A Teacher’s Adventure!

   

What a great lady!

On the 

 

Dragons!

Memorial Day in Boulder, Colorado!  That could only mean one thing, running 6.2 miles in the Bolder Boulder.  Lindsay and I completed in about an hour through the mist and 53,000 other runners.  It was actually a perfect day for running.  

This is a tradition for the two of us (15 times!).  She is also helping me to get ready for this next adventure.  I am still in a little awe at the fact that not only did I agree to go to Vietnam for nine weeks but I looked for this opportunity!  I am getting a little scared!  I have the guest bed loaded with all the stuff that I think I might need.  You should see the pile!  I went to get my suitcase and discovered it has holes in it.  I guess it was a good think I looked first.  Shots are almost done, one more set. Money is raised!  My school, Dawson, awarded me the Wolf Scholarship for International Study.  That will make all the side trips possible.  I leave a week from Thursday and report cards.  (I guess I had better start working on those!)  I am going to try to write as often as I can.  Hope you enjoy this journal and PLEASE respond whenever you would like to!  Debbie

 

May 24th

Last day of school was yesterday!  I am going to miss my class this summer!  They were all great kids.  They have given me some good advice for this adventure however.  They want me to drink snake blood (we saw that on a video about Vietnam) and they want me to bring back snakes so they can try it!  i will do my best.  I only lack a few report cards, one more set of shots, packing (oh yeah!) and making sure the house is ready to be left alone.  Lindsay and Michael are going to do most of the work this summer. Thanks to a few parents, I have a new collection of songs to teach my Vietnamese children and I have gone out and bought postcards of Colorado.  I am busy printing other pictures of my children, classroom, and my doggie!  I have started a written journal as well.  Wow!  This is  a BIG adventure for me!  My heart starts beating a little faster just thinking about it but I know I am going to come back with wonderful tales and new memories!  Please respond whenever you have questions or comments!  i can get right back to you! 

 

June 4th

TOMORROW is the day!  I am both scared and excited.  I have packed and unpacked several times.  Put stuff in, taken stuff out….just ask Lindsay and Michael, they both have to sit there while I did it!  Brutus, my dog, and Mookey, our cat, are both getting a little edgy as they watch me pack.  I have included a picture of them as they shared the room while I packed.  Excited looking, huh?  The kids and I are having dinner tonight (Amy by phone) and then Lindsay takes me to the airport tomorrow morning.  The next chapter will be in my new home in DaNang!  See you then!

I think it is June 9th and I am here.  Sitting in the living room of my new home for the next nine weeks.  The girls that I thought I was going to live with all LEFT for the states today.  Oh well, I had a great time with them yesterday!  My first scooter ride (me on the back!)  They are absolutely crazy.  There are no laws really so everyone just weaves in and out.  The streets are crowded and there are people everywhere.  The land is beautiful though and VERY hot!  i slept with the fan right on me last night and I usually hate a breeze right on me but not here!  We went to the beach and the river yesterday.  it is beautiful.  The sand is a light brown and very soft.  Everyone here goes either at 5:00am or 5:00 pm  they are not sun worshippers!  They wear long sleeves and long pants because they do not want any sun.  i sat in one of the little round bowl-like fishing boats.  I will post the pictures.  Everything is pretty crowded and there are bars on all the windows and doors.  The pick-pocketers are suppose to be pretty bold so I have been instructed on how to hold my purse walking or on the motor bike.  I am hoping to get a bike tomorrow so I can ride around.  Some of the teachers say that is almost scarier than a motor bike but I am going to try it.  I am teaching today already.  I will meet my students tonight.  I am actually pretty excited.  I am not sure what I am going to teach but tonight I plan to share pictures about Colorado and myself.  tomorrow I will begin with the real curriculum.  This weekend I am going to Hua An, I hope.  There is a group of students from California here for the next 28 days so i hope to catch a ride with them.  this is going to be a crazy nine weeks!

 

Wednesday, June 11 ( I think!)

Today is another Hot but adventurous day in DaNang.  I taught a class this morning of 16 little children (7 to 9) that know absolutely no english.  it was a lot of fun.  I got to give each of them an English name.  I borrowed from many of you, thank you.  There is now a Lindsay, Amy and Michael living in Vietnam.  I had fun telling each of the children a little about whom ever I named them after.  They just light up!  Beth, I named a shy, cute little girl Charlotte!  After teaching, Hai had me do a little talk for all the teachers.  That was fun too.  Again, I drew examples from all of my colleagues at Dawson-thank you!  This afternoon, I had my first experience of riding a “bike” on the streets of DaNang.  There are absolutely NO rules on the road.  Some little old ladies, yes ladies, ride going the wrong way!  The bikes we have are a little scary.  The one I had has a moving seat and the handle bars aren’t even.  So, I am balancing the bike, trying not to get hit and trying to remember where I am going so I can find my way back!  wow!  I went to this cool place called Bread of Life.  It is a restaurant that serves American food down by the river.  The amazing thing about this restaurant is that it is totally staffed by deaf Vietnamese.  The restaurant was started by a couple from Pennsylvania about five years ago.  I met the owner and she was truly amazing.  (She talks more than me!)  I will try to get pictures and post them.  I have loved reading your comments.  Keep them coming!  I love you all.

 

June 12th

I went to the orphanage today.  it was not at all what I expected.  it is just a store front that has been converted to an orphanage.  They pick up children from the streets or accept children from parents that can no longer take care of their children.  They can not be adopted.  If the children are old enough they go to public school.  If they come in too old to go to school, they try to get them into a vocational school or something like that.  The girls learn how to do fingernails etc and the men learn how to be mechanics.  The youngest was 3 and he was dropped off just 2 weeks ago.  The children played and read for the entire 2 hours I was there without any adult supervision!  I was so impressed.  They read, played chess, a board game like sorry and played badminton.  They have no place outside to go so all of this happens in the open “front room”.  It had no furniture except for a few bookcases.  I am hoping to go back next Thursday as well.  I was a human jungle gym for a few of them.  They loved the book Green Eggs and Ham!  This afternoon I went exploring.  i went to a jewelry shop to exchange my money.  They give you a better deal than the banks.  Then, i went to the big city market.  What a place!  Take a Mexican market and double the people and things in the same amount of space!  Wow.. i included some pictures but they just don’t do it justice.  At one meat store there were 1/2 grilled baby pigs!  head and all! Later today I am headed to a tailor.  You can get anything made in about 2 hours!  I am going to get a tradition dress made.  Should be fun!

Friday

Hi Everyone!  I made it to the tailor yesterday.  His name is Mr. Loi.  What a great man.  His daughter is studying in Texas!  She lived in colorado springs for awhile too.   What a small world!  he had us look through expensive American catalogs to decide what we wanted.  I picked out a beautiful, long, loose white blouse.  He then, took me to a fabric store a short walk from his shop and helped me pick out what I wanted the blouse to be made of.  Then, back to get measured.  he drew this very quick sketch of the blouse and then went to work.  i should have it tomorrow!  The cost will be around $10.00!  I taught my class this morning of children that do not have any background in English.  They can now say Hi!  Hello!  What is your name?  My name is…..  They also learned to respond when I clap and what “zip the lips” means.  Ha! Ha!  I spent the afternoon at the beach.  It is so beautiful.  There is no one there during the day  because they think you are beautiful or handsome if your skin is as white as can be!  Instead of Sunless tanning lotions they have whitening lotions!  I thought that everyone wore masks because of the exhaust and pollution but the wear them because they do not want the sun on their skin.  The girls also wear long gloves like evening gloves when they ride their motor bikes to keep the sun off of their arms.  if I go to the beach at 4:30 to about 6:00 in the morning, however, the beaches are loaded with people exercising, walking, swimming, you name it.  it is pretty cool.  In the evenings, they repeat the same thing and they also walk along the river in the evenings.  I am going to try to get someone to go to the river with me tonight.  Tomorrow we are off to Hoi An.  It is an old,old city from the time of the Chinese.  We are going first to a large orphanage to visit with the children there.  The whole school is going.  I will try to take lots of pictures and post them.  I can’t believe I have already taught for a whole week!  So far, so good for my tummy and all that.  I had a bad headache yesterday for awhile until I drank some more water.  it is just plain hot here!

Sunday Night

What a GREAT weekend it has been.  On Saturday morning, everything here seems to happen VERY early, we met at the school and took all the children and all the staff to an orphanage just outside of DaNang.  (If you have read the book When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, we went through the part of town that the story takes place in.) We met with about 50 orphans from the ages of around 5 or 6 to probably around 15.  The children and staff were divided into groups and we played games with the children.  I was in charge of a group!  I am quickly learning that I really don’t need much language skills to teach a game or let someone know I am interested in what they are telling me!  We stayed for about 3 hours.  I got a tour of the orphanage and will post a few pictures.  next, two of the Vietnamese staff members took myself and 8 volunteers from the school to a town near by called Hoi An.  It was one of the first ports in Vietnam, mainly visited by the Chinese or Indonesian.  It is one of the few cities near Danang that was not destroyed during the American War.  It is now a big tourist spot and I saw more white skin there than I have seen since home!  Most of the visitors ,however, are from Australia or France.  We shopped and stopped for drinks and went sight seeing.  One of the young boys had a suit made in two hours!  it fit like a glove.  i went to a shoe store to just look and shoes and they MADE me shoes to fit MY feet!  Can you believe that?  Custom made shoes.  Pretty cool!  I get them tomorrow.  (They deliver to DaNang) I also bought a beautiful painting of Vietnam, pretty modernistic.  I included a few pictures of the river in Hoi An.  It was amazingly beautiful.  The water is pretty polluted but pretty to look at.  The beggars on the river have been the first I have seen.  It is against the law here and the law really is the law!   today, Sunday, I went to a morning meeting of a group of international fellowship.  They were from Kenya, Australia, America, New Zealand, England, and maybe somewhere else.  It was great to meet them.  I was invited by the couple that run Bread of Life (the deaf run restaurant) to go to a place called Soua.  It was about an hours drive up into the mountain south of DaNang.  We went through a tunnel that cut through the mountain (the tunnel was 4 or 5 times longer than Eisenhower!)  We came out up on the mountain overlooking a bay.  All around the bay were rice paddies, water buffalo and small groups of little houses.  Everything here is pretty run down but it was still beautiful.  the big fishing nets were pulled up to dry for the day and the little boats were just floating quietly.  We went on into the mountains to pick up a deaf teacher that is working at a Catholic orphanage/school.  That was a road!  The Catholic schools here are only allowed to work with children that are minorities, disabled in some way or retarded.  They do not want any of the “good” children being exposed to another way of life!  Interesting.  Anyway, we picked her up and continued on up the mountain to Suoa.  That word means stream and the recreation area is a place were the rocks in the stream have been cut out by the water.  it is very similar to a slick rock area in Sedona.  Everyone was playing in the water and jumping around.  The mountains were all around us with the clouds hugging the peaks.  In the pictures you will notice most of the Vietnamese are wearing life jackets.  that is because very few people here know how to swim.  The rocks were so slimy and the water was moving so quickly that it was hard to get out of the stream.  I really had a good time.  I teach again tomorrow (3 1/2 hours at 2 different times.  I am headed off to check out the beach or the river tomorrow afternoon.  I also do not have any food in the house so maybe I should postpone my fun and go grocery shopping.  Let me see, fun….groceries….I will let you know in my blog tomorrow!  check out the pictures.  

