The Best Dressed Backpacker Bar Either Side of the Pacific

Hoi An, Vietnam, New Years fashion show brings everyone out in hand-made tailored shirts and dresses draped delicately down to perfect size and fit. The night rains on- the river so high that the first road and part way up the next block is mid-calf, but not to worry since tailored made clothes roll up fine, and if one needs new shoes, they can easily be made the next day. And if your fine Vietnamese silk stains, add a shirt to your tab and it will be delivered as requested.

Each town seems to have a “thing” for the tourists that sets it aside, weather it be a beach or museum, war site or waterfall. Hoi An, though sports a colonial old town, ancient Hindu ruins and a white sand beach, it is most known for the 200+ tailors who replace tourist shops. They are the tourist shops, for this is what one does here. Choose a style, choose your material, and go in for numerous fittings between visits to cafes and tea shops. It rained. It poured rain for days – I haven’t seen the sun since Boxing Day, and it didn’t let up long enough to even take a photo without the blur on the lens. But don your plastic rain coat long enough to make your fitting, and you will have something dry to wear to the New Year’s fashion show and well into the next year.