Our first full day in Hoi An was spent exploring the old town and looking in shoe shops. This was the tour director's dream experience. I said later it was thirty per cent history and seventy per cent shopping but the director disagreed and produced figures which were entirely opposite to mine. Hoi An is a Unesco historical site an ancient settlement on the banks of a wide river, I.n which repose several islands. As this was once an important trading port there was a clash of cultures, the Japanese and the Chinese both viewed it as a centre of commerce and both have left their remains.
An ancient Japanese covered bridge spans one of the rivers and Chinese temples abound. The small houses cluster in narrow streets which during most of the day are reserved for pedestrians u til nine thirty at night when motor bikes are allowed. The lack of engine noise makes it a pleasant plan to walk around.
The idea is that as you enter the town you buy a sheet of tickets which allows you to enter the various monuments, which are worth seeing. However, because the town is extremely commercially orientated even in Chinese temples you are asked to stop and buy trinkets. Shops inveigle you to enter, "looking is free". Nothing in the shops is priced and therefore you are expected to haggle, something that neither the tour director nor myself is very good at. However once bitten twice shy, the tour director decided to buy a top, a calculator is produced with a figure on it, we smile and enter our figure, the shop keeper laughs out loud at us and says "happy you happy me" and comes up with a lower figure until we agree a price, in the end we are quibbling about less than a pound.
These people are truly trained salespeople, attempt to leave and they will find three other things you might like.