Day 27: September 16, 2014

Today started out as they all do. I woke up and had breakfast in my room, which today was the other half of the lotus moon cake. Class started at 10am, so we met at 9:15 to head to Open University. Today, however, was the first day that I was able to successfully take the bus to classes. We walked a few blocks to the bus stop, waited for the bus to come, and when it did we just got on. The bus we will now take to classes is a double decker public city bus, and when you get on you sit down and wait for the attendant to come collect money from you. With our student IDs, the bus only costs us 2,000d each way.

Today's class was sociology, and afterwards I met up with Thao for lunch and to practice my Vietnamese. She brought lunch from a stand near where she lives because she says the food is cheaper there. So for 15,000d I was able to have what has easily become a staple meal for me--pork and rice. We practiced my Vietnamese until she decided that I could pronounce everything like a true Vietnamese. She also showed me her textbook for her class on American and British culture. She has a textbook that splits the United States into its regions, and I flipped through the pages describing the Midwest. The first picture of the chapter was a picture of corn fields, but there was also a section on Chicago, Mt. Rushmore, and the Iowa State Fair. Yes, the Iowa State Fair. I tried to explain what a fair is, but it basically ended with me saying that it was similar to a festival. She gave me a ride back to the dormitory on her motorbike, and we made plans for this weekend to go to her sister's English club as well as maybe check out a flea market.

Today is Ulysses' birthday, and he invited all of the Loyola students and partners out to eat supper at a Mexican restaurant he found. (Turns out that a few of the partners thought Ulysses was going to pay for everyone. Apparently if you're "invited" somewhere it means the host is paying for you.) I had a few hours to spare when I got back, so I managed to get some homework done. At 5:30 I got in a cab with some Loyola students and we headed to the Mexican restaurant. There were about 25 of us total that showed up, so it took a while to order everything. Not only did it take a while because there were so many of us, but none of the partner students had eaten Mexican food before so we had to explain the difference between tacos, enchiladas, burritos, quesadillas, and fajitas. I ended up getting a passion fruit, coconut, and honey smoothie and chicken enchiladas. The smoothie was sweet but not too sweet while the chicken enchiladas were topped with cilantro and guacamole. I spent way more on this meal than I have this entire trip, an astounding 205,000d, but I have also not felt this full since I've been here. Hopefully there aren't too many more meals in my future that are that expensive.