4 Months Later

So yes I realize I have been doing a horrible job of keeping up with my blog. There just really hasn't been anything to say. Now something finally has happened so I decided an update was necessary. I had my one week vacation last week and met up with my friends Chris and Renee in Vietnam which is a place I have always wanted to go. I was extremely nervous and spent the whole week beforehand on the verge of a panic attack. I am so glad I went, though, it is one of the most beautiful countries I have ever been in.
The first is me on the bus ready to attempt sleep the second is the beds on the bus and the third is the monsoon in my first couple of hours in Saigon. The whole street flooded.
We will start with day one which was last Saturday. I arrived in Vietnam around 2pm and Chris picked me up at the airport. I got to experience some more wonderful Asian cab driving skills on the way to our hostel. We only stayed in the hostel for a few hours before we hopped on something called a "sleeper bus" which is a bus that has beds instead of seats. We decided to sit in the back which was a big mistake because every time we went over a pothole or bump we flew about 5 feet into the air off of our beds. It was about a 12 hour drive from Ho Chi Minh to Nha Trang.


Sunday Monday and Tuesday were spent in Nha Trang lounging on the beach. It was beautiful and the perfect relaxing vacation spot. Renee and I also went parasailing which was really fun. I couldnt take any pictures from the sky because I was afraid of dropping my camera but Chris took a few pictures for us.

Tuesday night we flew into Hanoi for our tour the next day. We left Hanoi at 830 Wednesday morning. We met up with about 15 other backpackers and rode in a bus for a few hours. We were going on a tour of Halong Bay which has like a billion islands on it. A lot of tour groups take trips around the bay in boats and explore the islands so that is what we decided to do. We spent the night on a "junk" which looked like a pirate ship. We went kayaking to a floating village, went to a cave, and I jumped off of the roof of the boat (about 3 stories high) and almost peed my pants from fear. The next day we went on a hike up a mountain and then went to a place called Monkey Island where we stayed in bungalos on the beach. We went night swimming and saw monkeys. We stayed there until Friday when we got on several boats and buses to get us back to the city. I went souvenier shopping for about an hour then headed to the airport. I must say I really enjoyed my trip and Vietnam may be my favorite country I have visited so far. It is beautiful and the people are all really nice. It is a pretty popular spot for people to visit and we met a lot of cool people from Australia, America, Barcelona, Israel, and Holland. I am going to have to backpack around like Chris and Renee when I finish in Korea it is pretty awesome.

Christmas, snow, and Jorge

This is me in the snow... I stupidly decided to go grocery shopping and on the walk back almost fell on my butt. Snow is very slippery.

This is me and Renee... I had to wait for the opportune moment for this one. Funniest picture ever. The thing on my head is my husky hat. I have matching mittens. Animal hats are very popular here.

This is Jorge the minature snowman. Our fingers were frozen, but Daniel and I managed to create him out of a little snow, some sticks, and some coins I found in my pocket. Much harder to make than on t.v. He also has Soju bottles because he is a Korean themed snowman. :D

Since my last update I have experienced snow quite often and am starting to like it. Its not that cold, it is just the wind that is bad. Christmas was kind of a nonevent because we all had to work; a good portion of the people here are Buddhist and therefore dont celebrate which means their kids still show up at school :( I woke up to a text message from Renee, went over to her apartment in my pajamas and she, Chris, Daniel, and I exchanged/opened presents. One of our presents being reindeer antlers for me and Renee, and Santa hats for Chris and Daniel. I also was given a scarf and mittens which were Christmas themed and had bells. They jingled everytime I moved much to peoples dismay... I kind of waved my hands a lot cause it was funny. We went to work and had a little Christmas party in the staff room with music playing from our boss' computer, it was nice. I was given presents by my kids and we had a little party of our own. Then I came home and went to bed. Pretty uneventful but still nice. The week before we had a Christmas baking, movie, eggnog party at Renee's house and snuck to the roof across the street to build a snow man. All in all a happy Christmas. Gerald the bunny now likes me, he follows me around, gives me kisses, and comes when I call him. There is speculation, however, that he is only trying to get my guard down for his next attack. We had to work on New Years too, otherwise I would have gone into the city to hang out with Caroline. She and her friends were in Seoul for the holidays. Oh well, we went to a nearby bigger city after work and celebrated there. Again very low key nothing big. I thought the holidays would be kind of miserable here without family, and of course they werent as wonderful as they were at home, but surrounded by friends was a good way to celebrate. YAY 2010!

Let it snow

This is the snow video. It was just flurries, but I still found it necessary to run outside the restaurant and run around like a crazy person. After laughing at me my friends followed and thus the video. In case you dont get it, the song is my snow version of the song sung by Buddy to his dad in Elf. Im not crazy I promise. :D

Ajuma

I dressed up as an ajuma for halloween (an older Korean lady) and went trick or treating. I was laughed at by a Korean man in the elevator but I think he was just jealous of my outfit.

Introducing Mortimer

My failed attempt to get Mortimer's awesomeness on film

Going to get Mortimer

Not really sure why I made this one, but it was supposed to show how scary it is to ride in a taxi in Korea. It didnt, but it is kind of amusing anyway.

My classroom

This is a very exciting video about my classroom. Try to contain yourself.