The Road To Vietnam

Over the period between Christmas and New Years, I spent an action packed week in Vietnam with my sister. Somehow, one of the most action packed nights was on the way to the airport in Korea.

It started with poor planning. I booked tickets through a travel agent and I thought that our flight was leaving from Busan, in the South of Korea, and flying back into Incheon, closer to our town. Instead both flights were to Busan airport, and I did not forsee how hectic of a travel time Christmas Eve would be. Kelsey and I tried to book a bus ticket to Daejeon so that we could take the train to Busan, but the tickets were sold out for that night. Even worse, all the train tickets going to Busan from Seoul were sold out as well. Oops.

So we were in a pretty big jam with no way to get to Busan and a flight leaving at 10:30 the next morning. Luckily, our friend Michael had told us that his girlfriends car was being kept at his place while she was out of the country, and that we could borrow it for a short trip. I told him about my predicament, and he told me that the car may not be reliable enough to make it 5 hour trip to Busan, but that we were welcome to try if we wanted. Lacking any better options, we were on our way by about 9:30 that night.

We finally got to the airport at 3 in the morning after being lost for a while and almost running out of gas. With nothing to do until the flight, we spent a pleasant night of sleeping in the car while periodically running the heater to warm ourselves. We finally went to the airport at about 6 in the morning, and we were once again on our way.

We did have a nice stop at a rest area. Korean rest areas are top notch. They have restaurants, convenience and coffee shops, and sometimes batting cages. We were lucky enough to find one with a Santa, and took this photo just as midnight and Christmas day were upon us:

So from there the flight was comparatively uneventful, and we made it to Hanoi, Vietnam. Another weird speedbump was when we tried to change our money at the airport, and it turned out that the banks did not take Korean Won. I took some money out of an ATM to have enough for a minibus to a hotel where we could change over some Won into Vietnamese Dong. Somehow, I managed to leave my card inside of the ATM so that it sucked it back in and I lost my American ATM card within a half hour of being in Vietnam. Nice going.

It turned out we found a giftshop that would buy some Won at a semi-reasonable rate so we had enough money to pay for two nights of hotel and two plane tickets. From there we didn't really have any money problems because we could just change over money at the hotels.

The minibus ride was nice into Hanoi, and then I took a few photos of our first time walking around:

Some kids playing ball

An awesome church

The top-notch electrical infrastructure of Vietnam

I thought the money was really cool. It's called Dong and it has a tiny clear window on it

The rest of the first day was relaxing. We spent some time exploring and made some friends who were graffiti artists from Ho Chi Minh City while drinking at an outside cafe.

We were walking and this lady was aggressively trying to sell us fruit. She put her hat and carrying stick on us for a photo without even asking. So we got some nice photos:

Kelsey

Me

After she pretty much forced us to buy some bananas, so I picked up four bananas for a dollar. Not really a great deal, but the photos were nice I guess. It was a nice end to a long day.

Konichiwa, Japan

Ahh, the vacation was in full swing with the parents and little sis in Korea, and after a few days that meant it was time to hit up Japan, noted rival and sometimes hated enemy of Korea. Japan: the land of the rising sun, bullet trains, tasty sushi, giant sumo wrestlers, and pokemon (unfortunately). Here's a song to get you in the right mood while reading this post:

We had an early afternoon flight, and with Japan being Korea's neighbor, we were in Japan by mid afternoon. My sister and her husband were on a plane just a few hours behind us so we decided to kick it around the airport until they got there. Unfortunately, Tokyo Narita airport is vulnerable to some ridiculous bottlenecks (my trip back!) and we spent a great deal of time at the aiport. This did leave me a generous time period to stare at my newly acquired yen:

It's pretty cool money actually. The center oval is a solid creme color, until you hold it up to the light and then another image of face to the right of the oval appears. The money is, however really wide so it doesn't fit right into western wallets.

After Amber and Dave finally arrived, we were on our way to the series of train rides that would take us to our hotel. Here's a picture of the family together at last at the train stop. Kelsey's checking out the strange Japanese candy she bought. I bought some orange flavored M&Ms at the same shop.

