Hmong people near Sapa

Our second day in Sapa, consisted of a good 4 hour hike with two Hmong women to their village down the mountain. We had a great day of cultural exchange with them that included trekking down the rice-terraced mountain, exchanging stories of our families and lives (they could speak English fairly well), enjoying soup together, watching them harvest a garden, visiting their homes and buying some embroidered fabric and jewelry from them.

The women were especially nimble and strong, trekking down the muddy sides of the mountain with ease wearing sandles, while Andrew and I carefully watched our footing as we moved over rocks, crossed through mud and small streams. At a few points in our hike, both Hmong women held my hands to help me down the path. They were lively, humourous and great guides. Definitely a day I'll remember for a long time.

Andrew's New Hobbies

While in Sapa, Andrew acquired two new hobbies: admiring cabbages and giving northern water buffalo a good itching.

Trekking in Sapa

Sapa is a moutainous town in the North of Vietnam, close to the border with China. Andrew and I traveled there to do some hiking in the moutains to see beautiful rice-terraced hillsides and the villages of the Hmong people who live there.

The weather there was the coldest we have encountered since leaving the United States. In Sapa itself, it was foggy, misty and about 45-55 degrees. I know 45 degrees is not that cold, but it is cold when you do not have a jacket, but only a zip-up, hat, scarf, and gloves. It is even colder when none of the buildings have heat. Let's just say that taking a shower was an exercise in self-discipline. A better way to think of our time in Sapa is to think of camping in the fall. Its always cold, you never fully heat up but its pretty and you appreciate the views.

We stayed there for 2 days and 1 night. After we were done hiking, we would go to the 1 or 2 bars in town that had a fireplace to bring our temperatures back up. Then we would go back to our hotel and lay under the covers, this was nice but hard to get out of when you feel so toasty warm inside.

The hiking of trekking in Sapa was beautiful. Once you hiked down from the town, you would get out of the mist to see beautifully terraced hills and valleys. You would also get to visit a number of villages of the Hmong people. Enjoy the photos from our hikes.

Museums of Hanoi

While in Hanoi, Andrew and I thought it would be best to visit the museums of Vietnam, especially those that commented on the Vietnam War. In our few days in Hanoi, we visited the Army Museum (lots of old planes, bombs and artifacts from Vietnam's history of trying to overthrow colonizers -China, France and the US), the B-52 Museum (a collection of B-52 planes and parts shot down during the Vietnam War), the Ho Chi Minh Museum and Mausoleum (the museum itself was very modern and artsy, we didn't get to see Ho Chi Minh in the mausoleum though because it is only open to viewing in the morning hours) and the Ethnology Museum, which highlights the different ethnic groups in Vietnam (lots of good exhibits on the Hmong people).

Images of Hanoi

Here is an image of Andrew at a temple that sits in the middle of Hoam Kiem Lake in Hanoi and the very large turtle that came out of the lake in 1968 (other large turtles have been seen since, this one was 6 feet long). There is also a picture of Rayna enjoy a bowl of pho ga (chicken noodle soup) on the street. The soup consists of chicken, rice noodles, lime juice, chilies and lots of herbs.

Getting Around Hanoi

The easiest way to get around Hanoi is to hop on the back of motorbike and have the driver scoot through traffic to your destination. Hanoi is a honking nightmare of little street rules other than get where you need to go any way you can. It doesn't really make sense to Andrew or myself but somehow it functions. I am just glad I do not have to do the driving and can just sit on the back and enjoy the ride.

the wee hours in Hanoi

So Andrew and I took the night train from Sapa back into Hanoi. The night train is an ok experience. Sleeping in a small room with two bunks and constant stopping throughout the night is not the best way to catch up on your beauty rest, but it is a good way to travel a long distance without letting extreme boredom set in.
As we took the night train back into Hanoi, the only thing we were unaware of is the fact that the train arrives at 4am and we were unable to check into our hotel until 12pm. So, needless to say, we had some time to kill and no where to go. We arrived at our hotel and dropped off our luggage at 4:30am and then hit the quiet streets to see what we could do at such odd hours.
We walked the quiet and lonely streets of the old quarter, until we came upon a street vendor selling pho bo (beef noodle soup) and pho ga (chicken noodle soup). We decided that a 4:30am soup sitting would be in our best interests and it was. Pho bo and pho ga is pretty much the national dish of Vietnam. It consists of rice noodles in a clear beef or chicken broth that is flavored with a lot of fresh herbs like chives, parlsey, cilantro, mint and lime. You can also add chili sauce and some sort of pickled liquid to it as well.
At about 5:45am, we hit the streets again looking for a cup of coffee. Surprisingly, there is little to nothing open at this time as shops are just beginning to pull up their metal gates and prepare for the day. We did see somethings that surprised us though. On a bad note, we saw a pile of slaughtered dogs being cleaned on the sidewalks for eating. On a good note, we saw some great Tai Chi being practiced by older women near the lake and a variety of weird and wacky Vietnamese fitness regiments being executed. One man continued to whip his head wildly in clockwise and counterclockwise motions for five minutes, while another sat upside down on a park bench and swung his legs wildly above him. The viewing of these fun morning exercises was definitely the highlight of our morning.
It is now noon and the city is back to its normal chaotic hum, a very different rhythm than the wee hours of Hanoi.

