February 9, 2010

We get a copy of the Viet Nam News slid under our door each morning. It's a daily paper except on Sunday. On Saturday there's a Sunday section in the back. It's pretty much world news with only a little about the United States. The day after the Super Bowl, there was absolutely nothing about the game. The lead story in the Sports Section was about Viet Nam hosting the international chess tournament. It will take place February 8-15 in Ha Noi and athletes will compete in men's and women's team standard and blitz chess (in case you want to tune in). Yesterday there was an article about Madonna performing in the half-time show and M.I.A. flipping a middle finger to the camera. But cricket, cycling, soccer (football to them), and even an article about the Viet Nam table tennis team were the lead stories. There was a small article about Sharapova with her eyes on Olympic gold and Kyle Stanley winning the Phoenix Open golf tournament. There is a Bird Flu outbreak heading south from Ha Noi, so that takes care of us not eating chicken for awhile. There's a stock market report and cartoons and of course Sudoku.

I keep coming back to the subject of food, but there are some things that are just too fascinating not to mention.

Jackers are like Pringles, only thicker. Not bad really. The Muoi Tinh Say is table salt which comes in a bag. It's quite coarse and doesn't come out of our salt shaker, so I have to put it in a coffee cup and we take what we want a pinch at a time. The jar on the right is coarse ground black pepper: Tieu Den Xay.

The 333 is Ba, Ba, Ba - bier, the beer that Ron likes. I think it's around 5.3% alcohol. The Birdy in the middle is interesting. It's Ca Phe Lon which is canned coffee. It's sweet, you drink it cold, and is actually quite good. The ad says "More Flavorful, More Inspired." I doubt if you can buy it caffeine free! The bottle on the right is the Vang Dalat. It's Dalat Red Wine from Da Lat Vietnam. It's 12% alcohol and only about $3.00 a bottle. We like it. We tried a white Dalat wine and it was pretty bad.

OMO is my laundry detergent, and I thought the Chrystal salad dressing was interesting because it's called "Separating Italian Dressing." I guess that means you have to shake up the bottle so it isn't "separating" any more!

Tonight Ron gets home late again, so he's going to order from downstairs on his way up because they are so speedy with their delivery service. My choice for dinner is called "Special Plate No.1" I think it's going to be fried shrimp, egg rolls and fried rice. All the items on the menu have pictures. Ron is getting the German Sausage & French Fries and he told me he'd give me some of his French fries. Mine is 72.000 dong and his is 68.000. That's about $3.60 for mine and $3.40 for his.