Homeward Bound!

It's been a while since I've written...not a lot is going on. I'm really excited cause I'm leaving for home for Thanksgiving on Monday!! I'll be home for two weeks, so anybody who's going to be around, drop me an email and let's hang out!

As for life here, I've been keeping busy, and everything's been fairly normal and uneventful. Spencer got back from his month long trip home at the beginning of October, and noticing how burnt out I was on being in the city, took me on an overnight trip to Vung Tau. We took the hydrofoil over on a Monday, spent Monday night, and came back Tuesday afternoon in time to teach that evening. It was exactly what I needed. We rode around on a motorbike, had the best french toast Vietnam has to offer (at least that we've been able to find so far), and relaxed on the beach (until a huge storm came)...






The only other thing to report is the Halloween madness at ILA. Each level had a different contest (Jumpstarts had a costume contest, Juniors had a Halloween poster competition and got to go to the Haunted House, Seniors had a pumpkin carving contest, and Elites had a scary story story-telling thing). My seniors had a pretty awesome pumpkin design, and we had a lot of fun decorating it. It was a bit weird being the one in charge, though...they were all looking at me to carve the pumpkin (and I had to since I'd been explicitly warned that students weren't allowed to touch the knife).







My Jumpstarts were adorable. They came in in cute little costumes, and I realized it would be a perfect photo opportunity. After about a minute of the TAs trying to corral them into rows so that they'd all fit in the frame, I realized that the actual process of trying to get them lined up was way more adorable (and telling of what it's like teaching a Jumpies class) than the picture would be, so I switched over and took a video (in the video, note the kid in the front, in the Cat in the Hat shirt that strikes his pose, and maintains it the entire time).

The final picture:


The chaos of trying to get there (photo):


More chaos (video):

Other news is that I signed a six-month extension to my contract here, so I'll officially be here through the end of July. Weird to think about, but I'm very excited. I've started to book some trips for after I get back from Thanksgiving...so far plans include Christmas in Mui Ne, Tet (Chinese New Year, at the beginning of February) in the central Vietnam (Da Nang, Hoi An, possibly Hue, and Nha Trang), and Malaysia in April to go see a Formula1 race in KL. Should be lots of fun!

I'm off to start thinking about what to pack for my trip home....hopefully see some of you soon!
xo

Jakarta and Readjusting to HCMC

So a quick debrief of my trip to Jakarta....two of my really good friends, Robb and Sam, are there teaching, so I decided I'd pop over for a quick visit. My first impression of Jakarta was how huge it was. With a population of about 20 million (10 million in the center, 10 in surrounding areas), it was massive. I was met by huge skyscrapers, tons of traffic, and absolutely no sidewalks. I also showed up towards the end of Ramadan, so in addition to the beautiful calls to prayer that I got to hear, there were fireworks all over the city all night.

Day 1:
We went to one of the many shopping malls that Jakarta has to offer. While we were there, we had a quick lunch before the Fish Foot massage. Apparently it's becoming a big trend back home...it was bizarre. We got there, and the ladies working there washed our feet, then we sat on the benches and put our feet into the water. Once our feet were in, hundreds of fish swam up and started eating the dead skin on our feet and legs. It was the most bizarre sensation, and nearly impossible to describe or compare with anything. Later that evening we met up with Vivienne, another teacher that Robb and Sam work with for a few drinks, and at the end of the evening decided that I'd go with her on a day trip the following day while Robb and Sam were working.

Day 2:
Vivienne and I met up and took a cab to the train station (incidentally, going to the wrong train station, so having to get right back in another cab to go to the right one). We were trying to go to Bogor, an old Dutch town about an hour away by train and known for its gorgeous botanical garden, orchids, and presidential palace. According to a Google Image Search, the gardens at Bogor look something like this:



But when we got there, it looked like this (view from the cafe where we camped out for a few hours):



After realizing that the rain wasn't going to let up, we decided to go back to the train station and get on the next train back to Jakarta. By the time we got to the train station, we were absolutely drenched, and shuffling through six inches of water on the streets. We got on the next train, which had the air conditioning full blast, and froze for the entire ride back into the city. Later that night, Robb and Sam and I got a smorgasbord of street food, including chicken satay, fried rice (with extra MSG), and some sort of weird duck egg omelette/pastry type thing.



Day 3:
Nothing too eventful on day three...I went into work with Robb and Sam to see their school, and after a bit of time there taking advantage of the internet, I went to a shopping mall across the street. So excited by western stores, and by the prospect of going into a shoe store that would have more than one style in my size, I bought a new pair of shoes from Aldo. Yay consumerism!

Day 4:
Ramadan was coming to an end, and we were getting ready to go on our trip to The Thousand Islands. Robb and Sam had the day off of work, so we decided to take advantage of it by going on one of the walking tours that their boss had created for a book he's writing. We started at one of the many shopping malls, and walked through some back alleys. We instantly got lost, but enjoyed the wandering around.





That evening, we tried to go to a Padang restaurant, but everything was closed since it was the last day of Ramadan and most people had left the city already, so we ended up at Pizza Hut. Go figure. (some of us were more excited to be there than others of us...)



The Thousand Islands
The next morning we set off for a two-day, one-night trip to a resort in the Thousand Islands (small islands near Jakarta). We got to the port and after an hour and a half boat ride, found ourselves at the island that we'd be staying at. The water was crystal clear, and as we were docking, we could see a pod of dolphins swimming next to our boat. Overall, the resort was beautiful, except that it wasn't very clean (there was a LOT of trash in the water) and there were tons of mosquitos. There were also two or three komodo dragons that hung out around the resort (as we later found out, because the tourists give them their food scraps). Despite our nearly hourly contests of comparing who had the largest or the most mosquito bites, it was nice to get out of the city for a while and lie in a hammock on the beach and read.






We got back into Jakarta that afternoon, and managed to go to a Padang Restaurant. At Padang restaurants, they bring tons of different dishes to your table, and you eat what you want, and leave the rest. There were lots of unrecognizable meats (at least, we think they were meats?) and other foods, but overall, it was really nice.



I hopped on a plane the next afternoon and headed back to Saigon:














I was excited to get back to Vietnam, but upon arriving and getting a taxi from the airport home, my taxi driver tried to rip me off....welcome home...Everything's started to settle down a bit and I've been getting more into my routine here (although seriously feeling the need for a vacation again - somehow a vacation to another big city isn't quite as relaxing as a vacation lying on the beach all day...)

My Vietnamese class that I was taking through ILA has ended, but I've carried on taking lessons with the same teacher and one other guy. I still don't know how to say anything (Vietnamese is a frustrating language!), but at least I feel like I'm making an effort.

August Updates

Not a lot has changed here in the past few months...still working the same schedule, eating at the same restaurants, and hanging out with the same people. I'm still enjoying it a lot, though, so it's not like it's a problem.

