Quick update from Vietnam

I've been in Vietnam for a bit over a week now and what a week it's been! The time has just flown but we have managed to see (and eat) so much in that time.

I'm now in Hue and it is stinking hot, but then again, it has been stinking hot everywhere we've been. I will write more details later, but so far some excerts from my travel diary are;

Day 1 - Four Currencies in One Day and Lost in Transit
I had so much trouble getting my head around all the zeros from different currencies and could work out if things were costing me $1.20 or $12. We got an unexpected night tour of Hanoi when our booked transfer didn't arrive and then our taxi got very lost taking us to the hotel.

Day 2 - I See Dead People
We went to visit Uncle Ho in his Sleeping Beauty case and then wandered around the old quarter trying not to get run over by one of the millions of scooters in Hanoi.

Day 3 - Mee and See, my new H'Mong friends
The landscape in Sapa gives off such an amazing old energy. I could have just watched the mountains for hours with it continual dancing behind mist and clouds. Met many H'mong girls, a tribe that live in extreme poverty and continue to wear their traditional indigo dyed and embroidered costumes. We were adopted by a couple of the girls who told us a bit about their lives and showed us around the town.

Day 4 - It's a good thing my husband is not a jealous man...
I spent much of the day holding the hand of a man who wasn't my husband. We trekked from the township of Sapa into a couple of the villages. What is usually a good walk in the dry season was very hard in the wet, sliding down slippery clay slopes. We visited a Black H'Mong village and saw the poverty that these happy friendly people live in. We stayed overnight in a Day (pronounced Zay) village in a farmhouse.

Day 5 - Heaven, Hell and my Vietnamese Angel
The trek was harder than the day before due to more heavy rain and the fact that I had twisted my knee. The view was breathtaking but the hike was hell. My fabulous guide literally cared out mountains for me so that I could make it down the steep slippery clay slopes without getting covered from head to toe in mud. By the end, I was only covered on one side. We visited a Dao (pronounced Zao) village.

Day 6 - The Day that Wouldn't
One of those days when things just didn't go right......

Day 7 - Heaven on Earth
Halong Bay was truly amazing. We stayed on a luxury junk (is that an oxymoron?) and swam surrounded by ancient limestone pillars. The food was to die for.

Day 8 - Back to the noise
We woke up in Halong Bay and said goodbye to it as we ate our last meal on the boat. We headed back into the noise and craziness of Hanoi for a final time.

Day 9 - Hue
I had little sleep on the overnight train that brought us to Hue. We are about to head off and visit the old citadel

So that's all for now. Off to see more of this amazing country.

Only One More Sleep!

.... or half of one at this rate.... We fly out to Vietnam in the morning!

I did have good intentions of writing a nice long blog tonight, but packing took longer than I thought. Wayne is trying to enforce a "pack light" rule. I've taken that to mean "pack a little lighter than usual, but stuff it all into a much smaller bag".... mmm... My bag is already overflowing and I haven't even started shopping yet.....

I'll have little internet access while away and will probably be busy absorbing all the new sights, sounds and foods, so I may not get a chance to blog. So, with that in mind, see you when I get back in about 3 weeks!

Henna Gaijin

OK, I promise I will stop playing on Blogthings soon....

But in the meantime, the latest quiz I did was "What's your Japanese Subculture?"... and surprise, surprise... I got.....

You Are a Henna Gaijin!

You're not Japanese, but you wish you were! You can use chopsticks with your eyes closed, and you've memorized hundreds of Kanji. You even answer your phone "moshi moshi." While the number of anime videos you've seen is way higher than the number of dates you've been on, there's hope. Play the sexy, mysterous gaijin, and you'll have plenty of Japanese meat.

What's Your Japanese Subculture?

In case you don't speak Japanese, "henna" is not what I colour my hair with, but rather the Japanese for "strange".

What is Pocky?

