04/07/11 My Tho, Mekong Delta

Yesterday we woke up around 10 and walked to a bakery to get breakfast and left the hotel in HCMC and drove to our new destination. I sat in the back of the car with Jesse our coordinator. She is so adorable. She speaks very good english. She said she wanted to be an english teacher but the little kids were too crazy for her so she decided to be a coordinator but her real dream is to become a fashion designer. She said her parents told her that dream cannot be achieved. I told her to ignore that and to keep sketching and see what happens. She laughed and thanked me alot. She also explained to me that in Vietnam it is very important for the women to get married and stay married. No one can have sex before marriage. If they do it is very frowned upon and those women will always be alone. If a man divorces a woman and the woman has a child, they will most likely be alone. They are also frowned upon. AND if you don't find a husband by the age of 35 then people thing something is wrong with you and you live alone as well. So ladies, pressure is on in Vietnam!! Next time all of you single ladies complain, think of the real pressures that people experience.

Then Jesse also talked about meeting French people and suddenly the car ride turned into a French lesson for her. We drove by beautiful green rice paddies and over brown rivers filled with junks and fishermen. Soon we were in our new home for the month.

The guesthouse is very tall and my room is on the top floor, sharing with the two girls, also teachers, Riley and Leigh. It was so hot walking to the top. Thank goodness for aircon in the room. Then Nick (another coordinator also an adorable Vietnamese) and Jesse took us for a walk through the town and over the bridge, past countless motorbikes and bicycles. Rice hats were worn by everyone we saw. We walked along the water and some boys were jumping off the boats for a swim in the water. We continued to walk past the old buildings and into a restaurant where Nick took us for pancakes. These pancakes looked like omellettes and were filled with prawns and mushrooms and bean sprouts. They were massive! Then the lady brought out a plate of lettuce  and another plate of rice sheets followed by a bowl of fish sauce. Jesse explained how to eat the pancake. Basically you take pieces of the pancake and the leaves and roll them up in the rice sheet like a spring roll and then dip into the fish sauce. It is so delcious! It only cost 2 dollars for that huge meal. Then the woman took us in the back and let us see how they make them.

Afterwards, Nick and Jesse took us to the market. This was unbelievable. I realised then that I am definately in a third world country..

The market was full of things I have never seen before. The people were more traditional and wore their rice hats. It looked as though everything that I saw popped out of a National Geographic magazine. Here I was, standing amongst it all. There were baskets upon baskets of seafood and dried seafood, some of which I have never seen before. Everytime I stopped to take a photo I always got in the way of a bicycle or motorbike. There were foods and smells that were completely foreign. The colours were amazing. Everyone looked as us as if we were from another planet. They would shout ‘hello’, wave or just stare at us. Obviously, tourists are not common here.

Nick took us inside the market during the rain and Jesse helped me to haggle for some clothes for teaching. All of the Vietnamese women that I met told me that I was very beautiful. Afterwards we walked back to the guesthouse in the cool rain which felt quite nice. We lounged around downstairs. Some of the Aussie boys played a game of soccer with this weird tube shaped item with a feather on the end that Nick bought them. I eventually went upstairs to unpack and organise my life a bit. There are no closets or drawers so it was more like organising my suitcase. I talked to Jesse more and she laughed at my clothes and said I am so fashionable. Then I took a nice shower to cool off.

For dinner, Jesse and Nick took us (the new volunteers) and the current volunteers (mostly British and French boys) to a nice restaurant where apparently there are weddings. It was a really nice part of town. The waiters wore white dress shirts and black dress pants and were on roller skates! Jesse and Nicke ordered a few dishes for us. There was one beef dish which I obviously ignored. The rest were seafood. Seafood springrolls, squid, seafood rice and veggies with fried noodles. It was absolutely delicious! The entire meal cost us 3 dollars each. After, Jesse asked to roller skate with the waiter and they had a good time doing that. On the way back to the guesthouse, we all stopped at the local bar to watch the big tennis match. Then I went back and finally got a decent sleep.

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This morning I woke up and went downstairs for the housekeeper’s famous breakfast that I heard so much about: Egg sandwich with lettuce, tomato and hot sauce. Delicious. The coffee was delicious too! Then I got ready for school. Mrs. Snow, an English teacher, came to take me to the school. She handed me a helmet and we hopped on her motorbike. She assured me she was a safe driver. We drove to the school and then told the director that I need to rest before I start. So we hopped on her motorbike again and she took me for a drive through My Tho and showed me the Pogada (two giant Buddas with a big garden). Nearby was a beautiful vegetarian restaurant. It was set outside under a hut like roof with beautiful flowers. There was a monk and nun sitting nearby us. Mrs. Snow explained that all proceeds from the restaurant go to the orphanage nearby. Amazing. We didn’t have time for a full meal but she ordered us pineapple juice and pumpkin flowers. The pumpkin flowers were amazing! They were fried and you dipped them I a sweet chilli sauce. Mrs. Snow paid and refused to let me give her anything. She said she would make me her own pumpkin flowers and that she would take me back to this restaurant soon. She also invited me to church with her. She was self-conscious of her English but I told her that it was excellent. She told me I was very beautiful and if I lived in Vietnam I would be Miss Vietnam. She drove me back to the English school told me she will see me soon. She was the sweetest lady I have ever met.

Now it was time to teach! I followed Leigh (my roomie) into the classroom and together we taught the class. The teacher handed us the book and told us to review the questions she pointed to. So we sat in two circles. I was intimidated at first but once I got started asking questions like ‘ what do you have for breakfast’ and ‘what do you do on weekends’ it got better. Some students were really shy and took a while to answer and you had to really push them. Others were very eager and knew very good English. Eventually they asked heaps of questions about me and asked about my studies. I felt like it was so complicated to explain to them but they loved it! The teacher did too and wrote new words (most Aussie slang that I have grown used to in Australia that I don’t even think about now) like sunnies and prawn. They were loving it. Before you knew it the bell was ringing. First class success.

Leigh and I walked back to the guesthouse. Then we chatted with Riley and the three of us walked outside to the street stall practically on our door step and had delicious udon noodle soup and bread for under 50 cents.

Then Leigh and I went to the bar down the road to use the internet. I drank a café sooda (very sweet ice coffee) and happily read that I got three distinctions (D) and one C from the past semester and have a GPA of 5.7. All the hard work paid off! So happy.

I went to the next class which was at 430 but it was only 15 minutes long. There was an Australian man teaching it. The little kids were so adorable! They were playing head shoulders knees and toes and singing "ten little indians". Then we walked back and I went to the ATM and had to cross the street of never ending motorbikes. A nice policeman saw my foreign shock and helped escort me across the street and back. Then I went to the supermarket which was pretty crazy inside. I managed to find some things to give me protein and nutrition here and there (Vietnam is not big on vegetarians) and then joined the others for their street meal of pork and rice. I had canned tuna and rice. Of course the British guys had a field day with that but whatever. People are very ignorant towards vegetarianism sometimes and thats why I enjoy being one. It is a huge challenge and when people are ignorant it edges me on more.

As I am writing this in the WIFI bar people keep walking past and wave to me. A little boy, probably the owner's, keeps running over to say hello. I am sipping on my cafe sooda and loving life.Tonight we are all going to karoke.  Very excited!