Day 13 (Part 2) - Afternoon on the ship

Today is Mom's birthday!  But she doesn't want anyone to know so I'm not allowed to say anything.

Last night when we got to the room there was a letter on our bed inviting us to a Signature Asian Dining Experience in the Atrium Dining Room.  We didn't sign up for anything so I'm not sure what it is.

We woke up around 6am this morning and were at breakfast a little later than normal, around 7:30am.  The excursion to S21 and the Killing Fields starts at 8:30am (and when they say 8:30 they mean promptly).

When we got on the bus I asked a few people about the letter if they got it - some said no, some said maybe, some wives said maybe while the husbands said no, some husbands said maybe while the wives said no.  No one said yes. I only asked the people on our bus.  Later I saw Binh and asked him and he said the whole Group 1 got the letter and can eat together at this special dinner - - that's everyone who was on the bus, so no one but me read the letter! lol.

After the Excursion, which is under Day 13 - The Killing Fields, we got back to the ship and I wanted to make sure that we got a good seat up at the pool so we just changed quickly and went up to find seats.  It was absolutely no problem until about 3:00pm then they were all full.

We had the light lunch in the atrium room of a ham sandwich and I also had the traditional dish soup with everything in it. It was really good. We went separately down so we wouldn't look like we were saving seats and just brought our sandwiches up to eat in our seats.

Not as hot today

We have a nice shady spot.

The bartender made me a virgin pina colada (which was not beige) and one of their signature cocktails just without the gin and with soda instead of sprite because I don't like it too sweet.

At one point Mom went to the washroom and when she came back she said "were you wondering where I was?" Umm, no? "I was stuck in the bathroom, the lock wouldn't turn to unlock"  I guess she was knocking but there is an exterior door that takes you to a hallway to an interior mens and interior ladies washroom.  I went to the bathroom afterwards and had no issue.

At 3:00pm there was a demonstration of traditional costumes for Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam.  I said to Mom that I was going to go down so that I had something to write that wasn't so heavy today.  This was when someone asked if we were leaving because they were looking for seats - I told her that Mom was but I was coming back but she was welcome to take the seat next to me.  She wanted 2 so just sat further back in upright seats.  I was gone maybe 20 mins for the demonstration, I didn't stay for the whole thing.

The first one Jo volunteered for (of course!) and it's a daytime style but she chose pink which is a nighttime colour.  This outfit would be worn to go see the King or on special occasions (Wedding, New Year, a Water Festival). Traditionally they'll use silk but they use a linen cotton blend for demonstration because it can be washed easily and doesn't need to be dry cleaned.

(Jo is never still, she must find it hard to get pictures!)

They wrap and then safety pin to hold it in place.
I asked what they used before safety pins and she said
dried banana skins which they then tied up.

Then came Steve.  Jo is wearing her white button down top and a long black skirt under here but they didn't want any showing so kept tucking it up.  Steve was wearing pants that undid at the knees into shorts so when they started to tuck his pants up his legs he said "I can undo these!" undid them and dropped them to his ankles and as he's doing that I said to Jo "so they're just going to sit around his ankles?"  

No, then they had to take his shoes off to get the bottom half of his pants off but then he's wearing knee high compression socks which they just left.  

They dressed him in traditional trousers, silk jacket, scarf and belt and the whole time his wife is video taping and saying "I don't think this is going to fit you Steve!"  He was a big guy, probably 6'4".

I tried to take multiple pictures of Jo with her headdress added, she knew I was taking a picture but she can't help but move and talk, lol.  So this is the best one.

After these two I went back up to the pool so that I wasn't hogging a chair that was being 'held' and I sat up there until about 4:30pm because there was a talk Binh was doing about Vietnam and Cambodia today at 5pm that I wanted to go down and see.  As I left I went past the lounge and he was already talking, turned out it was at 4:30pm.  So I came quickly to the room and just change my sunglasses to glasses and grabbed my key and phone.  Mom wasn't in the room so I assumed she was in the lounge watching the presentation.

When I entered it was to the back side of the lowered projection screen and Binh was talking.  I did a quick glance around and couldn't see Mom but Carol gestured to a free chair at her table with Jackie so I joined them and sent Mom a message saying I was at the talk.  Turns out she was on the balcony when I went in the room so joined a few minutes later.

I missed the first 10 mins of the presentation but it was really interesting to get a different perspective on some of the things we have learned.  Nin, obviously, was Cambodian.  Binh is Vietnamese (he's our Cruise Director).

The presentation was called "Viet Nam and Cambodia, the Fate of Two Countries"

I entered when Binh was talking about why the Khmer Empire collapsed. 

3 reasons

Wars - Cambodia is rich in natural resources, pearls gold and silver, good soil for agriculture. They, throughout history, have been constantly attacked and when they were not being attacked from outside they were in civil war. 

Temple Construction - They built too many, expending too many resources. There are more than 800 temples around Siem Reap and more than 3000 in the country. It cost the country so much money and people were working hard for a century with not enough food support the workers who got disgruntled.

Deforestation  - They cut the forest down for timber for the temple construction but also to make room for temples and agriculture. But it’s a tropical climate, 6 months of the year they have heavy rain which washes the soil away because now there aren’t enough roots to keep the banks from eroding. 

Cambodia still has the lowest incomes in south east Asia.  

