Bai Bien Cua Toi (VII): Happy Mid-Autumn Festival

3:00
OUCH.
My feet and lower legs are on FIRE!  Did I walk through barbed wired?  NO, it must have been those bloody sand fleas while I was watching the Lion Dance.   
Add to that neck pain from sitting in front of the computer too much AND a fully grown hangover.
Toi khong vui!

Oh.  Is that what the new Google Doodle represents?

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival! Happy Moon Cake Day !  

Since my itching feet kept me up half the night, I end up mini-napping through the sunrise ;-(

6:20 .... and it looks like it was a GORGEOUS one .....

At 8:00 I finally have enough energy to drag myself down to the water.....

 Milk Mustache !

12:00

Still feeling hung over and tortured by the innumerable sand-fly bites on my feet and ankles.

Even the usually trustworthy Hair-of-the-dog approach fails me this time (it was worth a try ;-).

Time to exchange books again:   The Chemistry of Death in German.  Let's hope it's as good as the last one ;-)

Muoi insists I have a little lunch and her gestures indicate that she thinks it's good against Hangover, LOL.

Before I go in the water, I notice a swimming crab trying to make its home in a floating RED plastic bag.  It tries to crawl inside, gets washed away, swims back, and starts crawling in again.  WTF?  Sorry to evict you, but I NEED that bag to collect flotsam & jetsam !

On my way OUT of the water I notice a small instant-noodle-soup foil wrapper floating.  Might as well collect it and put it in the red bag..... oh look, there are tiny fish hiding in the wrinkles and crevices...... I try to evict them too but something MOVING TOO FAST TO IDENTIFY jets at my hand.  A SPEED-CRAB?  A BABY-BARRACUDA?   I give up, SCREAM & run onto dry land!

The Lion Dancer troupe is making its rounds through the village.  You pay them a little money, they dance in your entrance and yard, and only Good Luck will come your way (or something like that).  

I let me cell translator talk to Tam & Muoi:  "The owner should pay for a Lion Dance to bring good luck".   They both look at me with big eyes and then nose-point at the owner's wife and shake their heads seriously.    When I repeat it to the owner's Viet wife, she shakes her head vigorously with only barely camouflaged DISTASTE, CONTEMPT, and maybe even HATRED.    This Vietnamese woman calls herself a Christian but I'm still looking for the Love-thy-neighbour spirit in her...

Note to self:  My suspicion of Christian Fanatics has been re-calibrated and confirmed ;-)

16:45

School's out and Thom (in sporty Yellow) will play Frisbee for the first time in his life. (NO, it's true.  Frisbees are totally UNKNOWN in Vietnam ;-)

After 2 throws he has figured it out, LOL  But then which 11-year-old kid is NOT a natural with a Frisbee?

not a bad sunSET ....

... and a LOVELY rising moon ;-)

I take my dinner at the Swedish place.....it's somehow quieter and more serene over there....

Thi Lan had sent me an e-mail asking me to take her aunt to the market.  The aunt's balcony just happens to be on my way back to my room:

Thi Lan da noi...... Kim Anh muon di cho ..... toi se di..ngay mai, bay gio....

They give me unbelieving looks.......... but they understand ! LOL