today we are taking max's bike
because
it's easier for me to film and not have
to drive
but today we are at
vietnam's border city of lao kai which
borders
nice that's driving skillsmax which
borders yunnan province in china it
actually borders a city called
and there's some very interesting
history
here as opposed to monkai which we were
at last time
so we're going to go to a place that
overlooks the chinese border
and we're going to talk a little bit
about it let's do it
where am i going look at the chinese
right there
what's hunting uh where are you going
max i don't know good
question we will find out
it's just crazy though right across the
border completely different language
different people literally just
separated by a line
blows my mind quarantine versus
snowboarding quarantine versus no
quarantine internet versus like
well
no internet because basically facebook
and youtube by the internet
google
this is quite a small park i thought
this was going to be way bigger
i guess this is the park okay i guess
this is where i wanted to come to look
way bigger on the picture than video i
saw
get a first look at china up close
very strange
that's right there
forgotten how to read chinese oh my god
i haven't read chinese in so long
just on the other side of this river
here that is the bridge right there
connecting
well vietnam on this side
china over there
the border extends along through
this river here
i suppose we can probably get down there
i don't know how i don't know how to how
to get down there on
i assume this is the park this is not
the park that i'm standing in that would
make a lot more sense for it to be down
there
god it is so surreal
but as i was saying this place is
extremely interesting because of its
history so unlike mamkai
this place has actually been through
a war
in 1979
china
invaded vietnam and lokaya was one of
the cities where they invaded they
crossed this border right here and it
was actually destroyed and it was never
this border was not reopened until 1993.
it's actually really interesting i was
looking at a
google uh
it's called google earth google earth
images you can search in time from the
satellites over the years and you can
see
when lao kai was rebuilt after 1993 and
when
this place reappeared
pretty amazing that just in a few years
lokai has kind of returned
shall we get farther down and see if we
can see anything else
good question yes
do you think the people at work right
here are bored
probably a little more bored than us
yeah yeah
onward max
my grab driver
you wear the correct clothing for today
man
perfect
this is amazing i see oh i see a chinese
bank over there i think that might be
the bank i used to use when i lived in
china
that's funny
not my bike not your bike doesn't matter
thank you max
one really so i wanted to come over to
this road in particular
because it's very very very confusing to
me so
this right here i believe if i'm looking
at the map correctly
and this one right down here right on
the
it shows
i really don't understand this
it shows like tons of roads going in
between here look at this you see that
goes shows rose going in over the river
and stuff
and it shows this chinese road right
here right next to the river but this is
not there when you come look at it do
you see that look at that so i don't
know if this is just something wrong
with google maps so look at all these
rows on top of the river right here and
there's this road i know it's a chinese
road because of the name it says
road you can see right there
but when you come down here
at last there is just fields of
max what what is this a field of
right no no what is all this stuff
max would know better than me max the
food expert corn it's corn right okay i
thought it was corn
of course i say that after you told me
look at that look at the people
over there
you just see change in like the cars and
stuff look over there
infrastructure is completely different
the buildings look completely different
i mean you can see a stark difference in
between like the
the apartment buildings right there
the apartment buildings over here
very chinese style
apartment buildings
versus over here on the vietnamese side
still very lots of trees
much smaller buildings small hotel
little teeny tiny hotel you can barely
even see over the trees right here
man
there's just a charm to the vietnamese
side though
i do there are things i miss about china
though i miss the food
damn
it's like eggs and skyscrapers however
china i know yeah
there's no just like there's not this
like small little
jungle
small little charm that you get on the
vietnamese side
just big skyscrapers i mean
if they're both interesting in their own
way but
i don't know i prefer them
ready to go
have you noticed how close the chinese
side is like there's no lights on
anywhere you can see the tape went
across the buildings at the bottom
you won't even notice that no the only
car i've seen a few bikes go by but you
always see the security car going oh
shoot you're right
it's like shut down i guess because of
cobit huh
maybe
