Day 11

Now on this day it really hit us all that we will only have about two more days here in Viet Nam. So we ate breakfast like usual then left for UEF all decked out in matching shirts for our soccer match in the afternoon. We arrived to the school and walked up the seven flights of stairs for the second to last time to see a table with some students. They told us to write our names on a name tag and choose a paper with a number on it out of the fishbowl. I chose number one. It decided which group we would be in for the morning.

We got into the room where all the table were already taken out of the room and chairs lined the walls. We said our hellos and took our seat for Tony, one of the UEF students, to sing a song for everyone. He was very good! We then chose group names and started with our activities. The first activity we did was each group was asked a question. Our question was how do students handle school and working. The Pitt students all said time management. The UEF students say they do not normally work and study at the same time. Then we got into our second activity of a blindfolded yogurt race. Hard to explain. There's a video on facebook of us doing the race. We then took lots of pictures and headed off to the field to play soccer. The field was a turf field but it was a lot smaller than we imagined. It was very hot so we drank a lot of water. I would say some of the Pitt students played very well and we were able to hold our own against the UEF and ICP soccer players.

Once the match was over we had lunch at the Victory Hotel before going to the War Remnants museum. The museum was very graphic and hard to stomach. By the end of the museum, I needed to leave because the images were way to hard to look at and some things they said about the Americans or the war in general was way too intense for me.

The rest of the day was filled with shopping and going out as a large group for the last time. We are all getting sad yet a tiny bit excited to be going home. I'm pretty sure we all miss our beds.

Day 10

Today was a pretty typical day for us, but what made the day a little special was that it was our last business presentation. We all have not started to realize that we have to leave soon and probably are still hoping to stay longer.

The day started off with breakfast at the hotel again. My typical breakfast of eggs, bread, watermelon, pineapple, and water. The Vietnamese breakfast food has started to scare me because like half the people on the trip are having stomach issues. But anyways, after breakfast we headed to UEF for another history and culture class. In this lecture he spoke about the Westernization of Viet Nam and how it had an effect on the culture. One example that he spoke of was the new religions that were adopted. The people started to migrate towards Catholicism and Puritanism. Although they switched religion preferences, they still kept some of their culture in their Catholic religion. The Western Catholics worship Jesus, whereas the Vietnamese worship the mother Mary because they prefer to worship females instead of males. The teacher than went into the yin and yang philosophy that the Vietnamese tend to base a lot of things on. One part of the yin and yang philosophy deals with even and odd numbers. In Viet Nam, odd numbers are considered lucky whereas even numbers are for the dead. Something interesting that he said was that when people build houses, they will only build one or three gates, never two. Two gates is reserved for graveyards. He went more in depth into the philosophy but by that time all I was concentrating on was keeping my eyes open. By the end of the lecture I was asking myself why did I stay out till 1 AM the night before. I was able to catch the end of the lecture about the Ngu hanh philosophy made up of five elements: fire, earth, water, tree, and metal. Fire is yang, water yin, tree yang, metal yin and earth in the middle is both yin and yang.

After the lecture we got a break where some of us got ice cream from the cantine. It was delicious. I got this cone that was pre-wrapped with vanilla ice cream and a delicious chocolate topping. Yes I enjoyed the chocolate topping a lot. After finishing the ice cream and over break we started language class. We learned words like engineer, business, happy, beautiful, naughty, and tired. All things that that we can add to responses we have already learned. Like when someone asks us how we are doing we can now say we are tired or happy or even naughty. We then learned of a quiz that we will have to take on Friday. I’m going to need to study because I cannot recognize words yet only speak them.

After language class we went to lunch at the cantine. We had tomatoes, fries, this beef stew thing, and rice. We are all thinking they know what we like because they put out so many fries for us. Lunch was short so we could head back to the hotel to change before heading just a few blocks to the UEF administrative office for a presentation done by Mark Oakley of Duane Morris, a law firm here in Viet Nam. He spoke about the ups and downs of foreign investment in Viet Nam. Something he highly recommended for all people wanting to invest in Viet Nam is to go in alone or with someone you highly trust. He said he has seen way too many businesses get screwed over by local partners. He knows that there is a lot of potential in Viet Nam but coming from the law firm side of things, the government puts so many regulations on foreign investment that people considering doing it, needs to get things right the first time if they want a good shot of making it. The presentation was very interesting and I found it nice to hear about Viet Nam from that viewpoint.

