Family Display

My family is at the beach - Nha Trang - and I am finishing up my last day of school, then flying to meet them today at 5:00. I hear it was sunny yesterday, but rainy today. I wish you could guarantee the weather when you are a travel agent for your family!

I know it's a cliche, but it truly does feel like the school clock goes backwards on the day before vacation...

The kids came to school with me on Wednesday and all three of them were huge hits. In fact, some seventh grade girls will probably give me the silent treatment for a while because they were not asked to take Megan around school. The energy surrounding the kids wherever they went was pulsating. Perhaps the most pulsating moment, however, was at lunch.

Devon had told me at breakfast that he "didn't feel well." I bought them all lunch in the cafeteria - a pretty safe grilled chicken plate - and at the end of lunch, he came up to me and said, quite diplomatically, "Aunt Marjie, I don't feel very good. Where should I go?" I took this to mean that he was about to throw up and I looked around to problem-solve this when... he did it. He threw up in front of half of the school.

To Devon's credit, he laughed about it the whole way through. He said something like, "I really know how to make a first impresssion, don't I?" And his display didn't even defer an eight grade girl from asking him to the winter dance for tonight (too bad, he can't go). We got him a t-shirt from the PE Department and he sat down in the lobby for most of the rest of the day while Megan and Nolan played dodgeball and took science tests. (Shared with permission from Devon.)

That same day, my mom, dad, Angie and Lewis took a taxi in a downpour (they got to see the flooding right outside the school) to meet us at the end of the day. My students were especially excited to meet my mom, who made them cookies as motivation for a school-wide reading competition (that my 6th graders ended up winning). She also chooses the best table names for groups each month. They were late because of the rain, but my students stayed in my classroom an extra 15 minutes just to meet everyone. I'm so glad my family got to see it all - rain, flooding students, etc. Because it's really hard to explain it all.

When my mom was ready to get on the bus the other night, she said, "I'm looking forward to the beach, but I hate to leave your neighborhood." This is how we feel all the time. My whole family is now quite tight with T and T - Nolan had a specific vision to make some shorts with a neon green stripe down the side, and Thuy rode her motorbike all over Saigon to find that neon green material. I'm sure that after Nolan's fashion hits the streets of Saigon, even more people will be wanting to touch him. But they turned in clothes to be made by my expert tailor at the top of district one, as well as Sweet Seamstress (who is making Nolan's design dreams into reality) nextdoor.

It will be really nice to come back and have my whole family at the castle for a few days before we all take off to Hanoi/Halong Bay on Christmas Day. I haven't really felt myself until just a few days ago - that Dengue was really awful - so I'm looking forward to giving my family a rightful tour of all the food outside my door that I love so much.

Stay tuned for more kid updates when we return next week (and Merry Christmas)!

A Minute with Marjie

I could spend hours writing about how much fun it is to have my family here, but that will have to wait... the one thing we have all been laughing about is how much attention Nolan is getting from everyone. Everyone wants to touch him - whether it's to stroke his cheek or pat his bottom or just look at him with googley eyes and point him out to everyone who passes.

I took everyone to my Singaporean restaurant tonight and our waiter, who was male, could not keep from touching his cheek - over and over. He brought about ten of the staff over and pointed at Nolan. They all wanted to know how old he was and would he come back soon? It was beginning to get a little bit creepy how much attention they were lavishing on him. Nolan is pretty much unfazed about most things and he just kept poking his food with a chopstick and dropping it into his mouth, much to the entertainment of the entire wait staff.

We are wondering how we can make some money off of this Nolan Phenomenon...any ideas?

Guest Blogger #4 Carol Bowker, Ageless

Greetings from Ho Chi Minh City! Has it really been only four days? It seems like we have had a life time of experiences. When we first arrived Marjie was still in the hospital. Her friend, Sharon, took us to see her first thing. She was weak, tired, and covered in a red rash, but had a promise of release the following day. She gave us Vietnamese money, a phone, and a map and told us to go have some adventures. That we did!

We followed the map (carefully) to Thuy and Thanh's fabric stand. They greeted us warmly and told us to come back at 1:00 when their stand closed. We did and asked them to show us Marjie's favorite pho stand. They said "no;" they had fixed chicken soup for us to "keep us well." We were invited into their home which is behind their fabric stand and served delicious soup and an orange drink. When we tried to thank them, Thuy said "no." Then she pointed to her heart and said we were "one family." It was very touching. Marjie was quite surprised about the lunch; she has only eaten there once, and that was during Tet. Since that time we have seem them quite often. Yesterday they took John and me shopping at the morning market for ingredients for lettuce wraps, hot pot, and deep fried spring rolls, which they cooked for us that afternoon. Everything was delicious.

John and I also had the experience of being cheated by a pedi cab driver. We had taken a taxi to see the Reunification Palace (where President Thieu was taken by helicopter from the roof) and were trying to catch one to return to our hotel. A pedi cab driver just wouldn't take no for an answer. He kept saying "one dollar, one dollar," and practically pushed us into the cabs. Well, it WAS fun. At the end however, when John took out his wallet to pay, the driver's nimble fingers grabbed bills from the wallet and off he went leaving us with blank looks and mouths open. We think he got about $30. We learned.

Marjie is feeling better. She went back to work today; we are at the castle now waiting to hear how her day went. She is planning to take the kids to school with her on Wednesday. Another experience!