Rude American? Not in Vietnam

The Vietnamese people are very pushy. This isn't to say they are mean, but it is a simple cultural difference. There is no such thing as a line or waiting your turn in Vietnam. If people want something, they just go ahead and push till they get it. If you are in their way, they just push you aside. This has become evident to me at the airport, at stories, buying museum tickets and in the way they drive.
While we were standing in line at the airport to check-in, people kept pushing past us and cutting in line. At first I thought there was a reason behind this, but there was none other than "to each his own." While I was looking at a shirt in a store, a woman pushed me aside and grabbed the same shirt. After a few instances of this, Andrew and I have finally figured it out and are doing some pushing and cutting of our own and let me tell you it feels good. Amen! So to sum up, I want to say that I don't think there can be a thing such as a rude American in Vietnam because that is the way things flow.

Hanoi Christmas

We are in Hanoi and although it is Christmas eve, it feels strangely like autumn. There is a chill in the air that is refreshing and a few trees are changing color. The city is loud, chaotic but also beautiful and modern. We have enjoyed the switch from the beach and the cold weather.
We spent our day walking around the city, shopping and site seeing.
A few highlights include viewing the gigantic stuffed 6 foot tortoise that emerged from a small lake in the middle of the city in 1968. This tortoise is connected with the legend of the lake and the return of a famous sword, a few hundred years ago. Other large tortoises have been sighted in recent years with the last being in 2002. Andrew and I used our best scanning and telekinethic skills to make the tortoise surface the lake for our christmas wish, but we, alas, were unsuccessful.
To cheer up our dampened hopes, we decided to do a little christmas shopping and purchased the complete DVD set of Twin Peaks (highly recommended by Kanyun for years and difficult to find) and all 18 seasons of the Simpsons on DVD for $30. We will now be in television show heaven upon our return to Yangon.
TV shows on DVD has to be one of the best ideas of recent years. While I tend to overdose on episodes by watching 6 in a row, its great to be able to see what happens next in a show, immediately next! I highly recommend the first season of Heroes. Hiro is my Hero!
Tomorrow we hit the War Museum and perhaps the Museum of Ethnology! Merry Christmas Eve Everyone!

Baby Jesus lives in a cave

Southern Vietnam has surprised me in two ways. First of all, Southern Vietnam has a surprisingly large number of Christian Churches. This means that there are Christmas lights and nativity scenes everywhere along with dancing electronic Santas playing the saxophone. Unlike, nativity scenes back home, the Vietnamese baby Jesus was born in the cave of a large, rugged silver mountain. Who knew? Maybe we had it wrong all these years.

What's next

Sunday is our last day in Mui Ne and from there we take a bus back to Ho Chi Minh City and then fly to Hanoi in the north arriving late in the evening. In Hanoi we are looking forward to shopping, eating, and renewing our business Visas for Myanmar. We will spend the 24th and 25th there in Hanoi and then take a night train to Sapa, a town in the north bording China for a couple of days. Sapa is supposed to be a beautiful mountain town with terraced rice paddies. It is also supposed to be cold (Yahoo-time to break out pants and hats) and have hikes you can take to nearby Hmong villages. With Sheboygan having had a substantial Hmong population, we are really looking forward to these hikes.
After Sapa, we will take another night train back to Hanoi to spend the weekend there and then return to Mui Ne for another 4 days. More stories and adventures to come as they happen.

