Ho Chi Minh and Chiang Mai

next to a tank at the war museum

Ho Chi Minh Sight-seeing

Even though I’ve been living in Vietnam for more than four months, this was my first trip to Ho Chi Minh. The city is huge, and there are lots of things to see. After getting a bite to eat, I checked out the War Museum.  As you might expect, the exhibits in the museum are shown from a Vietnamese  perspective, with lots of propaganda. However, the pictures of victims of chemical warfare (not only those directly affected, but also their children) were especially sobering. Outside the museum, you can pose next to different airplanes and other weapons – see the picture of me next to the tank above.

man praying

church in downtown ho chi minh city

Other than the war museum, I also visited a church and the old post office in the middle of the city. To me, the church looks a little out of place in the middle of the city, but as the picture shows, people still go there to pray. 

the streets of Ho Chi Minh City - much busier than Hue!

People in the Park

After sightseeing, I visited the market and bought some papaya and pineapple. I took my fruit to the park to eat and enjoy the nice weather, but I hadn’t been there for more than 10 minutes when some people came up to me wanting to practice their English. Normally, I find this kind of thing a little irritating, but that day I had a lot of free time and didn’t mind so much. When one person left, another would show up, so that I ended up talking with different people for around 2 hours!

I was just sitting in the park, and then this happened!

One guy that came up to talk with me was an old Vietnamese Chinese guy living in Australia. He was really cool, and after he helped me find the pharmacy, we ended up having dinner and then coffee. He had a lot of interesting stories, which made me more excited than ever to visit Australia. I can’t wait to go to the land down under next week!

Chiang Mai Sight-seeing

Although I’ve only been in Chiang Mai for four days, it seems like the city primarily has two things – temples, and shopping! Everywhere you go, there’s either another temple or a street market. This morning I visited the most famous temple, Wat Phra That Doi Suthep Shrine. Although the scenery atop the mountain was breathtaking, I couldn’t really enjoy it. The place was overrun with tourists and merchants trying to sell you things. Yes, that’s right, atop a mountain at a Buddhist shrine you can buy all the knick-knacks your heart could ever desire!

the view from atop doi suthep

dogs sleeping on steps to shrine

posing at the temple

me in front of the temple

poor tiger, pacing in its cage

After the shrine, I visited the Chiang Mai zoo, which was on my way back to Chiang Mai city. At this zoo, you can feed pretty much any animal – I saw people feeding the hippos, elephants, and even giraffes! This means that the animals will come up really close to you, which was kinda cool. The zoo was really large and had a lot of different animals, but I didn’t stay very long. I got a little sad watching the tiger pacing back and forth in its tiny cage, and wasn’t sure about how well the animals were treated.

can you tell I'm worried the bird is about to bite me?

the zoo had some lovely flowers

at this zoo, you can feed the animals!

lady at the market selling noodles

 Finally, as I mentioned, there’s shopping everywhere in the city – just check out the pictures of different night markets below! Mostly, they all sell the same things – Thai pants, jewelry, pictures, soaps, and so on. The markets have pretty good food too – all different kinds of fruits, along with anything that can be fried or put on a stick. Another dish that’s really nice is rotee – it’s kind of like a crepe, which you can get filled with banana, nutella, honey, etc. Yum!

flowers for sell at the market

one of many night markets in Chiang Mai

Thai TESOL Conference

I came to Chiang Mai to attend and present at the Thai TESOL conference. The conference gave me a chance to reconnect with other fellows I hadn’t seen since our orientation in D.C., and meet some new people, including my boss at the embassy. There were some interesting presentations and speeches, and I always find conferences give me new ideas for teaching my classes and for research.

my audience

giving a presentation

My presentation was on spoken grammar, and I was a little nervous because it was my first time to present at a conference. The session was packed, with people standing by the door and sitting on the floor. Overall, it went really well, and I got a lot of good questions from the participants after the presentation was over.

me, saying something smart!

Overall, I’m glad I was able to attend the conference and give my presentation, but I’m also a little relieved it’s over. Because now, I can relax and enjoy a little vacation time!

