Changing of the guard

Jen and I had a lovely Saturday morning in Hoi An and a nice visit with Mai and family.  No stop in Hoi An would be complete without a trip to the wholesale shop!  It is like being in an episode of hoarders...but everything is for sale.  Tons of great items for friends and family back home without the storefront.  Brilliant!  Then, we packed all of the "must have items" onto the bike and motored back to Da Nang for a relaxing afternoon (of packing).  The last night in Da Nang for Jen was lovely...a beautiful meal cooked by Hang and her family on mats across the street from their house on their "patio."  I put quotes around it because it is really the back side of the church and sidewalk that they have adopted, covered, strung electricity to for fans and lights, and claimed as their patio.  Pretty creative if you ask me!  The case of beer and bucket of ice got dragged out and the feast was complete.  Needless to say, no games of Vietnamese blackjack this time!  We played earlier in the week and Jen and I spent 20 minutes scrubbing our faces at home when we finished.  Not to mention the looks we got on the motorbike on the way home!  Basically, the loser gets "painted" with the soot from an old kettle that sits on a woodburning stove.  I guess you could call it a Vietnamese facial.

Jen got a proper send off at the airport...complete with 18 kids, the house mothers, Diem, Hien, Ha, Mai, Mr Sun....she is one popular lady!  Coming to the airport is a Vietnamese favorite, as I have come to find out ;-)   Missing her in Vietnam for sure.  But, that gave me the day to get laundry done, the apartment cleaned, and some catching up on the blog and Facebook.  Not to mention, a few motorbike rides for the essentials (hand wipes, cell phone minutes, and Larue beer).  

Mom arrived at 4pm at the airport...and Diem was nice enough to meet me at the house, help coordinate some artwork for the airport arrival, and pile the kids into taxis.  The "let's get in the taxi" routine has become a ritual by now!  She was greeted with screaming, smiling, elated kids with hand-painted signs saying "welcome Nan" "we love you Nan."  Very cute!  They are keepers for sure (the signs and the kids).  haha!  I quickly indoctrinated Mom into the motorbike culture in Vietnam and we hopped on and headed to Chau after she got settled into the apartment.  Great seafood and prawns the size of small lobsters...yummy!  With full tummys and having had several beers, we had a great night sleep.

Monday we woke up early and had coffee at our neighborhood Starbucks...Cafe Ty!  A bahn mi opla and mi quang for breakfast and Mom was well on the road to blending in in Vietnam...except for the fact that we are the only two white people as far as you can see.  Oh well!  We went to the Lady Buddha at the base of Monkey Mountain and lit insense for Mr Tuan's father who passed away the week prior.  The view was amazing and the motorbike ride there was a lot of fun.  I felt like an old pro, since Jen and I had done this on our first morning as well.  However, Jen and I were perplexed at the parking fee (turns out it was a suggested donation...but translating that in Vietnamese was beyond us), but I now knew what I was doing!  We took some great photos and managed to avoid the hoards of tourists that started coming in buses as we were leaving.  We then went to Mary's House for Mom to see everything and hang out with the kids who were home from school in the morning.  The schools in Vietnam are so overcrowded that they have the kids go to school in shifts.  Morning or afternoon.  Some days the kids do both, others, just a half day.  Giving It Back To Kids also has a tutor come and teach the kids English two nights a week and help them with their homework.  We then headed to the GIBTK office to meet more of the staff and head to lunch.  Diem organized an excursion to Com 300 for some amazing lunch - all for 14 dollars for the six of us, total.  Pretty amazing.  You can do a lot here for not very much.  Eat.  Drink.  Travel.  Help kids.  All pretty darn affordable if you are American!