Oh yes, Hai, the owner of the school, is still looking for two teachers to teach for nine months at his school.  I you know of anyone that would be interested, have them email me at djenkins@dawsonschool.org.  He will provide housing, internet, salary (not much by American standards but great for Vietnam), and airline(I think) if they stay for the 9 months.  It has been a wonderful experience for me.  Pass this along to anyone you know.  Thanks!

more pictures.  I don’t know why it puts up that ?  If anyone knows, let me know!

Isn’t that a great picture.  He was just floating down the river!

t

Tuesday:

Hi Everyone!  today I really did have to work.  I went to the orphanage in the morning and volunteered.  There is a little three year old boy there that is darling and OUT OF CONTROL!  but still darling.  We were teaching the kids how to play duck, duck, goose and all he did was run all around the circle and try to get in the way.  this was not the way he was behaving the last time I was there so I started asking questions.  After much time and asking the same questions many times over….I found out that his parents had come over the weekend and taken his older brother (5) home to the country and now he was there alone.  I felt so bad for him.  I had brought some beads and yarn so they could make necklaces and of course I was going to try to teach some math or colors or numbers or something.  Anyway, these kids are really smart!  They count everything by sets!  it is amazing! And they are so fast with their basic facts!  No wonder the US is loosing all those math competitions.  I put out the beads in little bowls and let them make necklaces after the lesson.  This little guy was working so hard!  Remember, he is only 3!  he made an entire string of beads, probably 30 or more, and then had me tie it off.  He told me it was for his mom!  I almost cried!  I will include some pictures of him working.  After my time at the orphanage, I decided it was time to explore.  Off the “main” streets here are all these little alleys.  I have been trying to restrain myself from going down them because the motorcycles just zooom out of them!  Well, it was quiet so off I went.  What a little paradise!  Imagine your neighborhood with streets about two feet wide, the yards are fenced in and made of cement, there are orchids hanging everywhere and bird cages with beautiful little birds singing and then, to top it off, all your neighbors are sitting outside on little stools (about 5 inches off the ground)  talking.  It was great!  What community feeling!  The children are all out playing cards (these little cards that you throw down when you win.  I have not figured it out yet)  riding bikes, you name it!  I saw one little guy peeing into a wash basin and about 3 minutes later his mom came out and washed dishes in the same basin!  I don’t think he was suppose to do that!  In the afternoon I visited a a bookstore to start collecting books to bring home.  I got some penmanship books today.  the children’s writing is absolutely beautiful!  They learn to write on paper that looks like graph paper but with smaller squares.  The letters are more intricate than ours and they do not have an f, a Z or some other letter.  They do have two As, three Os and some extra letters too.  The accents are all over the place!  Wish me luck on those lessons!  I took pictures of a public school today but they are all closed for summer.  Oh well, I will have to come back!  Till tomorrow  Sorry!  the pictures posted at the beginning.  Who would have guessed!  Well, I am off to the beach tomorrow for lunch at some little sidewalk something!  I am going with a teacher from another school, from Nevada, that has been here for 10 months!

Wednesday

Wow!  What a day!  Everything here goes by so FAST!  I started the morning teaching my class of children that have had absolutely no English!  What a blast!  I feel like I am just playing charades for an hour and a half!  they are beginning to get a little though!  They all still think their name is Debbie!  I have just started laughing!  today, they had to learn “How are you today?  Fine thank you, and you?  Fine thank you!  They had absolutely no idea what they were saying but they said it pretty well after and hour!  They learn the nouns a little bit easier.  After teaching I went to meet Amy (teacher from Nevada) and we went to get a slushy (these wonderful ice drinks made up of fruit and ice. Strange fruit mind you!)  And we could not because the power was out.  That happens a lot here!  so, I got a scooter taxi and off we went to this little restaurant by the beach.  I orderer a bune mu op la.  Sounds good, huh?  It is this great bread, kinda like a little bagette but the outside is not as hard)  With egg, tomato and cucumber.  (Yes, more cucumber !)  not too bad.  and an avacado shake.  Everyone said they were great.  Not so much!  Oh well, I have to try everything at least once.  Then, off to the beach.  it was a great day to lie there and watch this guy raking the bottom of the water. I could not tell what he was doing.  I think that maybe he was fishing for crabs or something.  He never did bring anything out.  Next, scooter ride home and off to teach school.  My evening was VERY exciting!  I went with the students from California and three of us had a delicacy called “egg with wings”  yep, that’s right!  I have included a few pictures.  It is a duck egg that has just started making a baby duck.  They boil them for a while and then, you break open the shell and you are suppose to just spoon it out and eat it.  Well…..I did really good at breaking it open, does that count? There is still a big blob of yolk in the egg and everyone said to eat that first so I did.  it tastes like a really rich chicken egg.  Then you eat this stuff that is gray and yucky looking.  I mean really yucky looking!  You can see the beginning of little feathers!  Open up little one!  I put it in my mouth and really did try to eat it!  I promise.  It really did not taste that bad , I just could not get what it looked like out of my mind!  So…I did not finish it.  The pictures are great though!I forgot to tell you how you know who has eggs each night on the street.  They set up their little tables like everyone but the burn a little oil lantern on the front and that is how you know who has the eggs.  Pretty cool.   Next, we went to wash it down with this sweet drink they make using raw sugar cane.  They have this machine that they put the sugar cane through over and over again and it squeezes out every bit of juice.  It kind of looks like an old washing machine that had rollers on the top.  They squeeze a cumquat into the liquid and add ice, put it in a little plastic bag and you are served!  It was a hundred times better that the egg with wings!  Gastronomical Wonders for the day!  Maybe tomorrow I will just stick with grapefruit!

Saturday

It is another hot yet exciting day in Danang!  I had to write the first little reports on my students this week.  I don’t mind these reports cards, you write one good thing about each one and one thing they need to work on.  Pretty cool!  The children here seem to learn very quickly.  They all have access to TV and many of the channels are either from Australia or the BBC.  The only media from the states is CNN and then movies that are either translated on the bottom or voiced over.  Yesterday was VERY hot here and hardly any breeze but after I taught I had to explore a little anyway.  I headed to the market which still is an adventure all its own!  First you have to manage to cross the street!  One foot in front of the other, slowly, NEVER go backwards or you will get killed!  bikes, scooters, siclos (bike with a seat in front) cars, trucks, man pulled carts, bike pulled carts, you name it -and you have to dodge them all because NO ONE stops!  Yesterday i saw a man with a bag of something on the back of his scooter that was two men could not lift and off he drove.  One of the other teachers told me about a a scooter she saw with a fridge on it!  They are truly amazing!  I am going to try to spend one day just taking pictures of what people carry around here and how they do it.  This morning, i was walking to school and a young mother had her maybe one year old little girl holding on to the seat of her bike (on the fender mind you) and her 2 year old little boy behind her.  Off they went!  No car seats for these kids! today, we took a group of children to the city park and to the “zoo”  The animals look so sad!  Their cages are teeny, cement bottoms and no real habitats.  Some are even alone.  I did take some great pictures of the workers and people in the park though. There was a group of people gathering to take wedding photos and they posed with the children.  I was just standing there, kind of behind the children and the bride walks up to me and ask me to pose in the wedding pictures!  Wow!  I did not know if I was suppose to be complemented or not!  Someday, when they show their children their wedding pictures, there I will be!

Next, the staff took us to lunch to this little restaurant down an alley somewhere.  We had these crepes made from some kind of yellow beans that are ground up and made into a kind of pancake dough then cooked with sprouts and meat.  The meat is grilled on a stick similar to Bali.  They were great dipped in a peanut sauce.  Then, we had rice paper to wrap up the meat sticks, greens and unripe banana slices.  Dipped in peanut sauce, of course.  Great lunch!  They just keep bringing it as long as you keep eating.  They then charge you by how many plates or sticks there are at the table.  We had a coconut juice to drink as well.  I have found this little lady around the corner from the school though that serves the best smoothy type drink.  You just point to what ever you want in the smooth and she makes it right there!  5000 dong!  That is about 40 cents.  Great stuff!  Here are a few pictures I hope you enjoy!

The little lady you see is 75!  She makes her living by carrying her little “store” on her shoulders, selling different types of rice cakes and popcorn.  She was really nice!  I immediately dropped my rice cake though, they are about 12 inches across and really thin.  They make them by squishing up rice, adding black sesame seeds and then drying them either on the top of their house of the side of the road.  Hopefullly mine was dried on the roof or I just ate a whole lot of dust!  The kitchen was the restaurant where we ate the great yellow- beaned crepes.  All the kitchens are in the front of the restaurant and outside.  I think it is because it is so hot.   It was pretty cool to watch!

