Day 17 - Thu Duc & Glamor Shots

We decided to get up early today and head to Thu Duc again to meet with more of my father's side of the family. We've been to Thu Duc twice now and it's always been so rushed. Being ready to leave at noon, we were told at the last minute that it might be best to go there for the early afternoon instead. So my mother and I took a walk out to grab some lunch and then headed back to the condo to rest (aka, afternoon nap).

When we go to Thu Duc, we met with my other cousins on my father's side. I have no idea how to address people in my family sometimes because the family is so big and I don't know whose family goes before whose. I have been calling everyone "aunty" or "uncle" and my mother keeps reminding me that I'm supposed to address them as "brother" or "sister." Anywho, I have a cousin who I call "Co Ty" (translation: Brother Ty) and he's a second cousin on my father's side who is the same age as my parents but on the same "level" as I am. He now lives in Vietnam and I haven't seen him in 5 years so we were all so excited to see each other.

Instead of staying in Thu Duc, we were taken by taxi to Bien Hoa, another district nearby Saigon. I must say that I'm learning about all these different cities within Vietnam and I find that each of them has a different feel. Bien Hoa is an up-and-coming district in Vietnam and I could tell that a lot of development has been taking place. New condo buildings are going up, new restaurants are being opened and the nightlife is taking off.

We went for dinner at a seafood joint where every dish we were served was completely fresh. We were placed in a VIP room and dish after dish was like an adventure. We tried everything from eel to soft-shell crabs. I can't say that it was my favourite of food experiences but it was definitely worth a try. When we were finished with dinner, my cousin took us to a cafe that had an amazing patio. This is kind of how I pictured Vietnam to be - many cafe patios, taking advantage of the wonderful tropical weather. It started to rain heavily while we were having coffee but it felt so much cooler and because we were sheltered from the rain, it was just so pretty to watch and hear.

It was a late night for us and we didn't get back from Thu Duc until after 10pm. I was exhausted...and then I thought of my glamor shots and I was re-energized from sheer embarrassment. Here's a preview:

Day 13 - Thu Duc & Glamour Shots

Last night we had a good sleep with no plans in the morning. However, when I woke up, my mother was staring at me and ready to start her morning with a conversation. We have been sharing a king bed in Saigon but it still hasn't been enough space for both of us! I am constantly woken up by her stirring in the room at four in the morning, ready to get her day started - which means that I'm averaging about 4 hours of sleep! LOL

This morning, she had the brilliant idea that we should go back to Thu Duc because she still had people to see and we were asked to leave money with a relative for my uncle. We took a taxi to Thu Duc, which is about 35kms from Saigon but it would take about 45 minutes to get there. We were told by our tour guide that we can always trust MaiLinh Taxis because they cannot adjust their meters according to company policy. This doesn't mean that they can't take you for a ride around the city, but at least you know it's a fixed rate. :)

When we got to Thu Duc, my mother asked the taxi driver if he'd be willing to chauffeur us around for the day and we'd pay him for his waiting hours as well as the taxi fare. He agreed to it because he said he'd have to drive back to Saigon on his own gas money and he isn't guaranteed a passenger.

My mother said that growing up, she had four girlfriends who were very close. They all were around the same age and lived in the same neighbourhood. Only two of them still live in Thu Duc and she wanted to go see them. So our first stop was the local post office where her friend Thuy worked. I wish I had taken a video of their first encounter after 28 years because it was hilarious! My mother and I both walked in and she asked for "Thuy." The girl in the front yelled out for Aunty Thuy and she came out with sunglasses on and said, "Who's looking for me?" My mother said, "Are you Thuy?" and she replied, "Yeah, it's me." Then she took her sunglasses off and as soon as they recognized each other, both ladies literally ran to each other and embraced. It was an incredibly sweet moment.

It took all of 10 seconds for Aunty Thuy to ask for a longer lunch and she was out the door and into the taxi with us to go find my mother's second friend, Aunty Tuyet. We got to her house and nobody was home so Aunty Thuy called around and found out that Aunty Tuyet was working in the little cafe down the street. They decided to both go and surprise her. And so another surprise happened and I missed the opportunity to get it all on video!

It's been really fun to see my mother surrounded by family and friends. In Canada, although she has good friends from work and family on my father's side, I can see that she has a whole other life in Vietnam too. The ladies took each other out for lunch and I sat and listened to the funny stories about old boyfriends and neighbourhood gossip. They told me that my mother was once the most beautiful girl in Thu Duc and that the boys would always pretend to walk through their neighbourhood for a glimpse of her. I heard stories about how they would help each other sneak out of the house to meet their boyfriends...and how my father impressed them all by treating them to delicious Chinese food at his house.

We couldn't stay very long because I had my glamor shot appointment at 4:00pm so we left shortly after lunch, which lasted until about 2:30 or so. We laughed at Aunty Thuy because she had left the post office at noon and said she'd be back at 1:30pm. Time goes by too quickly when you're having fun! As soon as everyone separated and we departed from Thu Duc, it started to rain like I'd never seen before and the streets were starting to flood. Our taxi driver laughed because my mother and I were getting so scared. He said, "I can tell you're not locals because this is normal - just relax." hahah! He was pretty funny and he only cost us $40CAD for driving us around for 5 hours!

