My graduate trip : Day 2.

Day 2. Solitude.

When I woke up in the bus in the middle of night, I heard a man behind me snoring loudly. The beautiful scenery through the window made me emotional. The bus reached a rest area on the highway after a while. It was 2am. Still five hours left to Nha Trang. Everyone got off the bus to buy some snacks and fruits. Since I didn’t need to buy anything, I just wandered slowly around the resting place. There were many dried fruits, but nothing special in my opinion. I already saw these snacks many times in the Philippines. The resting time ended and the bus moved again towards Nha Trang. I couldn’t sleep again because of the beautiful scenery.

Finally, The bus arrived at Nha Trang at 7am. I was supposed to take a boat tour which usually starts at 8am. Since the guide book recommends “Mah Mah Rinh Café” for a boat tour, I needed to find Mah Mah Rinh quickly. I thought I could find the café easily if I asked for directions, but it did not turn out that way. Most people in Nha Trang didn’t speak English!! After I failed to find the way on my own, one fact popped in my head. ‘I am really good at body language.’ I tried to talk to people with body language. Yes! It worked the first time! I got to know the way to mah mah rinh, plus they also gave me some good advice. (Body language is amazing!) That was “to see the name of roads”. So smart! Why didn’t I think that? I had confidence not to get lost any more with this tip. I found mah mah rinh café. Unfortunately, it was closed. I needed to find another café.

The guide book says TM brother’s café is the biggest café in Nha Trang so I decided to go to that café. TM Brother’s Café was the biggest café I’ve ever seen. I asked many things to the prettiest staff in the café. She said “only for you” a lot with big smiles during the talk but actually she did nothing for me. Anyway, I was too tired to walk around at that time so I decided to book a room in TM. She said I needed to wait for more than one hour for a boat tour. You know it was a solo trip so that when free time arose suddenly, I didn’t know what to do. Luckily, I was really hungry so that I went out to try Banh mi which is a baguette stuffed with local vegetables. It was so good that from then on, it was my breakfast everyday during the trip in Vietnam. When I got back to the café, I was told the boat tour was delayed. So I went to the staff and had a conversation. She didn’t know much about the city she lives in. I gave up getting some information about the city from her right away.

Finally, the tour bus came. Many people on the bus I thought were Korean,. There were many couples in the bus. I didn’t know that this tour was for couples. I suddenly became lonely. My instinct told me that it would be lonely tour, and I felt a bit homesick at this time. I wished that I was with someone at that time.

Actually I cannot remember much about the boat tour. My memories were overwhelmed from the fantastic snorkeling experience. I saw such colorful corals and schools of many species of fish under the sea. It was the experience which I wanted to have since I was very young. I repeated to myself that “I don’t care even if I die right now”. One of my dreams has just come true.

During the dance time on the boat, the Vietnamese girls were openly aggressive. One of the girls approached me and danced ‘booby booby dance’ beside me. I didn’t dance with her even though she was pretty. This was because my head was already full of corals, no more space for her.

After the dance time, we had lunch on the boat and went to an aquarium. The appearance of the aquarium was truly magnificent. Because of that, my expectations were really high. Unfortunately, the aquarium quickly let me down. There were only some aquatic plants inside not very impressive, I realized why foreigners didn’t go to the aquarium. After watch, we went to a small island. There were many attractions on the island but I was just enjoying the wonderful sea view by sitting on a comfortable wooden chair. This was just what I wanted. I felt as if I became Richard of the movie “The Beach”. I promised myself that I will come again.

On the boat coming back to the café, everything looked so beautiful above the sea. When I got back to the café, the staff asked me how the tour was. I gave the "thumbs up" without a word. I still cannot believe it that this tour was only $7USD.

It was 7 pm when I decided to go out for dinner. I tried to find restaurants that the guide book recommended but the book was already out of date. None of the restaurants were there. I walked around downtown twice and went into one restaurant that looked luxurious and expensive. However, the food in the restaurant was not expensive. I ordered “Fried rice with fish” and it was quite nice. One waitress asked me many questions and she explained why she did. This was because she didn’t see solo Asian travelers. Although I saw many solo western travelers, I never saw even one solo Asian traveler during the trip. No wonder she thought I was unique. Anyway, it was hard to understand her accent so that I couldn’t reply properly.

The staff in the cafe told me that sunrise in Nha Trang is wonderful. I went to bed early so I could get up at 5 am.