Our Life in Singapore: May 2010

Wow, I have been on a major blogging hiatus lately! It's hard to believe we were in Vietnam nearly 2 months ago and I'm just now getting around to writing about our final day. We've had a lot on our plate lately and I just haven't had a chance to sit down and write this out, but alas...here I am. I'm sure you've been anxiously waiting by the computer for the next entry, right?? ;)

With all of the family and hometown visits behind us, day 5 was all about being true tourists. What does a tourist in Vietnam do? Visit the Mekong Delta! The Mekong Delta is famous for being a large rice growing area and many of the villages and houses around the Mekong are accessible only by boats. The Mekong is where I saw many of the scences I pictured in my head of Vietnam before actually arriving so I am so glad that we took a day to tour such a major part of Vietnam!

Since our entry point on the Mekong was about 2 hours from Ho Chi Minh, we stopped at a little rest stop for a quick break and whoa! It was the nicest rest stop I have ever been to!

Standing on a "monkey bridge" which is a log stretching from end to end of the river that allows locals to cross.

A beautiful lotus flower in full bloom :)

Finally, we made it to the Mekong Delta and boarded our little boat!

Dad and Vivi on the boat!

Along the Mekong, there are a lot of places to stop to look at local crafts and souveniers. It was nice to get out of the boat to stretch our legs!

Unfortunately, it is also HOT along the Mekong and none of the places have air conditioning. I don't think I have ever been so hot in my entire life. Here we are trying to share cool breezes from a fan :)

Back on the boat...

...and you'll never guess what we had for lunch. Pork chops! ;)

Matt managed to get a little nap in on one of our stops!

Then his head turned into a durian ;)

The best part of the day was when we got off of our little motorized boat and got into little row boats instead. It felt so authentic!

And that was our day on the Mekong Delta! We got back to Ho Chi Minh in the late afternoon and had just enough time to freshen up and get ready to meet our cousins, some we'd met and some new ones, for dinner at my Dad's favorite place in Ho Chi Minh...nha hang ngon.

This is my cousin Hoai and her husband Thong. Hoai is Uncle Hiep's daughter. We met them for the first time at this dinner and they were so sweet and nice!

So happy to be with so many new cousins!

Dad and Vivi have a close friend that owns a very popular night club in Ho Chi Minh city called the Factory. So following dinner, Dad, Vivi, Jason, Janelle, Matt and I headed over there for a night of fun and dancing!

Since we arrived early (around 9 p.m.) on a Tuesday night, the dance floor was pretty empty so we had to liven things up with our fancy dance moves ;)

We really enjoyed The Factory and the owners hospitality. It was a great end to a great day full of touring, family and fun! :)

As I'm sure you can tell from the first three Vietnam blogs, we kept really busy every single day. Day 4, however, takes the cake. I don't think we stopped to rest for one single second. My advice? If you're going to Vietnam to meet family for the very first time AND tour the country...try spending more than 5 days there. That is if you're interested in moving at a pace that is slower than an all out sprint :)

The first thing on day 4's agenda was more goodbyes :( Having spent the night at Uncle Hanh's house, it was time to say farewell to both him and his wife. (We said bye to Hung and Ngan too, but we knew we'd be seeing them the next night so the goodbye wasn't nearly as bad!)

Right before we left, Hung and Ngan were kind enough to drive Matt and Jason around on their motorcyles!

Cousin picture :) It's so fun to have so many "new" family members!

Last family picture for now. Goodbye until next time!

So after we left Uncle Hanh's house, Vivi's brother-in-law picked us up and drove us about an hour away to his house in Vung Tau. It was a beautiful and sunny morning and we decided to check out the beach.

Matt had the pleasure of another motorcyle ride, thanks to Vivi's nephew, Be! :)

M & K in Vung Tau!

We left the beach and this time it was Janelle's turn on the motorcycle

Then Jason had a turn!

A road side stop for fresh coconuts

Dad rode on the motorcyle too. I never thought I'd see the day! Turns out, he used to OWN a motorcycle when he lived in VN. Who knew??

After a morning at the beach and a delicious egg noodle soup brunch, we said our goodbyes to Vivi's family and made our way back to Ho Chi Minh City which is about 2 hours away from Vung Tao.

As we arrived in Ho Chi Minh, Dad pointed out this statue of General Tran Hung Dao. The reason he pointed out the statue is because it is directly across the street from Saigon Harbor (or Ben Dach Dang) and the exact spot that he departed from Vietnam in 1975. Having grown up hearing stories of his departure from Vietnam, it was really amazing to look over and see the place he left from...even if we only saw it from a distance inside a van :)

Guess what we started our afternoon with? Pork chops! The best pork chops EVER. The only downside to the meal was how incredibly HOT it was inside the market (Ben Thanh) that we bought them in. Ben Thanh is very popular in Ho Chi Minh, but personally, I couldn't stand the heat long enough to actually check things out!

Following lunch, we stopped by the Reunification Palace, formerly known as the President's Palace before the fall of Saigon, for a tour.

In the basement of the palace, where the president used to get all of his updates on the war while in hiding.

In the kitchen...Matt cooked up some good food ;)

We left the palace and went straight to the War Remnants Museum. Dad and Vivi had never been so it was new for all of us. Although many of the images stirred up sad emotions in both Dad and Vivi, they were still glad we went. It really gave them a great opportunity to show us pictures of things they remembered and to share their own personal experiences. And again, it gave all of us more perspective on Dad's live in Vietnam.

(We didn't plan to match in black shirts...it just happened!)

After we left the museum, we did some more touring around Ho Chi Minh. I have never seen so many motorcycles on the road in my entire life! (Crossing the street in Ho Chi Minh should probably get a post of its own. You just step out and pray that no one will hit you!)