The Mekong River and a Snake Farm

Well, today was the last adventure day here in Vietnam. Our family decided to take us to see the Mekong River and then to a snake farm. Both were very interesting.

While at the Mekong River, I finally got close to the experience you see in the picture at the top of our blog page. The scenery wasn't there, but the boat and the hats were.  We also had the opportunity to feed alligators (Mitchell's aunt had a great time teasing them) and watch people make coconut candy from scratch.

When we left the Mekong River, we traveled to a snake farm. They must have had close to 100 snakes here, They also had a few other animals: ostriches, monkeys, bears, snake-eating birds, and other little animals that I am sure are feed to the snakes at a later time. Now, this snake farm is not like one you would find in the US. They let you get up close and personal here in Vietnam. Below is a picture of one the snake exhibits. They were not all like this, but a few were. There is no type of cage around these snakes. They are just on a little island about 3 feet from the short wall you are standing behind to view them.

(Can you spy the snakes? There were about 10-15 little cobras in these trees.)

Now take the following into account and tell me how you would feel. You are in a snake farm filled with pythons and cobras. You see old snake skins OUTSIDE of the snake cages. The cages themselves do not look of the highest quality, and they have snake-eating birds at the farm. Let's just say I was ALWAYS aware of my surroundings.

Tomorrow morning I am going to try to upload some of the short videos we have taken while here. We will see if our internet connection can handle it. Some of the videos to look for: A Walk to Grandmother's House, Making Coconut Candy, Cleaning Out a Coconut, Feeding the Alligators, and Loc, the Snake Charmer.

More pics of the day: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

Happy Birthday to Mitchell

Tuesday is Mitchell's 33rd birthday. Since we are leaving the country that day, and Sunday is the only day most people have off in Vietnam, his family threw him a birthday party today. When I say his family, I mean the WHOLE family. I have not seen that many people in the same house since the family gatherings we use to have at my Mamaw and Papaw's house. I would guess there were nearly 50 people there.

As soon as Mitchell's little English speaking cousin (I blogged about her a few days ago) saw him coming, she started running in the house yelling, "Oh no, he's coming. Oh no, he's coming." When we made it into the house, they had a birthday cake set up for Mitchell, and his little cousin brought him a gift. They had even found candles that said, "33" for him to blow out. They sang "Happy Birthday" to him in English (some better than others).

Mitchell's dad had bought all the ingredients to make hamburgers for him. I think the kids enjoyed the French Fries more than we did, even though they dipped them in fish sauce instead of ketchup. The hamburgers were almost the same. They couldn't find hamburger buns, so we had our burgers on french bread. Mitchell said College Street Burgers is one of his first stops when we get home. (Mine is Mexican Food.)

Then it came time for the gifts. Mitchell received a hammock, shoes, shirt, and a little craft item that said "Happy Birthday". Besides birthday gifts, the family wanted to just give us gifts to remember them by. I received a couple of outfits. We also received coffee, cashews, hats for the kids back home, and banana candy.

It was a great day with the family. Many of them didn't want to leave because it would be the last time they saw Mitchell and his dad. We have been asked several times if we will come back next year. One of Mitchell's aunts said that as soon as it gets easier to travel out of Vietnam, they plan to come to America for a visit.

We have two days left here. Tomorrow, we are going to see the Mekong River with some of the family. It will be our last outing.

Pics from today: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

Vietnamese Elementary School

Being the teacher that I am, I had to go visit an elementary school just to see what it was like. One of Mitchell's family is a superintendent for the school district here. They live right next door to a school, so they took me for a tour. It was all locked up for the summer, but I could still see in the classrooms. When I glance into the first classroom, I felt like I had stepped back in time about 50-100 years. Each classroom has wall to wall desks (The old timey wood desks that hold two kids in each one.), one teacher table, one storage cabinet, a chalkboard, and was equipped with a ceiling fan and a few other fans. Mitchell's aunt told us that you can expect to find at least 40 kids in each class. In the picture below you can see their bell system. They had brought it into the classroom for the summer, so it wouldn't get stolen. It is the red drum at the front of the room. In today's gallery you can find more pics of the school. I can't wait to show these pics to my students this next year and talk to them about how many of the things they receive at school are privileges, not requirements.

