are you up for the challenge?

Just had a lovely evening with some ladies from work. It is Gen's birthday so we went to get our "junkfood-on" in Vincom plaza (Imagine Lenox Mall in Buckhead, but smaller). In our Vinasun taxi ride there, we got into a conversation about living here. I learned that Gen has lived in HCMC for 4 years. wow.

"People ask me why do I like living here?" Nicole stated, "Because everyday is a challenge."

True indeed. It is said that if you truly want to feel alive, you should live in Vietnam . . . . because you're life is on the line everyday. If it isn't the nasty street food that keeps you running to the toilet, it's the motor bike robbers trying to steal your backpack, or the city bus determined to not just run you over, but kill you in the process. While basking in some beach sun this past weekend, my friend Ludi (a Vietnamese-French VietQ beauty) mentioned that the Vietnam law states, if you injur someone in a motor accident, you must pay for all their medical bills, for the rest of their life, but if you kill someone you only serve 5-7 years depending on the situation. Hmmm, let's see, if I were poor which consequence would seem less threatening to my well being. . . kill someone? or paralayze them? you decide. Not to mention the language barrier. Luckily the Vietnamese language does not have characters but the 4-5 tones are crazy difficult!

Any ways, back to our food adventure. So Nicole describes the restuarant we're going to as Carl Jr.'s, "they have the best burgers!" Never heard of it. But in my mind, I'm thinking this will be a nice sit down restaurant, fancy tables, nice lighting, I mean we are going to Vincom Plaza, everything in there is high-class. After strolling around 3 floors of the mall, window shopping in Western brand names (Doc Martin, Nike, Ecko, Accessorize), Viet-style high class fashion stores with outfits too tight for us and drooling over sexxy NineWest shoes that were waaaaay over priced, we get to Carl Jrs.

"This is it??" That's Hardee's!" I said.

Sure enough, it was the same Hardee's Star character, same Hardee's burger taste. Well, tomatoe, tamato, the burgers were good. Can you believe we also saw a Popeye's Chicken? Don't worry it was still called Popeye's. Now if I see a Chic Fil-a, I KNOW I've seen it all!