Vietnam Day 2: Settling In

Quynh shared my room with me because she didn’t want to ride home so late in the night on her motorcycle. I showered and went to bed and fell FAST asleep. In the morning, she was already gone since she had work, and my brother came in to check up on me. I then learned my throat was pretty sore from trying to yell over the music. All from trying to talk people out of drinking too much. I need to figure out a more effective and efficient way of doing so, because talking it out is pretty useless :P

Anyway I got ready and started packing, because I thought we were going to head to Bai Chay (where my dad’s hotel is) and took a while. My brother finally tells me that there was no need to pack up so soon, we were only going to breakfast T__T! At the café, it felt really weird. I had ordered Banh My Pate, which I expected to come out like those Viet subs… but I got a real sandwich with toasted bread slices, tomatoes, lettuce, and pate. I sat there listening to English music, reading the English menu, watching my brother’s friends eat their cheeseburgers and tuna sandwiches, and felt a little depressed. Here I came excited to be immersed in my family’s culture, but so far all I’ve found is my own.

I couldn’t wait to head to familiar territory—I really wanted to see my cousins. We took a three hour ride from Hanoi to Bai Chay, and I felt more at home. We got to my dad’s home (formerly a hotel long ago) and got our swimsuits out! Billy and Nicole didn’t feel well, so Tony, John, Kyle, Kirby, Dave, Daniel & I headed out to the beach. I’ve never experienced something like this before and it was really cool. There were a lot of people, and the water was ridiculously warm. I noticed that not many females were rockin’ the two-piece and so didn’t feel comfortable taking anything off. My little sister came along afterwards, and trying to convince her to get in the water, I had to carry her and walk into the water fully clothed. It was worth it though to get her comfortable with the swimming :P The guys were throwing around a football, and attracted a lot of attention. Soon people were joining in, and we were definitely having a good time :)




Meet Dan
That night we had dinner at a restaurant near our place and had lots of seafood. I was full after just the shrimp and crabs. One of the waitresses was sitting down with us feeding my sister and I figured she was a family friend. Turns out she was my cousin… WTF LOL.


Kirby, Dave & Kyle trying to eat crab

Walking back to the hotel, I stopped in my tracks when I saw who was sitting inside. MY COUSINS!!! :D (from my mother’s side). I was so happy to see them. Hoang, Duong, and Tung are the three boys from my mom’s side who are close to my age and together we make quite the adventurous team B) ! Que Anh is Tung’s younger sister, and it really doesn’t seem like she grew at all these past two years, haha. Tung, on the other hand, is so goddamn tall now! He’s even taller than Hoang, who is turning 18 on the 26th, and I think is only 14? Or 15? Must find out.


Duong, Hoang, John, Tung & Que Anh

My brother’s friends went to get massages while we stayed to catch up with our cousins and aunt. We ended up going for a walk and went to the night market they have there. It’s just a complete tourist trap and my brother had this silly idea to pretend we didn’t know Vietnamese and see if anyone would rip us off. Let’s just say we got found out near the end of it, and my brother got told he’d get his ass kicked one day LMAO. My aunt was not impressed. We sat down for some drinks after. I had iced coffee, which turns out didn’t really work on me. When we got back to the hotel we said our goodbyes and they left to go back to Ha Long Bay.

With my brother’s friends still not back yet, John and I decided to go to an Internet Café before the night winded down and everything closed. It was pretty useless though because I wanted to go on Hotmail, and every time I did Internet Explorer would just crash on me T__T I was left with Facebook, but no one is up at 10AM! (Except Jeanette HAHA.) I couldn’t even work on my blog because I typed everything out on my laptop first. Epic fail.

When we got back we came right after everyone else got home, and learned that although they received great massages (and more for some…) they all got ripped off, and had paid the “white price” haha. Some people had been confused into paying a tip, when really there was no need because everything had already been paid for, in which the extra money was already included. We hung out outside for a long while and then ate some midnight snacks.

