Tuesday January 17

Oh what a great night sleep!!!  A little modern medicine helped as well to make sure I wasn’t waking up at all hours, but wow that felt good (a solid 12 hours).  We hadn’t made a plan for the day since neither of us were feeling well and knew at this point sleep was most important, but I think we both woke up around 9am.  We took it slow in the am and had cereal for breakfast to make sure any stomach issues were behind us (they were, wahooo) and then decided to attack the strollers!  Luckily, we just needed to attach the wheels, and Dan was awesome and went over the instructions with me so we had an idea.  We also packed a wrench and air pump to blow up the wheels, so we were ready to rock!  The second stroller probably took 1/10 of the time the first one did, we were pros!

We then headed out to do some errands (like true locals) as we needed to exchange money and grocery shop (the only stuff we got last night was enough to eat dinner).  Our errands were successful and we came back to eat lunch and Mom had to get on chat with Verizon.  Every year we come, we end up wasting half a day as something has gone wrong with the international travel plan we put on our phones.  Mom had gotten a text that said she was charged $185 (we had only been in the country for 12 hours at this point) so our yearly tradition continued!  A very long story short, the plan we always put on our phone no longer works in Vietnam (although why they added the plan for her and didn’t tell her it wasn’t going to work in the country she asked it to is weird – but typical Verizon).  Anyway, once she finally got that fixed we had a late lunch and got ready to head to the orphanage! 

As we wanted to bring the strollers we decided taking a cab was the best, so the hotel helped us to get a cab and we were on our way! 

One of these times it would be my dream to hire a photographer/videographer to follow us around, because I honestly cant describe how excited Cap was to see us!  He was jumping up and down and running and grabbing us and pulling us to go see everyone!  (Also, yesterday we didn’t have one picture inside the orphanage, as we were too busy with the kids!)

Since we were behind schedule today (stupid Verizon) we didn’t have time to go outside so we stayed inside and played.  Staying inside means you can spend time with more kids, but it also means more craziness, people grabbing you, pulling you in every direction, etc.  But, all was well and it made sense to stay inside so we were ready for mealtime!

Mom is in green!

I fed one of the George’s today (my favorite George) but man is he slow.  I sat next to another volunteer who is a retired barber in Ho Chi Minh.  I didn’t have enough time to ask him questions, but George seems to speak Vietnamese (although very slowly) so I asked the guy if he was actually speaking Vietnamese (some of the kids mumble and make no sense).  He said yes he does, and he’s saying he doesn’t want any more rice, just broth, HA!  George told me!  We had a successful feeding (besides getting sneezed on in the face, lovely) but he really didn’t eat a lot.  Luckily, we didn’t get yelled at by the workers, so that was good.  After helping to clean up we hit the road.

Mom tickling Cap!

This bus ride was much more enjoyable, much cooler and less traffic!

We decided to stay in for the rest of the night.  These are the times we REALLY enjoy having an apartment and not having to go out for dinner.  We are still jet lagged, and easily overwhelmed by the heat, noise, people, etc. so being able to cook something easy is so nice!  After much needed showers, Mom finished her pizza and I warmed up some leftover pasta.  We did a little blogging/email catch up, and I was off to bed!