The usual

Work goes on as usual, weekends are quite the blessing when they arrive. Some of my students have abhorrent behavior, but the handfuls of adorable and polite little girls and boys make it bearable. I ran a lot of errands yesterday, going to multiple stores and markets with the intention of following some recipes in the cookbook my mother sent over. Unfortunately, almost every single recipe requires some ingredient that does not exist in Vietnam; Lemons are actually somewhat challenging to track down, but I did find some lemon juice which I consider a success. After multiple failed attempts to get my hands on some sour cream and artichokes, I gave up and invested in some crabs and clams for a good seafood dinner. My mom had insisted on me buying a "crab pot" when she came to visit, so I thought I might as well get some use out of it. I also managed to identify the Vietnamese version of the avocado (it looks very different and I had to have Son with me in order to know I was getting the right thing) and upon smelling numerous bundles of herbs, settled on some cilantro for some fine guacamole. The idea for guacamole arrived when I saw a bag of tortilla chips in a Western store. This is a BIG deal, since I rarely come across them here. Cooking in general always proves a bit tricky since my ingredient selection is, well, very South East Asian. But in my defense, I'm getting very good at making some traditional Vietnamese sauces and food. Currently, I am steaming some Banh Bao for breakfast, which is a dumpling of sorts, filled with meat. Ideally, I'd like to bring home some solid Vietnamese cooking knowledge to share with friends and family.

Speaking of friends and family, I think I've made the decision to come home for good around Christmas time. With the thought of grad school constantly on my mind, and the necessity to enroll in a couple tech courses before applying (which all tend to start in January), it looks like I need to be home earlier than anticipated. I'm obviously a bit saddened to have to leave Ha Noi and all my current friends behind, but I would like to return here with a masters in Architecture under my belt. This city is an amazing place for real estate right now, as it is developing with such fervor. It would be great to work in a firm here, but instead of looking too far ahead, I'm just trying to focus on not going crazy at my current job. :)

Viet Nam's National Day

I'm done with my first official week of school. Now that I have a routine going, the kids are starting to calm down a bit and my job is getting easier. I was a tad bit worried in the first week before starting to teach the curriculum, since it was basically chaos for 5 straight days. But now, after learning most of the names (a very impressive feat if I do say so myself), things are gaining normalcy and the students are getting comfortable. I had the day off yesterday for Viet Nam's national day. Although a lot of business took the day off as well, the Old Quarter around Hoan Kiem Lake was totally mobbed. According to Son, people from the countryside arrive around 8AM and then proceed to walk around the lake and hang out until the fireworks begin at 9PM. Son and I went out to a cafe overlooking the lake to get a view of the mayhem. Luckily this place is pretty well hidden and we had the outdoor terrace to ourselves. After my intense experience watching fireworks by the lake during Unification Day, I opted to take a more laid back approach and see if I could get a good view of the fireworks from the roof of my apartment. Since most of the buildings in the Old Quarter around the lake are short, I figured I would be able to see a bit of the fireworks. I had a bunch of friends who also weren't up to the chaos around Hoan Kiem and they came over to watch from my roof. Once the fireworks began, it was clear that my roof has a PERFECT, unobstructed view of the lake. Additionally, we were able to see fireworks happening at Lenin Park and at West Lake. It was great to walk around and see the different fireworks going off around the city. I felt quite lucky to have that roof available, and plan on throwing some sort of fireworks bbq at the next opportunity.The streets are getting all jazzed up for the upcoming 1,000 year anniversary of Ha Noi. Ranging from hanging lights, to sidewalk planters, to new road dividers, the city is putting in a monumental beautification effort for the anniversary. Granted, this is definitely something huge to celebrate; it's very hard for me to grasp just how old the city is, coming from a country that is considerably young. I believe the city is planning a week-long celebration for the event, with a whole range of performances taking place on newly erected stages all over Ha Noi. Needless to say, it is going to be quite a good time. The streets will no doubt be incredibly crowded and hectic, but that's part of the fun of Ha Noi. Below is an image of my street getting all spruced up for the celebration.

I absolutely love this photo, so inherently Vietnamese! Along with the mausoleum, the flag, and the soldiers in white, you've got the family of four squished onto a little motorbike. So authentic.

Here is a picture of a government building around the corner from my house. Thought it was very pretty and that those at home might appreciate-

Rainy Season

Just as it sounds, it has been raining ALL the time. Before, it was your occasional heavy rain for 20 minutes then the rest of the day would be overcast. But now, it rains non-stop for hours. Granted, the rain fluctuates from heavy to light, from monsoon to blowing sideways, but either way, it's rain all the time. If I had a car to drive to work, this wouldn't be such an issue. Due to the fact that I use my motorbike to get everywhere, all this rain is a huge pain in the butt. I have a rather large heavy-duty poncho that I have been getting a lot of use out of lately. Driving in a downpour with a poncho still manages to crack me up every time, honestly, if people from back home could see me doing this, I would never live it down; I laugh at myself during a rainy commute just because I know how absurd I look. But then again, everyone else on the street looks identical to me- there's no such thing as looking cool in a poncho. Even after a rain when the streets are still wet, sometimes a poncho is necessary. The kick-back of water from the rear wheel of a motorbike can be brutal. The streets of Ha Noi are not the cleanest I've ever seen, and when street water flies into my face when driving behind someone else, I always make sure not to open my mouth for any reason. Plus, if I'm sleepy in the morning and don't feel like working, putting on my poncho and getting out in the rain (and traffic) is a sure-fire way to wake the hell up!

