Very unsettled weather here. Right now the sky is a grey-ish blanket overhead and as I was walking a light sprinkle of rain felt like teeny tiny sparks on my skin and I'm glad I brought my umbrella in case this little sprinkle changes to a downpour. These grey clouds could move on at any moment though and so I'm also glad I have my sunglasses too. 
Just now two young barefoot guys in swimshorts carrying their surfboards walked past me heading to the beach. Tourists, I could tell...as locals tend to be much more bundled up. It's 22c and for the locals this is quite chilly weather.
Just now two young barefoot guys in swimshorts carrying their surfboards walked past me heading to the beach. Tourists, I could tell...as locals tend to be much more bundled up. It's 22c and for the locals this is quite chilly weather.A taxi driver here once told me that if the temperature gets to be below 20c it is FREEZING. "Soo soooo cooold!", as he shivered in memory and tells me about the times it went down to 17c. His facial expression and cute mime of feeling so cold makes us both laugh, and I laugh also at that 17c is "soo soooo cooold!" to him. I wonder how he would fare in MINUS 17c, or less, hahahaa! 
He was driving a very cool electric car that looks like an old Bentley in the front but stretched out so it could hold 4 rows of seats behind him, but all under the same roof. Like a stretch limousine in size, but open-sided and with little roll-up/down clear vinyl window blinds in case it rains, or also, in case sun is too hot. I showed him the little succulent flower that I had just found laying on the ground before I got in his car and asked what it was called. It was mostly white, but with a lovely soft yellow inner petal, and smelled soooo heavenly...a scent I wish I could literally dive into and stay for forever. He told me it was a "Hoa Su" and very special for Buddhists. I have just now looked it up and read that the flower is called a "Frangipani", from the genus, "Plumeria"...but not in Vietnam though. Here it is a Hoa Su (with two different accents on the "u"). It is entirely gorgeous in both appearance and scent and what I would give to have one of the small trees it grows on! To see a tree bursting with these precious flowers and to have that, as was described in something I just read as a luscious scent "of a bunch of jasmine with a touch of vanilla" wafting around me...oh wow! What a beautiful offering from Mother Nature!! 
He was driving a very cool electric car that looks like an old Bentley in the front but stretched out so it could hold 4 rows of seats behind him, but all under the same roof. Like a stretch limousine in size, but open-sided and with little roll-up/down clear vinyl window blinds in case it rains, or also, in case sun is too hot. I showed him the little succulent flower that I had just found laying on the ground before I got in his car and asked what it was called. It was mostly white, but with a lovely soft yellow inner petal, and smelled soooo heavenly...a scent I wish I could literally dive into and stay for forever. He told me it was a "Hoa Su" and very special for Buddhists. I have just now looked it up and read that the flower is called a "Frangipani", from the genus, "Plumeria"...but not in Vietnam though. Here it is a Hoa Su (with two different accents on the "u"). It is entirely gorgeous in both appearance and scent and what I would give to have one of the small trees it grows on! To see a tree bursting with these precious flowers and to have that, as was described in something I just read as a luscious scent "of a bunch of jasmine with a touch of vanilla" wafting around me...oh wow! What a beautiful offering from Mother Nature!!
Well now it's really raining and I'm glad I am undercover of a roof here at this cafe I have come to have my daily "ca phe sua da" at. I will definitely need my umbrella walking back to my apartment...but then again maybe I won't. I've decided I'm going to stay here for a bite to eat, and by the time I'm done it may be sunny. Winter season here on the coast of the East Sea, and just a little south of the middle of this rather narrow S-shaped country, is right now seeming to be torn between giving us rain or sun. I'm accepting and happy with either one. 
Stock photo of a Hoa Su. 
Da Nang, Vietnam 
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