Some other things I learned about Vietnamese schools:

1. All students bring their lunch or pay to eat. There is not free and reduced lunches.

2. There is no school bus system. All parents must drop their kids off at school in the morning and pick them in the afternoon.

3. They have summer school just like we do. 

4. They must also pass a test to be accepted into college. One of Mitchell's cousins is having a hard time in math. She has to take her test at the end of July, so right now she is riding a bus 2 hours each way to Ho Chi Minh City to go to a special class to help her with her math skills. She stays in Ho Chi Minh for 4 hours. Then in the afternoons, she goes to another class in her town for 4 more hours to practice math.

5. They learn cursive writing in first grade. They are not allowed to write any other way, then when they reach 4th-5th grade they are allowed to write in print. They have beautiful writing by the way.

I am sure there are more things I learned, I just don't remember them right now.

More pics: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

The English Language

Before we came to Vietnam, we had been told that many of the younger generations could speak English fairly well. A Vietnamese student must pick a language, English or French, to learn in school. Starting in 6th grade, they spend hours a week learning that language, so by the time they have graduated, they have spent 7 years learning that language. In addition to that, they must also have two years of the language they didn't choose. For example, by the time I graduated I would have 7 years of English and 2 years of French.  They have been teaching this way since Mitchell's dad, Loc, was growing up.

(Mitchell's Little Cousin's Favorite Show, Phineas and Ferb)

This generation however, has an even greater advantage, T.V.. Last night, we were eating supper with Mitchell's whole family. He has a little 5 year old cousin that has just started school. She spent most of the night asking and answering questions in English. Amazing to me! How did she learn? In her class at school they watch the Disney Channel, which is still in English here, 3 hours a week. She had picked up enough English from watching English t.v. shows to speak simple sentences, understand our simple questions, and answer them in English. This begs the question, "How should we be teaching our American students to speak Spanish or any other language?"

The Heat

Well, it has finally happened. We have been told since we arrived that the government likes to shut off the electricity for hours at a time. It might be one section of town for a few hours and then another section of town. Up until this point, we have not seen it happened. Well, it finally happened!

We have just arrived back from Phu Quoc and are back in the town were Mitchell's grandmother lives. When we arrived at the hotel, they informed us the electricity had been shut off. We have been sitting here for almost two hours with no electricity, which equals no air. As I write this, I am also fanning myself with a book to keep the sweat at bay. I'm really hoping it comes back on soon, or it's going to be a long night.

Tour of the Island

Yesterday, we took a tour of the south part of Phu Quoc Island. The resort we are staying at provided us with a driver and tour guide who spoke English. I am so glad we had our guide, Thao, with us. He was able to explain many things about Vietnam and the island. He also answered all of our questions.

Once again we made many stops in one day. We visited a museum of the island, a pearl farm, a central market, the pier, a fishing town, a waterfall, a pepper garden(farm), and a fish sauce factory. The waterfall was beautiful and Mitchell got a little picture happy. (You can see how bad it was if you look at our pictures for the day.) We were suppose to stop at a Buddhist Pagoda, but we requested that we skip that stop since we have already seen several since coming to Vietnam. (The smell of burning incense is something that Mitchell and I will not miss when we leave. They burn incense everywhere you go.)

One thing we have noticed about the Vietnamese is they want to show you EVERYTHING. They are very proud of their country. You can tell that they do not have much understanding of America though. They don't realize how big the country is compared to Vietnam. They are amazed by things that are everyday in America.

We very much enjoyed our day and getting to ask questions of Thao. He was very informative and willing to tell us anything.

