101

I'm just back after visiting the Christina Noble Children's Foundation centre of social assistance for disadvantaged children.

It's amazing the difference that one person can make. I know that that's a cliche, but in this case it's actually true. And what they provide is so much more than an orphanage. There's a day care centre, they set up small business credits, for example a poor family could get a loan to raise a cow or a goat, and with that animal sell milkor cheese etc. There's medical facilities for children whose parents can't afford to send them to hospital or get them physio, or occupational therapy or speech therapy. A school for children who's parents can't afford to send them to school. I'm not very good at explaining this but if you visit http://www.cncf.org/vietnam/aboutvietnam.asp you'll get a much better idea.

You see here in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam you have to pay for everything and if you are too poor - tough luck. If you need to go to hospital you need to have insurance, if you don't have insurance, tough luck. If you need to go to school and your parents are poor, and you can't afford the uniform or shoe, tough luck. this truly is a communist Utopia.

Usually this is the kind of stuff that's not worth writing home about but ... I got my hair washed yesterday. I mean really washed. It was the best hair wash ever. It took 35 minutes and by the end i felt rejuvenated and it cost $3. First the lady lathered my hair without wetting it, massaging in the soap until it was a kind of a white foam, then once that was completed she brought me into another room where i had a lie down flat on a bed like thing and rest my head into a wash basin. There she shampooed, conditioned, shampooed again, massaged my head (which didn't really deserved it, as it's done nothing really since the end of August), then shampooed again. Then I got a rinse that took about 15 minutes, followed by a slow and meticulous blow dry. It was truly amazing.

I am leaving Saigon tomorrow to head to Mui Ne, because I have been told that it's really lovely (Bridin!). I finally am supposed to get my passport back today from the police with my extension. My actual visa ran out on Monday but the lady in the hotel advised me that that didn't matter so long as it was with the police at the time of expiration. I think what she really meant was, it doesn't really matter so long as you have the money to pay for it. Hopefully it will be my passport and not the immigration police that will be waiting for me when I get back to my hotel this evening.

Statistics -
1 overnight bus journey
3 boats
3 Home stays
1 Monastery
24 hotels
19 nights on overnight trains
3 flights
5 day motorcycle journey
1 crying spell
10 countries

2 tumbles

0 bones broken

1 camera stolen

1 wallet returned

101 days