A light "snack"

The other day one of my students asked if he could take me out for a snack, around 4 in the afternoon. I have been making a point of always taking up my students offers when I can, so I heartily agreed to go on a culinary adventure with him. Little did I know the two day eating saga I was about to embark on.

(Note, please forgive the lack of pictures, they were on the camera that got stolen, see below…)

For the first part of the snack, we drove downtown to a little restaurant that specialized in the food of Hue. (See two posts previous for information of Hue.) We sat down and had three dishes. The first was Banh bo, a sort of rice pancake with shredded meat and veggies, all covered in delish croutons and coconut milk.  Next we had a different sort of Bun, noodles with more shredded veggies and coconut milk and lots of fish sauce. Finally we had shrimp spring rolls, wrapped with mint and green onion and lemon grass, with an awesome dipping sauce. At this point, I was rather full, but was informed we were going to eat “dessert.”

Turns out dessert was snails, along with the half developed duck eggs the Vietnamese are so fond of. The former consisted of tender, delicious snails boiled in a sweet pepper sauce. They were quite good. The latter are hard boiled duck eggs that have been allowed to partially develop into ducks. You end up eating the yolk, white, as well as a soft baby bird. The first time I tried to eat one; I couldn’t get past the whole idea of eating a duck fetus. This time, I just tried not to think about it. They are actually quite good. Dessert having been eaten, I was finally taken home. Needless to say, I didn’t eat dinner.

The next day the same student, with a few others, took Danielle and me to breakfast. We had an awesome Chinese dish of Fried eggs, meat ball type things, lots of yummy sauce, and rice pancake type things. All with a mini baguette to sop everything up. It was really good, and would have been perfect on a morning after a few too many cocktails. Afterwards we were taken to Karaoke, at 9am, on a Sunday. We were not given much say in the matter. I had a great time, singing such classics as “Barbie girl”-Aqua, “you make my dreams come true”-Hall and Oates and “my heart will go on”-Celine Dion.

Afterwards my body was very confused, as we had spent 2 hours in a dark room, doing what I normally consider a nighttime activity. It was an interesting start to a Sunday. Later Danielle and I played volleyball with some German volunteers we have met, as well as a lot of very talented locals. Even though I am at least a foot taller than most these Vietnamese men, they can jump very high, and are excellent at sending that ball. I had a good time making some blocks and spikes that were hard to counter, given one of the German girls and myself were the only two above 6feet in height.

Police and Thieves

One disadvantage of being a foreigner in Vietnam is that everyone assumes, and often rightly so, that you have nice things like a laptop and digital camera. Also unfortunate is the fact that a lot of people in the town of Can Tho know that volunteers like myself live in a row of guest houses on campus one of Can Tho University. Still more unfortunate is the fact that our house got broken into three nights ago, whilst my roommate and I slept. The thief or thieves made off with my laptop, my digital camera, as well as several of my roomies possessions. They either got in through the roof or the backdoor, but certainly left by the back door. All the doors had been locked, but they were sneaky and managed to open the lock from the outside. All the things were stolen from the living room, and 3 nights ago was the first time i had ever left my laptop in the living room over night. Needless to say i am rather frustrated and bummed out about this. My number of blog posts might drop, at least until i get a new laptop and camera. If only i was not trying to live on $150.00 a month...

The cops came to my house, about 7 or 13 of them, and made detailed reports, etc. I would be infinitely surprised if they ever recovered anything.  Such is life. I am still having a good time here, despite this major pain in the ass.

Thoughts on Hue

In reference to my previous post, Hue really was hue too cool! 
After a 3.5 hour bus ride from Can Tho to Saigon, followed by an hour cab ride to the airport, and an hour flight, i finally made it to grey, rainy Hue on Friday. 


I found Hue to be a very pretty city. The climate was much different from Can Tho. The terrain was more mountainous, with a few big hills here and there, and there were dense stands of trees and forest. All this along with the cooler climate and the beautiful perfume river stood in contrast to the hot, flat, mostly treeless delta i have been living in. 


