and it feels weird...
If you didn't know i went to Vietnam for nearly a month and I just came back wednesday afternoon. I had a great time well spend in the sun and got to go to many different places everyday. I visited my mothers hometown Bien Hoa, and met some old friends i stayed at the last time i was in Vietnam (back in summer 2008). Mainly all of my mothers friends have children around my age and Julie's too, so it was not difficult to find us some "playmates". The same goes to my father, so whenever we went out to visit someone, we kids never felt bored or anything because there would always be someone around our age to talk to.
I stayed at my father's family's house in Go Vap - about 10 km from Saigon. My father's cousin takes care of the place when no one is using the house for vacation and therefore i always thought he was the "caretaker"... embarrassingly i had to realize he was my uncle and not the housekeeper...
I've always thought my fathers family was the simple one where i could count every head and know who was related to who in which way and that my mother's would be the messy one. I was so wrong. The first few days i met many came to our house to give us their greetings and everyone that came was a family member... My grandfather (father's father) has three younger siblings - only one of them alive, but they all have kids. My deceased grandmother(father's mother) had two younger sisters - only one of them alive but they also had many kids. That also results in many grand children and since it's common in vietnam to start a family early, i had a bunch of problems with formalities. Usually we call an older person for either em (younger sister/brother), anh(older brother), chi(older sister), thim/co(aunt), cau/chu(uncle) etc. but because of the ranking - like my grandfather is the oldest - many over 20 became my em... It's difficult to call a 30 year old person for your "em" when you always have in mind that they are older than you.... Okay that part might be a little bit complicated to understand if you aren't asian ^^.
Well ... Tet(chinese/vietnamese new year) was around the middle of february and we celebrated it for three days! One day we would eat at one of my many uncle's house and the next day we would eat at another. After the second dinner, my family decided to go to Saigon to watch the fireworks. The streets were packed and the traffic jam was unbelievable because people parked their scooters on the road and blocked the way. We stood of the taxi and walked downtown to find a spot were we could watch the whole show. It was quite beautiful, but i did not get to see everything because two tall buildings were in the way... -.-
The third day of Tet we ate at our place and we finished the dinner quite fast, because as a surprise, some of my uncle had booked two mini busses that would take us to "que"(my father's childhood home) in Rach Gia. We were there for about two days and stopped by Ha Tien (a beach) on the way back to Saigon.
When you're on the move you really loose your track of days and because i rarely was at home i don't remember which day i did what and went where. I don't remember when but i went to Nha Trang for 3 days and i loved it! Saigon is like a hot oven next to chilly Nha Trang. While my parents went to go sightseeing, Julie, Dennis, my uncle, cousin Lam and I went to Vinpearl Land - an amusement park located on an island. We had so much fun there, even though the line for everything was so damn long.
On the way back to Saigon we stopped by Dalat - a city located on the top of a mountain. I've been there before and i remember oh too well how sick i got from going there. I'm usually not carsick but i die every time we drive in the mountains. It was so bad that i still was sick a week from there and even now i haven't fully recovered yet. It's both because of the rough trip but also because of the sudden change in temperature. In Dalat the temperature is about the same as an average spring day in Denmark and in Saigon it about 27-32 degrees which is a big difference. My body can't take it and therefore i've been sick for such a long time.
Anything else I want to tell about ?...
OH ! About 8-9 years ago i met a boy HD. He's the son of my aunt friend and you can almost say that every forth year i've met him. He at my age and he now lives in Seoul where he studies. He came back to Vietnam the same day as i had to go home, so we agreed to meet. He came back to vietnam 2 o'clock and i had to be at the airport by 6. He picked me up at my place around 3 and we went out to find a taxi. For the first time i carried a purse, because i wore a dress with no pockets and needed something that could carry my hair-clips and eyeliner. It was quite stupid of me to do so, because there are so many thieves in vietnam. I just waked from my house to a taxi-stop which is less than a 10 min walk and when i reached to the taxi, a guy hit me with his scooter. Luckily he wasn't driving that fast, so i got to move away a bit, but he still managed to steer his handles into my stomach. I held my purse tightly enough so the thief did not get away with it. HD dragged me on the other side of the street and i got pushed in to the cab. Poor guy! He was even more shocked than me by the event that he was quiet all the way to the mall ...
We went to Parkson, a mall just next to the airport and got ourselves some smoothies and cake. We had a nice chat and decided to watch a movie. The only movie that finished just in time before i had to be at the airport was a Chinese movie with vietnamese subtitles and i can't read vietnamese... We decided to take a stroll and he bought me a Chubbystick from Clinique as a gift ^^.
At the airport we met one of my mothers friend that worked in the airport. He helped us though the security so we got through a little bit faster. The plane was a big one with the small tv screens so i watched some movies. I watched "The Watch" with Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn, and noticed it was censored in the most ridiculous way. Every time Vince would say something bad they replaced the bad word with something else but with another persons voice... "Di**" became to "stick"...and the voice sounded like Homer Simpsons...
After landing in Dubai we got through the first security check before Julie decided to have a severe stomach ache and pass out on the floor. We called the security for help and they called the rescuers who bought Julie to the doctors. I had to go with them because i was the only one that understood english. There wasn't anything serious with Julie. She was just exhausted and had diarrhea symptoms resulting in stomach cramps. She got some medicine and she got dismissed and that was when we realized that she wasn't wearing shoes... Somehow my mother managed to take of her shoes while she was lying down, so she had to walk through the airport, go on the metro to the next gate without any footwear and of course people looked - she was wearing orange socks... XD
After waiting for 6 hours we finally got on the plane... only to wait two more hours because of a thick fog prevented us from departing... When we finally came back to Denmark, my uncle came to pick us up and we ate lunch at his place before heading home to Odense. We came home around 8 and it was just as cold outside as it was inside. We turned the heat on in every single room and the toilet was so cold i had to use the blowdryer to warm up the toilet seat before daring to sit on it... ......... Well all of our fish are dead too.. and that's because of the cold...
I still actually have jetlag. Yesterday everyone in the house was awake by 4 and the time difference between Denmark and Vietnam is 6 hours plus so i would be like waking up at 10. Today i woke up at 4 again.. only to roll over and sleep to 8 .. School started again and it's difficult to keep up, when your mind is somewhere else.
Well i have to get going - I still have some stuff to pack out and i have to clean my room too.
Here's some pictures
Right now i'm in Copenhagen for the easter holiday and if you're a danish citizen you would know about the school crisis. Due some disagreements between the union of public school teachers and the union of municipalities there's a lockout going on. It means that only some students can go to school while others can't. Sadly both Julie's and Dennis' class have been affected by this and therefore they don't have any classes. The press believes that the lockout only will last for a week while others thinks the government has to interfere. How this affects me is that... I have less free time than i used to have... Well i don't have any anyway, so this doesn't change anything.... beside, i'll have to homeschool if the lockout will last long... ARGH.....
