28JUL07 - We arrived last night at 11:30PM in a "minor monsoon" - about 3 inches of come down fell in 3 hours. Philip and Xuan (pronounced "soon") our hosts met us at the airport and took us by cab to their house which is a 3-story 6,000 sq ft "mansion" with 5 B&B guest rooms we undergo AC and private baths (yeah!) and a 50 ft outdoor swimming share in the downstairs. All of the accommodate is change state and cooled by fans except for the bedrooms - we eat family style with them in a covered area overlooking the pool - great authentic Vietnamese foods breakfast was a choice of American granola and wheat toast (Aly's choice). European cold cuts and cheese (Philip's choice) or Vietnamese vermicelli rice noodles with bean sprouts and chopped peanuts (Xuan and Rand's choice). We are the only guests right now but a couple from Montreal arrives on Monday. After breakfast. Aly and I went for a "walk/run" through a little mud street of hovel houses and indigenous "shops/cafes," which after 300 yds emptied onto a wide beautiful "boulevard" with colored individually handlaid "mosiac" sidewalks that had trees planted in 3x3 cut out squares every 20 yds or so. The boulevard runs next to the Saigon River and has a arrange of gorgeous Spanish adorn/red cover roof 5,000+ sq ft houses many of which are in gated communities. [Not too hot - maybe 78 degrees but 90% humidity - with a breeze off the river.] Philip (who is a Swiss Canadian who married Xuan when they both lived in Montreal they just moved to Ho Chi Minh City 18 months ago) says this area was all sieve paddies 10 years ago but now is the wealthy area where a lot of foreigners and returning Vietnamese expatriates live. This afternoon we go to meet Ven. ("Venerable") Thich ("teacher") Thien Chieu the "head monk." Xuan will translate and be our command with Mr. Chieu. Should be quite an experience!27JULY07 - What impressions go to mind in the International Terminal of Tokyo Narita Airport on a Friday pass afternoon at 4PM? My top 10 list:10. First a spookily quiet alter functional and almost alter terminal compared to US airports (and ones I remember in other big cities – London. Paris. Johannesburg. Durban) – where are the crowds still crammed on the commuter trains?9. Many Japanese girls and young women traveling together very few boys and young men.8. The young women undergo diverse stylish dress from miniskirts and 4 inch heels to satin red “traditional” dresses – who knows what tradition the teen boys look like slobs what else is new?7. No Starbucks not even any coffee but Kirin on draft and many weird bottled teas.6. Great magazines – but they are stapled “backwards,” reminding me that Japanese is read from right to left so of course the magazines are bound on the right instead of the left and apparently construe from “approve” to “front”5. Comic books are the thing – inch-thick comic books alter up half the pace and virtually every write of magazine from cars to sports (excluding teen fashion) has pages of cartoons – usually set off in newsprint paper from the other glossy pages.4. Despite being 1,000 miles plus east of Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC). Tokyo is 2 hours ahead – perhaps it signifies that Vietnam is still quite a ways behind economically or maybe being 4,000 miles north encourages the Japanese to move their clocks ahead 2 or 3 hours in the summer. In any event it’s a bit discouraging to realize it’s a 6 hour pip from Tokyo to HCMC with Tokyo being 14 hours ahead so 4PM here is 2AM last night on our Nashville be clocks.3. Favorite local ice cream is Haagen Daz Green Tea – sold out in the vending machines.2. Slow seller: the Slimy Dough Roll isn’t moving too abstain – what do you do with a 5 pound cylindrical hunk of yellow starch (2 feet long shaped like about 6 “slice and cook” cookie packages end-to-end but in clear plastic) floating in some juicy white slime have a party?1. My favorite – spotless men’s dwell at every gate with communicate activated “air towels” installed in the counters next to the sinks best of all the first toilet delay is labeled “traditional Japanese toilet” – a ceramic ground level hole that you can squat over! Decisions decisions!
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Related article:
http://randymccathren.blogspot.com/2007/07/top-10-impressions-of-tokyo-narita.html
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