Stephen & Anh Family Pictures
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| We are here safe in Hoi An, the central coast of Vietnam. We are staying at the Glory Hotel. The kiddie pool is great and the suite is nice and they gave Lan (the nanny we brought with us from Saigon) a room for free, no kidding. I am a good bargainer when it comes to this hotel thing. The hotel pool has these mini kick boards and Kayla is already an expert after one day of use. We are about a kilometer from town, and 3 kilometers from the beach. We are looking forward to exploring both. Unbelievable, but not surprising that dad already has all of the pictures from your trip on the web. They look great, and I don't envy choosing from the 500 to get it down to 20 or so. I hope Anh will write more later. Love, Stephen June 1 |
Ryan plays in the kiddie pool at the hotel
View from the hotel window:
Oxen grazing and a woman picking rice from the field
(just like hundreds of years ago)
View of the river flowing through Hoi An
| I am out while Ryan naps, he is still trying to get over his cold, and while Kayla and Anh watch a movie. The kids love watching the DVD movies when it is connected to the TV. Today is our rest day as we want everyone better so we can go to the beach tomorrow. There are often only a few of the 65 rooms occupied, so we are treated like the royal guests. They keep asking if we have jobs or something local here that would allow us to stay for a month. We just smile and say nope, just travelling. If you thought we were a spectacle in HCMC (Saigon), we seem to be a really big attraction walking the streets of Hoi An. Everyone stares, asks us if they are twins (because of the double stroller) and the old ladies like to try to talk to us. They will talk with Lan (the nanny) more often when she is pushing the stroller, because she is obviously Vietnamese, but Lan is so protective she won't stop to talk to anyone. All is well, I will try to continue sending the videos shortly so you can get the whole thing at once by the time you wake up. Love, Stephen June 3 |
Give Kayla and Ryan a beach, and they have fun
| We have been in Hoi An now for 4 days. The kids are pretty happy here. I just can't believe how comfortable they are in a new hotel (this is our 13th one so far). Kayla already calls it her home. The best part about this hotel is they clean our room 2 times a day. They have given us discount after discount (2 rooms for 1, Internet, restaurant, and I hope more). Stephen is a really good negotiator. We have really enjoyed walking into town in the evening. The bad thing about this place is it's very touristy. There are a lot of old women and children trying to sell you things. It's hard not to feel sorry for them and reframe ourselves from wanting to buy their things. The best part is there are a lot of good restaurants. It's just really hard to choose. We went to the beach yesterday evening and we had a blast. The kids just loved playing in the sand and jumping in the ocean. We believe the whole town was there also. It was pretty crowded. Stephen and I enjoyed some fresh steamed clams while Lan (our nanny) was playing with the kids. Of course, Ryan had to come over and eat most of them. Today, we are keeping the kids at home. Kayla is sick again. It's so hot here that they get sick very easy going from really hot weather to an air conditioned room. We miss you and will e-mail you again. Anh June 4 |
View of our pool and kiddie pool
| Kayla had a fever for 3 days. On the 4th day, we decided to call a doctor. He and the nurse came to our room with his doctor's kit. Kayla was hysterical the whole time. He had a really hard time looking down her throat so we had to hold her down. He didn't speak much English and with my limited Vietnamese vocabulary, it was really hard to translate to Stephen (you can imagine how well that went). He gave Kayla a prescription and charged us $35. Stephen went to the pharmacy to get it filled (they gave us more than what we needed of course). It was then we reallized that she had bronchitis. After one dosage and a 2 hour nap, she was back to herself. She was eating again and talking up a storm. As for Ryan, he has diarrhea (oh how wonderful it is to travel in Vietnam). The good thing is he still eats, drinks and plays a lot. We are not too worried about him. Our nanny is working out great. She shops for us and plays with our kids. They seem to like her a lot. They are even trying to speak Vietnamese with her to get her attention. We miss you and will e-mail you again. Anh June 8 |
The kids enjoy a local school's playground
HAPPY 4TH ANNIVERSARY - STEPHEN AND ANH
June 10, 2005