Being a big tourist town, Hue had a really great backpackers district with neat bars, overpriced restaurants, and lots of vendors. I did my best to avoid the tourist restaurants, opting instead to eat from street carts and places that looked to be crowded with locals. I had some amazing pho the first night, which i suspect contained high levels of MSG, a "seasoning" found everywhere here!


My first night i was able to meet a great group of other westerners, a mix of Brits, Aussies, Canadians, Scots, and Americans. We did a nice little bar crawl, making our way from the hostel, to the DMZ bar, to a bar called "why not?." The second night i was joined by some friends from up north, and we had a great time eating veggie food, and going out on the town. We even got free beer one night!


Hue is the former imperial capital of Vietnam, and has a ton of beautiful tombs, temples, arenas, and pagodas to explore. We were fortunate enough to get two days of rain and two days of sun. Turns out October is the rainiest month of the year in Vietnam, and Hue is the rainiest city in Vietnam!! It rains an average of 24.5 inches in October in Hue, so you can imagine.  Everyone looked at me like i was crazy when i told them i was going to Hue this time of year, but it ended up being a really great time. 


The day we explored the citadel it was pouring rain the entire time! Most of the "forbidden purple city" lies in ruins, so we spent a lot of time walking from building to building, checking out what remains of the mighty dynasties that called Hue home. I was dripping wet almost the entire time, but still had a good time. Luckily it was warm enough to be comfortable still. On our way back to our hotel after exploring all afternoon, we encountered several flooded streets. Almost the entire area around our hotel had 1-2 feet of water in the street, i wish i could have taken a picture. I was too busy trying to stay on my bike, its quite a workout pedaling through that much water!! I luckily got a nice shot of a local riding there bike in the alley near our hotel. 

In addition to the citadel, we visited the tomb of Emperor  Tự Đức, and the Thiên Mụ Pagoda, the largest pagoda in Hue and its official symbol. The temple also houses the Austin motor vehicle in which Thich Quang Duc was driven to his self-immolation in Saigon in 1963 against the Diem regime, so that was pretty interesting. 

Our hotel was a great deal, for 8 bucks a night! We were certainly the only folks staying at the place, which made for some hilarious interactions. Before i had even checked in, i had already been asked by the hotel manager if i wanted do book a city tour through her. I declined because the tour attempted to squeeze 6 landmarks into 7 hours, and i wanted more time than that! We got breakfast every morning, and fresh fruit and coffee in the afternoon. 

Both the accent and people were also different in Hue. I found them to be just as friendly as in Can Tho, but maybe a little more eager to take my money. The food is also slightly different. The Nguyen Dynasty is famous for its gluttonous emperors, and extravagant food. I did not sample anything too crazy, but i had some awesome dishes while in Hue. The central market in Hue was also HUGE, and had every possible item you could ever want, from toilet bowls, to towells, fresh crab to tumeric to rice wine to "north face" backpacks. They had it all! 


I found it really refreshing and encouraging to meet up with Isabel and two other friends in Hue. I think it helps to be able to do some touristy things, when i have been getting used to just teaching all the time. The climate, city, and people were all different enough to really make me feel like i was in a new, but still familiar, place.  


Perfume River and Dragon Boats

One of two main bridges over the Perfume River, this one usually being choked with moto traffic.

Central courtyard at the Citadel.

The aptly named "long hallway" one of the largest remaining structures in the imperial city.

It was a wet day!

 We really wanted to go on an elephant ride, but they were not doing them when we visited!

 This is the courtyard in the Emperor's mother's palace. You can see a monumental gate behind the pretty yellow wall.

Flooded streets!

This beautiful pagoda had a very peaceful courtyard, and very friendly monks.