As soon as we got home, I had to get ready to go out with my 6 cousins to get glamor shots. Now, this was a hilarious experience as well and I'm not sure yet what the pictures are going to look like - all I know is that when you put 7 girls in a room together, getting hair/make-up done, it's chaotic. I felt so bad for the photographer because it seemed like we were the only ones having fun! I think we're quite the intimidating bunch travelling like a gang of girls. hahah!

Getting your makeup done in Vietnam is like no other experience. They do such a precise job and aim to please. The makeup isn't caked on but its very specific. For example, I have one eyelid that is slightly larger than the other...the girl that did my makeup noticed it RIGHT away and proceeded to add eyelid tape on my eyes to even them out. I was skeptical at first but when I saw the finished product, I thought, "Wow, my face has never looked this symmetrical before!" She also added shading to my nose to make it look more refined in the photos. I know that there is still a lot of photoshopping to be done to the pictures but I'm already impressed with the time they took to make each and every one of us look our best.

Of course, there were a few shots that I think are hilarious - like the one of me playing a Vietnamese zither (đàn tranh). I hope that they do a good job with the editing so that I can post some up on this blog. Otherwise, you're just going to see the one with the zither for good humour! :)

Day 3 - Thủ Đức

It's hard to believe that I've only been here three days because it feels like I've been learning so much. Connecting to the internet has been a bit difficult because Vietnam isn't as laxed about access as North America. Facebook is banned so I haven't been able to post any updates - I thought about using my Blackberry but I am getting nervous about what my phone bill is going to look like at the end of the month!

Yesterday (Monday), everyone went back to work and so my mother and I decided to use the morning to visit the place where my parents grew up, Thủ Đức. My mother warned me and said that it's not like Saigon at all...and I wasn't quite prepared to find out that my parents grew up in a very small town. The way that they talked about the place, it always felt so big and I almost romanticised the idea of what it looked like in my mind.

Of course, after so many years, my mother couldn't recognize where the town started because she said it had grown so much. We realized when we were in Thu Duc when we started to see the store signs. As soon as we reached the market, Chợ Thủ Đức, my mother started to yell with excitement. "I recognize it - your father's house is just around the corner!" As soon as I saw it, I knew that this was the building I'd seen in so many pictures growing up. Although there have been other buildings constructed around it, I could tell that this building once stood out tall from the rest.

This home has a very special place in my grandfather's heart - it is the place where he built his family, after coming to Vietnam with nothing in his early teens. During the Vietnam War, the government used the building as a headquarters and unfortunately, took over a portion of it after the war ended. It is divided into three sections, each with four floors and a top veranda. The third floor used to be used as a roller skating rink almost four decades ago! I went inside and took pictures of each floor, made videos too so I could show my family back home.

I climbed to the very top to see the amazing view, where you could see the entire town of Thu Duc. I saw the many rooms that my grandfather once divided among his children and their spouses and the back kitchen where they once had a handful of staff members cooking family meals. I know that the building looks derelict now, but any one can see that it was once an amazing sight - being the first building in town to have multi-levels.

While my mother sat and talked to the lady that tends to the house now, I frantically ran around trying to see as much as I could. Almost shamelessly, I took pictures and tried to ask as many questions as I could. At one point, I even asked to go into one of the bedrooms so I could see and then immediately felt embarrassed when my relative hesitated. I just couldn't overcome my own excitement - I did live here at some point, after all! He showed me one of the rooms that they use as a study room and pointed out a beautiful sideboard that my grandfather bought over 80 years ago (on the right). I immediately thought to myself, "How can I get this to Canada?!" LOL

After visiting my grandfather's house, we had our driver (who is also my mother's cousin) take us to see my mother's house. I laughed as my mother tried to remember how to get there but found it endearing as I watched her sitting at the edge of her seat. She was nervous that people would not know who she was and that the place she left so many years ago had forgotten her too. We parked on the narrow street because the van we took could not fit through the alleyway that lead to her house. I watched as she nervously walked past the place she had walked past for over twenty years as a schoolgirl.

She turned left and then right and as soon as we walked through the gates, someone yelled out her name. This happened several times while we walked through the neighbourhood and she showed me where she grew up, her grandparents houses and cousins who lived nearby. She didn't go into her old house because she was shy about asking but of course, I went in. It was so neat to see my mother's former home. The new tenant, who is a man who used to live across the street, told me that the area still floods and every year, the water comes up to about a meter. He showed me his new floors and insisted that tiling the floors made it easier to maintain and less damage would show through after the floods.

My mother felt like a superstar walking through her neighbourhood as people kept coming out to greet her and saying things like, "Wow, we cannot believe we're seeing you again after all of these years! Of course we recognize you - you have a face we cannot forget." I laughed at her again and again as she pretended to know who everyone was and then turned around to give me a confused look every time no one was looking.

When we left my mother's neighbourhood and exited out of the narrow street, she yelled out, "That's where you were born!" I looked over and what used to be the local hospital is now a pharmacy. How neat is that to know that I was born in this place...my mother having to walk over by herself to give birth to me! If I ever become full of myself - just show me this picture and I'll remember where I came from.

Leaving Thu Duc, I felt a little uneasy because we didn't get to stay as long as I wanted. I wanted to walk around, to go to the local market and see if anybody else recognizes my mother. We will be coming back after the tour through Vietnam...there are still more people to see and take out for dinner. :)