Right now, I am extremely tired, but super paranoid. While I was showering I started to remember all those ghost stories my cousins had told me during my last visit. Now, the place I’m staying at definitely has no creepy history, but just thinking about bad spirits wandering around Vietnam scares the heck out of me. If there’s one thing I’m sure to believe in, that’s ghosts/spirits, even if I haven’t had any personal experiences with them. I think what’s really bugging me is the fact that I have to sleep alone in my room. I’m going to have to sleep eventually, but I think it’ll be with the light on. Damn, my laptop is almost out of batteries and I don’t think it’s safe to plug mine into the outlets here. I will have to find an energy converter lying around. The sun doesn’t look to be rising anytime soon :( Why am I such a baby!!!!!

Live on arrival

So with where I left off last, turns out we weren’t taking the Vietnam Airlines. I got on the plane wondering why the flight attendants didn’t look Vietnamese and had Chinese nametags—we were flying with Dragonair (AKA, where all the Cathay Pacific rejects go ;) JOKES…) The food wasn’t that bad, but the Mei Goreng was definitely not so LOL! The flight on Cathay Pacific was good, though my neck was sore for a bit. I don’t know why, but I sort of enjoyed the turbulence we had. It felt like being on a rollercoaster, hehe.


John, Daddy, & me

Upon arriving in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam, I felt pretty anxious. I couldn’t believe I was really here, and I didn’t know what to expect because I’ve only ever visited in Winter and Spring. Walking from the plane to customs, I told my brother, “Dude, it even smells like Vietnam.” And he agreed. I don’t know what it is but there’s this distinct smell that reminds me of nothing else but here (it’s not bad or anything.) I think it’s partly the humidity that attributes to it, who knows. After a long line up with customs, we met up with the rest of my brother’s friends who were only there 20 minutes before us. After picking up our luggage we went out and were greeted by my stepmom, little sister, and my stepmom’s side of the family. At first I thought the weather wasn’t too bad until we stepped outside to get in our rides. It was only 10AM and we were already being choked by the warmth and humidity. Welcome to Vietnam. =P



My brother and his friends sat in the bus we were renting while I rode with my dad, sister, stepmom and her family. It was a little weird because I had no idea who they were and had never met them, but turns out two of the guys are my “nephews” even though they’re older than me by a lot. In the Western family tree, these guys actually aren’t my nephews, but there’s no real translation for how I address them in Vietnamese. My little sister is so adorable; she speaks much better Vietnamese than me! When she saw Jeff, she immediately grabbed him and hugged him the entire car ride. She fell asleep on me in the car =) Man, she’s tiny!

We arrived at my stepmom’s mother’s for some Pho Ga =P We were going to spend the night in Hanoi, so my brother and his friends got to get dropped off at the hotel to shower. Through my dad’s logic though, it somehow made more sense to have me shower later on… What a terrible idea. I was feeling pretty grumpy while eating because the two kids of someone in that house were dragging Jeff around and throwing him about. My heart died inside when he hit the ground :( I freaken sleep with that!! Also, I felt really sticky and gross and my mosquito bites from back home were acting up. When food was finally prepared, I have to admit I was quite disappointed. The pho was quite bland, BUT! I don’t want to complain too much, I’m on vacation!

After my brother and his friends finished eating (it was quite funny with seven Caucasians eating in such a small Vietnamese dining room) I finally got to shower!!! However, shortly after stepping outside the sweating commenced immediately. I met up with everyone else who were sightseeing at a lake. Tony was sweating beads LOL. I wasn’t doing too bad, but Dave had to take his shirt off. In the temple, everyone was giving him dirty looks, and someone had said. “Put your shirt back on,” in Vietnamese. I don’t know much about Vietnamese tradition and culture when it comes to things like these, but it was obvious something like that was disrespectful =P



The lake is a major tourist attraction, and with that comes hustlers! With such a huge group of people, we were targeted like crazy and they wouldn’t leave Dave alone, despite us walking such lengths. They had girls that were probably only seven years old selling things! One of them had told Dave, “You’re a bad man.” WOW! Its funny how of all things they knew in English, it was how to tell people off. Things had gotten really heated because they wouldn’t leave us alone despite telling them we didn’t want anything. It got to the point where they started swearing at us in English, which set my dad off, and he started bitching at them in Vietnamese. INTENSE!


