A Trip to the City

Yesterday I took a trip into the city, Da Nang that is. It's about an hour away from quite and pleasant Hoi An. I grabbed the public bus at about 10 in the morning. As I sat patiently on our very, im talking snail crawling slow bus (obviously so we could pick up as many as people possible) I realized that I was a rude neighbor to my fellow Ex-pats in Hoi An and quickly shot off a text back to friends seeing if i could get them anything. Now in America if that happened, people would usually say no, because a trip to the market is usually conveniently on the way to something else you have to do within your day. Not the case in Hoi An. I had short lists of chocolate and butter, two things hard to find in Hoi An.

So the kind bus driver tell's me where to get off so I can get to "The Big C" He gives me that look like "obviously a tourist would only go into Da Nang for The Big C I should have known." I just shot him back a big thank you smile as I was pushed out the door. "The Big C" was a little slice of heaven. It was a 4 story shopping mall, grocery store, and cinema all rolled into one! Did i mention it was air conditioned? The Borch's tried to prepare me but I was so overwhelemed when i get in. So I went up to the movies. They had a few to pick from but one was only playing right then so i bought my $2 ticket, a soda and popcorn (yes real popcorn) and headed in. The first scene was so scary I walked out and left. I felt like my mother. I justified it by thinking the movie was only $2 and it's not worth the nightmares I know I would get. Giggling to myself, all the workers just looked puzzled. They tried to get me to see a romantic movie which started an hour before and I said it's ok i'll come back later and buy another ticket. So I slurped down my soda took a handful of popcorn and discarded the rest.

My real mission of the day was to buy sneakers. It was like finding a needle in a hay stack. There was 1 street in the whole city that sold shoes. I went up to 5 stores asking if I they had sneakers for me. If they understood me they just laughed and if they didnt they just stared back at me. Women dont buy sneakers in Vietnam, they buy 5 inch heals. Oh and did i mention they have the skinniest feet too! I ended up with a boy's sneaker for $12. Mission accomplished.

Back to the big C! I did some searching all around. Up and down every isle!!! Then finally headed off to see "No Strings Attached" A movie a little more like my style. I even stayed the for the whole thing. And no I didnt buy more soda and popcorn.

The day was quite the adventure. It was lovely. So lovely that I almost fell asleep and dinner that night and slept until 11am this morning. A new record!