Back in action

The new school year has officially begun... mostly. Our school is currently under construction which makes everything twice as messy, twice as loud, and twice as confusing. When I arrived for the few days of teacher in-service, there wasn't even a working bathroom. Now we have one, to share between 100 staff members, since the children's bathrooms are not the most pleasant place. I lucked out and got one of the best classrooms in the old building. It's three times as large as the cramped space I was working in before, and it has huge windows spanning three of the four walls. Better yet, the sun doesn't shine in through the windows (which was a big problem last term) and turn the room into an oven. We have 2oo+ kids more than last term, so the playground is getting a bit hairy. I was walking around during snack duty yesterday and there was a line for the slide that rivaled those at Disney World. Kids were literally piling on top of each other at the bottom. Despite the comic relief, I feel bad that the play space is so seriously affected. It is supposed to expand once construction is done, but no one knows how long that will be. For now, us teachers have to be extra careful when walking around during playground duty.
I dropped a level and am now teaching grade 2, and they are all pretty adorable. I got flowers on the first day from a student named Son Ha, who I later found out is one of the biggest problem students, so I think his parents were making an effort to form a good impression. All of the girls are absolutely adorable, and most of the boys too. There are a few boys that are completely out of control, but that's the be expected. We were told not to oficially start teaching from the curriculum during the first week, so I've just been playing games and coloring with the students for the past two days. I have two classes, each with 22 students, and the names are definitely proving dificult. I don't know how I memorized them all last term, but since I was successful once, I think I can do it again. Should probably take me two weeks, since I'm memorizing two or three names per child instead of one.
It's definitely tough being back in the daily grind again, waking up at 6:30am and getting home at 5:30. It's a looooong day and I usually can't stay up past 10pm, but once the weekend hits I will be quite relieved. Well, students will be here any minute, got to get ready for some hot potato...

After Hoi An, back to work

Alas, my one month break has finally come to an end. I had a pretty fun-filled final week hanging out with close friends, eating great food, and basically just kickin' it around Ha Noi. I had to run a bunch of errands for the SIS HR department in order to get my work visa complete. In addition to getting to the American Consulate to authenticate my diploma, I had to go to the French-Vietnam hospital for a full medical check. I expected the whole process to take an incredibly long time, considering my previous experiences at the place, but I was essentially ferried from doctor to doctor and had everything checked in under 30 minutes. This included chest x-rays, eye tests, a full body physical, etc. I get my results back tomorrow, but all 7 doctor I ran across say I'm healthy! This is always good news for those at home, so thought I'd share it with you all to ease your mind after my snake village trip.

Yesterday looked like it was going to be a very beautiful day so a couple of uswent to our favorite hang-out spot, the Thang Loi Hotel pool. I've mentioned it before, but for those who don't remember it is located right along one of the biggest lakes in Ha Noi (West Lake) and has sweeping views of the whole city... in addition to immaculate gardens and hanging flowers. We took a hot motorbike trip over in the sun and huge clouds swept over immediately after our arrival. Then, it proceeded to monsoon for 30 minutes. Since we were getting wet anyway, it seemed the perfect opportunity to get into the pool. Once the rain stopped, the sun came out for a bit which was rather enjoyable, until the cloud cover returned for a second heavy rain lasting over 30 minutes. It was actually pretty enjoyable swimming in the rain as the droplets were cooler than the water. As I'm sure you can imagine, the water in most of the pools in Ha Noi gets very hot by 10am, as it tends to sit and cook in the sun. Basically, this means that you have to swim either before 10am or after 6pm if you don't enjoy swimming in water that is warmer than your average bathtub. Pools tend to get very crazy with the locals after 5, so a lot of foreigners get to the pools in the middle of the afternoon since Vietnamese people are afraid of the sun.