More pics at: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

The True Meaning of Rainy Season

So, we knew when we came to Vietnam that we were coming at the beginning of their rainy season. Up to this point, that has meant that it was incredibly humid and hot all day. Then around 4:00 - 5:00 in the afternoon, it would rain lightly and cool down. It would only rain about 30 minutes just like it does in Florida. Well, Mitchell and I have now traveled to a little island along the border of Cambodia and Vietnam. Here the rainy season has a little different meaning. Every morning it rains until about 10:00 a.m. and then it rains again in the afternoon. This rain is not a quick shower. It is steady, but not hard. Today however, we have been informed that it might rain all day. It was suggested that today be a lazy day around the resort.

Resort, I love that word here. Back home a resort would cost an exorbitant amount of money. Here, it is no more than the price of a cheap hotel, and we are mere feet from the beach.


Today's pics on our picture gallery include days 10-12.

http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

Q and A

Well, Mitchell and I are on our way to Phu Quoc Island today. We are sitting in the airport where our flight has been delayed two hours, so I thought I would write a blog entry.

We have been asked questions about various things from our family back home since we have been here, so I thought I would take some time to answer them.

1. We had taken some pictures of trees in front of Mitchell's grandmother's house that had bullet and shrapnel in them. We were asked what the story was behind them. Loc tells us that during the Vietnam War his parents' home was right in the middle of the war area. They do not live very far from Ho Chi Minh City (or Siagon). Their home was actually bombed during the war and fighting took place in the fields in front of their home. Those trees still have the scars of those battles.

2. Many items in Vietnam have English labels and people have asked why. A couple of reasons. Reason #1 is because so many tourists come in from Europe and Australia. They label things they think tourists would buy in English. For example, all bottled water is in English. Reason #2 is because Vietnam is so small. Large companies are not going to relabel items for the country. The items are just in whatever country's language they imported the items from. We have seen: English, Arabic, French, etc... In some cases, the items official names are left in English, but all the other writing on the product is in Vietnamese.

3. Someone asked if we have seen any factories in Vietnam, since so many products in America are starting to be made in Vietnam. Most of the factories we have seen are in Ho Chi Ming city. We have seen few that we recognize however,  I'm sure most American companies are just operating under a different name here.

4. Gas here costs $2 a gallon.

5. Food here is CHEAP. Mitchell and I can eat a meal for just a couple of dollars.

6. We were asked if we have seen very many people that are not Vietnamese. No. You can see a few people in Ho Chi Minh City that are Australian, American or European. Outside of Ho Chi Minh you never see anyone that is not Vietnamese, besides me of course!

That's all for now. Hopefully our flight will load soon.

Tired

Well, today we were in the car for almost 10 hours. We arrived in HCMC and sat in traffic for an hour or so. Mitchell and I are on our own now for a week. We are meeting a couple that are friends with the Gotchers (CBC People should know who I'm talking about.) here in HCMH tomorrow afternoon. Then we are leaving out for Phu Quoc Island on Sunday. This island is a very popular tourist spot for Europeans and Australians, so we shouldn't have any problems with the language. Everyone we have spoken to from the hotel speaks English.

The couple we are meeting tomorrow reserved us a room in the center of town. This is a popular tourist spot, so there were actually different food choices. Since we are both so tired of rice, we tired an Italian place. We were both craving pizza. It actually wasn't that bad. Tomorrow we are excited because no one will be waking us up at 5:30 a.m. asking if we are ready to go. We can sleep as late as we want.

We'll tell you more about Ho Chi Minh City in tomorrow's blog. Also, I have been asked a few questions and plan to dedicate a blog post to them. If you have any questions, please let us know. We want to answer them.

Today's pics are of our days in Dalat. In a two day period, we were taken to about 6 or 7 different tourist spots. We were so tired. These are just pics of the places we went and some are pretty repetitive. Hope you like nature.

http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

Busy, Busy

Things have been very busy the past few days. We have been doing the tourist thing. I'm tired right now, so this blog will not be long. Hopefully, I will be able to get back to it in the next couple of days.  I did want to share the best news from today. I was able to purchase a Diet Coke!!! Picture below.

