She wasn’t always Stephanie Craig.  Throughout most of her high titled career as our prospering nanny, she was incidentally Stephanie Jones.  Yes, another Jones in our family.  Having been with us since our first years on Mercer Island and then all the years after that, the goodbyes when we left for the trip were fairly wet. Mostly it was her eyes doling out the steady stream of salt while us kids insisted that we would be gone only a year and how little time it actually is if looked at in that perspective.  But, we would soon be the ones convincing her and her husband, Aric, to come and meet us on our global adventure. Though it was more of an obligation than anything. I mean, all of the other Joneses in our lives were making an appearance on ProjectEquator so she couldn’t just not come. So, with much back and forth, we soon were all reunited in Bali.

Steff and I hanging at Karsa Spa in front of the lotus pond!

The time quickly went by, seeming to slip right through our fingers, but not before we made sure “everyday was the best day ever” which was set out by Steff and Aric and wasn’t a very hard goal to accomplish.

Hanging outside of Intuitive Flow, our favorite yoga studio in Ubud!

Aric and Steff both loved sliver smithing class as much as I did.

Of course there were obstacles, even still in heavenly Bali.  Obstacles which put everyone (except Otto, Jones, and I fortunately enough) in a 24-hour state of toilet dependency. It didn’t matter what end of the pipe it came out of―nobody was feeling up to par and the victims were left helpless to the bug. Yet, we all managed to come out alive, for there were still plenty more things to do and see…. which leads me to one last thing. Steff and Aric, while we loved shepherding you around Ubud and spending time together, we’re not done with you yet on Project Equator. Come to Mattapoisett!!

CHEERS to the first day Steff and Aric were with us in Ubud!

The next morning brought us another encounter. It took a few seconds for me to remember and realize that this was the same person who starred in last nights’ escapade. When I did put two and two together, I was ready to acknowledge the fact that same events were inevitably about to take place. Then, suddenly she turned to Sam and his two good friends, who had joined us on this trip, to talk to them instead. Sitting just opposite, I began to feel a bit self-conscious as their conversation started heating up and indiscreet, widening eyes kept meeting mine. By now, everyone other than me, was standing up and voices took on a very rushed and excited manner. Then the words were all but flung my way:

“She says she recognizes you”
“She worked at your orphanage”
“She took care of you as a baby”
“She remembers you”

“She knows you”

Suddenly I was having a deer in the headlights moment. Was this a joke? Maybe. But they kept repeating it over and over.

In a matter of seconds this “visit to the town where I was born”, this “trip milestone” had completely turned into a dream. Far, far away from reality. This wasn’t supposed to be some whole reunion, emotional, yay-yve’s-back-home crazy rollercoaster. We had no ties to my birth mom / family, we had no luck in contacting the orphanage, we knew nothing about Guiping.  We weren’t really sure what we wanted to get out of this visit other than to sightsee. To just walk around the city was perfectly fine with me. “Maybe hike a mountain nearby,” suggested Sam. Finally, Mom came over and saved me from the headlights with her sweet words and incredulous facials.

From there, things seemed to pass in a blur. How could this not be a dream? How did I get here, in this perfect moment in time? I’ll tell you something though; I’m not a lucid dreamer, and I certainly felt like I wasn’t thinking straight. A million thoughts consumed me and the only thing I could properly comprehend was… a smile. I glanced at her again, and this time I didn’t see the lines stretched across her forehead oozing with vexation or the battling way her lips kept twitching, trying to find the right words, however useless, that might penetrate through to us like the night beforehand. Instead, I saw what she had really been trying to say to us in that sluggish means of a dining room. I understood with total clarity.

Completeness in a single smile.

She took the rest of the day off and toured us down (subconscious) memory lane. We visited the ― now revamped ― post office where I was left on its steps, with locals getting a kick out of us taking pictures at a seemingly unimportant local government building. We were then introduced to the lady who found me, freed me of that cardboard box I was left in, and brought me to the orphanage. She was very surprised to see me there in front of her store yet without hesitation, in a made-for-movies moment, she enveloped me in a hug that could quite possibly induce tears to a sob-story fanatic. After our farewell, we were taken to my old orphanage that is no longer in business. And in case you were having doubts that she might have been faking the whole thing and did not actually remember me or have worked in the orphanage (which at some point after everything, did indeed cross my mind) she showed us pictures on her phone of her when she worked in the orphanage and with other girls like me visiting Guiping. To end this dream, we were graciously invited to her house where we swapped emails so we could stay in touch and keep the connection going wherever the world may lead us.

