Plans

It's been almost two weeks since Ryan left and even though I've been really busy with IIE and teaching at Language Link I've been missing him a lot. Fortunately, time is moving quite quickly and before I know it my contract will be finished and I will begin traveling! My best friend, Noelice, bought her ticket to come out to Vietnam from May 23rd to the 30th. I'm so thrilled to see her and to show her around Hanoi and see some other parts of Vietnam that I haven't experienced yet.

The day after she leaves my brother is flying in and we'll do some more touring for two weeks in Vietnam and Cambodia.

After he leaves I will move onto Thailand and spend another two weeks or so traveling by myself. It will be the first time that I've ever traveled on my own, so I'm really excited about that.

The early bird gets the worm

This morning I gave a presentation on American social customs at IIE to Vietnamese students planning on studying in the United States. I had a ton of fun doing the research for the presentation.

I discussed topics such as: diversity, religion, friendship, dating, forms of address, tipping, table manners, and common stereotypes. I emphasized several times that they should never assume what they see on MTV or in American movies to be true for all (if any) Americans because that is all they have to base their ideas on about what we're like. We don't all live in The Hills, we don't all carry guns, and we're not all loud, belligerent ignoramuses. In the presentation I also stressed American values like punctuality, responsibility, initiative, good sportsmanship, honesty (as opposed to saving face) and discipline.

Afterwards, we had a discussion on America as a "melting pot", American idealism as well as our tendency towards materialism.

Overall, it went really well. It was exactly the kind of presentation that they were expecting and I was able to answer all of their questions.

The straw that broke the camel's back

I had just decided that I was going to stick it out for my last two months at my apartment because, as Ryan pointed out to me, I'm going to be working two jobs and it might be a bit stressful to move at the same time. I mean, I've dealt with everything for the past ten months...what's another two? However, today presented a new annoyance and that is what made me change my mind.

Last night I bought some yogurt (four little cups), a box of granola and some bananas so I could have them for my breakfast this morning. This morning I opened one of the cups of yogurt, opened the box of granola and put it in the fridge (so ants wouldn't get to it) and opened my package of bananas and left those on top of the fridge. I ate my breakfast, showered and went to work at IIE.

After work I got some lunch at an Uzbek restaurant, paid my rent for my motorbike, got it tuned up and came back home. I wanted to make myself some coffee so I opened my fridge only to find that my bananas had been placed inside (no big deal), and my box of granola was completely open and that I only had two yogurt cups left! One of the cleaning ladies ate one of my yogurts and possibly some of my granola too! Granted, it's only yogurt and it's only granola, but it's MY yogurt and MY granola and they ate them! I stormed downstairs and tried to explain to my landlady what had happened, but she barely understands English so she just kind of waved it off.

Immediately I went on the New Hanoian (an expat community website for people living in Hanoi) to go through some of the responses to the posting I had put up last week and called one of them and set up an appointment to see the apartment within an hour.

The apartment is, ironically, around the corner from where Ryan used to live. It's actually more like a room in someone's home. The couple who owns the home have two children studying at university in Canada and one of them happened to be there and was able to answer all of my questions. It's $200 which is $130 less than what I pay now and it's closer to Language Link. I told them that I would begin to move in next Thursday.

I felt so great leaving that place knowing that I won't have to live in my crappy guesthouse another month! As soon as I got home I started cleaning, throwing things away, and grabbing books, dvds and clothes to give out to people at work.

The only downfall is that I won't be down the street from my favorite pho place anymore, but I think that I can deal.

My new job

I started my new job this morning at the Institute of International Education. I wanted to wait until after Ryan had left before I started the position. My supervisor, Linh, is on maternity leave so I am filling in for her as the site's advisor in the morning, and another intern, Tram, works as an advisor in the afternoons. I've been interning there since September, but this is an actual paid position. So far what I have been doing at IIE is editing student's Statement of Purposes (SOPs) for their admission applications for undergrad and graduate study in the United States, giving presentations on the US university system and American culture, and assisting with the two college fairs that they held in October and in February. In addition to those tasks, I will be directly advising students at the IIE office from 8:30 to noon Monday-Friday. It's pretty awesome because this is exactly the type of thing that I'd like to be doing.

