Ben Tre

I had the opportunity to go to a countryside village to volunteer and it was one of my best days yet :)

I must admit that I am not posting this in a timely manner, but it is very hard to get everything done...

Anyway, it was on a Sunday about two weeks ago that I was invited to go to Ben Tre, which is South of HCMC and in the Mekong Delta area (at least that was my understanding). The drive was rather long ( I am thinking 3ish hours...but it felt longer). We stopped along the way for snacks. This was a very cool experience because it was just a local road side stop (ie: vendor cart on the side of the road with several small plastic tables and stools) . We were treated just like the locals - which was great. We ordered a coconut type fruit and sugar cane juice. The sugar cane juice was very interesting because we had to cut the sugar cane and juice it ourselves!

Sugar cane juice is made by pressing the sugar cane through a machine that looks almost like a paper roller, you just jam it in and it gets pressed. You keep doing this until the sugar cane pulp is dry. I am sure after having to do it a million times it loses its appeal but for me, I rather enjoyed it. After our snack we were on our way.

When we arrived at our destination, which was a church that facilitates a scholarship program to help underpriviledged children get an education, we were greeted by many excited but shy children. There were 70 children there in total and we were broken off into groups. Our group was about 20 students and we simply played games and sang songs that taught English vocabulary (Head and shoulders, anyone?). After the games were over, there was a regrouping, where we all got back together and some of the students were awarded prizes for participation and effort (this was done by the leader in hopes of inspiring the childrent to always try their best - not sure how I felt about it but...anyway), we then had cake together and the children sang some Vietnamese songs. They were very sweet and I look forward to working with them again.

Our final job was to have dinner. It was the best food I have had here, and I have had a lot (and I mean a lot) of great food. It was all traditional food prepared by the ladies as a thank you for our time with there children. I don't even think writing about it would be fair because words can not do justice to the flavours and combinations we were served. So, I will leave it at that.

We left after our meal and headed back to HCMC. Nothing really crazy or exciting, just a great day :). I am glad that I had the experience and I look forward to future excursions. Krista and I have started a clothing drive for another project and we are going to a remote village to deliver them in October. I am sure I will have a lot to write about after that experience! I'll keep you posted.

moon cakes, I'd rather be on the moon than eating this cake!

So it is starting into mid-autum festival here in Vietnam. Aparently students bring gifts for their teachers at this time. One of my students brought me some moon cakes. I was very touched by the gesture, I mean seriously I am the music teacher. Music teachers don't get gifts, do they?

Anyway, the gift was a box of moon cakes. They are traditional cakes that are eaten during this time and I had heard that we were going to have them at the school as part of our school celebration. We are having a paper lantern parade, and a dragon is coming, then we are having tea and moon cakes. I thought that sounded exciting. Moon cakes, don't they sound wonderful and who doesn't like cake? I thought that cake was cake, but clearly I was wrong.

Krista got some moon cakes too and she tried one at school - I, on the otherhand, did not, which I am glad I did not...Krista said it was terrible, I believed her but of course decided I would try it, just for the experience.

Now, these cakes come in packs of 4. They are all different flavours. They are about the size of one piece of cake, or a huge muffin and they are ornately shaped (like they are baked in a tin that is decorated), they look really nice, no frosting - just looks like a pretty little vanilla cake BUT when you break into them they are jam-packed with stuff and I use the term stuff because one of them had nuts and dried fruit and jelly and ham. Yes, I said ham. A vanilla cake with ham in it. What the hell? It was like a fruit cake for carnivores. Needless to say that was not my favorite one.

Anyway, I decided that since I took a bite out of one and it tasted like ass I should probably try all of them (at least a bite) just in case they got better (not so much). The one with dried fruit and ham was the worst I think...but then I had a bad experience with the second one I tried too. It looked more plain in the middle almost like it was just cake but there was something in the middle. I thought the something was an apricot. So I pulled a piece of it out and popped it in my mouth. It was not an apricot...It was an egg yolk. AN EGG YOLK! I popped an egg yolk into my mouth thinking it was an apricot. EWwww! Why, why is there a dried egg yolk in the center of the cake? I don't really like egg yolks when they are in eggs, I absolutely don't like egg yolks when I think they are apricots in a cake!!

The third one was more like the first, dried fruit, jelly, nuts, meat, an egg yolk...all things you would expect in an ornate baked good... (I know! I know! Lets bake random shit in pretty little cakes and watch what happens when people eat them...). The final cake was fluorescent green on the inside with an egg yolk in the middle. I tried it anyway. It was the least heinous of all the cakes. It actually had a hint of almond and I avoided the egg yolk completly. I won't say it was good, but it was clearly better then the barf in a bun version. I took note that the package read D-1 so when I am faced in public with eating a moon cake I will choose that one.