I was adopted at ten months old, which would leave me with no recollection of anything or anyone she showed me. Though, despite the fact that we may be strangers and the difficulty of the language barrier, we communicated in a way that I have never been exposed to and that’s what really touched me. Not the realization that I’m seeing where I came from, but the way we held hands like she was my best friend, sister, caretaker; and the way she looked at me and smiled like I was truly a miracle. Or maybe she looked at me thinking what slackers we were that it took us thirteen years to come and visit ― which she in fact did say, but in a nicer way. Though I am pretty certain she was just glad to see me.
Here is a text that she sent to Sam after we said our goodbyes…thank you Sam for the translation:

“Hello Sam. Thank you very much for bringing me my daughter to Guiping. Even though she is not my real daughter, I tended her when she was little and I took and treated her like my real daughter. Today I couldn’t be more satisfied than just to be able to see her even only for like a second. Thank god we met again after this long time. Hope you can tell her mom (Lisa) that she is a great mom and thank her for raising Yve. Thank you Sam and everyone for giving me this opportunity to meet my daughter again.”

In the end this is what I learned: There is a language within smiles. Within crinkled eyes and softened faces. It’s a language that is deeply rooted in genuine palpability. And hidden behind the vast complexes and double meanings is the simple truth. The truth that when there are no words to be spoken, a smile says it all.

Chen Bin Ying (the lady from the restaurant the night before) explaining to Sam’s friends in the hotel lobby that she knows me

 Chen Bin Ying and me in the lobby

Sam and me standing across the street from the post office where I was found as a baby

In front of her shop, meeting the woman who found me at the post office and brought me to the orphanage

Our movie-esque hug !

Sam having some quality “twin time” as we walked around town

Chen Bin Ying and I hand-in-hand as she tours me around Guipnig

This is everyone who came with us to Guiping: Sam, his friend from his basketball team, and his friend’s girlfriend who was also born in Guiping

Our last stop, at Chen Bin Ying’s house where we met her foster daughter (who was from the same orphanage as me)

For months prior to arrival, the anticipation of what Fun Sam’s would really be like was a topic of much discussion. It was to be one of the longest stay of our journey and we had very few details other than the reviews on TripAdvisor. Would they have good WiFi for homework? Would it be close to town? How would we get around not knowing any Chinese? Was Sam really that fun? Was his name really Sam?

Well, we lucked out! We could not have picked a better place to stay. Sam and his family made our stay in Yangshuo something we will never forget! Sam put us on the 5th floor where we had 3 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms and a private common room. Tuck pointed out that this was more bathrooms than we have on Mercer Island  We had several electric tea kettles and full access to Sam’s mom’s kitchen if we ever wanted to cook. There was not an elevator so we got some good conditioning for hiking the Great Wall

Sam runs the B&B with his parents and speaks impeccable English (as well as a few other languages!) He helped us book anything and everything, rent bikes and even helped us arrange a trip to Guiping! Sam’s mom is an amazing cook and made breakfast for us every morning and Sam’s dad was always there to make sure we arrived home safely every evening from our death defying bike rides

I could spend more time describing Fun Sam’s but I am sure you would rather see Tuck in another video

By the end of a month, we felt like part of the family!  Our trip to Yangshuo would have not been the same had it not been for Sam and his Family!  Sam taught us many things about China and one thing he taught us was that good friends don’t say thank you as much as we do. “If you know somebody well, you don’t say thank you…it is understood…you only say thank you to those folks you don’t know well.” Therefore, we won’t say thank you to Sam in this post, we will just say “you made our time in Yangshuo unforgettable and we will be back”

P.S.  For the record, Fun Sam’s had the best WiFi in China and Sam’s name is not really Sam

View from our room!

View from the roof deck!

