Rambutan

Rambutan is one of the many new tropical fruits Gavin and I have been enjoying.  It is related to Lychee and is a tasty treat on a hot day.  It looks almost like a chestnut, except the shell is soft, and can easily be peeled.  The color varies from yellow to red and the spikes are like soft hairs.  Using your hands or teeth, you can remove part of the shell and pop out the fruit inside.  The fruit looks like a grape and has a similar texture.  The first time we ate rambutan was in front of the hotel we spent our first week in.  We were returning from a night out and some of the bell boys had a bunch of rambutan and offered some to us.  We sat on little plastic stools and each had several, throwing the shell on the ground, enjoying the fruit and spitting out the small seed in the middle.  Bunches are sold as street food around the city or in the super market.  Gavin may actually be addicted to these.

The Guitar Master

Some time last week, Gavin and I were invited by our coworker, Kip, to a bar, Yoko’s, in District 1.  Yoko’s has live music most nights and a smoky, cozy atmosphere.  Getting to Yoko’s proved to be a feat, and once we finally arrived we were only able to see the band’s final few songs.  We enjoyed what we heard, including a searing rendition of “Johnny B. Goode”, but were left disappointed that we spent an inordinate amount of time trying to find the place. So we jumped on the idea of going to another bar/restaurant after the show with Kip’s friends, including the band.  At 138 we sat outside and drank beers.  I met some awesome female ex-pats.  There seem to be a lot more women here than in Istanbul.  Gavin met a few of the band members; one guy was from the Philippines as there is a large population of Filipino musicians here and another from Vietnam.  He also met a few other Western musicians, who gave him some tips about buying a guitar in Saigon.

Yesterday we set out to buy Gavin his 3-month anniversary present, his very own Vietnamese guitar.  We headed out to the ‘Music Street’ as we had been directed to the other night.  This street reminded me a bit of the hill at the end of Istiklal Street in Istanbul (Tunel): every other store sells guitars and assorted stringed creatures and between the music shops there are hole-in-the-wall juice shops or pho restaurants.  After examining the guitars at a few of these shops, we didn't really feel like anything we saw in our price range was that special as they tended to be generic factory-line models.  So we headed back up towards our apartment to a little shop by our house that we pass almost everyday.  Here we met Tuan.  He makes and sells guitars in his shop in the front room of his house.  Day after day as we passed, we would see him sitting on the floor with his tools surrounding him, working away on his guitars.  His small work shop is packed to the gills with half-finished acoustic, classical and electric guitars, amps, wood, molds, tools and scraps.  There is only a narrow empty aisle through the middle and hardly room enough for Gavin, Tuan, and I to sit and look at the guitars.  Tuan greeted us with hand shakes, a big smile and a little English.  He works sinewy and shirtless in his shop and has 2 extremely long fingernails (as many of the Vietnamese men have here).  He was excited to show off his custom-made guitars and even let Gavin play on one of his electrics with a strange, indented fret board that lets out mournful squeals and squalls of feedback simultaneously (Vietnamese style).  After meeting Tuan we realized we had to buy the guitar from him.

Today we headed back to pick out Gavin’s new friend.  Tuan was all smiles and quickly pulled out a few of the guitars Gavin had tried yesterday.  He ended up deciding on an acoustic with dark rosewood, a sturdy oak neck, and an unpolished matte finish.  It is absolutely beautiful and has a great sound.  Currently Gavin is happy as a clam, strumming and singing in the other room.  I don’t think I have seen him so happy since our arrival.  

Another Monday in Saigon

Gavin and I were rudely awoken throughout the night.  First by some unruly misquotes who somehow have become immune to our Raid plug-ins.  Then by the oppressive heat.  And around 9am by what sounding like the walls being bashed in by sludge hammers, but was probably in fact some construction going on near by.  The incessant pounding left us with headaches, not helped by the bottles of Saigon beer we had drunk the evening before.

We spent Sunday night with a friend, Patrick, who has lived here for 14 years and has a lot of stories to tell.  We were also joined by Freddy.  Freddy is nearly done with medical school in the states, but when he runs out of money to fund his education, he comes to HCMC to teach for a year to rebuild funds.  This is his third year out here.  We had our first truly negative interaction with a Vietnamese person.  The man offered to help us with the menu when we arrived before our friends, but ended up just being really annoying and drunk.  Once our friends arrived and a few words were exchanged in Vietnamese, his friends ushered him back to their table.  After that we enjoyed a few beers, music, stories and some amazing food.  Unfortunately I forgot the camera, but Gavin had a quarter-kilo of fresh prawns served grilled on sticks with their heads and shells still on.  He was given a lime/pepper/salt sauce for dipping.  I got noodles with beef and veggies.  Patrick ordered a whole red snapper.  The raw, whole snapper was put on the table in a large dish over a small burner sitting in a spicy broth with some vegetables.  It slowly steam cooked in front of us.  The finished product was amazing.  Over all, a pretty good night

After our rude awakening this morning, Gavin and I feasted on eggs, bacon and sweet rolls for breakfast, then headed out on the town.  Today's mission was to find a guitar for Gavin.  I think we found what we were looking for, but I'll save that post for another day.