Monday, June 23

This weekend was crazy busy!  I started the day by visiting the orphanage with our school.  We took gifts, played games and sang songs with the children.  They had me lead a song!  Now, that was just crazy.  They even gave me a loud horn so I could not fake it!  I did a hello song which actually was pretty fun.  We stayed for about an hour and then took our school kids to a city park.  There were animals again, in little tiny cages.  I taught school in the early evening and then we went to a DISCO  Yes, a DISCO!  It was amazing.  Strobe lights that made everything go in and out.  Everyone was SO crowded.  The bouncers were huge and the music was so loud that I did not hear again until Sunday night.  At the table, everyone had their own “helper”  THe men were all dressed pretty normal, nice but normal.  The women, on the other hand, were wearing VERY little!  Some had Blonde hair and some were cross-dressed.  What a place!  We, of course, stayed and danced for quite a while.  The cllub served drinks by the single drink but most people were buying whole bottles-  Crown Royal, Jim Beam, hard, expensive stuff.  When you took a sip, the waittess refilled your glass.  They also brought these great little appetizers to the table, fruit, nuts, stuff like that and then, we got to pay for it!  The most expensive night so far in Vietnam.  But, worth it!  I got up early Sunday to meet some new friends and then we went to lunch in this little hole in the wall restaurant.  I ordered crispy noodles with sea food and it was wonderful!  The rice cooked was as big as a pot that you might invision being a witch’s brew pot!  It was huge.  Again, the food was great and only cost me around $3.50 with my drink.  Next, we went to a place called Marble MOuntain.  It is right near DaNang.  It is this mountain that just rises out of the beach and is made entirely of marble.  The monks have used it as a sanctuary for hundreds of years because there are these fabulous caves inside.   During the ewar, the AMericans did not know there were caves and the Viet Cong were using it as a hospital and supply depot.  This mountain is less than one mile from the huge American Base in DaNang (It is only a wall and a few watch towers now with some barracks.  I will include some pictures later.  It was as close to Jurassic Park as I have been!  Spooky.  All natural lighting and slick rocks!  THere are huge buddas and gardens and pagodas.  Wow!  I am hoping that I will have time to go back before I leave. THe tunnels were so small that we had to climb on our knees!  Then, off to Hoi An again,  They are hosting the Miss Universe Pagaent there this weekend so they are getting everything ready.  The lanterns were hung and are beautiful.  I bought some more paintings and a few souvenirs to share with everyone.  Today, I got a foot massage after I taught in the morning.  I paid 70,000 dong (around $3.50 for one hour and they massaged my feet for about thirty minutes, then my legs, then my head, and finally my back!  It was fantastic!  And that is a foot massage?  I am going back to see what a whole body massage is!  I am running again tonight and hopefully I won’t get lost this time!  The evening will end with yet another fabulous fruit smoothie!  I think I love this country even if I have sweated more these passed 2 1/2 weeks than the whole rest of my life put together!

Fro

this is the big cave at Marble Mountain.  Sorry it is sideways!  During the war, the Viet Cong had a hospital in this room.  The other is me, at the top of the Mountain.  We had to climb through a tiny, tight cave to get here on very slick marble.  And, of course, I was in flip flops!  The ocean is that beautiful and the water is warm!  the beach is the end of the famous China Beach.

this is the big Budda in one of the pagoda areas at Marble Mountain.  It was carved out of the marble right there on the mountain!  

Again, a part of Marble Mountain.  To get to these two pagodas, we had to climb these very steep, uneven steps but it was worth it!  They were carved right where they stand!  The gardens around them were absolutely beautiful as well.  One of the unique parts of Marble Mountain is that it is quiet.  NO WHERE in Vietnam is quiet!

this is a Vietnamese orchestra practicing in Hoi An for the Miss Universe Pageant.  If you watch the show, this is what you will see but they will be all dressed up I am sure.  they were playing on the side of a little river that flows into the main channel  It is right at the Japanese Bridge.  The music was wonderful and very Vietnamese!

One of the little portable restaurant ladies.  I have not actually had a meal from one of them yet but i have bought drinks and the like from women that have restaurants that appear on the sidewalks at all different hours of the day!  Pretty good stuff and all very cheap!

Monday!

This was another amazing weekend!  We went to a city called Hue.  It is north of Danang about 100 miles.  We took a bus and saw the most amazing landscapes.  Lots of people working very hard.  I am so amazed by the hard-working people here.  Starting at such young ages they are off helping the family make a living.  I took a cyclo ride last week and the gentleman told me he had been driving a cyclo for 20 years.  he only makes around $30.00 a month and his children can’t go to school.  he spoke passable English because of all the tourist that he has taken around.  Many of the children are helping to clean tiles in the rubble, riding on bikes delivering things, I even saw a group of children taking apart electronic things to gather the wires, circuits and copper.  I am pretty sure they probably recycle it.

Hue was the capital of Vietnam until 1945 when it moved to Hanoi.  many of the buildings and tombs are several hundred years old and represent the different dynasties of rule.  I enjoyed the touring even though it was VERY hot.  I will down load some pictures of the city.  The Perfume River runs through the middle of the town.  It does not smell like perfume!  the people that live on the river have been there for many, many generations.  We took a Dragon Boat ride at 6:30 in the morning and when they came to pick us up we discovered that it was also their house.  They had three children and a teeny-tiny baby in a cradle right in the boat.  The river people were some of my favorite things that we saw.  Life is so normal when it comes down to it.  Everyone cooks and eats breakfast, we comb our hair, we love our children, go to work, do laundry and pay for services.  We just often do it in a different fashion.  After the boat ride, we visited the Dang Ba Market which is a fish market complete with live fish and pig heads.  I will include the picture of the smiling pig for you!

We ended the day on Sunday going to the beach.  IT was so much fun. We played in the water, walked the beach and shared an amazing meal.  Everything from these rice things to other rice things to fish soup to chicken heads and blood jello.  Yes, I did try the blood jello, yuck, but left the chicken head for someone else.  Isn’t that nice of me?

today was back to the grind stone and teaching.  I hit the beach again and watched the workers.  There is an old man that is at the beach everyday around the time I am.  He has this rake thing that he pulls across the sand for hours pulling up clams.  He puts them in a little sack tied right onto the broom.  He just goes up and down, up and down.  If the world were to have a comet hit it or something, I really do believe the people in Vietnam would figure out a way to make life work.  They can make something from anything, fix anything, and everyone works hard!  I hope I take home some of this attitude with me!

 

Meet my new boyfriend and how I am getting around  This were at one of the tombs in Hue and were just too inviting for me to pass up.  

My new job!  these baskets weighed about 70 pounds and the women just walk at such a fast pace.  I made about 15 steps before she felt bad for me and took over!  Lindsay, Amy and Michael take a close look at the sign!  Dangerous Zone!  And…of course I went in!  Ha! Ha!

I went on a river Dragon boat really early in the morning and life on the river was magical.  Quiet, cool, and very, very real.  I realized the very simple things in life go on no matter where you live or in what circumstance!  Washing clothes, cooking and eating, providing for a family.

these are the moments here that I will not forget!

Thursday, July 3rd

I can’t believe it is already Thursday evening!  this week has blown by!  My friends from California left early Tuesday morning.  Monday night we took them to this dive restaurant right on the beach.  At least to a 54 year old American, it looked like a dive.  The name is Cat Bien.  It has all the customary little plastic children’s tables and chairs, shells all over the ground and these little “napkins” they have on the tables (they are little 2 inch square pieces of paper to wipe out your bowl and clean off your chopsticks before you eat)  but they are also the only thing that even resembles a napkin and when you are done, you just wad them up and throw them on the ground!  Restaurants just appear every day in new places and by morning, there is no sign of them!  They actually put everything on a cart and take it home or something!  In the morning there may be a little lady serving coffee (Vietnamese coffee is fabulous!) and in the afternoon there may be a lady selling this refreshing sugar cane drink and then, in the evening there may be a restaurant!  You never know!  Well, back to the story.  For less than $35.00 US dollars we had about 7 pots of steaming, white clams, another 7 pots of spicy mussels (all caught right there on the beach earlier in the day) and 6 different grilled fish.  It was a feast!  the food here is fabulous even if there is not much variety.  To get this kind of seafood, you have to go to the beach and this trip was worth it!  We rode scooters too which only added to the fun!  I highly recommend it!

Tuesday morning they all left and I was pretty sad but only for a moment.  In the afternoon three new teachers arrived!  They are now sharing the house with me.  An older couple in their 70s are here volunteering from Australia.  They volunteer somewhere in the world every year for about 3 months.  Their adventures have been amazing!  I have loved just listening to them.  They are Ruth and David and David is a great story teller!  Phil, an american but he lives in Taiwan is also here now for three months.  He has rented a scooter which is pretty cool.  He feels very confident on it because that is what he uses in Taiwan as well.  He is a history buff especially war history.  He knows a lot about the Vietnam War (or as it is called here, The American War)  and he and I are going to go to My Lai next weekend.  (Of course on scooters!)  The other teacher that came one week again today is from Wisconsin.  She and I are the only “real” Americans now.  

I have continued my volunteering by helping to paint some of the walls in the Deaf School’s restaurant on Tuesday night.  I had to go after work because of the customers.  It was kind of cool though because I was the only hearing person there!  I did not know how to ask for paper towels and somehow, the two gentlemen that were there just figured it out!  There is one chap there named Chan.  He is 27 years old and did not learn sign until he was 16.  he told me he just hated life before that and worked in the rice paddies and learned to carve wood in Hoi An.  He would work three and four days on a piece and then, turn around and sell it so cheap that he still could not even eat!  since learning to sign, he has gone all the way through school as far as he can and has this job that is not only fun but is even paying enough to have a money for clothes and the like.  He stayed with me to paint and then, brought me home.  (On his scooter!)  that was a little scary because everyone beeps their horns to let people know where they are and he could not hear them!  i just held on and trusted him!  He was a very careful driver!