We even convinced Sam to go with us to Mood Food

My whole body shuddered with excitement as we woke up the first morning. I remember peering out of the curtains, in the room I shared with Otto, and just seeing a limestone cliff, only a few feet away, speckled with luscious bamboo, engulfed by melodramatic mist, and completed with a raging waterfall that landed directly into our backyard.

“Where am I?” was my very first thought that morning. “Definitely not on earth.” It was like someone had knocked me out, put me in a cryogenic freezer, and shipped me off to the Hallelujah Mountains in Pandora (from James Cameron’s movie Avatar) where they wrangle up pterodactyls. Needless to say, I started that day off with an extra shot of energy, enthusiasm, and angst for exploration.

I knew the next month was going to be over in a blink of an eye, and I just wanted to get the most I possibly could out of Yangshuo. So in my eagerness, I researched every restaurant, attraction, and thing there was to do there. In no time, my mom and I had mapped out our goals and threw together a weekly schedule.

If we felt particularly motivated in the morning, which was about twenty percent of the time, the schedule called for an early morning start:

We would first get up for sunrise:

Then we would get our sweat on by doing T25 on the roof of Fun Sam’s: As much as I would like to think that I got totally in shape and fit in Yangshuo, that dream was completely dead on arrival due to the weather. We quickly discovered how slippery and dangerous a tile roof can be while doing extreme cardio workouts in the rain.

I would also occasionally attempt to meditate: I know what your thinking…Whoa! Wescott has gone all hippie dippie on us…does he seriously meditate in the morning? Um…I guess it would all depend on your definition of meditation. Does sitting on the roof and just staring out into Yangshuo while daydreaming count? If so, then yeah I meditated a little bit, so I guess that makes me hippie dippie.

Finally, I would shower, brush my teeth, floss, and eat breakfast:  I’m pretty sure that showering and brushing your teeth in Yangshuo isn’t much different than in the United States, so how about we just skip to breakfast: the most important meal of the day.

Due to our abnormally long stay in Yangshuo, Sam, a total bro who also puts the “Sam” (as well as the “Fun”) in the hostel’s name “Fun Sam’s”, threw in breakfast for free.  So every morning we are randomly greeted with one of the following meals:

Mini muffins and bread. Where’s the protein?

Typical noodle breakfast dish

Handmade dumplings made by Sam’s mom.

The Yangshuo Breakfast Lottery jackpot was definitely the noodles made my Sam’s mom: something about a warm, comforting bowl of noodle soup on a chilly, rainy Yangshuo morning just seemed right.

There were all kinds of toppings for the noodles including pickled beans, peanuts, scrambled eggs and ground pork.

After our “typical” morning routine, the schedule began to vary depending on the weather and what day of the week it was. Let’s take a closer look at that schedule.

On Mondays and Saturdays we would bike to Tai Chi right after breakfast: a tranquil ride that floods your senses with beautiful scenery.

Next, we would spend two hours of the day mastering the art of complex hand movements. Extremely slow, methodical, and precise, Tai Chi proved more of a mental memorization challenge than a physical one. Every now and then we would take a vacation from slow town and balance our bodies out with some adrenaline by learning Kung Fu.

Or…if it was a Tuesday or a Thursday, we would bike to yoga and meditation at our favorite hang out, Mood Food.  The bike ride was a slightly less relaxing and more daunting task than the casual biking to Tai Chi.

Biking to Mood Food was hairy…we will upload a video when we have better WIFI

Following our daily death defying bike ride, I would try and baffle my genes, which, thanks to Dad, make criss-cross apple sauce more like side-by-side apple sticks, during yoga or we would all zen out during meditation.

However, if it wasn’t raining (which was almost never) and we didn’t have anything scheduled, I was blessed with the opportunity to go rock climbing.

But every day, no matter what the weather was like, we would eat at Mood Food for lunch. Wait. Back up! You ate at one restaurant every single day? Yes, yes we did, and still we long for more Mood Food!

We would start our meal off everyday with a bottle of Mood Food Kombucha!

