Food is my Mother Tongue

 

I introduced my family to a catchy, and oh so annoying children's song so they could learn to greet my family in South Africa. They sang it endlessly for three solid weeks. Even after we moved from a Sotho area to a Zulu one where the greetings changed. They sing it to this day at the slightest provocation.

“Thobela. Thobela. Thobela. Le ki. Le ki. Le ki. Regona recaralina. Regona recaralina.” I can still hear them in my head. But I can’t blame them. My aptitude for SeSotho was less than marginal on my best days so I didn’t have much else (language-wise) to teach them.

Despite my near obsession with travel, language is not one of my super powers. I learn the basics of course. Hello, goodbye, thank you. Such simple gestures, despite being basic decency, go so far in conveying goodwill on my part and receiving it from others. But unlike my friend who speaks seven languages fluently (and at least three additional one passably) or the average South African adult living in my old village who speak at least three, and my original host-dad who spoke all 11 official South African languages, I’m mostly a stereotypical monolingual American. A little Spanish to get by...not much more.

I do speak food though.

I don’t mean I know the names of things. Although I do my best to be familiar with dishes and the regions they are from, key ingredients and local variations on a theme. But when I say I speak food I really mean I am all in and want to try local food the way the folks in that place eat it.

Many people look up tourist hot-spots or historical monuments when they go someplace new. I research local delicacies. What do you eat and how do you eat it?

In Japan that involved discovering many folks take their plum wine with ice or water. In Vietnam I ended up eating strawberries with chili salt and nuoc cham (in Dalat) and toasting “yo” every time the family that invited me into their home for a party, filled my shot glass with local brew. I amused my village in South Africa when I first arrived because at a community function where everyone was eating with their hands they handed me a spoon (for some reason everyone in my village assumed Americans eat everything with spoons) and I instead followed their lead and dug in with my hand.

It doesn’t mean I love everything I'm offered, just that more times than not, I’m gonna eat what you give me and I gonna look for what you (person in a place I’m not from) eat.

Of course that bleeds over into my cooking. Experiencing a taste of something different often leaves me wanting more of it. But depending on where you are in America, you may not find what you are looking for.

I’m lucky, Houston is one of the most diverse places in America. I can find most things here without much effort. But even so, sometimes you have to know where to look. Pre-COVID my sister took me to a Vietnamese buffet spot. Fresh from my trip to Vietnam at the time I was expecting the usual fare. Instead I found dishes I had in the Mekong Delta- dishes I’d never seen on Vietnamese menus (in America) before. I was glee-filled, immediately transported back to buying fresh fruit from a floating market and watching the sun sink into the river at dusk.

I’ve loved dim sum for decades now. Ever since friends in Dallas introduced it to me. I’m pretty adept and can handle my own with a crush of carts and the soft tofu lady drilling daggers into me hoping I’ll capitulate and order some. But once I went with a friend of a friend. Luther, had lived in China for some years. So when the carts came around with something he wanted and he was offered the top steaming basket he smiled and shook his head no and pointed at the one below it. The next round of food he repeated this. By the third round there was no reason, the server smiled at him knowingly and reached for a lower (hotter) basket and placed it on our table with a knowing smile. Luther spoke food.

Like greeting someone in their mother tongue instead of expecting them to greet you in yours, knowing and loving someone’s food is a way to convey not only that “I see you” but that “I honor you and yours” too.

Kindness of Strangers

“I always depend on the kindness of strangers.”

I don’t but...oh how I benefit. I’d never thought before how the word is kindness, not niceness. Lots of people are nice. And I don’t mean to disparage nice. I am nice. But kindness...kindness is another thing altogether. Kindness is not an affectation for the comfort of self or others. Kindness offers something up of the person offering it. Niceness is smile, a head nod, a greeting, a "have a nice day".

The folks at my Taroko hotel hotel didn’t speak English. So when I clomped down the stairs, both my packs slung across my body, she smiled in the vague way I smile when I don’t understand what people are saying. A smile that says I am friendly and mean no harm but also I cannot participate in this conversation.

