Happy New Year!

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I know I was just online yesterday! But I made it to Da Nang this morning and am waiting for some of the other volunteers to arrive before we move onto Tam Ky (which is south of Da Nang) so what else is there to do but surf the net?? Currently I am sitting in an internet cafe with two volunteers, Brit and Hannah who have just endured a 30 hour bus ride from Laos. Yowzer! The internet connection is a bit sketchy and Yahoo is not accessible at the moment.

Yesterday afternoon was something else to experience the RUSH hour traffic. Now I thought the traffic during the morning was hectic but the afternoon rush when everyone is trying to get home is something else! Thank goodness I was on a tour at the time and we were in the "safety" (if you wanna call it that!) of a van. Oh yeah, I do know when the people of HCMC sleep..it is at 4AM. I discovered that on the drive to the airport this morning. Mind you there were still some people that were starting their days at that time since I did see a lot of vendors transporting goods on their cyclos.

The city tour I went on yesterday was quite interesting. Part of the tour took us to the War Memorial Museum. There were some pretty disturbing & graphic photos on display there. We also went to Cholon (also known as Chinatown) which is huge. On the ride back to the hotel we drove along the Saigon river. Now that is a river of contrasts. First we saw a long stretch of the river that was like a Shantytown. Make shift shacks built along the river. Kids playing in the dirt piles. Huge piles of debris everywhere. Then about 1km down the river you see a huge hotel being built. It was really sad to see..the first part..not the hotel...

There was a family of four that were originally from Mali but have since moved to Cambodia to teach. Mama and Natru have two sons Barry and ?? (can't remember his name) that are 9 and 10 years old. They were really cute and totally into the weapons. Got to practice a bit of my French (very, very limited by the way!) when they bumped into a friend from Cambodia that was also on holiday in Vietnam. For some reason their friend's little daughter (15 months) was attracted to my gray pants and would not let go! It was funny.

I look forward to starting my volunteer position after orientation that begins tomorrow. No rest for the wicked, it is New Year's Day. But that's okay since I'm not working at the mo anyway. 😊

So on that note, Happy New Year to you all and here's today's haiku/motto installment...

Number one, BE SAFE
Be cautious of strange people.
Common sense prevails.

Happy New Year!
Love,
Bonnie

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Photos

Happy New Year!
If I could add sound bytes I would have ABBA's Happy New Year playing in the background.