Hue Citadel, the beach & Huda Hue soccer!

Hi all! I am sorry that it has been awhile since I last blogged. Please forgive my slackness, for I have been really busy last week with readings (four books at one time), plus one exam and one paper.  Anyways, since we last spoke I have been to the famed Citadel in Hue, where the last Nguyen Emporere Bao Dai abdicated his throne in 1945 due to immense pressure from Ho Chi Minh (Democratic Republic of Vietnam). Basically they told Bao Dai, you can either abdicate and leave with your life or we will chop your head off, not the best of options. But hey that's what happens when you collaborate with the enemy. Then he set up a provisional gov't and became the president. 

The crazy thing about the Citadel is that they have two prices for admission. One is the foreigner (white/more expensive) and then there is the local (Vietnamese/much cheaper) price. Even the size of the tickets are different to differentiate who is who. Which truly didn't come as a surprise for me, because our instructor warned us about it. I think that it would be a common practice to charge foreign whites more monies, because they usually have the wealth or means to pay. 

However, what happened next I didn't really expect, but I knew it would be inevitable to not experience. Inadvertently this might be one of the reasons why I haven't blogged until now. I didn't want to be just the angry Vietnamese guy! Even though some could say that it would be valid. Anyways here is basically what happened. We were going through the line to get in and I hand the guy my ticket and he said Khong! Khong! Khong dung!(No! No! This is no correct.) He said that I wasn't Vietnamese. I tried to explain to him in my broken Viet that I was half. An American of German and Vietnamese descent, but he wasn't trying to here it. Fortunately for me, my classmates and teachers made a big enough scene to where he had to accept me.  From there on the day went kind of downhill for me, but I truly appreciate all the love my classmates and professor showed me!!! 

During our free time on Saturday we went back to the Thuan An beach. While there James tried to teach Mai how to swim. Leena bargained the clams from 70,00 VD to 55,000 VD which equates to like $2.50 US, they were very tasty. 

 

Then we went back to the city to see the local soccer team Huda Hue (class B). It only costs us 15,000 VD, which equates to 0.90 cents US. Quite the bargain.  They seem to play well as a squad, but their strikers weren't very good. They were down 1-0 in the first five minutes. We stayed until halftime and left to go explore more of the city. Well that is all for now, I will post more when I get back from shopping. I have more to write about some of the Vietnamese Royal Tombs, the Cham ruins at My Son and shopping in Hoi An. Peace, love and prayers....