In my happy place: carefree, stress-free, outdoors.
Coconut wine, nón lá and sampan rides. Three words I didn’t expect to entail so much fun. But our Ben Tre Day Tour yesterday was exactly that. So much fun!
Bullied into carrying these bees by our tour guide.
All is good after our tour guide, Steven, poured me shots of coconut wine. Sounds strange but was really smooth and light. Easy to drink and left no disgusting aftertaste!
Sporting a nón lá on the short sampan ride back to our van.
Despite being treated like a living and breathing punching bag by our tour guide (literally!), he actually made our day trip rather entertaining. Communication has been tricky and frustrating here in Ho Chi Minh, so it was great to be able to banter with a local. Personal highlights include taking sampan rides up and down the Mekong River while our cinematographer prayed our faces got whiplashed by oversized palm tree leaves, getting harassed into holding up some honey bees, stuffing my face with coconut-ginger and coconut-peanut candies and throwing back shots of coconut wine in the A.M. (because #YOLO, duh!). If it wasn’t for the fact I look like I’m a walking Christmas tree whenever I go through customs, I would have purchased a bottle of coconut wine to bring home with me! My carry ons includes a saa paper umbrella from Borsang, boxes of safron soap candles from Chiang Mai and ceramic homeware from Ho Chi Minh, in addition to my handbag and laptop bag. While alcohol is my achilles heel, I had to draw the line somewhere. #firstworldproblems
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xx Ling
