National Geographic

Today as I came back from lunch I noticed out of the corner of my eye a branch on the steps. As I was about to pick it up I realised that it was not. It was one of my worst fears, a snake. I detest snakes. I was scared stiff. As I walked up the stairs I was unsure whether to get my camera and photograph it. I have always wanted to get a snake picture with my camera.

I reasoned that it was small and if it tried to strike me it would be slow and not be able to break my skin. I decided to go for it and grab the camera. I noticed that I was a trembling a little, and generally feeling uneasy. I found the camera went down stairs hoping it was still there, and luckily it was. I moved into position to take the snake snap, mindful not to get too close. It was about 80cm long and the thickness of a finger. It had an intricate design on the back similar to some of the vegetation I have seen here. It’s head definitely looked like a leaf.

I took the first photo however it looked to far away, so I was trying to keep the same distance while taking the second. All of sudden it moved, slowly to turn around and look at me. My heart raced as I was putting a bit more distance between me and it. I took the second snap as it was about to leave, and tried to get a third. I was wrong about the speed of the snake, it could really fly. Beside the bike shed it went, and I was not brave enough to chase it down for the third pic.

The next time I will use the tap next to the greenhouse I will be petrified. Who knows what is hiding in the grass there. Well anyway, mission accomplished 2 pictures of the little snake.

Unknown Farewell

Thursday last week saw the English department have a farewell party for …? I wasn’t sure who it was for, either Scott or Lillian. I knew it was on, and was invited yet I did not know what time, and consequently missed the important speeches. I think it might have been for both, yet Lillian will come back after the northern summer and Scott doesn’t leave for a while.

When I arrived I saw the presentation of the gifts. Then it was time to eat. I usually don’t look forward to the food at the English faculty’s parties as I feel the food is far from adventurous. Eric and I earlier in the afternoon were trying to guess what the food would be. I was surprised to find that only two were right: a type of salad (Goi) and soup (Lau). This time they had a fish (Pink Tilapia) which was really fantastic. The flavour wasn’t strong and the flesh melted in your mouth. To top it off we had mangos like at home, sweet and orange. Most of the mangos here I feel are too sour and green.

Throughout dinner the guys were playing a game. Whenever we wanted to drink someone would say oooh chilli, and we would drink. We had to hide it as the Rector, Dr Xuan, doesn’t like drinking much. When it was time to go I was ready to escape to the next place.

Hendrik

For the last 9 months Hendrik has been with us here at AGU. He was a postgraduate IT student doing a project with the library. I learnt a lot of things about Germany and German culture. He really was a great guy, not what I would expect from an IT student. I also learnt the correct way to drink those German beers. The big ones. At Oktoberfest last year, which coincided with Hendrik’s birthday, we went Lang Toi and ordered litre beers. Metta, a Danish girl was also there and they wanted to have a proper Oktoberfest drinking comp. After much instruction I followed their lead and found myself with a sore arm. How can these guys lift a litre of beer with one arm. I thought it was crazy. They proceeded to tell us that there were barmaids capable of carrying 8 of these glasses through a tent of drunk Germans doing there slap dances.

Occasionally when the mood was right Hendrik would do a slap dance. Of all the crazy memories I have of Hendrik, one dance he did etched in my mind forever and when I picture Oktoberfest I am sure this is what all the people are doing.

Saturday Hendrik departed for the Middle East then off to Germany. We heard he arrived safely and did some things we wanted to do. On Wednesday last week was his official send off. He had a private dinner with his boss and the head of the university. By about 7.45 I was starting to feel my stomach eat itself as I could no longer wait for the food at the after party. I went to contact Eric yet his yahoo message was perplexing making me feel that I should not contact him.

Eventually Eric was starting to feel the pangs of hunger and contacted me and we quickly made our way to Truyen’s. At the restaurant Lillian and the family were there waiting. Next along was Sabrina. She is from Switzerland and is working for the pesticides department of the department of agriculture and rural development. She is doing her internship for here degree here in Long Xuyen.

Truyen had cooked up too plates of beef. If the beef had of been Australian it would have been divine. All the same the flavour was great if a little chewy. There were some really good deep fried mushrooms as well.

After everybody had arrived, I started to wonder if Hendrik was coming. He contacted us to tell us he was on his way yet this was about 30 minutes ago, and nothing takes 30 minutes to get to in Long Xuyen. I met Jack for the first time that night, he is the long term defacto of Kirsty, the other AVI who is newly arrived. She is working with the English dept. Jack kind of reminded me of my uncle Mick, a good bloke to have a drink with.

When Hendrik and his girlfriend Thu, arrived they were carrying a special present, a bottle of Johnny. We continued to eat and Truyen was well and truly beyond the great unknown expanse of drunkenness and kept ordering food. We kept drinking and then left at the latest possible moment.