I wanted to write about my birthday, but since it was over a month ago, it seems like there's not really a point anymore. My birthday fell on a Sunday, which meant that I had to work all day (teaching four classes, in school for twelve hours). The classes themselves weren't anything special, apart from a few students bringing me small presents. Since I knew that I'd be exhausted by the end of the day, and not feel like teaching four classes on my birthday, I planned ahead with Adam, another teacher, to co-teach The S5 Olympics. We both have S5's (Seniors, so students from age 12 through 15 or so) during the last class, and Adam's class is only about two weeks ahead of mine in the book. We planned a bunch of events - a scavenger hunt with clues hidden all over the school, a three-legged vocabulary sprint in the hallways (which we had to cancel after one trial because it was too noisy), and a few other things. Overall, it went really well, and even though it was significantly more planning than a normal class, it was nice to have a bit of a break from "teaching" at the end of the day.

I share a birthday with another teacher, so we decided to combine our efforts and go out together. A group of 20 or so teachers went out for dinner at Bernie's, a fairly new restaurant where the chef is American and the food tastes like it - I had a burger (recently ranked the best burger in town by one of the expat magazines). After dinner, we went to a bar next door. I had another two drinks and started to feel a bit sick, so I called it an early evening and headed home. I woke up in the morning with what I thought was a terrible hangover, which was weird since I'd only had three or four beers. When I was still feeling terrible that evening, I realized that it wasn't just a hangover. I spent the next four days curled up in bed - throwing up and unable to move.

Minor medical crises aside, everything here is still going really well. I recently finished the free Vietnamese class that ILA offers. A few weeks before the last class, we went on a field trip. Our teacher told us the name of a market, and we had to ask people for directions (in Vietnamese, of course) and once we were there, buy different fruits and haggle over the prices. It was pretty cool being able to do it all in Vietnamese, plus we ended up with lots of different fruit to eat that afternoon. I'm planning on continuing on with private lessons with the same teacher, just so that I can keep practicing.

On Sunday I'm heading to Indonesia for a week. My best friend Rob and his girlfriend Sam are teaching English in Jakarta. It's been almost a year since I've seen them, so I'm really excited about it! I'm not entirely sure what we're doing yet, but I'll be sure to post an update once I'm back.

I recently decided to extend my contract for six months since I'll be going to grad school in September, and would rather be here working, earning money, and spending time with friends than sitting at home bored. With the contract extension, I'll be in Vietnam for a total of a year and a half, which is too long to go without going home. Sooooooo I bought a ticket home for Thanksgiving to break things up. I'm looking forward to seeing everybody, but more importantly, to eating some Allen & Sons BBQ.

Back to lying in bed and doing nothing....ahhh I love days off!

Ball Pythons and Private Lessons

A few weeks ago, ILA had a petting zoo for the kids in summer school. They brought a bunch of small animals (snakes, rabbits, lizards, gerbils, etc.) to the fifth floor of ILA and all of the summer school classes got 15 minutes to go see all of the animals. I'm sticking in a picture of one of my favorite students, Jackson, holding the Ball Python. Jackson used to drive me crazy until I went on the field trip with the class to the zoo (the real zoo, not just the petting zoo), and he was cracking me up the whole time - wouldn't let go of my hand, kept trying to teach me Vietnamese, and sharing his snacks with me.

He and I got off on a bad foot at the beginning of the class. I told all of the students to make nametags with what they wanted me to call them, whether it was their English name, or their Vietnamese name. Usually when students pick English names, they choose characters out of their textbooks (I have a bunch of Andys and Pollys), a complete white trash trailer name (Cindy, Daisy, etc.), or something random (Catfish, Panda, TV, Balloon, Dragon Sky).

When I saw that this kid had chosen Jackson, and I was excited to have a cool, different name. I called him Jackson a few times during the first class, and he started to get mad. He turned over his nametag I saw that the other side said Michael. He insisted that I call him Michael Jackson (incidentally, my second student who wanted me to call him Michael Jackson). I refused. At the zoo, I called him by his Vietnamese name, and about an hour into it while he was holding my hand, he looked up at me and said "Call me Jackson". Hurray for minor teaching victories!

Another tidbit from the petting zoo...one of the TAs posted a picture on facebook of me holding the same snake. One of the teachers I work with posted the comment trouser snake?, and the TA responded It is "Ball Python". Hurray for American innuendos that go over the head of foreigners!

The other new thing in my life is that I've picked up another private lesson. The woman who does scheduling at ILA asked if I wanted it, and I decided to take it. She gave me the name of a woman to call, and the woman said that they were lessons for her manager, who wanted to work on pronunciation and some grammar. She gave me the address of the company, but said she wasn't working that day and gave me the number of the guy's wife. At this point I'm starting to get really nervous about why they won't give me his number. I assumed that it was because his English was so bad that he wouldn't be able to understand anything or arrange a time for me to come meet him. After setting up a time with his wife, she told me his name was Hoàn and gave me his number. I texted him to confirm the time of the meeting, and he called me (his English was actually pretty decent, which was a nice suprise). I headed over to his office (Khai Hoan Land Office) and the receptionist led me to his office. He hands me his card, and he is the Khai Hoan - Chairman and General Director of a 250+ employee company. Zoinks!

He's a really nice guy - he's studied English for a long time, but never gets a chance to practice. He has a translator for everything, but he told me that he doesn't really like his translator, and wants to get rid of him and do all of his business himself. A serious fellow - I quickly realized that this wouldn't be the kind of private lesson where I could go in unprepared and just wing it... He asked me if I liked Vietnam, and if I'd had any sort of problems since I arrived. I told him I hadn't, and said he was glad, but if I had any problems with anything (police, the government, or anything) to let him know and he'd help me out. A useful contact to have....

Vietnamese lessons are still going well. This past week we did ability (can and can't) and the present continuous. The more I learn, the more it all makes sense (duh), and I've gotten a few basic sentence structures so that I'm able to form my own sentences, rather than just the ones that we're taught in class. The only problem now is that I'll say something in Vietnamese, and the person I'm talking to will answer me in Vietnamese and I'll sit there like an idiot for a few seconds trying to figure out what they've said (I don't even know why I try - I really only know about 50 vocabulary words), then have to tell them that I don't understand. Oops.

In Thursday's class we had to interview two Vietnamese people (in Vietnamese, obviously) who worked at ILA, asking them questions about their daily schedules (what are your work hours; when is your lunch hour; when do you watch TV; how many days a week do you work, go for coffee, work out, go shopping, etc). It was pretty cool that I was able to actually have a "conversation" in Vietnamese and that they could understand me. (Not to mention that one of the people I interviewed was one of my TA's, and the other guy in class also interviewed her, and she said that my Vietnamese was better than his. Boo ya!)

Anyways, think that's just about it, really...

Henry, Larri, and the trip North

A few developments since I last wrote. My friend Henry is here visiting, and it's wonderful for more than just the fact that he brought me Firefly sweet tea vodka. It's been weird having somebody from home here, and showing him around and taking him to all of my favorite restaurants really has made me realize that this city is feeling more and more like home to me every day. Henry arrived on a Wednesday night, and things were pretty uneventful (what with him getting over the jet lag and getting used to everything here) until Sunday.

On Sunday, I took the day off of work and we went to champagne brunch at the Intercontinental Hotel to celebrate/mourn Tara's leaving. The brunch consists of all you can drink champagne and all you can eat brunch (complete with roast beef and yorkshire pudding). After an afternoon of drinking champagne, followed by an evening at the Blue Gecko filled with more drinking and darts, I decided it was time to call it a night (it was, incidentally, only about 7pm).

