Monday, February 10, 2014

Monday was definitely a “getting things done” sort of day. I went for my health check at a hospital in district 5 (the biggest hospital in all of Vietnam, apparently). And oh yes, it was big. And chaotic, confusing, full of... interesting smells, and definitely not easy to navigate.  They also just take a lunch break and have no one to cover... um. That makes me feel safe! It’s a good thing I had a Vietnamese person from my work to help me out and find everything (i.e. I think I went to 15-20 different rooms, each with a different purpose and each somewhere different in the hospital X)While I was there, my bf had an interview far far away, north of the airport.  In the afternoon, he had another interview (except on the same street as my school!) and then in the early evening, we met up with our soon-t0-be landlord! We finally decided on a place to live. It’s got a lot going for it – location, price, cleaning services and amenities... We’ve signed our life away now!

Exhausted from all the running around, we ended up just grabbing dinner at a place down the street from our hotel.  It looked amazing from the street. Little communal meals with a gas burner in the middle of the table and a noodle soup with all the fixings in the middle to scoop from.  To be fair, the flavour was good and typical of many Vietnamese soups.  BUT, when you find something that looks like an ear in your dish, it’s easy to be turned off. The name of the dish, I couldn’t tell you. The signage was really lacking.

Here’s my (amateur) interpretation of the ingredients:
- Beef broth (which they top up whenever you’re low)
- ears (seafood of some sort? Maybe?)

-        - other bits of chewy seafood

-         -  processed meat/fish pieces (actually tasty!)

-         -  beef pieces (actually just the fat and skin of the beef...)

-          - taro root (yum! It has a texture similar to potato)

-          - Lotus root (white, has holes (pretty root veggie), slight crunch to it)

-          - 2 types of noodles (you choose and put them in)

-          - Greens: green onion, lettuce, cilantro, parsley

You’ll be proud of me though – I managed to eat 2 ears somehow. No flavour, just really chewy... Mmmears.