I typed out “how can I get to the train station" on Google Translate, and she graciously walked me out of the front door, onto the porch, and pointed across the street to the bus stop.

Google hadn’t mentioned a bus to me earlier when I tried to figure out directions on my own, and since it is Sunday I hadn’t questioned the omission, but now I wondered if this would be Google’s second failure on my trip.

I crossed the street near the crosswalk, early in the day and little traffic allowed me to stroll. I passed what appeared to be a storefront church before arriving at the covered bus stop. My eyes glossed over the signage mostly written in Chinese, the few English words not helpful in deciphering my transportation fate.

And then a minivan pulled up, a child of indecipherable age leaning out of the front window. He looked at me and away, a smile sneaking across his lips, a glance as familiar to me in my travels as tourist menus (although I try to avoid these). For a second I forgot I was in Taiwan and flashed back to South Africa and wondered if the Sunday transport was a khumbi (minivan taxi).

But no, the van was parking and an entire family disembarked: the father, driving; the mother, holding a two-month-old girl; the sheepishly smiling 13-years-old, holding his 7-years-old brother.

I smiled, my eyes trailing to the baby because- I do love a baby. And the mom smiled and headed toward me. “Hello,” she offered. I returned her greeting. And then the most universal of travel conversations unfolded. “Where are you from?” “Where are you going?” on their part, “How old are the kids?” on mine.

The Xicheng Taroko train station, she assured me, was a little too far to walk, but off to the side her husband busily looked up the bus schedule and assured me one was four minutes out. We posed, me mom and children, for the picture that is often requested (less often in Taiwan than in China but still more than other places) and they continued on their way...I suspect to the church I'd passed.

I looked curiously up the road, in the direction my bus should arrive and sure enough a bus ambled down the street. The 13-year-old motioned to his dad and his dad walked smiling toward the street, urging me out too. He waved the bus in, had a short conversation with the driver, and then assured me this was the right one.

The doors shut, and I was gone.

I don’t always depend on the kindness of strangers. I depend on technology, and research, my own wits, and blind luck...I don’t always depend on the kindness of strangers, but oh how I benefit just the same.

Culinary Kindreds

My people are greedy.

Well, ALL of my people aren’t greedy. Many of the people dearest to me couldn’t care less about food. But my culinary kindreds, those people love food, those people are greedy.

A few months ago when I traveled to Sicily I visited with old friends from the Bay. We spent a solid week eating. I don’t mean we ate, everyone eats, I mean most of our waking hours were dedicated to eating or the pursuit of food. It was, quite simply, a delight. Here were people that I didn’t have to give a reason for stopping to look at food because they would never question the validity of my appetite based on something as trivial as the fact that we’d just eaten moments ago. These are people who were happy to order a bevy of items to nosh on on our way to a meal because “you have to try this”.

My people are greedy, in the best, most enchanting way.

Hiking the nearest trail in

Taroko (a place where a little research might have served me well), slow and plodding as is my way anytime I'm headed uphill, I stopped for the gazillionth time, Breathing heavily, eyes grazing the green enveloping me, laughing uproariously to Thirst Aid Kit, and watched three men only a few moments apart, scale the stairs I was reluctant to revisit.

The fourth man smiled and greeted me with a hearty hello. He asked me if I was going up or down, and once he confirmed I was (in theory) heading in his direction, he urged me to join him.

“I’m tired and slow,” I waved him off with a sheepish smile. “So am I, it gives me an excuse to rest,” he laughed. And so I got to my feet and began the climb again. Three or seven steps, stop to breathe heavily, seven to 15 steps, stop to breathe heavily. 

In between my panting he peppered me with questions, local trivia, and his own story: how long am I traveling?,Taiwan has mountains 3000 meters – taller than the Rockies, he just returned from Houston. Another man joined our ascent, and we all continued, up and up and up.

At the end of one of the trails the other men I’d watch pass were gathered. One had continued on to the next trail, the others waited for the lagging part of their crew still somewhere below us, and vacillated between continuing uphill or climbing down in pursuit of lunch. Their crew, it turned out, is a Triathlon group. That day’s trail run would be followed by the next day’s 105 km bike ride.