When I got in this morning I sat at Linh's desk and I realized that I had no idea what I had to do. She gave me a half hour overview of what she does a few weeks ago, but that really wasn't enough. One student came in and I answered some of her questions about MBA programs and scholarships and then quickly ushered her to the library where she could find the answers to the questions I didn't know. Besides that, I began to compile a list of available scholarships for Vietnamese/International students because I noticed on Linh's computer that the most recent list was created in 2006. That took me a few hours and I still have a lot more research to do tomorrow.

After I left the center I ate some com binh dan for lunch and went home. Since I live right down the street from the Ho Chi Minh museum I went for a walk around the complex. I've begun to agree with my students about the size of my waistline (something that has been pointed out to me at least four or five times), so I will start to make this part of my daily routine.

See you later alligator!

I met Ryan nine months ago. Ben, his room mate and my co-worker, had taken both Mikka and I on the back of his motorbike to his house so we could pick up Ryan and head to some weird Russian restaurant. From their house Mikka rode on the back of Ben’s motorbike, and I rode with Ryan.

We chatted a bit while at the restaurant, but it wasn’t until a week later when we met again, at Chim Sao restaurant, that we really got to talking. I told him that I needed to learn how to ride a motorbike and he so graciously offered to teach me.

The next day Mikka and I met Ryan for lunch and that afternoon Ryan and I drove around and he taught me how to ride a motorbike. In the evening we went to the guy who he rented his bike from and picked one up for myself. A few weeks later we started dating and the rest is history.

We’ve gone on so many adventures together around Hanoi, in Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore. He’s been my partner in crime.

This afternoon we took a taxi to the airport to say goodbye because Ryan is returning to the US to continue on his own adventures. We will see each other again in the Summer, but it was still very difficult to let go because he’s been such an integral part of Vietnam for me and I’m going to miss him tremendously.

As I was returning to the city from the airport, blotting my eyes and blowing my nose, I couldn’t help but remember the first time I took this trip when I arrived in Vietnam last May. I had no idea what was in store for me in my new place and I certainly didn't expect to fall in love with some guy from Colorado. Even though from the very beginning Ryan and I knew that our relationship would hit this crossroad and we knew it would suck I still would have never changed a thing about these past nine months and I'm grateful to have been able to spend this much time in Vietnam together.

If I could I would make a video documenting our time together, but my six-year old laptop doesn’t have the technological capabilities to do so. If I could make a video, I may have a song playing in the background…probably “I’ll be here in the morning” by Townes Van Zandt, or "You're gonna make me lonesome when you go" by Bob Dylan. In my video I would most likely use these pictures:

I love you Ryan and I'm missing you!

My humble abode

Almost ten months ago when I arrived in Vietnam I initially stayed in a hotel in the Old Quarter and all I wanted to do was find a place where I could put all of my things away. I had been living out of my bags for almost three weeks. When I found the apartment/guesthouse where I am currently living I felt relieved. Now I am itching to get out of here and find another apartment. I have realized that I have been too tolerant for too long. For the past six months I kept saying that I'm going to move, but I couldn't get myself to do it because the landlord, Dung, is so nice. Here are some of my issues:

• There are women who clean my clothes for me, which is nice I guess, but they have lost a few of my items.
• The building is old and constantly feels damp, so my clothes have gained a mildewy smell.
• The pipe running from the fourth floor (right above mine) in my wall behind my bed broke, so my whole wall was wet and started to grow mold all over it.
• If I want to come home later than 11pm, I have to wake up my landlord to have him put my motorbike away inside the building.
• I pay more than Ryan for my little room while he has access to an entire house.
• Sometimes my internet doesn't work.
• My refrigerator leaks water.
• My landlords keep changing the women who come to clean the guesthouse and it's kind of seedy.
• I have termites infiltrating almost every wooden object of my apartment and I can hear them gnawing in the middle of the night.
• Sometimes the paint in my bathroom chips into my shower and on the shelf above my sink.