Communist Connection

One thing that has surprised me about Vietnam is the large number of Russian tourists. This is the first place I have encountered that has Russian tourists, but it makes sense when you think about for two reasons. 1. Russia is relatively close to Vietnam 2. Vietnam is still a communist country.
The other night we were having dinner at a close by seafood restaurant that was infiltrated by 3 big tables of Russians. I did infact hear many long drinking toasts in Russian and the name Yuri (my little brother's name) called out several times, which I enjoyed. What is also interesting is that you can pick out who are the Russians even before they speak. The men are very tall and buff and just big in general, while the women are tall , skinny, beautiful and have sharp facial features.
Last night, there was a ladies night gathering that I decided to go to that was a blast. We all met (about 20 of us) at a nearby restaurant for dinner and wine. We then went to the kiteboarding school hut on the beach and proceeded to drink more and play Truth or Dare. After that, we went to WAX, the closeby beach lounge/bar for more drinks and dancing. What I enjoyed most is the fact that it was like a mini-UN meeting with women from all over the world getting together. Some women work in Mui Ne as kiteboard instructors or managers during the tourist season while others were long-term vacationers. Of the 20 or so girls there I was the only American and only 1 of 2 native English speakers. The rest were a mix of German, Danish, French, Finnish, Flemish, Hungarian, Vietnamese and Russian.
I especially enjoyed hanging out with the Russian girls from Moscow. They are very lively, spirited and have great accents. I think this fascination also comes from the fact that I grew up during the end of the Cold War and we were always told that the Russians were our enemies. That makes them more exotic somehow. I am now happy to report that I have two new comrade friends named Zoya and Maya.

Tech Ed. Randy look-a-like

This is the picture of the back of Mic, our high school counselor at the school where we teach. He looks so much like our good friend Tech. Ed. Randy from the back that we couldn't help but share this picture. He is from Colorado...could they be related? I do not know, but it is possible.

Motorbike Adventures

Yesterday Andrew and I rented a motorbike to go cruise up the coast of Mui Ne. We wanted to rent motorbikes to check out the coast and also in preparation to our visit to Hanoi in the North. Our friend Eloise recommended renting one there but we did not want to do that without first getting our bearings in a less-crazy motorbike town. Vietnam is crazy about motorbikes. In Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) where we flew in, I have never seen so many motorbikes in my life. There are about 8-9 million people who live in that city and 4 million motorbikes. There are so many that when you drive in a car next to them you feel like you are in the middle of a parade. There doesn't seem to be a rhyme or reason to the way the traffic moves either. There is a flow similar to how a school of fish swims in the sea, but its something that is unexplainable: organized chaos, perhaps?
On our motorbike trip around the Mui Ne area, there were two things on our list to see: the red sand dunes and the fish sauce factory. We are happy to report that all of our goals were completed.
We took a nice 30 minute ride up the coast to the red sand dunes. Upon parking our motorbike on the side of the road by some souvenir stands and restaurants, we were bombarded by a horde of Vietnamese children who demanded that we pay to go sandsledding with them. This experience was so unpleasant that Andrew and I immediately went into teacher mode and demanded that they be quiet. We had thought about going sandsledding on the dunes earlier, but now there was no way we were going if the yelling children had to join us. As soon as the kids, learned we weren't going to sandsled with them, the children told us to fuck off and gave us the finger. Yikes....where did they learn that friendly goodbye from. Oh well, you can't win them all.
After that we continued up the coast to see more sanddunes and a great harbor with 100s of multicolored fishing boats and some old above ground cemetaries. Our friend Caleb thought the cemetaries were Hindu? because they had the backwards sign of the swastika on them, which means death. I guess the Nazis took the hindu symbol of life and reversed it to mean death. Whether this is true or not, I do not know, but its worth looking into.
We finished our motorbike adventure by stopping at the fish sauce factory and store. I persuaded Andrew to get the half-liter of fish sauce versus the gallon. My key convincing point was the fact that we would be over our airline weight limit if we brought the gallon jug back to Yangon.
And so that concluded the motorbike adventure. With the helmets and Andrew's driving skill, we will be ready to tackle the streets of Hanoi.

Looks like triple trouble!

This is a picture of buddhist monk children from our October break. Sorry to confuse the order of this blog, but I just came across this picture and wanted to share its story. During the Full Moon Festival in October, people in Myanmar visit the golden pagodas and light candles. People also set off firecrackers and light pillow sized hotair lanterns into the sky.

These three baby monks were around in Nwge Saung and they were nothing but trouble. They were lighting bottle rocks off into crowds of people and tearing through the streets giggling. When Andrew and I saw this we could do nothing but shake our heads and say "Oh uh, here comes triple trouble."

More Pictures of Mui Ne

More pictures of a relaxing week in Mui Ne. First picture is Andrew examining the menu at a wood-fired pizza place on Wednesday night (Great pizza, kind of like Il Ritrovo). Second picture is the Vietnam flag. Third picture is myself and Jenny (high school science teacher at our school from Australia) enjoying lunch. Jenny and her husband Caleb joined us for 2 nights in Mui Ne before they continued their journey up the Vietnam coast.

