Mom and I walked around Old Town some more this morning. By the way-they can't get the weather forecast any more accurate than in Portland. The last couple of days have been partly sunny, mid-to upper eighties, with some humidity. It was getting uncomfortable though while we walked through the streets. Pavement and no breeze and no where to just sit and people watch-which I could do for hours.
Mom and I have been real careful not to drink the tap water here or order anything with ice. (we've been drinking beer at most meals so far. And bottled water. tons of bottled water). We have to brush our teeth with bottled water and we're told not to open our mouths in the shower. When someone told me that, I thought, no problem . . . .who opens their mouth in the shower? Well-you know what" Apparently I do . . . .Never realized it before. I've really had to concentrate on not doing it. Also-we're not supposed to eat cut up fruit because the knives used to cut it may have been rinsed in tap water. We have whole fruit in the hotel room that I've rubbed Purell on and then washed with soap and boiled water before cutting up. After all that-i decided it smelled and tasted funny and threw it away anyway. Not sure how much fruit I'll be eating. Maybe it was just the mango-I'll try the Asian pear next. Or one of the other pieces I can't identify.
I did eat some of these tiny bananas i bought off of a woman off the street. Well, really i was more conned into it. A women was carrying these 2 baskets of fruit on a stick carried over her shoulders and as I tried to sneak past here-she literally threw the stick over my shoulder and put her straw hat on my head (gross i know!). She said-take picture! So-i told mom to take my picture-and she did, telling me i was gonna pay for it. So-of course, after the picture was taken, she put bags of bananas and cut up pineapple in my hand. I said no to the pineapple and put it back in the basket. She took it back out and put it in my hand again. This went on for awhile. I asked her how much for the bananas (figured they'd be safe to eat)-and she wanted 50,000dong (about 3 dollars). I told her no way and offered her a dollar (which really is still WAY too much!) and after going back and forth-she agreed to the dollar. It was worth it to get her to leave me alone-which they know and many use that same tactic. Wear you down til you buy something just to get rid of them. So-far the shopping is tiring-dodging the traffic in the street, the heat, feeling guilty when you don't buy something. I bought an awesome purse, but that's it so far.
I decided to spend my last afternoon as a non-mom sitting by the pool, drinking beer and reading a book. I can already tell i got a bit of a sunburn. I thought mom had brought sunblock-but i couldn't find it and she was taking a nap.
Okay- a couple more pics . . .
An intersection near the lake.
A parking lot . .
me holding baskets of fruit with a strange woman's hat on my head . . .
1 comment:
Woo Hoo JM! We're all excited for you! :-)
Post a Comment