This was interesting Binh's, or Vietnam, perspective of 1979-1989 Vietnam occupation of Cambodia and why they came to Cambodia's aid in January of 1979 to end the Khmer Rouge rule. 

Pol Pot invaded Vietnam and made a big mistake. The KR landed in a village and killed all 500 citizens hanging their heads from the trees but the KR were unorganized and their child soldiers had AK47s, maybe a grenade launcher. Vietnam within 24 hours brought 140,000 army troops with tanks and heavy artillary into Cambodia to end the KR regime within a month. 

Once they realized the extend of the genocide in Cambodia Vietnam realized that all the intellectual talent had been killed - there were fewer than 5 Doctors and 20 Teachers left in the entire country. There was no one left who could read and write and the people left can’t be government advisors. So the Vietnam Army stayed to help rebuild Cambodia for 10 years.  (very different perspective but makes sense).

On to Vietnam - 

Vietnam is one of 5 communist countries (China, Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba and Laos).  Vietnam is still considered a developing country.

3 reasons why they are slow to develop:

State System - they don’t follow a state system. One party rules the entire country. They don’t like social debate which launches development. Social debate can reduce mistakes because there is discussion about impacts one decision might have on something else.

Writing language - Vietnamese has used the Latin alphabet since 1945 so only 80 years of written language. The language is lacking in scientific terminology and it’s not precise so needs a lot of words to describe something because the vocabulary isn’t there. There has been some discussion about expanding the vocabulary but it's slow.

I asked Claude to translate this and he said 
"a form of psychological abuse in which the abuser repeatedly denies
or distorts the truth, lies, or misleads in order to leave the victim confused".

Education - They have to send their children overseas to study for excellent education. In 40 yrs education hasn’t changed, Binh's daughter is using the same tools and booklets as when he went to school. There is no invention/innovation. 

2 policies have progressed Vietnam:

Ocean - here we go:  Starting in 1960 they became more focussed on ocean economics. Trade partners, etc.

Diplomats- Vietnam has been burned one too many times so now they have no more tight allies. No foreign army bases in Vietnam, it keeps the country but slows development.

After the presentation we went back to the room to change, I wrote up a bit of the blog and we had a drink in the room (me soda water and Mom a zero beer).

At 6:45pm every night Binh does a little overview in the lounge on what to expect for tomorrow so we went to that and Carol and Jackie joined us.

Mom asked for nuts and they gave us these
so she took 2 bowls.

He explained why we have dropped anchor and why there are so many other ships moored here. 

It's because the customs gate closes in Vietnam at 5pm so if you aren't here by 5pm you have to wait overnight in the space between the Cambodian and Vietnamese border.  This checkpoint is monitored by the Navy, not normal border patrol, so they'll come on the ship tomorrow - they won't ask to see our rooms or luggage just check the ships stores.  Binh is hoping that we can be on our way by 9:30am if we get in the line at 7am.

He told a joke and said that in a meeting of Leaders the French President said "I have 10 girlfriends and one of them is sleeping with my bodyguard but I don't know who" and the US President said he had a worse problem "I have 50 bodyguards, but one of them is a spy working for the KGB and I don't know who" and the President of Vietnam said he had the worst problem "I have 100 ministers and only 1 is working and I don't know who" - - this to explain if we don't start moving until 11am it's because they aren't really working not because there is a problem.

He also joked "you know Vietnam is a communist country?  We learned a lot from the French.  Making a baguette we learned from the French, our coffee we learned from the French, how to treat your King also we learned from the French - Long Live the King (insert choking noise and head cracked to the side)...and we become a communist country".

He explained our excursions tomorrow and that we would be leaving in the afternoon so if there is any delay in customs it won't affect our trips and we would be leaving my Sampan Boat (tender) so to wear good walking shoes, hats, bug spray and sunblock.  Tomorrow looks like a really good possibility for rain so we'll see what the day brings.

So far we have been so lucky.

When we moved into the Atrium area for dinner we sat again with Carol and Jackie.  Carol's husband passed in the last 4 years he had kidney cancer and lost one kidney and the other was working at 30%.  I'm not sure how he died ultimately but it was during Covid.  At one point she said "do we have any pictures of the Grandkids?" (Jackie and her have been friends for years and have done 2 trips a year together since retiring in 2005 - before that they taught together, I think they do everything together because it was Jackie who pulled out her phone to look for pictures of Carol's grandkids) I said "I've seen pictures of wine and pictures of cats but no pictures of Grandkids" they both laughed and said that sounded about right.

Dinner was a 5 course meal tonight and it was all excellent.  I could have done without the soup but it was still good.  

Mom had made me swear not to tell anyone about her birthday but after dinner all of the sudden there was Happy Birthday being sung and I looked in the reflection of the glass behind Jackie and realized they're coming right at us.  I put up my hands in the surrender position and said "I swear I didn't say anything".  I mean they have our passports for Gods sake, I'm not surprised they figured out her birthday!  I didn't take a picture of the cake but this was waiting when we got back to the room.

After dinner 5 of the staff came into the room to invite us to the Music Trivia and they would be dancing during the trivia.  One of them is the hostess in the lounge and another is our room attendant, Daneth. The Lounge is right behind this Atrium restaurant so I turned to Mom and said "we'll have to go back the long way" which is up to the 3rd level and back down the interior stairs.  We didn't, we walked through the Lounge and it was fine.

Now it's about 10pm and I'm done with the blog and heading to bed!