Central Vietnam Highs and Lows

If Cambodians treated us with graciousness, for the most part, the Vietnamese see us as an economic opportunity. Which, lets be honest, we are. But their tactics, at times, are questionable:

• Grabbing onto your arm to pull you into their shop
• Complaining that no one else has bought their goods
• Surrounding you with a group of friends, who pressure you to make a purchase
  
• Pushing their goods in your face

What are they selling? Sandalwood fans, bananas, water bottles, rides on their motorcycle, in their taxi, in their cyclo (bike attached to one person carriage), shoes, clay flutes in the shape of turtles, tailored clothing, marble statues, sugared donuts on sticks, silk scarves, fake name brand t-shirts, leather wallets . . . the real question is what arent they selling? Mainly, the food they eat, under tarps and in doorways, sitting on plastic furniture made for children. Only the tourists eat in restaurants.

Also, though many seem aggressive when it comes to attempting a sale, some are not. Those are the ones we are drawn to (surprise, surprise).

Danang
Our entry point to Vietnam was the fourth largest city. Though we found our way through the dark and rain to an unmarked vegetarian restaurant that was more like a stark living room, and mimed our way through the menu-less affair, I would have skipped this town if I had known what I was in for. The hard facts are that its not easy to make a modern town beautiful. Really, with absolutely no restrictions in place, it seems most cities head straight toward ugly. Case in point.

Hue
The train three hours north to Hue made me wonder whether we were in a period piece. Or in Russia. It was slightly nicer than Danang--hard to go down from there. At the end of a long, hot, humid day strolling through temples and pagodas, everything seemed to blend together. Our research yielded an apparent love of emperors for man-made ponds.

Hoi An
This was the jewel of the visit. Luckily we spent three days there, in an Chinese style guest house built in the early 1800s, made of black stained wood and mother of pearl furniture. Every year, it floods between 5-8 feet in height and they have to call on their relatives to help them move all the furniture upstairs as fast as they can.

The women at the guest house knew plenty of English and were happy to sit with us and explain various parts of Vietnamese life. For instance, everyone rises at 4 or 4:30 am. And by 5, they are walking around, shouting out their wares in the markets.

Cambodian Graciousness

Cambodian was an in-and-out affair. I already miss the deep red dirt, lush palms, and grey water buffalos' heads peaking out of rain-filled pools along the roadside. Everyone we met smiled, bowed, and said, "Thank you for choosing us, please come back, please remember us." Okay, not everyone. But close.

Hawkers overpower Angkor Wat

We began the day in a tuk tuk, with a friend from the US I had met at the UN, to tour close to ten temples of Angkor Wat, the largest temple on Earth. At the first temple, we learned the system:

1. Descend from tuk tuk
2. Take quick breath
3. Watch the children take notice
4. Watch the children run

That would be toward, not away from you. They shove postcards into your hands, bracelets onto your wrists. Here are some dialogue you can count on:

"Where you from?"

"United States"

"Capital Washinton D.C. President Obama."

Fair enough--I don't know the name of their king. It was sweet and sad to hear a throng of ostensibly street kids, hungry for the thousands of tourists that most likely didn't come this summer, repeating the name of the newly beloved president. (Beloved outside the US anyway.)

After ten to twenty "no's", they'd get right to the point:

"What you want?"

"Nothing."

"Okay. Two dolla for nothing."

This was a better deal than my friend got--a whopping ten dollars for nothing. (Cambodia informally uses US dollars.)

Sweetest Hotel on Earth

The hotel couldn't have been sweeter. They picked us up from the airport, greeted us with iced limeade, drew a bath in our room and filled it (and our bed) with lotus blossoms, and offerred us a Khmer massage--a lot like the Thai, knee-in-back affair. All of that was for free. Hot water was something they couldn't offer, but apparently that's Cambodia-wide.

Murderous Silk

During a visit to a Silk Farm, I was amazed and horrifed to learn that silk, which is manufactured in Cambodia, depends on the murder of millions of little worms. Apparently the cocoons, built from their own saliva, are thrown into boiling water and the thread of the cocoon is unwound. After that, millions of complicated processes that proceeded to boggle my mind (and still do) turn those cocoons into the gorgeous silks we find on clearance for 29.99.

Best part? Putting my ear down to the mulberry leaf feeding area and listening to the "roar" of thousands of worms munching away. Strength in numbers, y'all!

