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March 01, 2005
Day Three
It's 6:30 AM in Haiphong. We're leaving in a half hour for a three hour bus ride and then we'll begin cycling later this afternoon.
Yesterday was an incredible and very full day. We left Hanoi and took a long bus ride to Ha Long Bay. We boarded a boat and spent the afternoon crusing the limestone cliff islands, exploring an enormous cave and kayaking through little arches into lagoons inside the islands.
On the way to Ha Long we stopped at an arts and crafts center and one of our group who is here testing a prototype prosthetic hand found a forty year old man who had lost both hands and an eye in an explosion when he was nine years old. He had the man try out the hand and it worked really well. It was quite a moment with everyone in tears. I got a great picture of the two of them but so far we haven't had the time or the correct connection to post pictures. Stay tuned.
We had dinner last night at an orphanage that Kids First sponsors in Haiphong. It was another really wonderful and heartfelt event. The kids range in age from new babies to eigthteen years old and were all really sweet. It was great to see the older kids really looking after the younger ones and it, to me at least, felt like they were cared for in a real family situation.
We are finding that it is very hard to convey in words what we are experiencing here in the few minutes that we have to blog. Suffice it to say that it is unlike anything either one of us has ever experienced. We will continue to update you and I expect that after we get back home we will have a lot to say as this all settles.
Oren here - I second everything Ed said - but he didn't tell you about the close encounter we had in our minibus between two water buffalo taking up the right lane as a dump truck backed into the left lane, or the frequent restaurants along the road advertising dog meat (and cat too), or the warmth and humor of our guides, one of whom had everybody singing Beatles songs as we tromped through the cave. It's a great trip so far...more later!
Posted by ed at March 1, 2005 03:34 PM
Comments
Posted by: David at March 4, 2005 04:53 PM