Mui Ne = Andrew Kiteboarding Bliss

Mui Ne has meant much happiness to Andrew because he can do his three favorite things 1. kiteboard, 2. drink beer , 3. eat fresh seafood for cheap. In a tribute to his many loves, here are some photos.

Rub-a-dub dub, its a fishing tub

This is a traditional Vietnamese fishing boat. These are the boats that are used to catch the fish where the fish sauce comes from!

In the morning and evenings a whole group of these fishing tubs are strung together and led out to different spots on the sea by a motorized boat. The person working the fishing tub pulls in fishing nets cast earlier in the day and then the motorized boat hooks all of the tubs together and brings them ashore. Considering it is pretty wavy here on the South China Sea, I am not sure how the boats stay afloat and do not tip over. The vietnamese must be blessed with good balance and a lack of sea sickness.

Mui Ne, Vietnam

So, Andrew and I have spent our first week off in Mui Ne, Vietnam at Sunshine Beach Resort. Mui Ne is on the southern coast of Vietnam and the South China Sea. What once used to be a small fishing village that produces fish sauce (very tasty too- a somewhat salty sea taste used instead of soy sauce) has turned into a windsport destination over the past 5-10years.

We came to Vietnam to explore the culture (and the food thanks to the ravings of our friend Eloise whose studied here), but we came to Mui Ne for the kiteboarding opportunities.

Kiteboarding is key here and on any afternoon 30-40 colorful kites can be seen careening across the coastline. There are also a lot of windsurfers here. After many years of watching Andrew kite, I finally decided to take lessons at one of the many kiteboarding schools here and it has been a great experience. My instructor is a tall German woman named Sabine who is patient, explains things in great detail and is big on safety. I just finished my 5 hour lesson package with her today and I can now get up on the board for short runs. I am going to take some additonal lessons to keep perfecting this skill before we leave Mui Ne on the 23rd. Overall, learning to kiteboard has been a fun and enjoyable experience, not nearly as frightening as I thought it would be. Lessons though are key to learning this sport as there is a lot going on at any moment and there is a lot of theory to master beforehand.

That being said, here are some pictures of where we are staying. More photos and stories to come.

School Life

Teaching at an international school has been a really good experience. The students are for the most part well-behaved, studious and curious about what they are learning. There are always a few trouble makers and a few clowns but this makes the class interesting.

Our school is run on a block schedule, which I really enjoy. What this means is that classes are one hour and 40 minutes in length compared to the normal 50 minute schedule. In the high school there are A days and B days. On my A days I teach 3 blocks of 100 minutes, one US History section, one Freshman English section and a Dance elective. On my B days I see different students entirely and teach two classes, I have a different US History section and a different English section. I feel that block scheduling really allows a teacher to focus more indepth on a subject as well as allow for a variety of activities to take place within one class.

Here are some photos from my classroom: Note the studious expressions on my students faces. Angels, right?

Staff Christmas Party

Andrew and myself at a staff Christmas party at the Dusit where we live. There were appetizers, buffet of entrees and desserts. No Christmas cookies, but I guess will live. Included is a picture of the giant gingerbread house they built in the lobby.

Elephant's are a girl's best friend

Was that how that song went…diamonds are a …..no wait elephants are a girl’s best friend. Elephants are large, smart and amazing. A tribute to them and their powerful trunk. Check out the picture of the baby one (one year old). Andrew got into a shoving match with him and he lost, barely a competition. The 8-year-old Burmese elephant handler had to save him from a stomping.

Jacques Cousteau or Scuba Steve

Andrew catches us a red snapper for dinner via the old traditional spear fishing method. Supposedly he is the first foreigner in Nwge Saung to be able to successful spear a fish.

October Break Pictures

Here are a few highlights from our October break spent in Nwge Saung on the Bay of Bengal in Myanmar.

Hungry, hungry Hippo

Here are images from a field trip to Hlawga Lake (pronounced La-ga Lake) that Andrew took his 6th grade science students on. They looked at look wildlife including two very large Hippos that you can feed by hand. Now, you may or may not know this, but Hippos have incredibly strong jaws that can crush bone. The fact that kids can practically stick their hands into the hippos mouth to feed them just speaks to the trusting nature or naïve nature of this country. Either way, these are amazing creatures. I also added the picture of two of his students because they look so bored and unhappy (I am sure this is just a posed picture because how could you not have fun with Mr. Bauman).