When I went to check out my painting this morning, (there was hardly any light at night) the owner greeted me and proceeded to show me her NEW scooter.  (Can you tell how important scooters are to people here?)  it is bright red and an automatic!  smooth driving machine.  She had not had a chance to really drive it yet so she asked me if I wanted to go for a ride.  Well, of course I said yes and off we went!  I thought we were going to just go around the block or something but no, we went through the market, across the bridge at the river, out to the beach and around there for awhile and then, she decided to see how fast it would go!  Great fun I tell you!

today, I had yet another more academic adventure.  I visited the Cham Museum.  It is a museum here in Danang that houses some of the most wonderful treasures from the Cham Dynasties that were up and down the coast in southern Vietnam for 100s of years.  It is all these different gods, made of heavy rock.  This exhibit had been built in the 20s-the 60s.  AND thank goodness, because during the Vietnam War the Americans destroyed most of the remaining temples because they were afraid the Viet Cong were hiding in them.  The French Embassy actually wrote a personal letter to Nixon to ask him to protect this museum and about a year later, the American Army began guarding it and put it under a no-fly zone.  They say that many of the temples were not as big as Angor Wat but just as beautiful before the war.  Seeing this destruction has only harden my stand on the fruitlessness of war!

These are two of my teaching assistants.  They are both in their early twenties and attended a college for English in Hue.  I could not teach with out them!  They LAY DOWN THE LAW when the kids get rowdy!  I have no idea what they are saying but I sit in my chair!

This was the Emperor’s “house” where he wrote poetry.  It is surrounded by a a small lake/river that is filled with pink lilies (picture to follow!)  When the communist took over, it was closed down and during the “re-education” of the south, it fell into disrepair.  About a decade ago, or maybe a little longer, it was given a notation by UNESCo and funds were made available to refurbish it.  No one writes poetry here anymore but it is so peaceful and quiet which is very unique for this incredibly noisy country!  There are always beeping of some sort, banging, airplanes, you name it!  I really enjoyed just sitting there!These are the pink lilies.  They filled the pond!  Aren’t they gorgeous?  No real smell however.

Another Vietnamese Dragon.  Vietnam is said to have more dragons that any other Asian country and I am now believing that statement!

Sunday, July 7th

What a weekend this has been!  Three of the American teachers at the school on the 4th of July in Danang, Vietnam and not a firework display to see or a picnic to be had so….what to do?  I arranged a a few scooters to pick us up and after classes, we headed off to the beach.  On the bridge over ther river there are this great little designs that kind of look like fireworks if you really use your imagination so we stared at those for about 10 seconds and headed for the beach.  I have discovered all these little “dive” restaurants at the beach that have the BEST food yet!  for almost nothing.  well, we proceeded to gorge ourselves with grilled fish, clams and these wonderful rice cakes thingies.  You can dip them in this spicy sauce and they are delightful!  Also, when you order a beer in Vietnam, they bring an entire case of it and set it by your table!  They charge you by the number of bottles that are left at the end!  We sat and ate and shared stories for about two hours and then found our way home.  A great fourth of July by all!

Saturday was another treat that was as different as night and day are!  One of the other teachers and I were invited to a birthday party of a friend of one of the TAs.  Cool, sounds innocent, right?

Well, it was held at a Karioke Bar in a tiny room that was filled with smoke, beer, cake and sandwiches of all kinds.  And yes, I did sing and yes I did get 100% on one of my songs-You are my sunshine!”  ha! ha!  We stayed about 3 hours and had a blast!  I can sing Vietnamese when I have enough beer!

Today, I headed back to Marble Mountain to do some hiking and then to Hoi An for a boat ride down the river at dusk.  We rode scooters there which was actually a lot of fun.  I will include some great pictures of more dragons for you.   The river was beautiful and peaceful.  We got there in time to see the fishermen drop their nets in to the water.  it is so peaceful out there and everyone is working together with nature.  It is a feeling that I will not soon forget!  As we were coming back in, lightning began to light up the entire sky and the rain started to pour.  We had missed our bus so had to hire a car.  To go all the way from Hoi An back to Danang only cost $12.00!  I could fall in love with this country!  On the way to the bus station we decided to walk through the market and we met this little lady that was 6 inches shorter than me!  She was so funny.  ”You from kangaroo country?”  no….”from Kiwi country?”  no…  ”Where then?”  America  ”Okay, I guess.  You buy something then love.  Okay?”  She continued to just make us laugh so hard that we actually did end up buy little trinkets!!  What a hoot!  Adventure was not over then though!  We get to the bus station and find out the bus has already gone so we are told to go to the shoe store where the travel agency is (yes, that is right) and hire a car.  Okay, we can do that.  We get there, hire the car, and while we are waiting they talk us into buying shoes!  They measure you feet and make them right there for you!  I am getting another pair of leather shoes made just for me for $15.00!

This dragon was at Marble Mountain coming right out of a pagoda!  they are absolutely beautiful!

 

setting the nets

 This was a scene we saw over and over again as the fishermen were setting their nets for the night.  

 

The nets before they are lowered

 

On the boat

We were the only two on this boat.  I sat up on the front most of the time and enjoyed the cool breeze and the soft sounds.  The woman with me is one of the other teachers here at the school.  she is from wisconsin.

Thursday, July 11

Wow!  I can not believe the week is almost gone already!  I have continued to fill every minute that I can with something!  Meeting new people, walking down different alleys, eating new foods and, as of now, trying to find something besides rice to eat!

My classes have been going very well.  I realized I had yet to talk about my job!  I am teaching five different classes at a Language School on one of the main streets in Danang.  The street is incredibly busy and there are horns, hammers, and noise going at all times!  I have the front classroom on the third floor.  The windows have a film on them to try to reflect the sun back out.  I think it works a little but the room is unbearable without an AC and fan going!  The biggest class I have is 17 and the smallest is nine.  guess which one I like the most! Ha! Ha!  I am teaching words, sentences, spelling, grammar and lots of songs and games.  The children learn so quickly!  They are CRAZY however.  I totally lost my voice the first week.  Imagine yourself just screaming in the wind.  That is what it feels like sometimes.  I physically move the children sometimes now since I know them better.  I actually asked that a little boy not be allowed in my class on Monday.  He was HORRIBLE.  He even drew blood from one of the other little ones!  I found out later that this is his fourth language school and he only plays with the big boys.  I am giving him another chance but only after a big talk with his dad.

Yesterday I went on toad’s wild ride!  I was at the beach and was hitching a ride back on a scooter.  Most of the time you talk with the driver, decide on a price, jump on and go home.  This guy comes racing up, You Go!!! he actually yelled it and kind of pulled me on.  OFF we flew!  I am not kidding!  down the road on the wrong side, weaving in and out,(not that unnormal) and then, the scooter started going on and off.  He begins to drive with his head down playing with something on the side of the scooter.  We putter to the side of the road and he jumps off and starts pushing towards a petrol station.  I jump off, he puts in $1.00 of gas (about 15 dong) and off we go!  He was CRAZY!  I did end up home just fine but I sure had a ride that I won’t soon forget!

Last night  all the teachers at the school, 3 AMericans and 4 Australians decided to celebrate Wednesday and went to the beach for another wonderful seafood dinner.  They just keep getting better and better plus, I discovered another kind of beer (bia in Vietnamese) It was a beer left behind when the French left and it is great!  Tonight I was walking home from teaching and discovered a little mom and pop store right by our house that sells it by the can for only 6000 dong or about 45 cents!  JACK POT!

This morning I went off to a mountain just outside of Danang called Monkey Mountain and yes, I did see a monkey!  This is one of the mountains that the US ARMY build radio towers on during the war.  You can see for miles from the top and it was about 20 degrees cooler too!  Beautiful Place.  It only took about one hour by scooter so was actually a lot of fun.  

This weekend I am all signed up to go scuba diving at a island called Cham Island.  It is just off the coast about 30 minutes.  I am hoping to complete two dives.  I will let you know!

 

 

Shopping!

 

Monday, July 15th

The weekend was marvelous!  I started the weekend with an early trip (5:00 am) to the beach with all the rest of the city!  Exercising, tai chi, soccer,laughing, swimming, you name it!  On the corner of my little street is a women’s tai chi class.  they are all dressed in white and blast their music!  There are runners on every street and 1000s running on the walkway by the river.  One of the best times in the day!  On Saturday, I went to watch them set up the markets!  Motor scooters loaded to the top with stuff, little stores set up right in the middle of the street!  Everyone is busy either selling or  buying!  AND it smells much better in the morning than later in the day!

After class on Saturday, Amy (a teacher from Nevada) and I hopped on a scooter and headed off to Hoi An.  Everyone honking, the wind blowing, my hands begin to mold into the shape of the seat as I hold on for dear life!  We arrive and begin the search for our little hotel.  We find the street-yeah!-  We were at number 452 and the address was 15.  Ahhhh, a little ways to go, right?  Well, we drive up and down the street and about 1/2 hour later find number 15.  it is a nice looking hotel but….the wrong name.  Maybe it has changed its name we think….No, wrong number in the book.  Our hotel is just BACK down the road.  so, back on we go and head off.  Just 2 kilometers she says.  After two more stops and asking, we finally find our hotel and yes it is on the road but just about were we started out!  Sea horse Hotel is not right in Lonely Planet if anyone is interested!

dinner was another funny experience.  By the time we get around to dinner, it is pretty late but we are both hungry.  We find a little place that has a nice menu, not too expensive and Amy is craving pizza (the pizza here is actually pretty good)  We order.  Get our bia (my new favorite is LaRue) and we wait.  and we wait.  and then, they come out, NO pizzas tonight.  Okay, what do you have for tonight?  Rice, crispy noodles, broccoli and cucumbers.  That sounds like what I have been eating for about seven weeks now, okay….bring it on!