After the presentation we headed back to the hotel at 3 where I fell straight sleep until 5:20. After waking up we all, except Andrew, headed to the same place we went last night, The Black Cat. They guys still loved the burgers this time. I got a chicken panini that was not too good. The burger last night was definitely a lot better. We all came back to the hotel and then went out to have a few drinks at the world famous Rex Hotel rooftop to enjoy the view of the city. We decided to walk back from the Rex. On the way back we saw a bat just walking on the ground so we took a picture of it. Then we just enjoyed our walk back through the city. Our time here is getting shorter and there is still so much we all still want to do in the city.

Day 9

We woke up and had breakfast at the hotel like every other day. After breakfast we rode the van over to Viet Capital Securities Company. This is a stock company in Viet Nam. This was by far our shortest site visit. We walked into the company and saw a big board with stock numbers flashing in green or red. We took our seats and waited for someone to come and give us a tour or something. Well today must have been a very busy day because our “tour” consisted of us getting taken behind a counter in two groups and given a 3-minute briefing on what the company is and explaining what the big board is saying. Basically what she told us was that it was a rather new company in Viet Nam because stock is rather new here. Someone asked about why some numbers are highlighted and it was because those are being changed at the time. So after each group was briefed, we were finished our site visit about an hour ahead of schedule. So collectively as a group we decided to go shopping at the Tax Center in downtown HCMC. This center had three floors. The bottom floor was all jewelry, the next floor was brand clothing, then merchant clothing, and the last floor was merchant souvenirs like wooden bowls, paintings, chopsticks, and other things of that natural.

We headed to the hotel for lunch before going to ASCENX Technologies for our second site visit. Now this site visit was much more in-depth and by the end of it, no one wanted to leave. The site visit started like any other normal visit. We went into the boardroom of the company and waited for the two heads of the company to be ready. Dr. Berman then briefed us on the man who would be given the presentation and how he had an amazing story about leaving Viet Nam and how he ended up in California. Tung T. Bach gave us a presentation on the company. The company deals with repairing technology when companies do not or cannot go through the manufacture for the repairs or upgrades to their technology. They are basically the side mechanics when Ford does not have the part or they will not upgrade the technology. After the presentation someone asked for him to go into detail about his story. When he was five, his uncle, a very smart naval captain for the South Vietnam navy, ask his family to leave the country with him because it was right before the South fell to the North. His grandfather said no because he wanted to stay with their grandmother who had recently passed away. The uncle was later captured and put in jail. During that time, Bach’s mother visited her brother many times in the jail. After about a year he escaped with two other men and proceeded to be in hiding for four more years before he was able to escape. When he did escape form Vietnam after years of perfect planning, he was able to take two people with him. He chose Bach’s aunt because she was a female with many opportunities to gain away from Vietnam and Bach because his mother was kind enough to visit the uncle in jail. They escaped successfully by boat and lived in a refugee camp until their application to live in America was granted.

After the presentation, we were asked to go to coffee with us because it was the Vietnamese way. We went to the ground floor of their building and all got drinks while they talked to us more about their business and story. They also recommended places for us to eat and to go at night. We finished up the coffee and said our goodbyes. Everyone agreed that ASCENX was his or her favorite company so far.

Because of the ASCENX recommendation, we went to this place named The Black Cat for dinner. They had the best burgers any of us have had in a while. It might have been because we haven’t had American food in over a week.

Day 8

Monday officially started our second week here in Viet Nam. We all are getting used to the area around our hotel and the foods we have are having each day. Everyone is just excited to see what the second week will bring. What exactly I am thinking on this Monday is that the countdown to the end is beginning and that I really need to do everything that HCMC offers.

