Bouldering, Homework, and Laundry, oh my!

I honestly don't really remember what we did on Friday evening.. I probably took Anna to the park so she could play on the slides and swings. I taught her how to pump on the swings as well, partially so that I didn't always have to push her but also because it's fun as a kid to be able to power yourself on the swing. Sometimes I get on the swing after her if there are no other kids waiting to swing but the set is so small that I'm always worried I'm going to pull it out of the ground with the momentum I have.

Anyway, I got to sleep in Saturday which was nice, I still woke up pretty early since somehow my body doesn't like to sleep in here but I was able to go back to sleep because I didn't have school or any early morning plans. At 10 AM I skyped my mom to talk about my schedule for the second semester when I'm back in the US. We still aren't sure which classes I'll be able to get credit for here in Vietnam so we're scrambling a little to make sure I can get all the credit I need to graduate on time. She's also been helping a lot with my college application stuff since I'm not home to meet with my counselor and get my transcripts sent off. I'm very thankful for all her help but I think we'll both be happy when all this madness is over.

For lunch my grandmother made me pho and spring rolls; they were both delicious but I only remembered to take a photo after I had already started eating... The rest of the day after lunch was spent doing laundry and homework as well as some more research for Lily's visit and our Vietnam tour. The previous tour we found didn't work out so I've been searching Google and I think I found a good one that goes to a few places in the Northwest region of the country and includes an overnight train ride! Lily is most excited about getting to take a train so we wanted to find a tour that included one. The next step for her is to get a visa and plan her flight itinerary!

On Sunday I went to Vietclimb for a morning bouldering session. About an hour after I got there, my Scottish English teacher, Lucy walked in with the other foreign teacher, Brian! It was a little odd to see them there but Vietclimb has always attracted foreigners more than native Hanoians so I wasn't all that surprised. It would be a lot weirder (I think) to see one of my Vietnamese teachers for physics or geography there. After a couple hours at Vietclimb, I caught the bus back to the Ecopark for the afternoon. In the morning, Anh had told me not to take a key but when I got back and tried the door, it was locked! I waited for about a minute there and was worried that no one was home but luckily, he came and unlocked the door. I guess everyone was still asleep? At 1:30? Or they were just taking a nap... either way, I got in and had some lunch before taking a shower and finishing up my homework. I fell asleep for a little while since I was tired from climbing but woke up pretty quickly. I've never been a fan

of naps; they make me feel sick and hot so when I do fall asleep like that, it's never for a long time. After I collected my laundry I finished my math and then we had dinner.

It's a little later now, I've been working on an alternative assignment for Biology since I wasn't able to take the test. Instead, the teacher gave me an assignment to make a powerpoint presentation about animal cells and their structure. It's been pretty easy so far since and I'm almost finished. She never really gave me a due date but we have biology on Tuesday so I figured I would get it done by then.

I'm headed to bed now for an early morning start to the week. Thanks for reading and have a great Sunday!

p.s. - I took the sunset photo a few days ago, we have a lot of red sunsets (probably because of all the pollution) but this was the first one I captured. It's not a great photo quality-wise but if you see it on a small screen it probably looks pretty good and either way, the sun looks pretty spectacular.