Vietnam's best dishes

In the last two posts, you heard from my mates, but I am Barbara's water bottle now and it is my right to tell our story, so please ignore those other guys.

Today we went to the birthday party for a 4 your old.  In Vietnam, sparklers and candles are sold along with the cakes.  The sparklers are great fun for the adults, but the 4 year old was quite afraid of them.  Barbara always enjoys the opportunity to eat cake because Vietnam boasts one of the best cake recipes around.  The frosting is so light that it is like eating a cloud.  According to Barbara, Vietnam has 3 really great foods: cake, pork chops and smoothies.  This is what Barbara will miss when she leaves Vietnam.  She thinks that these foods rate up there with crepes in France, waffle cookies in Belgium, racellette of Switzerland, and yellow mole empanadas of Mexico.  I fear I will never experience the aforementioned taste sensations, but one can dream.....

How can water taste like fish sauce?

Barbara did not like me.  She says that the Japanese water tastes like Vietnamese fish sauce and poured all the water out of me.  At least she will not abandon me, she just does not like the taste of my water.  The bottle that she brought back from the wake is very small so she says she will take me on her journeys instead of the small guy.

Update:  Barbara never did use  me.  Arin is using me instead, so I still get to go to school.

Ha, ha, Barbara could not get rid of me.

Well, Water Bottle #9 has arrived and as I suspected, Barbara tried to throw me away but guess what saved me?  It was Arin.  He saw me in the trash and pulled me out.  When Barbara saw me sitting on the counter, she knew exactly what had happened.  She had personified me and Arin has embraced me as a brother.

Update:  Dang it all, Barbara threw me away when Arin was not looking.  Down the garbage chute I went along with a coconut that Barbara had finished drinking.  At least I had a lot of fun riding along with my coconut friend.  I don't know if you have ever heard a coconut bouncing off the walls of a metal garbage chute for 16 stories, but what a racket we made!

Attending a wake in Vietnam acq 14,15,16

Hello, I met Barbara at a wake for Khoa's friends's parents.  You should have seen the pagoda at this property.  It was a 150 year old structure made of polished wood.  Absolutely gorgeous.  We spent several hours eating an 8 course meal, and watching others drink beer and sing karaoki.  If you are comng to Vietnam, learn the words to Hotel California by The Eagles. You will probably be asked to sing it. We also took a grand tour of the orchard of mango, fig, pomelo and durian.  This was an annual celebration of life for the owner's parents which is held each year on the anniversary of the owner's father's death. This was truly a cultural experience.

Hi. Barbara brought me back to her house along with two of my friends and I have been told that we are Water Bottles #14,15,16  I'm #14. I'm ............ and my two buddies have stickers which read Legend Travel. I guess the guy who owned the house has a travel agency ????  I mean, it is written in English, so your guess is as good as mine...

Twice today water bottle #12 almost met its demise

Scare #1
OH, man, I almost bit the dust today.  The local Vietnamese guy who was hosting the pool feast, all of a sudden grabbed me when Barbara wasn't looking.  She saw him holding me, and after he put me down, thinking that the host had drunken from me, Barbara did not even touch me.  I knew it was curtains for me and la ti da would get her chance but luckily he picked me up again and Barbara saw that he was only using me to demonstrate some point he was making.  I think she is still somewhat suspicious but I know that she does not want to use La Ti Da because she is 16 oz and cumbersome to haul around.
Scare #2
Barbara stuck me in the freezer and then forgot where I was.  When it was time to brush her teeth, because one can not drink the water here, she searched for me.  She couldn't find me and was about to grab La Ti Da from the shelf when all of a sudden she recalled my placement.  I think she is still suspicious of The Host and will probably trash me when she comes across another normal sized bottle.

Hasnoor and Josh, Barbara's 30+ friends

You have heard about Hasnoor already, well, Barbara introduced him to a new teacher from her school, Josh, and now they are best friends who love to party together.  Josh, who says he had a hard time getting a date in the USA is living the bachelor life and loving it. They like to party they told Barbara that have to wild of a time together, they say, "It's Barbara's fault.," because she introduced them. Though these guys are 20 years younger than Barbara, she spends a lot of time with them. One of the best parts of being among a small group of English speakers in a foreign country is that you create a bond and differences in country of origin, age, etc, don't matter. Instant friends!

Today, Barbara was starving as usual and we went down to the new Sky Pool cafe for lunch.  As we were turning the corner, Hasnoor was seated at a large table filled with food. A local guy was hosting and Josh was serving one of his cocktail creations.  Barbara has been taste testing these cocktails that Khoa is going to let the guys sell at Tony Cafe, and she keeps telling them, "Add 2 tablespoons of sugar."  You see, the Vietnamese love sugar.  Just like the my previous example of the guacamole, you would be shocked to know to what they add sugar.

