September

We went to the movies with our friends from school Aine and Cillin. Afterwards we went for drinks. Can you guess who ordered the smoothies and who ordered the beers?

Which drinks belong to the boys and which ones belong to the girls? 

Yup... the girls were chugging the beer while the gents sipped on their smoothies.

Vietnam celebrated National Day on the second of September. We can see District 1 from our apartment (in the distance) so instead of joining the masses in town, we watched the fireworks from our bedroom window.

Mel won a voucher to an Irish pub through Facebook, and we figured who better to share it with than our Irish friends? We had some delicious pub grub (pies!!!) and watched the Gaelic Football final - which was rather interesting since we've never watched the sport. 

Cillin, Aine and Ross

The Dubliner chicken pie. 

With our new outdoor space we knew that we had to get a braai, so one Sunday Ross went out and found us one. He had some bungee cords and strapped it on the back of the bike and made the tricky (but luckily not far) ride back to our apartment.

The braai master.

Our first feast

Roald Dahl's birthday was celebrated in September and our school participated by having a dress up day, a drawing competition and some students read extracts to their class mates.

Some grade 4 and 5 students reading in the library

Saigon hosted a rugby 10s tournament and we went along to support, as a lot of the guys who play in the contact team play touch rugby with Ross. When we arrived they had a deal of 500,000k (around R300) for all we could eat and drink - all day! Of course the day came with its typical Vietnamese quirks, including an orange pushing a wheelbarrow filled with half time drinks and a nurse to support him. Each team also had its own set of cheerleaders from the university where the tournament was held and, of course, there were midgets wearing top hats and tailcoats.

Mel getting involved during the YMCA.

After the rugby, we went through to District 1 to watch a show at the Opera House. We had wanted to watch the AO Show since we arrived, but never quite got around to it. Mel is on the social committee at school, so she organised a discount for any staff members who signed up. It was a really great show - a mix of acrobatics with Vietnamese culture - certainly well worth it if you are in Vietnam.

August

When we arrived back from New Zealand we stayed with our friend's Tom and Stacey while we looked for a new apartment. We decided to move into a slightly quieter area, with wide streets and lots of trees, but unfortunately apartments in that area are quite expensive - or cheap and nasty. We were very lucky that we could take our time and look for a really nice apartment, instead of grabbing the first one we found. In order to make ourselves useful, we went about some errands for Tom and Stace while they were at work. One of these errands was getting keys cut. It's really interesting to see how they do it. 

We decided that paying someone else for a motorbike every month was a waste of money and instead, we decided to invest in one of our own. When we leave we should be able to sell it for almost the same amount that we paid for it - making it a good investment. We took the bike for a test drive and everything seemed fine, so we paid the money and went on our way. Unfortunately, things stopped working soon after and we had to basically strip the bike down and build it back up again. 

After a lot of searching, an apartment falling through, and loads of estate agents - we finally managed to find a great apartment. Mel asked if anybody knew of any apartments in a Facebook group and luckily a girl replied and that's how we found our apartment. It has a huge balcony which is ideal for braai's and it has an open plan living area downstairs and two bedrooms upstairs. 

Our friends, Marius and Andrea are leaving Vietnam to go work in Chile. Luckily they didn't leave before we got back from New Zealand, so we were able to go to their farewell and One Plus Beer Club. It's a typical Vietnamese beer club with cheap(ish) towers of beer and deafeningly loud music, but the view makes it all worth while. It's located on the 32nd floor of a building in District 1 and has a balcony which wraps almost the whole way around the building, providing an almost 360 degree view of the city.

Our new school threw a welcome dinner for the entire staff (teachers, administrators, drivers, nannies...).

Aoife (Eefa, it's Irish) and Mel

Chris (South African from Hilton) and Ross

Ross and Alex (the other grade 5 teacher)

Alex, Ross, and Daniel trying to make the most of the free beer

Aoife, Amanda and Aine

When it rains it pours! Our balcony gets a little bit flooded when there's heavy rain.

