My first week in Hanoi

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I started my voluntary work on Monday the 2nd of June. My mentor Duong was picking me up at my house to join me to my office on the other side of the city. The plan was to introduce me in the bussystem of Hanoibus cause that is the way I will go to the offices every working day. With the map of Hanoi in our hands and some money for a ticket ( 3000VND for a ticket which is € 0.111111111111111… )
we felt ready to conquer Hanoi… what a failure… first question where is the busstop… then where is the busstop for the bus that I needed… another one was when will the bus pass… how do we get on that bus and how do we get off… damn it, more than an hour too late at the meeting… aiai a good start 

Now one week later, I am able to find my way like a “native” Hanoi-an… I have my bus pass in my pocket and jump on and off like a real one… ( to calm down some of you the doors of the busses in Hanoi are always closed!)

I work 4 days a week in a centre for community health and development or LIGHT. Here they asked me to do some office work, to support them to set up a platform for migrants in Hanoi and to organize a HIV and AIDs prevention day for some streetyouth in Hanoi.
On Friday I work for SHAPC ( Std’s-HIV and Aidsprevention centre). I will organize some activities in their club, a meeting point for university students, teach English and sometimes I will translate or correct some English documents.
So, just to tell you that life in Vietnam is more than just a bit of hanging around and acting like a tourist … finally some work to do again, and guess what… I enjoy it!
My colleagues in both NGO’s are really nice. Most of them are girls and fun is guaranteed 
I also teach some English during three conversation classes on Wednesday and Thursday in the evening… This week is the start of the classes. They told me that there is a waitinglist of 92 students for my class… pfjiew... I asked them to make some selection and try to reduce the amount up till maximum 25… we’ll see…

And then Hanoi and the surroundings (already)… this weekend I acted like a Japanese tourist with my camera and map… only an umbrella and guide were missing … and discovered the Ho Chi Min imposant mausoleum, the one pillar pagoda, the old quarter and a delicious French Boulanger… Yesterday I booked myself a trip to the Perfume Pagoda. I ended up with a really nice Vietnamese family and a guide who only knew the English explanation like it was written in his book… an interesting and sometimes also very frustrating situation… BUT the pagoda (= a temple to worship the gods) was astonishing and the surroundings a pure relief for my ears! Finally I was able to listen to the sound of the Vietnamese nature… I let you enjoy my impressions by showing a few pictures…

Dear all of you,
So far my first real report about my trip! I am doing great here, hope to hear the same from you…
For all of you who are preparing themselves on vacation… enjoy it! And wish you all a relaxing vacation…

An

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Photos

Hanoi, 6pm on a saturday
picture taken from the last seat of the bus

Jenny ( my roommate from California) and our tourguide for one day, Thang
Thang is volunteering for VPV by teaching Vietnamese and organizing tours in Hanoi as an introduction for new international volunteers. we spent the whole day with her and she showed us the museum for Etnology, some pagoda's and the old quarter... a really nice and very intelligent lady.. wish her all the best on her studies in Japan!

Balloonlady near the museum of Entnology
the day we visited the museum was the national childrenday... what a chaos in the museum!

Com with vegetable and little shrimps
if you don't eat meat, you have to struggle a lot to explain what that means... so I tell then very specific "no cow, no pork, no beef, no chicken and no dog" but shrimps I do eat... although I though they would be peeled... a bit cruchy and a toothpick afterwards is really necessary hihi

how do you know I am in Vietnam ?
when I wanted to cross the street, I felt something on my head and on my shoulder.. a lady tried to let my pay for a picture in my vietnamese outfit... but she didn't see the policeman right in front of me so she started to run when he spoke to her... but she forgot her head... funny situation...

the lady from the funny story
reunited with her head...

this says enough
Thanks Vietnam for the tips!

she rescued us!
on our return trip from the perfume pagoda back to the village, we ended up in a real Vietnamese storm... the sky turned into black within less than 5 minutes and the wind comes up ... this lady, our local guide on the boat and the woman who was rowing us back, brought to a little hut from a local to hide for the storm...