The food there is somewhat like Malaysian food, of course, I can't judge much because I was only there for about two days? But from the meals I had, yeah, it's like Malaysian food.

 But this fish curry right here, it tastes so much like home that I could cry. T_T it's called Fish Amok, it's some sort of nyonya curry with coconut in it and it tastes really really good. It was a good change from the Vietnamese food I've been having so far.

This is the National Museum, it costs 5$ for the entrance fee. It was really nice, but I'd prefer if I had a tour guide to explain to me the historical/architecture/socioogical/??? part about the whole Cambodia. I'll read about it when I have time.

One of their royal kings, Sihanouk.

Ah, this one, it's a temple, and almost all of their temples look like this. It's really beautiful because of the intricate carvings along the walls, sculptures, everything was new to me. I could really see the strong influence of religion in their country because when I was walking around, no matter how old the house looks, the altar that is placed in front of the house always looks really good.

It's been exactly two weeks since I've been in Vietnam for my AIESEC Global Citizen Programme, and all I can say is that it has been amazing. =) Made so many friends from various nationalities and there's so much cultural exchange, it's just exhilarating. At times, when we are in a room for our meeting, I always take a step back to look at the room that we are in. Four walls, confining so many different minds from all over the world, different skin colour, different accents, different languages, but all coming together for a singular purpose and it is all made possible through AIESEC. I can't help but smile at the thought of the impact of globalization and how it is impacting our youths today. Though globalization, in my opinion, is most prevalent through the Internet, but through small organizations such as AIESEC, we can see even more diversity and convergence of cultures.

My project people. =) It's been awesome. There are 18 people in our group but we are distinctly
separated into two groups; most of the Europeans, and the Asians, with the exception of these two
Europeans who are with us now. I really don't wanna stereotype people, but sometimes I can't help it. It's a little sad that this separation is happening, but I guess having the same wavelength is really important. Plus, some exchange participants do not have the right mindset to come to Vietnam to work, and hence, it is harder to truly work together and achieve our goals. These pictures are taken in the span of one week or so. Let the pictures do the talking. =) 

I wouldn't say that going for this exchange is a life-changing experience, but without a doubt I'd say that I will always remember this unique and enriching memories. 

I've been here for a few days now, but man.. it does feel kinda long when I have quite a lot of free time especially at night. So, I've figured out a few things on my own.. I've taken the bus alone, crossed the crazy roads alone, and yeah I think I'm pretty comfortable to stay at home alone at night. But I'm also getting a little bored here because I can't really go out at night alone, I'm worried that I might get lost. @@ I hope that things are going to start to pick up, cuz we're getting to know the interns more now, and I've started to stereotype them? HOHO, that's bad. Of course, I'll always keep in mind never to generalize these people. 

Today was the first day of our Sexual Education workshop, and I can only describe it in a word; WOW. The school is pretty far away, almost an hour from where I stay, and I have to take the bus there but it was a good experience because it was a different part of the city; District 9. I stay in District 10. We had two classes today, and the first class was.. epicly horrible. It was the class with one of the naughtiest kids, and the social stigma here about sexual education is much more conservative than Malaysia I think. It is really prevalent in the Asian culture to be conservative about these things, but.. they were all like nononono! Or closing their eyes when we showed them illustrations? The main problem with the kids were that they do not understand us, so it was really hard for us to communicate with them. I think I handled it pretty well, I tried to grab their attention like how I do it with the kids I used to teach, but some of my team members just.. gave up. The whole situation was really tense. Imagine trying to attract the attention of a whole bunch of teenagers with raging hormones. It just.. really doesn't work that way. It was tiring, but now I know the reality of the teenagers here in Vietnam. 

Most of the European interns were complaining a lot, but I think for me, it was cool because this is why I'm here, to know what it really is like in Vietnam, if they were to dump is in some good school where everybody is rich and speaks English, it would not represent the majority of the country because most of them is not like that. It's really enlightening in that manner. As for now, I'm still ~.~ haven't really found a clique yet though I do talk to all of them? Ah, well.. Just see how things go. =) and the next thing I have to do on my own is..to order food for myself! :D

So, seeing that I'm not gonna be writing any handwritten journals, I think I'll be posting about my journey in Vietnam here. To remember what I'm going through in my AIESEC exchange. =) I've never been overseas alone before, and this experience is really like no other. Coming to a foreign country with no mummy and daddy to tag along, it's really pretty damn scary. Plus, I'm handicapped because of the language. Everybody speaks Vietnamese here and I just feel @.@ *.* ?.? lol. But okay, there are actually people taking care of me. My EP Buddy and my host family. =)

It has only been less than 24 hours since I've landed in Vietnam and boy, there is so much difference I can see. At certain points, the climate, the environment, it's sort of the same, but different as well. I can't really explain it, but yeah. Everything is a little bit more run-down here if compared to Penang. The temperature is slightly hotter than Penang, but for my first day here, it's bearable. But I've heard that it goes up to 41 degrees?! Damn, I'm gonna burn at that temperature. The first thing I noticed from my plane is that the houses here are really colourful. A splash of any color you could imagine, you can see it from the skies above. It is so unlike Malaysia, which is just a dull hue of colours; grey, black, brown. Getting into the cab with my EP Buddy, Sofia, I was presented with a myriad of tones that I have never heard of before. Vietnamese is so different than any other language I have heard before. There are no strong syllables, and I don't know, seriously, everything sounds like ngeeeiiahhhhhh or something. There's actually 6 accents in Vietnamese, which is 2 more accents than Mandarin, but my host said that grammar is really easy to learn in Vietnamese.