Ankle deep in water

Our favourite breakfast place is definitely a restaurant called Eden. They make the best flat whites (our favourite since we got back from NZ) and they've recently introduced an avo and feta smash on sourdough bread with poached eggs and bacon - deeeelish!

Our new friend Amanda celebrated her birthday and chose a restaurant we've never been to. The decor was really cool and felt quite magical. Driving home in the rain afterwards - not so much.

We discovered a road along the river near our house which is super quiet, as only people who live in the estate that runs along it can drive on it. There were plenty of runners and cyclists, since quiet roads in Vietnam are rather hard to come by. The one house had loads of cars parked outside - which was quite a sight, as cars are really expensive in Vietnam and only the wealthy can buy them. This family must be loaded!

There is an organic fruit and veg shop at the mall near our house. It also sells amazing cold pressed juices. Our favorite is beetroot, orange and passion fruit. Unfortunately all of their produce runs out super quickly, as it's such a popular spot, and the vegetables are of such good quality. 

Phnom Penh - Day 1

This feels like a lifetime ago now, but waaaaay back in February, we decided to make use of our TET holiday, where we had a little more than two weeks off of school. Mel's friend, Kate, was in South East Asia, and had already visited us in HCMC before doing her own trip through Vietnam, into Laos and down to Cambodia. We had arranged to meet in Phnom Penh, before doing the touristy things around Cambodia together.

The flights into Cambodia are ridiculously expensive, so our method of transport from HCMC to Phnom Penh was bus. Trusted Sinh Tourist was our bus company of choice, and boy were we happy with our decision! Unfortunately, they don't have a sleeper bus option for this trip, so we hopped into the regular, seated bus and began our journey east. The trip was the usual, terrifying experience that we have come to expect of road trips in Vietnam. What made us really appreciate our decision to travel with The Sinh Tourist was that they sorted out all of the admin at the boarder, and that made it a pretty smooth and stress-free process (friend of ours had a nightmare getting through the border as they were un-aided).

The Moc Bai border post.

Once into Cambodia, it became apparent pretty quickly just how dry, sparse and poor the country is. The roads are in even worse shape than in Vietnam, and the landscape is pretty bleak. Where in Vietnam there are quite a few farms lining the roads on the stretches between towns, Cambodia is a dust bowl. The arid landscape features a few shabby shacks on stilts and small groups of brown trees covered in a layer of dust, swept up by the wind as it travels across the empty fields.

The bus that we had caught was part of a greater, organised tour. Meaning that, once we got into Phnom Penh, we were dropped off on a random (ridiculously chaotic) sidewalk with our luggage and our next move was our own problem. This doesn't seem like such a big deal, but open up a Google tab and search for 'Cambodian alphabet' to get an idea of just how foreign a place we had landed in when we looked all around us.

Immediately we were swamped by a pack of ruthless tuk-tuk drivers, eager to take advantage of the 'fresh-off-the-boat' tourists. Throwing out ridiculous prices to take us such a short distance to our hotel. (Google Maps is such a wonderful tool to make sure you don't get ripped-off in this respect!)

Luckily we were able to keep our cool and, utilising the thick skins that we have developed from living in Vietnam, we shrugged them off before ducking into the safety of a nearby restaurant. This was a good opportunity to have some lunch, gather our thoughts and develop a plan of action to get to our hotel using the wifi in the restaurant. The air-conditioning wasn't awful either...

Eventually, we decided that we would walk to The S-21 Prison (The Tual Sleng Genocide Museum), and meet Kate there. The S-21 Prison was a horrific place in the capital city, where the Khmer Rouge converted a high school into a prison / torture / interrogation / execution centre. To say that it was an emotional experience would be a massive understatement. Being in the grounds and buildings provides you with just a hint of how tragic this country's (recent) history is. It was rough!