look at all the tape yeah i know you're
right i don't even notice that
damn
everything is like completely shut down
is there anybody even in those buildings
i don't know it looks very dark to me it
looks very very nice any clothes hanging
or anything
i want to come back tonight and see if
like the buildings are on with lights
yeah
i'm just curious because like usually
like i mean i know it's usually really
bustling yeah yeah yeah
right
anywhere no you're right
potentially just this area has to do
with like imports exports i wonder if
it's just like the fact that there's
just no business no economy or if it's
corona well no matter what it's probably
because yep
either way it's related to corona
come on there's a i want to ask this
vietnamese man to see if stuff is open
on the other side
well
what are you saying he said it is
because of corona
then norm norton said they're they're
all completely shut down
to me borders are just weird because
they're just like separating it's just
one line look how close this is look at
this
jeez that's close
holy crap yeah
what else
damn max that was pretty good you
remember that you guys might even be
able to see this on camera
[Music]
he looks like border patrol
max and i were just talking just like i
mean everything's closed now but it's
just crazy to think like
i have a chinese visa man do you have
your chinese visa still yeah we both
have our 10-year chinese visas
the benefit of being an american
but like we could literally just cross
the border go eat some food and come
back if there was no coping obviously
not now
but maybe one day soon in the future
well
maybe one day
in uh
one or two years china's not opening up
for a while
thank you grub driver
you're doing your job very nicely
the train that goes into china oh [ __ ]
it does
is that in china
that would actually not be a bad place
for a thumbnail wouldn't it
why don't you just ask her
okay that's it
yeah this is interesting is the train
goes right across to china
this is my that's my thumbnail shot new
thumbnail shot
you keep going that way
yeah let's turn around i want to ask her
a quick question
swing it around
did not sustain our
appetite this looks really [ __ ] busy
here
i don't know
see everybody
okay
hello
come on
[Music]
foreign
right here
water
[Music]
oh my god
they're like they have people like just
holy crap people wearing hazmat suits
over there still
crazy
you just missed it did you see the
person wearing the hazmat suit and like
what
what's so dirty
i guess going across
yeah well yeah they're like getting rid
of like germs and stuff covered germs
nuts
that's crazy she's she's like you know
i'm so scared anymore
i think the guy from china has moved
hazmat sees us he's like who are those
people not registered to
to more than normal okay it's okay
random people just come out hang out i
know over there in china it's just a guy
everybody here just a random see this is
like the stark difference between china
like the other side
on the other side hazmat suits
nobody there on this side just coming
and hanging out
they all know each other
no care in the world
oh
[Laughter]
foreign
[Applause]
[Laughter]
um
[Laughter]
um
foreign
so
oh my god yeah it is getting sprayed on
the other side
okay onward
how much how much do i owe you for
driving me around for the day
too much man too much
damn that side shows you how i don't
want to go china anytime soon i know
that was crazy jeez they [ __ ] spray
it he's in a hazmat dude he's just like
oh god is crazy i mean how is it gonna
get covered from the train passing by it
doesn't make any sense
nothing else
am i filming this time good thing
because i wasn't filming just now we're
back at the border
very lit up on this side
was not expecting it to be this lit up
when we came back i was expecting like
very much um
it to be dead just because of covet and
stuff but nope it is uh
very much well i'm not alive but the
lights are on at least
nobody on the roads yeah i know there's
no one over i mean i don't know if the
city's just shut down or everybody's
stuck inside or what's going on
interesting thing this is the same thing
in mamkai look at the light on each side
of the border
that's the chinese side look at all the
light from all these really bright
buildings coming up and look at the
vietnamese side
just slowly
turns into darkness
light
no light
light
no light
just as a final thought
about vietnam versus china i will say
there's one thing i really love about
vietnam that china does not have anymore
they banned is the outdoor seating like
this they haven't really banned it in
china but just putting it on sidewalks
like this and where you can just come
and enjoy like a restaurant here they
just put their stuff on the sidewalk
when the when the sun goes out
that's kind of banned in china
unfortunately now so
yeah last thoughts now max gets to have
fun driving on the shittiest road
maybe not the shitty show in vietnam one
of the shittiest roads in vietnam
enjoy max oh my god
[Music]
enjoy max
it's like being back home
on farm
watch your nuts
watch nuts