Day 10 - Thang Cong B week 2

Slept very well despite overhead thunderstorm. It was bucketing down Monday morning as set off for work. Plastic poncho and umbrella did not save me from the filthy streets and my trouser legs were soon dripping. However it was nice and cool by the afternoon. So, muggy and damp, teaching for the day was trying with no translator at all and unruly younger kids. No translator means I can't do anything new, so we played hangman and word search again.  They do call me Teacher. Goodbye Teacher they say at the end of class. Very surreal.  Everyone says it will be boiling tomorrow. 

Stopped in at the office on the way home. Duong asked me to write an article on Ninh Binh and Tam wants me to take a new volunteer, William, into work tomorrow so that he can observe a class, before going to another school on Wed. No problembo. I went by House #2 later and introduced myself to William. He is a tall fairly heavy set guy, 21 yrs old, from Warwick, who wants to be a History teacher and is here for the experience, not the travel. He has not really travelled before except to Italy on weekend breaks. He smokes, but otherwise seems quite nice. 

A construction crew, building a house nearby, are sleeping on site under a tarpaulin, complete with cooking utensils and a light bulb. The Vietnamese construction crews work all night. This lot are up to their ears in mud but the first pilings went in today I noticed.