Beach Baby (April 4th)

With Loan's help, we were able to arrange our weekends off from the orphanage during the last few of the 7 weeks we were stuck there. A weekend in Vietnam is Saturday afternoon and Sunday.

This one weekend started out with the intention of being lazy and relaxed. Molly and I were lounging around in bed about 8am, still in our pajamas, when we heard a knock on the door. Thuy was there, with a written invitation she had translated into English (with help of the internet). She was inviting us out for an adventure for the morning.

I rushed around getting both of us dressed, fed and ready for the day. When we went downstairs, Khuyen, one of Molly's nannies, was waiting for us. We hopped onto the back of Thuy's motorbike an off we went!

A half hour drive later, we were in Phoung Long, at Thuy's house, where I met her husband Thanh, her son Dac and her mother. She lives down what we might call a country road, lined with properties that seemed to be banana orchards and small farms. Thuy lives in a lovely home with land around it, and she grows orchids! Not many were in bloom at this time, but she showed me pictures of her greenhouse in full bloom - it's fantastic!

Thuy served us breakfast and Vietnamese coffee, she and Khuyen fed Molly some cereal, then Thanh jumped on the back of Khuyen's motorbike, and the 5 of us carried on. We cruised for a while down some highways. I saw salt flats, farms and shrimp ponds. Then we drove through Long Hai, a town I knew was about 30kms from Ba Ria, also on the ocean, but much quieter than Vung Tau. We stopped at the beach.

So, while I was asking about buying a hat for Molly, Thuy bought a straw hat for me and plunked it on my head! I didn't see anyone else wearing one on the beach - I felt conspicuous, but it did the trick.

We sat under a gazebo in beach chairs that you pay to 'rent', then Thuy grabbed Molly, and the 3 of us walked down to the water. We took off her diaper and plunked her into the waves. I think it took her a while to take it all in, but she seemed to like the water and the sand. The water was very clear and warm. It was the first dip into the South China Sea for both of us!

A quick photo-op, and then it was back to the shade - the sun is brutally hot, and I didn't have sunscreen for Molly. (Oops!).

On the way back home, Molly was tired and hungry, and was thrashing around in the snuggly on the back of the motorcycle. Thuy signalled Khuyen, who had my diaper bag. We did a hand-off of a bottle while we continued cruising down the highway. I grabbed the bottle with one hand while holding onto the hat that Molly was ripping off her head, and also holding onto a blanket wrapped around her to shade her arms from the sun. The bottle finally found her mouth and she calmed down. That's when I realized I was multi-tasking on the back of a motorcycle with a baby in my arms, cruising down the highway in Vietnam. I wasn't even hanging onto Thuy. What an incredible moment!

So, they dropped us off at the orphanage, which I wasn't expecting, and Khuyen said that she would come back at the end of the day to take us back to the hotel. I didn't argue, communication is difficult, and we were just fine there.

But Khuyen came back mid-afternoon. Again, communications failed. I thought she was taking us back to the hotel, but she took a different route, then turned down this very narrow lane, and stopped at her home!

We had a lovely visit for a couple of hours. I met her two daughters, and some of their friends were over as well. The girls all spoke a little bit of English, so they did some translating for me. They too, live in a lovely home with land, a garden and fruit trees all around them. Khuyen also grows some orchids, although on a smaller scale than Thuy.

When she dropped us off at the hotel afterwards, I bathed Molly and put her to bed, then melted into the mattress beside her. It wasn't the relaxing Sunday I had planned, but what a day! These memories will last a lifetime.

Thank you Thuy and Khuyen!