As for what Monday brought us, we started off at the school for a history lesson and than language class. The history class was about the ancient history or Viet Nam before Westernization. It was a little boring at first, but once it hit the time period right before Westernization it got very interesting because it really showed a lot of their beliefs and why the city and people are how they are. And then language class was just like normal but this day we learned the numbers. All the guys were excited for this lecture because they have all already learned one, two and three because they would always say one two three cheers! Mot, hai, ba, yo! Other than that class was pretty normal. Then we had lunch at the canteen, which was pretty ordinary with fries, these really good tomatoes over lettuce, bread and some other more Vietnamese food. By this day, we had seen most of the things that they can make so there really were no more surprises.

After lunch and a quick stop at the hotel to change, we headed over to the University of Agriculture and Forestry. Here we heard from some of the professors on catfish farming. The first PowerPoint was on the University in general. We learned about many things pertaining to the University like who are their international partners and the multiple degrees students can earn from this University. We then had someone from the faculty of fisheries talk to us about the main aquatic farming happening in Viet Nam. They spoke about the wealth in aquatic farming as well as the difficulties that have come because of either human actions or farmers wanting to switch the kind of farming they perform. The last presentation was on catfish farming. One thing that stood out during the presentation is the types of catfish farming. The cage farming was cool to see in pictures because we saw that on many waterways heading towards the Delta. The pond like farming we would be able to see a little later in the day.

We then took a short bus ride to another part of campus to see where they test and treat the catfish. They had created like a little sample catfish farm. They had the area where they hatched and grew the baby catfish, and where they changed the gender of the catfish from male to female. It was a very interesting display but because we were short on time, we had to leave for the hotel after only 15 minutes.

Monday night we all stayed in because we were tired from the weekend. I ended up going to bed early that night.

Day 7

This was our day off of site visits and classes so we went to Vung Tau. How did we get from Saigon to Vung Tau you ask, we took a catamaran on the Saigon River. The trip was a little over an hour so not too bad of a journey. When we got there we stopped for iced tea and water at a little restaurant across from the dock.

After a quick stop we took the bus to a mountain where on the top of the mountain was a huge statue of Jesus. So instead of just admiring the statue from afar we walked up the many stairs to the top in the heat of the day. I’m pretty sure the back and shoulders got burnt there because by the time we reached the top, we all looked like we had just gotten out of the water. But being up there was totally worth the hike. Benches lined the paths that had cities engraved in the bench. I found many benches from W. Chester, Pennsylvania. So it felt like a little piece of my hometown in Viet Nam. We then climbed back down the mountain so we could head to lunch at the same little restaurant we were just at.

When we arrived at the place for lunch, we opted to eat outside because the breeze felt much better than being indoors. We had lots of plates filled with Vietnamese cuisine. I wasn’t quite sure what I was eating but I ate it anyways. Lunch was a nice break from the intense heat of the day.

After lunch we finally went to the beach. Let me just say it was not what I was expecting. The water was littered with pollution so swimming was in moderation. At one point a net wrapped around my leg. So instead of spending all my time in the water I laid out on the sand and under the huge tent we rented. After two hours or so, the sun started to get to all of us. We drank a lot of water to get from getting dehydrated and put on a lot of sunscreen. We were able to shower before heading back to the catamaran. The ride back took a lot longer than the ride there. A coconut leaf I guess you would call it got stuck in the motor so we had to pull over at a dock and wait for divers to pull it out. By this time we all just wanted to get back to Ho Chi Minh and eat dinner.

We finally arrived back to the City and headed to the hotel for a little before heading to dinner. We walked to this place named the Barbecue Garden because it was only 5 blocks away and we are so glad we went there. We were able to eat as a large group. This place is were you got raw meat and barbecued it with the grill that is in the center of the table. It was a very nice restaurant and very delicious. I didn’t order anything I had to grill because I wasn’t that hungry so instead I got clams. They were delicious and on top of my plate of clams I got this rice cake that was to die for. Dinner was fantastic but one thing that was weird was that we had to pay for the napkins they placed in front of us without us even asking. That is a lot different than anything I have seen in the States. After dinner I walked straight back to the hotel then off to bed for the night.

