Things we have done during the wait

Well I received a few emails from folks asking what have you done during the wait to make it go by faster? Well truth be told no matter what you do it doesn't go by faster. Hopefully we are close to getting travel dates but here are some things we have done.

Big one is getting our little girls room ready. We were lucky we painted rooms in our house when we moved in a couple of years ago and decided we liked the color it was(light blue).

Lets see, my wife recently was given a shower at her work so we sorted those things and put stuff up, bought and put together a crib and in general got her room together and decorated.( Went with a butterfly theme)

Many many hours looking on the Internet at flight info, hotel things and travel guides for Vietnam. Se ms EVA and China Air have the best deals. Both fly there via Taiwan. Cathay Pacific is not much more expensive, via Hong Kong and Korean Air is about the same via Seoul. Also Thai Air seems to have good deals and that is via Bangkok. One thing I have thought about doing and may still is when traveling use this as an excuse to circumnavigate the globe! Yeah I know crazy idea but I am an avid traveler and would love to do this and it is not as crazy as it sounds.

Leave NC fly west and onto Vietnam Via San Francisco or somewhere there. When we leave we could take Vietnam Air or Singapore Air via Singapore and continue west. We would go from Asia to either Germany or France and from there back to US. ironically flight times going via Europe are about the same or in some cases shorter than flying the Pacific. So just a crazy idea I had but probably not gonna happen. If anyone has done this let me know how it went.

Hmm what else, I have ridden my motorcycle a lot(2006 Triumph,, mmmm) It is great stress relief just cruising around. Countless amounts of hanging around the house waiting for the phone to ring and it doesn't and checking email.(This is a horrible thing to do as it makes it worse, but you just cannot help it.)

Done some pre- packing and more pre -packing and making lists. Each time we either add or take away something.

Read lots on Vietnam. There are great websites out there and some really good travel guides as well. I like lonely planets best for info and fodder's for pictures and background info.

Finally if you try and learn some Vietnamese. I bought a computer course on learning Vietnamese. It is very basic but teaches you words and phrases. I have actually picked up quite a bit and seem to be doing ok. When we go to our local Vietnamese restaurant I always as about words and see if I am saying thing correct. But I am sure I will really mess up in Vietnam on some word but that is part of the experience.

Work on a life book. My wife has been doing this putting in pictures we get on our little girl and writing in it. Oh and keep a journal of some sort be it a blog or a personal diary.

Well that's it for now, maybe next post will be about travel.