2. A LETTER FROM SAIGON

Just when you were beginning to think we were not going to write....

Taken for a ride... In more ways than one

Well, we hit the ground running and haven't stopped until now that we are waiting at Saigon airport to fly to Ha Noi. It's pouring outside. Apparently Saigon has experienced a very dry wet-season. Well, not any longer. Torrential downpours on Thursday morning as we walked to the home of our friends and again on Friday afternoon. But it did not stop us from having a great time. We were so spoiled to stay with friends in a "big house". Probably better than any hotel we will be staying at in this country.

Fruit anyone?

Cramped Conditions

Incense spirals smoldering overhead in a Buddhist temple

As anyone who's been to a south east Asian city knows, out on the street, it's INFORMATION OVERLOAD!!! "and loving it" Sights, sounds, and smells not for the faint hearted. Alexandra let out a scream as a large scruffy rat ambled past us through the fish market. We both winced in discomfort as we watched gumbooted ladies with scissors snipp the legs, one by one, from live frogs before hacking off their heads.

Just a nip and a tuck

CROSSING THE ROAD At first glance it seems impossible to the mere western mind.... Multiple lanes, no crossings and relentless beeping traffic. 10 million Saigonese all zooshing by on motorbikes, taxis and buses. But it is do-able. It just takes faith. Of course, you do have to look both ways and pick your moment, but if one waits for a completely safe break in the traffic, you will literally never never cross the road. Whilst there appears to be no road rules for riders and drivers, there are some guidelines for crossing roads;

• Rule number 1; step out into the fray and and just start walking,
• Rule number 2; maintain a consistent pace,
• Rule number 3; stop only if you absolutely have to... But never never step backwards. This enables the dozens of motorbikes, that are heading toward you from the right and then the left, to line you up and vear around you, just missing you. In fact, they are very good at scooching around pedestrians. Actually, once you get the hang of it, it's quite exillirating.

This morning we saw a toddler, obliviously wandering up the road with motorbikes skirting gingerly around her. Before we could respond, a friendly "uncle" ran out and scooped her up and delivered her to her mother, selling vegetables at the side of the road. No harm done.

THE INCIDENT After a GnT and French crepe flombe at the Rex Hotel roof top garden, Alex had one of her famous claustrophobic attacks (claimed to be the worst ever) when she spent 3 minutes screaming and wrestling with the lock in the fancy lobby rest room. Meanwhile, I'm relaxing in the quiet comfortable air-conditioned lobby using the free wifi... Not a care in the world... She survived but it's not good for her constitution.

Meet the ancestors

PSALM 110:3 It's always a pleasure to go the KH and see God's clean humble people. We very impressed with the volume of the singing which leaves us in Australia for dead. Though the friends are "not recognised", the government has allowed them to register some places of w. So nice to see so many of our friends, old and young, who have moved to serve where the need is great... And what sort of people would want to go to a country that their parents fled, years before, to do voluntary work? We were even surprised to run into friends on the street who we didn't know were living here. Kingdom smiles abound and why not, the fishing nets are bursting.

SAIGON MUGGING No, thankfully it wasn't us ... but it could have been. We were standing at a busy intersection at 7:15 in the morning waiting for a couple we knew in australia and coincidentally met up with at the KH the night before... Anyway, I'm photographing the squillions of motorbikes passing by, as you do as a tourist, when I observed two young men on a motorbike pull off the road and look at me, so I stared back at them for a while and they looked away. Moments later I heard a lady scream and turned to see the bike take off into the traffic. Sure enough, this poor filippino tourist had just lost her purse ... and passport. Not good as she and her husband were heading home that day. Our friends arrived on 2 motorbikes and took the couple to the police. When they returned, they doubled us through the traffic to a little street restaurant to enjoy a delicious pho (pronounced fur) breakfast.

Pho for breakfast, that's the way to start the day

A SORDID HISTORY A visit to the War Remnants Museum graphicly reminded us what this countries people have been subjected to at the hands of greedy colonial powers and warmongers. And the aftermath of what is termed here, the American War, goes on as children are still born with hideous deformities as a result of agent orange, thanx to Diabolical work of profiteering dioxin chemical companies. But governments and big-buisness do not have a monopoly on culpability, false religion was right in the thick of it, in their purple robes and silly hats, blessing the bloodbath. We walked out of the museum thanking Jehovah that our organization is no part of Satan's grubby world.

Satan's handiwork (1 John 3:8)

Well we won't go on with details of visits to laqureware workshops, buddhist and Hindu temples and the market, rip-offs and bargains... Suffice it to say, we are having an amazing time. We are off to the ancient city of Ha Noi.

This is lloydnalex signing off, and as niece Jade likes to say...

Love you, bye!

 

 

 

 

 

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