Henry and I came home, and while unlocking the gate, I looked down and there was a tiny stray kitten sitting on the stoop. I've wanted a cat my whole life, and on this particular day, not thinking completely clearly, I picked it up, took it inside, poured it a dish of milk, and, again, not thinking clearly, adamantly demanded that I'd keep it.
The entire time, Henry was telling me what an awful idea it was, and when Spencer showed up about half an hour later, he agreed, and the two of them together tried to talk me out of keeping it. Spencer made the mistake of calling Zara to have her talk some sense into me. He either didn't know, or had forgotten, what an animal-lover Zara is, so when she came home and saw the kitten, she fell in love with it too. We decided to keep it until we could find it a home.

The next morning, Spencer, Henry and I left for the airport for our flight up to Hanoi. We arrived that afternoon and spent the rest of the day walking around the lake and exploring the city a bit. I really liked Hanoi. It's much prettier than Ho Chi Minh City. There are lakes and parks everywhere, and it's cleaner as well. For some reason that I can't explain, though, I still prefer HCMC - I feel like it has more character, as far as cities go. That evening, we booked ourselves a three day, two night trip to Ha Long Bay. I don't really remember much from our time in Hanoi - a lot of time was spent watching World Cup matches, making lots of "that's what she said" jokes (very few of which were actually funny), and drinking bia hoi (beer of the day - fresh-brewed beer that tastes suspiciously like Natty Light, but only costs about ten cents a glass). We also saw a few sites (the Prison where John McCain was a POW, and Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, where he was embalmed - in a word...creepy).



We woke up early to take the three-hour van ride to Ha Long Bay. It was pretty uneventful, though Spencer and I spent the time sharing my ipod and listening to Bill Bryson's memoir, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, and periodically cracking up. The ride went pretty quickly, and we got dropped off at the port and made our way to the junk boat we'd be on for the next few days. We got settled in our rooms, had lunch, and went up to the top of the ship to look around and catch some sun. Ha Long Bay is gorgeous; it's about 1600 square kilometers, and consists of almost 2000 limestone islets, some of which are really big, and some that are pretty small. Our ship sailed around for a few hours and we stopped at the Surprise Cave, which was a huge cave with tons of stalactites and stalagmites and shapes that were supposed to resemble animals, though I could never really see what any of them were supposed to be (at one point I think I offended our tour guide by guessing that one shape was a monkey. Turns out it was the Buddha). Of course, we all left our cameras on the boat and have no photos of the cave, but suffice it to say, it was really cool. After the cave, we had about 45 minutes of kayaking around. I'd never been kayaking before, and Spencer was kind enough not to get mad at me (at least, not visibly) when I completely sucked at it. We got back that evening and anchored the boat and went for a swim. Henry, Spencer, and a Kiwi named Rob that we made friends with all jumped from the top level of the boat, but I wussed out and climbed in off of the back. We swam for a bit, had dinner, and the four of us (Henry, Spencer, Rob, and me) spent the evening playing euchre and drinking games.

The next morning, we were woken up earlier than we would've liked (thank you, bottle of Johnny Walker) and ushered onto a boat to take us to Cat Ba Island. We hadn't really paid attention to the itinerary, so we were unsure what we were doing on the island, but as soon as we got there, they told us we were going on a hike. We were all pretty confident in our climbing, so even when things got steep and we only had on our flip flops, we weren't too concerned. It was when we got closer to the top, and things got even steeper (at times it was pretty much a vertical climb up rocks) and muddier that we were a bit concerned. It was pretty miserable towards the end, but once we got up, the view was spectacular. We climbed an old, rickety viewing tower (in hindsight, probably not the best idea) and rested there for a while before the treacherous climb back down. Going down was much more slippery and muddy than the way up, and there were a few moments when we were cussing ourselves for only having brought flip flops. We made it through safe and sound, though, and have a few pictures as proof. After the hike, we went to lunch at a hotel on the island, and then went off to Monkey Island, where we sat on the beach for a few hours and saw a few monkeys (overall, Monkey Island was pretty unimpressive).

We headed back to the boat for the night and found that a lot of the older crowd that had been there the night before had been replaced by younger backpackers. We hung out with them all night, trying our hands at karaoke and various drinking games. The next day was more cruising around the islands and then back into Ha Long City, where we had lunch and all took the van back to Hanoi together.

That evening, Henry met up with a few of the people that were on the boat with us the second night, and Spencer and I, both being exhausted and unable to stand Vietnamese food after three days of fried seafood on the boat, went to a nice Italian restaurant.

We left for the airport the next day, and after a two hour flight delay, made it onto the plane and got back into HCMC safe and sound (though the landing scared the bajesus out of me).

Not much has been happening since then - getting readjusted at work is going well, though I'm still getting used to Saturdays and Sundays of eight teaching hours each. Henry went up the coast on a week and a half long trip, and has just gotten back for a few days before heading home. We also found the kitten a home with our cleaner's sister. She lives out in the countryside in a house with a yard. We had to give her away just a few days ago. It's been lonely around here without her, but she'll be much better cared for.

Rainy Season and New Classes

Rainy season is finally beginning. It was late this year, which meant that up until about a week ago, it was incredibly hot and constantly looked like it was just about to rain. It's been nice so far; it pours down rain for a few hours at a time, and afterward there's the smell of rain on a hot pavement. The evenings are absolutely gorgeous - perfect temperature, bordering on a bit cool. We'll see if I'm still loving the rain on the pavement smell as much once I'm three or four months into the rainy season...

My friend Henry is visiting in about three weeks, and I'm starting to get really excited about it. Apart from the obvious of having him bring me things from home that I've been missing (including Firefly, Mom's homemade jam, and a frisbee), I'm also looking forward to showing him around what feels increasingly like "my city". We don't have a ton planned, but Spencer and I have both taken a week off of work, so we're all going to head up to Hanoi and Ha Long Bay and check things out up there.

My classes are going well. I've had a few of them end, and am starting some new ones. I'm finally done with the J3 class that I hated (the class with eighteen 7-10 year olds, 15 of whom were boys). That class has been replaced by Jumpstarts (4 and 5 year olds). I've only had them for two classes, but they're really cute and once I learn more games for them, I'll really enjoy teaching them...Not to mention that planning their lessons takes all of 15 minutes (mostly because roughly half of the lesson plan is Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes-based).

A few of my other classes have ended and I've started new ones, and almost have a schedule where I like every one of my classes. I also feel a lot more like a teacher. I'm more confident and have a better idea of what I'm doing...I'm getting to know my students better, and have a better idea of how to actually teach them (rather than going in with the mindset of "killing two hours"). I'm starting on a summer school class on Wednesday. It's a split teaching thing class, so I'll be teaching on Wednesdays and Thursdays and the other teacher that I'm sharing the class with will have them on Mondays and Tuesdays. The classes are 3 hours each, which means that I'll be really busy for a few months, but the money should be good, especially since I've got my bank of hours full and will be getting lots of overtime pay.

