Vung Tau

Hey everyone! Maeve here.

Heres the recap of the last few days.

Last thursday we went to the Ben Thanh market and bought some presents for everyone and clothes for us for the orphanage. It was SO crowded and smelly like a fishy smell combined with something sweet. Then I accidently gave 100 000 dong to some girl and her brother. The next day we went for what we call our second breakfast. We walked to the Ben Thanh because my mom wanted to buy something and Nina wanted shoes. Across the street from the Ben Thanh there is an alley full of shoes. Lots of knock-offs but so what! there just shoes and the look like the brand name. Any way, we moved hotels on saturday night from the Indoshine to the Nam Phoung Hotel. On saturday we went to a beautiful pagoda that we went to 8 years ago. It had lots of enormous fish and hundreds of turtles! I took a zillion pictures. There are lots of cute dogs around but we are not allowed to pet them because of RABIES!!!!!! On sunday we took the hydrofoil from Ho Chi Minh City to Vung Tau. We are now settled in the really nice

Interco Resort. This morning we went into town and saw the beautiful sea side. I will write soon.

Maeve

Nancy's Post

Today is Saturday and and I think our rhythms are beginning to make the switch to Vietnam time! This am the girls woke up at the late hour of 4 am but this time Nina did not turn on Asian cartoons at full blast. She thoughtfully waited until 5 and tortured her sister instead for the hour in between!We arrive for breakfast at the little downstairs restauruant promptly at 630 and have our usual baguette and soup yummy breakfast!

We are trying to head out to Vung tau but the weekends are booked and we will spend one more night in HCMC then take the hydrofoil with our multitudinous luggage and check in to the Vung Tau IntourCo . Hotel for 4 or 5 nights .

Last night we met with the family of Nina's Vietnamese teacher Teresa, Teresa is one of 10 siblings born in Saigon. She and 3 of the siblings live in North America now and the rest remain in Vietnam including her 87 yr old mother.

We brought a few things with us to deliver to Teresa's sister Phat and brother in law Kuong . They met us in our hotel lobby and brought us a huge basket of local beautiful fruit all labelled with the proper names to help us in our language aquisition! Tran the youngest daughter

peeled one of each kind and showed us how to eat it properly!

Tran is in grade 12 and takes the university entrance exams this year. That means she attends school from 730 am until 1130am, 130 til 430pm and then extra night classes from 7 until 9!! She studies English and speaks really well, but said she doesn't get to practice too much. Music is not "popular " to study and no other languages are studied except in a club or if a group of people wish to study independently. All education has to be paid for and night classes are extra. Some scholarships are available at the university level for very good students. If ones family cannot pay for education their is the option of a discount or free classes run by a religious organization.

Brian is switching our bags to a new room for the night so I better go and help!!

Bye for now!

Nina's Post-January 9th 2010

Hi friends and family

It is Saturday and I got up at 1:00am or two. Yesterday I wen't to the Rex hotel. It was so fun we all wen't swimming but Mom.

I hope

you are having fun in Canada.

Also we when to the Ben Ten Market it had clothing and food and shoes.I am doing lots of hopping and jumping and wriggling says Mom especially when everyone else is tired!!

And homework.

bye.

P.S. I am bring presents!!!!

Were here!

Hey everyone! Maeve here!

Here's a recap of the last few days: Emma and Auntie Debbie picked us up on monday night and drove us to the airport (thanks) we got in a pretty long line and waited and then some guy FINALLY checked our luggage in, most of it was too big so we had to go and put it in oversized/fragile. Even though some of our luggage was overweight the guy let it slide.

When we got on the airplane at 12:00ish and I fell asleep and when I woke up I didn't know if it was day or night! I watched zillions of movies and TV shows 'cause it was a 14 hour flight. The first class was really nice and they had BEDS!!!! The food was really good but mom threw up because she was tired and stressed. We got to Hong Kong which Hana says reminds her of a gorilla (I wonder where that came from) and guess what! there was a Starbucks Coffee

and it had WATERMELON JUICE!!!!!!!! The most exciting Starbucks moment of my life (I always have wanted watermelon juice). After I had my wonderful watermelon juice (which I didn't like) we got on a less modern plane and had a 2 hour flight to Ho Chi Minh City. We got through customs and took so long the guy from the hotel who was going to pick us up left! We hired a van and the guy talked and talked. When we got to the hotel it was about 1 pm vietnam time. The hotel not too fancy but nice and clean. That night we went to a Thai restaurant and I almost fell asleep at the table. There is a K Circle Mart next the hotel and we got some stuff there like Gatorade!

Today we woke up at 3:00 am and we ate a breakfast of fresh crispy baguette with jam and butter. Then at about 7:00 am we all went for a walk to the Rex Hotel. Ok everyone do not take Canada and Prague for granted because in Vietnam you just walk across the street and people have to try to avoid you on the mopeds, you almost get hit by random bikes 'cause there are hardly any stoplights at all!!!!! Its really warm out, about 30 degrees. Lots of people on mopeds wear H1N1 masks because of the dirty air from the cars. Right now I am on the rooftop of the Rex by the swimming pool. It says I posted this at 5:30 am but its really pm. These are the last

few days. Thanks for reading this!

Maeve