We get up early Saturday morning , drive into the Old Quarters and find the dive office.  not open yet so we park the scooter (a little lady agrees to watch it for the day) and we find a little restaurant open right on the river.  What a peaceful way to start the day!  I love the rivers here!  Then, off to dive!  The boat is loaded with people from around the world.  Australia is in a school break so loads of them, Spain, Scotland, England, France, we were the only Americans ,Japanese, Canadians, Indonesian, you name it!  The dive masters were from France and England.  They are all part owners in the company and were wonderful to all of us.  Many of the people on board were just snorkeling so they treated them to a hike on Cham Island while we took a second dive.  The first dive was at a place called the North Rainbow.  It was about 65 feet deep and the water was wonderful.  Attacking Clown fist!  yes!  that is true.  they had just had a ton of babies and they were swimming in and out of the anemones and the parents would come up and actually bump onto the regulators and lens!  It was pretty cool seeing these little fish attacking your goggles!  The coral was beautiful-bright purples and yellows and greens.  Lots of fish of all sizes and NO sharks.  Little tiny jelly fish that were really fun to watch and their tentacles were short so you could stay out them easily!  One group saw a huge jelly fish that was just floating by!  The second dive was 130 feet deep!  (I thought about you Amy and your dive in Bali!)  We were diving in and out of these huge rock caves!  Really cool stuff!  The current was very swift and I had to really work at keeping up!  As we came up to about 60 feet the coral started to change.  It became these little purple balls about 1 inch in diameter with a carpet of yellow, delicate flowers coming out.  It was for a far as you could see.  the dive masters called it a field of sunflowers!  it was really cool.  THEN, we went around this corner and out shot 3 huge tiger trigger fish!  Cool, i thought to myself until they started biting people!  YEAH!  Biting people!  The took a bite out of the dive master’s arm !  I was the last one around the corner and two of them started towards me so I took my hands and swished the water at them and they turned around but then, out came the DADDY!  he was probably about three feet in length and a beautiful green on top and blue on the bottom and he starts biting my fin!  I give it a quick swish and he holds on!  Another swish and he swims away!  Pretty cool!  Never had that happen before.  When we got up on top, the dive masters said they have named the pack The Dalton Brothers!  A beautiful dive and I would love to do it again if I had the time!

we got back to shore and were going to come right back to Hoi An but it was raining and lightning so we decided to stay and have dinner.  We found this restaurant called the Cargo Club.  The food was some of the first western food I have had.  AND a glass of Vietnam wine.  The glass of wine cost the same as my dinner and after the first one or two swallows was okay!

The ride home on the scooter was uneventful, thank goodness, and the weekend was placed in the history book.  When I got home my body was still tingly from the wind and I was deaf from the wind so I just sat in my room and did a little pondering.  This has been such a wonderful trip for me.  It has successfully fulfilled every expectation!  One of the important lessons I have been learning over the past five or six years is that it is all about how I define an experience not so much the experience itself!  Every experience can be humdrum or I can take it upon myself to paint it with bright colors and look for the magic!  I have learned how much more fun life is when I take every moment that I can and Stay in the present, keep it fresh and edit as I need to.  I learn from the parts I need to learn from but even that is cool because I don’t have to do it again!  Perserverance is teaching me to stick with an experience and complete it.  to appreciate it, to learn and to love.  What a nice change for me!  I have for about 7 years now with just living at the top, skimming life, enjoying it but not really opening up my heart to live it!  I will be coming home after this trip knowing that I CAN do it, I WILL do it and I love the flavors of just about everything I try (scooters, walks, alleys, trigger fish, mystery meat, new people, you name it!)  I don’t have to have someone with me HOWEVER, I am just now beginning to think it would be really fun to have someone to share it with.  I had not really considered that possibility for a long time! I think that maybe, just maybe, I am entering a new phase in my life with a new confidence that will allow me to take on a cause (on top of my own wonderful children which have ALWAYS been my major cause and will always be!) to risk taking on the stakes that come with it (the possibility of loss of trust, hurt, love, giggles good and bad) to become a real participant, a REAL player!  Watch out world!  I am coming home with so much positive energy!

 

Mid day bath!

 I caught this little one playing in the tub on my afternoon walk!  Everyone here closes down their shops, mechanical tools, even their bikes and scooter for about 2 hours and they play cards at the cafes, eat a leasurely lunch with friends, or just hang out with their family.  The dad saw I had a camera and came running up saying, “photo, baby!”  Doesn’t this just make you feel good looking at it!

 

Neighborhood Budda

this beautiful Budda is located at a pagoda just around the corner from my house.  the neighborhoods are loaded with these hidden treasures!  You just have to be brave enough to start walking and turn down an alley that may or may not take you some place!

 

Ho Chi Minh

Signs like this are everywhere.  Celebrating the holding up of Ho Chi Minh and the workers.  This is when I know I am in a different country with a different government.  Nothing is said outloud if you disagree with something and people are chosen in each neighborhood to :report:.  Even in the schools, every class has a reporter (Snitch in american english!) that reports on the other students and what they talk about and do.  Every neighborhood has the same system.  I wonder if anything has been reported about this teacher house?

 

Cham Island and the scuba boat

this is like the boat I took out to Cham Island.  Look at that water!  It was amazing and warm!  The sand was so hot that I had to run as fast as I could to get to the shade of the trees!  Great day!

Little old me!

On the way to Cham Island on the upper deck of the boat.  Did not last long here in the morning because it was so hot!  Did grab a quick nap on the way back though!

The beach on Cham Island

A bit of paradise on this Army owned island!  This is where the sand was so hot!

 

Wednesday, July 16

Another busy, crazy week.  On Tuesday a bunch of teachers from different schools (Australia, Canada, the US)  rented a van and drove to the site of the My Lai Massacre.  It was a sobering event!  I left feeling sorry for ANYONE that was there that day.  The Vietnamese families, the US soldiers, the reporters and photographers, the surrounding areas and the people that live there now.  I did not realize this but My Lai is literally steps away from one of the most beautiful beaches in Vietnam!  And it is surrounded by hills that look down on this small valley.  there is now a new village My Son that farms, raises animals and lives life just feet from the memorial.  There are many mass graves and statues.  I will download pictures when my camera battery has been charged!

Today is the 14th day of the lunar month which means that everyone sits a table for their ancestors by their front door, lights fires on the curb and floats candles down the river.  We went to the festival today in Hoi An.  What a treat.  It was a double treat because today was the day that our part of Danang is without power.  It was SO hot and the generator at school was not working so they canceled classes (no AC)  Lucky!  We arrived in plenty of time to walk around this beautiful, quaint old town and enjoy the sites and the crazy market!  As it began to darken the children and whole families began to gather at the river with these little paper bowls with a candle in the bottom.  You could buy one for 5000 dong , make a wish, and float it down the river.  I, of course, had to do it.  Can’t tell the wish though or it won’t come true!  There were all sorts of these little flat boats coming up offering rides down the river as well so four of the teachers decided to do it.  the exciting part was getting in and out with out spilling the boat!  As we floated down the river, we noticed all the other boats were picking up the floating candles.  We laughed that they must take them back and sell them again!  It was a beautiful site!

Afterwards, we headed to this restaurant called the Cargo Club, right on the river and had wonderful desserts and a bia.  I ordered this little fruit tart that had dragon fruit, mangoes, strawberries and kiwis in it.  What a treat!

I forgot to tell everyone something very sad that I learned this week about Vietnam.  40 children drown everyday here!  EVERYDAY!  Isn’t that a shame?  Every where you go there is water here.  Rivers, lakes, oceans, rice paddies, you name it and there is no organized way to learn to swim and the funding is nonexistence.  No YMCA or neighborhood pools with swim lessons.  I could not figure out why everyone wears a life jacket at the beach!  it looks so hot and so strange.  Now i know!

to end on a funnier note!  This morning I got up at 4:45 to go to the beach and exercise and swim with my friend Mr. Loi and his son.  We swam for about an hour, along with thousands of others! and then headed home on the motor bike.  It is about a 5 minute ride to my house from the beach.  Well, we followed a scooter that had 4 or 5 BIG pigs on it!  That is something I don’t think I will see in Lafayette!

Friday, July 18th

Here a bunch of pictures that I promised.  I had to go out and buy a new bag to bring stuff home in today.  I brought an empty bag with me but alas, it is not big enough.  The lanterns from Hoi An are just too beautiful to pass up as are the clothes made by the tailor!  I bought this great duffle bag with a Nike emblem on it (ha! ha!)  for only $12.00  I also found a pirated CD and movie store.  I bought a few movies for $1.00 and a double music video for $2.50!  If you have any special orders, let me know!  I will take a look!  I am now looking for the pirated computer programs store!

 

Floating lights

These were the little candles that we floated down the river at the Moon Festival.  Image, hundreds of them.  It was really a sight to see!

 

100s of little lights

This is not a very good picture but it does give you an idea of what it looked like!

 

buying flowers for the offering

As we wlaked through the market as the sun was setting and the moon was rising, hundreds of bikes began to show up loaded with just tons of flowers, especially yellow ones!  They use these in the offerings they offer to their ancestors tonight during the moon festival.

 

tables of the little floating candles!

Isn’t this the cutest little girl and her grandma.  They make the candles as quickly as they are bought.  and in this case, it was not just the tourist buying them but a fair amount of Vietnamese as well.  They cost 5000 dong each or around 45 cents.

 

One of the offerings

They set an entire dinner for their ancestors and light candles hoping they will come   they often use the most expensive fruit and what not that they can find!  The teachers told me that they eat it the next day themselves!

 

afternoon breaks!

As I have been walking around during the time between 12:00 and 1:30 and I see the most wonderful things such as this.  Men playing cards or chinese chess, sitting together and just talking.  It is a wonderful tradition shared by all.

 

kids take a break as well

This is the same time of day.  These little guys have tied a board to the fence and were using it to swing on and see how high they could get.  The fence was at the entrance of a huge pagoda which was why it was so shady!

 

Vietnamese siesta

As I was walking home this afternoon to get ready to go teach this guy was parked in the shade right at our corner.  He is a cyclo driver.  Look closely and you will see his bike loaded with mats.  These are the mats that the people use to cover the slats on their beds, or, as we would say, their mattress! They are of the “extra firm” style!

 

Another beautiful baby!

Isn’t she beautiful!  It is a good thing that adoption is so hard in vietnam!  You can not adopt if you are over 50 and then, you have to agree to stay here for an extended time with the child before you can leave.  The is not a “one child” rule here but parents can only get benefits for two.  In the country you can have three.  There has been an up swing in the number of girls being turned over to orphanages.  too bad!  They are gorgeous!  The grandmas are wonderful as well.  It is a rare baby indeed that is not being held by a grandma or grandpa.  Because of history, however, there are a lot more grandmas to be had!

 

Happy Budda

this huge Budda is about a five minute walk from my house at a beautiful pagoda and (I think) monasstery.  He is about 12 to 15 feet tall and so very happy!

