love the wang

sixteen hour plane rides are no fun. especially when you’ve spend the first 13 with a guy next to you who’s completely unaware of his foot odor.  about 25 hours ago, i hopped on a giant tin can (aka. a 777) in LAX and commuted 13 hours to Taipei (free WIFI at the airport! love my peeps!) i sat in Taipei for about 40 minutes before boarding another (smaller) plane to hope over to Vietnam. during the plane ride, this cute little old man from my hometown started a conversation with me. i told him i was doing a habitat for humanity build and I SWORE he kinda laughed. and then he started talking to other people around us, and i almost certain they were talking about me and my trip because i caught the guy in the next seating group, looking over at me and laughing. i think they were saying “sucker” in vietnamese. haha.

regardless, we landed without anymore humor at my expense. at immigration, the officer made me wait in line with nobody else in it so that this group of four next to me me could find their passports and proceed BEFORE me.  he kept saying, “they were here first” and made me stand there with my passport in my hand while they searched through all their bags. and then, there was the fun game of luggage carousel fishing. you know, the one where you viy for a prime spot to see when your luggage comes out? and to make sure no one snatches it? yeah…only mine never came out. it must have liked taipei because it stayed behind…. thankfully the airline has now informed that they have found my precious cargo, and i will not have to spend the remainder on my time in vietnam in an ella moss baby doll dress and leggings. (not so great for building houses in the humid country side.)

trying not to let the luggage error hinder my first and potential only full day in Ho Chi Ming City, i dragged my stinky, jet-lagged ass out and about:

it’s like find waldo, but with street signs.

vietnam is not unlike other asian countries in this sense: lots of mopeds, no systematic driving etiquette and lots of street vendors!

taking a ride in the bicycle rickshaw. it’s annie & patrick in front of me. sooo…the great story about this is that we ran into these guys while we were coming out of the ben thanh market and they promised us a bicycle tour of three tourists destinations for 15,000 don, which is less than $1 USD. so we agreed, since it would be a great way to see the city (if you don’t mind being honked at…) our first stop was the war remnants museum (which was suspiciously devoid of actual vietnamese people.) they waited outside while we toured the museum, but it looked like it was about to POUR. so we hustled back to cancel the remainder of the ride and pay them for the trip up until then. EXCEPT, they told Annie that they quoted her 150,000 dong. so after much argument, slamming of cab doors (to prevent us from leaving) and threats to call the police, i told Annie (shouting through giant droplets of rain that were about to pick up) to just give them each 100,000 dong and call it a day. annie was obviously pissed, but it was worth the $5.98 USD to get out of the rain and stop arguing with people who were obviously out to scam us. (this is your travel channel tourism warning

anyhow, dinner’s not even here yet but already much has happened. and if the rest of trip guarantees to match today’s excitement? they’ll be lots to write and read about!