After running (or rather biking!) all over town we ventured to a different super market near our house to stock up on some grub and household needs.  This time we went to Co-Op Mart rather than Super C.  Co-Op Mart is located on Shit Creek, which is sort of behind our house, across the railroad tracks and on the way to work.  Shit Creek was at low tide today so all the trash and sewage was exposed and extra stinky!  I tired to get a good picture of it, but kept having men peeing get in the way of my photography.  I did however capture one picture over the creek of men burning trash.  I guess the smell of burning trash is better than rotting feces.

Despite the stench and scene, Co-Op Mart far out shined Super C.  We had a field day in there and left with two huge bags of stuff, everything from dragon fruit and new cups to a new notebook for lesson planning and cream puffs.  We also couldn't resist the point of sale deals and sprang for a case of beer.  We rode home, our load larger than ever, along Shit Creek, over a bridge, through back streets and alley ways and along train tracks where we were stopped for a few minutes by a lurching train straight out of the middle of the century.  We carried on through the busy street,  to Cach Mang Thang 8 and finally to our quiet little alley and into Our Green Building.  What a long day, and we haven't even gone to work yet!

It's a full moon...

I guess that's why I had such wild classes today!  I started off my day with an interesting Angel Food Cake muffin we bought on the street last night.  I had originally thought the scrumptious muffins must be corn, but was surprised to find them to be sweet and delightful paired with a strawberry yogurt before a long day of classes.  Gavin had his usual of Corn Flakes and bananas with soy milk.  We woke up early and headed off to class around 7:15 so I could get to my 7:45 class on time.  This morning I started off with my 6-7 year olds.  I teach from a book called Beeno which follows the story of a bee (Beeno) who appears to be the milkman's androgynous child who lives with a seemingly normal family.  The kids are super excited to be in class and our time is filled with games, drawing, singing, and speaking.  The students are always enthralled with my lessons, however I leave less than stimulated after repeating the same 5 words over and over again for 2 hours.  

After Beeno (today's lesson was numbers) I went on to a 9-10 year old class of complete lunatics.  I had possibly the worst lesson I have ever had in my life today and had to threaten to call students parents.  Apparently Farm Animals wasn't as exciting to my students as I had hoped.  What can you do?


After class, Gavin and I hopped on our scooter and headed out for lunch.  We have a red Yamaha Nuovo scooter which nearly buckles under the weight of our combined 350 pounds (a feat not even achieved by a Vietnamese family of four deftly clinging to their motorbike).  Gavin wears a matching red helmet that says "Arctic Cat" on the side and a red bandanna covering his face.  I have a pink helmet with a matching pink face mask with a music note and an animal on it (still haven't figured out what the creature is).  The mask hardly blocks out the toxins from the caustic sea of exhaust, but I guess it's better than nothing.  We battled against traffic from work, along a sewage strewn river, down the alleyways of our neighborhood, finally past our apartment and to a Hanoi style restaurant just down the road.  There we feasted.  I had noodles and grilled flank steak in sweet broth with an array of vegetation (leaves, lettuce and some sort of stringy green plant) while Gavin indulged in a fried egg with greasy meat (maybe pork?) and a fresh French roll.  What a delightful meal to share on a hot day together.  

Upon arriving home at last, we kicked back and took naps.  The heat is exhausting.  It is very humid and consistently hot, weather that I am not accustomed to.  It has been a hard adjustment for me, but I am coping.  This afternoon we lesson planned together.  Gavin faces his first Beeno class tomorrow, while I have two 10-13 year old classes.  We have been surprised so far of how disorderly the classrooms can be.  Students chit-chat a lot and it can be hard to keep them focused.  We have to remind ourselves often of how we were at that age, and keep lessons interesting and creative.  The students we teach are very bright.  They have been learning English from about three, and are surprisingly good.  Their pronunciation is often weak, but they ask thoughtful questions and can answer vocabulary questions at 10 years old that advanced adult Turkish students struggled with.  I overall love teaching here even though it can be difficult to gain class control and keep the classes attention.  Let's just say I have learned a lot of games in the past two weeks!