Guest Blogger #3, Megan Griggs, Age 14

What was my first impression when I walked out of the airport and got into a mad man's taxi cab? "WOW" I was astounded and excited! The taxi ride was even better then Splash Mountain in Disneyland. It was a thriller experience. We drove on the wrong side of the road and almost ran over a dozen people on their motorbikes. We were trying to get to our hotel that is located about two minutes walk from Marjie's place.

This morning we got a magnificent tour of the market place where we bought huge amounts of food for paying almost nothing at all. As we walked though the alley ways of the market I felt like I was a member of the Cullen family in the series of Twilight. Every eye seemed to be fixed on us as we strolled along trying to mind our own buisness.... Awkward!

Grandma, Grandpa and I all tried some really good chicken noodle soup for breakfast this morning. They gave us a huge bowl with lots of noodles, chicken and all that jazz but then they gave us chop-sticks... "Great! This ought to be fun!" I said to myself. I attempted to use the utensils that were given to me only to hear everybody around the tiny little stand laughing. I had no idea how to use them! At home all that I would do is spear the meat or whatever we were eating with the chop-stick and it seemed to work pretty well, but my plan didn't succeed with noodles, trust me it doesn't work.

I also got to go to the Bum Bum, it is amazing! Some of the stuff that they did to my face kinda tickled, but it was definitely refreshing. Now my toes have been painted pink, my hair is straightened, and my face has been lushusly moisterized, what a treat! To sum up what I have seen so far, Vietnam is unique, delicious, and hot.

Guest Blogger #2, Devon Griggs, Age 16

Our first Ho Chi Minh City experience involved a taxi ride. Now I've never been to New York, but I can imagine that a HCMC taxi ride is a step up from from an NYC taxi ride. Passing on the right with oncoming traffic is something I'd do in a videogame without a care, but in real life it is quite thrilling.

We made it to the hotel at about midnight or so, HCMC time. I counted one Christmas tree and eleven motorikes sitting in the lobby, and little open floor space. There are motorbikes everywhere! On the streets, in the alleys, in the lobbies, in the family rooms; one must be above the ground level to be away from them. Which reminds me, most buildings here are four plus stories tall, with twleve foot wide alleys in between. The markets are in the alleys, making the walkways even narrower, and what's more, the streets and alleys are teeming with people!

I feel tall here. There are an estimated six million people or so in this city, which is really a lot of people. I'm fairly sure that all of King County back at home doesn't even have two million people, for some comparison. Anyway, Pike Place Market in Seattle is high class compared to the alley market here, and Seattle is just a toddler of a city on the world scale, I have now learned. HCMC, however, is not quite entirely unlike home. Life has been good here so far, the sky is blue, and I'm looking forward to the rest of the time here in Nam.

Guest Blogger, Nolan Griggs, Age 12

I just had the best yogurt in the world. My first thinking of Vietnam was...''so hot, so muggy, so humid.'' Every thing is so cheap. But not cheap in a bad way at all. SWEET SOUR SALTY SPICY CRUNCHY is quite right. It is 1 dollar to 18000 dong. For a coffee it is 30 cents. For a bowl of pho it is 60 cents. SO CHEAP!!!!!! the food is not normal but is still vvvery tasty.

Within the 2 Meter Thick Walls of the Citadel

*This post was written just hours before I got really sick with Dengue Fever and had to spend the week in the hospital. My parents arrived and have been impressively independent - they have already been treated to lunch at T and T's house and have been out in the hood for two days straight. I don't think they even need me...


I'm writing about Hue backwards...today I've posted pictures of the citadel, which we saw when we first arrived. The view from the train between Danang and Hue was breathtaking, just as we had heard it would be (if only the windows of our sleeper train didn't have an inch of dirt on them!). But the ride along the coast and through the foggy hills was a highlight for both of us.


We arrived in Hue at 4:00 and went straight to the citadel. The air inside the 2m thick walls was so pleasant and breezy and so absent of motorbikes, it felt like heaven. This place, however, is the setting for where "When Heaven and Earth Changed Places" - the name of the famous book that was made into a movie by Oliver Stone. I am going to quote the Lonely Planet's descrption of what took place here because I am too lazy to summarize it myself...

"Hue was the sight of the bloodiest battles of the 1968 Tet Offensive and was the only city to be held by the Communists for more than a few days. While the American command was concentrating its energies on Khe Sanh, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops skirted the American stronghold and walked right into Hue. Immediately on taking the city, political cadres implemented detailed plans to remove Hue's "uncooperative elements." Thousands of people were rounded up in house to house searches, conducted according to lists of names meticulously prepared months before.

During the 3 and 1/2 weeks that Hue remained under Northern control, over 2500 people - including wealthy merchants, government workers, monks, priests and intellectuals - were shot, clubbed to death or buried alive. Shallow mass graves were discovered at various spots around the city over the following years.

When the South Vietnamese army units proved unable to dislodge the occupying North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces, General Westmoreland ordered US troops to recapture the city. Over the next few weeks, whole neighborhoods were leveled by VC rockets or US bombs.

Over the next month, most of the area inside the Citadel was battered by the South Vietnamese air force, US artillery and brutal house to house fighting. Approximately 10,000 people died in Hue, including thousands of VC troops, 400 South Vietnamese soldiers and 150 US Marines, but most of those killed were civilians."

So the peace Jessica and I felt there upon our arrival somehow didn't flow with the history of what we were reading. How is it possible that this place saw so much pain? The grounds were so well-kept and absent of any of the city's past. I guess that's what time is supposed to do, isn't it?