Wilting

I've been trying to suck it up and not be a baby about it, but man is it ever hot in Saigon these days. So hot, in fact, that I've developed a case of swamp lip. Not familiar with it? Profuse sweating of the upper lip? Yeah, but I have it super bad because my lower lip does it now, too. Gross, right? It's so hot that just walking down the street makes sweat roll down your back. Two showers a day are an absolute necessity. Air conditioning is mostly a luxury, so there's really no relief.

I usually handle the heat fairly well - I've had a few months to get used to it now - but I've really been feeling the effects of it the last few days. I've had zero energy and, as a result, haven't done a whole lot of, well, anything really since I arrived in Saigon. Sure, I had a massage by a blind masseuse the other day ($2.50/hour!), but that didn't involve a whole lot of effort on my part. Other than that, I've mostly just been hanging out, reading, doing a little shopping, drinking fruit shakes like it's going out of style, that kind of thing.

I did manage to go to the War Remnants Museum today (formerly called the Museum of Chinese and American War Crimes), however. Outside the museum are US military planes, tanks, helicopters, and bulldozers which are pretty interesting to see so close up. Inside the museum are two floors of weaponry, ammunitions, propaganda posters (from countries and groups imploring the US to stop their illegal war on Vietnam), and maps. The most heartbreaking exhibits, though, are the photographs, specifically the ones showcasing the effects of Agent Orange. Hearing about the atrocities of war are one thing, but seeing photographic evidence of it is another thing entirely. After awhile it gets to be too much, too intense, and I knew it was time for me to leave.

I'll post pictures in the next couple of days, after I buy batteries for my camera. I bought four batteries on Thursday. Today is Saturday and they're all used up. You'd think that must mean I took a ton of pictures, but you'd be wrong. I must've bought crap batteries because the first pair lasted until today; the second pair lasted for less than 10 pictures. Argh.

Sad decisions

There's been a change of plans to my change of plans. I went to the Chinese Consulate this morning to apply for a Chinese visa since I wasn't able to get one in Hanoi. I could get one and I could have it by tomorrow, but it would cost me $150. That's a lot for a visa! The most I've spent up til now for a visa is $100 for India, but even that was an anomaly; normally a visa is $30 or less.

I'm sad, bummed, and disappointed. I'd been looking forward to seeing friends both old (met in high school) and new (met in Thailand). I don't think I officially mentioned here before, but I'd also planned on going to Korea. The new friend that I met in Thailand offered up the extra room in his house if I was ever in the area and when I realized how close Seoul was to Beijing, I figured I'd be a fool not to go.

But, to use a really professional sounding term, I did a cost-benefit analysis. The high cost of the visa, the multiple bus and trains through China, the high cost of living in Shanghai, Beijing, and Seoul, and the nearly $400 one way ticket back to Cambodia just didn't add up. Or, rather, it added up to a lot more money than I wanted to spend for a two week diversion. Even considering that I'd have (free) places to stay in all of those cities, I'd end up spending well over what I spent the entire time I was in India in less than half the time (5 weeks in India vs. 2 weeks in China/Korea).

The new plan is the old plan. From HCMC I will head into Cambodia, first stop Phnom Penh. From there I'm not exactly sure what direction I'll head, but I'll figure it out along the way.

Frogs and funny faces

Last night, after spending the day at the beach, Marina, Rhian, and I decided that we wanted to check out the restaurant next door to the hotel we're staying at. We'd looked at the menu the day before and were intrigued because some of the items available were, let's say, less than traditional.

I should've taken pictures of the actual menu just to prove that I'm not lying, but I didn't so you'll just have to take my word for it. You could choose from all kinds of seafood (lobsters, crabs, prawns, eels), civet cat, oxtail, java mouse deer, venison, plus your normal ol' beef, chicken, and pork. I wanted to try something a bit off the wall, that I hadn't had before and might not have an opportunity to have again any time soon. I was worried that Marina and Rhian would chicken out and order their fallback choice of fried rice with egg and veg. They surprised me, though, and we ended up with quite the selection.

