Travel Diary >>> Bien Hoa and nice cousins

 

 

Written by:                          Bien Hoa and nice cousins

 

 

 

 

I have 2 cousins in Bien Hoa, Dong Nai province. We used to play with each other when we were children. When they moved to Bien Hoa, I had not seen them again. On the business trip in the south, I had a free day and decided to visit them. From Ho Chi Minh city, I intended to take a bus to Bien Hoa. Fortunately, Sang, my cousin, had business in Ho Chi Minh, so he picked me to Bien Hoa in night by motorcycle. It took about 40 minutes from Hang Xanh intersection to Bien Hoa. The main road from Hochiminh to other provinces was dangerous with full of hundred of containers, trucks

 

It was raining when I woke up in the next day in my cousin’s small apartment. My cousin’s wife had left home for work, there were only Sang and Khanh Vy (his 3 year olds daughter) at home. After breakfast, we had a Bien Hoa tour and my cousin was a great tour guide. He introduced me many interesting things about transportation, geography and local customs, and showed me industrial parks and high technology zones on the way.

 

Bien Hoa had several industrial parks which built near residential areas. People from all over the countries come here to find jobs which made Bien Hoa become a multilingual area. It’s the first time I had seen the headquarter of famous co-operations such as SYM, Biti’s, Coca cola, it was awesome for an alumni of business school like me. The weather is the South is erratic and unpredictable. It was sunny, and suddenly change to rain which make me crazy because I had just put the rain coat on, right away had to took it off. One more interesting thing was the architecture of universities in Bien Hoa made them like a resort with green garden and blue swimming pool.

 

Nearly afternoon, we visited my second cousin, Xuyen, in her small beautiful house in a new settlement. The living room was simply decoration with only a shelf where people could sit down for a cup of tea or make conversations. Xuyen had two cute kids, Nhi and Ngoc. I was surprised by their independence. Although they was primary school, they could take care themselves, cook the meals and clean the house to help their mother. It's different from what I have seen in big city like Hanoi, where the children were nurtured by their parents, thus even being high school's students, they know nothing about housework. We have a lunch with sour soup which was popular in the south. Xuyen' husband brought two durians to entertain me. Durian is one speciality in the south of Vietnam, some people loved it said its taste is good, others were afraid of its smell.

5pm, I said goodbye to my cousins and nieces and came back Ho Chi Minh. I would remember this place with nice cousins, delicious durians and huge industrial parks.