Cultural Exchanges and Birthday Bashes

As many of you know, I gained one whole more year of life on November 5. It was my birthday!!!! I love my birthday, you get to do what ever your heart desires and no one can say anything because its your birthday. For example, there is an unwritten rule in Vietnam that you are not allowed to touch your motorbike taxi driver. Well, on my birthday, I threw that rule out the window for our ~20-km trip from an ethnic minority village to the beach. I was almost hugging him, that's how much I disregarded that rule. And I have to say, I don't feel bad about it, and I think he was fine with it. Plus, he was going like50 or 55 km per hour, which doesn't sound fast until you experience it.

Anyway, my birthday was great. The night before we had a cultural exchange at the village of Cau Gay, where the Raglay ethnic minority live. I was feeling a little homesick, because I didn't have my friends and the villagers were very shy and weren't really trying to make friends with us. But thankfully, Mister Vinh announced that it was my birthday the next day and the night transformed. There were lots of shots being poured, lots of laughter and singing and it was an amazingly fun night. Also, when I said that all I wanted for my birthday was to hold a puppy, they caught me a puppy. I got to hold it for a while before they told me to let the terrified little creature go. Julia has some pictures, but I haven't gotten them, so you will just have to wait to see them.

On my actual birthday, we went to the beach!!!!! We learned about sea turtle conservation and went swimming a lot. We tried to go snorkeling but the waves were too large to get to the reef, so unfortunately, we missed out. But did I mention we got to go swimming...on a private beach. Swimming was the best. That night we also got ice cream. Man, it was a great birthday.

My birthday gift to myself was a very red sunburn on my back that may never heal. It also looks really funny, because my swimsuit is backless, except for a small cross pattern. So where the straps were, my back is still pasty white, but everywhere else it is fire hydrant red. I would have attached a picture, but it is too painful to look at. (Plus, I didn't take any pictures on my birthday, because I was having to much fun just enjoying everything. No time for pictures.) I've been taking a lot of aspirin and using a lot of aloe. But its sooo totally worth it.

For the next two weeks I will be staying in Phan Rang, where Nui Chua National Park is located, and working on my independent study project. I think I have stepped into a boys' club here, but at least there is one assistant who works for the park that is a girl. I also have Alex, who is pretty patient when I go into girl mode and is also definitely willing to humor it. But I will keep you updated on my ISP in the next post when I've actually started my project.

Children in the Cham ethnic minority village who were so excited to get their picture taken. We were almost stampeded.

Cham ceramic artisan, who finished  this pot in about 5 minutes. The Cham in this village are known for their ceramics.

Another Cham woman who does traditional Cham weaving. No worries, I bought plenty of things from her, so you can all see it when I'm back in the states.