problem with vim via ssh

Dear All,

when I log in to a remote machine and run vim than weird things happen:

1. There is no syntax highlight (.C files, scripts ...)
2. In the "insert" mode the vim displays different characters from what I hit on my keyboard

client system: fedora 18
server : scientific linux 5.5 boron

If I do the ssh from a different system (e.g. ubuntu) the vim works fine and I neither encountered this problem
on fedora 17.

Cheers
Boris