Visa Appointment complete

We had our visa appointment yesterday and Kieran's visa should be ready late on Monday afternoon. Once we have that, we are ready to come home. We will likely stay until the 9th as planned just because we haven't seen much of Hanoi 'm not sure if we'd be able to get a flight anyway.

Kieran isn't sleeping much so we are dragging a bit during the day. Additionally, he still needs a bottle every 3 hours like clockwork plus baby food a few times during the day so by the time we get everything ready to go out and sterilize the bottles and change him, it's time for another feeding. Part of the problem is that he will only take in small portions of food and formula. If we can get him to drink a bit more, I'm sure we could extend the feeding times.

Yesterday, Brenda, Molly and I went to a jewelry store. I only bought 2 things but I was able to find one of the portraitists as they call themselves who was right next door. Laurie, who traveled last month, told me about them and we'd really like to have a sketch done of Kieran and another of Durban. I can just see the look on their faces when I bring in a photo of our dog and want to pay some obscene sum of money to have a sketch done. Oh well, I'm sure they'll do it if we are willing to pay for it. I hope we have enough time to get it done before we leave. They are really amazing.

We bought some sketches from an old man on the street in Saigon. When we asked what he charged for the sketches, he said he only wanted enough money to buy some food - maybe $1-$2. Of course I started crying and Santosh knew I was about to buy them so he just started picking out some stuff and then we handed over most of the money in our pockets. We are never sure they are telling us the truth - it's a much better tactic to say you need money for food than to try and give us the hard sell. We always pay three times what we would have if we think they really need the money. In a lot of cases, we know we are being completely ripped off. At the Ben Than market, one person wanted to sell me a baby t-shirt for $12. In the end, we walked away and she chased after me saying she'd take 30,000 dong which is about $1.90. Of course we didn't buy it out of principle at that point. If she starts with $12 - her original intent was to really take advantage if she could.

Santosh bought Kieran an exersaucer at a local store here in Hanoi for $15 yesterday. Of course it would never pass any US inspection tests but since he's only in it while we are with him, we thought we'd give it a try. It plays My Darling Clementine over and over and over and cannot be turned off - even when Kieran is out of it so I think Santosh will take out his portable tool kit and put an end to that this afternoon.

So that's about it for now. We hope to go shopping a little later and maybe do some sightseeing tomorrow. Not sure about Halong Bay - I'd really like to go but I'm worried Kieran will have trouble with the trip since it is 4 hours each way and a long boat ride too. I think someone said the boat was very hot too (so that will make me unhappy too.) I really don't want to miss that though so we'll see if we can do it.

That's all for now