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Published: February 17th 2009
Temple
at one of the templesAhhh...earlier today I wrote a super long detailed blog all about my great weekend and past few days. And then the computer screen went blank and I had to restart the computer. And it was gone. I will attempt to re-create the blog, however I warn that I may get bored of typing and miss some of the important details that I had included. Oh well.
Friday morning I ran away from the rehab center for a little while to go help out at a baby orphanage across the street. The babies were so so so cute and I got to help out with baby baths! It was quite a task to wash so many babies (all under 1years), but they have worked out an assembly line system that seems to work very well! Ofcourse being a PT, i was checking their motor skills and encouraging tummy time! So many of the babies had serious plagiocephaly because they spend so much time on their backs!! The 'mothers' at the orphanage have been taught, but there are just so many babies and not enough help that they can't even be blamed for this!! 3 of the babies got adopted last week,
Monks
Monks in training with their funky hairstyle! but there are still so many of them!!
I left Friday afternoon to go to Hue. Maury and I planned to meet at the train station at 1pm in order to get tickets to take the 2 or 2:12 train that I was told existed. After many stops along my way pointing to my lonely planet's dictionary for the word "train", I found the train station and found Maury. We go to the ticket counter to find out that the only train was at 1:05 or much later. Luckily the train was running a bit late and we had no problem making the train. We purchase our tickets (44,000d-about 3 dollars) and get on the train. The train was really nice and the journey was absolutely beautiful! Much of it was along the coast and we saw some amazing undeveloped beaches! There were beaches on one side and huge mountains on the other. It was great. I was initially unsure about going to Hue, however once I was on the train I realized that even if I didn't like Hue, the trip would have been worth it!
We arrived in Hue to a plethora of motorbike, taxi and
Tomb
at one of the tombs cyclo drivers trying to take us to a hotel. We had already decided we would walk to one specific hotel and check it out. Ofcourse when you tell the drivers this, they insist your hotel is fully booked and suggest a better one. Knowing this was a total scam (I mean, really, would they actually know the vacancy status of every hotel in the city?), we just told them that we already had a reservation and would walk there. The weren't too annoyingly persistent...just slightly!
We arrived at the hotel and got a room. Many of the hotels here say they have free internet in the room-that makes me think they have access if you have your own computer, but no, here it means there is an actual computer in your room! crazy! It didnt work very well for me (the internet here is not a fan of yahoo email for some reason), but I didn't want to be wasting time in the room anyways!
I had wanted to go to Hue because of the historical sites around it, but Hue itself turned out to be better than I had expected. There were many tourists, but it still
Market
everybody needs a nap sometime! kept its Vietnamese feel to it! That night, we went to dinner at a Japanese restaurant, called "Japanese Restaurant". very creative! We chose to go there because I had read that the owner had developed programs for street children teaching them skills and the restaurant was a product of that and also funded it. It sounded similar to where my cooking instructor from Hoi An had been trained. It is so amazing that there are so many wonderful programs like this to help the street kids of Vietnam! The dinner was great (edamame, veggie roll and eggplant), however the end of the dinner was not so great. We were finishing up our beers and all of a sudden a rat decided to quickly run into and out of the restaurant! ahhhhhh!!! The restaurant was completely open to the street and luckily it left just as quickly as it had entered, but ofcourse being me, this freaked me out! I did not jump on the table or run away, but it took everything in my power not to. I ended up feeling super jittery the rest of the night, that I was jumping at leaves on the street. I didn't sleep
Market
makes me want to cook!! that night, but by the next day I was able to put my fear slightly out of my head.
We got up early the next day to take a dragon boat trip on the Perfume River in order to see some of the sights. We went to 2 temples and 2 tombs. Both tombs were absolutely beautiful with lots of trees and lakes. I had listed the names of the emporers they were for and some details in my long lost blog, but I dont have the stuff in front of me now and don't feel like getting it. sorry. I do remember that one of the emporers had had 104 wives and tns of concubines, however never had any children. Both of the tombs we went to, they are not actually sure where the bodies are buried. They believe they are somewhere on the huge property, but an exact location is not known by anyone because they are afraid of grave robbers! during this trip, I met the strangest lady from the UK. She lives 1/2 year in France and 1/2 year in Sri Lanka. I asked her a simple question and it turned into this huge political
Market
eating my An Chay food! lecture where she gave me her twisted views of the world, which had nothing to do with the question I had asked. Everyone else on the boat saw this encounter and found it pretty hilarious how she completely accosted me! She was quite bizzare!
After our long day of seeing dead emporers' tombs, we decided to check out this one restaurant that we had read about and also been recommended to by many people. We were told to take a taxi there, but we decided to try out the cyclos. We felt sorry for the cyclo driver because it was a long trip into the citadel, but he didnt seem to mind. When we got there, he said he would wait for us until we were done to take us back to the hotel. We were at dinner for about 2 hours (it was a 7 course set meal-for 10 dollars) and sure enough he waited for us. Dinner was a slight dissapointment-presentation was good and the setting was nice, but the food was not all that good. We headed back in our cyclo and just prior to reaching the hotel, the driver offered to let me drive the
Market
Maury and I eating! cyclo. This was super fun, but then realized why he had offered. He totally tried to cop a feel of my ghetto booty!!! I felt his hands sneaking up on me and pushed them away. He didn't try again once I put him in his place...it was actually quite funny!
The next day, we went to the local market which was a lot if fun! We strolled around and eventually found one of the stands that sells all the things that are used for offerings to the dead. One of the piles had this really brighlty colored beautiful paper and Maury decided to buy some in order to wrap gifts when she gets home. We werent really sure what the paper was actually for, but figured it was probably some form of offering. People kept pointing at it and laughing at her, but we weren't sure why. Finally this one young girl explained to us that they burn it to symblize clothing for their dead relatives. Now we understood the laughing! The other paper, which was kind of dull and plain, was used to burn for younger people who died from accidents. The one Maury bought was to be used for the older people. While at the market, this one lady tried to throw a stick with some kind of meat on it at me and to get out of it I said "an Chay". She then showed me other food that was vegetarian and even though we werent hungry, we sat down to eat it. We ended up sitting with the grandpa (we think) and the young daughter and having our lunch. They were so nice even though we couldn't actually communicate with them!!
We then headed back to out hotel to take a bus back and were quite surprised when the bus was a sleeper bus that had actual beds...especially since our journey would only be 3 hours!! It was so comfortable!! We made it back to Da Nang and I felt quite proud that when we were dropped off, I knew exacctly where in the city we were and was able to walk back to my street. We stopped for a foot massage at my fav new spa and then went to my veggie restaurant and then to a great cafe down the street. This cafe had super yummy hot chocolate (its no City bakery, but still really good) and was so nice-fountains and comfy couches and everything. The server spoke no English, but at one point came back from the kitchen and wrote on a piece of paper "I love you"! It was so funny!
I have ben having a great week, but the mosquitos are eating my feet and I want to upload some pics, so you will have to wait to hear about it later!!
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Megan
non-member comment
Sounds awesome
Vietnam really intrigues me, sonds like a really good experience, especiaslyy with the work you're doing