Singapore Food Issue

When people say Singapore is one big shopping mall, they aren't employing a metaphor. Singapore really is a series of linking shopping malls, which might sound horrific to the non shopper, but here is the catch: within them, they hold the keys to the best food in the universe. Where? In the Food Courts, of course.

I spent Saturday stuffing my face in a fashion Thanksgiving dinner has never managed to bring about. Here are the (incomplete) results:

From the "best food I've ever eaten in my life," list:

• Butter Roti Prata. This comes from the Indian influence in Singapore. Think paratha or crepe, then try not to think about the massive amounts of butter being dumped on it as it fries on the griddle. Just tear it into pieces and eat up. (Often served with a side of dahl.)
• Fried Been Hoon. Might double a Singapore Noodles. Fried vermicelli noodles with strips of fried egg and tofu. Traditional breakfast dish.
• Rojak. Pineapple, cucumber, and some fried to hell and back tofu-like substance covered in a sweet, sticky satay sauce and sesame seeds.
  
• Taiwan tofu wrap. Tofu "skin" fried, bunched, thrown into a cup, doused in a mysterious sauce, and stuck with toothpicks for easy consumption.
  
• Tutu. They made this in the supermarket, but that doesn't mean I know what it was. Either shredded coconut or crushed peanuts inside a white gooey substance we were told was flour. (Not flour.)
• Grand finale: savory carrot cake. Put everything you know about carrot cake out of your mind. Then mix carrots with a mysterious substance to make a custard. Then steam the custard. Then cube it. Then fry it with noodles and veg and tofu in a red sauce and devour it as fast as you can.
  

List of dishes for which I scorned my adventurous spirit:

• Fresh soy milk. How much could this possibly diverge from EdenSoy, eh? Plenty, because EdenSoy manages to convince you that you are not drinking liquid, sugary soy beans.
  
• Moon cake. Particularly the one with hard boiled egg yolk. Thick, sweet lotus paste tasted less enlightening than expected.
  
• Half boiled eggs. It's literal; sort of cooked, but sort of not, AKA not totally raw egg soup (only ingredient: eggs). Challenging texture and not much flava flave.
  
• Jelly. No, not what you're thinking. Transparent chunks of sweet, flavorless jelly in a bowl of crushed ice and canned mango and pineapple.
  

Somewhere in between:

• Jumbu fruit. Shaped like a pear. Red like Rhubard. Crunchy like apple. Stringy like celery. Not sour. Not sweet. Not juicy. (But what is it?)
  
• Kopi, traditional Singapore coffee. Sweetened with condensed milk and stronger than two shots of espresso. This will get you moving!
• Kaya toast. Sweetened coconut paste with slab o' butter on regular old toast. Sort of like the coconut version of nutella. Usually eaten with Kopi (see above).
  
• Mee Siam. Rice vermicelli in spicy, bean-like sauce with fried tofu and half a boiled egg. Somewhere between noodle dish and a soup.
  

Goolgle-Translating Norway's News Answer to Boredom

While doing some "investigative" work on the Norwegian press, E finally took the plunge and hit that "Translate this Page" link on Google's search engine. Now she's wondering why the hell she hadn't done it earlier. Some good finds:

• "improved happy the next time"
• "two time glued penis to incredible man"
• "gas stations disappear"
• "large, small, and insanely"
  
• "hamster life"
• "new dog bites most"
• "approximate sock away"
• "do not agree, nevertheless"
• "Thursday ran from the place, after having thrown the bottles."
• "traffic flows best when 40% violate rules"

The Sad Truth of Ignorant E: Countries of which E was Unaware

• Niger is NOT Nigeria. E thought the French-pronounced nee-sheer was what people said when they wanted to sound sophisticated. With the help of Wikipedia, now E knows they are sophisticated.
• Dominica is NOT the Dominican Republic. This, despite the indelible image of a decapitated cat strewn across the roads of the DR's capital when E visited years ago.
  
• Mauritius is NOT the German pronunciation for Mauritania. No, two different countries. And Mauritania is gigantic.
• Congo is one place, the Democratic Republic of the Congo is another.
  

Etymologized Word of the Blog Post: Languish

I couldn't really think of what word to do, and even though the spelling of languish doesn't immediately yell FRENCH to me, the idea of it does. Don't you think the French were just, like, languishing throughout all time?

