[Disclaimer: So, although I didn't get the chance to finish blogging about SAS in real time - 2 years later I am finally posting this piece that I actually wrote while we were in Vietnam (approx March 2011)... I just edited the end. :) ]
Sailing up the Saigon River to Ho Chi Minh City (known as Saigon before communist regime came into play), was amazing. It was interesting to see how similar it felt to sailing up the Amazon River, but with Vietnamese boats and fishermen, rather than Brazilian. This was my second visit to Vietnam, I visited the north back in 2007 with my classmates (see previous blog posts). Saigon was definitely a different, more modern feeling city than Hanoi. Since I have already seen HaLong Bay and SaPa, we decided to stay in the south.
We were fortunate to be traveling with our good friend, Annie, who is Vietnamese and had a family member in Saigon. I feel like in our time there, I had the privilege of traveling like a 'local' and experiencing all kinds of great foods. Service was also a focal point for our time here.
Our first meal off the ship was at a cute little place with a deceivingly westernized name, called "Wrap and Roll" (see yummy freshness above:). Annie ordered for us and we had 3 different kinds of spring rolls, roasted chicken cooked in banana leaves, and a few other delicious things. Saigon had a distinct Westernized feel. In Hanoi in the north, I remember definitely feeling the French influence in the architecture and in the city layout, but Saigon felt much more cosmopolitan. There were high end stores like Chanel and Louis Vuitton, modern malls, an oversized colonial post office, a replica of Notre Dame (see photo below), a backpackers district, and the all encompassing Ben Thanh Market. This market was a huge warehouse with hundreds of little stalls selling everything from fabrics and shoes, to candies, dried fish, and North Face backpacks.
On our second day in Saigon, we got to meet up with one of our friends from California who happened to be in Vietnam for business. We met up for breakfast at a place called, Pho Hoa Pasteur, which is apparently where pho (a vietnamese soup) was made popular. I've had pho before, but never for breakfast, and that is actually when most people eat it in Vietnam. It was delicious and so authentic in a hole in the wall type place. Here's the evidence...
The following day we went to a center called the Christina Nobel Foundation, which is a program for street children, and they have a variety of facilities. They have a live-in center, a medical clinic, school, art program, and other locations throughout Vietnam. This was one of the most organized and best kept programs I've seen. We were there because our friend Annie made a connection with them, and through her involvements with Freedom in Creation, we were able to have the children in the art class paint some pictures and create a poster. It was a great experience, and although there was a major language barrier, we were still able to elicit the smiles and hugs that melt your heart. That night we went with a big group of friends to dinner at Nha Hang Ngon, which was a sister restaurant of one I loved in Hanoi. It's an open air restaurant with French decor, and authentic Vietnamese food stalls lining the perimeter of the restaurant. The food was amazing, and Annie and her cousin just ordered a bunch of different things for us. We also did our fair share of karaoke in Vietnam... which was such a fun group activity with the private rooms. So fun!
The next day we went on a Semester at Sea sponsored service trip to a school in a more rural area for children with disabilities and who are hearing impaired. We rotated through a few different classrooms and played with them during recess. When we were outside playing, these two little girls came up to me and wanted to take pictures. I soon realized that they were twins, and they so reminded me of my own nieces whom I missed tremendously. I showed them my nieces pictures, and they looked at each other and laughed as they realized they were twins too. It was definitely a moment I won't forget. I let one of them use my camera and she wanted to take a picture of me -- I'll never forget that - I was wearing my green SAS shirt giving a peace sign. She was so excited to get to use my camera. This 'service' experience and the other brought back memories of my dissertation research and the idea of ethics in service. While I don't consider this a true service experience, I think it was more of an exchange that was still beneficial to both parties. The teachers and principal at the school were extremely proud and excited to share with us all of their projects and initiatives. At the end of the visit, they invited us to buy some art created by some of the children as a fundraiser for the school. We could not resist.
The replica of Notre Dame in Saigon
Overall, Vietnam was great and I feel like we got to have a unique experience with a good friend. She hadn't been back to Vietnam in a number of years and it was fun to see the sights and foods from her perspective. This was the only country I've been to before on this voyage, but I had never been to Saigon. On an unfortunate note, for the first time in all of my travels - I got robbed in Vietnam. It was our last day, in my last taxi to the ship... I was leaving the Ben Thanh shopping area, and my friend and I decided to separate because she had another errand to run and I had felt safe getting around. I looked at the cab driver in the mirror, and I had a gut feeling (always follow your gut!!!) He didn't really smile when he picked me up, and I knew something was up. I only had the specific amount of dong left to get back to the ship, and I saw that the meter was skipping... as others complained about being scammed like this earlier in the week. So I confronted him, and after a heated and somewhat scary exchange, he ended up with my iphone. I had pulled it out to show him the numbers of $ that I had on me - and handed it to him to see (as I had been doing while shopping). He took it, started yelling at me in Vietnamese, and tried to grab my bags. Luckily we were parked right outside of the port, so I got out of the cab after giving him all the dong I had left. I didn't realize that he had my phone until I got to the ship. I am lucky that it wasn't a worse situation, and ultimately, it was just my phone and a bruised ego. I survived and found it somewhat freeing to not have a phone (to the point that after we returned, I stalled on getting a new one!) Overall, despite this incident, I really enjoyed this experience in Vietnam. The food was amazing, the sights were sensational, and the service experiences provided more awesome opportunities for reflection and growth.
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