Vietnam in Pictures(Part 1)

Due to much clamoring of the masses, here is the first part of our long-overdue picture post. It contains some of our favorite photos of Vietnam with some brief explanations. Now that we have left Tina's homeland for Laos, I am beginning to gain some perspective on our experiences there. I truly enjoyed Vietnam, but to simplify my feelings: Vietnam is hard, while Laos is really easy. For instance, in Laos, I sometimes wait 45 minutes just to get my bill at a restaurant. In contrast, in Vietnam, I once had a waitress reach inside of my wallet while it was in my hand, as I suppose I wasn't paying my bill fast enough.

Once I figure out the rest of my thoughts, I'll make sure to post them.


Obligatory Tina in a rice patty hat pic.


A wonderful meal of "elephant ear" fish.


This is our crew. We don't mess around.


This is a non-alcoholic beverage made from the saliva and fungus produced nests of a special swallow in Southeast Asia called the Yen(pronounced Een(g) in Vietnamese). People collect their small white nests off the sides of caves and sell them for about $2500 per kilo. They have to be very careful to not over-collect the nests, otherwise the Yen numbers will dwindle. A medicinal soup is also made from the nests. Oh and I am planning to go check out an Yen cave in Thailand, as the Vietnamese government controls their Yen islands and told me to get lost.


One of the numerous snake in ricewine jars we saw throughout Vietnam. This one was extra special, as it was a cobra with a bonus black crow thrown in for extra aphrodisiac goodness!


We woke up at 4am to go to a floating market in Can Tho and it was beautiful. We saw everything for sale on the boats, from durian and dragonfruit, to baguettes, steaming bowls of Pho and even...


Babies for sale!
Although this family indicated it was selling chuoi(bananas) based on a pole with a chuoi sticking out of their boat, when we came upon them, they had a baby sitting on their scale. I asked Tina's Mom how much Vietnamese babies cost per kilo, but she said that it wasn't actually for sale. So, I responded by informing her of Branjelina's Vietnamese baby purchase and suggested that perhaps they came to the same floating market.


My third favorite fruit(behind durian and dragonfruit), chom chom aka rambutan.



I am frustrated with blogspot at the moment, as it is taking forever to upload pictures. I'll post the rest ASAP.