Day 6

Our day at the Mekong Delta has finally passed. At almost every site visit we are asked if we have gone into the countryside and more specifically the Mekong. We travelled on a highway lined with small houses and fields for growing or raising plants, animals or even fish. I slept a lot of the time because we had to get up early so I have some pictures and only a few memories of the drive to Ben Tre.

We arrived at the warehouse of Vinacacao where they meet with sellers and partners. Out front where they actually had their desk was just a little hut with a straw roof and open wood sides. This allowed for the breeze to easily enter the “building”. We then got a tour of the warehouse where they had a few things showing how they complete the process. They showed us the actually cacao shell with the cacao inside. They told we could eat it so we all tried a piece. It was horrible. I will never eat raw cacao ever again. We then went out back to see where the cacao is fermented. It was just a bunch of wooden crate like structures where the cacao would go. After we got to see and try the fermented cacao. This time I was unable to swallow the fermented cacao because it tasted darker than baker’s chocolate. After we took some more pictures, we saw where the cacao is dried in the sun out in front of the warehouse.

We then left Vinacacao to eat lunch. The place where we ate lunch was beautiful! When we first entered the hidden paradise we saw tons of tables that were floating above a lake. There were hammocks hanging from the many palm trees. The outdoor paradise also over looked the Mekong River.

After lunch we headed to the Success Alliance head corridors in the Mekong. There we saw more of the process of producing cocoa and was able to taste test the chocolate liquor. I opted out of the taste test because dark chocolate and I do not work well together. After the presentation and taste test were finished, we went on an adventure to an actual cacao farm! It was super cool to see the cacao trees all over the place. The walk through what seemed like the wilderness was a lot of fun except for the fact that a fire ant bit me. It hurt a lot more than I would have thought. We walked up to a very pretty house with chickens just roaming around in the front lawn area and that is where we took a break. We drank a lot of water, and then we were served the freshest fruit I have ever had! It was absolutely delicious! My favorite new fruit was lychee. I hope they have it in the states somewhere. So after eating the best fruit ever we went back on the bus to go home. We were all exhausted and needed a shower or two because of how much we sweated and smelled. We arrived at the hotel and grabbed a quick dinner at KFC (Vietnamese KFC is a lot different than in the states). After eating the terrible meal I went back to the hotel and fell asleep for the night because tomorrow we are off to the beach for the day!

Day 5

Friday was an interesting day full of site visits. What made the day extra interesting was the site visit in the middle of the day to Intel Products. We started the day in the lobby of the hotel to meet some students from UEF who joined us on the trip out to the technology park. We started out with a tour of their factory. The factory was very empty. We weren't told at that time why it was empty expect that it was a new facility. We later found out through the presentation that the factory was empty because they were only going to add to it when the demand for the product demands it. After the tour of the factory, we headed to the office space. It was the coolest office I had been in yet. One thing that reminded me of Dupont was that all employees had to hold on to the hand rails when going up and down the stairs. After heading up the stairs we see a very large colorful room filled with cubicles. They were very spacious and lower to the ground as to rid the large room of closed in spaces. Walking down the hall we head to a room that is called RELAX. Yes this is s room build for the sole purpose of relaxing anytime during the work day. On or off of breaks. As we sit in the brightly colored couches and beanbag chairs our tour guide tell us we need to leave because she has to show us the "play room". We all run to the next room to see a large TV, pool table, darts and many more games. It was such a cool and different environment than any other office I had been in. We end the tour and are given a presentation on the company. We are told that this plant of Intel is one that is responsible for assembling the processors. Rick Howarth, the general manager, also goes into detail about the future of Intel. They want to put their product in smart phones and mini laptops. They are working on creating silicon that can be small enough and fast enough but run with little energy so the phone they do create will be able to have a long battery life. All these ideas are so that they can be viewed as a growing company and not a mature company in the eyes of stock holders. The presentation and office space were very cool and I will definitely be excited to see what they have in store for the future of their company and the future of their impact in Viet Nam.