After we were full and had received a new, eye-opening lesson on anatomy or healthy living, we would leave Mood Food and bike home.  Imagine the bike pic you saw earlier, but in reverse. We would also stop to buy some fruit for dinner: apples, bananas, miniature mangos, kumquats, and mangosteens…the usual stuff.

This is us biking with the iPad strapped to the front of the bike basket to capture footage

Mini mango…Yve has pretty small hands too, so you can just imagine the size of the mango.

However, at one point or another the day did need to involve some schoolwork. So, from six to eight, I would tackle Spanish vocabulary, Romeo and Juliet, market analysis, and common sense in Everyday Etiquette. To avoid falling behind any further in my studies, my mom and I developed a new strategy to track progress in each of my classes: the agile development system. Now I don’t know if you know what agile development is already, but I was fascinated by the concept when Mom began explaining it to me. My school system now keeps me accountable and on track, well not really, but more than I would have thought.

Lastly, we would wrap up the day with some nice, old-fashioned dinner and movie. We decided that since Yangshuo was all about schedules and focusing to excel in our interests, movies should follow that suit. We picked a few actors/actresses and decided we would have a marathon of movies that they were in. To transition from one actor to another, we would have to watch a movie that had both of them in it. We ended up picking Tom Hanks, Amy Adams, and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Guess what? In a blink of an eye, Yangshuo was over, just as we had predicted. Between the esoteric karst peaks, the constant misty aura, and the foreign, fascinating culture, it seemed as though our entire stay in Yangshuo was a fantastic dream.  A dream that we will always remember, and a dream that will always make me smile for years and years to come.

Everyone’s got someone that they can truly be themselves around.  For some people it is their dog, for others, their mom. For me, I have Ryan Delis Jones.

Ever since first-grade, Ryan and I have known each other because we were on the same soccer team.  Apart we’re both okay guys, me more than him, but together we’re simply idiots! The perfect kind of weirdos.  Anyone can act stupid, but when you have another person supporting your stupidity no matter what you do, then it becomes a movement!

Discard every last bit of conventional wisdom and preconceived ideas you may have about us….we are absolutely off the deep end! Now, whether that’s good or bad, we simply don’t care because we don’t turn around to check who’s watching. We don’t let peoples judgment even phase us. If anything, we laugh right back at them until the situation is so awkward and they feel so uncomfortable that they begin to question our mental stability.

When I say “weirdo,” I know that everyone interprets that word differently.  It might sound a bit off-putting, but let me remind you that many people would have considered Steve Jobs a weirdo when he was in high school.  Now, I am not saying that either of us are likely to be the next Steve Jobs, but let’s just say we cover all ends of the weirdo spectrum. We have done everything from starting a company (not really in the slightest) to jumping off cliffs. Ryan always preaches “Friends don’t let friends do stupid things alone!” and believe me, I take advantage of that 100%.  His motto is our excuse for doing something that our parents wouldn’t approve of.

While Ryan is usually the test dummy for our biggest moments of crazy, I happily take the credit afterward. On the flipside, he has a passion for stealing my ideas, or as he likes to call them “his ideas.”  Case in point, my family decides to go on a trip around the world and somehow Ryan ends up spending a semester in Chiang Mai, Thailand the exact same year. This is actually perfect, because we all know that no Sharples trip would be complete without Ryan for part of it.  My parents fondly refer to Ryan as “their sixth child” and he often accompanies us on family vacations.  In addition, we also have an odd affinity to people with the last name Jones, and have met the majority of them on this trip already… (Steff, where are you? Just because you changed your last name to “Craig” doesn’t mean your getting out of this!)

Once it was confirmed that Ryan was going to be in Chiang Mai at PREM for half of this year, my parents changed our entire itinerary around the world to meet him. This resulted in us cutting Myanmar short by a week…thanks a lot Ryan!

Some highlights from Chiang Mai and with Ryan include:

1) Sneaking out of PREM and going on a run through the rice patty fields and mountains

2) Sharing a hotel room and watching The Silver Linings Playbook more times than I would like to say in this blog post

3) Watching a guy almost get beaten to death during a graphic Muay Thai fight.