 

Isn't she beautiful

This little lady sells soup or cigarettes near my school.  She is so cute.  if you look closely at her teeth you will notice they are all black.  That is because she chews betel nuts.  They spit this horrible red stuff when they chew them and the nuts are suppose to “relax” the chewer!  You never see men chewing them, just the women!

 

A little bit of Europe

this is one of the alleys near my house.  I try to walk down different ones everyday.  This colonial architecture dots many of the neighborhoods.  Just a little more history to learn!

 

Another wonderful little lady

this is another great story.  I was in a market about a twenty minute walk from my house and I was taking ictures of the fruit when all of a sudden several of the women started standing in front of the fruit wanting me to take their pictures.  Of course I did and showed them each their own picture and they giggled and laughed!  it was great!  They kept pointing to this woman and they wanted me to take her picture but she would not move or join them.  I love this picture because she was giggling so loud!

 

Me at the Moon Festival

to end this photo essay, me, at the Moon Festival.  Aren’t the lanterns exquisite?  This is in Hoi An, the city I have fallen in love with.

Monday, July 21 (I think)

this was another crazy, busy weekend!  When a person like me only has one night and the next day off before they start teaching again, they have to fill it to the brim!  That’s me!  We left after teaching classes at around 6:45 Saturday night  and headed off to Hue, a 2 hour drive north of Danang.  It was pitch black most of the way but the moon was unbelievable!  Huge, yellow and glowing!  I sure some of it was because of the dust in the air, but it was a sight to see!  We arrived in Hue around 8:30 with an the address of a hotel in hand.  We found the street straight away but , no hotel.  Kept looking up and down the road (is this story beginning to sound like the weekend before?)  We finally settled for another hotel and just checked in and had some dinner.  I had this beautiful vietnamese noodle dish with these little capped mushrooms that were amazingly tasty!  Our tour of the DMZ  (oh yeah, that is where we were headed) was to leave at 6:00 am so I was up early and ready to go.  We arrived at the Booking office and no one was there.  Strange….I had talked to them just the day before. They had given me the address for the hotel and the time to be picked up.  I had done this all by myself, in vietnamese.  I was so proud!  Ahhhhh…..not so proud now.  I began worrying about everything that could go wrong.  Did I get the address wrong?  Did I get the time wrong?  You know all those kinds of questions!  I went back to our hotel and asked them to call the gentleman I had talked with, Mr. Long.  He did and they said they had checked with the hotel the night before and we had not checked in so they assumed we weren’t coming and had sold our seats!  Okay, Plan B.  But, how did I get things so messed up?  I started repeating the name of the street and the address they had give me.  1734 thong pue.  I had spelled the name of the street right because the car driver had been able to find it!  Guess what?  Thong Pue in Vietnamese sounds like three four!  I had repeated it back several times and they had said it to me.  We both thought we had it right!  Oh well.  Well , anyway, back to the story.  This gentleman was so nice.  I think he could tell how disappointed I was and so he said , just a minute, let me see if I can call up a car and a driver for you for the day.  It will cost more but you will still be able to go.  Okay, and that is what we ended up doing!  It was great!  the driver, Lindsay from Wisconsin and me.  We did everything except the gift shops and the military bases which we really did not want to do anyway.  The country side here is truly a beautiful!  It reminds me of the ocean only it is rice.  The further we went though, the drier it got and the number of rice fields began to go down.  Rubber trees began to line the roads as well as tea plants.  Still that dark green hue everywhere.  Our first stop was Vinh Moc tunnels.  This was a fishing village just north of the 17th Parallel (The DMS) that had been continually bombed by the US.  for 6 to 8 years they built tunnels and the entire village lived under ground.  they had three different levels-the one that was 15 meters under that was used for just hiding, then, one 23 meters deep and that had 95 family caves in it, a hospital (17 babies were born there) and meeting room that fit 40-60 people in it, and 3 different fresh water wells.  There was a third level that went even deeper ( 80 steps down to be exact) where the people went when the heavier bombs were being dropped.  On that level, they also had supplies storage and weapon storage places.  Not one single villager was killed after the tunnels were built!  They also had a museum that told a little about the area.  Our guide knew pretty good English and was proud to tell us of the “failed” american raids.  Being here has given me the opportunity to hear about the was from a different point of view!

Next, we headed off to the reunification bridge.  I will post pictures.  During the war, the bridge was painted half yellow and half red!  It went over the river right on the 17th Parallel.  The French are the ones that actually first built it.  There is now a new one that traffic moves on that is right beside the old one.  The only people that use the old one are the bicycles.

From there, off to the Ho Chi Minh Trail.  This was really interesting.  The country is busy making the trail into a two lane highway from Hanoi to Saigon.  We drove on a part of it that took us through areas that were heavily deforested  during the war.  They have now planted miles and miles of rubber trees.  I had no idea how they harvested rubber.  They tie a little bowl onto the tree and hammer a little metal spoon into the tree right above it.  The liquid rubber drips into the bowls and people come by and empty the bowls into a bigger bowl and off it goes to becoming a tire or something.  Pretty interesting stuff!

Next we went to this minority village.  It was actually a Catholic hospital and church. The story goes that the Virgin Mary comes there and offers help and solitude for those who believe.  It was a beautiful, peaceful place!  There was the old cathedral that was built in the mid 1700s and a new hospital and clinic.  In Vietnam, if you are blind, deaf, burned, leper, or really just about anything, you can’t go to school past the 5th year.  many of the people we saw had something wrong.  I saw one little boy (probably around 7 or that was burned all over his face and one side of his body.  he was healthy and rambuctious  and ready to play.  All I could think of was how do you get someone like him to a place were they can do the needed surgeries and life can go on for him?  Otherwise, he will be stuck there and will probably become a beggar or something.  This was the first group of people that have just asked for money in all of the places I have visited.  In the cathedral, they were holding a mass for children and on the outside altar, there was a group of women singing their rosary.  It was beautiful-especially in Vietnamese!  A place I will not soon forget!

Next, back to Hue.  We decided we would go see a few sights there because we had a few hours but first, we would catch a bite to eat.  We stopped in at this little restaurant that was close by and listed in our travel books.  The owner was this guy that was 55 years old, he shared that with us, that was just a hoot!  he asked what we wished we would have seen during the day and didn’t and we told him we had hoped to see water buffalo really working but had not.  Oh, I have a friend that has a water buffalo!  For 70,000 dong I will take you myself on my motorbike!  So, off we went!  he took us all through the country side,  On little ditches, roads, the sides of little canals, looking for the buffalo!  Finally, we found one.  I do have a picture of me with the buffalo but he was not very friendly so I did not get very close.  i did pose with the buffalo owner though and he said not to worry because he controlled the buffalo with his mind!  Oh yeah!  This country side tour was a highlight of the day!  As we were coming back into Hue, it started pouring.  My driver had a raincoat and he put it over me and him!  It was a poncho but was still a bit tight!  I did stay dry though!

When we got back, we still had about 45 minutes so we decided that was plenty of time to shop a little.  Lindsay found a used book store that had English books so we went in!  The books left on planes and in hotel rooms are definately a random group of books!  In one of the cases was a children’s book for form 1.  I picked it up and looked through it and noticed it was math.  I said that I was a first grade teacher and she got so excited!  She went to the store in front of hers and brought back two little purses!  One for Lindsay and one for me just as a gift.  Pretty amazing!  I wish people in the US thought about teachers like they do here!

We finally had to make our way back to our driver and then back to Danang for me to teach this morning.  Every time I experience something new here or see something that touches my heart, I can’t imagine the next day topping it.  But, It does!

Wednesday,  July 23

Another adventure!  Hai , my boss, took us out into the countryside!  What a day!  We saw things that I could never see in Danang and the ride was only 45 minutes.  I have included pictures of the market that we found on the side of the road.  Ducks, pigs, chickens, tobacco, thousands of brooms, flowers, veggies, fruits of all kinds, jewelry, Anything and everything!  Trucks were whipping by, motor scooters zooming way too close and bicycles in the mix.  The walkers were at everyone else’s mercy and, of course, I was one of those!  After the market we headed off to a little village.  There is a lot of French architecture here and I see it in the most amazing places.  This little village could have been in Paris!  Beautiful columns and yellow paint.  The lighting here only makes it more romantic.  Many of the little houses had the round “bowl” boats on their front porches and I could not figure it out because we were not close to the ocean.  They are for the floods.  They get flooded pretty regularly and so they stay ready.  We got out of the car and began just walking down a little path.  At the end, between rice fields, mango trees, corn, and tapioca bushes we found this little house.  There was a mom, dad and a daughter sitting on the porch and they invited us in.  Can you imagine?  They proceeded to bring out chairs and offered cold water.  We talked for a while with the help of Hai.  They were a family of five.  No one farms anymore but they love living there.  They have two daughters and one son.  The mom was 53.  She was excited when I told her about my family.  Both of her daughters are married and live in their husband’s villages now.  Both have gone to school and one is an accountant.  They were so proud of their children!  What a treat to get to spend a few moments with them. I got my traditional Vietnamese dresses today.  They are stunning!  A tailor that specializes in making them, Mr Loi’s brother, made them just for me.  I can’t wait to model them for you!

Only 10 more days in vietnam and then off to Cambodia.  I can’t believe how quickly the summer has gone.  I have most of the days planned to the max!  I don’t want to miss a thing!

These little piggies went to market!  They are just loaded up into these baskets on the back of scooters and sold.  They were making all kinds of noises but I would have too!

These ducks just sat there!  No leashes or anything!  some of them had little bowls of rice to nibble on while they waited to be picked!  I saw one man checking them over.  Upside down, down their neck, into their mouths.  Some are eaten and some are kept for their eggs.  

Another beautiful woman.  She was busy in the market.  She was selling vegetables.  She just kept smiling and laughing.  The markets are filled with women that are elderly and making a living.  There is no such thing as retirement here!  Not in the countryside.  There are not very many older men anywhere and most of the women live with their daughter’s families.  It is rare to see a child without a grandma!  The grandmas are funny too because they often have a huge, hand rolled cigarette in their mouth or betel nuts.  Both are pretty make for an interesting picture.