After Intel, we came back to the hotel to eat lunch. Lunch was okay but I really enjoyed the ice cream. It was pink and seemed more like an icy than a cream. But it was a pretty neat texture. After lunch we walked like 9 blocks to hear a presentation from the ACDI/VOCA and Success Alliance on Cocoa bean producing. They talked about everything we would be seeing the next day in the Mekong Delta. They showed us how the cocoa plant in grown then harvested and fermented. There are all these steps that are taken before anything even remotely tastes like edible chocolate. Success Alliance went more into detail about how they teach farmers in the Delta to grow cocoa as a living. By teaching people this skill, they are able to make a living in the Delta. The presentation got us excited for what Saturday would bring.

We ended up taking a taxi back to the Hotel because we needed to get ready to meet our guide Miss Tu and our new friend Phung for a shopping/dinner/music night. We headed to a shopping plaza where clothes was the number one selling object. It was like a mall but with booths instead of stores and you could barter the price down. It was a neat experience and I was able to come away from the plaza with a shirt, necklace, and headband. We then headed to dinner which was typical Vietnamese cuisine. My roommate Rayna and I shared prawns and an egg. It was very delicious. Then after dinner, Miss Tu took us to a Rock Show at a local coffee shop. It was fantastic! They played live old rock songs like Hey Jude and we sipped on drinks for about an hour and a half. When the concert ended, we returned to the hotel, some on motorbikes, and met up with all the boys to go out for the night. We headed to a place that looked and was named the Factory. That was the end to our friday. Tomorrow we go to the Delta!

Day 4

Day four started off with breakfast at the hotel as usual then straight off to UEF for some classes. The first class was about rural planning and development in the Mekong Delta. The lecture was interesting because it was given by Le Quang Minh who has lived in the Delta almost his whole life. We learned many things what is grown in the Delta and the current problems they are having live the mixing of salt water farms for shrimp and pure water farms for rice. Before it got to the end of the presentation, I was called out of the room. It turns out that a Ho Chi Minh City television station was doing a piece on the program and wanted to interview a female from the group. They asked questions like how I like the culture and how I liked the classes, if I was excited about the site visits and activities planned. I probably said exciting and interesting a lot more times than I needed to but it's whatever. So hopefully, on day, I will be on Vietnamese television!

After the Mekong Delta presentation, we had Vietnamese Culture class. Now this class was very interesting because we learned common things to say and do while in Vietnam so we would not be viewed badly. One major thing is to not let anyone lose face because it is viewed in a very negative light. Another thing that we learned was in order to not lose face, never admit you are wrong. Something that our entire group has been trying to do more of is complement the service or gift instead of just saying thank you. Thank you does not allow for growth in a friendship. Culture class was definitely a positive experience that has made us more aware of the Vietnamese culture.

We soon left UEF and travelled to the US Commercial Service Office in the center of district 1. There we met with Jennifer Ludders the economics officer for Ho Chi Minh City and Dave Averne the commercial officer. They are in Viet Nam to help US businesses decide in Viet Nam is the right place to grow their business. Using current statistics and knowledge they have gained about Viet Nam, they are able to connect US businesses with Vietnamese companies to given them a little more insight.

Since we were in the middle of the city, we decided to walk to the markets after the site visit. Little did we know that some monsoon rains would hit us then. We tried to wait it out but after 15 minutes, we decided to walk through the rain, 5 blocks, to the market. It was an experience and totally worth getting soaked. At the market I bought a lot of things which will become known to everyone once I get back.

To make the night short, we had dinner at this VERY nice Vietnamese restaurant but the cost of the meal was less than 7 per person. We all decided that we will be looking for these nice restaurants and eating at a new one almost everyday.

Day 3

The third day consisted of two site visits. The one to the Vietnam Singapore Industrial Park was definitely very interesting because we were able to go see II-VI. Two-six is a company that specializing in optics for lasers and a chip that will cool down electronic devices. We were able to go into there factory and have a tour in the actually places where the materials are created. It was really cool to learn about the optic side of the operation because we learned how the glass works in Physics 2 just last semester. Even though I didn't learn anything from Physics, it was nice to see how Physics can be applied outside of the classroom. As for the cooling chip, it is currently the chip used in the Xbox's Project Natal to cool down all the electronics used in the system. Visiting two-six really gave me the opportunity to see how foreign businesses are run. One thing that caught a lot of our eyes, no pun intended, is that none of the workers who are working with glass material were wearing safety glasses. That would not fly in the U.S. at all. After the first site visit we went to a buffet style lunch at Monaco buffet. I would call the lunch interesting. I didn't fall in love with anything there so I ate very little but tasted a whole lot of things. I had my first rice pancake and solidified my love for the watermelon here in Viet Nam. The watermelon is not seedless but the work done to get the seeds out is more than worth it.

