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.