I was recently at a beach in Hoi An, on the central coast of Vietnam. I would head out to the beach in the morning and laze about all afternoon, then as the sun started to wane, floods of Vietnamese tourists would rush to the beach to swim... in all of their clothes. The beach was literally deserted during the day except for your occasional foreigner soaking up the rays (which Vietnamese people consider absurd). So, for anyone looking for a pristine beach devoid of people during prime sun hours, get over to Vietnam! Hoi An is also famous for tailors, so I couldn't help but get some nice shorts for work made. The city is is referred to as the "Ancient City" since nothing was touched during the war and all the buildings are extremely old. Many other cities in Vietnam were heavily bombed so a city with all perfectly preserved buildings is hard to come by. Even with the rest of Vietnamese cities modernizing incredibly fast, Hoi An still doesn't have any skyscrapers, so the whole feel of the place is very dated and authentic. The restaurants are incredible, and it was great way to spend some of my last days of freedom... until I came down with bronchitis and had to cut the vacation short to return to Ha Noi. Despite being sick I managed to get a bit of a tan and swim in the crystal clear ocean everyday. Here's a couple pictures from the beach and the city itself:

Snake Village

So I'm down to my last week of vacation and have been making an effort to do some interesting things before I become a slave to work. Today, I went with 2 friends about 30 minutes east of Ha Noi into Le Mat snake village. Calling it an actual "village" is a bit misleading, since it is more just specialty restaurants all in a row. It was Son's idea to get there very early, so we were literally the only ones at this place when we arrived around 10am. Doing the whole "snake thing" is more of a dinner phenomenon, but we had the day to kill so we decided that snake for breakfast wasn't too bad. We got to the main floor where there were a bunch of cages housing all different kinds of snakes. At this point we were told to pick out our snake. The wrangler/owner took out a pretty formidable spitting cobra and jostled with it on the ground for a bit. He then proceeded to show us his missing finger, claiming that if a snake bites your finger, it's better to cut it off immediately rather than let the venom get into your bloodstream. I decided to take his word on it and back away from the cobra, and then we requested something a bit smaller and not so poisonous. We were shown a couple snakes and we settled on one of the smallest. Once we gave the nod, these guys went right to work. They cut out the heart and drained some blood, then ushered us upstairs to this very fancy dining room. There, my friend Dan proceeded to take a shot of snake blood vodka with the beating heart. Apparently this is a very manly thing to do, and I've heard of many Vietnamese men making the trip to snake village on the first day of the lunar month to test their level of manliness. Since I am not so much of a man, I was fine with my little bit of snake blood and vodka. After that part was over, the waiters started bringing up all different sorts of food prepared from our snake. Varying from snake spring rolls, to grilled snake, to dumplings, to snake porridge, and even rice cooked in snake fat, the whole thing was a feast of snake. It was actually pretty good, but I decided to pass on the ground-up snake ribs because I couldn't really deal with the crunch. In total, the whole ordeal cost us around 30 dollars, which is considered a bit of a luxury meal in Vietnam, but well worth it for the experience.

Now, I'm sure there are a lot of you thinking how terrible a thing it is to kill snakes, but a trip to the snake village is a very popular thing for Vietnamese businessmen so I was simply participating in the local culture.... don't judge! And in an effort not to gross out all my family and friends, this entry is very edited and very short. :)

A week at Chen La

Mom and I spent our final days in Viet Nam living in the lap of luxury. Chen La Resort and Spa is located on the island of Phu Quoc down a long, orange dirt road. The rest of the island is barely developed other than the occasional resort, so when we came up to Chen La, seeing the lush greenery and stilt-house villas along the beach was truly a fantastic sight. I had done a bit of research in finding the place, and found that it was a very small resort with an excellent spa. Since my mother was hoping to find both of these things on our final vacation before her return to America, I booked us the nicest villa the place had to offer, and we were both quite
happy with that decision upon walking into our house. The villa was made from salvaged wood from a traditional Vietnamese stilt-house, and decorated in the same manner. Our platform bed looked out over the ocean through a wall spanned with glass. The bathroom was enormous, boasting a sunken tub, hanging orchids, and both an indoor and outdoor shower. Out on the patio we had a nice lounge corner with cushioned benches and a freshwater jacuzzi of cool water. I really had never stayed anywhere so nice in my life, and couldn't expect the place to get any better, but after a couple trips to the spa and some time spent at the pool, was convinced that the entire place mirrored the luxury of our villa. We really enjoyed taking it easy for the next couple days, and made one excursion to the other side of the island to visit the famous waterfall and Sao Beach. The beach was your typical Vietnamese hang-out, with thatched roof huts housing tables for giant feasts, and wild dogs taking over the place. My mom felt pretty bad for them and attempted to feed a couple, but they were so well fed from successful begging, that they didn't even want out handouts. She felt better after they ignored our crackers, sure that these dogs were really "living the life".

Since we went to Phu Quoc during storm season, the resort was mostly empty, with the exception of the occasional honeymooners or Japanese family. This fact means we got some pretty heavy rain on a daily basis, but it always cleared up with enough time to spend by the pool or the beach and get some sun. Since I spoke enough Vietnamese to communicate that I was an English teacher, I got offered a job teaching English at what my mother came to call "Shangri La". I'm definitely considering it, but would have to spend 6 months on an island

with nothing to do other than sit on a beach and read. Also, I would be the only white person in the place, so I'm still considering if I can handle the job. While I'm waiting on that, enjoy the pictures!