Hoi An, Vietnam
So I've been in Hoi An about two days now and I'm really enjoying it, not sure when i'll leave. The town itself is really laid-back and seems extremely safe walking around. Lots of Chinese architecture to see. You don't have as many people trying to sell you stuff like in Nha Trang and Saigon. Lots of sidewalk and corner cafes and restaurants. The shopping here is also incredible, more about that later..
Beer here is extremely cheap like most places i've been but even moreso here. Most places sell their own draft beer which they simply call "fresh beer" (bia hoi) and it's about 3000 dong a glass, or 19cents USD. It's an extremely lite and low alcohol content beer so it can usually be drank anytime. An incredible value. People seem to drink it like tea here. The locals sit on the side of the road here and drink it with breakfast, lunch, diner or anytime night; they never miss an opportunity to drink beer.
The beaches here are also nice if not better than Nha Trang, they're certainly less crowded. I spent the last two days walking around the main town, looking at all the shops, the central market and just exploring some of the sights along the river. It's much easier to walk around here than other places, the people here seem be very friendly and there is much less bicycle traffic; No problems at all. The only major problem is some areas around here are under major construction. They seem to be digging up parts of the road along town putting in new pipes/water lines which only leads me to believe that Hoi An will one day become very similiar to Nha Trang, a full blown beach resort destination.
The thing I like most about Hoi An is the fact that you can have any piece of clothing copied/made here for a fraction of the price that it would cost to buy at home. Tailoring is huge here. I guess Hong Kong, Bangkok and Nha Trang are the tailoring capitals of Southeast Asia. There are literally thousands of tailor shops that can make anything you want, custom designer suits, designer shirts, polos, pairs of jeans, winter jackets, handbags, sneakers, shoes. Anything that can be made with fabric or leather, can be made entirely from scratch here or elegantly reproduced from a magazine or replicated from a piece of clothing already in your possession. The best part is that this ready the next day (often less than 24 hours), give or take a few hours for alterations and adjustments. You can generally pick any tailoring shop because the majority of them farm the work out to the same large factory, only some of the larger tailoring shops actually do the tailoring in house.
As a result, I'm having a field day over here designing an entire new wardrobe. The hotel i'm staying at (along several other people) recommended a place called Kim Huong. I ended up having a entire suit made with Italian cashmere wool with a real silk lining (I verified this) with pants and a shirt for $85 USD. I was a bit worried at first because most of the places I reviewed on the Internet never mentioned this place and I'm almost positive they just farm the work out to a factory somewhere else. Nevertheless, It came out extremely well and i've very happy with the design. I'm having them do a few more minor alterations and it should be ready tomorrow morning. The process was painless. Once I picked out the style and fabric I wanted they precisely took all my measurements checking them again several times to make sure they were correct. I basically already had an idea what I wanted and they filled in the rest. If you have no idea, you can just browse through magazines and catalogs, point to what you want and they'll reproduce it almost perfectly. I tried to be extremely picky about stuff I wanted them to fix and they seemed to have no problem making adjustments. I'll admit I know next to nothing about suits but it looks good to me. Everything is double stitched, the seams are tight and straight with everything aligned perfectly. Nothing is uneven, buttons are sewn on tightly and more importantly, everything fits perfectly because it was tailored for me. I guess the hardest part about me buying clothing is that i'm short so everything is usually too long on me or too wide. Having proper fitting clothing is a first for me. I guess I can finally take the smug satisfaction if someone asks me "Where did you buy that shirt/suit?" I can reply "Oh this old thing..it's just a little something my tailor designed for me....oh sorry? You don't have a tailor? Such a shame I say.."
I also went to another shop called A Dong Silk to have them design some new shirts for me. I used one of my favorite Topmann shirts as a template and then I had two identical shirts with different color fabric produced. The shirt originally cost me around $50 USD, A Dong Silk charged me $14 USD/each. I picked these up today and they came out fantastic. I can't wait to wear them. I can't get over how well they copied the design; all that's missing is an exuberant price tag.
Lastly, I was fascinated by the number of places here that can make or reproduce designer jeans. Because my favorite pair of jeans were ripped/destroyed in Nha Trang I knew I wanted to have a couple knew pairs made for New Zealand. I ended up walking around town and found a shop called CQ Jeans which seems to specialize as you might have guessed only in jeans. I looked at some of their sample work and the quality looked very nice so I commissioned them to copy my pair of Desiel jeans that originally cost me about $150. After they measured me, I picked out the fabric/style that I wanted and left my jeans there for them to copy. According to them, they should be ready around 2PM tomorrow. At $30 a pair, if they come out good, I told her I would have them make one more.
So far I've already had 1 suit made, 5 shirts, and 2 pairs of jeans in progress. Basically an entire new wardrobe for about $185 USD. Just my diesiel jeans alone cost $150. Amazing and i'm sure I could have gotten everything a bit cheaper too if I haggled a bit better though I figured I wouldn't try to nickle and dime and hope for quality. I'll update here tomorrow and report on how everything else came out when I come pick my stuff up. I'm debating on whether or not I should have a second suit made now too.
