Vacation

Yes! I have finally completed my PA report. Locked myself at home the whole day just so that I could concentrate doing it. Now, there's still 3 more publications to go.. feeling extremely swamped. So here I am taking a break - gonna do a recap on my eventful 3 months vacation. The most recent, trip to Vietnam and Cambodia - more photos and tidbits.

Just arrived! Goofing around in the hotel. The only night we lived in luxury.

Our first meal in Saigon - Pho 24. Highly recommended by Lonely Planet. ha. Not surprisingly it was very much catered for tourists. But good for a first meal, clean and all, for a paranoid-over-cleanliness me.

Wet market

With our manicurists. I know it's madness getting a manicure when we're gonna crawl the cu chi tunnels the next day but heck, we wanted a relaxing afternoon. Mine were destroyed the mo I stepped out of the shop..my first time ok

The first thing that struck me in Saigon was the traffic. It was absolutely impossible to cross the road, I don't know why they even bothered to draw zebra crossings. Our first crossing was hilarious, we waited about ten mins before deciding to just dash forward - eyes closed, screaming and all. We realised that you just gotta step out onto the road and the locals will slow down for you. Soon, it was all easey peasey.

Click to read. Interesting. But doesn't make sense to me.

Cao Dai Temple - Weird. Victor Hugo was a Cao Dai-ist. What I found out from a local guide was that Cao Daism is actually a sect. They believe in the harmony of all religion BUT there is a supreme god called the "Holy See", characterized by the eye, that will get one to heaven directly if you believe in it. hmmm.

Cu Chi Tunnels - I really enjoyed this day tour to cu chi and cao dai. Every tourist will make a trip there but it's really worth going. When I was crawling down there in darkness for 30m I almost wanted to give up, it was only when I took out my torchlight (go on, have a laugh) that I could continue on for the full 90m crawl.

We made new friends! A couple from France with their son, Loan, who was born in Saigon. Met at Cao Dai Temple and kept bumping into each other and we were even staying at the same hotel. At first the French guy kinda offended me cos when I asked him where he's from he said France but quickly added "not Paris", with the knowing look. Come on! But now we're cool haha.

On the road. A chatty toothy smiley ah pek who stopped not to ask us for a ride but just to chat told us in mandarin that he's a "guang dong ren" - and that was about all he could say in chinese :)

Ben Thanh Market. Had a chance meeting with my church friend and her son!

War Remnants Museum - A place to remind us all that wars should never be started. Cruel and inhumane, it breaks up families, separates loved ones and children suffer. It's sad to read testimonies from the locals and disturbing to see dead deformed foetus kept in glass jars showing the world how the Agent Orange children suffered from the deadly dioxin toxin.

At Apocalypse Now - a nightclub recommended by Lonely Planet. It's interesting, but such an expat place. Local girls all decked out looking around to earn some cash.

That's all for Saigon, Phnom Penh and Siem Reap next post!

Meanwhile, I've been playing volleyball every week for 5 weeks now. Spurred on by the sedate office lifestyle that made my ass feel so heavy at the end of each day. Presenting to you guest player SK from the shores of Johor.

On to my 10 weeks (7May-13July) Public Relations stint at RDC:

Highlight of the internship was organizing Maggie Q's Die Hard 4.0 press conference. She was absolutely gorgeous. And may I add, we all got passes to catch the media screening of the movie! Just last week my ex-colleagues got passes to The Simpsons, which sadly I have not yet seen! (Nasty, considering I'm such a fan)

At Brewerks on my last day. We had a great time sharing and laughing and having such a good time. It was also then that we got personal and it's amazing what you girls have gone through. I truly respect you girls and I AM going to learn how to be strong - just like the two of you.

My ex-colleagues at RDC. From left: Marie Anne from SMU, Angelika the manager (we had a girls night out at her awesome place!), KaiWei also from SMU and crazy/mean SiNing a full-timer.

My surprise farewell party in the office. It was great! And for a moment I forgot that they were my colleagues and that I've only known them for 10 weeks. They are great people I would call friends and I hope we never lose contact. Besides the point, Angelika was shocked that I could not even finish my leeettle glass of white wine :S Europeans love to drink eh