4) Getting upstaged by a seventy year-old lady who had way more muscle than we did for crushing herbs into curry sauce

5) Losing a water fight to five elephants

It was a bummer to say good-bye in Chiang Mai, but we will see each other once again in the land of Bali.

(PS: I can’t really take credit for this whole blog post, it was a collaboration between the two of us. Ryan contributed the majority of the poorly written sentences and bad jokes, I added the rest.)

In Hoi An, Vietnam, Bagan, Myanmar and Chiang Mai, Thailand, we found three awesome photographers and genuinely nice people to spend the day with. Each encounter shared the attribute of the unexpected, with the day unfolding organically, leading us to amazing sites, meeting with interesting people and connecting to local culture in a myriad of ways.

Étienne: Prince of Hoi An

Etienne Bossot, a French photographer living and shooting in Vietnam for over 5 years

Luckily, this young, bright guy is a good marketer, snagging us into this new activity with a well placed and designed sign out in front of his gallery down the lane from our hotel. Advertising a photo tour package to a local fishing village from dawn through lunch, we met Etienne and made plans to be picked up the next morning. His demeanor and graciousness as host to the 10 of us who accompanied him was evident from the moment he came to get us at our hotel gate. With a range of skill sets and cameras, he balanced his time perfectly with each of us, offering advice on equipment, lessons on some of the basics of manual photography, and personal guidance on getting “the shot.”

For me, the most fascinating part of the day revolved around how to take pictures of people, one of Etienne’s specialties. It never dawned on me how important the ability to make personal connection and exude an outgoing demeanor is to great photographers. In observing and listening to Etienne, I have a whole new respect for the broad range of interpersonal and technical skills that go into a memorable image.  Effortlessly navigating the docks and streets of this sleepy, tiny fishing village, his boy next door / comfortable-in-his-own-skin attitude won smiles, hugs and conversation with many of the locals. As we learned about the daily ritual of the fisherman coming home from the evening’s catch, navigated the impromptu market that sprung up around the docks, breathed in the pungent smells of a fish sauce producer, meandered through the back pathways between local houses, and rode bikes along the river back to Hoi An, we snapped to our hearts content and enjoyed the company of an interesting band of travelers.

Maung Maung: King of Bagan

Maung Maung is a local photographer who has achieved International acclaim

Credit for this whirl-wind day goes almost entirely to Etienne, having insisted that ProjectEquator would be incomplete without traveling to Myanmar. We had recently given up on obtaining visas, and had almost finalized new plane tickets to cut Myanmar from the itinerary; but after Etienne’s passionate plea, we realized our error and made a major overhaul to our plans to get us to Bagan via Bangkok and Mandalay.  After some research, we were connected with Maung Maung, a Myanmar citizen who has made an international name for himself for his outstanding images. It could not have been a more dissimilar experience and adventure than our day with Etienne, teaching Lisa and I about a completely different method of “getting the shot.”

Maung Maung is a master of light. He knows exactly where he needs to be at precisely the right time of day to create a moody, evocative image. Shooting in and around Bagan’s thousands of temples for decades, he has a network of friends and access to unreachable places that made us feel like we had a golden ticket for the day. Unlike almost any other photographer we’ve met, Maung Maung offers to recreate and teach you how to get some of the award winning images he’s taken over the years. In contrast to the documentary-style of Etienne’s photo essays of people, Maung Maung creates extremely deliberate shots that have been scouted, planned and rehearsed.

When in Bagan, surrounded by thousands of thousand year old temples, monks offer a wonderful subject to photograph. We had the opportunity to meet several as Maung Maung zoomed in and out of a few monasteries to pick up our own personal monk to accompany us to various locations. As bizarre as it sounds, these boys served as authentic models in elaborate, stunning locations. Maung Maung, like many people in Bagan, spent months in the monastery we kept returning to, so he knew everyone very well. Each monk barely spoke, and rarely smiled as Maung Maung would direct the scene for our awaiting lens. We zoomed precariously from place to place in his small car, tracking monks and nuns collecting daily offering of food from the locals, visiting a monastery at mealtime and entering many locked pagodas cracked open for our king, making the entire day action-packed and slightly overwhelming. He offers a private 15-day tour of Myanmar, and you can bet that Lisa and I are already scheming on when we return!