School-related topics aside, things are still going really well (with the exception of the occasional bout of homesickness). Stuff with Zara is going great - I'm loving living with her, and we've been going to the arcade at Diamond Plaza fairly frequently and honing our zombie killing skills with House of the Dead. Apart from our Diamond Plaza adventures (and the temptation of the KFC that's on the same floor as the arcade), we've been going to the orphanage most every week, though this past Wednesday was my last since I'll have my summer school class starting. We've also been going to a gym near our house a few times a week. It's fairly small, but it has a few ellipticals and a swimming pool, so it's all I really need. I'm teaching an "English Club" there once a week in exchange for membership. The class is about twelve students, all employees of the building (which is an apartment complex and offices) with low levels of English. Because it's English club and not really an English class, I'm not expected to really teach them anything - I'm more supposed to just give them a place to practice their English and build their confidence than to teach them grammar or new vocabulary (though I manage to sneak some in). Basically I show up and play games with them or give them a song lesson for about an hour, then go and work out. Not a bad gig, really.

Apart from that, I haven't really been doing a lot (hence no updates in a while). Zara, Spencer and I are almost done with season 3 of The Wire, so that's been keeping us busy. The other day Spencer and I went to the driving range and he taught me how to play, and I was a lot better than I expected (managed to drive a few 100 yards, though it was probably more like 120 if you account for the extra distance that the hook took them). Hopefully we'll go back soon, and even more hopefully, I'll be semi-decent by the time I leave this country.

I'm giving Vietnamese classes another go. It's another teacher, and so far I'm class all-star (since I've already learned everything that we're going over). Next week it'll all be new material, so I'll no longer already know everything, breeze through, and win all the games. That will be a sad day for me, as the games that we play in class (the same ones that I play with my own students) have made me realize just how competitive I am. The teacher is different, so I'm still getting new things out of classes, and am able to pick up more new things since I already know the basics (at least so far. We'll see if that changes once we start learning new things)...

The only other notable piece of news is that I made the discovery the other day that the KFC down the street delivers. My life as I know it is officially over (or complete, depending on how you look at it...). If there's not a blog post for another few months, it's probably due to my massively clogged arteries...

Phu Quoc: Rum Cocktails and Beautiful Beaches

I got back from a 5-day trip to Phu Quoc, a Vietnamese island off the coast of Cambodia. About a month ago, Spencer mentioned that he was feeling like he needed a break from the city, and I was all too eager to join in on a vacation. We took Tuesday and Thursday off of work and head to Phu Quoc for the week. Landing in Phu Quoc, it was hard to believe that a place this beautiful is only a 45 minute flight away from Saigon.



There's not a lot to say about the trip - it was very relaxing...most of our time was spent sleeping, sunbathing (managed to avoid a sunburn this time!), swimming, reading, listening to music, doing crosswords, eating, or drinking. Our resort was a gorgeous little place right on the beach, and as we discovered the first night, conveniently right next to a bar and restaurant that had delicious cocktails and BBQ, and about five dogs that roamed the area (to the best of our knowledge, the dogs and the BBQ were kept completely separate). We went back there a few times, and couldn't get enough of the pork BBQ, or the dogs (again - separate thoughts).

Towards the end of the trip, we were having lunch at another resort down the beach, and they mentioned that they were having a seafood BBQ that night. I was feeling adventurous, and Spencer wanted some seafood, so we put in a reservation for that evening. We showed up, and there was a large buffet table set up with all of the raw seafood on it. We walked around, pointing to what we wanted (snapper, scallops, tuna, black king fish, and some beef skewers for good measure), then sat down and they brought the food over to us once it had cooked. I'm getting better about seafood, as this wasn't just bearable, but I actually found some of it pretty enjoyable.

There's not a lot to tell from the vacation, as every day but one we stayed at the resort. The one day we managed to leave, we went to Sao Beach, which I can say is one of the nicest beaches I've ever been to. White sand, clear water, and beautiful green forests lining everything. We only stayed for a few hours, but the whole beach reminded me a lot of the Whitsunday Islands in Australia, though with far fewer people, which was lovely.

It was also nice being out of the city because everybody on the island was beyond appreciative when we spoke Vietnamese to them (and by "speaking Vietnamese", on my part, that consisted almost exclusively of saying "hello", "thank you", and ordering beer in Vietnamese). I'm picking things up, phrase by phrase and street name by street name.

We got back yesterday and since today is a national holiday (Labor Day), have had the day off to get back into the swing of things in big city life. It also means that we only have to work a one day weekend, which will definitely help. The teaching's still going well. One of my classes that I really don't like is set to end on Tuesday (by going on holiday when I did, I managed to avoid giving the speaking test part of the exam, as well as the whole grading of the exams, so I get to come back for just the end of course party), so after the end of course party with them, I'll be switching classes. Other classes continue to go well for the most part, though summer school that's coming up soon may change my schedule for a bit.

I'm off to catch up with Zara for a bit, since we've pretty much only watched The Wire since I got back, and haven't talked much.

April: New House, and the Slaking of my KFC Craving

Zara and I moved into our new place. It's a small, two-bedroom, three bathroom house, that Zara and I have pretty much destroyed already since we're both quite sloppy and neither of us like to clean - quite an impressive feat, given that we've only been living here a week. Our next step is to hire a cleaning lady so that we can continue being lazy....gotta love the low cost of living here.

The neighborhood is really nice - there's a wide alley leading to our smaller alley. The big alley has tons of street food and a few small stores. It's a really young feeling neighborhood - lots of teenagers hanging out playing cards, and quite a few little toddlers walking around or riding bikes or playing in the street. Very cute. Our landlord lives just around the corner, and has a little bit of English, so if we need anything, we can just pop over and ask.

Our third or fourth day, we decided that we needed some things for our house, so went to Diamond Plaza (the upscale mall near where we live). Zara was excited because she used to work in a department store, and it reminds her of home there, and I was excited because there's a KFC in it (for some bizarre reason - as Adam can verify from our experience in Barcelona, and Robb can verify from my experience in Morocco - I get intense cravings for KFCs when I'm outside of the States, even though I hate it when I'm at home). Anyways, it turns out (and I'd completely forgotten this), that Diamond Plaza is about 80% clothing, 2% KFC, 10% arcade and bowling, 2% housewares, and 6% grocery store. After a few weeks of cajoling, Zara finally caved into going to KFC, and we walked in the door, I'd just picked out what I wanted to order, and Zara promptly decided that we weren't going to eat there (she's a vegetarian). So we left, and went to the grocery store.

The grocery store didn't really have anything on our list (other than booze), but it was so exciting to be surrounded by western products, that we ended up spending 1.3 million dong (about $70) and, while standing in the checkout line, watching our items being scanned, realized we'd gotten nothing on our list (other than booze), and had somehow ended up with 4 air fresheners, shampoo, perfume, band-aids, a toothbrush, a few other random things, and the only edible items....a box of crackers that I'd picked up as an impulse buy as we were standing in line.

We got back home after our grand grocery extravaganza, and as I'm unlocking the padlock on the gate, Zara points out that we'd totally forgotten to eat dinner. So we dump our things and head down the street to find a restaurant. We walk into a restaurant that has cute pictures of ducks all over the walls, and sit down and get handed the menu. Every single item on the menu (with the exception of "soup broth with no meat", "asparagus" and "white rice") had duck meat in it (duck head, duck chest, duck feet, etc). I ordered duck fried rice, and Zara asked for white rice and asparagus, but was not happy about the situation - again....vegetarian). After a few minutes, the waiter came over and told us they couldn't make rice with no duck in it, so we left. After that incident, Zara was more than happy to go to the KFC right down the block.