It was pointed out to by the lovely Leigh, that I didn't explain what Pocky was in my What flavour Pocky are you? post, for those not-knowing-what-Pocky-is people.

Pocky (rhymes with rocky) is a thin stick of biscuit with a flavoured coating. The basic version is chocolate but there are and have been many different flavours. Wikipeidia lists;

Chocolate flavors

Anime Pocky
Chocolate
Giant Chocolate
Giant Double Choco
Gokuboso Pocky (Superfine Pocky)
Little Pocky
Marble Pocky Chocolate
Marble Royal Milk Tea
Men’s Pocky

Fruit/Nut flavors
Almond
Chocolate Almond Crush
White Chocolate Almond Crush
White Chocolate/Chocolate Almond Crush
Café au Lait Almond Crush
Mild Milk Almond Crush
Honey White Almond Crush
Anglaise Almond Crush
Banana
Choco Banana
Coconut
Coconut Milk
Cinnamon Apple
Green Apple
Mango
Melon
Pine Cream
Strawberry
Tsubu Tsubu Strawberry
Tsubu Tsubu Giant Strawberry

Mousse flavors
Azuki
Black & Latte
Blueberry Yogurt
Choco
Chocolate
Creamy
Extra Chocolate
Mild Chocolate
Hazelnut Milk Chocolate
Custard
Green Tea
Hokkaido White
Royal Milk Tea
Strawberry
Tiramisu
White
New White

Decorer flavors
Berry Chocolate
Grape Mild Chocolate
Lemon Chocolate
Mont-Blanc White Chocolate
Peach & Strawberry Chocolate
White Wedding Chocolate
Apple Cream Custard
Bananu Semi-Sucrée
Chocolat de Caramel
Fraise au Chocolat
Gateau Chocolat
Strawberry Gâteau

Seasonal flavors
Special Pocky flavors available only during certain seasons.
Winter - Fuyuno Kuchidoke (Winter Melt-in-Mouth)
Winter - Murasaki Imo (Sweet Potato)
Spring - Honey
Summer - Kiwi Mango
Cocoa Powder

Regional flavors
Special Pocky flavors available only in certain regions of Japan.
Nagano - Grape
Hokkaido - Yubari Melon
Kyushu - Kyushu Giant Mikan
Kyoto - Kyoto Powdered Tea Azuki Bean
Kobe - Kobe Wine

Reverse
Reverse
White
Strawberry

Fortune Telling Pocky
Honey & Milk
Grape
Strawberry

Pocky G
Pocky G
Berry
Neil

Five Flavor Combination
Pocky with a combination of five flavors. Limited edition 2006.
Kurogo (Five Black) - black pine nut, black soybean, black karin, black sesame seed, unpolished black rice
Goka (Five Fruit) - peach, apricot, jujube, plum, chestnut

Crush
Almond
Cookie
Strawberry

Special Occasion flavors
2001 Giant Rainbow (Contains Giant Cider, Giant Green Tea, Giant Custard, Giant Blueberry, Giant Orange, Giant Chocolate)

European Pocky (Mikado)
Milchschokolade (Milk Chocolate)
Zartherb (Bittersweet Chocolate)

Other Pocky flavors
Caramel
Cereal Almond
Kinako (Soybean)
Kurogoma (Black Sesame)
Lemon Cheesecake
Milk
Milk Chocolate Whole Wheat
Pudding
Pumpkin
Yogurt

There is a Pocky Gallery where you can see the packaging of many of the flavours listed above.

My personal favourites are Almond Crush, Coconut and the good old plain chocolate Pocky.

Unfortunately, you can't just go into a store and have all of those flavour choices. Japan giveth flavours and snacks and just as quickly taketh away. Just when you finally decide that you do like Soybean flavoured Pocky, you head down to your local Circle K and find that it is no longer sold. Wayne and I make a point of going to the convenience stores every now and then just to see what new snacks have been released and which have dissappeared.

