To market, to market

This morning we went to work with Terry then went for "pho" breakfast (pronounced fua) at Pho 24 near his office. It took three tries to get the Lipton tea with condensed milk that I wanted and that's only after Eileen walked back into the kitchen area and showed them the can. Even with my phrase book they didn't understand - - and they were reading the Vietnamese words. It's like that so often here. I never really know what I'll get but that's part of the fun. So we made up our own phrase for the kind of tea I want: Cha (tea) sua da. It's logical to us since the coffee version is Cafe sua da. We'll see tomorrow if our logic translates. (Note: later I asked Le Ly about this situation. She said, "We don't drink our tea like that so that's why you didn't get it that way." So just because they don't serve it like that they WON'T serve it like that? Yes, she said. Interesting!)

We headed to the market immediately afterward where I took lots of pictures of bins piled high with dried shrimp (beautiful bright orange), dried fish, medicines, the woman who gave us dried coconut, the guy getting my brown pearls, etc. The smells in that market are unbelievable - - good and bad. I bought a bunch of stuff and admired a lot more than I purchased. But I DID buy shoes! And had so much fun doing it! My trying on shoes drew a crowd - - I suppose for a variety of reasons but it was funny to watch men and women and security guards gather around while I sat on a small stool only inches above the ground and tried on shoes. With my size 8 shoe (small to average by American standards) I had a hard time finding shoes my size (huge by Asian standards). If, when walking by a stall, the sales girl looked at your feet and didn't say anything to you that generally meant she didn't carry any "big sizes." Often I would see people staring at my flip-flopped feet and kibitz with one another as if estimating the size of my foot. While trying on shoes when I would squeal, "Oh these are so cute!" so would one of the sales girls, imitating me. I'm not sure it was the imitation that's in the form of flattery or if she was mocking/making fun of me but it was funny to me and Eileen nonetheless. After every purchase they made you feel like you were long lost friends, like you needed to take a photo with them or give them your email address so you could keep in touch with one another! It's funny. And everyone waves to you as you walk down the aisle to the next stall - - even the men and guards. "I see you again?" they say; or, "Good luck to you!" Jeez, ya almost feel bad leaving them they're so dang sweet. See the photos for the shoes I bought; the crazy gold ones are for an Indian Sari Luncheon with ILV I'm going to on Thursday. They'll match the orange sari that Eileen had made for me. I paid a total of $18US for these two pairs of shoes. See the photos for pictures of fruit and flowers inside and outside of the market, too.

We headed to the Chinese market after the first market with the intention of just driving around it (we were exhausted!) and taking photos but it started to rain a little so I couldn't take photos or moving pictures. Now there's a bustling place! Full of activity and great colors everywhere. I bought a couple of lanterns to match some I bought in N. Vietnam in 2000. It was a long day shopping...very hot, very tiring but really a lot of fun.

We went to lunch and experimented with some desserts after our delicious lunch. The desserts were horrible! First of all, everything we wanted wasn't available but secondly, the stuff we did decide upon was just terrible. But like Eileen said, "Oh well, that's thirty cents down the drain." It's not like we paid a bunch of money for a dessert at Cafe Latte and couldn't eat it...