Point of Reference Adjustment

March 24, 2009 Ken Vietnam

People were being met at the arrival gate in Seoul just like you could in the states years ago.  Although we had to go through security again when transferring to the last leg of the flight, we didn’t have to take off our shoes.  The airport was immaculate.  While cleaning up after a snack, an airport employee offered to take the waste out of my hands before I could locate an actual trashcan.  Another thing I’m used to.

Marissa remarked that the map of the world that hung above the one of the moving walkways in Seoul was backward as the Western hemisphere was on the Eastern half of the map.  I reminded her that the earth is round and it is arbitrary as to which ocean should be split in order to flatten it.  The way they chose to split the Atlantic, leaving East Asia as the center of the map and that was probably by design.  It’s all in your frame of reference.

I imagine there will be more frame of reference adjustment during the next ten days.

We are finally in Vietnam.  We arrived a little after midnight (local) at the Rex hotel. I’m trying to count the hours between 5am EDT Monday and 1am Wednesday in Saigon, but my brain hurts.  33 hours awake?  The luggage did, thankfully, make it to Ho Chi Minh with the plane.  On the way here Marissa noticed the ad hoc nature of traffic in the city.  Wait until she sees it in daylight!

Skype is working to Grandma’s where our younger daughters are.  The WiFi is pretty good at this hotel, but there are lots of hops between Ho Chi Minh and Upper Sandusky, Ohio so it occasionally drops out.  Unfortunately it isn’t helping with the jealousy from some of those who aren’t on the trip.

Again, more opportunities for reference point adjustment.

Incheon Our Way There Communism and Capitalism