A bit of beautiful French Colonial architecture in the middle of the old market.  I have come across these buildings all over the place in places that I would never guess.  They are beautiful and often, not kept up very well.  This one was being used as part of the market.

She was so proud of her chickens!  they just let her swing them around by their feet!  I guess they don’t really have a choice.  They market is filled with so many different sounds and smells.  I have grown to love my time spent exploring them.  Everyday I find a new part with more interesting things to see.

That is Lindsay taking pictures.  She is from Wisconsin.  We are all camera crazy here.  I wanted you to see the woman in the background.  Most everyone here covers their whole bodies up.  They HATE the sun.  They do NOT want to be tan.  They even have whitening lotion if they do get too dark.  They look like bandits on the run everywhere.  The men don’t wear them as much as the women but they all wear some kind of a hat.

Hammocks are everywhere!  This one was on our walk in the country.  I just could not refuse the chance to try it out.  today, I was coming home from the beach and a line of about 5 trucks was parked on the side of the road during the siesta time.  Everyone of them had hammocks hanging in them or from them!  What a way to spend the hot part of the afternoon!

Monday, July 28

Another busy weekend has come and gone.  I went to my first movie in Vietnam-Get Smart!  Everything else was in chinese and I did not want to have to read and think while I am at a movie!  it was a laugh out loud movie even though it was kind of stupid!  I did try the vietnamese movie popcorn and it is not bad and a whole lot cheaper!

Saturday I got up early and went on a 2 hour scooter ride up into the mountains to a place called Ba Na.  Beautiful mountain retreat complete with monkeys and tourists from all over the world.  There is only one hotel with about 30 rooms so there really weren’t very many people.  The road was quite steep and only one lane in places so we had to go pretty carefully.  The ride was through the country and again, I was overwhelmed by the clear colors of the land and the friendliness of the people.  The landscapes unending from the top of the mountain.  The air was about twenty degrees cooler as well.  We had a beer at the top and enjoyed the views as the clouds floated in and around!

On sunday, I took it easy.  Can you believe that one?  got up and went to a gathering of ex-pats.  Enjoyed it.

took a long walk through the alleys of Danang in the afternoon and attended a birthday party in the evening.  All good things!

this week will be a work week.  I have to give three tests and hold four parent meetings.  I am already ready so I won’t be too stressed.  I am also planning on going to the beach at least 2 days and visiting some caves on Wednesday with two teachers from another school.  No time to be wasted.  I am also hoping to go to this restaurant Cat Bien at the beach one more time!  On Thursday, I hold my last parent meeting and then, at 10:00pm, say good bye to Vietnam and hello to Cambodia.  I will be traveling in cambodia with a young Canadian.  Should be fun!

I will post more pictures when I have a chance.

Saturday, August 2

Cambodia is very thing the books say it is!  I have only been here for 2 days and the people are so friendly and the food is wonderful!  I have discovered this dish called Amok that is incredible!  I have had it both with chicken and fish!  Let me back up though.  My last day in Danang was wonderful and long.  I began by going to the beach at 5:30 to swim one more time.  I got to see them bring in a whole boat of fish.  Everyone on the beach was helping to pull in the nets.  Pretty neat stuff!  I then proceeded to go from friend to friend to say goodbye. I ended at my sschool by teaching one last class and hosting a parent meeting. My boss took me to dinner at a street cafe and Mr. Loi, my tailor, and his family met me at the airport to say goodbye.  I am amazed at the friendships that can be made in such a short time when I am open to them and looking!

Cambodia is beyond words!  Ankgor Wat can not be described!  We rode bikes yesterday for about 6 hours and caught the sunset at one of the tall temples.  We were the last two off the temple.  We started this morning for the sunrise and did not stop until the sunset again and were never ready to leave.  It rained a fair amount today and that did not even deter us!  I took over 700 pictures today!  Absolutely amazing!  When I have more time I want to try to find the words to describe this member of the 8 Wonders of the World because it truly is!  Tonight we attended a free concert for the children’s hospital here.  1 out of 5 children here have TB or dengue fever.  To have a child live to 5 years old is nothing less than a miracle.  The man that dreamed up this set of hospitals played his cello for us!  He does this every Saturday night and has for 15 years.  The Power of One at its best.  They also treat burns because so many children get burned because all the cooking is done with open fires.

Tomorrow we will head out to the silk farms and the floating villages.  I will write more from haLong Bay which is my next stop.

August 12, 2008

I am home and I think I am adjusting back.  I have to work this afternoon!  Hey, I have been home for 24 hours, on to the next adventure!

I do want to catch everybody up on the end of my trip. I did it the old fashion way and wrote in a journal.  I am going to type it so you have a glimpse of the feelings as I wrote them, fresh off the trail!

August 3,

I”m still thinking about Cambodia.  This country made a huge impression on me.  The rules they lived under just 10-15 years ago is beyond anything I can possibly imagine!  to see so many people with legs, arms, hands missing is beyond my words.  to know the starvation, the humility, the raw human spirit that it took to survive leaves me in awe!  Yet, today, there is laughter, families that REALLY appreciate each other, new businesses blooming and HOPE everywhere.  Could we do this?  I don’t know.

The Cambodians looked different than the Vietnamese or Youns as they call them (it is a term that carries some derogatory meanings with it)  Their skin is darker, the eyes rounder.  they are still such a poor country.  Vietnam is the land of plenty compared with the current day Cambodia.  There are still poor, hungry unclothed in Cambodia.  The beggars are on the streets and children are working as soon as they can walk.  They are living on the line!  On the rainy day at Ankgor Wat, the children were ready to sell anything for a dollar just so they could eat that night.  I paid X 2 for little bracelets because it juust was not fair!  Cambodia will be on my mind for a long while!

Now, on to Ha Long Bay!  Wait till you see the pictures!  It is as special as everyone says it is!  Jellly fish are about the onlly draw back and they are huge.  On yeah- and the breakfasts are not that tasty-no Ban me opla!  I did not like Cat Ba Island as much as the junket-it just seemed dirtier and all the vendors were pushier.  They seemed posed to “rip me off!”  I took a long walk in the afternoon and that was great.  The island is quite mountainous and the trails are built right on the side of the cliffs so that was pretty cool.  The islands are truly amazing.  They are made of limestone and they seem to just pop up out of the water.  It looks like Lake Powell x 1000.  and they are filled with caves.  We had the opportunity to climb through one of the bigger ones.  I HAVE pictures!  On to the boat, I have made friends with two thirty-something couples from England.  Very nice teachers!  and two young men from Australia.  A family of three from France and an older couple from France that were everything that makes the French so unwelcome on the tourist trails!  They complained about everything.  On the way back, I met a famiy form Canada-a dad and his adult children.  They were fun too!

Our “guide” was really something.  He is always trying to be entertaining somehow-NOT!  Yesterday, he did the ultimate!  We went to the Cat Ba Monkey Island Reserve.  AS we were going he kept talking about his sisters.. And in all my knowledge of such things, I did not think anything of it except, “Isn’t it weird that his sisters spend their days on the island.  do they work for the park services?”  He was happy to introduce them to anyone, especially the two single Australian.  Still did not catch on!  …..We would have all the time anyone wanted.   Still, did not catch on!  They were prostitutes!  I did not even catch on until I saw the little huts in the trees!  Boy am I naive!  I was so busy swimming and climbing the hills for a beautiful view of the islands!  I am not sure I will ever catch on to things like that!  It is beyond my thinking!  (Thank you mom and dad for that sheltering!)

Highlights of Ha Long Bay!

1.  The quietness of the water. (Not the continual generators and horns though)

2.The sheer extent of the islands and their stateliness-standing tall- topped with jungle, sandy outcoves, sampans with blue tarps and of course, the floating villages with their blue walls and fishing nets.

3.  The mist settling in.

4.  The sunsets!  

It was part of China until 1979 when Vietnam took over.  they call the Chinese pirates!  It became even clearer here how the Vietnamese see China!

Off to Saigon and the Mekong.  Then, home.  I am ready but I can not believe how fast this time has gone.

This wtype of thing was everywhere!  Ankgor Wat truly is one of the wonders of the world!  There are not words to describe this wonderland!

This is ANgkor Wat-the main temple-at sunrise.  It is hard to imagine, but this was only the beginning of the entire kingdom.  we went for 12 straight hours and did not even dust off the top of what we could have sen.

THis was just funny.  Our Tuk Tuk driver ended up staying with us for two days.  He even introduced us to his little three month old son and his tuk tuk driver brother.  They actually live in the shadow of Angkor Wat.  That was such a surprise to me-people live in the temple walls!  They have their gardens up against these magnificent temples!  A truly living ancient city that is as alive today as it was thousands of years ago, with out the kings and emperors and gold!

THis is his baby!

This is a temple called Ta Phom.  When the French rediscovered Angkor Wat area, they decided to leave the trees here because they are actually holding it together.  Yes, it was raining but thank goodness because it is so hot there.  It also gives you a great perspective as to just how big this place really is!

Angkor Wat at sunrise.  Yes, I was up!  There is a thriving village literally a foot from the wall of this temple.  They were offering breakfast to anyone that walked by.  There were horses graving on the grass withing the timple walls.  It was like dream-walking through history and then, out of the mist into a current living museum!

The Pol Pot tried to knock many of the temples down and they are busy rebuilding them.  They have actuallly numbered the bricks and are trying to put it back together again!  The temples were originally built with out mortar or joining materials-just bricks stacked up and carved out so they would balance.  WOW!  the more I talk about this place and think about it, I continue to be amazed!

The monsoons are just beginning in Cambodia and the rice is waiting to be planted.  The oxen are working as are the peole.  there is a window of opportunity to get the fields ready, now that they are softer and before the rains.

Me, at a Phom.

This was one of the emperor’s swimming pools, now the neighborhood kids use it!

EArly morning work routine!  This was truly special to see.  Imagine, if you can, a two-laned road running right beside this filed with every imaginable wheeled vehicle on it and this perfect scene happening right beside each other.  a contrast of world that they live within everyday!  Prosperity and hope combined with the realitites ofliving, anyway you can!

Me, again, trying weird stuff.  This time?  A boiled silk worm.  Not so good!