Barbara was also working on something to sell at Tony Cafe, cookies. However, the project did not succeed for 2 reasons:
1. Most Vietnamese food consists of boiled noodles so homes do not have ovens and the only one available to Barbara is Pat's light bulb over. Cookies don't cook well with only a lightbulb.  2.Vietnamese do not eat cookies. Yesterday was the bi-monthly children's birthday party at the school, complete with cake, cotton candy and a magician.  At the end of the party, with 60 kids in attendance, plates of oreo cookies remained untouched.  Can you imagine? Here is another interesting cultural note.  There was a limited amount of cotton candy yet the cones were placed on the table for anyone to grab.  Several kids took more than one and most were left with none.  Not a word was said to the greedy kids. Ha, try that anywhere else and you'll have a guilt trip put on you.

Khoa is quite the entrepreneer. He is now thinking of starting his own English school and hiring Arin and Barbara to run it. Awhile ago, Arin starting teaching English to Khoa's two children, Khoa introduced Arin to more children and now Arin has 12 students in our little apartment school

Advice: If you are hesitant to go to a new country where you don't know anyone, consider applying at a school to teach English or find a volunteer opportunity.

nothig written

La , te da #13 la ti da

Tony and his wife Thuy were to visit today to try the Mexican version of avocado preparation, which is guacamole, but, in order to avoid having to host in the apartment, Arin suggested bringing the guac and chips down to their home on the 13th floor of our apartment complex about 10 minutes before they were set to arrive.  Barbara had spent all day making and baking chips which was not easy since the homes in Vietnam do not contain ovens.  The chips really were not good but the guac was.  So, they set off to Tony's apartment, only to return a few minutes later.  Tony had clearly been asleep and Thuy was at the gym.  Apparently they had all but forgotten about the Mexican food. So, the guac was simply dropped off. Later we spotted Tony in the lift.  He wanted to return the guac containers.  When asked how they liked the dish, he informed Barbara that once his wife added sugar to the guacamole, it was fine.  I know it sounds terrible, but although an American would never try it at home, the Vietnamese are accustomed to sugared avocados. The most common use of an avocado is in a SINH TO which means it is mixed with condensed sweet milk blended with ice, and served as a smoothie. We already knew about the sugar because the avocado smoothie is a favorite of our friend Pat. She has been touting avocado smoothies since we met her.  Barbara has not been interested in trying one yet but I am sure she will one day order it mistakenly because she likes to use the local language when ordering. If you are visiting Vietnam and want to try it, the Vietnamese name is SINH TO ZOAI. Other common smoothies are strawberry and mango. They are super high calorie with the sweetened condensed milk, but also super delicious!

Aside from adding sugar to avocados, another Vietnamese tradition is that when you visit someone's home, you bring a gift, most often fruit. Likewise when you leave, you are given a food item to take home.  Today, when Barbara and Arin dropped off the guac, Tony had to quickly find a food item to offer. A case of Japanese water bottles was sitting inside the front door, so of course, Barbara and Arin came home with one of them, #13. These water bottles happened to be French, so water bottle #13 is given the name: Madam La Ti Da.

Barbara's English conversation group at Tony cafe

Barbara took me for a walk along the river today because she wanted to see the damage done to one of the bridges along the river.  It has been reported that a barge full of sand had collapsed the bridge by running into one of its pylons.  Once we got to the river, sure enough, the entire middle portion of the bridge was missing.  This is a 100 year old bridge built by Eiffel who is the same fellow who built the Eiffel Tower in Paris. There have been some horrible bridge collapses around the world with dozens of people killed, but this collapse only resulted in a few motorbikes diving into the river and the passengers swimming away unharmed. When asked how long it would take the government to repair the bridge, Barbara was told, "A long time".  This also means that all train service to Ho Chi Minh is shut down.  The southern route now ends here, in Bien Hoa, at the station which I can see from our apartment.

It seems that every time we go to the river, we meet someone, and this time we met a primary teacher.  Barbara has invited him to her bi-weekly free English lessons at Tony cafe. She is hoping to get more private students.

La Ti Da here.  I don't know why I am being called this name, but I will hereby be known as Water Bottle #13.

