deep thoughts

Times come during a trip when there is “nothing to do”. especially with walker. So we try to find little things to do that become the focus of the day. for example, this morning we walked down the road to deliver 2 kg of laundry to chip chip. This will cost us $2. That is for approx 1 load of laundry. Not bad. So now we are backing the room, waiting for walker’s nap time, which is about 30 minutes from now. Other such time filling events include buying bottled water, finding a cookie snack, swimming in the pool (much to walker‘s immense delight!!), having a short dip in the ocean, and going for a short walk around the compound area. The one thing that I wish were different about phu quoc was that there was a place we could stroll for long periods of time. I enjoy walking with walker and looking at things. Here, there is a dirt road out from our alley, and it is not so enjoyable to push the stroller on, as motorbikes are whizzing by and it is very dusty and gravelly. The beach is beautiful, but there is no place to go for a walk. In some areas, there is even a retaining wall, instead of wide stretches of sand leading to the shore. In addition, the sand is a very thick grain, and this makes for mushy walking. Mushy walking while carrying a 23 pound baby is not that fun.

So, we do other things…like visit the scary monkey down the alley, and look at the carrier pigeons, and checkout the incredible flora and fauna. The monkeys are in a cage. But guess what? The little one can squeeze himself through one of the chain links. He acts like he wants to climb in walker’s lap, and I saw his little sharp teeth earlier when he was chewing on a stick, so when he gets out, we run away. The plants are gorgeous. There is a pencil cactus TREE. The Devils’s Backbone is not a plant, it is a BUSH. Orchids and bromeliads are everywhere. Some other beautiful flowering trees are everywhere too. The bouganvilla are perpetually in bloom and one plant blooms both white and pink flowers. I love the papery blossomson a bouganvilla.

The past few evenings we have gone over to the bar at the moon resort, had a few beers, played some pool on the wonky pool table, and watched some amazing sunsets. Truly gorgeous.

We met a Canadian couple when we first got here. They were debating about coffee, so I nosied in and recommended the iced white coffee. Then after watching them I realized they did not want Vietnamese coffee, they wanted western style coffee. Then they complained about the hotel and the service, and changed hotels. I saw them later and they told me how much better it is where they currently stay, that they are on the 5th floor and the room is much bigger and the pool is much better, etc. I told them I was glad it worked out for them. I realized that these people are spending their time here in Vietnam, trying to make things as much like home as possible. Instead of enjoying and appreciating the differences, they wish things were like they are in Canada. I feel bad for them, for not being able to laugh at the funny differences, for not appreciating the delicious coffee made with condensed milk instead of cow’s cream. These are the type of people who end up blaming the Vietnamese for things that they Canadians themselves either misinterpret or just don’t understand.

Now I must compare the asian countries I have traveled to in recent years: India, Thailand, Vietnam. Vietnam has by far the friendliest people. Thai people were so shy and in India I mostly talk to men, who usually want to sell me something orprove how much smarter they are than me, being male and all. In Vietnam, communism planted a seed of gender equality. You see women on constrcution crews, women driving vehicles just as much as men, women working everywhere. In India, many women stay at home with the children. In Thailand the women worked as well, but were too shy to interact with us.

Here in Vietnam we have not heard much music. Every once in a while we run across some loudspeaker than has some guy yelling about something and then there will be some brief music. We imagine this to be the communist propaganda loudspeaker. In India, music is always playing…either bollywood hits or older religious songs or classical. People walk down the street singing to themselves, to the passing cows. In Thailand, I remember lots of western music.

The cloths in Vietnam are boring. Regular western cloths, with a bit of bad taste. There are two notable outfits: the traditional top with a long skirt attached that slits up to the waist on both hips. Pants are worn underneath. We have only seen this outfit worn as work clothes, not as daily wear. For daily wear, we have seen this type of pajama ensemble, which is made of a simple button blouse and simple pants of a matching material. All of these I have seen are made of light polyester and the patterns and prints are either not so good or plain old terrible. Often, the prints are right out of 1975, and not in a good way. The men all wear pants and shirts or jeans, nothing to remark on really. The clothing in India as you know is a whole other story. Colorful, flowing, sparkly, embroidered, silky, saris, salwaar kameez…some men wear traditional cotton outfits, some western pants, but there are also the tribal folks who really wear the spectacular things. We will not get to the north of Vietnam to see any tribal people. Their needlework is very similar to that of the tribal people in Thailand. Very colorful embroidery and lots of tiny quilting on clothes. So I am sorry we will miss seeing that.

Vietnamese are mostly Buddhist. Although we see many pagodas and small shrines, the religion does not seem to play the same big role as religion dopes in Thailand and india. The latter 2 countries have festivals and temples everywhere….and religion is a big obvious part of daily life. Esp in India, as Hinduism looks for any excuse possible to celebrate.

I have more to say as far as comparisons go, but I don’t want to bore you. Basically, I like India the best, then Vietnam, then Thailand. So far. Maybe once we get to hoi an I will see more and change my mind! (bearing in mind of course I have seen limited places in Thailand and Vietnam….and only a few areas of India for that matter! And of course, we are only tourists!!)

We did eat some seaweed flavored Pringles yesterday. walker loved them too. Very salty. A small “hash house” down the alley is our favorite eatery, where we dined upon meat stuffed squid and shrimp in coconut curry. The best meal yet. Those stuffed squid were so delicious…we will try to make something similar when we get home, but we already know they won’t be as tasty. Walker had some coconut curry and he enjoyed it too, just the right amount of spice. We walked through the night market last night which has many food stalls, and I saw listed “sautéed goat udders”. mmm, sounds delightful, doesn’t it?? Ha, I think tonight we will return and see if there aren’t some interesting things we actually are interested in sampling.

Jamie is off on a scooter ride, walker is napping. I have finished my 2nd book and now need to find something else to read. I’ll try to upload some pics, too. Hope everyone is well. Write us email please, we check it all the time! (we don’t really have access to face book, though.) jo: jlgjewelry@ mindspring.com and jamie: jstirling71@ yahoo.com emails keep us from feeling homesick, and we want to know what you guys are doing too!!