Still bumbling along...

Hi from Anne. There is not that much new to report around here. We have settled into a routine of sorts--I go off to write when the nanny comes and Mark goes to his campus and we usually meet for lunch. The kids are finding friends. In fact, Hudson has a really good friend, Linh, who he plays with almost every single night after dinner. Mark and I are slowly starting to socialize with the neighbors. One guy, Tinh, Vietnamese, went off on his scooter and returned with all these amazing foods for us, plus beer. We have no idea what it was or where he got it, but it was good. One thing looked like a muffin with shrimp cooked into the top. You then broke them apart, wrapped them with basil and lettuce, and dipped them in a fish sauce mixture. The other was kind of candied fried shrimp balls--sounds weird but was tremendously good. There's also an Australian on our little street who we met last night playing badminton in the street with his girlfriend. So slowly we are working our way out of the isolation we sometimes feel.

We are heading off on a beach vacation tomorrow for several days so we'll be off the grid for a while. We're going to Phu Quoc island, supposedly one of the most beautiful and unspoiled beaches in southeast Asia. Getting there is a two day affair involving several modes of transportation--minivan, bus, airplane, and motorcycle taxi--but once we get there, we will have a beachfront bungalow and and it will all be worth it.

Another new development is we have a fresh produce/meat/fish seller come to our house every morning and we then select what we want and she debones the fish and cleans the meat and veggies for us so we can cook here with relative ease. We are also keeping the French bread seller in brisk business--he comes by here probably 10 times a day, and we buy regularly. It breaks my heart though to hear him call out around 11 pm when we are in bed. When we leave, we want to give him a 100,000 dong and tell him to take a day off.

Hope you are all well and staying warm. love, Anne