Our school provides us with a dinner if you work in the evening, but since only Gavin was working, I made us a snack before he left.  We have been trying a lot of the different things available here, so I made us a platter containing sweet buns with a few different cheeses and fruit.  Unlike Istanbul, buying different cheeses  doesn't cost much and we have been endulging (Gouda, Emmental, etc).  We also had one of the sweetest mangoes I've ever had and a hot pink fruit the size and shape of a large mango called a Dragonfruit, which tasted like a Kiwi.  And some sour cherries dipped in a spicy salt mixture. 


After Gavin left for work I enjoyed a Zorok beer (Polish origin now brewed in Vietnam?) and finished my lesson plans for tomorrow.  I also did the laundry.  We are privileged enough to have a washer.  While hanging out laundry to dry, I noticed our neighbors doing theirs by hand.  It looks like an arduous task.


Tomorrow I look forward to a class observation from our head teacher and two "exciting" three-hour lessons with some "wonderful" children.  I just hope they are a little more well behaved then the ones I had this morning!


I hope everyone is doing well!

First Notes on Ho Chi Minh City

Classrooms packed to the gills with batshit-crazy children.

A sea of chugging motorbikes spewing palpably viscous chunks of exhaust down scarred lungs and up red-raw, dripping sinus cavities.

Pudding-thick tropical air stirred once a day by torrential downpours.

A nascent relationship sprouting between us and tennis.

A pink-tipped, wedding-cake ornate pagoda viewed from our bedroom window. Its denizens solely female. A forgotten Monastic order that clings to peace in the midst of this chaotic megalopolis.

A spacious, clean apartment placed somewhere above the city. An incongruous wonder of modernity when juxtaposed with our neighbors' detritus-strewn rooftop hovel.

An ostensibly simple cuisine to those who don't get further than Pho, yet rich in simple complexities when the intrepid muncher ventures from the well-worn path.

This is HCMC.

Bulgaria the Wonderful

After several uneventful weeks of life and work in Istanbul, Gavin and I realized it was time for a little excitement: A trip to Bulgaria.

What's better than a trip to a beach town in the heat of the summer...nothing. Thus, our adventure to Varna began.

After an uncomfortable 10 hour bus trip, we arrived in the pre-dawn hours to a spectacular lightning storm. The increasing winds and parched electrical warmth should have warned us to take cover, but due to the early hour and lack of knowledge about Varna we wandered through the streets aimlessly. When the torrential downpour commenced we were lucky enough to be near to an outdoor tented cafe, where we managed to stay somewhat dry for the duration of the storm (Hurricane Katerina). Laying on benches, we attempted to sleep, while trying to keep the millions of beetles covering the ground off of us. When day light finally came we managed to get some directions to our hostel, but, alas, it was not open yet, so Gavin and I started our party early and downed a few beers (Beck's) in a breakfast cafe (thank you Kate Cambell for the six leva you left Katie, without which we would have been screwed!).

Around 8am we made our way to the hostel only to find it still closed, but where a wary traveler, Jon the Baptist, was waiting as well. He was easily persuaded into breakfast with us. After more beer and great food, we wondered over to the hostel (Flag Hostel, we recommend it for anyone traveling there alone), and finally got into a room by 11 and got some much needed rest.

By 2, Gavin and I hit the town. We discovered quickly that while there doesn't appear to be any Chinese people living in Bulgaria, there is a plethora of Chinese restaurants. After indulging in a feast of fried noodles with pork, Gavin and I wandered about the town. The town stretches along the Black Sea. There is a wonderful park that runs directly above the beach for what appears to be miles. We took a long walk through the town, park, and along the beach, finally laying out for a few hours and getting some much needed sun.

Bulgarian beaches are a very peculiar place. Women tend to go topless and often wear only a thong from age 6 - 85. There sure were some sights to see! There were many tourists there as well, due to a small cruise ship parked there the fist day of our trip. American women attempting to "go native" and exposing white flabby skin that no one wants to see... it was entertaining to say the least.

Later that night Gavin and I ran into two Canadian girls from our hostel, whom we enjoyed another feast of traditional Bulgarian food (very home style baked casseroles, with a lot of cheese and potatoes and of course PORK.) After dinner and drinks (vodka was cheaper than water) the four of us made it to a beach bar, here we met up with other hostelers and Jon the Baptist for an all out Bulgarian beach party which lasted until the wee hours.