After Monaco we went to Glass Egg Digital Media. All I can say about that company is that they really disappointed us as a group. After talking to Dr. Berman about how the tour and info session went last year, we were really mistreated. Apparently the two people who wanted and invited us there had a surprise meeting and were unable to join us. We asked really good and in-depth questions and only got a couple word response. The scary thing was, I had to be the one to give the gift of our appreciation to the presenters. I was shaking and definitely mispronounced towel. Oh good old me and my lack of vocabulary and word pronouncing skills. I got the job done and in the end I made them laugh at my ridiculous pronunciation.

The site visit not going so well disappointed us but after we headed back to the hotel and probably all fell asleep. Not for an hour but for 4 hours. It was crazy how tired and jet-lagged we still were. But the nap seemed to do the trick. We all have been sleeping mostly through the night! After waking up around 8 p.m... we needed to eat. We didn't know if any places would be open and we need a burger so we went to the Hard Rock. It was totally worth the high price tag. The fries were delicious and even if our stomachs could only handle less than half the burger, it still tasted so good. But probably what made the night was that it was just the girls from the trip so we were able to get to know each other a little better. Hard Rock ended our night and we then proceeded to fall right asleep all over again.

Day 2

Today we got more intense into our learning and studying of Viet Nam. It started off with breakfast again where they served Singapore Noodles. Didn't get a chance to try it but the next day it is out I will have it. After breakfast we headed to the University in our little van. Van rides are getting hotter and longer because they are not as exciting as the first few times we went in one. The motorbikers are still very very intense. We were able to drive through rush hour which probably was slower than if we walked. It took around 8 minutes just to go one block. So anyways, at the university we had a presentation on the business and industrial facts about Viet Nam as a country. Surprising they have a very low (5.3) unemployment rate. The informative lecture was boring at times but it was good to know about some facts that pertain to the country. The lecture was over in about an hour and we then continued our language classes. Today we learned more words like what to say when you are talking to your friend or your teacher. All the 6 or 7 phrases we have learned are already running together in my head. But i'm pretty sure that i've got thank you and hello down solid. After language class ended we went to lunch at the cantine again and had more Vietnamese food. It has yet to get boring and I have fallen in love with it.

So I have come to realize that a very important part of being in Viet Nam is drinking water. I probably have 5 to 6 water bottles a day and most days that still isn't enough! I drank a lot of water at the school but when I got on the bus to travel to South Saigon to meet with the leaders of Phu My Hung, I got so car sick. So my lesson of the day, water water water water. Now Phu My Hung put on a great presentation. Being an engineer, I was really into how they were engineering this "new city center". What Phu My Hung is doing is building in what used to be swamp lands a new city center for Ho Chi Minh City. The point is to bring people out of the congested "old city" and into the well maintained and less crowded new one. My thoughts on the project: it will only bring more foreigners into Ho Chi Minh because of the high cost of living that the project already brings to the table. There plans are to reduce pollution in the air and congestion in the streets. I hope there goal is reached because if not, the project could end up costing more for the city in terms of pollution and disorder.

So after Phu My Hung we travelled back to the good old Victory Hotel to eat then hopefully go out for the night. We ended up ordering pizza (very different from american pizza) then taking a taxi to a club called apocalypse now. It was interesting to say the least.

So that was my day two... 12 more to go and I cannot wait to see what's to come!