The homes on the Cambodian countryside are all raised on stilts or made to float because of the rising or sinking water levels.  And, they all have a smaller boat somewhere because the water levels are so hard to predict and they may have to abandon their homes several times a year.  The floating villages actually move the entire village at least three times a year because of the water levels.  If the homes are entirely on the water, they do not have to pay any taxes so many of the people build their homes on the water to save money!

Raw silk threads!  We visited a silk farm on the countryside. For the past 10 to 15 years there has been a mass exodus from the countryside to the cities and ultimately, to a new urban poverty.  Many NGOs have begun doing work to encourage the country people to stay put.  They have been funding opportunities for the peopel to use the skills they have had for hundreds of years , silk making, wood carving, rice farming, and to make it more profitable for them so they can stay on the countryside.  This farm was funded by several sources, mainly the Netherlands, France, and Belgium.  They are maintaining the silk making that is “all natural.  The dyes are made from bark and leaves.  The weaving is done by hand and the machines are made with extra parts from anything they can find.  The spinning wheels were made from bicycle wheels and gears!  And yes, they do everything by hand.  I even had the opportunity is finding a yellow worm, those are the good ones! and placing it in the basket to make its cocoon!  then, as the picture so beautifully caught, I got to taste one!  They really do like them!  Yuck!

Wednesday

I am still working on finishing up my trip!  On to Ha Long Bay in northern Vietnam and the capital city of Hano.  Ha Long Bay has only been part of Vietnam since 1979, before that, it was a part of China.  some of the highlights of those five days include:

Seeing and elephant waiting in the shade of the highway underpass!

A herd of cows going the wrong way on the highway.

Seeing the historical water puppet show in Hanoi.  I included pictures of this!  I also bought a puppet dragon to bring home.  The stories that are included in the water puppet shows are stories that tell the history and legends of the region.  It was great to see the show at the end of my trip when I was able to relate to the different scenes.  

An intimate tea House that had over 100 different kinds of tea.  We ordered six different ones all by ourselves.  To get to the tea house we had to rove through different alleys and narrow streets in the Old Quarters of the city.  We sat on the floor, listened to the quiet (which is unique to Vietnam) and had a great conversation!  I went there with two new friends that I made, Duyen and Shawn.  

We visited the “Oxford” of Vietnam.  What a beautiful campus.  This “university” was established by one of the emperors hundreds of years ago.  This was the only place that students could come to take their exams while they tried to become the BEST student of the year.  Some would come from as far as Ho Chi Minh City to take the exams.  Families would invest their entire worth to get their child there to sit the exams because, if they passed, their lives and their families’ lives would change forever.

 

For lunch, we ate the most yummy spring rolls ever made!  PLUS, I had eel soup for breakfast that day.  AND yes, it tasted great!

 

We walked around the main city park and the lake in the middle of Hanoi.  In the middle of the lake there is a pagoda in the middle that reflects so beautifully at any of the different angles and through out the day.  At the far end of the lake is another pagoda with a bright red bridge that actually glows in the sun.  It is surrounded by trees and flowers making one feel like they are there all my themselves, even in the middle of this huge, fast moving city!

The streets of Hanoi were lined with old, old trees that looked just like they were coming out of the cement!  They lean across the street almost creating a natural tunnel.  The shade is lucious on a really hot day!  As we were walking around in the late afternoon, the park became filled with people walking, talking, playing badminton, running and just enjoying each other’s company!  They were even doing Tai Chi on the terrace of one apartment building.

There were fishermen anywhere there was water.

The musical instruments that were played were magical.  They were every shape and made every different kinds of sounds.  I have pictures!

A typhoon was on the way so I got to experience the change in the weather!

I got to spend a weekend on a junket in Ha Long Bay and then another night on Cat Ba Island.  The sunsets were absolutely stunning!

Ha Long Bay in the morning!  The air was so clear and the light was just plain special.

This is one of the junket that I got to stay on!

Just another great view.  I could not pick just one to include on this blog!

This is the pagoda in Hanoi.  To walk all the way around the lake would take about 30 to 45 minutes.  In the early morning and then again in the late afternoon, hundreds, maybe thousands, gather to play games, exercise, and talk together.  It is really special and makes such a statement about family and friends.

These are the puppets from the water puppet show.  Each scene had a totally different set of puppets.  At the very end of the performance, the puppeteers came out and introduced themselves.  The music was also live and wonderful.

Another view of the puppets.  They are on a long pole that guides them under the water.  The puppeteers

are behind a screen and they shake, twist and move the puppets with out making too many waves in the water.

 

The entry gate to the Oxford of Hanoi.  The University was so very peaceful and lush.  There are many open porches where the students would study or listen to lectures.  There are huge statues of the founders and supporters of the Universities.  The names of all the scholars from over the hundreds of years are listed on tables that are mounted on these huge turtle statues.  Just plain cool!

The Mekong Delta

I have heard about the Mekong Delta for as long as I can remember.  I learned about deltas in science and social studies forever.  We learned about it during the vietnam War (or American War) and how the Viet Cong hid so well in the jungles and rivers.  Well, I agree now with everything I have learned.  The water is immense, the jungles thick and the colors as bright as you can ever imagine.  Again, every shade of green repeated over and over again in different shapes and with different fragrances.  The villages were often on the water floating from place to place as the level of the water changed.  The animals that were being carried on the back of bicycles and motos was extreme!  Pigs that were bigger than the vehicle!, rabbits, puppies (yes puppies.  Dog meat is suppose to bring you luck!)  geese, roosters, fish, you name it!  School had started down south and the high school girls were riding their bikes in their long shirted traditional dresses.  They are pure white and as they ride on their bikes they look like angels flying.  I got to try Bumble Bee Wine and Snake wine (finally!)  They were around 45% proof!  I swear that if I had breathed out and a flame had been near, I would have been a fire breathing teacher!  And, oh yeah, they were awful!  The coconut candy on the other had was wonderful as were the puffed rice cookies.  The canals were very much like Venice, Italy only the homes were thatched as built on stilts.  The poverty of the countryside was more apparent here than up north as well.  All the floating houses had TVs though!  There were also floating schools, gyms, churches and banks.  They would just move with the town when they had to move because the water got too low or too high or the wind blew too much or for a thousand other reasons.  It the house or business was floating, they did not have to pay tax to the government.  I rented a bike on afternoon and rode down the paths for about 2 hours.  That was really nice.  It was thick jungle in places and I was afraid I would get lost but everything is on an island and I knew if I just went in the same direction I would end up in the same place after awhile!  I had an interesting dinner!  I got to meet the free-range chicken that I had for dinner.  They bled the chicken out then boiled it to pull the feathers.  I wasn’t sure how I was going to feel so I just ate when dinner was done and it was actually pretty good!  THe water was different there.  It was so muddy!  If it got much thicker, I could have walked on it.   The people were very busy working on the sides of the paths and the dikes because the monsoons are expected to begin anytime now.  There were NO rice paddies!  too wet!  The frogs’ songs echoed at night and the bugs were huge.  I spent the evening in the home of a family and they cooked my chicken on an open fire.  Breakfast as well.  The scents of the different woods were the smell that woke me up in the early morning.  I watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics in their living room in Vietnamese!  I bet I don’t get to do that again!

Other highlights?

The roasted pig hanging upside down with a bow behind its ear.

The “good luck pagoda lunch”.  It was the 14th day of the lunar month and on this special day anyone can go have lunch with the monks.  I joined a table with about 8 older women and they quickly filled my bowl before I had a chance to say anything!  AND you can leave any rice or you are really doomed to have BAD luck for the next month!  They are superstitious about everything!

I was fascinated by the variety of homes in the Delta.  Lots were thatched walled and roofs and then, the next would be new and beautiful.  My guide told me that the Mekong is where the rich in Ho Chi MInh come to build their “mountain house” to relax on the weekends.

I visited the War Remnants Museum.  Another place any American that visits Vietnam should go.  THey have saved many different types of souvenirs from the War.  From tanks and airplanes to posters of anti-war protests from around the world to pictures of chemical warfare and villages being burned. It is an eye opener to read history from a different point of view.  It was a very quiet place.

All of the floating homes here at antennae instead of satellite dishes.  It was crazy!

Women rowing down the llittle rivers.  In the afternoon this got so shallow that not even the flat boats would floait.

Another earlly afternoon break.

Look at the river water!  It really was that muddy!

So, what are my memories going to be? My favorites and my not-so favorites?  Here are a few thoughts:

Favorites:

The people, especially in Danang because I had the time to visit and re-visit them.  relationships are where the true joy is!

The motor bikes and coming within inches of anyone and everyone else on the road!  YIKES!

The beautiful penmanship.

Spicy food

The landscape

The quietness of the countryside

The families working together and enjoying each other each and every day!  they don’t wait until vacation to play a game or have a long talk!

The children

The alleys and the whole different worlds that were there!

The beaches!

The parks and beaches in the mornings or late afternoons

Every shade of green.

Not so favorites:

The monotony of the food

The dust

The constant AC but needing it at all times!

The honking, especially in the mornings and the people driving on the sidewalks!  Where are the walkers suppose to go?

The sweating!

Surprises:

The constant propaganda signs that were everywhere

The monotony of the food, the people, the language

The subtle way that the government keeps everyone in line=loss os speech and religious freedom

The fact that the children copy everything the teacher says or does.  

The tattling in class and in the neighborhoods

the loud, echoing classrooms

JUST everything is done by hand and slowly!

The recycling!

My own behavior, “Just do it!)

How much I missed my own children.  How comfortable I felt in almost all situations.  

How I realized this reallly is my only life-for good or bad-  If I am going to create a fun, worth-while existence for myself I can’t wait for it to be perfect or for someone to invite to live it!  I just have to “do it”  Smile, take it all in and use my energy positively.  AND BE HAPPY!

What will I try to do differently?

Add more games to my classroom teaching whenever I can  

to appreciate things more openly and to ask more questions

Invite more people to my home.

Exercise in the morning again.

Take a TESOL test

Sign up for a new gym with classes so that I can continue yoga and train for a race.

Find a place to volunteer regularly at

Work on meeting more people in my neighborhood

DO THIS AGAIN!  Maybe Nepal, Bahrain, Arab Emerites, Cambodia…who knows!