It is early Saturday morning in Hoi An, despite the hour a crowd has gathered at Balance café where Mr Vinh meets us with a big smile and wishing us good morning. He has prepared a full day of activities for us!
Our first stop is at a local restaurant where we will have Vietnamese breakfast. All of us catch our bikes through the already awake and buzzing city. The scenery of the rice fields is beautiful in the morning lights. I start to think about how much I appreciate to be here, as well as the opportunities that I have compared to so many others.
We arrive the local restaurant and there is arranged a breakfast table for us. The breakfast includes a bowl of noodles, vegetables, tofu, meat, and spring rolls. A heavy breakfast in other words! Next up is Vietnamese coffee. The first thing that strikes me when we arrived the coffee place is the music pumping out of the stereo. Not sure if morning coffee or 90’s disco. Anyway, we gather around some tables and sit in the typical, almost children looking plastic chairs and soon we are ready to order.
As soon as we finished up our coffee-talks, we got ready to move on and were divided into small groups. All of us received questions that we needed to answer. To answer these questions, we had to move around the town to take photographs in front of our targets and collect business cards from different shops/museums. Mr Vinh could even tempt us with a secret prize for the winning team.
After biking around the city looking for art, temples, memorials, and shops – we could finally relax with a cup of coffee at break bread where we handed in our answers to our seminar leader, Rasmus.
Most of us were quite tired after the race but there were still two activities left. Cooking class and Bingo! I thought the best part of the class was the eating part. The fresh tasting food was eagerly consumed. However, some of us was quite dedicated to the class and made some impressive décor of tomatoes. After a short break, it was time for some Vietnamese bingo! I can’t explain the immersive performance of the “bingo-masters”! It looked like they had been doing this for ages. Great show!
The winners of the race were later announced. The winners had taken the task to another level and made a short video of all the answers. 1st place won a boat tour with “cinnamon cruise” including dinner! Well deserved! 2nd place won massage at local spa. A bit jealous, but also; well deserved.
Soon a surprise awaited us. Three of the student turned 20 this month and got a Birthday Surprise party! Fireworks, cakes, and birthday song was included in the celebration. Mr. Vinh had even prepared a happy birthday banner for them! Despite that all were quite tired in the end of the day I would say it was a great Saturday!
Next: Field work in Co Tu Village