Camille in Wonderland

My name is Camille Zummo, I'm 15 years old and I'm currently living in Vietnam with my parents. My mother, France Hamel, works as an operations advisor for Développement international Desjardins (DID) and she accepted a 2-year assignment in Vietnam. She asked me if I wanted to go with her and I said yes, thinking it would be a new experience. The last few weeks before I left I was pretty stressed out, since I said goodbye to my friends and family without knowing what lay ahead for me there.

When I got to Hanoi, the capital, I was impressed by the beauty of the scenery and the thousands of motorcycles on the street. There are so many rice fields (the grain grows in water). I had to learn to cross the streets like the Vietnamese do, meaning anywhere I could, always at the same speed and avoiding motorcycles and cars. Talk about a challenge! The food is really, really good and I've started eating noodles for breakfast.

When we arrived, we visited many apartments and each time, I gave my opinion about it. I also now ride a motorcycle with my father. Here we don't have cars because it's complicated and they're just too big to park. When I started going to school, I was really nervous because everything was new (friends, teachers, classes). But it worked out really well. At school, my friends are from South Korea, France, Morocco, Egypt and Vietnam. It's fun because I'm learning all kinds of things about the Vietnamese culture (the way they sit, what they eat, etc.) At the school cafeteria, we eat great Vietnamese food (rice, beef, noodles, etc.)

When I miss my family in Quebec, we talk to each other on Skype. We talk every week and even several times a week!

One weekend, we visited Halong Bay. We swam, kayaked and slept on a boat. During the trip, I got scared, because there was a tropical storm. It rained really hard and a lot of water got into the boat. Dishes, glasses and food kept falling on the floor and the boats were knocking into each other. I couldn't wait for it to stop!

I also swam in the ocean, visited beaches and took photos of the people and scenery. There were many beach vendors walking around trying to sell us food and souvenirs. Vietnamese people are really nice.

At the moment I'm writing you these lines I've been here three months and I'm happy to be here because I'm getting to know a new environment: the country, people, places to visit, markets, school…everything is new and really cool.