Day 30: September 19, 2014

Fridays are supposed to be weekend days with no classes, but instead this morning was greeted with me having to wake at 8:30 to head to a makeup sociology class. We took the bus to class, and thankfully class went by rather quickly. We spent a lot of time discussing different cultural aspects, such as the meaning of home and child rearing. For example, people in Southeast Asia associate the word "home" with their family, while almost everyone in our class associates it with the physical place of their house. There are so many cultural comparisons to make that at times it crosses my mind to just upload the weekly papers I write because I feel that would be the best way to get some of the cultural differences across.

After class, Alex, Cate, Summer, and I met with two of the partners for lunch. We ate in the canteen and I had rice and chicken. Bonus: it also came with a banana. We also ate some green tea chocolate from Japan that our sociology professor brought for us. After lunch we hopped on the bus to head back to the dormitory. The rest of the afternoon was basically spent doing homework since this weekend might be rather full.

I began to work on my research project and let's just say that it is very hard to do research when the internet connection is not the greatest. I'll hopefully be meeting with my Bach Koa partner tomorrow so she can help translate the questions that I need to ask people. It's also very hard to find background information on a topic that isn't widely studied in this country.

My computer has been a source of frustration lately. The VPN I downloaded does not want to work, so a lot of websites that I usually go to are blocked. Everybody seems to be having problems lately though with the internet being slow, and I'm hoping that by the end of the weekend it will have magically fixed itself. Also along with my computer is the fact that the electricity here is killing my battery. I have my charger plugged into my convertor/adaptor, which is plugged into the wall. However, my computer is charging faster than it would at home as well as dying much faster. At this point, my computer can only be unplugged for about 2 hours before it completely dies and needs a recharge. I guess when I get back to the states I'll have to buy a new battery.

Cate and I decided to get supper around 6pm, but since it was raining we headed to the coffee shop next door for banh mi. I got banh mi ga, or chicken banh mi. We went to the supermarket because Cate wanted some snacks, and then I decided I really wanted some sweet soup. We walked the streets for about 45 minutes but we couldn't find the place I was thinking of nor any other place that was selling sweet soup. Not that we know what it is in Vietnamese anyway. To compensate, I headed to the smoothie stand by the dormitory and got a mango smoothie.

As I was sitting in my room finishing my smoothie, I heard a move begin playing outside. I looked out my window and it turns out that the dormitory plays movies here for students. Tonight's showing is Spiderman 2. The only thing that sucks for them (but great for us if we decide to watch) is that the movies are in English. Imagine if every time you wanted to watch a movie you actually had to read subtitles. That would be so annoying! It is, however, nice of the dormitory to provide something for the students to do since there is an 11pm curfew.

Check out some more of the videos I uploaded:

The view from our boat in the Mekong Delta.

 

One of the places we visited where they showed us how they make popped rice. The black stuff that it starts out as is sand from the Mekong River. They add coconut oil and the rice, and as the sand heats it pops the rice. They then separate the rice from the sand, and the addition of the coconut oil helps keep them separate.

 

The next two videos are from an open air market that we went to. Pay special attention to all of the animals that are still alive.. chickens, frogs, snakes, fish, eels, etc.

 





 

This last video is not for those with a weak stomach. Our guide bought a snake at the market for us to eat and showed us the proper way of killing a snake, which is what this video is of.