After a switch to Japan rail from the airport line, we arrived in the district which contained our hotel, called Shinjuku. It's home to a nice electronics and shopping district, plenty of bright lights, and the busiest subway stop in the world. This is one of the first pictures I took of the scenery in Japan:

Luckily for us, Amber married a man with a great interest in all things Japanese. Dave did some careful studying of various maps, including Google maps to find our hotel. He served as somewhat of a navigator for our entire trip. Thanks Dave!

He lead us almost directly to our Hotel, the fabulous hotel NUTS. This picture was not taken the first night but rather on a different day.

Why is it called hotel NUTS, you ask? The place IS NUTS. Or maybe the rooms are so tiny that you feel like a squirrel storing nuts in a small tree. There are many schools of thought on this top....oh wait:

Of course! The hotel is a new urban time and space. It was definitely something. It turns out it was converted from a love motel, meaning the type that was once rented by the hour. I liked it actually, it had a soda fountain where you can bath in the luxury of three complimentary beverages each day. The rooms are tiny, but the bathrooms are huge. And bonus, the toilets are sanitarized:

So nothing to worry about there. The TV was huge, and so was the remote:

Yep, thats got all of the buttons I'm used to. A 1, a 7.....wait....um, a 10, 11, and a 12? I've never seen that one before.

Once settled in, we ventured out into Shinjuku to find a restaurant for our first Japanese dinner. We settle on a place that had nice pictures on the menu. We each ordered a good looking meal. The meals were for the most part OK, but my little sister ended up ordering a dish with chicken gizzards, and my mom was served a dish which included the parts of the chicken that are a little chewy/crunchy. This was somehow the main part of her dish. It was literally that part of the chicken that is crunchy and chewy which was breaded, deep fried, and served with peanuts. She hated it. I somehow got myself to like it. This part of the chicken usually makes me gag/lose my appetite, but when I was expecting it I thought it was actually kind of good. The other dishes were at least edible, so there was one Japanese meal down.

Next was another small Christmas in which a few holiday cookies were eaten which Amber had managed to smuggle overseas, and gifts were exchanged between Amber, Kelsey, Dave, and I. It was a cozy Christmas to say the least. Amber and Dave did get me one of the best possible gifts for a Brewers Fan, this Bratwurst racing sausage bobblehead doll. Thanks Amber and Dave.

See you tomorrow for more Japan fun!

Happy Hollidays, Ho Ho Ho, Etc.

So things have been barren around here, I know. The last few weeks have been extremely busy with preparing for my family to come to Korea, and then the trip to Japan. I expect to write upwards of 7 posts about the trip, so make sure to check back often.

Before I get to my Japan trip, I have another exciting story to share. This is the tale of when I dressed up as Santa Claus. Oh what a day!

First, all of the kids wore these corny hats with tinsel on them. These types of celebrations are a lot about good photo opps with the kids to please the parents.

I peeked into the room a few times, but then I had to dress up in my costume and hide so that the kids couldn't see me until it was time for Santa to arrive. This meant that I had to miss the kids' performances of the Christmas songs which I had helped them learn. Luckily the other foreign teacher was able to take some photos for me. This is a class I don't teach but they are really cute kids:

The next photo is of my group of 6 year olds (American 5) who had to learn 'Santa Claus is Coming to Town.' My tactic to help them learn it was to first sing the song as a class, then have each one sing it individually and give them a sticker if they did, repeating everyday for two weeks. It worked pretty well.

Then, all of the lights were turned out and the kids were given candles. They had to cheer out for Santa Claus to arrive (I was just hiding out in an office).

I came out in full getup, my boss is right behind me but his eyes are cut off. If you look closely you can see that my jacket and pants are just a little too short.

I had to give a present to each of the Kindergarteners, 50 in all. Each came up to get their present and had to listen to one of the Korean teachers and promise that they were going to be a good little boy or girl for the next year. At least that's what I think it was because I don't understand Korean. The deal was sealed with a pinky swear and a nice photo.

Last, just a matter of a photo with each class and I was out of the costume for at least another year.

Well, happy late holidays and make sure to check back daily for the next week or so because I plan to do a post a day or so until I finish with the trip. If there isn't a post for a day just assume that the game Grand Theft Auto: China Town Wars for Nintendo DS is a really good game (it was one of my Christmas presents).