On the surface, these are not my people.

Except...as my Forest Gump running ex taught me, folks who work out seriously have insatiable appetites. They have to, their metabolism burns everything off so quickly. That ex was a compact man, no body fat to be found. People would size him up at restaurants and shrink our orders, assuring us we had more than enough food. We never had enough food. He was, based on appetite and joy of eating, my people!

Triathletes are hungry too!

The group decided heading down was best – it was getting late and restaurants in the area close-- so we (because now I'd been absorbed a bit into the group) were headed for lunch.

After trying to scare me with descriptions of a possible lunch that would include stinky tofu (so much stinkier in Taiwan than how I remember it in China) and snake (I'm not easily scared by food) we headed to a local spot and I sat down with a barley drink and waited.

Plates started arriving on the Lazy Susan, 10 of us arranged around it. Rice, of course, an omelet-looking dish, chicken, beef, wild boar (a local specialty), squid (we are on the coast- so much of Taiwan is coast), fern, a local dish they described as Chinese chewing gum...then clam soup, large shrimp that would have brought joy to my mother’s heart if it weren’t for the heads still attached, a whole fish, more greens (water spinach maybe), another fish dish (when they showed me the picture of it immediately sent it to my dad because he was the only person I figured could give me the English name- and I was right!), another omelet, more rice, and fruit.

I smiled. I smiled so much.

One of the downsides to traveling alone is ordering. My appetite is substantial but even I have my limits. I can order a few things by myself but at some point it is just wasteful. But sitting there with this group (two more joined us eventually) of athletes, the question wasn’t “is this too much” rather, “is this enough?”.

Between the chewing and the conversations I couldn't understand, we exchanged pleasantries – they were intrigued with my travels this year and I couldn’t get over the fact that one woman had completed 51 marathons in the last five years. FIFTY ONE! She’s run more than 1,300 miles and that doesn’t include the training!

Travel and running aside, we continued to eat. And eat. And eat.

The plates slowly cleared. People picked off the remnants of their favorite dishes, The last man to arrive drank the last of the soup from the serving bowl. We divided up the check, paid, and parted ways.

And I was reminded...again...that my people are greedy. Long live greedy nation.

Lost in Lisbon

Europe must work for my affection. Whether it is some unconscious bias for its colonial past or more likely, a conscious one for its numerous sleights, I am not a fan of the “the civilized world.” few countries within its context have made my list of “must see” and even those that have (Italy and Greece) the visit is predicated less on what the country might offer (Vatican or Acropolis) and almost exclusively for the food I imagine they harbor.

After decades of dreaming of Egypt, when I finally visited I lingered over every

grain of sand and unfurling piece of history. Meanwhile, two hours at the Acropolis and I had spent my reserve of “awe” for the crumbling structure and was ready to move on.

Still, I planned for at least part of my yearlong sabbatical to include Europe. After the whirlwind that was me darting from city to city throughout southeast Asia, thirsty for everything she had to show me, I figured Europe, equipped with all of the history I am least interested in, would be a place I could sit quietly and write. 

So, I entered European borders with a bit of attitude and the expectation that if I were to fall in love here, if this were to be more than a glorified writer's camp, Europe was going to have to seduce me as no other place has been forced to seduce me.

Lisbon courted my affections with public transportation. Anyplace that links the city to the airport wins at least a begrudging nod from me. All the more so in Lisbon, the $2 ride diluting the damage a week of less frugal spending in Croatia inspired.

The sun bright, the language scrutable (with my elementary understanding of Spanish), I could feel myself relenting- succumbing slowly to Portugal’s charms.

Novelty (escalators on the streets connecting one block to another far above it) and historical predictability (statues of people on horses showcasing ancient ideals) weave the city into an interesting tapestry.

But the food?

In theory the food should be the thing that certifies Portugal in my heart. Portugal’s marauding citizens pillaged countries my heart gleefully embraces without wooing, for spices and culinary secrets. Portugal has Angola, Mozambique, Cape Verde, and Macau in its colonial arsenal and their foods integrated into the tapestry of the place as it if has always been here.

Hangry, my search for food was fraught, as it usually is in my first days of a city. Still settling into a place, still getting my bearings, I knew what I didn’t want but less what I did. The tail-end of the holiday season means many Europeans are off on vacation, one place I'd read about was closed until September, another remained hidden somewhere between the certainty of my GPS and the winding multilayered streets of the city.

Exhausted, with less than an hour of sleep in the last 30 hours, I finally stumbled into a nondescript restaurant tucked in-between houses on a street that I thought led to my hostel (it did not). Desperate, I asked if I could have lunch and they nodded and settled me at a table with a couple finishing up their meal.

Scanning the menu, I was unimpressed but desperation forced my hand.

Cod. 

This is a coastal place, everyone says seafood is a winner here and cod is a local dish. Although this is sardine season, my hunger wouldn’t allow me to gamble on the tasted of grilled sardines just yet.

Bread arrived, a fanta, I breathed deeply and relaxed into my seat.

The food arrived after the delay that food cooked fresh requires. A huge piece of cod, charred perfectly and adorned with sliced garlic and a bath of olive oil. The sides included potatoes, sweet and savory, and a greens, broccoli, and carrots (Vegetables! In Croatia vegetables were not as common as I would have liked).

I dove in greedily. Learned that the bones were still inside the cod, realized despite the copious amounts of olive oil the dish wasn’t greasy.

And they had WiFi. The WiFi that let me know I'd been headed in the wrong direction...only, I suspect it was the direction needed to feed both my body and my expectations.

Stranger Dinner

The tea it started with.

It started with tea.

No, it started with rain.

It started with rain and ended with dinner.

No Grab driver would accept my ride request, I suspect because of what was about to happen. I began walking down from the beautiful grounds of the King Palace Din 1 Da Lat and felt a few wayward raindrops on my hand. Further down the winding hill, the rain intensified. It spattered the longs sleeved shirt I’d put on in anticipation of the early evening ride to dinner, which in Dalat, promises a chill.

Two hundred meters later and the sky opened up. I scanned the street for shelter and my gaze landed on a storefront hosting a few motorbikes and an older man standing in the open doorway. I smiled sheepishly as I approached and he nodded his head, no smile but no furrowed brow. Two men sitting at a table just inside smiled vaguely in my direction and went back to smoking their cigarettes and drinking whatever brown liquid was in the clear bottle on the table.

A few seconds passed and the man at the door gestured me inside and pulled out a chair. I sat, grateful for a resting spot while I watched, with dawning realization that the rain would not be stopping anytime soon.

A woman appeared with a small glass of warm tea which I drank thankfully. My glass was refilled and people began to ask me questions: where are you from? How long have you been here? Do you like Vietnam?

Coincidences arose...the family so graciously hosting me was headed to Californian tomorrow. More than that, they were having a party to celebrate their travels. Lam, the man who had been standing at the door, held up the translation “Please stay for dinner,” on his phone.

So I stayed.

Never mind there was little shared language between us, this was a party and I was now a guest. People began to arrive and I followed everyone into a room. There was food laid out for at least 20 people. Rows of stools corresponded with sets of chopsticks and bowls. In the middle of the table were heaps of herbs, peanut dipping sauce, pork, and all the fixings for a type of spring roll you roll yourself – dropping in herb and vegetables and noodles and pork and something crunchy that I don’t know what it is but adds so much satisfaction when you bit into your roll.

I ate. People encouraged me whenever I slowed down. The homemade rice wine came out. My glass was filled and filled and filled no matter my protestations. I was full. And thankful.

Only, that was just the beginning. The thing to start us off. A hot pot soup came out, complete with sterno burners beneath them to keep them bubbling hot. The soup pot was set down with a plate of vegetables and mushrooms and one of the older men at my table took expert control, using the unused ends of his chopsticks to monitor the soup and, when the time was right, drop in the vegetables. Once he was satisfied, he began scooping soup into small bowls.

I dropped in some noodles and began to much away. More than anything, I loved the small rice paddy crabs, slightly larger than doughnut holes, stuffed with pork.

More drink, a new bottle emerged, stronger than the first batch, and everyone laughed at my response.

Then came fruit. Ice-cream. Chocolate.

As the group began to thin, someone insisted that “uncle” give me a ride back to my hotel. And just like that I was on the back of his bike riding through the cool night air.

Homemade lunch.

It is a specific kind of generosity. One I am often gifted with when I travel. Like the woman working at my hotel who took time out of her day and money out of her pocket to cook lunch for me. She seemed genuinely excited to share this experience with me and I felt honored. Or the parents of a friend’s friend who spent three days showing me the wonders of Kuala Lumpur and even saw me off the morning of my departure. They continue to check in on me- on my travels. The kindness overflows.

In moments like these I am lost. The Southern in me (and apparently something innate in humans) makes me want to reciprocate. Back home I would have baked something or at least brought something to drink. But out of my cultural element, I don’t know the best way to show my appreciation. I don’t want to monetize a sincere interaction with someone. Neither do I want to take whatever kindness they've shared with me for granted.

For now that leaves me with nothing more than the sincerest appreciation for people who open their hearts and homes to me. Appreciation for the time I have been gifted. I hope to be able to return the gift, because it is precious and I am forever grateful.

Fried Kindness

I wonder about the kindness I find in other countries. Unasked for and unexpected. It makes me wonder if the absence of such generosities in America are the result of my attitude or the way I go

through the world. I wonder because, all over the world people have shown me kindnesses that inspire me, at least for a little while, to be better.

Tonight, walking from dinner and still peckish, I stopped at street vendor to inspect her wares. Mostly drinks I eyed one of the small tables behind her stall with an elderly man sitting in front of it and noticed a plate full of fried...something. I pointed and she smiled and nodded her head.

“What is it?”

she didn’t answer, language a barrier between us, but she fished through the brown discs on the plate and handed me one, knocking one to the ground as she searched. She smiled as I tasted.

I still don’t know what it was. Sweetened glutinous rice-flour deep fried?

I shook my head excitedly trying to indicate, “yes, I want that.” and then I sat down at the tiny table and share, resting my day pack on me knees which in turn butted into my chest in my crouched position.

To my surprise she didn’t go back to the small skillet that rested to the side of her stall, instead she grabbed a plate and squirted a red substance and a white substance and then headed back to the plate she’d plundered earlier. She inspected the pieces and picked up two, dropped them on the plate and then handed the plate to me.

Flush in my travel mindset, I accepted the plate without question, set it on my table, and began to eat. The discs were greasy and lukewarm...and they were delicious. I played with them, wondering at the extent of the stretch.

I ignored the condiments until the lat half of my serving, assuming ketchup and mayonnaise – confused how ketchup would complement the dish and vehemently opposed to mayonnaise). Something made me tentatively dip the slightest edge of my mystery cake into the red blob and when I put it in my mouth I was pleasantly surprised. It tasted a hint of fish sauce, a bit of tang to accent the sweet. Unsure of what any of it was it worked, so I dipped conservatively and enjoyed the last bites

Read to move on, I motioned to the woman that I wanted to pay. She simply smiled and shook her head. When I pushed, she managed the word “free” and smiled again.

So I left, decidedly less peckish and thrilled to have experienced yet another treat. More than that, appreciative of the niceties people of the world offer up just because...

Wet Naps Mean I'm Special

Mui Ne, Vietnam

“You are special,” said the woman sitting across from me.

I held up the wet wipe and responded with a smile, “I know.”

There was no sarcasm. In a country where some restaurants don’t supply napkins and others slip a small package of wet wipes at your place setting before you meal and then charge you for them once they’d been used, I knew my treatment was not the usual.

It started with my nosy gaze falling on the vendor’s small station, she cooked over a coal pot and as always I wanted to know what it was. Before I had an answer she motioned for me sit and have one and so I sat on the tiny plastic stools in front of her.

When she handed me the bahn trang it was wrapped in paper. More specifically, it was wrapped in used notebook paper. I smiled immediately upon recognition because the packaging was familiar. When I lived in rural South Africa it wasn’t uncommon for me to get a fat-cake (an appropriate name for deep fried dough) or curry-fish (which might have had a hint of curry but definitely had no fish) I similar wrapping.

Faster than I anticipated I attempted to hold the cylindrical dish and rummage for my money- about 35 cents- to no success. In that moment I was reminded that I would not be pressed for money until I motioned that I was ready to go. With that, I settled into my food.

Crunchy and chewy, savory and sweet, I picked up hints of cinnamon which seems bizarre from what I know of the flavor palate of Vietnam (of course that is limited but growing daily). Halfway through, I realized I was dripping oil down my leg (I never saw her add oil t the dish) and attempted to wipe it off with my hand. That is when the vthe woman across from me reached for another piece of used notebook paper from the vendor ad handed it to me. As I cleaned myself up the vendor smiled as she handed me the wet nap.

And I smiled in return. Because beyond a courtesy of vendor to patron, I know that wetnaps are a luxury

Beer with Strangers

She waved me down with a small crab in her hand. I thought she was trying to sell me something so I smiled and waved know. She waved harder, insistent, this time she offered beer. I smiled and shook my head again. Finally she reached fort the watermelon sitting in over-sized pieces on a plate.

The watermelon I took, the sweetness bursting in my mouth.

The only photo I got (after I left)

She smiled and handed me the crab – the size of the palm of my hand, pink shell and white underbelly. I stared at it, unsure of what she expected me to do. She pantomimed cracking it in half. A little flustered, my phone in one hand and a small crab in the other, I looked around the table. There were six people assembled around the table with another two women sitting on separate seats but clearly a part of the group.

Everyone smiled as the crab woman gestured to her seat and then scooted over to make room for me.

I sat. my phone and backpack settled in my lap. And then I cracked the crab in two.

I looked for the meat, dug my fingers into crannies and pulled out bits of soft white flesh. She handed me a small bowl with a chili sauce and I dipped what meat I could find into the bowl.

Then came the beer.

Drunk people cannot be reasoned with, no matter the country- no matter their beverage of choice.

I watched her pour a beer from a bottle in to an ice-filled mug. She thrust it cheerfully in my hands and gestured for me to drink.

I demurred, as much as one can demure when I don’t speak Vietnamese and the group assembled doesn’t speak English.

Desperation to avoid drinking the beer encouraged me to use Google Translate- to no avail. Whatever I said was met with raucous laughter and inspired a side conversation in the group that I had now way to participate in.

so there was beer.

I drank a little and tried to put the mug down. She insisted I drink some more. I tried again. More drinking. The mug finally drained she smiled and gestured for another round...just for me.

The enthusiastic peer pressure reminded me of marula beer season in my village in South Africa. A small green fruit that ferments and notoriously gets elephants drunk, is also fermented on purpose in rural areas. The go-gos (grandmothers) would sit outside next to a frothy bucket of marula beer and insist I have some. “O nwa, Lerato, O nwa!”( Drink Lerato, Drink). Rather than face the wrath of a village go-go, I'd drink up and exaggerate how good it was.

Outside on the sidewalk next to the ocean in Vietnam, I reenacted my South Africa days.

As we continued to battle over the beer she began to hand me other things on the table. Squid (overcooked but still squid so I happily ate it). Everyone seemed surprised that I ate and presumably liked it. Next was a mystery...something pickled maybe. It tasted a little like cabbage but much thicker. Then more watermelon.

By now she was insistent that I have more beer and I was insistent that I not. The older woman sitting on my right, on a small stool next to me gestured for me to go. She pointed at the woman while she was supervising the beer and shook her head in the universal language of “my friend is drunk”, so I took her advice and departed.

Where Tourists Congregate

Ho Chi Minh tumbles in every direction. Flying in low to land, the city looks like a jumble of legos in various states of constructions. Descending just shy of city level and an orderliness begins to unfold; the buildings, retail and homes are more easily defined. The cab shuttling me to my hotel inched its way between other four-wheeled vehicles and a swarm of two wheeled ones. The vehicles scoot and nudge in a civil if passive aggressive interaction that only intensifies the further from the airport we get.

The city’s architecture flaunts its fusion history and present. Hastily constructed cement buildings sharing foundation with advertisements for Hermes, French colonial structures refurbished as hotels.

Folks zooming on two wheels; look in the background

I am enamored if terrified as I watch women maintaining poise and posture as they side-saddle the back of motorcycles and small children are either perched precariously at the front of the seat of a scooter or wedged between people larger than the child.

a glimpse of Bui Vien

My hotel, a few measly miles from the airport, demands an almost 30 minute adventure through the streets of the city. I take it in, the sun still firmly in the sky. We passed what appears to be a lake that, if the lifesaver rings are any indication, is sometimes used for swimming. We passed an enormous banyan tree, its seemingly endless roots thickening the trunk, giving it the appearance of walking- bored somehow with its original position. Only tourists seemed to notice, stopping to take pictures while downtown Ho Chi Minh churned on in the foreground. Maybe everyone else has already taken in the grandeur and us tourists are simply late in our discovery. Or more likely, given that there are much larger ones strewn throughout Vietnam, maybe it is the equivalent of gawking at grass.

My hotel finally appeared, I almost missed it amidst the bustle of the city.

After an hour or so...hunger set in. Street food is delicious (and to my understanding, Vietnam’s street food is amazing) but I am in desperate desire of vegetables. I looked up a restaurant and walked out of the hotel only to discover I am in tourist central.

Bui Vien, feels like canal street in the heart of the French Quarter. So many people meander in the

street that only a near miss with a motorbike indicated the street is not a pedestrian walkway.

At each intersection I bide my time or follow locals to get across. Whatever rules I think I've established are run over the next time I attempt to cross the street – crosswalk or jaywalking- there is no discernible difference. I watched a little girl, no more than 7, manage the throng of motorized vehicles, pink lunchbox in hand, she didn’t look phased in the slightest. Meanwhile, I got cocky, thinking I'd finally mastered the madness before being grazed by an onslaught of bikes coming from what felt like every direction.

This place requires your wits about you.

I wandered for a while, people watching, food watching. My restaurant selection faded in my mind swallowed as it was by the onslaught of foreign palates. Although that isn’t accurate either. Bui Vien has was appears to be a bustling youth presence. Not just tourists, but local young folks clustered around certain restaurants (a note to myself for tomorrow when there isn’t an HOUR wait on the BBQ octopus that looks so tantalizing).

banh mi for abut $1

I settled on a banh mi. Ironically, the three-wheeled stall was across the street from my hotel. I knew the meat patties were fresh because I had watched him make them. He slathered on the heat, both sauce and fresh chilies, and while the sandwich was delicious, the heat barely registered a tingle on my bottom lip.

Still early, I walked the strip again. I watched a young boy spit flames from his mouth, spitting out the fuel and tamping is lips where hot ash clung.

My mind on a massage, I eyed the small storefronts along the street. Smiling and scantily clad women offered fliers for services. I can’t help but wonder if the massage is really what they are advertising. How practical is a tiny denim skirt for massaging or a blouse with a plunging neckline barely containing the breasts behind it?

I could be wrong. I hope I am. Of course women can revel in their bodies for no one’s pleasure save their own. Or they might simply be meant to grab attention- the Carl’s Junior approach to spa treatment ads. Still, their presence reminds me of the darker side of tourism. The power dynamics at play when tourists come from countries that don’t blink at at 25,000VND sandwich (barely one dollar- which I’m sure I’ll discover tomorrow when I wander out into the wider city, is deeply overpriced) or a 1,200,000 VN massage ($50).

This is only a glimpse...five blocks on a hungry stomach. Tomorrow I get to venture out and see/eat so much more than the tourist district.