Countdown to Asia

Well, I'm off to Vietnam this Friday morning, at the crack of dawn (seriously - my flight from Halifax is at 6.00 am). Still can't quite believe it.

These last few weeks, what with trip preparations, feverish writing of lectures, holiday shopping, and cranking out Christmas cards and letters, have been busier than anything I can remember for years and years. What's even stranger is that I haven't completely lost my marbles by this point - I'm actually feeling quite calm and well-prepared for everything.

I arrive in Hanoi late night on Saturday, local time (Hanoi is 12 hours ahead of EST), so I have a total travel time of over 27 hours. Errrgh. I'm planning to crash immediately on arrival, then have plans to meet a friend of a friend on Sunday afternoon, for an epic shopping expedition around Hanoi (since that's the only free day we have there).

I'll be staying with the rest of my group at the Army Hotel - which is not fancy by any means, but is apparently perfectly comfortable, and in a good location. Happily, they also have a large outdoor pool - which I hope to use as the temperatures there at the moment are an unseasonably warm 20-25 degrees C.

The hotel apparently also has one or two public internet terminals in their 'business centre', so I hope to be able to post news and updates (and possibly even photos) to this blog while there. So watch this space!