While Pocky isn't my favourite Japanese snack (that place is reserved for Kinokonoyama), it's up there. What I do love though, is their commercials. Just for fun, I mean research purposes, he's an ad featuring Morning Musume.

Time for another four-some

Yep, it's definitely time for another. Time to go to the hairdressers.

Last time I went to the hairdressers I really wanted a cut and colour. The cut is no problem, the colour however is a little more difficult. I can only use semi-permanent dyes, which are very rare over here. It makes sense, as most of the population have black hair, so if they are going to colour their hair brown, or the red that I desired, for example, it needs to be bleached first. The lightened hair is then dyed the desired colour. There is no real point in getting bleached hair dyed with a semi-permanent.

I thought I would try though. It took a lot of broken Japanese to get my point across, but once they understood, I was told that no, they didn't have such a dye. "Oh well," I thought, I'd just get a cut.

The hairdressers in Japan lavish their customers with attention. The particular salon I had chosen was run purely by men. Male hairdressers don't have the same gay stigma they do back home and are usually straight. Straight and very funky. I was treated to a lovely scalp massage while having my hair washed, but the best was yet to come. While cutting my damp hair, my attendant played with it. With each snip, my tresses were caressed with great tenderness. I melted in this man's hands. Now, I should point out here, that this isn't an isolated experience, but rather one I have come to expect from hairdressers in Japan, male or female.

While drifting in bliss (can you drift in bliss?) in the back of my mind was the small regret that I would then have to go home and colour my own hair. I had brought a number of boxes of dye back from Australia on my previous trip. Tentatively, I asked the delightfully funky man playing with my hair, "If I bring in my own dye, would you put it in my hair for me?" After thinking for a little bit and consulting with the manager, he said that would be no problem. He finished cutting and I raced home with wet hair.

The box contained two bottles of chemical that needed to be mixed and instructions in English. The hairdresser had never seen this sort of dye and asked me lots of questions. Once confident that he knew what to do, he mixed it and started to apply it. Curious, the manager came over. The dye was more liquid than the paste they were accustomed to. He took a comb and started applying it on the opposite side to the first hairdresser. Ahh... it was heaven, not one, but two cute funky men playing with my hair. The third guy in the salon had no customers, so came and joined the other two. I had two applying the colour and one combing it through, but all three playing with it at once.

Once the colour had been rinsed out, I was treated to another four-some, this time, two with hairdryers, one with a brush. Upon paying I was presented with a large bottle of treatment all beautifully wrapped with a bow.

I floated across the road to the shopping centre where I ran into my husband in a book store.

"Your hair looks great" he told me.

I smiled and told him "I had a four-some."

He laughed and said "That's good. You look like you enjoyed it."

What flavour Pocky are you?

Still sick... it's been more than two weeks now... so I needed something to cheer me up...

You Are Flan Pocky

Your attitude: modern and offbeat East meets west... sweet meets salty. You're a pro at bringing unusual combos together!

What Flavor Pocky Are You?

So, what flavour are you? Leave me a note in the comments to cheer me up...

13 more sleeps and the one that won't go away..

It's only one week until I start taking my malaria tablets, which means it's only two weeks until I go on my summer trip! We're off to Vietnam, Cambodia and doing a couple days in Thailand before we head home. We're so looking forward to it!

On the other hand, I still need to get over this darn cold. I start to feel better for a day, and then it gets worse again... today is a feeling-worse day. I spent last night coughing so hard that I seriously thought a lung was going to come out of my mouth. It was violent! When I did finally get some sleep, I know I was snoring loudly, as I was snoring so loudly I woke myself up! Poor Wayne is a bit worse for wear, as sleeping in the same bed as me, well he's not getting much sleeping done.

I've just spent the day at work, stuggling to speak, with my ears blocked so badly that I feel like I'm underwater and going through packets of tissues. Not fun! Not fun at all!

I took drugs for a week, but they don't seemed to have done much.

