Pics are of lunch with the national instructor team, Anh (young guy, translator) and General Te to my right. Others are a flower dealer at the public market (drive by it each morning on the way to class) and the training of trainers class photo (yup, I’m the tall one…). The only woman in the photo is Julie, UNICEF. The only woman at the course (both weeks) was the one serving tea at the break.
On the drive in to Ho Chi Minh City from the airport, the taxi went by one of the local lovers lanes – actually a major thoroughfare. Lots of young couples cuddling atop motorbikes. Since everybody lives at home until marriage, there is no private space. All this love beside a busy, congested, polluted road.
On the way to class this morning, saw two guys on a motorbike today with the passenger holding 2 aluminium door frames upright as they went along in traffic. The frames looked to be easily 7 to 8 feet high, commercial grade, and close to 3 feet wide. In traffic. Upright. No ties or straps. Amazing.
At lunch, I mentioned that I was going to pick up some local green tea on the weekend to take home. Next thing I knew one of the police students was handing me a huge bag of loose tea he just bought. Next was the promise of a new, local tea pot (delivered the next day), and I got a lesson in how to make Vietnamese tea back in the classroom. We had to talk quietly as three students were sound asleep on top of desks, flat on their backs, shirts stripped off, heads resting on textbooks, gently snoring.
An RCMP friend of mine is going a multi-month stint with UN peace-keeping police in Sudan right now. His Blog is at
http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Cin-and-Galib/ very worthwhile visiting. He sends the info home to his fiancée Cinnamon who maintains the Blog. Start at the bottom of the Blog page and work your way up the posts. His is an adventure I’m not anxious to live.
