Phan Thiet Apr'12

Mid-April went as usual here in Phan Thiet, dinners with friends,work and coffee. I did get a visit from Doan, he was in town for work and we had coffee together. He once again brought up the subject of me "staying" with him. I looked in the guy's face and said "No" multiple times, I even told him that I just don't find him attractive that way. It didn't seem to work, but at least he doesn't know where I live so can't turn up at the house unexpectedly. Another good reason to always keep the gate locked. I went up to Nha Trang for Becky's birthday as I'd promised, luckily this time the weather played ball and the trip up was less hair raising than the last time. It was an OK weekend, the girls up there have a set pattern to their weekends and this one was no different. Start in Guava, move on to the Sailing Club and end up at Why Not bar. Have to say that the best part of the whole night was the birthday cake, it was a large chocolate fudge brownie covered in this awesome chocolate ganache. WOW!I had a bit of an issue getting into my hotel at the end of the night, one of the neighbours had to call the hotel to get someone to let me in after I spent what felt like 30 minutes banging on the door. I met Dr. Jason's replacement, Henry. He came up from Saigon for the day. He doesn't know what is going on in our school and even when Ms.My and I told him, he still seemed to believe that we can resolve our problems the way he does in the Saigon school. He was most put out that no one had told him that I was leaving at the end of my contract. Although I don't know how we could have as neither of us knew who the hell he was until he came into school. He hadn't notified me that he was my new point of contact in head office. I don't know if he had notified Ms. My, I doubt it. I started the holiday weekend by staying home on the Friday night and having a few beers. At the end of the evening it crossed my mind that I could go out to a club but I wisely resisted the temptation and stayed home. My head thanked me for it the following morning. I really resent wasting half of my day off recovering from the night before. I had lunch with Tuan and some of his teacher friends at the restaurant where we had had lunch before out on the Mui Ne road. Tuan is a music teacher. After lunch we went and sang some karaoke, of course I sang "Hello", I think every karaoke joint in Vietnam has that song. I ducked out before the rest of them were finished and went and had my hair cut. I am still trying to grow it but I've gotten to the stage where it is just a mess and I can't do anything with it. I hate it at the moment and it makes me feel even less attractive than I already do. I met Vu, a caddy friend of Anna's, for coffee and we ended up at 7Up club where I bumped into my hairdresser and his friends. It was a great night. Vu went home and I had a drink with Su, one of the Novotel chef's, on my way home. An Chien picked me up the following morning and took me to the wedding of another Tuan, the blind massage guy. It was at his family's house about 20 kms outside of town. Foolishly I was worried about being late and didn't take a jacket with me for the bike ride, I got really sun burnt. It wasn't a fun wedding. When the groom wasn't sat down or being guided by his new wife, people would kind of shove him into place when he wanted to move. When about 20 or 30 of his blind friends arrived there wasn't a guide dog or white cane between them. I guess that's normal for Vietnam but it doesn't seem right somehow. They are already disadvantaged by their disability and then they are further disadvantaged by their government in not being provided with those aides that could enable them to live a more independent life. I don't know if it was the table I was sat on, but it was a very quiet wedding and hardly anyone spoke. Then I had to sing, as the groom wanted me to. I totally forgot the words, it was hell, I was so uncomfortable. Never again if I can gracefully avoid it. When we got back to Phan Thiet we went for a beer at a restaurant called "Ancient House" and we bumped into one of the security guards from MTV. He wants to study English so he came back to the house and we chatted for half an hour with the aid of an online translator and my phrase book. Interesting. I finished the day by having dinner with Daniel at Novotel. It was the first time he had been there. The restaurant is very good, I haven't had a bad meal there. I was having a very good holiday weekend. I spent Monday afternoon and evening with Sasha in Mui Ne. She's leaving soon, she's going to visit a friend in Hong Kong and then will go back to Australia for a few months. I think she wants to come back to Vietnam for next high season. Anna's back in Saigon, I haven't seen her as yet but she did email me when she was in Sweden, about a week before she came back. I think she has plans for a visit to Phan Thiet, we'll see. After I got back to town I got a call from Tuan, he was drinking with friends and wanted me to join them, so I did. They were at a new restaurant next to Bocano, I am not sure what the food was like as I'd had a big lunch at El Latino in Mui Ne and was still feeling full as well as delicate from the night before. Tuan did try and feed me some frog, which I declined, but what really upset him was when I declined to drink beer and drank tea instead. He was also upset that I'd gone home from karaoke while he was out getting me some food, when I hadn't known was what he was doing. I'd just had enough and wanted to get out of there. I did apologise to him for leaving. One of Tuan's friends, don't remember the name, wanted me to go to a hotel with him as he wanted to "try out a foreign girl", direct quote. Unbelievable. I made my excuses and left, although I actually did have plans to meet Tina. Tina is a woman who Ms.My is trying to recruit to teach at APC next year. She and I interviewed Tina over Skype and Tina decided that she would come and take a look at Phan Thiet and the school, at her own expense. I took her to Bo Ke for dinner, she's a really nice person. We'll see what happens, she's planning to stay for most of May.