2 Visitors in Hue

Visitor from Danang 

So, last weekend, another fellow working in Danang came up to see Hue with a friend from the U.S. This gave me a chance to do all the touristy things around the city, like finally visiting the citadel. The citadel is the old home of the kings in Vietnam, and contains mainly large buildings and palaces. I was surprised by just how large the citadel was and how ornate all the decorations were. Also, even though the citadel is in the middle of the city, it's really quiet and peaceful inside the gates. 

another picture from the citadel

In front of a gate at the Citadel

After visiting the citadel, we had lunch, tea and coffee, and visited the night market. It was fun to be a tourist in Hue and show Lesley and her friend around.

me and Lesley - the fellow in Danang -
I look tiny next to her!

 What I found in my Bathroom

So, normally, I find lizards, cockroaches, and other bugs in the bathroom or even sometimes in my bedroom. Usually, I just ignore them and they don't bother me, but this was in my shower the other evening. I'm pretty sure I didn't invite THIS visitor! Yikes!

this was one big spider!

found this in my shower!

End of the Semester

I haven’t posted in a while, mostly because not that much has been going on. Classes finished last week, and the next two weeks are devoted to finals. I only have to proctor two finals, so it’s giving me a good chance to catch up on work for my PHD (and TV shows that I’ve been missing . . .)

dinner with Tuesday students

dinner with Wednesday students

My metaphor research class finished with a total of 6 students in Tuesday’s class and 4 students in Wednesday’s class (after starting with 26 . . .) After the last class, I went out for dinner and karaoke with one class, and dinner and coffee with the other. I can’t say I’m not disappointed that more people didn’t attend all the classes, but that’s to be expected with a voluntary class. The 10 students that toughed it out are real champs!

I rode my bike to the restaurant in the rain, so not looking my best . . .

dinner with friends

There's also been a lot of random stuff with friends, like dinners out or karaoke. I've also found some running partners - a girl from Australia and another from Holland - and I'm really enjoying group running again. Oh, and I also judged a high school speaking contest one Sunday. It was fun, but a little boring to hear 15 speeches about how wonderful Hue is . . .

high school English speech contest

Christmas in Vietnam

Although I said not much has been happening, there have been a few events, including the holidays. But, honestly, Christmas was a bit lackluster this year – In fact, I had to teach one class on Christmas Eve, and another class on Christmas Day! The university gave a party for all the foreign teachers, which was nice, but a bit lame, and afterwards I met up with some friends at a restaurant for a Christmas dinner consisting of pizza and pasta. Not so traditional, but still quite yummy! It was also nice not to have to cook anything special, which made for a very low-key holiday.

A few weeks before Christmas, I went into the administrative building and saw some of my coworkers putting up a Christmas tree for the holidays. They seemed a little confused, so of course I had to step in and help them out! I also received a package from the states and didn’t even wait to open it. Mostly, my parents had sent me food items from the U.S. that I had been missing – after abstaining for four months, the box of cereal and the dove chocolates only lasted three days! 

Bach Ma National Park

top of the waterfall

Yesterday, I visited Bach Ma National Park, which is just an hour away from Hue. I’ve been wanting to go ever since I arrived, so it was nice to be able to take a trip out there with some Chinese teachers from my university. I haven’t done much hiking since I moved here, so it was a great day!

bottom of the waterfall

enjoying the lovely weather!

The park was beautiful, and some of the views were absolutely stunning! However, many of the trails were not well maintained at all – they were overrun with plants, and could also be quite dangerous. We took the stairs to the bottom of a big waterfall, and the handrail was rusted and tearing apart in places. The stairs were pretty tough too  - the sign warned of 689 “very steep” stairs, but we went there anyways. The paths also involved a lot of river crossings without a lot of bridges or stones, and the water was freezing. Finally, 3 out of 4 of us picked up a leech at some point during the trip.

view from the top

Still, I don’t want to complain too much, because the weather was awesome and I was so happy to be out hiking with friends. I mean, just look at these pics! Hopefully, I can go back again soon.

what a great day!

how soon can I come back?