The last few days have been so busy at work, we had a huge pile of tests to mark and then today, I did about ten practice interview tests after classes. So wish I could just go home and recover from this, but have a busy weekend ahead preparing work for while I'm away... ahh... my kingdom for some sleep.....

Drugged up

Yesterday I discovered a way of getting to see a doctor without having to wait. Be a stupid gaijin!

You see, what started out as a little cold on Sunday, has worsened day-by-day until I could take it no more yesterday. I told Wayne I would go and see a doctor. He knew I was really sick then, I never see doctors over here. I had too many bad experiences my first time living here that it has scared me off. I even had one medical professional tell me I had cancer (in his defence, he never thought I had cancer, but didn't know the English word for cyst but did know the word "cancer", so just told me I had something like cancer, that it grew like cancer, that they had to cut it out like cancer... - all I was hearing was cancer... cancer... cancer). Wayne and I have only really had to deal with doctors once since we've been here together and other than him being told that he was "diseased in the head" the doctors were great.

Wayne talked to his supervisor and got off work early to take me to a doctor. We first went to our local clinic which on a quick glance was closed until 5pm. Wayne then decided to take me to the hospital. Once we got there, I chickened out. Going to a local clinic was one thing, but having to fill in all the forms and work out where to go when I was feeling like death was another. I told Wayne we'd wait the two hours until the clinic opened.

Wayne wanted to get there just before 5 in the hope that the wait wouldn't be too long. Another think I hate about going to the doctor, is waiting rooms. The last thing I want to do when I'm sick is sit and wait in a room full of people with germs. I'm sick, I don't need more germs around me. I'm sick, I want to be lying down in my own comfortable bed, not sitting in an uncomfortable chair for hours. Of course we have waiting rooms back in Australia, but we also have appointments, so hopefully, the wait isn't too long. In Japan, there are no appointments for doctors, you just turn up during the opening hours and sit and wait.

Mmm.. yes... turn up during opening hours... that would help....

We got to the clinic just before 5 and surprisingly the clinic's car park was empty. I was a bit suspicious then, but too sick to really care. Then one guy (how by the way turned out to be a cleaner), who didn't look sick at all, walked in the surgery door. "OK" we thought, he's Japanese, he knows what he's doing, we'll just follow him (I operate on the Dirk Gently navigation technique in Japan). When we entered the foyer, the doctor came out of his office looking very surprised and asked me what was wrong. With my head heavy with all the germs I was confused as to why the doctor would be greeting his patients at the door and in a pathetic voice simply replied "I have a bad cold".

He quickly ushered Wayne and myself upstairs where the reception was dark and there was an obvious lack of nurses and patients. Kindly, he looked at my throat, listened to my chest, asked about allergies and then ran off to his pharmacy in the building next door. Following him, Wayne and I read the sign on the door and realised that he was in actual fact closed on Thursday afternoons. Closed, but still kind enough to see the lost and confused gaijin.

Another reason I usually resist seeing doctors in this country is the amount of medicines they prescribe - lots of them! I was given, all in little white paper bags with a cute cartoon character in the bottom corner; antibiotics, something for my stomach to stop the antibiotics from making me sick, an anti-inflamitary painkiller, some tablets for my throat, some gargle for my throat and some cough medicine. All little blister packs in paper bags with the number of times a day I am to take them. No side-effect information, nothing. Just cute little paper bags. But right now, I don't care - give me drugs and lots of them!

I did, but the way, get through the interview tests, but not easily, not comfortably. I interviewed 61 students for about 2 minutes each. My voice lasted for the first one and a half interviews. After that, it was a raspy yell to try to get anything out. To make things worse, over the noise of the old air conditioner and the construction happening outside, the students couldn't hear what I said, so I'd have to repeat it a number of times. With each syllable I uttered it felt like a cheese grater was being scraped across my throat. As the interviews wore on, salt and lime was following each cheese grating motion. With each interview, I averaged about 100 syllables... 100 syllables multiplied by 61 students makes a hell of a lot of cheese grating. Once I got home that night, I almost cried with each question Wayne asked me.