I was right. (Surprise!) c.1300, from languiss-, pp. stem of O.Fr. languir "be listless," from V.L. *languire, from L. languere "be weak or faint"

Sultan of Oman Knows How to Party

In anticipation of the upcoming firework show at the Fête de Geneve, hosted by the Sultan of Oman, last night, for Swiss national day, we got a twenty minute preview: liquid gold showering down, streamers bursting into falling stars, a sky bursting with red and white.

White Currants Discovered Despite Ignorance of Name

• E and J bought, shared and consumed a small box of white currants yesterday despite not knowing their name, proving that this too can be done.
  
• How is they? Bitter, but only slightly, and so small and poppable, thereby overcoming the sour taste.
  
• Where is they? Au marché, of course. Their growing season might be a quick one: E noticed them everywhere last week, but this week they could be found in the Italian stall only.

Etymologized Word of the Blog Post: Surface

I know, what a boring word. But as we drove over to the horrible Champion grocery store (reeks of fish, employees might be unhappiest/angriest in supermarket world), and, as usual, chose the "surface" parking, I said, "Sur-Face--because it's over the face, i.e. the flat parking lot!" Score one for E.

1611, from Fr. surface "outermost boundary of anything, outside part" (16c.), from O.Fr. sur- "above" + face. Patterned on L. superficies "surface". The verb meaning "come to the surface" is first recorded 1898; earlier it meant "bring to the surface" (1885), and "to give something a polished surface" (1778). From Etymonline.com

Santigold Steals the Show

Who is cooler--Santigold herself, or her dancers (or the costumes)? On Saturday, as E shook it to her rad tunes, that was the question, one you'll not be totally able to answer from watching this video of L.E.S. Artistes. A few rows back, Santigold didn't invite E on stage, keeping her ghettofabulous moves secret and safe, Frodo style.

It was up to Tracy Chapman to make E cry for the entire song, "Baby Can I Hold You"--okay, let's be honest: sob. And Cold War Kids kept E and J awake until 2 a.m., despite a few slows. (Note to rock musicians: no slow songs after 1am, s.v.p.)

Snackin at Paleo

• E scarfed down some much needed quesadillas with pitch perfect guacamole, though the spanish rice was BNB (bad news bears), possibly because it's not even good in Mexico
• Kürtöskalárs, the Transylvanian tube pastry, of which Google images do not yet exist, found its merry way into E and J's mouth, which gobbled it down to a nub

Etymologized Word of the Blog Post: Benign

E thought there was no way we'd ignore "g"s like the one in begign unless it were French. E was right! Etymology c.1320, from O.Fr. benigne, from L. benignus "good, kind," lit. "well born," from bene "well" + gignere "to bear, beget," from genus "birth." So that benign tumor of yours is just a great birth of cells.

Concert Reveals Moby's Potential Nerd Factor

You know the man. Everyone knows the man. He plays every instrument. He's written hundreds of catchy tunes since forever +2. On MTV, he rocks out with Gwen Stefani. His name is Moby. He is undeniably cool, right?

Wrong. Possibly. Late night research at his concert last night (Paleo) suggests the bald-headed belongs to a different clique. The evidence? How he ran around stage like a child afflicted with ADD. His obsession with bongos despite their absence in the songs, a behavioral cousin of air guitar.

The cool bits: The songs were mainly good, his gospel singer was amazing, and he knows some French. Conclusion: Undecided, but questioning.

Other Paleo Goodies:

• Rodrigo y Gabriela: most talented guitar players I've ever seen. I cried, I danced, I clapped, I woo-hooed. (I could not stop woo-hooing.) Watch them on YouTube.
  
• That Greek stand, La Grèce? Avoid their Loukoumades (fried dough dipped in honey). Chewiness factor suggested multiple frys, and taste seemed to capture that of a refrigerator's interior.
  

B Visa Spectacular:

• A fourth trip to the Swiss gov't offices afforded us the beloved B visa, as opposed to the crap L visa they'd planned to give us in a last minute switcharoo. Background: B is jump up and down worthy and L is more shit-eating grin.
  

Etymologized Word of the Blog Post: Marinate (on this)

• After suggesting we marinate cherry tomatoes in balsamic vinegar prior to making our next basil and tomato omelet, J suggested marinate was French. La mer is the sea. Sea men are mariners. And most of us are aware of the word marine.
  
• The proof: c.1645, from Fr. mariner "to pickle in (sea) brine," from O.Fr. marin (adj.) "of the sea," from L. marinus. Source: www.etymonline.com