Day 16: September 5, 2014

Even though it is Friday, we had a make-up sociology class at 10am. All of our classes here are two and a half hours long, so they are very hard sit through. We learned a little about the history of Vietnam. Our professor also told us there are three ways to tell if a country is under Chinese influence:

1. Do they use chopsticks?
2. Is Confucianism prevalent in society?
3. Is their language similar to China's?

After class I headed out with Thao, Tho (another partner student), Alex, Cate, Tori, and Summer. It was a restaurant, so a little more expensive than street food. I got seafood rice, which cost 45,000d. When we were done, Thao said I needed to practice my Vietnamese so we headed to the canteen. She helped me with my pronunciation as well as helping me memorize it. When she decided that I had done pretty well, we hopped on her motorbike and headed to "Lantern Street". This weekend is Mid-Autumn Festival, so everybody is buying lanterns to decorate with. She gave me one as a gift, too! The lanterns are very colorful and range in intricacy.

Lanterns, as seen on "Lantern Street".

Some of the more simple lanterns.

On the way back to the dormitory, we stopped at a food stand where I had an ear of steamed corn for 7,000d. It was completely yellow but still nice to have something that reminded me of home. We also passed a Dairy Queen, and Thao said she has never been there so I plan on treating her sometime. When we made it back to the dormitory, we headed for the Co-Op and each got an ice cream cone for 3,000d.

Vien took most of us out and showed us a good place for hotpot, which is when you cook meat and vegetables in a giant bowl and share from it. We had salmon, okra, and some other vegetables. I'm not exactly sure how I feel about the fact that we were able to get salmon from a street restaurant, but it's probably better not to think about it. It was 50,000d per person, and I'm slowly starting to figure out that the less I spend the more I like it.

On the way back to the dormitory we stopped in front of a building where there was some stuff going on for Mid-Autumn Festival. It seems that this holiday is celebrated because of the Chinese influence, and the act we saw reminded me of the parade I saw in Chicago for Chinese New Year. When we got back to the dormitory, there was a lady making Vietnamese quesadillas (or so Wilson calls them) on the street. Rice paper, pork, some spam and herbs, and a little sauce. We also got smoothies from a street vendor. The strawberry smoothie I got is probably one of the best ones I have ever had.