A Stranger in the Land of Vietnam

My first outing onto the streets of Vietnam was very exhilarating and downright terrifying. Mom and I made a trip to the jewelers down the street from my grandma's house to exchange U.S. dollars into Vietnamese dong. (If you were curious, the current exchange rate is $1 USD = $20,960 VND). As my mom and I were walking down the street, I kept getting stares from passersby. Apparently, I do not look like your typical Vietnamese girl. Every single person turned their heads to look at me. I do not have the build of a Vietnamese girl nor do I have the face of one. However, I didn't notice this because I was distracted by the fact that a motorbike was about to run me down or that people use their car horns like it's a turn signal. Just an example of how the streets of Vietnam look:

It doesn't look that scary in still photography but believe me when I say I was afraid for my life. There is a strange organized chaos that Vietnamese drivers have. They don't believe in lanes or turn signals. Turn signals are only if you are turning left or right. If you're switching lanes, you honk your horn as you're doing it. One way streets? You can still drive down it if you make your way carefully across to the correct direction. Stop lights have timers on them to tell you how many seconds are left on the red or green light. If there are about 3 or 4 seconds left of the red light, one is allowed to start driving through the intersection. In all of this chaos and bending of the rules, I have yet to witness a car crash. Motorbikes will slow down or speed up to avoid a crash and somehow in the madness it all works. Here's an idea of the organized chaos:

The best way to travel around Saigon is on a motorbike. It's easier to maneuver through traffic and doesn't cost or as time consuming as a taxi and I will be spending a lot of my trip on the back of motorbikes.

What a Strange Land I've Landed In...

Fourteen hours on a plane to Incheon, mad dash through the airport and another five hour flight to Vietnam, I finally land at Tan Son Nhat International Airport. Even though it was about 11 PM local time, the heat and humidity of Vietnam was enough to make me sweat through my shirt as we waited with about 100 other people for our luggage to arrive.

Going through customs was an oddity as they gave my mom a hard time about her Visa and then later on about the massive amounts of "drugs" she was carrying in her suitcase. She explained that the customs man was looking for his monetary bribe that should have been in her passport and as for the suitcase and the massive amounts of drugs they uncovered? Costco sized bottles of calcium supplements my mom brought for my grandparents. If not for a family friend who turned out to be friends with the customs agent, my parents would have to pay them $10. Not the best impression so far Vietnam!

Making our way to the taxi stand there are throngs of people waiting for their loved ones on the other side of a gate, some holding signs, others holding babies, while others just smoking a cigarette. This is where I met my half sister and my niece for the first time. I also met a couple of other people and re-met some family members that had visited Seattle years ago. All made the comment that I'm not fat (how my mom would describe me to my relatives), I just look strong and American-made (doesn't translate well into English what they actually said). At this point, I'm just a bit overwhelmed and just glued a smile to my face. We finally gather all our family and head off to grandma's house.

A daylight photo of my grandma's house. The homes in Vietnam are built up and not out. There are 2 floors above the ground floor. Once you walk into the front doors there is one room where there is a dining room table and a refrigerator, walk through the doors and it's a living room/bedroom where grandma sleeps, and through the final door is a bathroom and the kitchen. Upstairs are two bedrooms and a couple bathrooms and the very top floor has a bedroom and a bathroom. A side note about Vietnamese interior design, the bathrooms are one room with a sink, toilet, and shower. Literally nothing separates these three items. When you take a shower, your toilet will get wet and your toilet paper too if you are not careful. The first couple of showers took some getting used to but I think I've got the hang of it now :)