As an expat, a lot of these really huge events are things that we normally don't even end up hearing about. While I would imagine some of the expat community is unwilling to admit this because of their own arrogance, we are a rather insignificant part of the population here. Unlike other parts of the world, the long-term residents that are not Vietnamese is actually quite small here. If there were 5000 foreigners that call Da Nang home out of the 1 million plus people that live here, I would be surprised.
So when I was going on a beach walk yesterday I was a bit surprised to see that something this huge could manage to come to town and I haven't heard anything about it.
I saw it in the distance when I was about an hour into my walk and also putting myself in danger of sunburn, as is usual for me.
As is true with most things when Vietnamese people have access to amplification, I could hear it long before I could see it. I noticed the powerful bass speakers from kilometers away and it was just curiosity the likes of "what sort of silly really loud thing are they doing now?" thing. When you hear loudness like this more often than not it is just some bar that got a new sound system or some sort of team building exercises that destroy the quiet nature of the beach but this time, at least it had the decency to be a really large event.
It's a pretty large undertaking and I bet it is pretty damn cool when it is all lit up at night. I don't know if I care enough to wander down there once all the lights are on but we'll see. Apparently this is going on for 2 days and nights and it is sponsored by Tiger Beer, hence the tiger that is on stage.
So I guess you could say that I am a bit appreciative that at least for once, the incredible amount of noise that was being created for everyone on the beach for miles in both directions at least is a major event complete with organization, security, and a real setup and not just someone that rented some over the top speakers and is now going to do super-loud karaoke for the next couple of days.
I'm not really a fan of whatever we are calling music that DJ's put on in front of crowds but the sound mixing was really good for this one although of course it was way too loud and I am sure it will be even louder as the party goes on. God help anyone that is staying in any of the hotels nearby, sleep is going to be impossible for you! Thankfully, the police here will enforce that things like this must disperse at 10pm so I suppose that is reasonable.
In the meantime the sound system completely drown out the peaceful sound of waves crashing and birds making sounds and well, I've just come to accept this part of Vietnam as a regular occurrence.