You can take the girl out of Philly, but...

You don't even want to know what I would do for a disgustingly greasy Philly chicken cheesesteak with fried onions and mushrooms right now.

...you can't take the Philly out of the girl.

Let's play a game

Guy from Long Island: What are you doing here?
Me: Oh, I'm an english editor for an art publishing company.
GfLI: That's pretty cool.

Three minutes later...
GfLI: So, what do you do here?
Me: I'm an english editor. For an... art publishing company?
GfLI: Oh that's so great. You usually only meet teachers coming from the west. Do you like it?
Me: Uhh... yeah, we talked about this three minutes ago.

Let's play a game, it's called LISTENING. I know it's hard, but give it a try; not only might you enjoy it and get more out of life, but people will like you better. Just a thought!

0-7 in three minutes flat

I went from zero mosquito bites to seven mosquito bites in three minutes.

Oddly, it was at my yoga center. You're supposed to relax there, not frantically scratch bug bites just to attain a few seconds of relief. Even more interesting, my yoga instructor is really amazing and manages to make us forget about them during the session, and for the rest of the evening really. The problem is, tomorrow I'll be scratching like an addict of sorts. Win some, lose some.

Mosquitoes 23, Lauren 2. I'm making a come back, I mean 23 wretched mosquito bites in three months really isn't so bad when you think about it. Then again, rainy season is coming...

90 days later

I'm pretty sure I was thinking about posting earlier, but I'm really backed up at work and forgot whatever I was going to post.

But then I realized, today is my three month anniversary with Vietnam! I hope it buys me dinner or at least flowers.

I'm hanging back at work for another 45 minutes to get a little more work done and then going to celebrate some German holiday that I've never heard of. ::shrug:: When in Rome... or something.

<3

Mission: Complete

So, Lizzie, my roommate, insisted Tracey and I sign up for this website called goodreads.com. Being the bibliophile I am, I signed up without much of a push; feel free to friend me, just use my email address. Don't judge the books I've rated, I don't have hours upon hours to update the site and I proudly admit to enjoying a good piece of trash every once in a while. Anyway, it's a great way to keep track of the books you've read and the books you want to read, as well as get recommendations from your friends. I've been intending to make a book journal for ages and this just made life infinitely more simple. Alright, enough free advertising.

Anyway, I was looking for the title to a book I'd read in a private journal I've been keeping since my first year in college. I was smart enough to finally tag all of the entries two summers ago when I was lifeguarding an empty pool. In my search, and the point to this post, I found this gem:

"I want to move to another country and maybe never come back. How do Visas work? I don't necessarily want to give up my citizenship, I just need to do something new and exciting. Places I have in mind, even though I don't really know much about most of them: the U.K., Spain, South Africa, France, Italy, or maybe Greece (I don't know how hot it gets there). I'd consider South American countries, but it's too damn hot."

Well, I'm out of the country! No where I thought I'd like to go and it is damn hot. But, first part of the mission: COMPLETE.

I imagine if I kept looking I'd find others but I'm off to meet Romy to go to Velvet for Ladies Night.

It's getting hot in here, but taking off your clothes won't make a difference

In Ho Chi Minh, as well as, I'm sure, other cities around the world that use too much energy, they shut off power grids around the city for about 10 minutes what seems to be once week to conserve energy or something ridiculous of that nature. Once the electricity comes back on though, for some unknown reason, the air system doesn't turn back on in my office building for 4+ hours once the power is cut... we're working on hour 5 right now. It's actually cooler outside than it is in the office. The editorial team is in a small room which fits us and our seven desks and our seven computers which give off MORE heat.

I'd cry, but I don't want to lose any more fluids.

Vocabulary lessons in my own language... who knew?

So, my weekend in Ba Ria with the Euros was a lot of fun (despite the unending French) and I have a hand-written entry to post, I'll get to that as soon as possible. As well as neglected emails. I'm anticipating a slow week, though there's only three and a half work days, so how much could really happen (isn't that the last thing anyone says before utter chaos strikes?)? Yes, one-half. The boss is making us all come in for a half day on Saturday to make up for the two weekdays he gave us. I'm not complaining though - seriously.

I wanted to share the new words I learned at work today. They are real words, in the dictionary.

higgledy-piggledy - in utter disorder or confusion
kerfuffle - a commotion or fuss

Also, Mom, you may find mild humor (or disgust) in this, the book I'm proofing now uses the word armpit! I changed it to underarm, but still... it's more widely used than even I thought.

Love and miss you all. Hope spring is bringing the much anticipated May flowers <3

Indian concept

It's National Broken Heart's Day in India.

Interesting concept, isn't it?

Ba Ria, con't

I was getting worried it might rain and put a serious damper on our evening, but the clouds have passed. We've all napped and we're gearing up for another exciting evening around the barbeque and bonfire, and a "midnight bath."

A teeny-tiny part of me misses the city, but I'll be back there soon enough probably counting the days until I can escape again.

Ba Ria, Vietnam

There's something really beautiful about the rustic simplicity of this place. We (Julien, Romy, Laurent, Julie, Ernst, Romain, and Jessica) have come for holiday to Ba Ria. It's really nice to be out of the wretched smell of Ho Chi Minh, if only for a few days.

It's so hot despite the breeze coming off the ocean and there's little to do. It's nice that we are eight because it's hard to get tired of each other, although the fact that we've only known each other for a short period of time makes it more difficult to know each other so well that we share our most annoying habits or know well how to push each others buttons (except Julien, I think he got a handbook on all of us that outlined the best ways to make us want to tell him to shuuutttt uuupppp).

The beach is beautiful and deserted. I think that is so strange, coming from NJ where it's nearly impossible to find your own private space at all, let alone at the beach. I guess it's different here because the women are so modest with their bodies AND this particular "resort" is pretty expensive for a Vietnamese salary. At the pool I feel guilty when there are a lot of Vietnamese, as if I am offending them in my two-piece bathing suit. We probably are, they're just too nice to say or do anything.

This place reminds me a lot of Deer Lake. We've got the ocean and a pool, little (extremely hot, no aircon, pathetic fan) cabins for sleeping, group showers, volleyball, and a pool table. We had a really delicious barbeque last night - I don't see how I'll ever be able to go back to veggie burgers after chicken kebabs, potatoes, pasta, and fresh salad. And while these Europeans could never replace Conor and great times at Deer Lake, it's been an overall lovely experience. Except for the bugs, but what can you do?