I tried to get caught up with pictures on our gallery. Still a few days behind. Take a look at the ones we've added.  http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy

Odd Things

I would like to dedicate this blog enter to little things we have noticed that don’t fit into our other blogs. Some of them are things we find odd about Vietnam.
1. At Aunt's house in the city, high-speed internet, but no indoor plumbing.
2. In every home there is a large number of furniture pieces. There are many tables and chair, and they have one particular piece of furniture that looks like a huge table, but they use it to rest on during the day. Some people also use this piece of furniture as a place to store items.
3. At church, they have a projection and audio system, but no air conditioning.
4. Young people listen to American music. Dance music in particular.
5. American items pop up in weird places. Many little kids wear Mickey Mouse and Power Rangers clothing. They have "Welcome" mats. They watch Disney channel on t.v.. (Most of their t.v. stations are American, with Vietnamese subtitles.) Many items are obviously knock-offs.
6. Florescent lights are about the only lights in the home.
7. Because of the temperature all businesses are outside, so while you are eating or drinking coffee people will just come up to ALL the time trying to sell you lottery tickets. Lottery tickets are a big government business. The lottery is held every day.
8. Most people work out of the front of their homes. For example: At our hotel, the people lived in the hotel also. A person might run a restaurant our of the front of their home. As I sit in Aunt's living room, I look out the window and see a barber cutting hair in the front part of his home. One of Mitchell's uncles runs a wholesale business out of the front of his home.
9. Stuffed animals seem to be popular with adults. Mitchell's aunt has over ten in her living room area alone.
10. Yards are very trashy. It seems like they just throw whatever into their yard. Yards are few and far between to begin with, but even people with yards do not use them. They are more of a trash dump.

Day 5: Church

       This morning we attended church with Mitchell’s aunt and family. When we arrived, the pastor and associate pastor wanted to show us and Mitchell’s dad around again. They took us around to several Sunday School classrooms. Many of the adult classes were located in various sections of the church auditorium. The youth met in the balcony. They have a breeze way at the back of the church, which is where the children met. They also had a new believers class meeting in the partially constructed SS building. After our tour, we were taken to Mitchell’s aunt’s SS class.

I know many people want to know how different the church service was from an American service. To tell you the truth, about the only difference was the language. Mitchell and I both recognized many of the tunes that were being sung though we of course did not recognize the words. Before attending this service, we thought Bruce was the KING of long announcements.....BUT to all the Central folks, Bruce is merely an understudy. Announcements went on for a while. We thought the guy making them was teaching or preaching until Mitchell’s dad leaned over and told us that he was making the next week’s announcements. Computer geeks must run in Mitchell’s family because when we arrived at church this morning, we noticed Mitchell’s cousin was operating the computer for the projection system. For those of you that don’t go to Central, Mitchell does this same job at our church. 

To wrap up this blog, I want to leave you with some differences we did notice about a Vietnamese church compared to our church, Central.

#1: Offering was taken in fish nets by three men and three women.

#2: They have women deacons.

#3: No padded pews (This is everywhere though. Most seats period do not have 

      padding.)

#4: Men and women set on different sides of the church. Sunday School is also 

                 split up except for the little kids.

#5: There was no type of invitation as far as we could tell. However, one girl was 

      saved and came forward after the prayer to make it public. How it was made 

                 public is hard to explain on here. It was very different.

More pics: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy#100046

Day 4: An Unusual Day

       Well, yesterday was a very busy day, so I was unable to blog. We have moved to Tan An, which is where one of Mitchell’s aunts live. This town is much bigger than Ben Luc. I realize now how much we were in the country before. Size is different here. For example, Tan An probably takes up about as much land space as Rockwall, Texas, but has a population much like Dallas. It is much cleaner here in Tan An than in Long An. You can tell they are working hard to make their town nice and modern. (When I say modern, I mean for Vietnamese standards, not American.) For example, they are starting to construct public parks and malls.

