We get up around 6:30AM to head over to Anh Hung's mom's house to pray for our ancestors. Her name is Bac Phat. The house is about two hours away by way of car in the province of Dong Nai - situated in the countryside. There are no markets or signs of city life for miles (actually kilometers here) in all directions. The house is fairly large and has two separate quarters. In the main stay, is where all the praying and celebrating went down. Praying was lighting incense, closing your eyes and bowing down a couple times. On the shrine was a picture of Daddy and 3 of his 8 siblings. Only 3 of the 9 brothers and sisters are still alive (Oanh, Vinh, Lap).
The celebration was eating and chatter. We had goi (lotus stem salad), roasted duck, chicken, sweet rice, bread, curry, white rice, bun, nem chua (fermented pork roll), canh mang (bamboo soup), and some banana leaf dumpling thing that I don't remember the name. Afterwards, I learned tons of names and a fat part of Daddy's family tree. I saw some familiar faces from 2004. I ate and drank with all the cousins. The tables were separated based on age range. I had about 10 to 12 beers. We left the house around 3:30PM and didn't get back until 6:00PM. There were tons of traffic on the way back.
Later that night, Tony hits me up to go out for one of his friend's birthday. Her name is Kiwi and the place is called S5. This place was less crowded than the one on Thursday night but it too didn't have smoking regulations.
I met up with Tony at his place. Tempo was already there and we waited for Mimi. Tony bought a couple Heineken's at a convenient store in his hem (alley) before we boarded the taxi (no such thing as having an open container in the car being illegal). Us four taxied over to Lys' house and picked her up. Tony was in the front seat and I was in the middle roll with Mimi and Lys. Tempo was taking a nap in the last row. This night was really a blur to me. I don't remember anything else or even saying anything. I just remembered someone saying the Backstreet Boys are coming to Vietnam in a few weeks and me saying the Backstreet Boys are doing that bad? Anyway, at the club we had a small standing table and there were a couple bottles. I left the club with Tony on his bike around 1:30AM to a massage parlor to sober up and we get out fairly quickly. We get back to his house at 2:00AM and I spend the night there.
