75 cent Xit-Lo rides

It's about 10pm sunday night and I'm waiting for the "right" time to call Vancouver. I'm still on my quest to get my mom a flight home with the rest of us. The attempt the other day was very disheartening.

• We didn't do too much this evening. KA and I layed around in our room (as we always do) from 12 - 3pm. We've rendered ourselves useless during those 3 hours of the day. Too hot to go out and do anything. But lying around got boring too. We've finished listening to book 2 of the "The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe" series. We've started book 3 of the 6 book series. It's so much easier listening to the audio books - that way we can pretend to do stuff at the same time.
• KA got into her homemaker mode and decided to sweep and mop the floors in Anh Hoan's place. I felt guilty so I went to the bathroom and did some more laundry. We're doing laundry on a daily basis now. Throwing a few pieces into the bucket, washing it and then taking it to the roof to hang dry. I'm careful not to lock myself out on the roof now.
• KA did her best with the floors but they didn't seem any cleaner after her hard work (the first time she dipped the mop back into the bucket - the water turned black...so she mopped the rest of the house with black water) - she actually broke out in a sweat as there are 3 floors in this building. Not including the bottom floor which is the internet station part - VERY dirty down there. The problem in Vietnam is that it's so dusty here. :-) Definately not a good place for my "white" obsession. But I wear tons of white anyhow - old habits are hard to break. To make up for it I have been bleaching my clothes on a regular basis. KA said she discovered little black bugs that would crawl away as the mop headed towards them. The mop is strange too. It's basically a clamp on a stick. So you can put any kind of cloth in it - there were T-shirts in it. I think that if KA had to mop the ground on her hands and knees she would refuse.
• In the afternoon we called up a "xit lo" (which is a guy who bikes your around in a big chair thing). That's our third mode of transportation (first being our feet and second is the motorbikes). We bargain for 10,000 dongs (which is about 75 cents) for a ride to the supermarket area. Both of us climb into the little chair (realistically it's only meant for one person but the xit-lo guys here are greedy and don't want to share in the money so they insist that they can push the both of us). I sat in the chair as I'm much bigger than KA - she manages to squeeze her little bum onto whatever leftover piece of ripped plastic is left. It's really easy for me to find these guys on the street as I'm pretty much a magnet for anyone who wants to make a buck (darn those short vietnamese girls!).
• Our xit-lo guy today was pretty scrawny and was huffing a bit when he reached the supermarket (which is 7 or 8 city blocks away). He was doing much better than this other guy we used - who was having a REAL problem with us as he lost his momentum on a hill and was starting to roll backwards. It was our fault really - we passed by a bicycle stand and waved at it. KA and I were only commenting to ourselves that we should check out the prices of a bicycle as some of our younger cousins want to exploit us and have been hinting of what kinds of "gifts" would make them happy. KA has already had requests for bicycles, watches, clothes, origami books/paper, etc. Most of the kids don't ask me as as I hold a more formal "title" here. KA is really good with giving money to the "cute" beggar children. She tries to change some of our larger currency into coins in the morning so that she has money for the kids. We don't want to give them large currency. KA and I basically carry 50,000 and 100,000 Dong bills. :-) Hard to bargain with vendors when they see your wallet full of red and green bills. Lol - we've got to start looking "poorer".
• That's one thing that we're still getting use to. The whole use of titles. We're not known as "Kim" or "Kim Anh". Depending on which house the person is from and where they rank in the immediate family - our titles and theirs change appropriately. KA still uses the wrong word for "aunt" (there are 4 versions of "aunt" in vietnamese - depending if the aunt is a sister on your mom's side or your dad's side and if she's older or younger than your mom or your dad). So it works the same with "uncle" as well. To complicate matters worst is that it's not like Canada where you would say "Uncle Jerry". Here it's about ranking. So you would say "younger-aunt-on-my-dad's-side-number-6". The numbering system is off too. I hold the "big-sister-number-2" title (which is the top title for a girl in any household). The kids are named 2, 3, 4, etc. I'm not sure why there is no "1".
• So I'm "big-sister-number-2" to all cousins who are children of aunts or uncles that rank lower than my dad. The cousins if they want call KA "big-sister-number-3" but some of the younger generations drop the formalities and just address her "big-sister-Anh". :-) When I'm not being called by one of my titles then everyone here uses my "real" Vietnamese name - which is "Hoang". It's strange having everyone call me that for such a long period of time. KA is not use be being called "Anh" either (which can also mean "big brother"). I get called Hoang every now and then from the older folks in Vancouver but they visit on such a rare occasion. I'm not use to it and forget to respond sometimes when an "older" person calls me. :-) The fun thing with ranking is that age has no effect on your title. I have to call all the cousins on my mom's side "big brother" or "big sister" because my mom is the youngest in her family. So one of the cousins we hang out with is in grade 6 and his title out does mine! Lol...I told him that he should treat me out for coffee/dinner as he's my "big brother".
• My sisters and my parents refer to me as "chi hai" (big-sister-number-2) at home so I'm use to that title. KA finds it unfair as she says it's much more respectable than "chi Kim Anh". I laughed and said "too bad" - so she continues to call me Chi Hai for my parents sake.
• In the afternoon as we wandered around the supermarket (MaxiMart) area. I found a store that actually had some shirts my size. Yah!! I don't know the misery I have had in the last week and a half in terms of find something that would fit! Goodness - I need to go to Saigon (so much more in the big city). So I bought 6 shirts for 60,000 Dongs each (approximately $5.25 each). They don't bargain in these "modern" stores but I was happy enough to find something that fit so I didn't care.
• I found a really nice bracelet in a jewelery store but the girl wouldn't lower the price for me. I was mad so I didn't buy it. KA bought a pair of silver star earings for $5.50 there. My bracelet cost too much (in Vietnamese standards) so I passed up on it. I'm sure I can find others.
• On the way home KA and I stopped by a bakery. There was so many pasteries that looked yummy and the prices were just cents! So we bought 3 bags worth - ended up costing us $8. We didn't need that much food but it's so cheap and we haven't had pasteries in awhile. We were craving "snack" food. Life over here is different - no fridges means that everything is bought in the morning and cooked right away.
• With afternoon "siestas" - it's super hard to find a local vendor selling something edible or drinkable from the hours of 1-4pm. Right beside my cousin's store is the Blender-lady. She makes fruit smoothies for everyone. So good as the fruit is super fresh...mmm. Nha Trang has awesome fruit!
• Kay - I haven't killed enough time yet. I'll stop boring you for today.
• I was on the net surfing for tours out of Nha Trang (looks like we might need a "plan B" for our tour of the north). We haven't been able to find a tour operator who is leaving in the next couple of days that will take us. We might have to just find our own transportation and accomodations in each destination.
• Here's a someone else's blog that I came across - which I found fun to read as it's similiar to our impressions of Nha Trang. Tales of Asia. You can read if you are absolutely bored of my bantering and want to read something more witty. :-)