After the all-day tour yesterday, most of us decided to take it a little easy today and recharge for the long work week ahead.

We started the morning with a massage at the local institute for the blind. Unfortunately, I do not think my masseuse was blind, but either way, the money we paid for the services benefited the center and the students. (And of course, how could anyone turn down a $2.50 hour-long massage?)

Our next stop, shopping! A few of the girls visited the “Michigan Ave” (or for others “5th ave” / “Rodeo Drive”) of Hue to browse some clothing. I discovered while packing for this trip, that many of my clothes are made here in Vietnam and sure enough, I saw stores with brands like Express, Forever 21, Zara, and others present with their full tags. Price-wise, it was definitely cheaper here, but not cheap enough that I felt inclined to purchase the clothing. What I did like though was that most of the clothing here is made for smaller body types like myself, and tailoring, if needed, occurs on-site and is very cheap! I ended up purchasing four beautiful silk summer dresses for a nice price =)

In the middle of our shopping trip, we experienced our first Vietnam rain. We rushed inside a store and watched as the streets flooded quickly, the cockroaches scurried for higher ground, and saw how quickly the stores shut down and packed up their store-front displays. We were stuck inside a very small clothing shop for quite some time before it stopped. I have seen some harsh thunderstorms in both Texas and Chicago in my life, but nothing compares to the intense downpour and booming thunder that we felt here today.

Once it cleared, we ended our perfect Sunday with dinner at the local Indian restaurant. The food was amazing and it was really nice to have a wonderful and familiar break from the local cuisine:

=)