After all was said and done, I had four bites of yuck and a mouthful of experience. I now know what to expect when we have them for the celebration at the school...I can't really say that I am as excited about that now as I was when I was ignorant but at least I am prepared!

deodorant drama

On a daily basis I am learning several new things. One thing that I keep learning more about is the importance of customer service here in Vietnam. There is so much importance placed on customer service here that it is almost counterintuitive. Let me explain. When you go into a store you get instant attention and it is like you are being shadowed at all times. You know when you have that feeling you are being watched...it never goes away here. Anyway, I tend to like to look at items and not be bothered by clerks BUT here in Vietnam it would be poor customer service if there wasn't at least one, if not two people bothering you. This is where I get somewhat frustrated and decide to leave the store (not good for sales, thus counterintuitive). I guess I just need to adapt and, to my credit, I am starting to wait it out a bit. My exit time has lengthened...

I do have a story though. I brought two sticks of deodorant with me but it is coming to the time that I will need to get some new deodorant. Now, I have decided to start shopping for deodorant early due to the fact that I have issues with scented products and I know my selection here in Vietnam is going to be limited. You see, there is an obsession with being 'white' here. There are whitening creams, lotions, waxes and, you guessed it, deodorants. I don't know how I feel about whitening anything in the first place, second of all, we all know how deadly deodorant is supposed to be anyway, and finally I don't want white armpits! Seriously! So, I have two blatant obstacles to overcome...the sented factor and the whitening factor...but if you count customer service there are actually three obstacles to overcome, let me explain:

This is how my experience went. Went to store, picked out deodorant while being stalked by clerks. Got antsy. Decided to just grab something that was non-whitening and looked somewhat familiar (Dove deodorant). Took deodorant home, wore it next day to school, ended up with a scent headache. Dove deodorant is not my friend. Gave deodorant to Krista. Went to next store, only carried Dove deodorant and whitening deodorant (might have to be a Smelly Nelly... ). Decided to try store that is close to school. Get into store and I am immediatly flanked by two clerks. I try to shake them in the shampoo isle, but they are good. They eventually catch me in deodorant land. I am just trying to buy a non-whitening, non-super scented deodorant folks, it shouldn't be complicated. I am smelling the deodorant. I just want to smell the deodorant, find one that is not going to make my olfactory system overload and get the ****out of dodge. The one clerk pulls a ladder out of thin air, she's the magic clerk that can pull a ladder out of thin air - every store should have one. Anyway, she does this because she is too short to reach the top shelf of deodorant, she proceeds to take deodorant down off the shelf and rub it on my arm. She rubbed it on my arm. Now, clerk number two is on the other side working the lower shelf. I was not liking the smell of the first brand of deodorant that I was assaulted with so clerk number two got me with something equally unappealing on the other side. Brilliant. Now I have two types of deodorant on me that smell really bad, and as I am politely saying no thank you to one clerk I get plastered with a new brand of deodorant by the other clerk. Four different smells are on me before I can get out. Perfect, four smells that I don't like on my arms. I reek like a bad version of a Yardley London store. Needless to say, the 'customer service' scared me away without purchasing my intended product. At least my arms won't perspire?? :S

I guess I will have to have a better plan of attack if I am going to succeed at this mission. Perhaps some sleeves and maybe a decoy...

xe om...the ride of your life...

I went on my first xe om drive tonight. They are motorcycle taxis. It was pretty crazy. The driver drove really fast compared to most drivers and I felt, at times like I was in a movie. I know that I have explained how crazy traffic is to some people briefly - but there really are no rules here, I can't even truly put to words what it is like. I was actually driving down the middle of the road tonight with both lanes of traffic jam packed and flying by on either side...it was nuts.

To set the stage a bit it was raining, dark, and I was on the back of the motorcycle driving in rush hour traffic. The idea here is that you just drive, doesn't matter where, on the sidewalk, down the middle of the road, who cares - you just go where you can get through. Anyway, I was going to meet Kim (a friend) for dinner in District 1 (which is a half an hour away). She sent a xe om driver to come get me and I was not really prepared for what I was going to experience - think amusement park ride but in the real world. No seatbelt, no holy shit handles...just me on the back of a motorbike.