Mitchell’s aunt took us shopping with her yesterday. This adventure was quite exciting since Mitchell’s aunt does not speak ANY English. She was making her son translate for us. He was having a hard time explaining himself. It was funny watching him try to figure out what to say and us trying to figure what he was saying. He would often get frustrated with himself because he could not think of the right words. We actually went to what they call a mall. We have a pic of it on our MobileMe Gallery.  The main store in the mall is a supermarket. It is their version of Walmart. They had quite a few American items. The difference is that the American items are VERY expensive in Vietnamese money. They cost the same here as they do in the United States. For example, Pantene shampoo was $4 a bottle, which in Vietnamese money is A LOT! Outside of the supermarket, there were several stalls, which held clothing stores, jewelry stores, etc. The oddest thing about our adventure to the mall was the security. I was not allowed to take my purse into the supermarket. I had to check it in at the security office and pick it back up when we left. We had to carry our money in our pockets. 

After we left the mall, Mitchell’s aunt took us to see her church. She was VERY excited about us meeting her church family. We arrived right at the end of VBS. Here VBS last for a week, and the children are at the church all day. This was the last day of their VBS this year. We were introduced to the children’s minister and the associate pastor. They both spoke English well, and they gave us a tour of the church.(Pics on MobileMe Gallery). They have just built this new church in the last two years. They are in the process right now of building a Sunday School building, but construction is at a halt until more funds are raised. They need $10,000 to put a roof on the building and $8,000 for the windows and the doors.  We also were invited into the Senior Pastor’s home and of course served fruit and water. We spent a great deal of time speaking to their pastor. He had many questions about American churches and we learned quite a bit about churches in Vietnam. It was very informative on both sides. We had many translators for our meeting since the adults were always wanting their children to practice speaking to us in English.

I really enjoyed today. It was the first day that we actually left the house and did something. 

More pics at: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy#100039

Strange Findings and Skip-Bo

Strange Findings So Far:
1. Horn Honking: In the United States when someone honks their horn it is out of anger. Here horn honking is a common occurrence. It is not done out of anger however, it is simply used as a way to warn people you are around. With so many people riding motor bikes, they do not know when a larger vehicle is coming up beside them. Honking your horn is a way to say, "Hey, I'm here. Watch out."

2. The Dentist: Mitchell's dad decided to go have his teeth cleaned at the dentist while we were here. In America, you would have to make an appointment way in advance. Here his dad just walked right in and said I want my teeth cleaned. 30 minutes later he left with clean teeth (done by the dentist himself, not a hygienist) and only cost him about $5 American money.

3. Small things: There are so many small things that just seem to make no since. For example, in our hotel room is this beautiful, solid wood door that would cost no telling what in the United States. Then on the door is what appears to be just a cheap, plastic door knob. Another small thing is that two of Mitchell's aunts have Christmas trees in their house as an everyday decoration.

Our day:

So, today was spent half between Mitchell's great-aunt's house and his grandmother's house. Once again we were served more food than we could ever want. Once we arrived at Mitchell's grandmother's house today everything seemed to calm down. We had finally met all of the family and the BIG dinners were over. This afternoon was much quieter even though several people were still at the house. We broke out Skip-Bo to play and invited Mitchell's cousins Linh, Thao Linh, and Thao Anh to play. It was quite an adventure trying to explain the rules of the game to them, but they caught on quickly. They seemed to really enjoy the game. The two older girls could of course speak some English due to their training in school.

Tomorrow we are headed to another little town called Tan An. One of Mitchell's aunts live there, and we will be spending a few days with her. On Sunday, she is taking us to her church. It should be interesting to sit through a church service in Vietnamese.  After that, we are headed to Dalat for the week. This is a tourist spot for many Vietnamese. I do not know the next time I will be able to have internet, so it may be next week before I am able to post anything else. We will see.

Before we leave tomorrow, Mitchell and I will be venturing out by ourselves for the first time. We hopefully will be able to purchase ourselves coffee and breakfast. This should be fun.

More pics posted at: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy#100031

Food

I would like to dedicate today's blog to Vietnamese food. We have been here for two days and have been offered enough food for 2 weeks!

Our Day of Food: At Mitchell's Aunts' houses

First, Mitchell's dad takes us to a coffee house to sit and drink coffee. Now this is nothing like a coffee house in the United States. We sit in plastic chairs around a plastic table outside in the heat. They like to drink iced coffee here. Sometimes they will even mix their iced coffee with fresh jasmine tea(which is served for free to anyone buying coffee).

