It's the start of week 10 for me - almost 2.5 months in Hanoi. Crazy how time flies, and yet - sometimes it feels longer. Good longer - productive longer - but ... longer. Definitely still suffering from the occasional bout of homesickness, but it's getting a bit better as I meet more people and keep trying new things.
So let's see ... the past two weeks ...
Let's start by highlighting how I've been working my ASS off. Not even kidding. 1 week in Jakarta working 12-14 hour days, followed by last week working 10-12 hour days. Let's just say - it was misery. I'm back down to 9-10 hour days ... I can live with that.
I realize that's not the scintillating stuff you're here to read, so how about ...
I've made friends! Like, real, honest to god friends! I met Nathalie (from California), Lamonte (from Georgia) and their daughter Monae through David and Julienne and have hung out with them several times. They're really great people - totally relaxed and welcoming. Through Nathalie and Lamonte, I met Dharaka and Damien ... another couple, from Northern England (crazy accents - brilliant as the Brits would say).
Yes, both are couples, but ... as I was explaining to Dugs last night ... it takes one set of friends to introduce you to another and then they bring their friends and then it's all one big friendly group of friends (that's an excessive use of the word friends ... friendsfriendsfriendsfriendsfriends). Plus, Damien's a doctor for International SOS - so maybe he has hot single doctor friends? Fingers crossed!
Oh my god, I found the Vietnamese version of Costco. And it was epic. Was introduced to Metro by Nathalie and Lamonte who swore that it's THE place to buy things in bulk - including fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, dairy, etc. We went Saturday afternoon and I promptly plopped down $200 for 4 lbs of ground beef, some noodles, fruit, speakers for my laptop, fresh fruit, veggies, a rechargeable fan (evidently power outages are common here in the summer, so a rechargeable fan is a MUST), some toiletries, yadda yadda. Was so pumped to get home and enjoy the amazingness that I heard was Metro food products ...
... and was sorely disappointed last night when I realized the ground beef had to have been at least 50% fat - the fan is noisy as all get out - and the fruit is mushy.
Oh well - still a good place to stock up on toilet paper. And you never really can have enough toilet paper.
All in all, it's been a productive few weeks. Still missing family and friends and still HOPING someone (or all of you) takes me up on my open door policy, but until then .... catch ya on the flip side!
And of course - some pics!!!
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| Guess he just really needed a smoke ... out on the ledge ... of his three-story office building. Huh. |
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| I found the keymaster. |
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| Make shift barber shop on my street. |
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| Jakarta. |
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| My building in Hanoi |
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| Lobby of hotel in Jakarta (you're likely noticing that I don't have any pics of the actual city of Jakarta ... right - because I only saw my hotel, and the streets to and from my office from a taxi. RRRRRiiiiiiiggggggghhhhhhhtttttt.) |
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| Sunset over the lake. |
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| My creation! |
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| Found at a bar on Friday night. Amazing! I like #7! |
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| Metro (aka Costco) |
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| Sunday in the park ... |
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| No one needs this much garlic, but for $1.25 a bag, you'd totally buy it too. |
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