He wouldn't be left alone LOL.

We stopped by to rest and cool down at a Café, and then did some more sightseeing around Hanoi. I couldn’t believe I saw a KFC! Or a Shiseido, or a Clinique, or a Nike store…. OR BUBBLETEA! What the heck? I’ve never really toured Hanoi like this before so I guess this is why I’m so surprised.

As the sun was setting, we headed to eat dinner at this buffet. This was the biggest buffet I have ever been to. There were so many choices and different types of food. There was sushi for crying out loud! The food was good, but I had more fun walking around looking at everything rather than eating it. A family friend’s daughter joined us, whom I apparently have met before but was too young to remember. Her name was Quynh and she was the same age as my brother, and pretty much everyone else (23). She was really cute, and being Dave’s wingman, I told him to chat her up. She had learned English after university and it was actually really good! We were trying to convince her to go clubbing with us, but Dave’s charm wasn’t working on her. So, Dan stepped in. It was hilarious, but I felt bad for Dave because I had failed him :( Dan worked his magic, and she finally agreed to come dance with us =)

We all headed back to the hotel to freshen up, and then off to the club we went! Now, clubs in Vietnam generally aren’t like the ones back home. For one, I was allowed in HAHA. Two, there isn’t a dance floor, you just stand around some high tables, drink Hennessy, and eat fruits. Where you’re standing IS the dance floor. Quynh had brought her friend along and boy, was she tall! It’s pretty difficult to have a conversation in the club as the music is ridiculously deafening. I didn’t drink, but I still had fun dancing, and used up a lot of my voice to get Kirby to quit drinking so much. Dave was already on a high and watching those two dance was pretty entertaining. Tony and his girlfriend, Nicole, weren’t with us, but they did miss out on his younger brother, Billy, get drunk. The waiters/waitresses fill your cup up literally every two seconds. My dad, stepmom and other friends of my dad were with us as well. The two nephews of mine were also there, but being my dad’s minions they didn’t drink so they were clear headed to take care of us. They’re both really sweet and made sure everyone was okay.

At 12AM the party was over, and most of us stumbled to our bus. Seated to my left was a drunk Dave with his thumb stuck in a waterbottle, and a piss-drunk Billy who opened the bus door while it was in motion so he could puke. This was only Day One. LOL

Vietnam Day 1: AIRPORTS!

I think if you were to throw me anywhere... I will still be able to do the same thing I always do: eat & sleep. Cathay Pacific is a wonderful airline, their food is really good and it's so comfortable even if you're only in the Economy Class. My brother's seven friends, that are travelling to Vietnam with us, had to take the China Airlines because we had booked tickets too late, and couldn't get the same flight for all ten people. Right now I'm in Hong Kong, waiting to board the Vietnam Airlines. The other group had a stopover in Taipei, however. Hopefully none of their flights are delayed and we'll arrive in Vietnam just about ten minutes after them :)

Apparently there is going to be a solar eclipse in Asia today. Awesome? I wonder if I'll get to see it. My sleep schedule in Vancouver was so messed up that I'm feeling really good right now. It's 8AM here and 5PM back home--pretty much when I'd be normally waking up, eh?

OH MY GOSH they're boarding now :) I wish I had put my USB cable in my backpack so I could upload photos, but I'll edit this post later.

Now, for a two hour flight. Last time I flew with Vietnam Airlines... their food wasn't very good :( We'll see....


My brother and I were laughing our heads off at this. RUN AWAY from the fire!!!


In case of flood.... run this way?! LOL