Ryan: Documentarian and Environmental Crusader of Chiang Mai

Ryan Libre lives in Chiang Mai and spends lots of time nurturing young documentary film makers and photographers

Joined by our very own Ryan Jones from Mercer Island, we decided the kids should jump in on the fun as we connected with another Ryan (Libre) who owns and curates the Documentary Arts Asia in Chiang Mai. When he is not documenting life in Kachin State in northern Burma, or on some assignment elsewhere in the world, Ryan teaches photography at Chiang Mai University and takes people like us around the countryside to practice photography. Like the other expeditions, we had no idea what to expect, except of course, the unexpected!

The morning started on an organic farm about an hour or so north of Chiang Mai. Amidst idyllic rice paddies and rolling mountains, this permaculture / sustainable living commune is owned and run by Thai folks, and offers wonderful views and whimsical adobe architecture. Ryan owns land between this farm and the next organic farm called The Panya Project, which is a school that teaches people from all over the world the arts of adobe construction, permaculture, organic farming and community development. We hiked both farms and got a taste for how flexible, sustainable and malleable adobe architecture can be.

While chatting with some folks at Panya, we learned that all of the students were in the village building a 2-story adobe house for a local resident who needed a house. Off we went into a traditional, rural Thai village, where Wescott, Ryan and Yve were invited to join the work crew and get covered in mud. They laid a row of adobe bricks for one of the walls and learned the basic principles of how easy, fun and environmental this construction can be.

For lunch, we dropped in on the village chief who owns a sprawling homestay that would give any Marin County artsy / organic / zen compound a run for its money. Tasty vegetarian fare in a spectacular setting gave us renewed energy for our afternoon, which included a visit to an enormous, almost never-visited temple complex. It was a great location to contrast Thailand’s elaborate, palatial Buddhist Wats to the more primitive, ancient style of Bagan’s pagodas.

The last part of the day took an even more unexpected turn, as Ryan was invited to interview a famous Swiss photographer named Rene Burri at one of Chiang Mai’s most exclusive resorts, Dhara Dhevi. Sending the kids home, Lisa and I accompanied the press corp, consisting of an entourage of several photographers and handlers. The whole thing was a bit surreal as we were ushered into a magnificent suite, greeting Rene who sat on an expansive veranda with his son and wife. For the next two and a half hours, we sat riveted like disciples as Rene waxed on about his experiences being invited to shoot the Cuban revolutionary Ernesto “Che’ Guevara, his friendship with Pablo Picasso, his thoughts on photography and many pearls of wisdom about an 80 year (and counting) life that has taken him to over 200 countries and in the middle of countless world events.  For photography collectors and enthusiasts like us, it was a very special surprise and a wonderful end to an unexpected day.

Jones Family in Ha Long Bay

For those of you who have hung out with us, you know we leave a wide wake wherever we go… so you can imagine the tsunami of activity that 4 adults and 9 children left! Whether it was adventuring on a boat in Ha Long Bay, navigating street food vendors in Hanoi, riding mopeds in Mui Ne or playing many, many games of RummiKub across the country, our two families meshed shockingly well. Connecting with fellow travelers around the world is a big part of the overall experience; to connect with such an amazing family that will land back in the same hometown is ever so much more special.

We needed a very large chartered bus to get out to the coast in Vietnam

Gretchen and Jon have a theory that they like to call “Subtraction by Addition.” Basically, the more people you add to an already large family, the easier it is to manage the whole troop. After months of international travel, this theory certainly worked its magic, giving all of us a chance to remix in new combinations of relationships for a little while. David splits the difference between Otto and Wescott’s ages, so the three boys spent lots of time hanging out, playing pool and riding mopeds. Molly and Yve are exactly the same age. With so much in common, the two quickly disappeared and hung out for most of the time we were all together. Maggie at 8, with the sweetest personality of anyone you’d want to meet, easily bounced between the older girls and the younger kids. Vivian, Tuck and Jones are all the same age, and the three had a blast doing crafts, setting up a tattoo parlors and making up all kinds of games.  As for the four of us adults, we had lots of opportunities to be, well, adults!

