Sweat Lodge

When you're living outside of your comfort zone, it's easy to plateau. You find a routine that's comfortable enough. The thing is that if you want to be more than 'comfortable enough,' you have to keep pushing past it, back into discomfort, to eventually face more bits of daily life confidently and comfortably. One thing I had yet to do was buy jackfruit. I rarely buy fruit to begin with, because I receive plenty of fruit most weeks. When I do buy fruit, I buy fruits that I can ask for by quantity (like mangoes) or that I can bag myself (like cherries). In contrast, jackfruits are giant, weighing tens of kilos, and so you buy chunks of the big fruit. Not remembering how to ask for half a kilo makes it hard to explain how much I want. Yesterday I gave it a shot. It turned out that my hand gestures weren't enough to articulate my desires, but by coincidence the previous customer spoke enough English to interpret for me and the seller. It worked out.

Back in my room, I dug in. It was only when I was finished that I realized that I was very sticky. After washing my hands to no avail, a little internet research revealed that jackfruits create a glue-like substance that is not water soluble. So I was sticky for a good while.

Morena left Vietnam the same day I went to Dalat, so these last two days have been my reintroduction to life alone. Even though it was not unusual for me to go out on my own when she was here, it is different to not have a choice in the matter anymore.

Yesterday I woke up to find that my nose had turned into a faucet. Today Trang and I went out for an early lunch and I asked if we could find some sort of chicken-based soup. Easier said than done but, with my expert foodie guide, we succeeded, and added two new dishes to my tally.

First, these rice-based elbow-shaped noodles: núi. Next, because we were still hungry, we tried miến, another kind of noodle. These noodles had a rather lougie-like texture but, that being said, they were not unpleasant.

Trang also taught me cellphone texting code for Vietnamese characters. 

• Special letters: 
• dd = đ
• aw = ă 
• aa = â
• ee = ê
• ow = ơ
• oo = ô
• uw = ư
• Tones:  
• s = ´  
• f  = `
• r =  ̉
• x = ~
• j = ̣

• As an example of how that would work: 
• awn cowm = ăn cơm
• mawnj moif = mặn mòi
• mieens = miến

It feels like being back in middle school, with a (not so secret) special code I can use to communicate with friends.

On the way home I bought a pile of tangerines and other citruses to self-medicate. I proceeded to nap my way through the afternoon, a/c off and in jeans. It felt like I had taken up residence in a sweat lodge, but I am feeling much better now because of it.