After coffee, you must go eat breakfast. The Vietnamese do not distinguished breakfast food from other food, so you are just as likely to eat a pork sandwich or pork and small rice for breakfast as you are for lunch or supper.

Once breakfast is over we go to see a water bottling company that Mitchell's Aunt owns and operates. As soon as we walk in the door, water is being served to us. Then we are asked to have a seat. After a few minutes of talking, Mitchell's aunt leaves and returns with a big plate of fruits. We had pineapple (which was WAY better then any in the US), mango, rambutanan, sweet-sop, and logan. I posted pictures of them on our MobileMe Gallery.

We then leave that Aunt's house to visit another aunt. When we arrive there, we are once again asked to have a seat. She proceeds to bring in plates full of snacks. One was a weird green layered snack that Mitchell's dad loves. I laughed when she tried to offer us some chocolate candy, which come to find out had been brought to them the week before from another family member from the United States(Snickers, Butterfingers, etc.) They just seemed so out of place.

Finally, it was lunch time. We were presented with a table of food. Three types of fish dishes and two types of beef dishes. Rice and french bread were of course served with it. The Vietnamese people are very big on serving you. If they notice you have not tried something on the table, they will just go ahead and get a piece for you and place it on your plate. It is very hard to refuse to eat. When the main course is over the fruit plate always appears. This time it was mango and pineapple.

An hour or so after lunch, the snacks reappear. Today we were offered dried fish and dried beef (like beef jerky). A few minutes later clams appear at the table. Then more fruit.

Before you know it, it is time to eat supper. Let's just say, both days Mitchell and I have turned down supper because we are sooooo stuffed. What amazes me more is that although these people eat so much food, they weigh nothing. I will give them one thing, the food here is MUCH healthier than anything in the United States.

More pics from the day are posted at: http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy#100016

Off to Grandmother's House We Go

Today we spent the whole day with Loc's family. We started the day by being served roasted pork sandwiches on fresh French bread for breakfast and then going to a local coffee house to sit and drink coffee. I had orange juice, but when I received it, it had ice in it. We had to request another one without ice. Not being able to have ice in my drinks really stinks. When you are sitting in the hot, humid weather ice just sounds so good. Mitchell wasn't too happy either. He had to drink a hot coffee while everyone else had iced coffee (one of Mitchell's favorites).The good thing about bottled water is that one of Mitchell's aunts is a manager for a bottled water company, so it is pretty easy to get.

After our coffee house experience, we quickly visited one of Mitchell's great aunts, then we headed over to Mitchell's grandmother's house. We spent the rest of the day there. Most of Mitchell's aunts, uncles and cousins were there. They served us food, then more food, then more food and yes, more food. We got to try many tropical fruits we have never had. We had a variety of meat to pick from: duck, chicken, beef, and pork wrapped in banana leaves. This was served with two types of noodles and rice. We did not even eat supper because we were so full from lunch. It was like a big family get together in the United States; more food than you could ever eat.

Mitchell made buddies today with a couple of kids. One was a cousin's kid that we have affectionally called "Silly Boy". He followed us everywhere we went and was always getting into everything. The other boy was a young man that found all of Mitchell's gadgets very interesting. He is just beginning his 7 years of English in school and tried some out on us. (Yes, I said 7 years of English. They start in 6th grade learning the language.) He really found Mitchell's iPhone fun to play with and kept Mitchell company all afternoon.

Luckily, Mitchell has two cousins that speak English. The first is Ngan who is able to speak a little English, but carried around her Vietnamese/English dictionary all day. The other was a cousin that is an English teacher in the local high school. She spoke English very well. I felt sorry for her because all afternoon she was required to translate between us and Mitchell's aunts.

We have uploaded many pictures to our MobileMe gallery. Click the following link to see them. If you want more information about a picture, just click on it then click the round "i" button.

http://gallery.me.com/mitchellandwendy#100008

Good Morning, Vietnam!