With access to cells still containing the remnants of torture, write-ups of personal accounts from prisoners, seeing tools and structures used to torture the prisoners and walking through rooms containing photographs of prisoners, you can't help but feel emotionally beat-up by the end of your visit to this museum. That being said, we would definitely recommend taking the time to visit it if you find yourself in Phnom Penh.

One of the rooms used to torture people.

The hanging post. 

Pictures of some of the prisoners.

1m wide cells.

It wasn't as far from the S-21 Prison to our hotel, as from where the bus dropped us off earlier in the day, so we decided to catch a tuk-tuk. We were quite keen to drop off our bags by this point. We made plans with Kate to meet up later that night and bundled into the tuk-tuk, before being shaken off to our hotel (Green Mango Hotel) in one of the thousands of rickety death-mobiles speeding through the streets of Phnom Penh.

That evening, we thought that we would walk down to the river front to see what the vibe was like down there. There are some bars and restaurants lining the street opposite the river and, a little further up the road, there's a night market. We thought that we would take a mosey through to pass some time and because - you know - it's the touristy thing to do. We were pretty underwhelmed by the selection. To be honest, from our experience, most markets in SE Asia are different variations of the same, average products.

Once we had done a loop through the night market, our tummies were beginning to rumble so we strolled along the road trying to select a suitable restaurant. We came across one which had tanks of tiny fish positioned under the tables. We soon realised that they were those fish that suck the dirt and dead skin off your feet. People pay loads to have those little critters suck on the ends of their toes, so we decided that we may as well make use of the free service while enjoying our dinner. We had mixed feelings about this decision. It feels really strange and, at certain points, almost unbearable.

After a meal interrupted by giggles and squeals (manly squeals from Ross, of course), we thought we'd walk around and try find some dessert. We found a little coffee shop and Kate and Ross got coffee slushies. By this point, we were all ready for bed so we decided to walk Kate back to her backpackers; and just as well we did!

What looked like a straight-forward walk back when looking on Google Maps, turned into the three of us getting pretty lost. Now being lost in a foreign place is scary enough. Take a minute and picture being two girls and a guy lost in the dark, dirty alleys of a Cambodian ghetto. At one point, the road we were looking for appeared to go through a gated park. We stepped through the gate and were immediately met by a scene out of a Train Spotting type nightmare. There were small groups of dodgy characters mulling around - some of which looked up as we appeared and looked like they may engage us in conversation. (No doubt it wouldn't have been a conversation about our favourite books or movies.) To top it off, Mel witnessed a guy shooting up some kind of drug. She just so happened to look in his direction as he was plunging the piston of his syringe, emptying whatever contents into his arm. Needless to say, we couldn't get out of there fast enough!

We decided to back-track a little and walk around the park. It wasn't long before we found Kate's backpackers and caught a tuk-tuk back to the safety of our own hotel. It had been a long and eventful day.

First impressions of Cambodia:

* The people are darker in colour than the Vietnamese, and don't seem to be terrified of the sun like their neighbours are.

*There is FAR more poverty in Cambodia than in Vietnam.

*The service industry in Cambodia is better than in Vietnam - the waiters/waitresses give you a menu, then leave you alone to decide what you would like to order. As opposed to in Vietnam where waiters/waitresses stand awkwardly at the edge of your table while you flip through the 78 page menu, trying to decide what you feel like.

*The people who do speak english in Cambodia speak it better than those who speak english in Vietnam.

*Phnom Penh feels less organised and more chaotic than HCMC. (We didn't think that was even possible!)

*There are far more drivers in HCMC, but they react better to the other drivers on the road than the drivers in Cambodia. (Again - a very unexpected observation coming from the worst place to drive in our lives!)

Mekong Delta

We recently had a week off of school, as it was The King's birthday, Freedom Day, and Worker's Day all in one week! Since we're saving furiously for NZ, we decided that a week away would be a bit too much of a splurge and we had a few errands to run in HCM. Mel ended up getting really sick, so it was lucky that she could rest and try to recover. We did however, finally go down to the Mekong Delta! Our friend Duyen is from a town called My Tho, so we headed down there with her and Michael for the night.