Hue too cool

I'm going to Hue(whey) this weekend! It's going to be Hue out of control. Hue is the former Imperial capital of Vietnam. It's chock full of ruins of a big citadel, tombs, and temples.
In other news, its sunny here! The rainy season makes for cloudy days usually.

More soon.

Kids Everywhere!!

I wanted to share two experiences i have had recently involving small children.
The first was a few weeks ago, just after the mid-Autumn festival. I was invited by a Vietnamese friend to a ceremony for children about the festival. I didn't have any more details. What it actually turned out to be was a performance organized by this famous Vietnamese singer's fan club. There were games, a dance number to some American hiphop, and lots of food and toys for the kids. Eventually,  Danielle and I were coaxed into singing in front of the whole crowd! We sang Edelweiss, and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. The main act was a young Vietnamese singer, who turned out to be a Vietnamese version of Raffi. She sang a bunch of kids songs, and then a bunch of us handed out candy and lanterns to the kids. It was a pretty fun experience. It all took place in a People's Committee building, so Uncle Ho was presiding over everything.

The second expereince was today. I had gone one an hour bike ride to explore a few areas around where i live. It turned out to be a great little ride. I found a lot of peaceful and picturesqueness streets, lined by houses, banana trees, and little canals. It was remarkable that there was such a peaceful neighborhood in the middle of bustling Can Tho. Sadly i did not have my camera.
On the way back from my mission, i ran into my neighbors, Bill, Dan, and Jun. They were on their way to an orphanage, where they do volunteer work once a week, and invited me along. I had a great time seeing the Pagoda/school/orphanage where these kids live. The first floor of the 4 story building was the temple part, followed by classrooms on the second, then hammocks and sleeping quarters on the third, and finally a big open eating/playing area on the fourth floor. There were about 30 hammocks on the third floor, for all the kids, along with the largest mosquito net i have ever seen! The thing was big enough to cover all 30 hammocks.
On the top floor i was greeted by a ton of screaming kids, as well as a few other volunteers, both local and foreign. I met four Dutch volunteers, ranging in age from 18-22, and a few Vietnamese university students as well.  The kids were so much fun! A lot of them just wanted to be picked up and carried around, we also tried to play a few organized games with them. The only one that seemed to work was teaching them the Macarena. We stayed with the kids for about an hour, and gave them some fruit and bread as treats. We left when it was time for their dinner, and i can't wait to go back!
I again didn't have my camera, but next time i will!

I also found an awesome pool!!! Its only 75 cents for a day pass, and its usually empty! 

My House, in the middle of a swamp?

It has been raining a lot here recently, not surprising as its the middle of the rainy season! Every time it rains heavy our front yard and walk flood. A lot of times we get water on our living room floor, along with earthworms and toads and frogs trying to escape the deluge.

The other night my students took my to Karaoke at this ridiculous club called Queen. The place was about 8 stories tall, with really nice private Karaoke rooms with big wrap around couches. The dozen students and I sat around the couch and sang a ton of different songs, all while consuming copious amounts of Bia Saigon, grapefruit, and green mango. Some of my favorites were "Brown Sugar", "You Make my Dreams Come True." and "My  Heart Will go on." They love Celine Dion in this country!!! It was a completely hilarious experience, and sadly i didnt have my camera on me.

Danielle(my housemate and fellow volunteer) and I finally got some kitchen supplies last week. Our apartment was supposed to be fully equipped with a stove and utensils, etc. But, someone took them out of the place during the summer, and everyone claimed to not know where everything was, so we got a few pots and pans and a stove. It has been really nice being able to cook. We live right across the street from a little market, that has people selling pretty much everything you could ever want to eat! Its nice to run across the street for eggs, or fresh veggies, or fruit whenever i want. It also makes it possible to cook up almost anything on a whim, provided the market is selling it.

I have a few pictures here of our apartment, thankfully dried out from the last storm.

My bed and skeeter defeater

Our deluxe kitchen

Foyer and Living room, kitchen and bedroom beyond

Front yard!