Luckily, the students now have tests, so I have a few days off from school. It's so frustrating though being sick on days off. I had been so excited about having a day off coincide with my favourite flea market, but instead, I had to spend the day in bed, my body would punish me with shooting pains in the head and I'd be bent over coughing if I tried to move. I'm now drugged up, taking a OTC cold medicine on top of all the other prescriptions, but that only lasts for about an hour at a time, I then have to wait a few hours until I can take the next one. Actually, the effect is wearing off now.. so I'm off to bed until it's time for the next dose.

Not on speaking terms

I'm not talking to my husband. That's kind of ok though, as I'm not talking to anyone. I'm voiceless. I'm without voice. Well without much of one anyway. I can get words out quietly, but it hurts and if I try to project my voice, it just comes out like bad feedback from an amateur rock concert.

A voice is something that really comes in handy when you work as an English teacher. At school, we are nearing the end of student interview tests. I have about 280 students that I teach each week and during interview test week, I well, interview them each for about 2 minutes at a time.

Sam, who I teach with, was kind enough today to help me out. He did all my roll calls, did all the pre-test explanations and taught half of a normal lesson that we had scheduled in. So I managed to make it through the day, only having to postpone the listening test recording that we had to do. I have 3 more classes to interview tomorrow and then I don't actually teach for a week. I'm hoping it will hold out.

I must say though, I hate being sick in summer. I hate being sick anytime, but at least in winter you can snuggle into bad and drink lots of hot tea and have lots of warm soup. Instead, I came home early from school today and fell asleep on my futon in a sweaty heap.

I don't really know why I'm blogging all this. Maybe because I love talking, haven't been able to do it all day so need to waffle on about something. Off to bed now and hoping I wake up with a voice.

How do you comment....?

Every now and then as a teacher, you come across some work that you're really not sure on how to comment.

This particular gem came from a student in response to the question of what they thought visitors to Japan would find surprising;

"I think a visitor to Japan might find lowness of
men's toilet. In America or Europe men's toilets are installed
higher. Japanese men's toilets are installed very low because Japanese men
are shorter than European and American.

On the contrary, if we use the toilet in America,
we have to turn our Johnsons upward."

I am curious guys (as opposed to girls...) is it true?

Pepsi Ice Cucumber - the verdict

When I first heard about Pepsi's new flavour - Ice Cucumber on An Englishman in Osaka, I believed it for a moment and then assumed it was a joke. I mean this is a country that has wasabi ice cream and pumpkin flavoured KitKats, so an cucumber flavoured soft drink didn't sound too far-fetched, it was the comment about Coca Cola Broccoli that turned me into a disbeliever.

It was on Mike's Blender and I realised that it was in fact, real. I had to try some. I love cucumber juice in hot weather, and so now in Japan is the time.

The search began. I went first to my local supermarket and they had already sold out. I had to go home and do some things, so Wayne offered to go out on a "hunt" for me. Ahhh.. we're a real hunting-gathering couple - he hunts for strange flavoured drinks while I work on gathering vintage kimono fabrics. Luckily, he didn't have to hunt for long. He found a bottle in the first of many convenience stores near out apartment. A single bottle only - it was the last one left!

I excitedly pounced on it when he arrived home. With almost the same anticipation as one would have uncorking a vintage wine, I unscrewed the plastic top. With the sound of the fizz, wafted out the scent of sickly sweet fruit. A hint of cucumber maybe, bit it was certainly only a hint.