So what did we end up with? Sauteed frogs with chili and lemongrass, grilled hedgehog, and our "safe" dish was fried noodles with squid and prawns (we wanted to make sure we ordered something we knew we'd like, just in case the first two were horribly inedible). Verdict? The frogs were delicious - spicy and not at all greasy like they tend to be. I had to teach the girls how to eat them (I'd had frogs legs before, but never the whole frog) and they were too spicy for their liking, but they actually liked them, too. The hedgehog was also spicy. It has a gamey flavor, somewhat similar to lamb, and eating it was kind of like eating ribs off of very tiny bones. It was a bit tough, but I don't know if it's always like that or if it was due to preparation. The noodle dish was mostly great. The squid was probably the best squid I've ever had, but the dish lost points for using instant noodles - not a problem if I'm expecting them, a disappointment if I'm not.

Afterwards, we were in the mood to go out. Actually, we'd decided before dinner that we were gonna go out because it was our last night in Nha Trang. We all wore new dresses and were looking pretty (if I do say so myself!). And then the silliness kicked in. All of a sudden we needed to get photographic evidence of various funny faces that we could make. We even asked the guys sitting at the other end of the table to pull faces with us. For some reason, they didn't think we were completely bonkers and they actually joined in. It was a really fun night and our latest night out in a long time. I don't think we got back to the hotel until after 1am and then we did the girl thing and stayed up for awhile after that talking.

We were up bright and early this morning, though, sleep be damned. We checked out of the hotel and stored our packs. Marina and Rhian went to Vinpearl, an island in the South China Sea reached by cable car that has a water amusement park. I opted out. Partially because we're getting on an overnight bus later and a shower beforehand probably won't be an option, partially because it's nearly a day's budget entrance fee, partially I just wasn't feeling like it.

The bus leaves tonight at 8:30pm and arrives in Ho Chi Minh City at 6am. In HCMC, I'll be getting back to my couchsurfing roots as I have a host all lined up. I'm excited about it and think it will be a good way to wrap up my time in Vietnam.

The update

Hmmm, so where did I leave off? I guess I never finished up telling about Hoi An, did I? I was hoping to post pictures of all of my beautiful new custom-made clothes, but it looks like that's not gonna work because of the flash drive issues that I'm still having. I ended up getting a brown, shimmery silk dress with a Chinese style collar and a row of dragonflies embroidered under the bust (embroidery not shown in pic); a cotton summer dress; a dray gray silk kimono with tiny flower embroidery; and a corduroy coat with green silk trim. I love all of it! I'll be shipping the silk dress and coat home, but the other items will stay with me and have already gotten some use. :-)

I also did a cooking class on my last night in Hoi An. It was only so-so, unfortunately. The food was good - fish in banana leaves, shrimp spring rolls, beef salad, wontons, and white rose (a Hoi An specialty that's pretty much a dumpling) - but it wasn't nearly as hands on as I'd have liked. We basically just chopped and mixed and didn't do any actual cooking. The course in Chiang Mai was much better.

Quy Nhon was very quiet. I'm pretty sure that I was the only foreigner there right up until my last night. I'd found a guesthouse called Barbara's Kiwi Connection that had a dorm with a bathroom en suite for 50,000 dong (about $2.50). It was already a great price. What made it the deal of the century was that I was the only person in the room for 2 out of 3 nights; I had a huge room with a hot water shower all to myself. I spent two days doing exactly what I said I was going to do. Nothing but lying around on the beach or beachside with a book. I did manage to upload all those pictures that had been hanging out in my camera, but that's the only productive thing I did. I ended up having dinner with my new roommies on my last night. A Swedish girl named Madeleine, a New Orleaner named Ryan, and I went to a seafood restaurant that we'd heard raves about. It was truly a place for locals. No one there really spoke English and although there was a menu, it had the most basic of English words on it and no prices. The three of us just pointed at a few different things and hoped for the best. We had two beers each, salad, grilled shrimp, steamed crab, and a tuna steamboat (hot soup is brought to the table along with a plate of fish and vegetables and you cook it yourself). It was very tasty. And cost less than $6 per person!

