"How did I get here?": Mind Blown

1. Dong

Approximately 20,800 Vietnamese Dong = 1 US Dollar. I am currently a Vietnamese millionaire. When I arrived in Ho Chi Minh City I went to the ATM and took out $4,000,000 dong, which is the equivalent to $192 USD. This was one of the hardest things to adjust to earlier in the week. Imagine walking into a restaurant and seeing everything on the menu around $55,000 – I had a mini panic attack. I’ve quickly learned how to divide by 20,000 (with help from my phone). Once you are able to do the math you realize everything on the menu is about $2.25 USD. Everything is so cheap over here- an expensive meal is $10 or above per person. The other night I got sea bass with mango avocado salsa (they snuck in some cilantro on me) and it was 179,000 dong (9 USD) and it was amazing! For lunch I usually end up trying a few things because I can never decide what I want and it is usually around $5-7 USD. Earlier in the week, I freaked out because I owed my coworker $10,000 dong – when I went to my room I put the $10,000 in a separate compartment of my bag and made sure to give it to him the next time I saw him. It wasn’t until I was handing over the money that I realized I was freaking out over 50 cents an amount that I probably wouldn’t even pay back in NY. One last thing about dong, I got my first paycheck earlier this week and it was $1,564,500 dong – I bet you never got paid over a million dollars in one pay check ;)

Sea bass with mango avocado salsa- half eaten because I obviously couldn't wait 30 seconds to dig in.

My amazing Banh Mi- for about $1 USD

2. Motorbikes

I mean I knew there were going to be a lot but this many? Its crazy and there are no rules. I wonder when the last time someone got a traffic violation was!

1. Red means don’t go straight- turns are fine.

2. Sidewalks are fair game when there is traffic or anytime.

3. Pedestrians don’t have the right of way…even on the sidewalk.

4. TRAFFIC CIRCLES- I will never complain about the Jones Beach traffic circle again.

5. Don’t think too much when you cross the street- they do avoid you, but they will honk to much sure you know that you inconvenienced them.

6. But definitely don’t hesitate while crossing the street.

The first time I tried to cross a really busy street it was comical- took me approximately 5 minutes (there is an excerpt of it in video on Facebook). We could only make improvements from there right? Major lesson: once you start don’t stop. We are all pretty good now- except for yesterday when I got stuck on the center of a traffic circle for a pretty long time. I kept on giving up on the intersection I was trying to cross and walking to another one thinking there has to be fewer motorbikes over here. I finally I got to a crosswalk with bikes coming from one less direction and I was able to cross.