banana pancakes and rice paper rolls

To get to the next city, Hue, we took an overnight sleeper bus. There were rows of bunk beds extending to the back of the bus and we chose the big bed/mat at the very back. When we crawled in their were two girls already there who were none to pleased to have to share the large bed with us. The girls got off an hour two later and the bus driver put a couple in their place. I had known what would probably happen next. In Vietnam if there is not a clearly defined seat with no possibility of squeezing someone in next to you then you can be assured more people will be forced in. In this case, around 11pm the driver directed a 5th person to our 4 person bed. We all attempted to protest but knew from the start it was futile. I resigned myself to the situation and spent the rest of the night crammed between Dan and a British journalist. While it was uncomfortable at the time, that's the type of funny memory that will pop into my head years from now and still make me laugh out loud.


"the food critic"

Hue was a relatively quiet town for Vietnam and the tourist section was small so it was easy to spend time where the locals live. It's not hard to get comfortable in the tourist area with all of the amenities you need right outside your hotel. Dan has been really good in pushing us to get out to the more local areas so we can see what the cities are really like. Hue is known for their great food, and it definitely lived up to my expectations. My favorite lunch spot was a restaurant over looking the river that is owned by a deaf mute couple. I loved to order this one dish with meat, grilled vegetables, and greens and you roll it all up in rice paper and dip it into a peanut sauce. My favorite dessert sport was a small restaurant that served the best banana chocolate pancakes. Pancakes here are a common dessert and usually resemble a crepe or a very thick traditional pancake. In this case it was the latter and filled with sliced bananas and melted chocolate chips. I've become a bit of a banana pancake connoisseur.


Our second day in Hue we rented motorbikes and drove to the countryside covered in rice fields. We stopped at a historic bridge our book mentioned. The bridge itself was a let down, but the old woman sitting inside made it a whole lot more interesting. Motioning with her hand she called me over to sit next to her and talk. Her face was rolled with wrinkles and covered in carefully applied bold colored makeup. Where her eyebrows had once been were two thick black pencil lines spanning across her forehead. Her thin wispy hair was pulled into a tight bun on top of her head. She was quite the character and asked me questions about where I was from and my age, then she got down to business. She took my hand, twice the size of her small frail one, and traced the lines across my palm with her thin finger. "You want me to read your palm?" She asked. "I will tell you when you get married, if husband will be handsome. I tell you if you have babies. Oh, you're going to have many babies, many babies." I smiled at the offer but politely declined. She was definitely one of my favorite parts of the motorbike ride that day outside Hue.


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