Herrang Week 2 (My first week)

I'm all settled in in Herrang, Sweden for the biggest dance camp in the world. I'm doing Balboa classes this week, and they are going well, and also I've been recruited for the usual crazy and random projects that go on in Herrang. The first one this year was to arrange the song L-O-V-E in 3 part harmony for the teachers to sing at the daily meetings. Did this project with a crazy dude named Chris Wells. We've got rehearsals coming up soon, we'll see how it goes.

Tonights agenda: Hot Dog eating contest!

Vietnamese Root Canal

I had a root canal done in Vietnam a few days ago.  It started as some pain in a tooth that had a root canal done about 10 years ago, and turns out to have become infected and gone bad.  So, out with the old filling, and in with the antibiotics.  Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to do the whole process before I left for Sweden so I have a temporary filling and a series of antibiotics to take for the next few weeks, and I need to find a dentist here to finish the job.  More to come soon.

P.S.  I'm in Herrang now.  More on that soon.

Last weekend I took a trip to Hoi An in Central Vietnam. Hoi An is a lovely old town with a lot of Chinese influence from several hundred years ago. It is also a nice beach town.

We arrived late Friday night in Danang airport and got in a Taxi and asked the driver to take us to the hotel we had reserved and paid for, Hoi An Pacific Hotel. The driver says no problem and that he knows it when we ask if he was familiar with it. Great, lets go! 45 minutes later on arrival in Hoi An, turns out he has no idea where it is. Typical asian taxi driver behavior. Anyway, a few calls later and we get the address and arrive at the hotel, which is quite nice.

Next morning, not too early, we make our way to the old town for some lunch, and then to the beach for a full day of doing absolutely nothing at all. After a trip back to the hotel for a shower and change of clothes its back to the old town for dinner. Isabelle got some shoes ordered while we waited for the food to arrive. The food, I thought, was good but Isa wasn't so impressed. In any case, here is a picture of the fare.




After dinner, we rode our borrowed bicycles around the old town to see what was about. Hoi An is filled with tailor shops and shoemakers, as it seems to be the traditional businesses for the area, specifically the old town. We also saw some sort of street show which seemed very Chinese in style to me, but was obviously being performed in Vietnamese.





The next day was back to old town for lunch, and then a stop at a traditional barber shop (I was getting pretty shaggy). This was interesting, got the full treatment including a shave with a straight razor (disposable blades though). Still, the haircut and shave wasn't the best I ever had. Isa is much better at the shaving thing than this so called professional.




After the shave it started to rain cats and dogs, so we hightailed it back to the hotel for a swim in the pool. I don't have any pictures of the hotel pool, but it was quite nice, and the water was quite warm, especially in the rain, but thunder and lightning made us decided to get out of the pool and instead take advantage of the free sauna.

At night we went for a nice dinner back in the old town, Italian food and Rose wine, and more ordered shoes.

Monday we picked up the orders then headed back to Danang for the flight back to Saigon, punctuated with a trip to visit Isabelle's aunt in Danang. Fantastic trip.

Dirty Dirty Boy

Last weekend I took a trip outside of Saigon to Binh Chau hot springs. Isabelle, Catherine, Kirsty, Daniel and I took the hydrofoil boat from Saigon early(ish) Saturday morning to Vung Tau. The boat was a rather unpleasant affair, dirty and crowded, with overbooked seats and cockroaches as fellow passengers, but we made the best of it with a game of Monopoly (on my phone). Even getting off was a chore, as they turned off the air conditioning (and therefore the fresh air source) before we were off the boat, and it was quite stifling.

Once off the boat however, the trip definitely took a turn for the better. We rented a trio of motorbikes and took off along the coast road towards our final destination. The roads here are claimed to be the "best in Vietnam" and without a lot of experiences to compare them, I'm still going to say that that is a pretty supportable claim, as the roads really were quite nice and a pleasure to ride on.


Several hours of driving later we arrived at Binh Chau hot springs, our objective for the day. First step is to soak in hot spring water for a while, but it is pumped into a bathtub/jacuzzi like thing. Next step is to smear handfuls of thick dark mud all over your body:












This you let dry, but not without taking loads of silly pictures:

After everything is dry, you jump back in the hot spring bath to "wash it all off" but it just doesn't come off and you end up finding bits of mud on you for days to come.