| After one week of being sick, the kids are back to normal. It was really hard to keep them away from the pool and the beach. Yesterday, we went on a boat ride down Hoi An river. It was quite beautiful, peaceful, and breezy. After the boat ride, we stopped by Hoi An Life Resort to have lunch (this was where I wanted to stay, but out of our price range.) It was a very bad lunch but the place was air conditioned (I think they used the left over bacon to make my sandwich). We went over budget with our lunch and so we had Vietnamese sandwiches for dinner. When we got back to the hotel, we all jumped into the pool to cool down. We were all pretty hot from walking back from town. Kayla can swim across the width of the pool now. She can even stop to take a breath while she treads water. Watching her swim makes us so proud. Then it was off to nap time. They usually nap for 2-3 hours so Stephen and I can have some free time to ourselves. Lan stays with them in the room. The other day, I went to the beauty shop. I got a manicure, my feet shaved, and my lips waxed for 30,000 VN= $2. I tipped them 20,000 VN because I had 2 women working on me for 1 hour. The wax was pretty painful though. She was using a piece of floss. I will try to have Stephen take a picture of it next time. It was a pretty interesting experience. I don't know why they call it waxing when they don't even use wax. I was glad I didn't ask for a bikini wax. By the way, we just sent Joe some new pictures. We are sure he will have them on the website by the end of the day. http://www.seidler.com/stephen/family Anyhow, we miss you and will send more updates soon. Anh June 12 |
Matching shirts and some calm time with daddy
Fun in the kiddie pool (note Stephen lounging in the upper left of the picture)
and fun in the room
Boat rides are fun, but it's time for a nap
Exploring the ruins at My Son of the Cham culture
Some playtime in the room and clothes modeling by Kayla, and
Ryan enjoys some cotton candy while watching the outdoor festival below with the family
| We left Hoi An for Danang (another city in central Vietnam). On the way we stopped at Marble Mountain. This is a grouping of 5 mountains that are made entirely of marble and where they obviously carve and sell many beautiful and huge statues, fountains etc. Yesterday, we were in Danang. It was a pretty disappointing city. It's supposed to have a milllion people, but we hardly ever saw anyone. We went to a waterpark at 10am (another disappointment). We thought it was closed because it was pretty empty (they told us that it packs up after 3pm). We laughed because the people in Vietnam are so afraid of getting dark. Even our nanny Lan was wearing her jeans jacket the whole time. After we bought our tickets, they told us the slides will be turned off from 11:30 until 1pm. After 2 hours, the kids were ready to go back to the hotel. I was glad because they didn't have any food there. After a good lunch at a vendor near our hotel, we jumped into a big van headed for Hue. It was the most beautiful and peaceful drive. The kids were asleep and no one was on the road. We were lucky because it was only a 3 hour drive; they had opened a new tunnel 2 weeks ago that goes through a mountain between Hue and Danang. Anh June 25 |
| We are in Hue now. This is a very beautiful city because of the river and trees. I was here a few years ago, and I am glad to have come back to visit this place again with Stephen and the kids. After we checked into our hotel, the kids were ready and up for another adventure. We jumped on a boat and cruised down the Perfume River for an hour. What makes this river so spectacular is it's surrounded by a lot of trees. We then went on an excursion to find the best "bun bo Hue" in town (a traditional noodle soup dish of this region). We weren't disappointed and Stephen had two bowls. After that, we took the kids to a small amusement park. There were a giant size jumper, bumper cars, and a roller coaster. They took a ride on their first roller coaster. They had so much fun that they made us ride it 5 times with them. This was the longest day ever. It ended well because it only took 10 minutes to put the kids to bed. Today, we went to visit two tombs. Just so you can visualize, these tombs are huge complexes that consist of lakes, temples, royal residences, etc. They were magnificant. We wished the weather was a little cooler and less humid. We only stayed at the tombs for a short period because the kids were complaining that it was too hot. Tonight, we are going to take a xit lo (bicycle rickshaw) to the citadel and try a vegetarian restaurant (Anh's idea). Hope you like the pictures. We miss you and will e-mail you soon, Anh June 26 |
On the road again... back to Saigon for 2 days
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