MIDDLE OF THE WEEK

MIDDLE OF THE WEEK

Greetings to all back home in OZ … Well, I thought it was well overdue to add to the blog, but since there has been no recent drama’s, I thought it would be all too boring for all to read.

Work here at CHIA is going great, we get two OT’s from Canada in a few days, and I’ve been appointed the person to do the inductions and get them to settle in and give then their task lists … Me ??? Yep, the bosses (Aussies and Vietnamese) are making it clear to me every day that they want me to stay, not go home ever. Of course you would when you get free labour, but I guess I must be doing all the right things to be even offered a “free” voluntary position for another 9 months … as Project Development Officer, with accommodation thrown in …. But home I will come in November … and will consider the future … (maybe my boss would LOVE to arrange a secondment for a few months on full pay?? !! pssst Jock – John :o) )

Anyway all organised for the girls, gunna be the eternal language issues; as French is their native tongue, with english second; going to be lots of areas where stuff gets lost in translation. Just had lunch again with the troops …. Not getting much easier to eat street food … again was rice, grass clippings (they call it vegetable) … chicken bones with a sliver of tough dead chook … (they call it meat). Banana’s are ripe when they are green, lemons and oranges too!

One of the boys took me out for dinner last night in the ancient town to a “local” restaurant … not too bad actually, once you got past the grime .. Now I know that the wages here are not good, so I said that I was going to pay the bill, and had a heck of a time to do so without him appearing to lose face. Even bought him a beer, something he can’t afford often – a Heineken – 20 000 dong here .. about $1.30 … dessert was a disaster, thought I’d go pancakes with banana .. if I had my camera would have taken a photo … think they threw small amounts of batter in at a time, then threw bits of bananas, so you can image what it looked like … yep … like twenty overcooked pikelets all stuck together and turned rubbery! … was less than $1 so didn’t mind wasting it. We were upstairs overlooking the river, so could not throw the chick bones onto the floor for the dog to eat – it couldn’t get up the stairs … even I had problems with the stairs … they are soooo narrow and sooo high and most railings are a bit on the wobbly side.

Came close to having my first crash on the bike last night …. Motor bike turned in front of me … which is not unusual, but I didn’t see that it was carrying a coffin behind it … then got the giggles, at the image of me sprawled across the top of the coffin, then got the wobbles and got stuck in the sand on the side of the road (there’s lots of that here … quite thick, and comes about a metre from the road side on both sides of the road) … but amazed that I stayed upright, and safe.

Took bike back to my bike fix-it-man at the weekend, cause the light for the battery went flat …. 3 hours and 200 000 dong later, he say … all fixed … thank you madam … see you later … and of course when the sun went down, did the light work ??….. NO …. Ripped off again … no good going back, cause the general opinion here is if it’s broken, fix it for the day, and if its broken again tomorrow, fix it again … I guess that gives everyone something to do every day. Am learning soooooo much here, ie patience patience PATIENCE…. Just shrug the shoulders and say öh well” .. things might be better tomorrow.

ATM’s are a classic … some days open, sometimes closed, but always with an EXPECTED time to re-open … and most don’t … (especially when you need it) … sometimes you can get a max of 1 000 000 and sometimes 5 000 000 out. Most annoying cause each time you take money out it costs $5 back in Oz, so you want to get a big lot out in one go.

Our little kitten Sinatra is thriving … he can even purr now, still unsteady on is feet, when he shakes his head he falls over. None of the Vietnamese staff like cats, (as pets anyway) … maybe they are tucker back at home!; so It’s up to Nadine and I to do all the feeding – down to four hourly feeds now! And when he curls up he still fits into the palm of my hand! So cute …

Took the treadlie back out to the beach last weekend! … It’s still a mess from the storm, but was such a great “winters” day … came home absolutely cooked, and Suong from Fawlty Towers came running towards me crying: “You want doctor?” … No I say, no doctor, just sunburn … “Sit down Madam” she say .. I get you cold drink and cold towel and banana before you go upstairs. All I wanted was to get into the shower … the sand over on the beaches her is so fine, it sticks like glue, and I just wanted to wash it all off … but no, I had to sit and do as I was told, until they were satisfied that I wasn’t going to die from sunburn.

OK better go and see if I can upload this now, everyone is starting to wake up, so it’s time to get back to work again ….

Hope that the flooding back in Grafton wasn’t too bad … spoke to Ben ? from Bello this morning – he said it was minor down there … and Holly had a little baby boy last week! Yeah! Cheryl oi … hurry up and book to come back …. So I can book for HCM – will have to do it through Mr Hung cause it will be a last minute reservation!

So bye for now … take care all … sorry Chrissie, I can’t write every day!! Hug hug lyn oi

now nighttime and can finally get into the blog to post ... news news news - Cheryl coming back to HCM Friday evening ... I going down there ... and we coming back to Hoi An Saturday arvo ... then back to the Orphanage again at 7am Sunday morning ... yeah yeah