Construction = Chaos

No, we haven't disappeared from our blog - we just can't seem to get back to our routine!  After three weeks back in Hanoi, we're still not fully settled.  We came back to major renovations in the building where we live; in other words...noise and dirt!  Doug & I are in our rooms, but our teammates haven't moved in yet because their rooms aren't ready. We haven't cooked in our kitchen since we got here. Hopefully that will change this weekend. The good news is they made the kitchen and dining area into one large room by knocking down a wall.

In our 2nd week back we were off to attend the Team Vietnam orientation for 5 days. It was fun to see all the returning teachers and meet the new ones.  The Vietnam team is growing - and there were 6 adults and 4 children missing from this picture!


Doug is now in his second week of teaching. He has 5 speaking classes this semester, 4 of them start at 7 am!  But it is cooler in the morning, so maybe he won't be so uncomfortable while he's teaching.  He does have one class at 3 pm.
 
I've been busy with a number of activities, my one day a week job at Hanoi International Fellowship, tutoring sessions three times a week with students and just trying to figure out what and where we will eat dinner!  Now, you might think that getting take out or dining out is easy, but we are NOT in the good old USA.  The choices and variety are limited and we need to take a taxi just about everywhere - it gets expensive. We,ve been able to shop for cold cuts, bread, fruit and yogurt, so breakfast and lunch are ok in our room.  But until I can use my kitchen, our diet is hit and miss, not what we prefer.
 
 
Many student friends from last year have come by; they are as anxious as we are to start our weekly meetings again. Seeing them has reminded us why we came; they are great kids.  But for now, the construction keeps us from using the meeting room and common area. After all, what will we do if we can't all eat brownies together!  We just hope that we can start next week or soon after. Then we'll happily get back to normal, whatever that is!