On the way to Cambodia

Last visit to Vietnam I didn't start planning travel right at the beginning so I missed some sights I hoped to see. This time around I started scratching things onto the calendar from almost the first day. And so this morning I'm sitting in Than Son Nhat International Airport waiting to board a flight to Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Once there I'll visit the national museum across the street from my hotel. Then Sunday I take a day trip to Angkor Wat. Then back to the hotel for a ride back to the airport and a flight back to Hochiminh City tomorrow evening.

Snow ball's chance in hell...

Around town businesses are busily taking down Christmas decorations and putting up Tet decorations.

Even so there's still plenty of Christmas stuff up. I have to say they really do put effort into putting up a good display and it looks nice. 

I do find it amusing to see all the snow, snowmen and winter time motifs in the displays though. There's not a snowball's chance in hell to see such a thing for real here. December/January is the coolest part of the year. So far the lowest temperature I've been aware of is 80°F.

Ain't gonna be no snowmen here!

air quality -- the pictures

An update to my previous post. Two pictures looking at the BITEXCO Financial Tower taken from locations about a block apart. The one where the tower is barely visible reflects conditions that prevailed for about four days this week.

In the clearer one the air is visibly better. Even so it isn't as clear as when I was here in September.

The bad air - the tower is barely visible

...and the "good air" - different camera at about 1/3 the resolution too!

Air quality...

Sucks!

When I was here before I noticed the air was bad. In the morning it started out okay and through the day it got worse and worse. Some days I could "feel" the air on my skin.

Well that was then, the end of the rainy season, with rain at the end of every day or in the night.

This is the dry season. The temperatures are much more tolerable for me so that's a relief. However without the daily rains, not a drop since I landed a week ago, the air quality is worse.

My own explanation for this is more dust and dirt is kicked up by traffic because it isn't stuck to the ground from being wet. The really fine particles stay in the air longer because there's no rain coming down to wash them out and back onto the ground. And then there's the traffic which is continuing to make its same contribution, wet season or dry.

We talk about alternate fuels in the US. If reliable reasonably priced electric vehicles could be introduced in Vietnam I have no doubt there'd be health benefits realized in short order.

It's the same... only different

Being in Vietnam continues to be a stimulating experience. Everything is familiar and yet everything is a little different.

There's a variety of stores, grocery, electronics, pharmacy, clothing, etc., with all the products that are expected. Take a closer look and the differences start showing in the details.

It dawned on me yesterday as I was getting a splash of Listerene, bought here, for my attack on morning breath that there is no need to squeeze the sides of the cap to get the bottle top off! Apparently there's not much concern for safety or the ability to easily open common health products doesn't create liability for the producer.

Soda and juice cans seem the same size and shape but they're not. Instead of 12 oz, 354.9 ml, they're 320 ml. That is just 1.2 oz shy of normal size in the US. Not enough to be immediately apparent when you're holding the can in your hand.

Escalators go up on the left and down on the right. Something I didn't even realize in the US until a couple of attempts at getting on the wrong escalator here.

Saying "thank you" or in local speak "cảm ơn" isn't expected. As a matter of fact saying it routinely gets odd looks from people its directed at. In the US we'll say thanks when wait staff takes our order, then when they leave drinks, then the starters then the main course and then when the table is cleared. Here it isn't the habit and the wait staff start giving odd looks about the 3rd "cảm ơn". Same holds true for getting some help from the desk clerk or asking assistance in the grocery store.

It feels odd for me not to say it but then it obviously feels odd to hear for those its directed at.

I'm sure there's other things I haven't put my finger on yet. What it all amounts to is everything is the same with just a little different wrinkle to make it feel not quite exactly what you already know.

More food - duck embryo anyone?

My former father-in-law ate fertilized duck eggs. I've forgotten what the believed value of eating the fertilized egg is. However the egg simply being fertilized didn't necessarily make the egg desirable. The more desirable egg had a well defined duck embryo inside!

I can remember seeing him relish eating eggs with a clearly identifiable duckling, head, eyes, bill, webbed feet etc. all clearly visible. The eggs are eaten hard boiled.

Well, I never ate one and neither did any of his other sons in law.

Yesterday Huong took me to a hot pot restaurant. Never seen anything like it before except in a video game my kids had. You order a hot pot with broth which goes into a recess in the counter at your seat. There's a conveyor just beyond that which goes past all the seats in the restaurant, like an airport baggage carousel. On the conveyor are dishes with various ingredients that you pick off and dump into your hot pot to make your own meal. This conveyor had the fertilized duck eggs on it.

I was at the restaurant with my Huong and her oldest daughter. She asked me if I wanted one of the duck eggs and said it is one of her girls' favorites. Before I could think about it there it was in my hot pot. So I ate it. As it turned out mine didn't have a really well formed embryo so there was no visual of a little duckie being eaten. There were lots of veins in the egg and plenty of downy feather filaments though.

Now that I've overcome my reluctance to eat a fertilized egg I may need to try again, and again, until I get an egg with duckling inside. Then I'll know what it's like to eat one of the really desirable eggs.

More Food

I like to try all kinds of food. George Carlin set me off on a quest for the "blue food" ages ago. Like him I still haven't found it but I've come across plenty of mighty tasty things in the search.

Last night I went to a food festival in Hochiminh with my fiancee and her daughters.

Huong broght back to our table some grilled meat on skewers. Turns out one was deer and the other crocodile.

I've had deer before in the US. It's usually a bit gamey and tough. This deer was much the same.

On the other hand the crocodile was tasty. I would definitely enjoy having more. "It tastes like chicken" is often used to describe unfamiliar meats. In the case of crocodile it actually does taste something like chicken. The meat has a texture like beef though. It makes for an enjoyable combination of flavor and texture. I'll be having me some more of that!

And now that I'm back in Vietnam I need to get back on track sampling the unusual meats I didn't get to sample last visit. So still to come cat, rat, snake, cricket (bugs are meat, aren't they?), horse and I'm probably forgetting some.