Day Ten

Wednesday morning began a little differently than usual. Instead of heading to UEF for classes, we took the bus to the New Worlds Hotel for a cooking class. The New Worlds Hotel was quite impressive; it was a five (?) star hotel, so it was unlike anything we had seen on the trip before. I mean this place was so fancy even the guys on the bathroom signs had pocket squares. After a quick tour of the hotel, we began our cooking class by learning how to make Vietnamese spring rolls. The head chef would demonstrate the process and explain the ingredients, and then allow us to make our own. For the regular spring rolls, we began by taking two pieces of brittle rice paper and overlapping them, and then hand-brushing them with water to make them flexible. Next we’d place shrimp, lettuce, and basil onto the paper and roll it all tightly. The rice paper becomes somewhat transparent when you brush it with water, so the pink of the shrimp and the green of the vegetables can be seen. The chef explained to us that the separation and different colors of the ingredients in the roll is representative of the seasons in Vietnam. Next we made a fried pork roll. For this we used a thicker, green bean paper instead, and placed into it a mixture of pork, vegetables, and mushrooms. We then rolled them and placed them into deep oil, and let them fry for five minutes. After we made each roll we were allowed to eat, and although I’m no five star chef, I think I proved I know my way around a Vietnamese spring roll. After cooking lessons, we had lunch at the hotel. Again, this is a five star hotel. And it was a buffet. Needless to say this was probably one of the top three best meals of my life, not including any of my mom’s home-cooking. I would go into the specifics of what I ate, but to be honest I ate so much food it all sort of began to blend into one.

After lunch we headed back to the hotel, and got ready for our last business visit to Newport Saigon Corporation (NSP). NSP is one of the largest ports in Vietnam, with many terminals all across the country’s coast and rivers. NSP is actually run through the Vietnamese Navy, yet still has to compete with other privately owned ports in the country. The stacks of shipping crates seemed to stretch on endlessly, but what was more impressive was how busy the port was. At the entrance, there was a line of what had to be over 100 trucks waiting to accept crates. NSP really served as an indicator of just how rapid the economic expansion of Vietnam is. On our tour we got to see the control tower, where the unloading of ships and storage of crates is managed. We also got a quick bus tour of the port grounds, on which our tour guide sang us a traditional Vietnamese song. It really was a great way to end the business visits on this trip.

After we got back to the city, a group of us walked to the Ben Thanh market. Bargaining wasn’t as simple without the UEF students by our side, but I think we handled ourselves pretty well. For dinner we went back to the same place as last night to get Banh Mi (seems to be a group favorite). We also got our suits when we got back to the hotel. I’ve got to say that tailor did a fantastic job, he hammered out more than 20 great suits in less than a week. Xin chao!