Zara and I are continuing to go to the orphanage, and I'm getting more used to it there, and feeling more useful. When we got home afterward on Wednesday, Zara pointed out how weird it was. We walked in, and each picked up a baby, then just went on having a conversation like nothing was out of the ordinary. This time when we got there the babies hadn't been fed yet, so we each picked one out and held them while they drank their bottles. I decided, being the mature person that I am, to race everybody else, and I'm proud to announce that my baby (nicknamed "The Philosopher") kicked all the other babies' butts. After that, we stayed and played with the babies for most of the time (I'm also starting to fall in love with the one we've nicknamed "Uncle Fester" - the fat, not-so-attractive baby that Zara loves).

Classes are going well for the most part. I've got three weeks left in one of my classes that I really don't like, and then I can ditch them and pick up a different class. Summer school's coming up, and that will change my schedule a bit. I plan on working a lot of hours, and probably being pretty exhausted, but the money will be excellent.

Off to dinner at a BBQ Garden around the corner. Not entirely sure what that entails, but it sounds delicious....Now a few pictures of the house:

View of the living room/kitchen from the front door:



Our sweet chandelier:



Our tiny kitchen: (still unused)



The top of our sofa, our nooks for displaying art (?) and our statue:



My room: (Somehow I managed to take a picture that shows absolutely nothing. That is the far edge of my bed, my bedside table, and through the curtains is a little balcony)



Zara pointing to my bathroom:

Brief Updates

Mui Ne trip was debaucherous and fun. Don't really have any blog-appropriate details to share, but suffice it to say, it was nice to get away from work for a few days and relax by the beach...

Teaching's still going well. I have a few classes that I'm really disliking, so I'm trying to figure out how I can strategically dump them. I think that once summer school starts, my schedule's going to change, so that'll give me the perfect opportunity to get rid of some of the worse classes. The good classes are still really good though, so that's keeping me enjoying the job. I was talking to another teacher the other day, and he told me about a conversation he'd had with one of the other teachers talking about how, despite complaining about teaching and disliking kids, when you're teaching here, you're guaranteed to legitimately smile or laugh within the first five minutes of your workday around these kids. When I thought about it, I realized it was true. And the more I think about things that way, the more I think about how great this job really is.

Other news...Zara and I found a two-bedroom house in a nice part of town, so we're working on getting the lease signed and moved in now. I'll be sure to post some pictures once we're moved in and starting to get settled. I'm looking forward to getting out of the guest house...it's a bit obnoxious having to ring the bell whenever I'm coming back after 11pm and hope that somebody wakes up to let me in...

Only other update was that I started volunteering at one of the orphanages here. ILA has tons of volunteer opportunities, but this was one of the few ones that doesn't involve teaching English (I really don't want to teach more during my free time). Every Wednesday and Thursday, people from ILA (both teachers and TA's), take a taxi over to the orphanage. When I got there, it was a bit overwhelming. We walked into a room full of about 25 baby's cots, with babies either crying, sleeping, or just lying there. We'd arrived after they'd been fed, so we'd just pick babies up out of their cribs, play with them for a while, then put them back and get a different kid. I also visited the toddler's room, and played with them for a while. After a few hours, we fed the babies, and put them down for naps. It was my first visit, so I wasn't quite ready to go into the room with kids who have disabilities, so I just stayed with the babies and toddlers, but eventually I'd like to start working with some of the other, less fortunate kids. Overall, a very good experience, and I'm glad that ILA is involved in the community as much as it is.

Other than that, Zara and I have found a house and will be moving in tomorrow (I had a slight moment of panic when I thought I'd lost my passport, so I wouldn't
have been able to sign the lease, etc., but just found it a bit ago, so I'm good to go). It's a nice place, on a really nice street and alley, and I'll post some pictures as soon as we get a bit more settled!

Two month mark!

Not many updates...

The other day, on my way back from my private lesson in Phu My Hung in District 7 (about 20 minutes away or so), my xe om driver turned on a street near to the one where I live, and there was a "roadblock" (Vietnamese road blocks consist mostly of cops sitting at a little table next to the road with a whistle, and whistling at people that they want to stop).

The police whistled at us, and instead of stopping, my driver sped up. One of the cops ran after us and ripped the key out of the ignition. He pushed his bike back to the table and chairs where the rest of the police were, and we stood there in the street (he knew what was going on, I obviously didn't, as the extent of my Vietnamese is what I've learned in my survival class...though earlier that day I did learn the word for "police officer" - but didn't think the cops would appreciate me pointing at them and showing off my amazing Vietnamese skills...

Fortunately there was another guy who had been stopped at the road block who spoke English, and the cops asked him to translate for me. My xe om driver didn't have his license, so basically he had to bribe the cops. The guy who spoke English asked where I was going, and since it was only a few blocks away (I would've walked, but that would involve crossing a 4-lane highway during rush hour), he dropped me off at my place on his way home. Just another day in Vietnam, and yet another reason I've got to get a motorbike...

I've decided to stick with the Vietnamese classes. It was really frustrating at first because I couldn't say anything, but now that I'm learning a few phrases and able to ask and answer a couple of questions, it's encouraging. I get most of my practice in on Wednesdays, immediately after Vietnamese class, on my xe om ride from the school to my private lesson. And by practice, I actually mean asking the driver what's your name? how old are you? and where are you from? (answer: Vietnam), and while bargaining with people (though the only real bargaining phrase I know is "too expensive!" and I've forgotten most of the numbers, so it's pretty ineffective). Now that I've gone to four or so classes (not to mention my extensive practice outside of the classroom), I'm starting to pick a fair bit up, so the language is less intimidating, which is definitely nice.

The school-sponsored trip to Mui Ne is on Monday and Tuesday. I've taken Tuesday off and plan on staying Monday, Tuesday, and taking an overnight bus back Wednesday night to get back Thursday morning in time to plan my lessons and teach that evening. It's a much-needed break, and it'll be nice to lie on the beach, relax, and do absolutely nothing.

Just getting around to uploading a few random pictures off my camera...

Julie (my private lesson student), after I noticed just how small her finger was:


Delicious pork on a skewer that I got just around the corner from where I live...could be my new addiction here...


Lewis modeling his fashionable and stylish glasses that he bought so he doesn't get dirt in his eyes when he's on his bike:


The other news is that I found out this morning that I got into the MPA program at UW, with enough financial aid to make it a viable option for me. I'll be getting back to them in the next few days to see if I can defer, but in general, I'm very excited about the idea of living in Seattle!!

My visit to the Vietnamese Hospital and other adventures

My first time in a Vietnamese hospital was thankfully not due to a motorbike accident. I had to go in for my health check to get my work permit. It was, as expected, a truly Vietnamese, bureaucratic experience (not to mention a complete waste of time). Five of us met at ILA headquarters and one of the TAs came with us to translate. The medical exam consisted of:

- an eye check
- drawing blood
- urine sample
- chest X-Ray
- ear and throat exam
- blood pressure
- talking with a doctor

Seems like a normal enough medical checkup, but...here's what actually happened:

- We arrived at the hospital and waited in the waiting room for 20 minutes. One of the other teachers and I each had Earth Song on our ipods, so we listened to them sychronizedly and marveled in how epic a song it is.

