I had such an amazing time yesterday. A senior PhD fellow drove me to our Dean's house to celebrate the New Year together. Because his wife is Cambodian, they made a lot of Southeast Asian dishes and it feels like home. To be honest, the Cambodian dishes are very similar to Vietnamese dishes, but the difference is noticeable too. We have a special fried cake which is similar to "Bánh Căn", but it tastes quite different. It reminds me of the culture of the very southern part of Vietnam where it borders Cambodia. I also have the udon noodles which is "Bánh Canh" (quite similar pronunciation but this is different from the previous dish!). The porridge was also well cooked too! It's chicken porridge and the meat is so juicy and tender. I just love every bit of it.
After that, we spent some time playing a game called "Blank Slate" and I found it fascinating. It's a simple word game where you need to think of a word that matches with a given word, to form a meaningful phrase or a collocation. We had so much fun playing that, and I came up with so many cool words I never thought of. I also played Scrabble for the first time, and it was really enjoyable.
The countdown was the greatest part. We watched TV together and it was airing the live performance of Beatles, then it started counting down to the New Year's Eve, ended with a firework grand finale. It made me feel homesick a lot. I wish I wouldn't have to go to study a PhD here if my country were richer and I could afford to live. Oh well, I guess everyone has their own decision, and what I have been doing is truly great to myself. I treated me well!
One last thing before I went home was that the Cambodian friends asked me to play "Tiến Lên" a.k.a the traditional Vietnamese card game. I was surprised because I didn't think they knew that game and they called it in Vietnamese! I will play with them during the Lunar New Year!
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