9 Days until Christmas

It is Wednesday, December the 16th here and it blows my mind. How did this happen? Maybe it's because it's so hot here that we didn't notice Christmas sneaking up. Maybe it's because we've been busy. Maybe it's because we don't have a tree and haven't bought any gifts, and that's why Christmas is all of a sudden UPON US!

No time to blog or journal: a situation that needs to be remedied. For now, I was walking down the street the other day and some people were chopping up a tree and shredding it. I asked what it was and they it was a papaya tree. Apparently, they use all of it for something, maybe juice, I don't remember what they said. As is usual when I say "What is that?" in Vietnamese, they assume that I know Vietnamese (which I love and wouldn't want to change) and wanted to ask me every question I could answer. Even though I barely understand a word when they ramble, I just stick with the answers I know: "country America," "24," "husband, not yet," "teacher, language English, Binh Phu Street."

I asked Erica to take out her camera to take a picture of them, and the girl jumped up to be in the picture with me. I haven't seen her since. But I like her.