On Monday, Gavin and I celebrated our one and a half year anniversary. We decided that the hostel wasn't quite for us. Sleeping in bunk beds across the room from each other in a minuscule apartment inhabited by 8 strangers isn't quite our thing. We managed to find a wonderful room in The Hotel Splendid (We got a deal for the room after talking to the Manager, I would recommend it to any couples who go there, it was only 20 leva more than the hostel for two and very private/clean.) We ate Chinese again. Fried noodles with mushrooms and pork spareribs with spicy cabbage salad. you sure can't find that in Istanbul! Our day was spent swimming in the Black Sea and laying out on the beach reading and talking. When the sun finally set, we made our way to a beach bar for another night of fun. After meeting the veritable conflation of Mad Max and Johnny Knoxville, Uncle Petey, we went to an unimpressive fish dinner ("I'd rather eat a plate of bullocks than those fucking cold mussels!") and hit the town once again, this time in grand form - don't order the "love cocktails".

Tuesday was spent in the sun. Petey and his Lithuanian pals, Jon the Baptist, Gavin and I spent the whole day swimming, sunbathing, drinking Bulgarian beer and "taking the piss" out of life at the waters edge. We feasted one last time on Chinese food, this time getting even more dishes. The evening was spent laying in the sun in bean bag chairs; yet, after a few too many drinks our company sculpted the aforementioned bean bags into a large fort and took turns running into the pillow-fort at high speeds.

Then the "Choice" was made. Not quite as shocking as Sophie's, but difficult as we turned our backs on Varna and headed to the bus station. As a final send-off, we quickly stopped in a grocery store and stocked up on sausages, extremely cheap booze, and honey.

Upon arriving in Istanbul at 7 am we were reminded of all the faults of this city. No clear signs to the buses to get back into the city. Smelly buses/people. People staring at us like we were aliens. Having to walk on the side of a highway with no side walk to get home. Oh, the malignant woes of Istanbul. Next summer we will be spending three months in Bulgaria rather than just three days.

To the say the least, Eastern Europe is highly recommended by these pseudo-intrepid travelers.

Too Many Starbucks and Not Enough Screens

A couple of my friends from college (let's just refer to them as Tim and Sean) recently spent ten days in the city with Nellie and I. One of their countless observations concerning Istanbul was that there is "too many Starbucks". Agreed... there is too many of them on this planet. A second concerned windows and the lack of screens accompanying them in this country. At the time, the lively atmosphere prohibited deeper probing into the validity of the statement, but I was immediately skeptical as to the real practical utility of the screen. We composed a quick tune on the subject, moved on to greater philosophical ramblings, and let the question of supercilious window coverings disperse into the night air.
A normal being would let the subject die, but I had to exhume the corpse due to a throat illness and a glut of free time following the departure of my friends. Thus, over the next few days, I had little to do but vacillate internally over the need for screens on windows. Istanbul does indeed have a fair amount of mosquitoes; on the contrary, this is not sub-Saharan Africa and we follow local Istanbul custom by keeping numerous basil plants in the living space (according to Turks, mosquitoes don't like basil as much as Thais or Italians do). There is also the question of thieves and the easier access provided by a lack of screens, but the ubiquitous bars on all ground level homes usually provide a deterrence to would-be intruders. Points and counterpoints streamed through my consciousness until my brow burned and I gave up - banishing that silly debate from my addled brain. Flash forward to early this morning, when an event of such gravity occurred that my bi-partisan ramblings on the subject were forever quelled.
Our new apartment is located just a few blocks from this district's camii (mosque) and the first azan (call to prayer) woke me at ten to five. I generally tune-out the azan and rare is the time I am awoken by its cacophony. However, this time, the abrupt prelude of abrasive, crackling speakers led to such a sonorous, deeply beautiful melody that I was peacefully brought from my dreams. The nasal pitch of the call was softened by a wistful, melancholic undertone and as I listened in silence I felt that I could understand the Arabic words as though they were imperceptibly translated in my psyche. It was if I held my breath for the entire duration and when the speakers were disengaged and the crackling subsided, I gasped for air.
Severely self-satisfied and exhausted by this fleeting grasp of cosmic piety I quickly fell back asleep.
Albeit, there is no rest for the weary and, moments later, I was startled out of bed by a soft thud that emanated from the windowsill. It took my eyes but a moment to adjust to the darkness and to my great surprise a small ebony cat was perched on the cabinet beneath the window - in our room! My heart just about leaped from my chest and, invariably, the little brigand was as frightened as I. The critter hastily returned to the night scape from whence he came and Nellie woke up to me shrieking that our luck is forever marred as great Providence has bestowed the ultimate sign of our demise upon us - the black cat!
I didn't enter into cardiac arrest, but the ordeal was less then ideal. Needless to say, I am now a card carrying member of the pro-window screen lobby.