- eye check: I walked into a room, they asked if I had in contacts. I said yes. They had me read the chart (with my contacts in) and asked what my prescription strength was, and sent me into another room down the hall where I put my chin on a machine, and the man shone a bright light in one eye, scribbled something on a piece of paper, stamped it, and sent me back to the waiting room.

- drawing blood: took a sample of blood out of my wrist and squirted it into two separate vials. Gave me the cup to pee in (more on this later)

- urine sample: the opening on the cup they gave me was literally smaller than a shotglass. And the bathroom was down the crowded hall. And had no toilet paper. Surreptitiously carrying my urine sample back down the hallway was one of the more entertaining parts of the visit.

- chest x-ray: After walking across the hospital, we arrived in the x-ray area, which had a live tree growing through the middle of the waiting area (it was surrounded by glass. I went into the changing area of the x-ray room, took my top off, and put the gown on. I walked out, not sure what I was supposed to do next. The doctor pushed me towards the wall, pulled my arms behind my back, and shoved me further toward the plate I was meant to lean up against. I was so confused the entire time about what was going on that I hardly had time to react.

- ear and throat exam: Went upstairs for the ear and throat exam. Consisted of the nurse making small talk about how hot it was outside, a doctor using a tongue depressor and looking in my mouth for a total of one second, and then shining a bright light in my ears for another two seconds.

- blood pressure and talking with the doctor : After a nurse took our blood pressures, it was about 4pm and the TA we went with who was translating for us informed us that the doctors were going to leave on time at 5pm that day, and there were 10 people in front of us in line to see them, so at best, the doctor would only get to two or three of us, and the rest of us would have to go back tomorrow. After a few minutes, the TA was able to talk the doctors into seeing us before the rest of the other patients (she takes ILA teachers to the hospital at least twice a week, so the doctors there know her). The doctor visit consisted of her asking where I was from, then saying "tell me about your family". I was a bit unclear on whether she was trying to make small talk, or get medical history, so I gave a noncommittal response (something along the lines of "They're fine. They're healthy". Then she asked me to lift my shirt up, looked at my belly, put my shirt down, and started poking at my belly.

The whole process took about 4 hours, and felt really pointless. But it's done now, so I'm well on my way to getting my work permit!

Teaching's still going well...I've started doing graded readers (basically "dumbed down" versions of well-known books in English) with my S4s (my favorite class). The plan was to assign 25 pages or so, then have a book discussion in class the following day. The book discussion format that I planned on doing was actually the same one that I did when I was in 6th grade - there are five or six people per group, and each person has a different job (discussion leader, passage person, word master, connector, etc.) and is responsible for analyzing a certain aspect of the story and explaining it to their group. My class chose Gulliver's Travels, and I handed the books out last week, along with the job sheets. I'd planned to have the talk on the following Saturday. We got into class and played a brief game to warm up, and I separated them into their book groups. When I looked around at their sheets, I realized that none of them had done their homework and it would be impossible to have the discussion. I was so pissed!! I had to pull the "mean teacher" card and made the students write essays for 15 minutes about the importance of being prepared for class. The whole time they were writing, I wrote different ideas/questions on the board for them to think about (Why do you come to ILA? Can you get as much out of class if you aren't prepared? How would you feel if you were a teacher and your students didn't do their homework? What would their punishment be?) The students felt really bad, and I got some pretty good responses back from them. A few of my favorite excerpts are the following:

It is important to be prepared for class. But today, I am not prepared for class an I am not done the homework. That is my fault. I think my teacher feels sad. I want to apologized to my teacher for that. "I am sorry and I promise I will prepare for class and done the homework at home from today." That's what I want to say to my teacher.

I don't want upset my teacher and my classmate. And I'm sorry because I didn't do my Top. I have many time but I don't do it because I'm lady. I promise I will do my Top every day, I'm very sorry. I would feel very sad if I was a teacher and my students didn't do their homework. Their punishment should be I kick them and say that "you are a lady student I never want to see you again go away of my life"

The first ten minutes or so were easy to maintain the "I'm disappointed" thing, but after sitting for a while and thinking about how ridiculous the entire situation was (like, seriously, who let ME be a teacher? I have no idea what I'm doing! And most of the time I'm just laughing at all of my students' inappropriate jokes...) I'd gotten way too lax with that class, so it was good to give them a little reminder that I was their teacher and not their friend. They did get the picture, and on Sunday every single one of them had done the homework, and the one girl who was absent sent her completed homework in with another student. Hurray for small teaching successes!

Apart from that, teaching's been pretty uneventful. Tonight in class (with my Level 6 Elites - advanced level teenagers), we had a 45 minute discussion about prostitution. The book had a section on different phrases used to give opinions, so I figured we'd practice with a lesson out of a book called Taboos and Issues, which would be more fun than just bookwork, and give them a chance to express their opinions using the new language. My favorite part of the lesson came when we were going over vocabulary beforehand, and one of the word was pimp. It was a matching activity, and the definition was something like "a man that manages prostitutes blah blah blah". My students were a bit confused, and I asked why, and they said that most of the prostitutes here are managed by a woman. So, yes, on my third lesson with this particular class, I indeed did teach them the word pimpette.

I'm off, as I've got to finish up my homework for Vietnamese class tomorrow...

February Updates

Every day that goes by, I get more and settled in and comfortable here. I've had at least three teachers act surprised when I told them I've only been here a bit over a month, since all of them thought I'd been here for ages since I was so comfortable in the Teacher's Room and interacting with everybody. I've gotten to know a few of the road names in the area, so that always makes me feel good about myself, and helps me realize that I am living here long-term. Also helping with that is the fact that three or four new teachers have arrived, so I'm no longer "the new kid". Two of them (Jo from Manchester, and Zara from London) are really cool, and I I get along with them really well. We've already talked about living together, and plan on checking out some apartments and houses later this month.

Everything else is continuing along just the same. My private lessons are going very well, and Julie is still absolutely adorable. I've officially got a full load of courses that I'm teaching (2 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and 4 on Saturdays and Sundays), so I'm busy, but it's nice that they're my classes, and I can run them however I want. Yay! I had my observation (by Rachel, the boss of the entire branch where I work - eep!). I had her observe my J3A's (my worst class, full of 15 boys and 3 girls - 8 or 9 of the boys have absolutely no desire to be there, one boy has a learning disability which means that he spends about 30% of class walking around the room and humming). I was a bit nervous, but overall it was really, really helpful, so I'm looking forward to incorporating some of her advice and tips into my lesson with them tomorrow.

I'm two weeks into my Vietnamese lessons and so far they're going pretty well. It's a very difficult language, and often I can't even hear the difference between what I'm saying and what the teacher is saying (damn tonal language!). After two weeks, I know numbers 1-99, and how to say What is your name, What is your phone number? Where are you from? (along with the names of about 20 different countries), and How old are you?. I've used Vietnamese...twice after starting the class. Once I was in a taxi, and told the driver the road, and he asked for the number and I was able to tell him. And another, I was at a bar with Zara and Jo, and a little girl came up trying to sell us gum and I asked her what her name was. I was pretty proud of myself. I'm not sure how long I'll be staying in Vietnamese class. I definitely would like to learn, but it's pretty demoralizing to never be able to say anything correctly, plus the class is on my day off.....the plan as of now is to stick around in the class until I feel like it's stopped being useful (which I don't see happening anytime soon).