On the first sip I had the impression of drinking an overly sweet apple juice drink after having brushed my tongue and the roof of my mouth with toothpaste. Mmmm.. not so good. I was hoping maybe the taste would mature. Well it did, but it matured from a five year old's birthday party drink to a sixteen-year old's my-parents-are-out-of-town-for-the-weekend-so-lets-raid-their-liquor-cabinet type drink. It was reminiscent of a cocktail mixed with Blue Vok, Midori and sprite, minus the alcohol, with added caffeine. Over the course of the evening, I went back to the drink every half hour or so hoping it would redeem itself. It didn't. It stayed with me though. Stayed with me, coating my tongue and my palate like the scum around a bathtub after you've used cheap bath oils. Brushing my teeth was a relief leaving only the after effect of the caffeine.

Mmmm... I won't be buying that one again. But hey - if anyone wants some pumpkin flavoured KitKats, I still have some in my freezer since last Halloween.

Confirmed

As I wrote recently, I finally paid for our tickets for our summer trip. I thought the confirmation email I got from my travel agent was worth sharing;

"Please let me send E-ticket. After it prints it out, it becomes a flow that does the check-in in the airport from the following. My best regards."

Free hugs

Tonight while I was YouTube surfing... ummm.. I mean working very hard, I came across this gorgeous video about a guy in Sydney giving out free hugs. It is so lovely and made me a little teary thinking about how much I miss hugs from my friends in Australia. The music is by a band called the Sick Puppies.



I then got to thinking... I wondered if this would work in Japan. Japan isn't a country known for its hugging. I searched further and found many responses to this first video from Tokyo and Kyoto. Here's one of them




So to everyone out there to whom I can't give a real hug to - cyber hugs to you (to everyone other than the sighing, eye rolling, ignoring bank teller that is).

Being Illiterate

After a panicked email to my travel agent, I was able to get an extra working day to pay for our tickets for our summer trip, so now they are all paid for, though it wasn't a painless process.

I hate going to my local bank branch. There is a woman there that decided she didn't like me from the first day I walked in their door. She doesn't even try to hide her dislike. She sighs loudly at me, rolls her eyes and sometimes even refuses to talk to me. Today, she did all three.

I had to do a domestic bank transfer, a furikomi, if you will. The problem today was while it was to a Japanese company, in Japan, the invoice and banking details were written in English. Good for me, but apparently not for the bank. The sighing woman, sighed heavily, rolled her eyes and thrust a furikomi form at me. All in Japanese off course. I looked at her, I looked at the form and then I looked back up at her with what I hoped was my best "please help the illiterate gaijin" face. She sighed heavily, rolled her eyes and walked off.

The younger teller who I'd been thrust in front of looked at the furikomi form and looked at my invoice. Repeatedly. For about fifteen minutes. At the form, at the invoice, back to the form.... It was like watching a flea tennis match happening on the counter. I wasn't much better. In time with her worried "mmm"s and "ohhh"s, I looked that the form, looked at the invoice and looked at her. My "please help the illiterate gaijin" face had more effect on her, she was trying but just had no idea what to do. She ran to the sighing woman and was only sighed at and then ignored. I'd like to say that at least it's not just me that she sighs at and ignores, but I think really she was sighing and ignoring the other teller as an extension of me. If she helped her, then really she was helping me, and she certainly wasn't going to do that.

After running around a little more with a "please help the young teller" face, she came back to me and told me, "Please fill in the form." I had kinda figured that much, it was the how-to I was having problems with. I would have to translate everything from English into Japanese. I asked if it was OK if I wrote in romaji. That question caused another ten minutes of "mmm"s, "ohhh"s and "please help the young teller" faces.

Finally, another teller came back from lunch and to the rescue. She explained that I would have to fill in the form in kanji. I explained that while I didn't really write kanji, I could copy it if it was written for me. This lovely rescuer teller then filled out the form in kanji for me to copy, as the form could not be in their handwriting. When I handed it back to her, she was even kind enough to compliment my badly completed form.

After another 30 minutes in the bank, it and another furikomi through the ATM were complete.

Since my last post, I've been told of a bank with a branch in Nagoya that offers Internet banking in English. I think it's time to sign up for that!