Our history final was emailed to us today, so I spent the rest of the morning getting a rough draft for that finished. Binh and I got lunch at the canteen and today I had rice with pork and vegetables. We sat with some of his friends that I know and the little boy whose dad runs the canteen came over to talk to us. He's only eight years old but is pretty good at English! Some people from Nestle were also in the canteen promoting their drinks, so we had some Milo, which I believe is like hot chocolate. Except they drink it with ice here because who wants a hot drink in this country.
I came back to my room and did some more homework before heading to Open University. The Loyola students were asked to attend a meeting they were having in search of new partners for next semester. A lot of students showed up, but the meeting was very different than it would have been if it was held in the United States. In the US, this meeting would have been held at several different times over the course of the past month to work around students' schedules. The deadline for the application would also not be a week away. When Vien said the students needed to have their application in by December 10, I was shocked! Not only that, but interviews then take place the next day!
After the meeting, Dan and I walked to District 1 as we both had some stuff we needed to buy. We headed to a bookstore, and a guy started talking to Dan. He asked him where we were from, if we were friends, and of course mentioned how tall I was. I met a guy in the back who asked where I was from, how long I had been here (his eyes opened pretty wide when I said I've been here since August), and then asked for my help in choosing a gift for a 16-year old girl. After Dan and I purchased our items, the guy who had talked to Dan asked if he could take a picture of us. We said sure, and he asked for our emails and promised to send it to us. Well, here it is.
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| Only in Vietnam do you get your picture taken like a celebrity does. |
By this point Dan had gone back to the dorm, so I told Binh that I needed to go to Ben Thanh to get a few more items. We walked there and once again he helped me get lower prices. One woman offered her first price as 120,000d and Binh countered with 90,000d. After a little bartering, she went down to 100,000d. Binh really wanted it to be 90,000d, but I told him I was willing to pay 100,000d. After we bought it, the woman told him that if I had come by myself she would have started the price out at 300,000d!
We were both hungry since it was already 6pm, and looked around outside the market for something to eat. Everything was pretty expensive, though. Even the street food was too expensive--a lady selling noodles wanted 45,000d for each bowl! We decided our best bet would be to come back to the dorm, and we ate at the bot chien place. I thought I had ordered nui xao trung but instead received mi xao trung. No worries, though, as it was still good. While we were eating, Alex brought her parents and Thinh to eat there, and it was pretty funny to be at a street vendor and hear more English being spoken then Vietnamese.
Tonight was the last night of Circle Talk, which was going completely fine until everybody at the end started wishing me farewell and a safe trip. Most of these people I only know through English Club and Circle Talk, yet having them say those things just made me completely sad as it reminded me that this trip is coming to a close and I leave so soon. When asked how long I was here, I used to be able to answer that I have three months left but the days have slowly dropped down. Two months. One month. Three weeks. One week. Three days. How is it possible that time has passed so quickly and that I've grown so attached to this country and the people I've met?
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