In terms of other things I've been doing....

Lewis gave me my first scooter lesson the other day. Overall grade....2/10. For fear of Mom and Dad reading this and flipping out, if anyone wants to know just exactly how badly it went, feel free to ask me. (And don't worry, Mom and Dad - it wasn't THAT bad). Also, don't worry, as I'm not taking another one until my health insurance goes through...

The other day Kim and I went to the War Remnants Museum (formerly named the The House for Displaying War Crimes of American Imperialism and the Puppet Government). It was a pretty intense experience (particularly the jars of fetuses that had birth defects from Agent Orange), and many of the photographs and descriptions of torture techniques. Kim and I finished up there around 10:30, and our first act after leaving was to go next door to the bar and have a beer. It was that kind of museum.....

Coming up on March 22 and 23, ILA is sponsoring a trip to Mui Ne. They're putting us up in a 4 star resort, paying for the bus to get us there and our meals while we're there (verdict's still out on whether they're paying for drinks, though that could be quite dangerous for them). The bus leaves at 6:30 on Monday morning, and gets back at 4pm on Tuesday, in time for us to teach our lessons Tuesday evening - however, realizing that would be awful, and not nearly enough time in gorgeous Mui Ne (I can't believe that the only two times I'm leaving the city are to go to the same place twice...), I've booked off of work on Tuesday, so plan on coming back Wednesday or Thursday evening. Should be very exciting!

I've gotta head in to plan some lessons, so I'm off! I'd love to hear updates from all of you on how/what you're doing!!

It's hard to believe that I've been here for a month. It's flown by, and if the rest of my time here goes this quickly, I'll be home before I know it!

I'm doing well with getting settled in here. I was speaking with Sydney, one of the other teachers who's been here about three months, the other day. She asked how long I'd been here, and when I told her three weeks, she was shocked. Because of the way that I was interacting so comfortably, joking with all of the other teachers, she had assumed that I had been here for much longer, and was just away on vacation for the three months that she'd been here.

Tet holiday ended well - On Wednesday Freya and I went to the Cu Chi Tunnels. It was really, really crowded with other tour groups, but interesting to see nonetheless. We didn't really get any pictures worth putting up, since most of the pictures are just holes in the ground that lead to tunnels, or holes dug out with bamboo spikes sticking out of them. (On a side note, our tour guide informed us that the term "booby traps" comes from the Bamboo that the Vietnamese used in their traps during the war). There was a shooting range at the Tunnels where visitors could buy bullets for any number of machine guns, rifles, or handguns that were used in the war, and shoot them at targets across a field. It was a bit disconcerting to hear gunshots while walking through the jungle on the tour.

After we got back from the Cu Chi Tunnels, Freya and I both had a nap, then went out to dinner and on Huong Vuong Plaza to watch Avatar in 3D. Watching movies in foreign countries is always amusing, and this was no exception (though not really worth going into in detail on here). The rest of Tet holiday was rather uneventful - it consisted of lots of 24 watching and sleeping in. On Friday we went into school to plan all of our lessons for Saturday and Sunday.

I had my first full weekend (four classes on Saturday, four on Sunday). It was every bit as exhausting as I expected it to be. Afterward I went out for a few drinks and dinner with some of the other teachers, and in true ILA style, ended up at T and R and ran into a bunch of other teachers there. I ended up staying out til 5am and got back to my guest house as the guy who works here was waking up. Ooooops!

I started my private lessons yesterday. I'm working with a 10 year old Korean girl, Julie, who has fairly good English, but trouble reading, writing, and connecting the words that she knows when they're spoken to what's written on the page. She's absolutely adorable, and working with her is so much fun that I almost feel bad for charging...At the end of the lesson, we play bingo with numbers 1-30, where we each write numbers in a 3x3 grid, and draw little slips of paper with the numbers written on them out of a drawer. Becky told me that Julie always beat her, but also warned me that she cheated when they played. Before we started, I told Julie that Becky said she cheated (how's THAT as an example of reported speech...), and that she wasn't allowed to cheat when she was playing with me. I won the first game, and was excited, and told Julie that Becky said that Julie always beat her badly. Julie said "I know...it's because I cheated". She's so adorable, it seems like the perfect job! The only downside is that it means I don't have any days off now (work at ILA on the weekends and Tuesdays and Thursdays, and this on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays), but I'm very much looking forward to it anyways.

There's not a lot else going on here. My Survival Vietnamese lessons start tomorrow afternoon, and I'm very much looking forward to being able to communicate a bit...or at the very least, learn some pronunciation so that I can say my students' names....

Chúc Mừng Năm Mới (Happy New Year!!!)

The bus trip to Mui Ne was a lot more fun than I thought it would be. It took about 5 hours, and was actually a sleeper bus (which felt a bit odd since we were making the trip during the daytime, leaving at 8am). There were three beds going across the bus (one in the middle of the bus with aisles on either side and one on each window side). Freya and I had the luck (still not sure if I'm being sarcastic when I say luck or not) of being all the way in the back, where it was just five sleepers across, with no aisles. Apart from Freya and I, there was a British guy next to me, then a Vietnamese guy next to him, then a Dutch guy on the other side. The Vietnamese guy was really friendly (even though he had practically no English), and kept laughing and making jokes that nobody understood, but laughed along with anyways. The atmosphere was quite fun in the backseat, even if it was cramped at times. The most comfortable way to sleep on these buses was on your side, and the seats weren't very long or wide, so at a few points I woke up to notice that the 5 of us were all laying on the same side, knees bent, and basically spooning each other.

During the bus ride, it sunk in that I'm living in a developing country. It's easy to forget that when I'm with all of the expats in District 1 of a big city, but once we ventured out, it was easy to see the poverty in the country. There were open fires by the side of the road; lots of cattle, either roaming around or lying down, but not fenced in; and houses that looked like they'd fall over at any moment. Despite this, most any person that we passed looked happy. The other daunting thing about the bus ride was that our driver wouldn't slow down while going through towns - he'd only honk his horn - and was whipping through towns and passing motos, cars, and other buses going about 50.

As far as I can tell, drivers will honk their horn when:
- they want to pass somebody
- somebody is passing them
- somebody is pulling out in front of them and they don't want them to
- the person at the light in front of them takes more than half a second to go after the light changes
- or whenever they damn well feel like it.

Our bus driver was constantly honking, which made it a bit difficult to get as much rest as we would've liked on the bus ride. We arrived in Mui Ne safe and sound and went to grab some lunch and plan the rest of our time there.

To clarify - Freya and I decided to come to Mui Ne about two days before we left, and hadn't planned a single thing. We had the name of a few resorts in our guidebooks, and a hotel that another one of the teachers was staying at, but that was about it. We had no idea what to expect, or how long we'd be there.

