Today was awesome. After making it through some struggles at the airport, we got to the hotel and I was in bed by 2. At breakfast I experienced my first culture shock. It is one thing to read about and see pictures of how many Vietnamese people travel by motorcycle, but when the unending river of motorbikes drove past as I ate breakfast, I was in awe. Another thing that was different by actually seeing it is everyone in pants. It is hot so I assumed people might wear shorts, but we were told that people would wear pants and they did. I have accepted this though, because it is going to be hot if you are wearing pants or shorts, so pants just make sense. Pants keep the sun off your legs and then you are also more presentable in formal company, like we were at the welcoming ceremony with the Minster of Education.

Another culture difference we came across during the city tour was seeing kites. In my experience, kites are just a stereotypical activity for families to do in the movies, but I’ve never seen one used. Here, there is a park in the city that is full of kite flyers. I also noticed a lot of imagery of Ho Chi Minh while we were touring the city. We respect our founding fathers, but we don’t have them up on every other block. I was told that Ho Chi Minh is everyone’s Uncle here.

Another thing on the city tour that I noticed was many signs in English. This is clearly the beginnings of globalization, even if it is mostly for tourism at the moment. With all of these signs, it means that people are coming into the country that don’t speak English, and as more people do this, the more connected to the world Vietnam will become. The tallest tower in South East Asia is hard to miss, another example of development here in Vietnam. We drove past many construction sites downtown that were preparing to build large buildings. These would seem likely candidates for office places that global companies could use.