Tai Chi on the deck of our boat in Ha Long Bay

We started our Vietnam homecoming in the North, where everyone’s favorite honeymooning couple, Mouni and Kim, met both families. Barbequed street food and getting busted up by the police on Beer Street in a semi-legal homebrew establishment were among the highlights. But to really get to know each other, we decided to go on a 3-day, 2-night boat cruise together in Ha Long Bay. Check out Tuck’s excellent blog post to read more.

Vivian, Maggie, Tuck and Jones eating fried rice

After our cruise, we schemed to meet back up in No Chi Minh City, where we would head to the Vietnam Coast for a week at the beach. Our plan to remain in Hanoi for another 10 days got cut a bit short after receiving glowing Instagram feeds from both the Jones Family as well as Mouni and Kim.  Adding Hoi An to our itinerary, we headed to the middle of the country assuming our friends had left for Ho Chi Minh before we would arrive. Completely by surprise, we spotted David’s smiling and somewhat bewildered face as we entered the courtyard of our awesome hotel. As if we hadn’t seen each other in years, the party began immediately. Mouni and Kim were also still in Hoi An so they luckily got more unplanned, quality time with the 9 kids J A perfect night ensued, filled with glowing lanterns, enchanting streets, an amazing street food dinner and of course, fantastic company. Call it a “flow” moment, or just being perfectly happy living inside the moment of now; we all had a standout evening. Far better than I can explain, Gretchen Jones wrote a great blog post about it on their family blog, which you can read here!

Jon getting lettuce wraps handmade and hand fed, while interspersing sips from his mojito!

Total free-for-all food fest at this awesome BBQ street food restaurant

Woman selling floating candles on the shore of the Thu Bồn River

Kids getting their candles to make a wish and float their lantern down the river

In Southern Vietnam, we met back up again in Ho Chi Minh City, where we kicked off our re-re-reunion at Ichiban, a disco-eclectic sushi bar and restaurant run by Vietnamese brothers who spent a lot of time in Southern California! A private room, an endless supply of sushi and many drinks made for the opposite of an intimate dining experience, as the 15 of us celebrated the last night of Mouni and Kim’s 3-week Vietnamese adventure. The evening ended in the bar with a dance party, sake bombs and a raid on an unsuspecting Baskin Robins who had already closed for the night but changed their minds after much coaxing…

Since we were becoming such fast friends, we decided to skip the dating courtship and just move in together. We headed to Mui Ne, with visions of kite boarding in our heads. After some shuffling of houses, we settled into 2 villas on a communist interpretation of the Truman Show’s set. Villa S79 housed the parents and the younger kids. Villa S8 was like a retro-MTV Real World episode, housing all the teens. With a couple of motorbikes to go back and forth, we reveled in the guilty pleasures of an all-inclusive, completely generic, you-could-be-anywhere, resort by the sea. The pool complex was staggering, and at pretty much any time of day, we could find all 9 children sliding on a tiled slide between two of the pools, playing king of the hill around lots of sharp tile edges… clearly lawyers have not taken hold of this country just yet!

Kids hanging on the edge of the slide in the largest pool complex we’ve seen in a long time!

I think all of us were a little hotel-weary, so we cooked most of our meals, including an outstanding fried rice dinner. In fact, I think all of us might have been slightly global-travel weary, and the time we spent in Mui Ne was almost like a vacation from our respective trips. While we did not end up kiting, we did manage to see the town, go on a surreal hike through a shallow, red-clay canyon and throw ourselves off of red sand dunes at sunset with and without plastic sleds. We parted company at the airport, the Roaming Jones off to Singapore, and we off to Thailand after a few more days of fun in Ho Chi Minh City.

Playing RummiKube on the deck of our boat

The Gang!

We’re all on our own again, exploring new destinations and connecting with new people. But like brothers in arms, its comforting to know the Roaming Jones are out there somewhere to our south, right now sailing from Bali to Komodo Island in search of dragons. We look forward to each new Instagram and post from them. We’ve already planned our reunion in Seattle, wearing all of our shoes and clothes we each had made in Hoi An, and inevitably commiserating on the woes of leaving the open, global road and returning home.