We sat down and started calling the resorts in the guidebook that sounded affordable and nice, and for every single one, were either told that they were full, or that the price was $50 and up. It was a bit discouraging, since we were counting on finding a nice room for about $20. Our waiter came up to us and told us that it was high season (Tet), so everything was full and prices were high, and gave us a map with lots of different hotels and their phone numbers. We scanned for the cheap ones and started calling, but got the same answers (full or at least $50). After a while, the waiter returned, gave us a pamphlet of a place nearby, said that the owners were eating a few tables over, and asked if we wanted him to see if they had room. We said yes, then after looking at the map and seeing that the price listed for this particular resort was $120+ per night, panicked a bit. The waiter came back, said they'd give us a room for $45, and it was right down the road. It was more expensive than we wanted, but it looked really nice, and we didn't have much choice, so we took it.

The resort was reallllly nice. The room was very new and clean, and the resort itself was right on the beach, complete with a bar (and people to come around and ask if you wanted anything to drink) swimming pool, and free breakfast (which consisted of coffee or tea, a buffet, and the option to order eggs or crepes).

We spent the first day trying to figure out what to do, since the trip was costing us about twice as much as we'd planned on. We decided to go for a walk along the beach and spend a while watching the kite surfers (Mui Ne is known for its kite surfing, though that also tends to make it a very touristy place, as we all know that Charlie don't surf). The afternoon consisted of sitting by the beach reading, snoozing, and watching the kite surfers. I ended up with a bit of a sunburn, but it was so relaxing sitting in front of the beach, being out of the city for a while that I couldn't bring myself to move into the shade.

After our relaxing afternoon, Freya and I decided it was time for dinner. We headed for a place that my guide book had recommended, though after walking about 3 kilometers and finding nothing at the address listed in the book, we popped into the closest decent-looking restaurant around. The entire time we couldn't stop laughing about how poorly planned the whole trip was, but were also pleasantly surprised that it was going so well. On the way home after dinner, we stopped by a bar on the beach for a few drinks. While we were sitting talking about how relaxing Mui Ne was, but also about how much we missed Saigon, an Australian girl came up to our table, sat down, and started talking about how she was traveling alone and lonely, and wanted to sit with us. We talked with her for a while, and she invited the two guys who were sitting at the table behind us to join us (Chris from the UK, and some guy from Canada). We sat for a while, sharing travel stories and advice, and "enjoying" the karaoke going on behind us. We found out that Chris was headed to Saigon within a few days, so before we left, we gave him our contact information and told him to give us a call when he got in.

The next day was officially the Lunar New Year (and Valentine's Day), and Freya and I woke up to our complimentary breakfast at our resort. The entire day, everybody was wishing us a happy New Year. It's actually quite cute, because people here don't say New Year, but ratherHappy New Year, as if that's what it's called. Similarly, It's not your birthday, it's your happy birthday (as in, my happy birthday is August 1st.) When Freya and I were buying our bus tickets, the man at the agency was explaining "because it's Happy New Year, the traffic is slow, so the bus might be late." It's amusing, and I'm not surprised that none of the students' teachers have tried to correct them (although maybe they have, unsuccessfully), because when you hear it, you can't help but laugh (in a culturally respectful way, of course).

We spent the rest of the morning going for a walk on the beach and lounging by the pool at our hotel again. After lunch we headed back to the resort since we'd booked a tour go to Fairy Springs, and the sand dunes near Mui Ne.

The Fairy Springs were really neat looking - it was basically a kilometer-long walk through a small stream a few inches deep, but with cool-looking rock formations all around. I was surprised that the majority of the people there were Vietnamese, and the children especially were absolutely loving it. As Freya described the experience, it was kind of like an water park, but "without the thrill". At the end of the spring, there was a small waterfall. After snapping a few pictures, we turned around, walked back down, collected our shoes, and got in the Jeep to go to the white dunes.

On the way to the white dunes we stopped so that we could take some pictures of the fishing village of Mui Ne. There were hundreds of boats, and the pictures don't really do it justice, but it was very peaceful looking. After our quick break, we headed on to the white dunes. It was weird seeing a desert after seeing beach only a few minutes before, but it was also gorgeous. It was also a bit odd since people don't typically tend to think of deserts when they hear Vietnam...It was my first experience in a desert, and the vastness of it was astounding. We rented a hard plastic sheet so that we could go sledding down the dunes, but after lugging it all the way to the top, found that it didn't really work, but rather just sunk into the sand, resulting in a disappointingly slow ride down. Freya tried to go just sitting on it, and when I saw how slowly she was moving, I decided to try going head first, but that was just as disastrous, and both of us ended up with sand everywhere. We were laughing about it until we realized that we were catching the 2am bus that night for Saigon, had already checked out of our hotel, and wouldn't be able to shower until we got home...

After we finished at the white dunes, the tour took us to the red dunes for sunset. Both the white dunes and the red dunes were beautiful, but I think I preferred the red dunes because the ocean was visible from them - very bizarre. We watched the sunset there, took lots of pictures, Freya failed at an attempt to make a sand angel, and headed back to the Jeep again (we decided not to bother trying with the sand sledding this time...)

We got back in time for dinner and went to a bar/restaurant that was open 24 hours and showed movies, since we had to wait for our 2am bus. We got dinner there and proceeded to stay for six hours, watching a few different movies and talking a few other tourists (some were waiting for buses also leaving fairly late). At 2, we hopped on our bus, immediately passed out, and woke up in Saigon at 6:30, ready to shower.

We still have the rest of the week off, so Freya and I have been taking full advantage of not having to teach...we bought the box set of 24 (all seven seasons), so we've been watching that and trying not to get too addicted (we limit ourselves to four episodes in a row, after which we force ourselves to go outside for at least ten minutes or so before coming back to watch the next four episodes that we allow ourselves...). We met up with Chris last night for dinner, a few drinks and a game of pool, and after meeting an Australian and another American at the bar and sharing jokes, we decided to call it a night. Today we met with Chris again for breakfast (we all had delicious western breakfasts - french toast, omelette, scrambled eggs, sausages, hashbrowns, coffee, orange juice...) and the three of us booked a half-day tour to go see the Củ Chi tunnels tomorrow morning. I'll put pictures of that up when I get back.

After booking that, and feeling rather productive, we went to the movie theater in District 5 where they show Avatar in 3D and bought tickets to see it tomorrow night. Afterwards, we wandered around Chinatown for a bit and found a nice little cafe where we got juice and sat for about half an hour before the long walk back to District 1. Freya and I were both very pleased that once we ventured out of District 1, there was hardly a westerner to be seen. The nice thing about Vietnam is that you can always get a nice Sunday roast or hamburger when you want one, and hang out with westerners when you feel like it, but if you really want to get away from that, all you have to do is venture a few blocks away from the backpacker district ("the Phạm" - called this because one of the main streets in the backpacker district is Phạm Ngũ Lão). It's also nice to walk around outside of the Pham because the Vietnamese are so excited to see foreigners - just walking down the street to school (or anywhere else, for that matter), at least two Vietnamese small children (they're usually children, although today we had a few that were adults) will smile, wave, and shout "Hello!", and the smile they show you when you say Hello back is incredible.

Wow. I feel long-winded, and I've got a bit of sleep to catch up before Freya gets here to watch 24...Also, I've just posted pictures of the Tet lights on the last entry, so feel free to take a look at those!