Day 16, Summer in Asia ~ From Phnom Penh, Cambodia to Ho Chi Mihn, Vietnam
At 5 am the walkers around Independence Monument were plentiful. There’s a serious commitment to exercise here. At the one end of the plaza a woman had a little weighing station set up. For a fee you could be weighed.
Before 6 am a political rally had already gathered, thousands of people sitting on chairs in white shirts and hats. There’s usually a bit of swirling chaos when thousands of people try to do anything, but not so here. Everyone was so orderly.
At 7 am we were having breakfast one table over from the friendly Entomologist from Baltimore. We had an interesting convo with the young woman from the front desk. We were saying how you don’t see many dogs here. She told us that she has a dog. One day he went off playing with his friend and disappeared for days. She was afraid he was “cook” by the Vietnamese who live here. But after a few days he came back and didn’t want to go outside anymore. She said there aren’t many cats or dogs in Vietnam because they get “cook”.
On an entirely unrelated subject, I will miss all the creative fish designs on the pottery here. I can never get enough of the swirly fish motifs in blue.
I’ll also miss the bed Buddhas.
By 8 am, Kier had found herself a corner to work, within our orderly chaos. Since we are traveling with such small bags, there is always a bit of a mini explosion to get anything out. But everyone is responsible for the own little clothes volcano, and has their own system. So I never touch the piles.
This afternoon we head to the airport to fly to Vietnam. After looking at the options, we decided against going to Wat Phnom, not to sound Wat-snobbish, but we’ve seen so many and this one wasn’t as interesting as some of the others. I’m sure it’s amazing, but we were feeling templed-out for the moment. So we did a unanimous Wat? Nah…
Some mornings you need to do real life stuff like work, blog, continue your Netflix binge, and find a store that sells tampons.
Since Paul was out on one of his epic walks, we asked if he could pick up some tampons. He lives with four women with no option to be squeamish about feminine products. Like many countries we’ve been to, tampons aren’t commonly used so there is little demand for them. When men say, “just use something else.” I compare the request of asking a woman to give up or switch from a favorite product to asking a man to switch his favorite sports teams. Like this, “Do you have the same interchangeable feelings towards the Montreal Canadians as you do your Toronto Maple Leafs? Of course not, that’s a ludicrous request.”
Paul’s training has been boxes of unused items if he buys the wrong thing, so he is a master to detail in this area now. The first grocery store he went to had two aisles of pads and one tiny box of the wrong type of tampons. He figured he’d try a pharmacy. The pharmacies here are often a counter with all the products in the back. This requires a bit of language or lots of hand signals. Hand signals weren’t really an option in this case, but he found someone who knew enough English and brought out the options. I wonder if that’s the first time that’s happened. Paul returned with exactly the kind and brand requested, with two sizes in one box. That was a gold medal effort that he crisscrossed the city to find. Impressive!
Next, we grabbed a nice rice lunch at the hotel restaurant and packed up our gear.
We had ordered a van to the airport for five people and a small SUV arrived that could seat four. It was a little too late to quibble, so we squeezed four into the backseat.
On the hour to the airport we once again noted the ordered chaos of the roads. There are many intersections that don’t have lights or stop signs. In Miami, if there is chaos, there is open hostility, but not here. Here everyone heads for the middle and it’s like a ballet of vehicles, large and small. There is no malice or anger, honking of horns (usually), and it all seems to work out.
We noticed most of the people on scooters are wearing long sleeves and winter gloves. Since it was over a hundred degrees, the gloves must be for sun protection.
We always get to airports with extra time for international flights because you never know what extra steps they will require. We actually love exploring international airports. We grabbed some Burger King, which is ironic, because we never go there when we’re at home. We lived for a year across from one that we never set foot in. But sometimes when in Asia, you want a burger that you can recognize.
Kier went to the pharmacy and found many new items we don’t see at home. There are many black shampoos here.
Degree scent: Motion Sense, Sexy Intrigue
We also found a store that makes bags out of recycled materials including fish netting. Kier got Derek a present there, Cali a couple of backpack decorative flowers, and I got a little zipper bag to add to my collection. First time I’ve seen “Child Labor Free” on the label. More of that, please!
This is Cali, using only 2 of the 3 screens she brought with her.
This is one of the softest airport sofas in the world, right here.
We’ve noticed a trend with boarding planes where they don’t announce anything over the loud speaker, but send you texts. Makes sense, since we often tune out all the gurgling loud speaker talking and are usually tuned into your phone. They can also send you introductions in your language. Well done, Qatar.
We were a little surprised how empty the A330 was. There were about 20 of us on board. I can’t remember the last time I’ve been on such an empty flight. Since we were only in the air for about 45 minutes, I watched the first and last 20 minutes of Sense and Sensibility. After Cambodia, I needed some happy-ending feelings even if they are Jane Austen ones.
For the first time, we had to show local immigration officials our boarding pass to exit the plane. That sent us all scrambling. Usually, we don’t keep track of them after we find our seat, but we won’t make that mistake again. We had to show them again to immigration.
We mostly travel somewhat spontaneously with no or a loose framework of an itinerary. But we are always detail oriented to Visa requirements. That is one surprise you don’t want to have. In Vietnam you need a Letter of Invitation in order to then apply for your Visa On Arrival at the airport. You need that from a travel agent ahead of time, which we had, so the process went smoothly.
We decided to go with an Uber to our hotel. But as we are standing by the road, you could see his little car on our screen pass by repeatedly. Kier kept saying while looking at the map in the app, he just passed by again, like he’s right here! We kept looking for the make of his car, running around the road, looking at cars. Couldn’t find his car. Kier said, he’s likely on foot, and she was right. A man approached me and showed me his screen with our names on it. But it was pretty funny how we were scrambling about, but looking for the wrong thing. It’s usually one of the girls that sorts out these little mysteries before we adults do. Traveling is like a huge pile of little puzzles and things to solve or fix if you can move forward.
Our first impression of Vietnam is that it may be more affluent and developed than Cambodia. We’ll have to see if that rings true with the more we see.
Our Uber stopped and showed we’d arrived by pointing down this little dark sketchy alley that had some guy playing a guitar at the entrance. Really? The Diamond Hotel is in there? Our question was confirmed with a tiny sign up the side of the wall.
We walked back and then the hotel entrance exploded out of nowhere. 
This hotel has mini apartments with full sized kitchens. I always find it interesting what any culture considers the basics when stocking a kitchen. Here are the utensils and tea set.
Nice modern bathroom with little extras.
Paul went out for a late night walk to explore the neighborhood and saw a pink cathedral and brought back the closest thing he could find to Cheetos.
I’ll need to see that pink cathedral in the morning with my own eyes.