The first person I was to interview was the Vice President of the Education Department for the government. I was so nervous, particularly after meeting Mr Khanh as I thought that this VP was going to be a man who was very formal. Yet, when Chau and I arrived to the office, a lovely lady came out and greeted me very warmly. I felt right at ease. The first thing she says to me is "you are very beautiful" and we seemed to hit it off right from there! She spoke about her government's involvement in the projct. Yet, the problem was for me to understand it!! We have interpreters, but I'm finding it a challenge sometimes to understand my interpreter!!! And, she talks so fast that trying to get all the notes down (and you need to take them down verbatim!) is very hard. Anyway, we made it through and the first interview was over. Phew!

After everyone completed their interviews we went on a little sightseeing around the Khe Sanh town for a couple of hours. We went to a prison used by the French between 1908-1945 for political prisoners. We also went to the Khe Sanh war museum which is located at the Khe Sanh Combat base, the site of the most famous siege of the American War. The base was never overrun, but about 500 Americans and 10,000 North Vietnamese troops and uncounted civilians died around this base. Also at the base is some US air fleet, helicopters, tanks and a hercules plane. I find it very surreal to be standing on the airstrip that was used to fly supplies in and out and also on the soil that so many died on. And, in the background, the next generation was playing soccer, without a care in the world.

After some 'tourist' time, we went back to the hotel for our debrief meeting. This is just a quick 30 min meeting to go over key things we learnt from our interviews that day and an opportunity to find out if we need to explore anything in more detail the next day. I have been charged with typing notes of the debrief meeting. So, by the time the debrief meeting was over it was 7.30pm and we hadn't had dinner yet. Once dinner was over I was back in my room typing up my interview notes before having a shower and getting into bed by about 10:30pm.

Tomorrow will be the first full on day with two interviews plus lots of travel. Til then x