Leaving

I've finished grading all the students' tests, I've cleaned my room, packed my bag, checked and rechecked my to-do list. In the morning my taxi will arrive at 5:45 am to drive me to the airport, and I won't be back to Nha Trang until the end of December at the earliest. Leaving this place, even for a few weeks, feels strange.

I'm prepared, though, in part because I'm a chronic overpacker. I dont pack obviously extraneous stuff, but I just like to be overly prepared. And it often comes in handy. I overpacked for my and Sam's tirp to Da Lat, which turned out to be a good thing as ended up taking a 3 day trek through the mountains.

I've also stocked up on some new music, from a place called "Groove Shack" in the tourist area. You can buy digital versions of albums for 20,000 dong, a little over 1 dollar, and they'll put the music on your iPod or flash drive. I opted for the former, so that I could the actual files on my computer. Here's what I bought:

• Thomas Dybdal, "One Day You'll Dance for Me New York City"
• The Ting Tings, "We Started Nothing:
• The Radio Dept, "Pet Grief"
• Stars, "In Our Bedroom After the War"
• Sigur Ros, "Agaetis Byrjun"
• Portishead, "Third"
• Patsy Cline, "20 Golden Hits"
• Chet Baker, "Let's Get Lost--The Best Of" (which, due to a misprint in the shop's listings, I didn't realize I already had. Huge bummer.)
• Chet Baker, "A Jazz Hour with Chet Baker"
• Ane Brun, "A Temporary Dive"

I'm disappointed about only ending up with one new Chet Baker album--he's almost all I'm listening to these days. Oh well. I'll have to drop another 20 Grand for a replacement...And I was happy to see that they had the full catalog of Ben Folds, including this last album that came out a few months ago.

Today I also...got my hair cut again! I wasn't totally satisfied with the last cut--it was awkwardly long in the back. They have this thing against cutting off too my length here. So I texted Lien today to see if she wanted to go to the nail shop with me, which turned into me and Katherine going over to her house for lunch with family and then going to the nailshop. I was a bit stressed about time--I had a lot to do today--but it ended up being fabulous. Both the company and the food.

Finally at the nail shop, I enjoyed a relaxing hair wash/massage before getting my haircut. The girl that cut my hair last time wasn't there. Instead, a young man (I've never seen a guy working there before) had overtaken her role. Lien informed me that he was a "famous" hair dresser in Nha Trang, which was a comforting fact. At least before I noticed his terrible mullet and too-short bangs. It was worse than Spanish mullets. "He might be a great hair dresser, but he's clearly not doing his own hair," I thought.

He started cutting my hair, finished, and proceeded to dry it....straight. In a fifty-year-old-woman stye. It looked awful. And it was still too long in the back. I hated to have him do it again, but I did. In fact, it took about 4 tries to get it close to being right. He seemed good-natured about it. In any case, now I have certifiably short hair. I'm missing my long hair--apparently I look older with short hair. In fact, someone thought I was 28 the other day. A fine number in itself, but I dont want to already look six years older than I am! But I'll enjoy the short hair while it lasts....



I also got little snowflakes painted on my toes. 'Tis the season!!!

I'm feeling more sore today from the accident last night but still just relieved that no one was seriously hurt....Unfortunately, though, my student (who was with me) had another accident on her way home. She was hit by a drunk driver. She's more or less fine but pretty banged up. I feel terrible for causing one of her two accidents in one evening. Again, though, just happy everyone is alive.

Alright, I have to be up in less than five hours. Yikes. The off to Danang, then who knows what until Christmas in Dalat! And I'm sooo excited to see all the Fulbrighters!!!!!!!!!!! Blogs will be few and far between I'm afraid but I'll try to at least update about my whereabouts.

Just for fun, a pic from last night, before the accident and second haircut, but after I bought my crazy new Che Guevara shirt!




Currently listening: "In Our Bedroom After the War," by Stars.