Vietnam Day 2

                Today was a day of many different experiences. The first thing that Hannah and I did was get our friend Emily. The three of us set off on a mission: to find a tailor. Well, needless to say that is not anywhere near in short supply here. We found one that many beautiful dresses in the styles that I was looking for, and for a reasonable price. So I was fitted for 2 dresses and Hannah just had one top made for her Sari that she bought in India. This took about an hour to get all the measurements and logistics figured out. I am so excited to see my dresses!

                After our fitting we decided to walk around for a few hours and just get a layout of the land. We found this cool shopping place called Saigon Square. Here we could buy things we would find in the U.S. but for less. We spent some time (well actually a lot more than we thought) and just looked around to see what we could find. This was good practice for converting Vietnamese Dong into U.S. dollars. 1 U.S. dollar is worth 21,000 Vietnamese Dong. So sticker shock occurred all the time in this port. I don’ t think any of us bought anything because we knew the market we would go to the next day would have better deals.

                While walking around Saigon Square I looked at my watch and realized it was noon! We had to get back to the ship for a quick lunch and then for a SAS trip to a school for the deaf. I know this is weird, but I’m going to talk about lunch! For lunch today we had pizza. It was not the best pizza in the whole world, but it was pretty good considering we live on a ship.

                OK, after lunch the three of us went to a school for the deaf. The school was in a very strange place. It was literally in an alley in the middle of a busy part of Ho Chi Minh City. There were only 43 students in the school and they ranged from 3 years old to 15. The principal told us that she started the school in 1989 when she discovered that students who were deaf were not getting an appropriate education in the city. Once the principal was finished with her introduction we were invited upstairs to play with the kids.

                While I enjoyed meeting the children it was a strange experience. Right off the back I could tell that they had visitors many times before. That in its self was hard because it felt like they were on display. I don’t know it was just sad almost. The students all ran up to us and picked someone to sit with. We all sat on the floor with some students and had the opportunity to try to speak with them. It was hard even though I knew some sign. Again, sign is just like any other language, it’s different everywhere you go. So even though the alphabet is similar it was very difficult to communicate with them. Thankfully the school provided us paper and some crayons to draw and write with. I really enjoyed this part of the day. I enjoyed trying to communicate without the paper and crayons. I was able to pretty effectively communicate with the little boy named Tung (pronounced like Thong).

                After about an hour and a half of time at the school we all went to the zoo with the children. This was interesting. The kids were honestly running around everywhere so it was more like babysitting than actually enjoying the zoo, but the kids loved it and so that was all that mattered. After running around like a crazy person at the zoo with the kids it was time to drop the kids back off at school and head to the bus. So, instead of going back to the ship a small group of 4 of us signed out of the trip and stayed at the zoo.

                Now I had the chance to see the animals. Wow, were they in bad shape. I don’t really know what to say about the zoo except that if this zoo were in the states it would be shut down. This really shocked me. I guess I had never thought a zoo in a different country would be that much different than the ones in the states. It was just very heart breaking.

After the zoo we decided to grab some dinner. We wandered around the city looking for a restaurant. Okay wait, we were not really wandering. In fact, I knew exactly where we were going. I had found this cool sounding restaurant in a guide book that we wanted to try. So after about a 20 minute walk with crossing all of the crazy streets we finally found Bo Tung Xeo. This cool little place has a meat dish that the restaurant is named after that we ate. Basically the restaurant brings you the meat in a sauce raw and you cook it on a coal fire that they bring to the table. It was so much fun! I think that it is safe to say that we all enjoyed the meal, and it was very inexpensive. I think my favorite part about it though was the fact that there were no other SAS people there. It is so fun to find a cool and unique place where no one else in the group has found or is not there with you. This way I feel like we got a better experience because we were intermixed with tables full of locals. It was just a very fun night!

                Once we finished dinner we walked back to the shuttle that took us to the ship. By this time it is well past dark. Night life in Vietnam is so fun! It is full of music and people and street vendors; it is something I feel like I can describe effectively. I just loved it! Don’t worry it is very safe to walk around in a group at night. Once we got back to the ship Hannah and I sat up talking about the day we had just experienced, both good and bad, and discussed our plans for the next day.

                As I went to bed I began to wonder what the day would be like tomorrow. I was so excited to see what else Vietnam could show me. All I knew was that I had had 2 totally different and very unique days so far, and I could only hope that the best was yet to come.