Day 2 in Vietnam

Another day goes by in Vietnam.  We have done so much already that it’s hard to believe that I was in the U.S. just a couple days ago.  Today was another good and fun day, but it was long and wiped me out.  We started off at UEF again, where we heard a lecture on the economic development in Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh specifically, that was really cool.  For example, there are about 630 motor bikes per 1000 people in Ho Chi Minh.  That’s insane!  If you’re here though it is definitely believable because EVERYONE has one.  My goal is to go on one by the end of the trip; we’ll see how that goes.  After the lecture we had language class which was another fun lecture.  I actually enjoy going to these classes and trying to learn their language, even though I thought I would hate it originally.  We got lunch next and got to eat a purple soup, which was surprisingly really mild tasting and pretty good (I had pho for the first time at dinner as well and it was awesome).  I want to try more odd foods, like frog legs that my dad always likes to joke about eating.  After we were done with the school, we went to Phu My Hung, which is a development company that is responsible for the construction of south Ho Chi Minh.  It was pretty cool, but it was creepy at the same time.  They like to call their work “The Master Plan” and the part of Ho Chi Minh that they built is a lot like a utopia.  Anything titled “The Master Plan” seems just a little sketchy to me.  One really cool thing about the trip, though, was that the huge rubber duck that was in Pittsburgh in the beginning of the school year was actually right outside of Phu My Hung’s main building as well.  It’s just one of those odd coincidences that you would never expect to happen.  Finally, we went out to dinner and then went to a Vietnamese club with some of the UEF students.  The club was a lot of fun and it was cool experiencing what a Vietnamese club was like.  The funny thing was that they played a lot of American music that was not very current.  I specifically remember them playing “Low” by Flo Rida and it immediately brought me back to middle school when it first came out.  Overall, the club was a lot of fun and I think everyone in our group is becoming a lot more comfortable with each other already.  Also, the UEF students are awesome.  I really feel like I got to know many of them today and they’re all great people.  It’s so cool to see in what ways they are similar and in what ways they are different from people in America.  For example, many of them listen to American music (one girl, Julia, even likes country music which made me so happy), but they don’t eat a lot of fast food.  I look forward to getting to know them even better over the next couple of weeks.  

Things I learned:

There are exercise parks in Vietnam that have stationary bikes at them.

“Chao ban.  Minh ten la Conor.”- Hello, friend.  My name is Conor.

Too many old creepy guys like to go to clubs and dance awkwardly in the back.