Learning to Eat With a Spoon

Vung Tau

I have blogged about Ba Ria, the town where Molly lived, and the time I spent there with her at the orphanage.  After the investigation was completed, we were free to move to Vung Tau.  Most families have gone back to Ho Chi Minh City at this stage of the adoption, but I had gotten to know the city of Vung Tau, and liked it.  Plus, the cost of accommodations was much less that HCMC.

Molly and I moved into a residence hotel that Loan recommended.  We had a lovely apartment with a full kitchen and laundry.  There was no pool, but the cost of our apartment was about $10 per night, compared to $160US per night for the Somerset hotel in HCMC!  Molly and I were very happy there.

The ladies who ran the hotel both spoke English, and there were many other families staying there from France who were adopting babies from VT1.  I finally had a bit of a social life, and heard many wonderful stories of how other families were formed by adoption.  Some people were there for the second time, and I got to know and admire a woman from France who was single, and back for her second child.

Molly and I would go out in the mornings to run errands, then escape the heat to nap indoors in the air conditioned apartment for the afternoons.  Later, we would go for what the French parents called a 'Promenade' - the families would all meet up with the babies in 'poussettes' (strollers) and we would walk through the neighborhood, ending up at the cafe for a blended fruit drink and a chat.  Fortunately for me, a couple of the ladies spoke English very well, so I was able to share in the conversations.

I noticed the irony of struggling to communicate in Vietnamese at the orphanage, then getting to Vung Tau where I struggled to communicate in French!  There wasn't another Canadian family there until the last week before we left.

We enjoyed walking a few blocks to purchase fruit and vegetables from the street vendors.  The food was fresh, tropical and very cheap.  I had purchased a 5 kilo bag of rice, and I would cook myself a simple meal after Molly was down for the night.  I then would spend the rest of the evening on the computer, keeping in touch with friends and family at home, and catching up on my blog postings.  I was able to find a computer store in town willing to let me rent a laptop for the month we were there.

Our apartment at the Binh An 2 was our first home together for Molly and I.  We found a new daily routine based on Molly's schedule.  She sleeps until 8am!  She quickly stopped napping in the morning, instead, we would lie on the bed together while she drank a bottle, then just have some 'quiet time' for about half an hour.  Then she would nap between 12 and 2 in the afternoon.  (She still has the same routine today, although I'm lucky if she naps more than an hour these days.)  We had found a grocery store nearby, had a favorite children's store where I bought bottles, toys and clothes for Molly, plus gifts to bring home for friends here, and found a tailor who made some clothing for me.  I could envision living there quite comfortably!

We had toys, music, treats, and lots of people we considered friends.  Molly also enjoyed the birds across the street at the first Binh An residence.  There was a rooster, chickens and some baby chicks that she loved to watch.  There was also a couple of birds in cages hanging from the trees in front of the hotel lobby.  Molly learned to imitate the 'Cock-a-doodle-doo' of the rooster by the time we left!

By the time we had the adoption ceremony and were able to arrange for a flight home, I was somewhat reluctant to come home!  We were happy there, and home was where Molly was.

But now, 2 months later, we have settled into our life in Canada together.  We are happy here, too!  But if we had a chance to go back and live there for a year or so, I wouldn't hesitate.

In the van on the way to Vung Tau for the first time

A view of the Mullberry Beach neighborhood

Lunch on the patio of a seafood restaurant in Mullberry Beach

View of Front Beach

View of Front Beach

View of Front Beach

View of Front Beach

View from the 7th floor patio of the Binh An 2 Hotel

View of Back Beach from the 7th floor patio

Our apartment in the Binh An 2 Hotel

The 7th floor patio

All this for less than $4.00

A Day in My Life

We met a friend on the street today, and he asked me how my day was going.  This is what I replied:

"It's 4:30pm, and I have just picked up my morning coffee.  I ate one meal today, and haven't showered yet.  I desperately need some groceries, but I should be at home feeding Molly her dinner right now.  I hired a housekeeper to help me clean, but when she didn't show up, I phoned and found out she was out of town, and will come by next week instead.  I hired my friend's son to come to the house to play with Molly for an hour or so, but he has only made it over once - he's out of town this week with his family.  We haven't played with any of her friends for a long time, and the last time we went to the park was a week ago."

However, it's not all bad.  We had an appointment this morning with the Infant Development Program, and found that Molly's gross motor skills are delayed, which was expected, but not bad enough to warrant any professional therapy.  I have some things I can do to help her learn to walk.  She scored really high in the social and communications areas, and all other areas of development are just fine.

Molly also has other recent accomplishments.  I bought her a potty last week, and she is using it!  Some days she likes it more than others, but she sits and does her business.  I also bought her a bowl with a suction cup on the bottom, and gave her a spoon yesterday.  She now feeds herself most of her meals.  She eats cut up vegetables by hand, and her rice and cereal mixtures are moist and sticky enough that she can scoop it up with her spoon and get it to her mouth without losing too much on her bib.  She learned how to fling food off the spoon today, and got some in her hair.  Yayyyy!  That's a big milestone.  Way to go Molly, Mommy's proud of you!

Remembering Ba Ria - Part 2

This posting is about the part of town where the orphanage is.  If you look at my sidebar, there is a Google map titled 'Where Molly Lived in Vietnam'.  The marker shows that the orphanage is in a township on the outskirts of town.  It took about 10 -15 minutes by taxi to get from the hotel to the orphanage everyday, and cost 50,000 dong, about the equivalent of $3, one way.