Saying goodbye to Sabrina, with Truyen watching.

At the guest house the party continued and we drank the whiskey empty. Hendrik was even brave enough to pick up a guitar and play. I was starting to feel tired myself as I did not sleep well the previous few days and by this time I could tell Hendrik had had a long day and the whiskey was taking its toll. We had a mission to complete, finish the bottle. I struggled through the tiredness and together the three of us finished the bottle and called it a night.

Playing the Guitar

The evidence makes us guilty

Lang Toi

Lang Toi (my village) is a restaurant that I feel is in the upper end of the restaurant scales here in Long Xuyen. The tip off is the fact that is a Nha Hang. Most restaurants are Quans, and this gives an indication about the prices inside and supposedly the size. It is one of the restaurants that brew their own beer in two flavours dark and gold. In Vietnamese Bia Den refers to dark beer. As you enter through the parking ground you look to the left and you see the brewhouse.

When you look to the right you will see the seafood and other live specialties on offer. I generally find it is a mixture of fish, eels, prawns, and snakes. The black snakes in the picture are the best snakes for eating yet I didn’t find it enjoyable. The meat was really rubbery and you had to be careful not to eat the stomach or the backbone. And then there were the rib bones, I felt that if I was starving I might eat it again, yet most often I would give it a miss.

The atmosphere of the restaurant is quite pleasant. The owners and host are quite friendly and will often come and chat. Occasionally they may also give us some free fruit. I often find it awkward though as the ability to communicate is limited by language, however the new host appears to have a good grasp of English. They are nice good natured people who try to enhance our dining experiences. They also own another restaurant called Tre Xanh (young bamboo) which is similar to Lang Toi, although I am yet to see this for myself.

The restaurant has been through a number of renovations since I have been in Long Xuyen yet the decore is generally the same. It use the bamboo outdoor theme which makes feel like you are a prince dining in a private jungle. There are 3 levels ground, up a few stairs and upstairs. I find that downstairs is the most enjoyable yet dangerous as most people will pass you by, and occasionally be brave enough to try out their English skills. I feel upstairs seems to have the worst service as you are far from everything.

Now the bathroom here is the most interesting I have ever been too. I and the other volunteers here used to refer to it as the disco toilet as it was like walking through a nightclub. Loud music blaring with videos of fashion shows. Under the last renovation it got larger and seemed to lose the speakers. It also became more modern.

The day Eric, Hendrik, Tyler, and I came we were in the mood for spaghetti. This was the only place we knew at the time to sell it. We also ordered some garlic bread. I find the garlic bread too oily or too dry. I think it is because they don’t use butter and grill it on a bbq. The spaghetti is also strange, good in a way with really strong Asian flavour influence. There was one herb there that just does not belong, and it affects the taste of the rosemary. I don’t think the others agree with me about the taste description, yet they agree that it is strange.

Although the European food is not the best, their Vietnamese food is good. I have sampled many dishes here and found them to be good. I really liked the basa (catfish) served in a lemongrass and chilli sauce. They do good tofu as well if you are not into eating any meat. Lots of grilled dishes, rice, and of course the specials you see when you walk in.

This particular day we were interested to drink the brewed beer yet they had run out or something. This is the first time I recall that this has happened here. Never the less they do have a large selection of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. The last time I went we sampled the dark and gold beers and found them to be quite good, if not better than before. I feel if you are in Long Xuyen and you are looking for something popular and swanky this should be considered highly on your list, just stick to Vietnamese food.

What are they doing?

Well the Coop Mart has done it again. After asking them to stock cheese they finally did. I felt elated about having cheese, and relieved not to need to ask for cheese every time my friend goes to Can Tho. After rectifying the cheese issue it has done one worse.

Now when you are hungover there is nothing like lemon-lime Gatorade (or even orange). It just peaks you up. So I felt that now everything is set, drink all night and one bottle of Gatorade for breakfast. Such a sweet deal.

Now they have decided not to stock it. Why? If there was ever a place that needed Gatorade outside of a sports venue it is Long Xuyen. Drinking is a national sport here. And I have seen some guys at work looking like they fought a truck at high speed (I have even seen it in the mirror sometimes too). I guess I am disappointed. No really disappointed. You see Jeff rocked in from Long My yesterday and we started a little early and finished a little late. And today I woke up feeling like I had survived a nuclear detonation in my head. I really just wanted to go and vege out and have some refreshing, life giving Gatorade. As I write this my mind is ticking (loudly) about how to get more Gatorade into LX. (pic is from Wiki)

The end of the line

This is the name of the last story mission in the game GTA San Andreas. GTA (grand theft auto) is the name given to the crime of stealing automobiles. In this game you are a criminal who tries to help out your brother. Interestingly enough I felt the missions with your brother are not that good. Once he gets arrested after about 10 missions, you start to work for some triad gangsters, and this is where I thought the game got really excited.

It also involves a lot of racing. Usually away from the cops though. I loved two things about the chases, when you were at top speed the screen got a little blurry representing real life at high speeds and this just added to the realism of the chase. The second as frustrating as it was, when you took your car over the cliff, it really gave me an anxious feeling of falling off the cliff, my stomach at times felt like it had left my body.

So throughout the game you move up in the criminal world and you feel like you have achieved something. Starting in Los Santos you are a common street thug, in San Fierro you move more into car theft, in the desert you meet a government agent who asks you to do some missions for him, and by the time you leave Las Venturas you have a stake in a casino. After returning to Los Santos you give it all up to be a street thug all again. It was disappointing after achieving virtually so much.

So the game is mostly based on movies like Colours, Boyz in the Hood, New Jack City and Menace to Society. Yet certain missions where direct copies of other movies like The Usual Suspects, the Fast and the Furious, Goodfellas, and Ocean’s eleven. The music is what drew me in the most. It just added, what I felt, an incredible feel to the game, like a soundtrack in a movie just adds the oompf. They selected well known tracks from 1992 (the year the game was set in) and added the nostalgic feel to the game.

So after 45 hours recorded on the games statistics, more in actuality, I finally completed all the missions for the story game. This means there is still 40% of the game to complete.

I have started the next game in the series Liberty City Stories I feel it lacks the appeal of San Andreas, due to the soundtrack not being as good. The cars in the game don’t seem to handle as well, and the targeting of enemies is not as good. I have completed a few missions yet can not see myself playing this as much as the GTA San Andres (Pics from wiki and gtasanandreas.net).

Hai Lua

Early in April I went to Hai Lua with some English teachers. This restaurant is an interesting place as the name means second brother or country bumpkin. This restaurant is good for two reasons, 1 the owner speaks English and really wants to make sure you have a great time there and two, if you like boats you can take one out in the middle of the canal, although I have heard reliability is a factor. I was the second person there and ordered a beer, Sai Gon Xanh, much to the dismay of the Coors Lite girl.

While waiting for the food and people to arrive I noticed that they had not cleaned up after a previous wedding. Here is a glimpse of the stage they use in such things. When I mentioned that the wedding decorations were still around I was filled with dread as I saw the eyes of my inquisitor flash and the wedding question asked. I am really irritated by this question and it seems like such an important issue for people in Viet Nam. I will let you guess this question.

Not long after the first dish arrived some kind of tofu. Now I use to think tofu was this horrible, nasty, crazy vegetarian food yet I have seen some amazing things done to here. This particular dish (made with egg and butter possibly) was great, you eat it with a mild chilli sauce and it just melts in your mouth. The taste was like a light brown omelette, ahh magnificent. This is my favourite tofu dish to date and I got to learn how to make this so I can make it in Australia.

The great tofu dish of unknown name half eaten

A few more members arrived and finished the tofu just as the second dish came grilled beef in fish sauce. Now this is one, if not, my favourite Vietnamese dishes. Essentially marinating the beef in fish sauce (sometimes with garlic) and quickly grilling it and eating. I could only imagine how great this would taste with good Australian beef. This dish didn’t disappoint. It was all that I expected and more with the red tomatoes, a rarity here I can promise you.

My favourite VN dish

Next up was the so (blood acra in English yet can not find the spelling anywhere and the dictionary translates them to baby oysters) drizzled in oil grilled and sprinkled with green onions. I usually have them salted or grilled till dry, however these I found were fantastic. The oil and green onions were the perfect mix to bring out the taste of the sea. When putting them with chilli salt and lime I thought it was utterly divine.

The so dish

Lastly we had chicken. We put away our fears of chicken flu (no cases reported for a while) and ordered a chicken. For $8 you can have a whole chicken butchered (vn style = with a cleaver and no precision) prepared and cooked for you. And when I mean a whole chicken I mean all, you can see the head. The head, the chicken and insides are cooked together. Luckily one part is missing. We ordered this with chilli and salt and it gave a nice crispy skin. The chicken arrives with some little pastries which are fried and I think really enjoyable. Some parts of the chicken where dry which was disappointing. On the plus side however I really loved how it made the beer taste good. Definitely would be interested in doing a beer and chicken night.

The chicken with the head at the top of the body

On the way out I saw this Heineken sign. I just had to take a photo of it for all to look.

Tell me when you will be mine (corny commercial)