We spent the day today at anchor just off shore in Singapore bunkering and just got underway about an hour ago. I can see the lights of the city right off the port side of the ship. Nothing too crazy going on.It's been kind of a long day for me.I was up late last night and up early this morning, followed by Global Studies, staff meeting, desk duty from 2-8pm, a Students of Service Auction meeting at 7pm, Cultural Pre-Port Lecture at 8pm and now Pub Duty from 9-11pm.Tomorrow shouldn't be too bad and maybe I can sneak in a nap ;-)Oh…and another thing, I haven't been able to do laundry since before India so I am basically out of clothes at the moment.My cabin steward noticed and left me a note that he would take care of it.I left two bags of laundry the other day but haven't gotten anything back yet. If it doesn't come back soon, I'm going to be out of luck for Vietnam!

After leaving Malaysia, we sailed down through the Straits of Malacca, one of the busiest shipping channels in the world and there were a ton of big ships and little tiny fishing boats.The water was smooth and the sun was HOT.My nose got little sunburn. We are on our way to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and I'm very excited for the next couple of ports we're visiting in Asia: Vietnam, China and Japan.

I will admit that the first part of Global Studies today was actually interesting.One of the professors talked about his experience as a soldier in Vietnam and that time does in fact heal wounds. This will be his first time back to Vietnam since being drafted in the Army. When I think about it, it's really not funny how little we know about the rest of the world.Most of my knowledge about the American involvement in Vietnam comes from the movie Forest Gump and that's pretty sad. I was talking with another faculty member who explained that it's just too recent to be included in American History texts and classes and too far removed for anyone in the younger generations to really know anything about it.I definitely fall in to that age range. Of course, there is a whole lot more to learning about Vietnam than the American involvement there but I am leading a trip on my last day in port to the Cu Chi Tunnels (the network of tunnels the Vietnamese built under the city to evade soldiers) and will let you know how it goes.All I've really heard is prepare to crawl and get dirty.

My other plans for Vietnam are the following:

Day 1 - No plans… head out in to Ho Chi Minh City and explore, hit up the markets and get some great Vietnamese food.Apparently a bowl of Pho costs about $0.40 on the street. (One of my favorite things in NYC is Vietnamese summer rolls so I'll be on the lookout for those too)

Day 2-4 - I'll be on an SAS trip called Mekong Delta Explorer which should be pretty cool, especially because there are only 19 people going. We get to see the floating markets in the river, visit some Khmer monks, and sleep out in houses on stilts in the Delta seeing a little bit more of Vietnamese countryside and less urban areas. If I had to do it over again, I might have chosen a single overnight to the Mekong Delta to have more time in Ho Chi Minh City, but this trip was chosen back in December before I left.I'm sure it will be great either way.

Day 5 - Leading a trip to the Cu Chi Tunnels and Cao Dai Temple.

Once again…I can tell already that 5 days is going to be way too short to do everything!I'd like to see Ha Long Bay which is up by Ha Noi, the capital of Vietnam and is the water with all of the cool rock formations in it.

Some other quick notes:

• The money is also getting a little ridiculous…. 1 US$ = ~15,800 Vietnamese dong.
• We actually gain an hour tonight! The 1st and only time the entire voyage, we get to an extra hour. I'm not quite sure how this makes sense but the time zone for Vietnam requires us to set our clocks back.

A few quotes that share some of my thoughts and reflections from the past few days/weeks:

"We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend."

"A man travels the world in search of what he needs and returns home to find it" - George Moore

"My travels led me to where I am today. Sometimes these steps have felt painful, difficult, but led me to greater happiness and opportunities." -Diana Ross

"As with all travelers, I've seen more than I remember, and remember more than I've seen."