The day I came to Nha Trang, I was to meet up with Rhian and Marina who arrived from Hoi An the same day, just a few hours earlier. I stepped out of the cab in the center of town wanting to find an internet cafe so I could find out where they were staying. Purely by coincidence, they were standing right there and we'd met up before my bag was even out of the cab. Today was spent at the beach, tomorrow will be more of the same. On Tuesday we plan to catch an overnight bus to Ho Chi Minh where we will celebrate Rhian's birthday and where I will (hopefully) get a Chinese visa lickety split.

New beach, new city

It's been days since my last post, but that really wasn't my intention. I'm in Nha Trang now and would have posted sooner, but for some reason after my last post in Quy Nhon, I couldn't access Blogger at all. I couldn't even go to any website that had blogspot.com in the address. It was weird.

Anyway, this isn't my official catching up post; I'll try to do that later today. Right now the girls and I are getting ready to check out of one hotel and into another that's slightly cheaper. We'll have breakfast and spend the day at the beach and then I'll be back with more.

To tide you over, I have uploaded all pictures - Halong Bay, Hue, and Hoi An - so go check them out!

Beach time

I'm still having issues with getting my pictures uploaded. I'm pretty sure I have well over 100 that still need to be posted - from Halong Bay, Hue, and Hoi An, with Quy Ngon soon to follow. I have a connection right now that is good and cheap, so I'll see what I can do about fixing that soon.


I also have a shopping spree update (yay!), but I want to wait until I have pictures to go with it. What good is show and tell if you can't show?


I arrived in Quy Ngon (pronounced hwee and then your best approximation of the French 'no' - if you try saying it out loud and you think you sound like an idiot, then you're probably saying it right!) Wednesday afternoon around 1:30pm. I'm here by myself for a couple of days before I meet up with Rhian and Marina again in Nha Trang. I plan on doing a whole lot of nothing over the next few days unless it involves drinking fruit shakes, laying on the beach, or reading a novel. Perhaps all three at the same time. :-) Posting may be sparse around here for a couple of days as there won't be much of interest to post about: "I laid on the beach. The next day I did the same thing."

Today marks

five months on the road for me. But before any particular person gets in an uproar over that statement, it's also my little sister Amy's birthday. She turns - should I say? yah, why not? this might be the last year she lets me - 29. Every birthday for the last 29 years I've spoken to her or seen her to wish her a happy birthday. This year, being that I'm 8,279 miles away (I just calculated that now and it doesn't seem as far as I'd have thought), I'll have to make do with a "Happy Birthday!" via blog.

Traveling with and getting to know Marina and Rhian over the last month or so has been a little bit like having my little sister with me. They are sweet, fun, and funny, but they can also be frustrating and annoying (although maybe that last bit is just because I'm used to traveling on my own now and it's so much easier to do things, make decisions, etc, when you're only one person). Kind of like my own sister, in other words lol, but that just makes me miss her that much more.

I've had many names for my sister over the years. Amy, Aim, Aimers, AJ, brat. Heck, when we were in high school together, she didn't even get a name; she just got a punch, a pinch, or a push. All in good fun, of course. :-) Now she's Military Mommy Amy and it just goes to show how quickly things can change and people can grow up. She's my little sister, but in some ways she's so much more adult than I am. She has a family, owns a house, works a full time job, and has started her own business. All at the same time! And now she and her family are preparing for a deployment on top of everything else. I have no idea how she does it (and does it well, I might add!), but I admire her strength and am so very proud of her.

Amy, happy birthday! I love you, miss you, and hope you have a fantastic day!