The 1st Day Of Activities..

Chao (hello) readers, greetings from Vietnam.

Side note: Everything that took place was according to the time in Vietnam which is one hour behind Singapore!

Today was rather eventful even when we didn’t go according to plan. We took a little tour to the Sesame School of Hospitality after finishing up with our breakfast and roughly reached there at about 9am. While getting off the bus, I noticed the tiny school hiding behind the towering bright orange walls along. Weaving our way through the foot path to our designated meeting place, the students were preparing for the games we were going to play afterwards.

First came the introductions, next we were brought to their work stations. There were 3 kitchens in total and a mini restaurant. They learnt how to cook, bake and serve everything in the food and beverage line. These were unfortunate kids learning how to survive and they are given a better life from whatever background they were from. It was an honour to have interacted with them during games and free time (as I made some new friends)!

We proceeded to have lunch @halal, some restaurant in the town Vietnam, the supposed upper east side of the city. It was a good lunch with a variety of dishes.

When lunch was over, we went to the Lacquer industry that has been providing for Vietnam’s economy over the decades. They have 3 main and different types of material they use as design and decoration. Mother of pearl, Egg shells and Paint are the secret ingredient to pretty lacquered end products waiting to be shipped and sold worldwide. The products can be found in their very own store next to their workshop. They take 2 – 3 months for each process to complete. Pretty as they are, they sure carry a high price.

We went to the Tan Binh Exhibition and Convention Centre (TBECC) to have a look see. We had the privilege to go to an ongoing convention, which was the maritime Vietnam 2011. We inspected the inside of TBECC and found out that there was a huge contrast to what we do or have in Singapore. For example, after every day of the convention, the event organiser would place a rice paper over the door as a precaution for whoever who wants to break into the premise. And also it would prove what a horrible job the security guards are doing. Whereas in Singapore, we have a biometric system that is remote controlled; it enables the doors of the convention centre to be secure by magnetic technology.

We left TBECC to the Water Puppet theatre. It was a vintage and mint theatre all equipped with plush chairs. There were a variety of performances by the puppeteers with original live music played for the show. I think the puppet show was truly humorous interesting and innovative as there we lots of choreography between both the puppeteers and the musicians. I was in awe on how they were able to manipulate and manoeuvre the puppets waist deep in water and still figuring how they do it when we were on our way to dinner (this is the highlight of my day).

We had dinner at a nonya penang restaurant which served really awesome spicy mango chicken salad. The seating allocation for us was horrible though, narrow and “squeezy”. But that would have to do since there are so many of us.

All in all, day two of Vietnam was packed, a bit messy and tiring but fun and exciting. I am going to put the blame insufficient rest.

(Thus, the writer should have a well deserve massage and spa treatment to sooth her muscles and... The writer is just kidding. She jokes. )