Budget: 1,200,000 Dong/$60; Spent: 1,438,000 Dong/$72
Jeff here.
It was a pretty uneventful day today. We got down for our free breakfast around 11:00am and didn't leave our hostel until around 12:30pm. Our intention was to visit a bunch of sites today, but that didn't happen.
On our way to the first site, I was approached by a young boy of about 12 who was pointing down at my feet. I, naturally, looked down at where he was pointing and suddenly I found the kid kneeling down at my feet trying to glue a part of my shoe back into place. I told him repeatedly "no" and began walking away, when Patty said "why not?" and asked the boy how much it would be. I still wasn't convinced, but was persuaded to step out of my shoes and into some sandals the boy was carrying. The first boy was joined by another kid and for a second I got the image of these kids running off with my shoes. Thankfully, they did not.
The second boy started cleaning one shoe and the first boy was trying to figure out how to glue a part of my shoe back into place. Unfortunately, my shoes have pretty much always been like that, which I think is due to a design flaw rather than anything else, so there was no really good way to glue the parts back down. Instead, he got it in his head that he was going to sow the pieces back down. Awesome. I half-heartedly tried to get him to stop a couple of times, but he was determined. At this point it was very clear the kids were going to expect more than the $1 they had originally asked for, so I was getting pretty feisty. When he was done, my one shoe looked like the Frankenstein monster, with scraggly sowing lines going in all directions. It's now known as The Frankenshoe.
So, of course, when the kids were done they asked for more than the $1 we had originally agreed upon. I was visibly annoyed by this time and tried shoving $2 into his hand, but he wouldn't take it. So I just started walking away. I gave the money to Patty and she seemed to make things better with the kids. It was a very annoying experience: not only did I not want them to do anything to my shoes in the first place, they actually managed to make them look worse than they already did. I did not think this was even possible.
I was in a pretty crabby mood after this and was annoyed that Patty had persuaded me into agreeing to it. So Patty and I walked in silence to our first site. When we got there it was closed for lunch. We started walking toward the second site, when it started raining slightly and Patty was concerned our painting, which we were carrying with us (packaged up) would get wet. So instead of heading to the second site, we went in the direction of the post office.
Patty and I still weren't really talking at this point, so once we got to the post office, Patty went inside and I waited outside reading the Lonely Planet. Patty ended up paying over $30 to ship the stupid painting home, which is a complete rip-off, considering it weighs practically nothing. I sent over 8 kg home for that much from Hong Kong, although Patty had sent the painting home by air, rather than by ship.
We then picked out a restaurant from the Lonely Planet to have lunch at and headed there. The walk took about 30 minutes, but we were seated immediately and our food came soon after. The restaurant was a real hole in the wall, but the food, which was a kind of mix between a noodle and beef soup and stir fry, was amazing. Here's a pic:
After our lunch, we spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around shops, again, mostly in silence. Finally, we had had enough of being annoyed over something so stupid, and we decided to sort out our differences. So, naturally, we threw down our gloves and went at it.
After I tapped out (by arm bar), we decided to head back to the hotel for a couple minutes to change, before leaving again for dinner. We went to a restaurant called "Lean and Green", which advertises itself as a vegetarian restaurant even though it's menu clearly has plenty of non-vegetarian dishes. Very odd. Anyway, our dinner was really good. The egg fried rice (not in the picture) and garlic fried eggplant (on the right) were absolutely spectacular. Here's a pic:
We once again wandered through the shops in the Old Quarter before a couple dresses in a window caught Patty's eye. She went inside and proceeded to peruse the wares. The shop was really hot inside for some reason, so I decided to just wait outside. Apparently while I was waiting outside, the worker in the shop didn't treat Patty very respectfully and she was pretty upset when she left. I guess Patty had spoken to her a couple times and she completely ignored her. We started walking home, when Patty insisted we go back to give the worker a piece of her mind. I wasn't really sure what to think of this, but it was clear Patty had been strongly affected by how this girl had treated her, so I didn't object. On the way back to the shop, Patty stopped a couple of times to rethink the point of her going to talk to the girl. In the end, she decided that she had never really stood up for herself like this before and that now would be a good time to start.
I didn't enter the shop with Patty, although I observed from the window. I just saw the girl nodding, but other than that she hardly moved a muscle. When Patty came out she said that it was one of the weirdest experiences of her life. I guess she had told the worker that she made her feel very disrespected and unwelcome, and that she should be nicer to people. In response, the worker simply said "OK, thank you for the experience" with apparently no facial expression. Neither of us were sure what to make of that. Maybe she's a psychopath? Hopefully not. I wasn't checking to see whether she followed us home...
Tomorrow we have our sights set on the Women's Museum. Hopefully we make it there!
Good night!
Bad days happen! And you are learning from your mistakes! I hope today went better for you guys! As always, I enjoy reading your stories, I laugh sometimes picturing you in the odd situations! My parents went to Vietnam a few years ago and they loved it. They found the north and the south to be very different, including food-wise. Have a great time there!
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Anne-Sophie