First, we had to find the bus stop, which was burried deep in District 5. Duyen organised tickets on a 'local bus' rather than a tourist bus and this bus company only goes down to the Mekong. It was really nice and clean and pretty spacious, we would definitely recommend using them if you go down to the Mekong. It only took and hour and a half to get to My Tho. We walked to Duyen's house, since it's super close to the bus stop, and then we caught a taxi to drop our bags at our hotel. We then made our way across the street to the dock, where we were meeting our tour guide.

Duyen the ninja! She didn't want to get burnt so she wrapped her jacket around her head.

Duyen organised a private tour for us, rather than being placed on a boat with loads of people. This meant that the four of us and our guide had a boat to ourselves! We made our way across to the first island. Here, we got to try some honey tea and dried banana. When we were finished, we walked down a path to our next stop which was to sample some of the local fruit grown in the Mekong. There was nothing new that we hadn't tried before, but it was a very welcome snack.

Our boat - just for the four of us!

'Yummy' green guava.

After we had eaten our full, we made our way to a little dock to catch a row-boat, which meanders through the palm trees along a skinny tributary. As we got on the boat, we were each handed a Vietnamese hat to don for the boat trip. (Just try not to think how many other heads have been in it before yours!!) There were loads of other people there, so it was a bit of a bun fight, but with some clever angles we managed to get some of the pictures to look like it was just us cruising down the river. The people who row the boats are extremely strong and we were well impressed by them. They sit in such an awkward position but manage to row with ease.

Traffic!!

After our little boat journey, we went to see how coconut candy is made. First, they cut open the coconuts and then scoop out all of the flesh. Next, the flesh is squashed in order to get all of the juice out and to make it a smooth consistency. After that, sugar is added to the coconut and it is churned until it is completely combined. The coconut mixture is then poured into moulds before being cut and then wrapped. The ladies wrapping up the candy were amazingly quick! We took a video of one of the ladies and it's hard to believe that it hasn't been sped up at all. After sampling the candy, we bought some of the plain coconut flavoured ones. There are a couple of flavours and we thought of buying some durian flavoured candy for Mike, but we decided against it. (Mike HATES durian with a passion!) We climbed back on the boat and headed to our next island.

Churning the coconut.

Coconut candy squares.

Phoenix island was rather interesting. There was a man who lived there for years and he didn't eat anything except for coconut. He only drank coconut water and he even showered in coconut water! He lived there with 8 ladies, all of them naked, and he travelled around talking to people about his religion. Apparently he weighed 28kgs and he lived to be about 80!! So anyone wanting to lose weight... eat coconuts exclusively.

A random pool of crocs on the island. You could buy meat to tease / feed them with.

There were loads of beautiful lotus flowers on Phoenix Island.

A hollow ball of rice being cooked.

Group shot

Now change position (nice one Ross)

The tour guide then took us to the next island. It was finally time for lunch and we quickly ordered because we were hungry. We then waited, and waited, and waited for our food. They had forgotten about us! We eventually got our food after almost an hour, and then made our way to the next attraction... a horse drawn cart! The poor horse had to pull 6 of us along behind him, luckily it wasn't for long. We then had a refreshing water-coconut drink before making our way back to the boat. Here another coconut awaited us! Fully hydrated, we made our way back to shore for a rest before dinner. We went to have Michael's favourite Vietnamese dish for dinner, Sa Te (pronounced - satay). Sa Te is like a really rich stew with noodles in it, it was delicious and no photos were taken as we ate it too quickly!

They even cut us a straw holder.

On day two of our Mekong trip, we went to a temple near Duyen's house. Here we saw three huge Budda's, one sitting, one standing, and one lying down. We also walked through a temple that has monks living in it.  It was then time to head back to Ho Chi Minh City. Our trip to the Mekong was a great break from the hustle and bustle of the city - thanks for showing us around Duyen!

The monks were having lunch