Hey guys! We have made it. Right now it is 7:00 a.m. Wednesday morning in Vietnam. We arrived here last night at 11:30 p.m.  We made it through customs successfully, but nothing prepared me for what was awaiting us when we left the airport.

I felt like a movie star! They obviously do not let anyone in the airport the is not flying in or out, so as you are walking out of the airport you see this huge crowd of people. They are all waiting behind a roped off area, waving and screaming. Really, picture a movie star or singer stepping out into a crowd of people. To go with the people, you have the sights and sounds of Siagon. Siagon in some ways has the feel of New York City; lighted billboards everywhere and the sound of MANY people. We didn't get any pictures last night, but hopefully we will in later days.

It felt like Loc's whole family came to welcome us, but really it was only two families. Come to find out, Loc has 5 brothers and 5 sisters. One of Mitchell's cousins is able to speak some English, and that has been VERY helpful. We stayed in a hotel last night for the whopping price of $10. We having to decide now if we want to stay here or stay with one of Mitchell's aunts.

Too much to say, but I will leave you now. We are going to see Mitchell's grandmother for the first time today. I am going to use this blog to share my thoughts and feelings while we are here, so some of my posts may get very long or I may write two or three a day. Sorry.

I will leave you with a picture Mitchell took yesterday on the plane. It is of the Grand Canyon from 50,000 ft.

Heading Out

It is Sunday afternoon and we are about to leave for Dallas. Just wanted to say bye to everyone and we'll talk to you the next time we have internet. Chao.

The Night Before

Finally, we are packed. Let's just hope we have everything we need. Tomorrow we are leaving for Dallas to spend the night since our flight leaves so early Monday morning.

Question of the day: A couple of days ago someone asked me if it would daylight or darkness while we are flying. The more I think about it, the better that question becomes. I know we leave here during the morning time and arrive there at night, but once we leave L.A. and start flying through MANY time zones will most of our time be in the dark or daylight?? One friend of mine said that when she flew to Japan it was light on one side of the plane and dusk on the other. I'll post later on what we find out.

This week Mitchell and I have spent our meals enjoying all the foods we will be unable to eat while in Vietnam: hamburgers, BBQ (ribs), Mexican food, and Mitchell's favorite, tater-tot casserole. We have one final meal before we leave. I think we'll make this one Italian.

Before we leave out, I would like to ask you guys just to pray for us: that we have a safe trip and have no problems with customs.

Many Questions

Now that the time for us to leave is getting close, we have a lot of people asking us questions. This post is dedicated to those people.

Question 1: What is the time difference between the United States and Vietnam?
Answer: Vietnam is exactly 12 hours ahead of us. While I am writing this blog it is 7:45p.m. here; there it is tomorrow morning at 7:45 a.m..

Question 2: How long is your flight over there?
Answer: From the time we leave DFW to the time we land in Vietnam it will have been 28 hours and 10 minutes. Actual time on a plane is about 22 hours.

Question 3: What about money?
Answer: The official money in Vietnam is the Dong. We have been told however that some places will take US money and debit/credit cards. This is mainly in the city. As of right now, the exchange rate is $1 equals $19,000 dong. The moment we step off of the plane, we will be millionaires. Unfortunately this makes us targets. (Yes, the dong above would equal .03 in US dollars.)

Question 4: Isn't Vietnam a third world country?
Answer: Yes, most of the country is still considered third world. Only the big cities have what I would consider modern conveniences (a.k.a. hot water, air conditioning, steady electricity)

Question 5: Why are you going to Vietnam?
Answer: we are going to meet Mitchell's family on his dad's side. We will meet his grandmother, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Mitchell's dad is going with us.

Question 6: Do you know any Vietnamese?
Answer: NO! Mitchell's dad will be our only line of communication with some people. However, the younger a person is in Vietnam the more likely they know English.

Question 7: Will Mitchell be able to survive without internet???
Answer: We'll find out!! :) Actually, in the cities we will have a chance to get internet, but we are not staying in the city most of the time.

That's all I can think of right now. If you have a question, leave a comment and I'll let you know what we think the answer is.