May 26_2

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May 26, 2007
Ho Chi Minh City
Rainy now

Breakfast: Pho…interesting…I so wanted some bread (partries)…I was devouring the bread this morning. Orange juice was delicious. They put sugar at the bottom…so it was like a reward to finish your drink.

Then we took a long walking tour of HCMC. Honestly this city is not beautiful. There is not any eye opening buildings. The shops have so much beautiful items. The furniture is gorgoues and so well made. I want to buy it all. Even the paintings are great. I can not wait to buy stuff.

We went to the American (Vietnam) War Museum. We had an hour so we all started in the first building and looked and read the pictures. It was surprising what they had on display. There were close-up of men in the field…pictures of explosions…pictures of planes crashing. It was all so real. A little to real for my liking. By the time I got to the end of the first building I was upset and not feeling too well. I was angry at the US for a war I did not even live through. Outside were war plane and gun and tanks. All seemed to be US property. It did not excite me to see those pieces since I’ve been to plenty of museums before.

On a funny, disgusting note…while looking at the souviener shop I was pooped on my a bird. That thing hurt too. I little gross I know. Anyway, I got the courage to continue onto another building. This one seemed worse. There had malformed babies (THREE) in jar; preserved. No noises and distorted limbs. I thought I was going to throw-up. There were so many pictures of malformed children. It was quite sad. So as you can imagine I’m up here feeling quite light headed, wanting to just sit down for the remander of the time. Then there was a ‘happy’ room…the love story room actually. There were letters of solders, ‘happy’ pictures. Then there was a woman’s wedding dress and a portrait of the married couple. On the other side was her mourning dress and picture of her husband being exacuted four months later. I’m sad once again.

I then made my way to the prison on site. Ooo it was like Dacho (Germany and the Jews all over again). There was the machine that be-heads person and tiger cages. Needless to say I was quite depressed when I left. As well as everyone else.

Lunch was awesome!!!! There was soo much food. It cost like $1.50 for each of us to eat. We started with a salad…all fresh. There was cabbage…carrots…shrimp…dark green lettuce. Then small fried ‘egg-roll’ like rolls. With shrimp in each. Then a rice roll with shrimp, green onion…and those clear bean sprots. It was okay…it looked more eye appealing. Then whatelse…rice and pork (or beef ??) and these common greens. It’s equivalent to out broccoli. Then we were served pineapple, watermelon, and dragon fruit. Dragon fruit is this fruit that taste just like kiwi. It is pink on the outside and white with black seeds on the indside.

We had Survivual class for like 3+ hours. It was really intense. We all got split into I think four groups of 6. in my class is: Sebastan, Ross, Leeanne, David, and David (professor). We learned who to say our name and ask another theirs. Where we are from. Numbers…money…vowels and constanents.

Then we had two hours before dinner. We found a café and had coconut juice in a actual coconut shell and a chocolate tart.

Dinner was aight…lunch was better. We were served these chips things with cheese (which in uncommon in Vietnam), chives and shrimp. We wrapped them in lettuce and ate them. Then we had there soy chips with a salad. Similar to lunch…all few ingredients. Then a soup with this spungy vegetable. Not sure what it was called. There are always green at meals. This meal also had a tofu dish with pork but no one ate it. There was just way too much food to remember everything on the table. Of course, fruit was served at dessert. This time there was this grapefruit-like fruit, this ‘over-ripe-like’ fruit, watermelon, and dragon fruit. The tea here is really good.

Now I think we’re about to go out for fun. My internet does not want to work so I can not upload anything *tear.

Money: snack before dinner: 47,000 dong - coconut drink and choc. tart
Bar after dinner: 51,000 dong - vodka and coke, and tonic water

Converted $43 USD
Spent: 98,000 dong >>> $6.13 USD

Finished at 1:35am Sunday

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