Last night, my host, Thuy, brought me out on her bike. Wao, it was such an experience because the roads are really really busy. If I hadn't ridden a bike before, I think I'd be scared to death. I did ride bikes before, but it was still a really scary experience because the roads are really narrow and some of it bumpy, and everybody's riding a bike. That makes everything a lot more scary. XD It was really fun for me to be on the bike for my first night here. The night breeze felt cold against my skin, though I was worried how polluted the roads are with the amount of motorcycles on the streets. At roundabouts, everybody goes about their own business and it felt like there are no specific rules to be on the streets. Yet, my friend was stopped by the police because she did not switch on her signal lights when turning. Anyhow , my first meal there was Korean food and it was with Thuy, Jino, and Ngeh. Very peculiar first meal but my host was craving for Korean food, so we went to Kimchi Kimchi to makan! It was decent, nothing particular about it. I'm looking forward to more awesome meals here that are actually Vietnamese food! :D

Oh right, the bed, I couldn't sleep last night because the mattress is really thin, so we are actually sleeping on some sort like a tatami? And my pillow is really thin too, and I just keep waking up in the middle of the night because it was really uncomfortable. @@ Damn, I miss my soft and comfy bed back at home. But I'm hoping I'd get used to this soon, else, I won't be able to survive without sleep for so long. =/ Anyway, this post is really messy and I haven't had time to organize all this, I should really be preparing to go for orientation later, but here I am, typing away. Hopefully there are more updates from me soon! =) 

Right now, I'm in the middle of my exam week. Just today, I'd say I had the toughest paper for this semester. Toughest, in the sense that, lecturer's not helping much, slides were confusing me even more, and honestly I don't even know what I did this whole semester. In a blink of an eye, I'm going home this weekend. o.o It's funny how things turned out, after watching many episodes of How I Met Your Mother, yes, I can rewatch it thousands of times, this episode just got me thinking like, how did I get here? If you asked me 5 years ago, where do I see myself in the next 5 years? I'd honestly tell you I don't know. 5 years ago, I had no idea what I wanted to do in life, having no distinct preferred interest or exceptional abilities in anything at all, I was a mere.. mediocrity. *.* Even though I just read this article on how being mediocre is totally fine, it still gets to you, you know? I wanted so many things; art, engineer, science, medicine, you name it and I can imagine myself being one. But now in this moment of time, I'm in the path of becoming a Social Scientist. Have you heard of it before? I sure haven't heard of it before, 5 years ago. Thing is, I love what I'm doing and it gives me this passion to look up to my lecturers who have knowledge that knows no horizon. ahaha.

Just.. Where am I headed to in 5 more years? Am I even gonna have a job? What do Social Scientists  even do? T_______T When I look at people my age that has accomplished so much more in life, it really makes me wonder what have I been doing my entire life? I'm 22 this year; so that's 22 years of......? I wouldn't say I'm not happy with where I am right now, but, seriously, I envy those people who knows exactly what they want to do with their lives and work their asses for it.

Time has started to really slow down around here. With all of my assignments done, and study break looming in my face, I really have plenty of time in my hands. Initially, it felt good to not feel stressed or weighed down by work, but being the workaholic that I am, I think I'm starting to feel it, the pulling of the edges of my mind to be focused on something. Maybe I should be focusing on my finals, but too bad, I'm not. It just seems so far away right now.Thing is, I'm not even comfortable in my own home. I've noticed that I get a lot more short fused that I used to be but.. Maybe it's because there's nothing much for me to look forward to here. Sure enough, I can count the number of things that make me feel comfortable here. Things have gotten complicated around the house, and with guests, and such, I've just grown accustomed to being locked up in my room. My roommate gives me comfort, and solidarity too. But I still need space from all this. 

Truth be told, I miss my boyfriend so much, and I miss home so much. In a way, I'm running away from reality because I'm just putting of to-do things off, I'm just procrastinating, wasting away, doing anything but work. Nothing is urgent right now, and nothing has to be. I want to just sit around and read and write and dream but.. sometimes, it gets to me. So many things have changed, and it really upsets me in some way that those simplistic things that I took for granted back in high school? Yeah, I really miss that. I miss my girlfriends, cuz they don't seem to be around for me anymore. I miss my parents, when I had to rely on them and not be so independent. I miss my brothers, when we could just wrestle around all day and they'd know all these cool gadget or game stuff that just sparks my interests. I miss all of that, and so much more, but that's the truth of life.

You can't turn back time, no matter how much you want to. It's just like how Barry Allen finally gets his chance to go back to the past to save his mother from being killed, but in the end, he didn't do it. Because he knows that although he had the power to change time, time is an infinite continuum that keeps going on and on and what he has right now is what he should be grateful for. Many opportunities open to me to make new friends to be closer to people, but I constantly push them away because I'm stuck with the ideal of my friends that's in my mind. And they would never feel the same. I just wish the people that matters to me, feel the same way too.

My coursemates even contacted my boyfriend to give me a really belated birthday surprise. So sweet of them! I was really really touched. <3

I can't wait till we meet again. =) 3 more months.