Phong Nha – 23rd May

I woke up after 8am on Thursday 23rd May and had messages from Chung and Hoan asking how I was. I felt loads better and actually felt hungry, which was a good sign that I was getting over the sickness. I got to the Phong Nha Vegan at 11am, said hello to May, the dog, and got on the scales. I’d lost a whopping 3kg (6.6lb) since last week and I could tell. I was also surprised to find that the entire kitchen had gone through a total deep clean. Chung, once she had heard I may have food poisoning, had got everyone scrubbing the place down. I was sure it was nothing I’d had at the Vegan but it can’t hurt to give them an excuse to exercise a bit of hygiene awareness.
Hoan made me a vegan pho which felt like the best meal I’d ever had. I also shared a pot of licorice and ginger tea with Chung and Hoan. I wasn’t going to stay long but it started to rain and I got talking to a couple of English holiday makers. As we sheltered, Hoan cooked up some jack fruit seeds which I absolutely love. They taste like chestnuts and are also great in a vegan curry so we looked at some recipes. Chung worked on her laptop at the Vegan as it lashed it down around the edges of the open building. There was Vegan condensed milk at the Vegan which costs 100,000VND (£3.10) per tin – very expensive, I thought. I didn’t leave until the rain eased at 3.30pm and then called at the shop, where I bought the following;

WinMart Supermarket
1 Chunky KitKat 17,700
1 flannel 24,400
1 box 5 Grains biscuits 30,500
Total spent 72,600VND (£2.25)

I got in the room to find it had been cleaned and the rest of my fruit cake and cheese had been thrown away, my tupperware had been washed out and was drying on the table. I ate the KitKat and felt ok, then had a shower before getting ready to go back to the Vegan at 6pm. May, the dog, was gadding about with the dog from next door and he came to say hello. Ha made me an iced kumquat tea and Hanh made me a tofu and tomato noodle soup which was extremely good, she even gave me steamed rice to go with it to keep my strength up. I was very grateful of the vegan restaurant right now as they fed me very well. I didn’t stay long as I didn’t want to overdo it and I had a video call booked in with my parents.
Ma & Pa were in good spirits as Dad had been checked out following a poorly ear and all was good. They had decided to fly back from Turkey especially for the appointment so, although it turned out to be nothing to worry about, for the price of the flights it was worth doing. It did mean they could now go back to Turkey again when they wanted and hopefully would be there when I got there. I only had 28 days left in Phong Nha and would be in Dalyan in less than 5 weeks time. I went to bed late and hoped I’d not kept the people in the next room awake with our call. Tomorrow, Captain Caveman was due back from the cave and I was probably going to be practicing my Vietnamese at the Vegan at both lunch and dinner times.