Saigon

Our flight to Vietnam went as smooth as could be! We even arrived a little early, but it was still about 1:00 am before we reached our hotel so it was about 1 1/2 days of travel time to get from our house to our hotel!

The hotel is in the heart of the city and you can hear horns all the time. It reminds me of the slot machines in Las Vegas. Brianna was up by 6:30 am, but I think her internal time clock is starting to adjust. She is
asleep already and it's before 8:00 p.m. 

We had a long day of shopping! The Ben Thanh Market is incredible! It is an indoor, non-air conditioned "mall" and People are packed shoulder to shoulder walking down "aisles." Each vendor has their own "shop" and it is mostly organized by what they are selling. The t-shirts are in one area, the linens are in another area, etc. The vendors are scrambling to make a sale so they were hounding us from the moment we walked in the door! I really thought Brianna would be put off by their aggressiveness, but the shopper actually loved it. In addition to the products that are for sale, they also sell fresh flowers, vegetables, fruit, seasonings, meat. Remember, this is not an air conditioned building! We saw tables with beef, pork and chicken, but Brianna found the liver, intestines, brains (I have no idea what kind of brains), and seafood. We also saw the men cutting the heads off frogs! It is very colorful to say the least!

The last time I was at the Ben Thanh Market was in 1999 when I adopted Brianna and I am glad it hasn't changed a bit!

We did quite a bit of walking today and saw the Ho Chi Minh City Opera House which illustrates the French influence on the architecture in Saigon and the Rex Hotel. The hotel was the hangout for many reporters during the Vietnam War and it has a lot of nostalgia to it.  Daily press conferences were held in the hotel, and some of the first guests in the hotel in 1961, while construction was still in progress, were American soldiers who were waiting for their tents to be ready.  Now it is a very upscale hotel!

I wanted to change my American dollars for Vietnamese Dong, but since it's Saturday the banks were closed. We walked quite a way and then Brianna recognized a money changing place that we used in 2008! I couldn't believe she remembered it! By this time we were so far from our hotel we decided to take a cab to get back rather than walking in the 90 degree heat. Fortunately, it isn't as humid as it usually is and there was even a little cloud cover. 
We had a press conference and there was a television crew and several newspaper reporters that attended to learn about what the Catalyst Foundation is doing to help the Vietnamese communities. In addition to donations of clothes, medical supplies, and toys, we raisedover $28,000 towards this relief effort! The amount of monetary donations is down about 80% since 2008 which probably is due to the Haiti & Chile earthquake relief efforts and our struggling economy. In any case, every little bit helps, and in Vietnam the funds go a lot farther than they would at home, and the need is so great.  Thank you to all who supported us and this cause!

Tomorrow we will leave by 7:00 am and drive to Kien Giang. Then the work begins . . .