The gate of the orphanage

I didn't see more than a block or two any direction from the orphanage.  Just about every day I would go out to buy water, coffee and fruit.  There was a 'convenience' store kitty corner from the orphanage, Sic Cafe across the street, and I bought fruit at a stand from some very friendly people a block down the street.  I wandered a block up once or twice - I ate lunch at a street restaurant, drank sugarcane juice from a cart, and bought fruit from another vendor up that way on occasion. Again, I wasn't out long - it was too hot and humid to walk more than a few blocks.

Goats wandered freely in the neighborhood, along with some really ugly chickens.  I didn't get any good pictures of them.

The 'convenience' store where I bought water

These cows were wandering past one day - shepherded by the guy on the motorcycle.

Cafe Sic.  I drank lots of their coffee.  Sometimes I sat there, but often, the nannies would phone over an order, and they would deliver iced coffee to us in the baby room.  We shared the ice-cubes with Molly and the other toddlers.

My favorite fruitstand.  The ladies were very friendly.  There was also flowers, meat, vegetables and seafood offered in the street stalls.  Just like the grocery store...

Sadly, I see that I didn't take many pictures of the town, or my surroundings.  If I had written this posting while I was still there, perhaps I would have wandered out just to document the area more completely.  I wish I had more to share with waiting families, but hopefully someone else will take more pictures when they go there, and fill in the blanks that I've left!?!

A Sale on Sale

Robeez is offering an addtional 25% off their sale items until August 5th.  There are good bargins for summer shoes for girls and boys.  The free shipping offer is over, but there is still free shipping on orders of two pairs or more.  Type the promo code "EXTRA25" on the basket page when you make your purchases to receive the discount. 

Click on the link in my sidebar to get started.  Thank you for helping Molly get a baby brother!

Remembering Ba Ria - Part One

I spent so much time in this small town when we were in Vietnam, but have posted very little about it.  This is the town where Molly lived for the first year of her life, and I wonder if she was also born here, or nearby.  Ba Ria is at the junction of two highways, Highway 51 that comes out of Ho Chi Minh City, and continues south to Vung Tau, and Highway 55 that turns north, running up the coast to all the beach resort towns.  The Province is called Ba Ria - Vung Tau, obviously named for the two largest towns in the region.  It is an affluent Province - there is offshore oil providing infrastructure.  Road improvements, schools, hospitals and government offices can be found everywhere.  There is even a university in Ba Ria.  The town is full of churches (Catholic) and pagodas (Buddhist).

Despite the fact that we lived there for almost 2 months, I saw very little of the town.  We drove from the hotel to the orphanage every day, and only had the odd weekend free to explore.  I walked around a few blocks from the hotel, but couldn't go far - it was too hot to stay outside for long.  There was a Co-op Mart (supermarket) two blocks away on one side of the hotel, and the town's market two blocks the other direction.  Very convenient!  So we didn't really need to go much further.  The freeway was right in front of us, and the few blocks behind consisted of the typical Vietnamese lifestyle.  Almost every home had a business at street level, and the family would live behind and/or above it. 

The freeway approaching Ba Ria from Ho Chi Minh City, about a 2 hour drive away.  It was a cloudy day, but no rain.  It rarely rained when we were there.  The monsoon should have started in April, but it was very late this year.  There wasn't much rain in May either.

This is a street scene just around the corner from my hotel.  Note the motorbikes and the pastel colored homes. 

A home/business a block away sold live chickens.  They would wander live on the sidewalk in front of the home.

The boulevard across the street from the hotel.  It separated the street from the freeway.  A very large and incredibly noisy truck would come by at about 4:30am every morning to water the foliage.  It would make a couple of passes back and forth, just to make sure it woke me up.  But the traffic noise from the freeway was much worse.  Horns blared all night and all day, too.  I'm surprised Molly slept through it.

This is the water feature at the An Nam Restaurant that we ate at often. Actually, Merel and Nathan ate there often, and they would bring a doggie bag back to the hotel for me. It was open-air, large, and very beautiful. The food was great too!

We watched the rice harvest happen here about a month later than when we were in the Mekong Delta.  This is the stalks of rice being transported from the fields to be processed.  The ox-drawn carts roll down the streets with all the rest of the traffic.

Another street scene.  Nha Nghi - lots of rooms for rent.

The street behind the block from the Hotel Thanh Sang

My hotel. Very new, very nice, and the family that owned it was very good to me. We were happy there, and I would recommend it to anyone else who wanted to stay in Ba Ria.  Our room was on the first floor on the right, blocked by the tree.

The front desk of the Hotel Thanh Sang.  Note - get a room on the first floor - there's no elevator.

Our room. They didn't have a crib for Molly, and she could have fallen out of the bed overnight, so they put a mattress on the floor between the two beds for us. This was the realm of Molly's existence there. I didn't allow her to wander off the mattress. On the desk across from it was the thermos of hot water, her bottles, cereal and formula, our medicines and vitamins, and fruit. There was a small fridge underneath. We had everything we needed.  Cost - 300,000 dong per night, about $15 - $18 Canadian equivalent, depending on the exchange rate.

The family that owns the hotel.  They took very good care of Molly and I.

The grandparents.  Grandfather was very sweet to Molly.

The town gate.  This picture was taken from inside a moving taxi, when Molly and I were going back to Ho Chi Minh City for our last 2 days before flying home to Canada.  We had just passed the hotel, and I started crying.  I had just told Molly to say goodbye to the place where she came from.

Just Because I Can - April

Here are more random pictures of Molly from April 2010, while we were still in Vietnam: