Hurts So Good

It's amazing how far a 45 minute plane flight can get you. After the fifteen hour bus journey from Hoi An to Dalat, Mom opted to spend the next leg in the air. We left behind the lush hills and valleys of the central highlands and landed smack dab in the middle of hazy, humid, crazy Saigon. Officially known as Ho Chi Minh City, the name still depends on where you're from and how communist you are. Either way, people will know you're talking about a place with 8 million people and 3 million motorbikes.

Crossing the street feels a little like swimming through a school of tiger sharks - as long as you keep moving calmly and sedately, avoiding any thrashing or sudden movements, you'll come out on the other side in one piece. We had plenty of chances to practice this skill as we made our way across the city, as the streets are much wider and the blocks much longer than Hanoi. From the backpacker area we wandered past the old market, stopped for some passion fruit ice cream that had Mother swooning, visited a Vietnamese quilt shop (selling finished products only, to Mother's dismay), and finally washed up on the doorstep of the Golden Lotus Foot Massage Club.

Although the name suggests a bad Chinese restaurant by day and a seedy dance club by night, the place was actually more than nice enough for my mother. The card claims to have the "Facilties of a 5 Star Hotel At a price That is much less expensive Than anticipated and Easy access" and we're inclined to believe them. For $15 dollars we first sipped lotus tea to soothing music, then were ushered upstairs to a cadre of giggling young women who proceeded to massage and manipulate our bodies for the next 90 minutes. Rose water foot bath, cucumber face mask, more methods for spine cracking than I've ever encountered, we got it all. I believe I still have a footprint-shaped bruise between my shoulder blades from when the gal did the cha-cha on my back.

Spines realigned and muscles melted, we emerged back into the thrum of the city as darkness was settling. Today we explored some other dark corners in the War Remnants Museum and the Reunification Palace before making a good effort at spending the last of my mother's dong. She's sitting beside me as I write, watching a Chinese soap opera dubbed into Vietnamese and waiting for the taxi that will take her to the airport. Since she hasn't disowned me yet I can only imagine that she enjoyed her short stay. It will be a bit lonely without her - safe travels, mummy dearest!