that although this might have been one of the busiest days so far, it was a remarkable adventure with many ups and downs (literally, hill after hill, on the bikes).
We miss and love you all very much xx

Sophie and Carien 

“Pagoda’s Pigs”

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Dear families and friends of our travelling Pagodas,

Thanks to the wonderful donations made by a lot of you, here is part of the result of the contributions and the way in which our students have made an impact.

I noticed that this photo did not come through on the original blog post and it is simply too wonderful not to share! My copy is a small file but you get the gist and are able to connect to this spectacular moment.

Luisa Ingram

pigs-in-the-village

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