The Birthday Rat

Jessica writes: The hotel where we stayed in Hue is great! Super clean and the staff couldn't be more helpful. They saw that I had sunburn on my back when I was checking my email and went out to the pharmacy and got cream for me. Not the typical American hotel experience. The first three questions you get from any and most Vietnamese people is Where are you from? How old are you? Are you married? (side note - I left my wedding ring at home so we've had some strange looks. One guy wanted to know if Donovan was my boss!) Needless to say, they asked how old I was and I told them I was turning 30 that day. They wished me a Happy and Lucky Birthday as we left for dinner. When we returned later that night, Kim, the woman at the front desk took us aside and explained that she was extremely sorry, but that while we were gone, they cleaned our room and found a rat. She was completely apologetic and said that if we felt uncomfortable that she would change our room. Kim wasn't the easiest to understand because her English isn't the greatest, so I had to get Donovan to help me translate exactly what she said. I couldn't figure out whether the rat was dead or alive and for some reason in my slighly drunkin haze, I thought this was going to make a difference. When we got to the room there were roses, a birthday cake and a card waiting for me. I was very touched that they went out of their way. However, I still thought there was a rat. As I began to pack to switch rooms, I kept telling Donovan that I felt bad that we were switching rooms after they did this nice thing for us. He proceeded to check all our food and was amazed that the rats didn't get into any of it, as it was sitting out. 20 mintues into packing, we received a phone call asking if we found the rat. It was all a big joke - as you probably guessed. But if you know me, you know I'm SO gullible. I kept reminding Donovan that he fell for it too! We just didn't expect the nice, sweet Vietnamese to be able to play such a practable joke. They are so serious most of the time. HAHA.

Also, thank you all for your birthday wishes. It was a great day. We went on a river boat tour and then out drinking with a great couple we met from Argentina.