More Exploration of HCMC

During our second week in Ho Chi Minh City we've gotten a little more settled and seen some more of the local, less-frequented sites and restaurants. Oh yeah – and I won a 4k on Sunday and got a free business class plane ticket!  More on that below. Some of the more practical news from this week: our first shipment of stuff from the US arrived, so we now have a few more clothes, toiletries, food, etc. This might sound boring, but it was much anticipated! Also, we hired a cook/housekeeper that makes delicious food twice a week!

On the fun side, we took field trips with our language teacher to a temple, the local zoo (learning animal names!) and a "water puppet" show. The temple was beautiful with 7 levels and various representations of the Buddha throughout. We interviewed a monk who was reluctant to talk at first, but then launched into a detailed description of his beliefs (of which I understood very little!). The zoo was interesting – orangutan, monkeys, crocodiles, white tigers, civet cats, etc – though it seems they should dedicate more of the proceeds to animal food. The water puppet show had to be one of the highlights of the week. It's an art of telling stories about the countryside using puppets in/over water set to traditional music with narration in Vietnamese (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_puppetry). These guys were super-skilled and we totally enjoyed it.

On the weekend, we had originally planned to take a hydrofoil to a nearby beach community called Vung Tao. Unfortunately, the return tickets were sold out, but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. After waiting out a huge rain storm drinking coffee and reading our books in a café, we made our way out to Chinatown (a place called Cholon) where we toured a half-dozen different beautiful temples and were generally overwhelmed by the huge number of people, scooters, and stores. It was way more dense (and less clean) than where we live in district 1, but very interesting and "alive." We opted to walk home (about 4 miles) and saw every imaginable kind of store. We also witnessed our first scooter accident (scooter with 2 people meets bicycle), which didn't result in any major injuries – it's a wonder these things don't happen more often.

I started Sunday with a fun run. It was a charity event put on by the British Business Group in Vietnam and about 6000 people entered. Despite not running at all for about 2 months and a couple nagging injuries, I somehow managed to gut out a win (with a course record!). The whole thing was pretty interesting – I started in the middle of the pack and wove through strollers, rollerbladers, flag wavers, and a marching band to make my way to the front by the first mile. People were running in all manner of gear, including a fair number of barefoot competitors. Once I reached the police escort, things improved, though about 400 meters from the finish I had to literally jump/run over a wall of moving scooters that had failed to heed the flashing police sirens. The prize for my efforts?  Free Adidas gear/shoes and a business class plane ticket to Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, or Bangkok. Nice!

After the award presentation, a performance by a Cuban band that plays locally, and a nice breakfast to celebrate, Nikki and I headed to the local horse track for a different kind of race. The entry fee was a mere 50 cents and for another $5 we sat in the VIP section, which had air conditioning. We won all that back and more with a 30:1 bet on a horse that miraculously got 1st place. Could this be a new career? After we got home we did a little work on our scuba nitrox certification. We take the practical portion on Tuesday, so we'll be certified before we go diving in Nha Trang this weekend. In the evening, we tried out a cool restaurant called Bobby Brewers that has a mini-movie theatre upstairs where you can watch free (probably bootleg) films if you order dinner. We enjoyed some mindless action-thriller (Predators) before strolling home in a light drizzle.

Here's the food update: We've been eating at home more often, but explored some more small-scale restaurants as well (after our first week of frequenting the nicest places around). We've tried out a few of the ubiquitous pho (beef noodle soup) restaurants, including a local chain called Pho 24. I'm definitely a fan, even though it often includes a random assortment of beef parts (including tripe). Another great local dish is Banh Xeo, which is basically a crepe/omelet thing with shrimp and pork wrapped in a lettuce leaf with mint and cilantro. Sound weird? It is! But super delicious. We went to a hole in the wall place (maybe "side of the street" is a better description) that specialized in the dish. The good news is that it was fantastic and we only had minor gastrointestinal issues afterwards. Other colorful dishes from this week included a "fishball coke" (half a coke with a tray of fried unidentified fish balls floating on top – yummy after-school treat) and a "California burrito" (definitely not a burrito, but not a bad attempt).

We are continuing to make friends and settle in. Nikki is looking into a book club and I have my usual soccer practice. I also got a chance to play cards last week with some US and Aussie expats which hopefully will be a regular thing. This week is our last one in language immersion before Nikki starts work formally, so we're planning on a bit more fun before getting down to business.