Tuesday:
The danish lady that we were staying with turned out to be quite the grouch and didn't like us staying in the same house (that she's renting btw, it's not hers) as her because we tended to leave the fans on....apparently that was a huge problem so to avoid conflict, Kim (project manager) moved Sophie into a hotel. This actually works really well because we're not stressing about annoying the old lady :P and the people at the hotel know us by name - but a lot of the time it's "how was your day, teacher?". Our day was hence interrupted by packing up and moving around quite a bit.
Wednesday:
After class, Sophie and I decided to venture up to the north side of Nha Trang to do some touristy stuff. We went to visit the Cham towers - temples made by the cham people which are now almost non-existent because of the more dominant chinese, vietnamese, and cambodian cultures. The towers themselves, although partially re-built, are spectacular. They are still used for prayer so only tourists have to pay admission to go enter the grounds. The fare was less than a dollar. Although there's only four towers in close proximity, we stayed for about an hour just wandering the grounds in the blistering heat. The towers are set on a hill overlooking the harbour/river so it we were perfectly content to enjoy lazing about in the shade enjoying the scenery. From there we walked about 45 mins to see the Hon Chong Promontory. In short-rocks. For some reason, we've developped a bad habit of walking long distances mid-day, direct sunlight, exhausting heat. So after wandering through fish markets and never ending roads, we finally arrive, but go for a quick wade in the water to refresh. The rocks weren't anything phenomenal but we ran into a group of vietnamese having lunch on the rocks so we caught some shade and chatted with them for a while and took some pictures. We were so exhausted from the walk and from the sun so we sought out a cab pretty soon after. The cabs tend to sit around in the shade and sleep in between driving, and the one we woke up was so out of it he couldn't even figure out how to bring his seat back up to verical again. Sophie and I just looked at each other in disbelief thinking, is he okay to drive? He finally got himself together, but didn't speak english, so once we got back onto the main beachfront, he decided himself where was a good spot to pull over and drop us off....which wasn't necessarily all that close to our hotel. We felt just as delerious as he looked, and when we began the still 15 minute walk further to get home, all we could do was start laughing at the situation and how pathetic we must have looked sauntering home, soaking wet in our own sweat (attractive, I know).
We slept well that night.
Thursday:
I got my hair straightened!
A friend of mine took me to a local place to permanently straighten my hair. I know it sounds vain, but the curly hair was just looking too scruffy and was getting to be a hassle. The 3.5 hour process cost me all of 250 000 Dong, equivalent $15...which at home would have cost me about $500. Amazing. The whole salon process had me laughing out loud with the girls there (none of which spoke an ounce of english) for example three or four different women came up and grabbed my nose, one to demonstrate point out how flat theirs are in comparison, and two to test if it were real :P.
All in all, as stupid as it sounds, it has already completely changed my life and I'm so happy I was able to do it.
Friday:
Another day of walking in the heat :P. We decided we wanted a good walk and ended up walking about 3 or 4km to the south where the main docks are. Not much to see, but it was nice to get out of the tourist area.
Saturday:
Friday night we stayed in and went to bed early so that we could go diving on saturday. The bus left at 7AM to go to the docks(which we ventured the day before) with a group of about 25 people. It was the first time Sophie had ever been diving so she was pretty nervous but her boyfriend dives quite a bit so she was determined to overcome her fear of the ocean :). I had been once in Australia but was excited to go again. On the way to our first dive site, we were all assigned an instructor and it turned out that one other girl, Sophie and I were the only begginers, so we got a full briefing on what to do. I think the explanation of what could go wrong made us both more nervous than we were before lol. After pileing on what felt like 200lbs of equipment on top of a slightly large wetsuit, we were ready to jump in a sink straight to the bottom. Luckily, we're both still here and ended up having a great dive, despite our claustrophobia in the water :P. The second dive site we had decided just to go snorkeling which I found was just as much fun and we got lots of photos. We bonded with some of the crew and other divers and all lounged about on the 45 min trip home. This was the first time I got a slight burn on my back - otherwise I've been tanning slowlybut surely.
Despite the early start, it was a great day in the sun with lots to explore and lots of time to enjoy being out on the ocean on a beautiful day (as always). I kept thinking of how much Dad would have loved to be on the boat with us out on the sea...:) We got back and passed right out for a couple hours...it's surprising how much swimming takes out of you.