So you can see why I've been a little annoyed and I think I will move out of here, hopefully, before I have to pay April's rent.

Tet Holiday Trip Pt 4 - Kota Bahru, Malaysia

Ryan and I arrived in Kota Bahru in the morning and took a taxi to the center of town to find a hotel. The taxi drive dropped us off in front of a hotel that probably paid him to drop people off, but when we went inside and looked at the room we realized immediately that this wasn't for us and left. We wandered around the town for a bit looking for places that we had seen in our tour book. Finally, we arrived at Zeck's Traveller's Inn and booked a room for a night. We took a really long nap because (at least for me) it was difficult to sleep on the overnight train.

There really isn't too much to do in Kota Bahru and usually people stay here for a day before they head to the Perhentian Islands. Since we didn't have enough time to go to the islands and still make it back in time to go to the Batu Caves and back to Kuala Lumpur, we only stayed in KB for two days and one night.

Kota Bahru is the capital of Kelantan - the Islamic state of Malaysia. It's a slow moving and conservative sort of town. Almost all of the women in the town wore the hijab or some other type of head covering. The Kelantan government wanted to put into place Shariah law which would have made separate sex everything - from bus stops to lines at the supermarket, but it never passed.

Ryan and I walked around the town and found something to eat. By the time we were finished it was around 4:30pm and at this time all of the museums or anything of interest were closing, so we just walked around some more and returned to our hostel.

That evening Zeck and his wife told us that we should go to the night food market for dinner. This is a place where lots of locals come to get some grub. People set up little stands serving all sorts of local food, you find what you like and you sit at a table. The tables are "owned" by the people who run the beverage stands, so wherever you sit dictates where you will get your drink. Someone then comes by and takes your drink order and provides you with utensils for your food.

I ate Nasi Kerabu - a blue rice sort of dish with fish and coconut. Ryan had Nasi Kuning - a yellow rice with some sweet/spicy chicken. Everything was absolutely delicious!


The next morning we bought some bus tickets to get a ride back to Kuala Lumpur that evening.

I had read that there were a lot of Batik shops in Kota Bahru and I wanted to find them and perhaps purchase some items. We took a bus towards the beach, about 15 minutes outside of town and near to where all of these shops are clustered. Once there we found a few shops and as we perused them Ryan and I both came to realize that batik (at least the stuff they were selling) is actually kind of ugly. Also, their products were imported from Indonesia, so that was disappointing.

We started to walk back towards the town, found a bus stop and waited. As we were walking to the bus stop we heard the call to prayer from a loudspeaker at a nearby mosque.

Once back in town we ate lunch at McDonald's. I know, I know. Besides the ice cream we ate at McD's in Kuala Lumpur, I haven't eaten at a McDonald's in almost two years. Normally I'm very against eating at one of these fast food joints, but it was there and we were somehow craving it. Afterwards, though, we said we would never eat there again....except for the ice cream when we returned to KL.

Later that evening Zeck took us to the big bus station in town and off we went on an overnight bus back to KL.

Trapped

Yesterday I was trapped in an elevator at Vincom towers and I had to climb out. Here's what happened:

Ryan went to park the motorbike in the parking garage and he asked me to go up to the movie theater on the 6th floor to buy tickets because we were running a little late. I waited in front of the elevators in the garage with about fifteen other people. When the doors opened up we all crammed inside. Someone pushed a button to go up and instead the elevator dropped....twice.

I started to panic. I started to feel hot and the room began to spin. I was murmuring under my breath "open the door". There was a child in the back of the elevator that began to whimper and I felt the same way he did. A man pushed the emergency button and spoke to someone through the speaker.

Finally after 5 minutes an emergency guy opened the door from the outside and we found ourselves between two floors. We then all climbed out and I immediately called Ryan to tell him what happened. In the time that I was stuck in the elevator he had gone to another one and was waiting for me on the 6th floor.

