Well I haven’t published anything here for a while and it’s because I didn’t have the heart to. I suffered an emotional breakdown and it wasn’t a very pretty sight. Retrospectively I was rather a pathetic creature. I want to thank everyone who helped me pull through especially David. His compassion and love are sometimes what I find most strength in.

I feel very different now. I am currently in Vietnam on that trip I dreaded most. But it did me a world of good to get away from everything. Strained friendships, painful reminders of past failures and the heavy burden of teaching at Thieu Nhi.

Here I’m with my parents alot but they have social lives here! We have random relatives come over and talk with us. My dad the shopaholic goes shopping. I’m getting along better with my parents – though I know that when I come back, moving out is still my best option. This is an idyllic time in our family relationship, but I know that I can easily fall into that pit of depression once we get back home.

When I was younger I used to dream of travelling alot. Getting away from home, from my parents and start over anew. But while I’m here, I’m incredibly homesick. I miss home so much, I miss my friends. I find it hard to sleep here. At night when everyone else is asleep and I’m alone in my thoughts, I remember walking up Middle Street in Kingsford in the dark, the lights around that area, K17 and Engineering Walk, that whole area around uni. It makes me want to go home so much and to see it again. Those memories of that area are infinitely precious to me.

I spend alot of my time at the local internet cafe up the street over the bridge from my Aunty 7′s house. I upload the photos that I’ve taken on the trip to share with everyone home. But somehow I wonder how I can deal with another 3 weeks of this!

Tim isn’t coping well. He’s probably more homesick than me. He spends all his time watching DVD’s that we bought in Saigon last week. He’s hitting the bottom of his pile though. He wants to be home going out with his friends celebrating after the HSC. We went on a tour of Ha Tien over the weekend and he didn’t even get out of the car to make an effort to take a look. He has stomach cramps. It’s really sad.

My parents are considering cancelling our tour of Da Lat because if all Tim will do is just mope in the car then it’s not worth going. I would like to go – it would break the monotony of just vegetating in My Tho. Tim wants to go to my Cousin Nghia’s house in Saigon who is quite wealthy and has cable TV and a dedicated ADSL connection that was made available for our use when we were up there for a couple of days. Kind of like home but without the opportunity to leave the house whenever he wants.

For me, I miss my privacy. I share a room with Tim, eat all my meals with at least one other person and people keep fussing over me which makes me uncomfortable. My parents are being really generous on this trip, they bought me a digital camera and have paid for developing of my photos (of which I have taken too many to count – somewhere around 450 photos). You can see all my photos on my photo site.

I love taken photos and amatuer photography is something I’ve really taken to here. I use a combination of my new digital camera (Sony DSC T7) and my dad’s ancient Pentax SLR. I’m currently sorting out my best shots for a photo scrapbook that I’m going to call “Postcards from Vietnam”.

And you know what? I’m happy. I made all the pertinent decisions before I left for my peace of mind and I’m really quite happy right now.

With love,
Cecile