The Dentist

Today, I went to the dentist for a regular cleaning and for laser whitening. Everything is cheaper in Vietnam, so I thought I’d give the whitening procedure a try, as it cost around $56. The cleaning was okay, but not too thorough. The laser whitening, on the other hand, took just over an hour and was a little uncomfortable. They stick this thing in your mouth to keep it open and use the laser after applying some stuff to your teeth. Your teeth start to feel a bit hot, and they still feel a little sensitive, even now, after it’s over. I had read some horror stories about Vietnam dental clinics, but overall, it was a pretty good experience – clean, efficient, and cheap! I’m not sure how much of a difference the laser whitening made, though – what do you think?

before

after

Trip to Danang

Conference in Danang

Last week, I went to Danang to attend the GloCALL conference (Globalization and Localization in Computer Assisted Language Learning) – basically, it’s a conference on technology and language education. There were a lot of interesting presentations, but the best part was getting to meet other teachers, professionals, and fellows at the conference.

thanksgiving lunch - I had the vegetarian version without turkey or gravy :)

The conference started on November 28^th, which is Thanksgiving, so I met the other fellows for a Thanksgiving lunch at a place called “Bread of Life.” It’s a non-profit restaurant/bakery that trains and employs deaf people in Vietnam. The food was great, the staff was friendly, and the owner was a real chatter box! It was definitely a nice way to start off the conference and spend Thanksgiving away from home.

more singing and dancing

All Conferences in Vietnam start with Singing and Dancing

During the conference, I also met with leaders from the National Foreign Languages 2020 project (NFL2020), which is a government initiative to train all the teachers in Vietnam and improve the standard of English education throughout the country. Since I’m supposed to be contributing to the project by working at the regional language center in Hue, it was a good chance to get better acquainted with the project and meet other people involved in NFL 2020.

Out to Dinner with the English Language Fellows
from Danang, Vietnam and Chiang Mai, Thailand

On the Right - Jill, Senior Fellow in Hanoi

I was also able to spend a lot of time with the other English Language Fellows. Since we work in different cities and even in different countries, we don't get to meet each other often. One night we went out for pizza (which was amazing! I hadn't eaten pizza in over three months!), and another evening we took a trip to a nearby tourist city called Hoi An. It was great to hear about the different activities other fellows are doing and even about some of the challenges they face. 

Homestay in Danang

While attending the conference, I was also able to stay with the family of one of my mother’s friends in Danang. They were just amazing! My mother’s friend’s two sisters and brother live in a house in Danang, and they agreed to let me stay there. I felt a little guilty, though, because they called their mother to come visit and help cook food for me. I also caused a lot of confusion/problems by being vegetarian – they weren’t really sure what to buy or cook for me, as the family loves eating lots of meat!

Birthday Party

birthday cake - yum!

The first night I arrived, there was a big birthday party for one child in the family. He was turning two years old, so we had a lot of food and cake! The little boy received a lot of presents too. During the week, the youngest daughter would usually pick me up from the conference and take me to different places along with her boyfriend - I saw the dragon bridge, and one night we went to a bar to hear a Filipino band sing. The whole family was always looking out for me - One morning I accidentally locked myself in the bathroom after my shower. The lock was on the outside of the door, so I couldn't get out! I didn't want to wake up anyone, but as I was thinking about what to do, the mother appeared in the hallway. I motioned to her to unlock the door, and the whole family laughed about it over breakfast later. 

one of the best dishes I've eaten in Vietnam!

Before I left, the mother made me one of the best dishes I have eaten in Vietnam – they told me what it’s called, but I already forgot. It was noodles with a vegetable soup and lots of lettuce and other herbs added in. I also bonded a lot with the family dog – being a little dirty, most people ignored him, so he was really grateful to get attention from me and started following me around the house. Anyways, the family was so sweet and caring – I wish I could have stayed with them longer!

homestay family

homestay family

2^nd Thanksgiving

I returned to Hue on Sunday, and one of my expat friends here was organizing a Thanksgiving dinner. So, I picked up some food at the grocery store and headed over to her house for my second Thanksgiving meal of the week. We were a little limited by the types of ingredients we could find in the store, and also by the cooking equipment available (only two people had access to an oven), but we had chicken, dressing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, salad, and apple crumble – not a bad spread, all things considered. For some of the Vietnamese people at the dinner, it was their first chance to celebrate Thanksgiving, and for the expats, it was a nice way to share a tradition while far away from home. Overall, it was a great ending to a wonderful week!