First of all, the driver was driving fast and it was raining. All I could think was if we slip we are dead but that isn't even half of the experience. Next, he was talking on the phone. It is against the law to talk on the phone when you are driving in Canada for good reason and this guy was driving a motorcycle with me on the back while chatting on the phone! Picture this, he is on the phone (it is still raining folks) and as we were turning a corner all of the sudden a bike and cart pulls in front of us (not to mention the 500 other motorcycles that were driving around us) I thought for sure we were toast but no. Then there was the magical moment when he decided that the motorbike lane was too slow so he zipped into the 'car' lane - IN BETWEEN A BUS AND A CAR that were driving parallel to one another in ONE FREAKING LANE! ... that was a bit close for my liking (seeing as I find it freaky sometimes when I drive between two trucks on the highway and we all have our own lanes!). I lived through that and was on a bit of an adrenaline high but was also kind of hoping that there weren't too many corners left until we got to our destination. Then we crossed through the traffic again and I was all cool and ready for the going between a bus and a car thing again (not really cool, but pretending I was) and he proceeded to go even further...we were driving down the center line. Full on traffic on both sides! Like playing chicken...seriously...Think Star Wars Folks - I lived it!

Obviously I survived...a little soggy and shell shocked...but I'll do it again.

Wires in the Water save the day

Signing up for touristy trips is not really my cup of tea, but I decided that I would do the 'Mekong Delta' with a group from the school. I was not overly excited to get up a 5:30am on a Saturday - although it was a bit of a sleep in from my regular 4:45-5:00 range during the week. After convincing myself that I would be fine once I got going, I went.

It was a bouncy bus ride and our tour guide was an ex-US army person who decided that yelling was the best way to communicate (of course this tends to be a theme when language barriers exist...If they don't understand just say it louder and slower and if they still don't understand say it even louder...) Anyway, I was not really excited that my day was starting off with Drill Sergeant McGee yelling on this bumpy bus. It did not get worse, but then again it did not get better...

The Mekong Delta is called the rice basket of Vietnam because most of the rice for the region is grown there. I had envisioned seeing many rice fields with workers, a bit of history perhaps, but it didn't really turn out that way (note to self, have no expectations and you will not be let down). Anyway, it was a nice day, not too hot and not too cold thus, despite the loud guide, it would be fine.

We set off on our boat tour to our first island where we were served local fruit in a covered eating area and were serenaded by local folk musicians at which point I decided that there is hope for me as a music instructor here in Vietnam. After the music was over we were shuttled back into the boat to go to our next destination, another island where they make coconut products. I must say that I was impressed by the coconut factory which consisted of three ladies, a grinder, and a fire pit with three pots...Holy crap were these women fast. The woman that was wrapping the candy deserved a metal of some sort for being capable of continuously covering coconut candy in a crazy fast way. I was impressed. After witnessing what I am guessing is close to slave labor, we were able to purchase candy or soap (hmm...) and were scuttled over to have tea with local honey and were offered, potentially, some of the strongest rice wine ever produced on the face of the planet (think nail polish remover in a shot glass).

What next... ah yes, off to see a water buffalo and to have lunch. The boat took us to the last island we were going to visit for the day and we were assured that we were going to love it. I am not so sure what might make someone get excited about seeing a water buffalo that has been tied by a giant rope through its nose, in a clearly un-humane fashion, to a small tree but... it takes all kinds to make the world go round. Much to my horror the poor water buffalo was there for our viewing pleasure. Lunch was not all it was cracked up to be either which was a bit of a surprise because short of the fermented shrimp incident...oh yeah, and the pig head...must write about that later... the food has been very good. Needless to say when it was time to go, I was not upset. I was glad to be back on a boat heading for home. But the story does not end there...

About half way home we were stopped by the police who informed the driver of the boat we weren't allowed to pass quite yet because a Hydro line had fallen into the river. Hmm... that sounds like a bad combination...Hydro and water. I think I will just do as I am told at this point. Anyway, this is actually where my day got better, believe it or not. Because we were stranded in a boat and were given a timeline of approximately and hour and a half to wait, our boat guide decided he would take us to a local market and let us wander at our leisure. Exactly what the doctor ordered for the tacky tourist weary traveler. I had had enough of being shuttled around and was more than happy to become like a zoo attraction in this market. Krista and I went on our own and just wandered. I kind of felt like the Pied piper because children just started following us around. It didn't take long before people were bringing their children to see us. Children on bicycles were creeping out of the woodwork. It was kind of funny. Nothing beats a shy hello and peels of laughter from a Vietnamese child after a day of silly souvenir shops.

Unfortunately our market visit was cut short. Aparently getting a Hydro wire out of a river doesn't take that long after all, who knew? The rest of the day was pretty uneventful (unless you count that some weeds got stuck in the propeller of the boat and one of the people that was helping to run the show just stripped down and jumped in the water to solve the problem...).

We made it back to HCMC with out getting electrocuted and Krista and I made it to our costume party on time :) (and that is another story too...)