After this, we got back on the road to Vung Tau, but stopped in a little inn about 30 minutes back from the hot springs. We had a good meal at a restaurant on the seaside, and then back to the hotel room for a great night of drinking games and generally good times before passing out. Some of the fun here was the neighbor coming by at 9:30pm on a Saturday night telling us to be quiet because he was trying to sleep. Of course we "tried" to be quiet, but 15 beers definition of quiet is different from Vietnamese dude's definition. To be fair, he got his revenge when he was up partying with his own mates at 4am. Different strokes for different folks.

Next morning we had some breakfast then headed back to Vung Tau to return the bikes and take the boat back to Saigon. On arrival however, we discovered there were no tickets left for that day. We negotiated a taxi to take us back to Saigon instead, and it only cost a few more dollars than the boat would have. Twice as long too, but in general comfortable enough, and everyone pretty much slept the whole trip back.

All in all it was a great experience, with some wonderful friends to share it with.

Conservatory Visit

Yesterday I went to the Central Conservatory of Music in Saigon to help my friend Megan out with her music classes. She was conducting a workshop on instruments for the students at the Australian International School, and I brought some of my instruments down to show the kids, and to help explain some of the instruments. It was a really fun experience, and further evidence to me that I really like teaching about music. I got to demonstrate several of the instruments that I can play, and some (like trumpet) that I can't really play, but I can at least get a sound out of. I also helped explain things about the instruments that the local players couldn't express in English.

They also had a big grand piano there that I got to play on for a while, the bass end on a grand is so much more satisfying than on an upright.

At night, and tonight as well, I have been conducting small workshops on aerials, which is good because it gives me the opportunity to express just how important safety is when doing aerials. So many people think that they can just toss the girl around and everyone will be ok, but as I know from taking River and Robyn to the hospital in times past because some idiot guy thought they knew what they were doing, it just doesn't work that way. The classes are quite small and manageable, so only minor injuries (the usual kind for practicing aerials, bruises and bumps and the like) are happening. It is fun and a real workout, for myself included.

Dance weekend in Saigon

This weekend was a pretty full one. Saturday morning I went rock-climbing with Jerry (a swing dancer living here in HCMC). The place is a lot nicer than the places in Beijing. The equipment was actually in good condition and they actually followed through with some basic safety procedures. I haven't climbed in a long time, but I did alright with some fairly difficult climbs. At the end of the day, my climbing shoe, that I've had for 14 years, fell apart and I had to call it a day, but it was still fun.

Sinclair from Singapore was in town for the weekend, and he conducted some workshops over the weekend. I didn't attend the Saturday classes (on account of aforementioned climbing) but there was a party in the evening. It was a vintage theme party, which is right up my alley. Don't get to dress up much in this heat, but I pulled out the ole tie and suspenders for the party. I also sat in with the band at the party venue and played a few tunes on Tenor sax.

Sunday I did attend Sinclair's workshops. He taught a series of moves/techniques in tribute to Frankie Manning, including Frankie's Tranky Doo. Sinclair is a good teacher and it was good to see him teach and see his style of introducing movements. As a teacher myself, the best things I can get out of attending classes is to see other teachers methods, and see what might work for my students. I was also standing in the class as a leader (there are never enough) but also occasionally helping Sinclair demonstrate something as a follower, which is a real brain twister.

Sunday (after a nap) there was also another dance party. Danced until the very end as usual. I guess thats why I got the nickname "dancing machine" here.

Vietnamese Food

I haven't done anything really noteworthy the past few days, so in the interest of keeping in the habit of updating this, I thought I take a moment to talk about Vietnamese Food. The food here is...interesting. It mostly consists of a lot of noodles in soup and raw veggies. Most of the food sits out in the heat all day and yet I've yet to be sick from eating anything here. Perhaps our paranoia about food spoilage is just that, paranoia. Although I have been sick from eating pork in Beijing more than a few times, so I'm still going to avoid that where I can.

The food that I do eat here is quite tasty, but as my friend here Abbie put it, it is "ethereal." What this means to me is that although I can eat a giant bowl of Pho (soup noodles) and be quite full, 2 hours later I'm starving again. It actually seems to be a bit of a challenge to get a meal that lasts me the usual 6 hours between meals. Perhaps I just don't know how to ask for more hearty foods...hopefully I'll get better at the eating thing over the next 3 weeks.

On the other side of the coin, fruit juices are readily available, cheap and easy to come by, and taste absolutely delicious, so if not for my protein cravings, I could live on the fruit juices alone quite happily.