88days

After our trip to Sapa, we rested for a day in Hanoi, then took a bus to Halong Bay. The three hour drive through the countryside of Vietnam was one of the highlights of the trip. Once we arrived, we boarded our Junk boat which we toured the bay and the caves. We had our meals on the boat and even stayed on the night on the boat.

One December day in Tucson during lunch, Aunt Linda convinced mom to travel to Vietnam to visit Tad and I.  They came in mid March and stayed for two weeks.

After a few days in Hanoi, we took the overnight train to Sapa Vietnam and stayed for three days. Sapa is a town where people from different ethnic minorities in Vietnam live together, and we had the chance to trek through the villages of the Hmong people with some Hmong girls.

The town was beautiful and we enjoyed walking through the markets and around the lake.

I will post the rest in the next post.

Yesterday morning a bout of food poisoning knocked me out. After an “episode” at school I made it home just in time for another episode. I had a few more by the end of the night, and today I feel like I am on the road to recovery.

The help I have received from my school community has been amazing. First though, a run down of the remedies that were suggested:

Hoa: take 5-10 pills of this Vietnamese medicine, dont eat fish, but eat pork and beef. (I don’t eat pork here).

Mom: eat bananas, rice, applesauce, toast and tea.

Chi Hien (the helper in our building) : said she would not buy bananas for me because she said I should not eat them if I am sick. Chi Hien brought me Excedrin and rubbed essential oil on my face, neck, back. That was great.

Mom: Never mind, don’t eat bananas.

Georgie (co-worker at school): put a bit of salt and sugar in your drinks, and eat meat.

my boss: sent me beef ravaoli, tomato sauce and focaccia with salt and olive oil. She also suggested I get fluid replacement drinks.

Wednesday-

girls downstairs in the cafe: go to the hospital.

My boss: sent me a large pot of soup and 10 packets of fluid replacement powder. Said to eat bananas.

I have been eating soup and bread, but no meat ravioli yet. I am so thankful for the help I have here. Back to school tomorrow.

Here is the POSSIBLE cause for the recent power and internet outages:

This afternoon I took advantage of the cool fall weather and rode my bike to the Hanoi Botanical Gardens. Although I have never been to the Botanical Gardens before, I saw it everyday on my commute to work downtown over the summer. The two notable characteristics of the botanical gardens are:
1.) It is an absolutely beautiful and serene park in the middle of a chaotic city
2.) There are always at least 5 bridal photo shoots going on at any given time.

I counted 15 brides. Here are a few of the highlights.

Before we moved to Hanoi, I read that Public displays of affection are looked down upon, and that Vietnamese do not hold hands or kiss in public. Well this park was the lover’s lane of Hanoi.

Visiting the countryside of Vietnam is how Tad and I spent this past weekend. We went with 40 other people from our church in Hanoi. The destination was a Thai village about 3 hours outside of Hanoi. Situated in a lush valley surrounded by tall mountains populated by the Hmong people.

We stayed in stilt homes. The open sleeping room was on the top floor along with the kitchen, and the dining room and living room is downstairs.

A walk though the rice patties left me covered in mud.

Close sleeping quarters, only a mosquito net and a curtain between each bed. 12 people slept in our room.

I would go again to a home stay in the countryside. There are still so many places in Vietnam that I want to see, I hope that Tad and I can travel more in the next year that we are here.

I love our apartment, but it is falling apart. Just this weekend, our stove stopped working, our kitchen sink faucet busted and water sprays everywhere, termites are eating all of our wood furniture, and right now there is a strange cracking/knocking sound coming from the ceiling and there is a decent possibility that something might break. I am scared to investigate.

Progress is happening.

We are finally having our wardrobe (no closet here) replaced, so our clothes are all over the bed and we are sleeping on the couch.

We are washing dishes without using the faucet, and I have decided we will order out until the faucet is fixed tomorrow.

There was rumor in our neighborhood that the house next door (we share a wall) was coming down or undergoing major renovations so that could start anyday.

I love this apartment and our street so hopefully all problems will be fixed tomorrow.

This weekend is the Mid Autumn Festival in Hanoi. The origin of the celebration has something to do with a focus on kids during the harvest time on the country side. At school we made lanterns, fish, star wands and moons to hang from the ceiling. This weekend the kids in the neighborhood bang drums and wait for the full moon. Last night I was delighted to see the dragon go down our street with kids following behind it.

With Tad still out of town. Rachel and I decided it would be a good weekend to do something cultural in Hanoi. The Water Puppet theater was sold out, so we decided to go to the Museum of Ethnology, which highlights all of the ethnic minorities in Vietnam.

We invited our language teacher, Phuong to come also. I started Vietnamese lessons this weekend! It only took 6 months of living here to finally start taking lessons. Our original plan was for the three of us to ride on one bike, since that is very common in Hanoi.

Three on a bike is neither safe nor comfortable, so Rachel took her xe om driver, Dung (pronounced Zoon) and invited Dung to join us in the museum.

I was impressed with the museum and the replicas of the homes used by some of the hill tribes.

The Tall House

The Long House

After a few hours of musing, we had a drink at the cafe.

Rachel, Diana, Phuong, Dung.

Notice Dung’s sleep wear as outerwear outfit which is very common in Hanoi. Next week: Water Puppet Theater.

I finally became a member of the Hanoi Cinematheque, an art house cinema that shows mostly independent films from around the world. Last week I saw a movie filmed in Lebanon and this month they are showing all Vietnamese films. A friend and I went to see three short films about live in Vietnam. The best one featured the Hmong people in Northern Vietnam and their yearly courtship ritual called the Love Market.

The happiness of the Hmong people struck me in this film. Their contentment with life and enjoyment of others was different from the daily interactions that I have seen in Hanoi. I hope to visit this area of Vietnam sometime in the next few months.