Day 1

So today was our first full day in Viet Nam. Last night my friend Kyle and I arrived in a VERY hot and humid Viet Nam at 10:30 to find the whole plus 3 group waiting for us. Even though it had been dark for a couple of hours it was still very hot. We arrived at the Victory Hotel like 30 minutes afterwords to head straight up to our rooms and attempt to fall asleep. Sleep didn't really happen until around 3 am but the little bit of sleep I did get came in handy for the first day. We woke up and headed to breakfast where they served an assortment of meats, noodles, eggs, bread, and my favorite item, pineapple. For an untraditional breakfast, Viet Nam sure does breakfast well. We then headed out of the hotel to the University of Economics and Finance to meet our Vietnamese counterparts for the trip. They seated us all in between two Vietnamese students so we could get to know more people. I ended up sitting next to a guy named Tony who was very nice and funny. He would laugh when I attempted to speak Vietnamese words as simple as hello. We then all stood up and sang a Michael Jackson song about peace in the world, or something like that. It was odd but i'm pretty sure that we were all thinking the same thing.

After the welcomes and meet and greet were finished, we headed to language class. Let me start off saying that Vietnamese is very difficult. We learned how to pronounce all the vowels and consonances and all the variations that came with the letters. We soon moved on to phrases like "my name is Julie", "it is nice to meet you", "I am American", and the informal version of those phrases. All the tones get me mixed up. Like when to use a deep voice and when to use an increasing high voice is very tricky because it is nothing like English. Although i've come to realize that the vowels are very similar to French, and some words are identical. Although French has slipped my mind since 11th grade, I can still point out similarities.

After language class we ate lunch at the cantine. We had real spring rolls (which were delicious) and plantains that tasted perfect. There was other food as well but it has slipped my mind at this time.

We quickly took a stop at the hotel, then were back into the van to head on a city tour. We saw the War Memorial building which was right around the corner from our hotel, the cathedral, and were able to spend some time in a very popular market. Walking around in the market was amazing. So many things to buy from necklaces to fish to dvds. I didn't buy anything today because I wanted to get used to what went on in a market. We all definitely want to go back soon.

After the tour we headed to the US Consulate to take a tour and meet the head counselor general named Chuck, and a visa checker employee named Dave. We all headed to an upstairs boardroom where we were told about some of the history. The old US Embassy was positioned in that exact location until the Viet Cong took over the Embassy. We then were allowed to ask any questions we had for Chuck and Dave. I asked about how they decide who they give visas to and if they get a lot of fake marriages just so a Vietnamese citizen could travel and live in American. One thing that really surprised me was that the average time to get a visa for a Vietnamese citizen who has been petitioned for a visa from a sibling living in the US in 11 to 14 years. That makes all the fake marriages and sneaky behavior make sense. 11 to 14 years is a very long time. After the Q and A session we headed on our tour of the grounds. We walked on a field of grass where the Embassy once stood and view the memorial for the 5 men who died at from the Viet Cong attack. Of course we took a picture of the group at the memorial. We were then told to look over the wall guarding the Consulate to see a redish brown stone wall. That is the Vietnamese memorial recognizing the fallen Viet Cong. It was a little humorous of the placing of two such different memorials in such close proximity. We then walked back to our little van to go back to the hotel to rest for a little then head out for dinner.

Now dinner was amazing. Walking into the restaurant we had to cross over a bridge with water underneath it. That led us to a rainforest looking restaurant with many wooden staircases surrounded by a pond and many palm trees and plants. We headed up the flight of stairs and were seating at a very long wooden table. Also immediately after sitting down, they came around to get our drink orders. I ordered dragon fruit juice and was told that if I drank it that it would make my skin very soft. Right after that food started coming. Dish after dish we never knew when it would stop. We had a plate of spring rolls, a plate of steaming beef, squid, a spice soup like dish with clams, shrimp, and what we thought was tofu, plate of shrimp, pho, this soup where like shrimp were dropping into the boiling soup right before our eyes, and a plate of fruit. Of course everything was delicious. One thing I had that I don't believe i've had before was Jack fruit. It was actually very very good and reminded me of gushers for some strange reason. Dinner was amazing and I got full very fast.

After dinner some of the group decided to check out the swimming pool. It was warmish but very refreshing after the very hot and humid day. That was day 1 for me. Very exciting and I cannot wait to see what's to come for us in this great country.