grocery shoppig late night with Tony

Since Barbara is no longer at the school, she is able to take on private lessons.  She has started a club called Coffee and Conversation whereas she invites anyone to join her for casual conversation 3 mornings a week at Tony Cafe.  One of the regulars is Tony.  He met Barbara when she substituted in his adult English class at the school, and now he is one of our best friends. Tony wants to take Arin along next time he and his wife grocery shop, since he knows we usually have to go by taxi. Here's how it goes when someone in Vietnam offers you an  invitation....This morning at breakfast, Arin was invited to shop with Tony and his wife.  Most of the day passed without hearing from him. 8 pm Arin receives a text and it is time to go.  By this time of night, Arin has settled in and not interested in going, but he really likes Tony ( a 58 year old man) and out of respect, agreed to go.  So, Arin heads out to the elevator and within moments he has returned.  UGHHHHH, guess what, Barbara has to go too.  Oh, well, time to get out of the pajamas and get dressed she says.  Anyway, with this trip as with all others, it is topped off with a street side coffee.  Getting coffee can also mean, and in this case does mean, getting a (Sinh to (smoothie) or ep (fruit juice).  At the coffee stand, Tony's wife, Thuy purchased some avocados and Barbara told her about guacamole, a Mexican chip dip containing avocados, lime, and sometimes garlic, tomatoes or peppers. As soon as Thuy heard this, she promptly gave them to Barbara and announced that she and Tony would be coming to our home tomorrow night to taste some. Now you must remember, Tony is an English student and Thuy doesn't speak English, so there is always somewhat of a language barrier in every conversation. Barbara must had unknowingly offered an invitation.?.?.?

Put the new job for Barbara and Arin

Another 50+ friend, a Brit named Eric whom Barbara met at the pool works at another one of the English schools in town. Today, Barbara got a surprise call from the director offering her a job. Apparently Eric gave her Barbara's number. Now she is teaching an adult class and also has 5 minute English conversation sessions with children.  It really is about the easiest teaching job in the world because the curriculum is good and requires almost no prep.

After the first day of work, the director asked if Barbara had any friends who needed a job, so now Barbara's son works there also. What!, you say, Barbara's son???  Yes, Barbara's oldest son, 24 year old Arin, came to Vietnam. He's always wanted to travel and when Barbara offered him the chance, to come and make some money for college, he jumped at it.

The twin is no more, the job is no more

The twin here. Well, it happened, Barbara finally had it with this goofy school where she works.  The school unnecessarily works all their staff to death and then when a new boss was hired and decided to change everyone's teaching style, Barbara was done.  Today she collected all her papers and put in her notice.  Also, she knew that I would probably remain forever by the chom choms so she tossed me in the trash to end my lonely misery.

Communications bloopers with The Family

Incident #1
After this, we know to ask, "How far away is it?"
Barbara and Arin are friends with a group which includes a male music teacher, a male math teacher, a husband and wife with a preschooler and three grown children, all of whom I refer to as The Family. Barbara first met the music teacher in the park by the river and we were invited to his home. The mom, Dung, was also invited and she and Barbara danced the cha cha while the music teacher, Thanh Su, played the guitar and keyboards.  After lunch we were invited to see a pagoda.  Of course we jumped at the chance.  WE picked up more people and we drove and drove until finally we arrived at the beach town of Vung Tau where we remained until 10 pm at the Pagoda, which was a private beach club, not a religious structure.  The water was seriously like a bathtub, much warmer than Hawaii.  We ate, waded and listened to the music teacher play guitar.  It was quite lovely, though unexpected.  Vung Tau is 40 miles away, but took two hours due to high traffic volume (normal traffic).  After this incident, we know to ask, "How far is it?"

Incident #2
After this incident, we know to ask, "How long will it take?"
The Family invited me to shop in Saigon at the Metro supermarket.  I had been with them before, knew it was 20 minutes away, and said yes.  Two hours later I barely made my 5 o'clock class.  Again we were driving and driving and come to find out, we had to drop off some supplies at someone's house in the next province.

Incident #3
After this incident we know to ask, "What exactly is required of me?"
The math teacher asked if we would help distribute charity items to high school students.  Barbara arrived at the High School in her shorts and pink tennis shoes only to discover that she was the guess of honor so not only did she and Arin have to sit on the podium, but it was actually an award ceremony where everyone was dressed up.  Next, Barbara had to give a speech on the microphone and to top it off, the whole ceremony was videotaped.  Later, the math teacher showed Barbara a DVD box with her on the cover, and the DVD movie began at her apartment building where the math teacher had gathered her on his motorcycle.  We never did get a copy of it and have no idea to whom it is distributed.

One lone twin

My twin and I are still sittinThe teacher complaints have really heated up since the new manager was hired. PUT STUFF FROM OTHER BLOG

 when a new manager arriveMy twin has a new owner. Here is what happened:  One of the British teachers was rushing around preparing for her class, tossing items in one of these rectangular plastic baskets which teachers load with classroom supplies.  The school is game based, so the baskets can contain anything from fly swatters to bowling pins, and are usually quite full.  I took many a ride with Barbara, because a teacher can not last an entire 2 hour class without water.  Well, the British teacher thought the same thing and since she was in a hurry, she grabbed my twin for her refreshment and my twin was never to return. Good-bye good friend.....

Meeting the family only 12 remains Intro Arin

That's right, Barbara's son Arin has