Vietnam
Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon)
Mady – We are staying at a skyscraper apartment building that has 49 floors, we are on the 30th floor. We can see over the city and at sunset you can see the city light up one by one.
Ho Chi Minh or Saigon is known by two names. People who have lived here since they were a child call it Saigon, tourists call it Ho Chi Minh. After the war happened, the name was changed to Ho Chi Minh.
Mady – Today we went on a walking tour. It was free! We learned so much about Saigon/Ho Chi Minh city and at half time (after walking for over an hour) we got coconut chocolate drinks and the adults got coffee. We learned about the city, and how they struggled to reunite the North and South Vietnam.
We also went to the Independence Palace which is where the government used to meet, and where they planned their attacks during the war. They used to have discussions about war and how to improve the city.
The tour guides were University students studying English and they were both very smart and funny. They taught us so much without making it boring, it was constantly interesting. Jinny was one of the tour guides, and the other one was Andrew. Jinny knew about Harry Potter and she told me she was in Ravenclaw.
Also, while we were walking we saw a whole bunch of women who were in beautiful traditional Vietnam dresses. (Mom asked if we could take their picture.)
The dress is cut in half and there are pants under it. The dress part is floral or one solid colour with beautiful designs, some with beads, some without. When you are in school in Vietnam, every Monday you wear this white traditional Vietnamese dress. Jinny said you only eat a little and you don’t want to go overweight because they are very tight. They are absolutely gorgeous!!
Jade – our walking tour started at the Ben Thant Market. After the tour ended, we went to the Independence Palace and then to the Post Office.
To get to the Post Office, we called over a guy who had this bicycle but with the handlebars athe back of the carriage and the front wheel of the bike was changed into two wheels of the carriage. When the person rides the bike, the carriage goes ahead of it. We flew into the city streets sitting in the carriage of this bike. The funny part is that if we hit a car we would get hurt and not the driver. I’ve always wanted to ride in this kind of vehicle because I saw it in TV shows and in internet photos of ‘fun things to do in Vietnam’. I was excited that this was an opportunity that I could accomplish. Me and Mady shared one. And Mom and Dad got their own. Three in total.
When I am writing this right now, it is officially our second month anniversary of our trip.
China – Shanghai
My first impression of Shanghai was of a big city, then we went to an old part and saw old buildings with circular roofs. They said they were built that way like a smile, to bring good luck and also to let more light into the buildings.
In the downtown area, we went to a very tall hotel and we took an elevator to the 87th floor. We could see over the whole entire city.
There are 30 million people living in Shanghai (Canada only has 36 million in the whole country!) China is in the shape of a chicken on a map. Shanghai is located on the coast of China and at the feet of the chicken.
Jade: We went to the Jade Buddha temple. As we walked in I could feel a special connection with it as my name runs in it. The temple was built for people to go in and pray to the different statutes of Buddha. When I walked in there were trees and the trees had no leaves, the branches had ribbons instead. You would get a ribbon and write a wish or prayer and tie it on to a branch of the tree. If your wish came true, you would come back and take it off – if you look at some of the ribbons and one looks faded from the sun, you can tell that wish hasn’t yet come true.
Mady: In Shanghai, we went to the Jade Buddha Temple and when I heard the name was Jade, I was like no fair. And then when I got in, the tour guide also said there was a “Madison” Buddha – which I think was for good luck, kindness and healing.
Jade: I was so eager to see the Jade Buddha statute – but we had to go to the other Buddha’s first (Madison, Shiva, and the guardian of hell – that would take you to the different levels of hell depends on how bad you were. Number one would be stealing, lying, all your life and number 18, the last level, would be murder, etc.)
The piece of jade used to carve the Buddha originally came from Burma/Myanmar. During the Cultural Revolution in China, they tried to destory the Buddhas, but a few monks were so smart, they built a 5 metre pit, took the Jade Buddha and put it in the hole and buried it. Ten years later, they unburied it, and brought it out. If you look at it (since it’s white Jade), you can see that it is kind of brown, near the bottom, from all the dirt that was on it for 10 years.
Tea Ceremony: A cultural celebration/practice is to have a tea ceremony where you drink different types of tea. It sounds boring, but it was an amazing experience. I liked the baby jasmine tea. It helps with headaches, digestion and sleep. My Dad liked the black lychee tea, it helped with blood pressure, cholesterol and digestion. Just for show, (Shout out to Yvette!), they had homemade wrapped bundles of “Romeo” and “Juliet” tea flowers. The Juliet flower was a bundle of shredded leaves with a flower in the middle of it that blooms when it hits the hot water.
Mady: For lunch we went to a tradtional Chinese food restaurant. Everyone might think, “oh, chicken balls and rice.” That is not traditional Chinese food. The first meal we had was sticky rice, pork and soysauce. It was divine. The two dishes that were my favourite, were noodles, with chickens, carrots, soy sauce and herbs. And my other favourite dish was an amazing dumpling, which tasted like our friend, Youmei’s. Then we also had roast duck (which was like a mix between turkey and chicken). NOT my favourite, but good. For dessert we had sticky rice stuffed inside the holes of a lotus flower drizzled with honey. The root was surrpisingly naturally sweet. And it was very good. I love traveling!
Love you all, Mady and Jade.
Parents corner – It was great to celebrate International Women’s Day in Saigon/Ho Chi Minh where many stores and restaurants offered discounts for women and girls!
Quote of the week: “This traveling thing is epic!”
Side note: China was a very short stop and we traveled back through Moscow in transit on our way to our next stop: Portugal!