Tet Holiday Trip Pt 3 - Singapore

Ryan and I took a five hour bus ride from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore. We were so excited and bouncy to be on our way. We were only on the road for 10 minutes when a man a few seats behind us threw up all over the floor. Great.

Four hours and fifty minutes later we arrived in Singapore. We walked to our hostel, The Hive, in "Little India" and got settled in.

If we thought Kuala Lumpur was clean...Singapore was much, much cleaner! The people were just as friendly as in KL, everyone spoke English, and everything seemed to move so efficiently.

On our way to dinner that evening we passed a Hindu temple that had some sort of ceremony going on. Because I didn't feel as if I was dressed properly enough, we didn't go inside to catch a real glimpse of what was going on.

We ate some dosas at a restaurant called Dosa Corner and wandered a bit around Serangoon Road.

The next morning Ryan and I walked around Little India moving in an out of shops. It felt a little strange and familiar at the same time to be there because it reminded me so much of the real India...minus the grime and poverty.

As we walked around we came across this gorgeous mosque.


From Little India we made our way to Chinatown to get lunch at a hawker stall and do some shopping. While the prices in Singapore are cheaper than those in the United States, things are much more expensive than in Vietnam or Malaysia.

Because we were there during the Chinese New Year the city was filled with decorations.

A Hindu temple, a mosque, Chinese New Year decorations...again, like in KL, I loved the multi-cultural aspect of Singapore.

Singapore has an incredible transportation system. It's clean, fast, on time, and easy to navigate. From Chinatown we took the subway to the colonial part of the city only to end up at a shopping mall (the Raffles Place station lets you out in front of a mall). Ryan and I really had no intention of going to a mall that evening, but we ended up spending several hours there - walking, eating, and just wandering around.

Initially, we had only planned on staying in Singapore for two nights, but since we didn't feel as if we would get to see everything that we wanted, we decided to tack on one more night.

The next day Ryan and I went to Tanjung Pagar Railway station to buy our tickets for the following day to Kota Bahru - a Malaysian city in the Islamic state of Kelantan.

The train station is probably one of the oldest buildings in Singapore and it was only built in 1932. Government officials are considering knocking it down, like most of the other older structures, to probably put up another shopping mall, hotel or another high rise office building.

After buying our tickets Ryan and I decided to split up and go our separate ways for a few hours. I was more interested in going to the Asian Civilisations Museum while he was more keen on going to the Singapore Art Museum. On my way to the ACM I came across this statue of Sir Thomas Stamford Bingley Raffles on the Singapore river.

The ACM museum was filled with the history and artifacts of many of the Asian cultures that are represented in Singapore today: Indian, Chinese, Thai, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Cambodian and Malay. It was really cool because the museum was also designed for children, so there were lots of hands on exhibits as well.

Ryan and I met up again at a Starbucks and decided that we were going to see a movie that evening. The only movie playing that was of any interest to either of us was, "Inkheart". Not bad, not great. I'm not a big fan of Brendan Fraser anyway.
(Note to self: Next time you go to a movie theater in Singapore, bring a coat!)

On our last day in Singapore Ryan and I wanted to see the famous Singapore Merlion at the marina.


After we took our pictures here, we headed back onto the subway to Arab street for a Middle Eastern lunch.

We returned to our hostel, grabbed our bags, hopped on a bus, and arrived at the railway station. We got on an overnight train back into Malaysia and onto Kota Bahru.

Just passing through...

I have been feeling a bit sad lately. I've realized over the past couple of weeks that I couldn't do this job for longer than a year. It has absolutely nothing to do with teaching because I enjoy teaching. What I really can't take is that this sort of job and lifestyle is so transitory. You meet people one day and then they're gone the next.

Ryan is leaving in two and a half weeks to go back to the U.S., my friend Mikka and her boyfriend are in their last week at Language Link, and my friend Amalia's contract is up in the beginning of April. I don't finish until May 25th.

I knew that before I came here I would meet many people along the way who would inspire me and touch me in some way - and I have, but I forgot that eventually we will all have to say goodbye.