That night was one of the infamous "Full moon" parties at a nightclub on the beach that we usually end up at called the Sailing Club. We headed over around midnight after having a couple, also infamous, drinks called "buckets" at Crazy Kim's (where we teach). They are pretty much exactly what they sound like - buckets of alchohol. The first one we ever tried was out of a watering can, which you can imagine cracked us up... they also come in fish bowls and metal buckets hmm. Anyways, the full moon party was a blast, the club looks out onto the beach and on regular nights, there's tables and chairs out on the beach so you can get away from the club a bit. Saturday night, they had set up a huge stage for the DJ and lights surrounding the place. The dance floor was ultimately the beach with a couple stages set up so people can climb up and dance. We saw some people from our boat from diving that day but mostly we hang out with the locals. Thats the problem with Nha Trang, is that most people who we've met only stay for a couple of days, so I don't know many foreigners here - just Sophie.
I got my hair straightened!
A friend of mine took me to a local place to permanently straighten my hair. I know it sounds vain, but the curly hair was just looking too scruffy and was getting to be a hassle. The 3.5 hour process cost me all of 250 000 Dong, equivalent $15...which at home would have cost me about $500. Amazing. The whole salon process had me laughing out loud with the girls there (none of which spoke an ounce of english) for example three or four different women came up and grabbed my nose, one to demonstrate point out how flat theirs are in comparison, and two to test if it were real :P.
All in all, as stupid as it sounds, it has already completely changed my life and I'm so happy I was able to do it.
Friday:
Another day of walking in the heat :P. We decided we wanted a good walk and ended up walking about 3 or 4km to the south where the main docks are. Not much to see, but it was nice to get out of the tourist area.
Saturday:
Friday night we stayed in and went to bed early so that we could go diving on saturday. The bus left at 7AM to go to the docks(which we ventured the day before) with a group of about 25 people. It was the first time Sophie had ever been diving so she was pretty nervous but her boyfriend dives quite a bit so she was determined to overcome her fear of the ocean :). I had been once in Australia but was excited to go again. On the way to our first dive site, we were all assigned an instructor and it turned out that one other girl, Sophie and I were the only begginers, so we got a full briefing on what to do. I think the explanation of what could go wrong made us both more nervous than we were before lol. After pileing on what felt like 200lbs of equipment on top of a slightly large wetsuit, we were ready to jump in a sink straight to the bottom. Luckily, we're both still here and ended up having a great dive, despite our claustrophobia in the water :P. The second dive site we had decided just to go snorkeling which I found was just as much fun and we got lots of photos. We bonded with some of the crew and other divers and all lounged about on the 45 min trip home. This was the first time I got a slight burn on my back - otherwise I've been tanning slowlybut surely.
Despite the early start, it was a great day in the sun with lots to explore and lots of time to enjoy being out on the ocean on a beautiful day (as always). I kept thinking of how much Dad would have loved to be on the boat with us out on the sea...:) We got back and passed right out for a couple hours...it's surprising how much swimming takes out of you.
That night was one of the infamous "Full moon" parties at a nightclub on the beach that we usually end up at called the Sailing Club. We headed over around midnight after having a couple, also infamous, drinks called "buckets" at Crazy Kim's (where we teach). They are pretty much exactly what they sound like - buckets of alchohol. The first one we ever tried was out of a watering can, which you can imagine cracked us up... they also come in fish bowls and metal buckets hmm. Anyways, the full moon party was a blast, the club looks out onto the beach and on regular nights, there's tables and chairs out on the beach so you can get away from the club a bit. Saturday night, they had set up a huge stage for the DJ and lights surrounding the place. The dance floor was ultimately the beach with a couple stages set up so people can climb up and dance. We saw some people from our boat from diving that day but mostly we hang out with the locals. Thats the problem with Nha Trang, is that most people who we've met only stay for a couple of days, so I don't know many foreigners here - just Sophie.
Sunday:
Was spent nursing our hangovers on the beach while our friends slowly came out and joined us.
Today we are thinking of wandering again and maybe go to the mud baths for some spa treatment :) I don't think my nails have ever grown this long on their own - probably in fear of putting my fingers in my mouth :P
Thanks to all those who have left comments on my blog, it's probably my favorite part of writing. The feedback and just knowing that your all there...It makes me feel the connection.
Lots of love,
xoxox
Was spent nursing our hangovers on the beach while our friends slowly came out and joined us.
Today we are thinking of wandering again and maybe go to the mud baths for some spa treatment :) I don't think my nails have ever grown this long on their own - probably in fear of putting my fingers in my mouth :P
Thanks to all those who have left comments on my blog, it's probably my favorite part of writing. The feedback and just knowing that your all there...It makes me feel the connection.
Lots of love,
xoxox
2 comments:
You should put up some pictures! I would love to see what your seeing over there :D
I'm glad you're having so much fun!!
Its good you got your hair straightened, it would probably feel a lot cooler now, right?
I agree, put pictures up!
I miss you!
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