Katrina K. Photography

Buying fruit local style, including the squat and the bargaining I have been a foodie my entire life.  Even when I was a little girl, when my mother would ask me how my day was, or how camp was, I would give a rundown of the food I ate--including critiques of dry carrots, I am told. The same is true today. Indeed, I remember the exact moment that I discovered how salt can add flavor to a dish: It was at summer camp when I was about twelve years old; I don't recall exactly what I was eating, but I remember it was extremely bland so I thought, "Let's see what salt does to it." It was a game-changer.

I love Hoi An, and I'm sad to be leaving, but I'm also excited to be going to Labuanbajo and Komodo. Every time we visit Hoi An, we have a wonderful time, and this visit was no exception. Of couse, seeing My graduate from university was fantastic, and hanging out with her family was a lot of fun. We especially enjoy chillin' with My's father, Can. Add the beautiful, (relatively) cool evenings in the old town, and our stays in Hoi An are always relaxing.

I  write this siting on a quiet beach on the South China Sea, south of the (in)famous China Beach, sipping Biere Larue, chilling  with Tadashi and our new friend, Pengodactyl. Our new friend's  favorite color is blue, and his favorite foods are trash and humans; trashy humans are the best of them all.

Our trip had taken an unexpected turn -- for the good. Two weeks ago, we learned that our dear friend from Vietnam, My, was graduating from University with a Bachelors in English on June 30th. 

Less than two weeks ago, we learned that our dear friend My was graduating from university--ranked number 1 of nearly 800.   Yesterday we attended her graduation and it was fantastic to see her give the valedictorian speech. We are so very proud of her!

Our only purpose for visiting Vietnam this year was to see our friend My (pronounced Me). We met My on our first visit to Hoi An in 2004. How we met her is actually quite an interesting story. We were originally trying to leave Hoi An the morning we met her, but that bus was full and we had to take the afternoon one. That morning, I was sleeping in and Tadashi went for one last morning walk along the river. He was taking pictures on a bridge when My approached him, said hello and started up a conversation. It turned out she was going to try to sell him a boat ride, but was clever enough not to be obvious about it (usually people just ask, “You ride on my boat?”).

Flower H'mong fabric being woven in Sapa Vietnam has some beautiful textiles, and we were lucky enough to see some being made. One town we visited, Hoi An (in the center of the country, near the de-militarized zone) is especially famous for its clothing. Nearly all people who come here get clothing made. Although we left without custom clothes, we did get to see the pre-process in action.

A sweet family in Moung Koung As you know, we have many friends in Sapa that we made the first time we went there. All of our friends are doing very well, and Hang and Nam are no exception. We first met Hang when she worked at the Mountain View Hotel, where we stayed the first time. She was the front desk manager, and so we came to know her well. (It turned out that it was her husband Nam’s bike that Tadashi crashed, causing the muffler burn on my leg.) We became quick friends with Hang, and she invited us to her room for dinner one night. We had hot-pot for dinner and it was fantastic. She and her husband rented a little room that was about the size of a dorm room, but with an attached bathroom. Although it was small, they made it very cozy. The last time we we in Sapa, (3 years ago) Nam & Hang had opened their own CD/video shop. This shop was small, but it was theirs and it had a nice size sleeping room above it.  This time we went to Sapa, they are doing even...

About one hour into our stay in Sapa, we were invited to our friend's wedding reception -- which we had to leave nearly right away for. Tadashi's written a very good description about this on his blog, so I won't try to be redundant. You can read about it

After 24 hours of traveling, we're finally in Hanoi. The flight to Hong Kong was 14 hours, then 2 hours to Hanoi. I tried a pair of compression socks for the long flight, and man-oh-man, what a difference! It was so amazing that I'm going to get T a pair when we get back. We've been to Hanoi many times, but a lot has really changed since the last time 3 years. The biggest difference is