Today was our last full day in Saigon, and it was my birthday! It was a great day. We had the morning free so I met up with a fellow Springfield friend who was in Saigon to visit his family. We went with his aunt to have breakfast and coffee. She treated us to the meal because she owns the restaurant we were at. Our next stop was for me to finish souvenir shopping so we headed over to Ben Thanh market and I was able to get everything I needed for my family and my friends. Because I will be in South Korea and Japan, I had to make sure I still have enough space for souvenirs.
After hanging out with my friend and his aunt, they brought me back to the hotel so I could get ready for the business trip to United Airlines. Our meeting started at 2 and we were meeting the country manager for Thailand and Vietnam, Joe. He talked to us how United had been one of the first movers in obtaining important flight routes in Asia and how they initially had problems adapting to the Vietnamese market until the utilized the GSA, native Vietnamese to do marketing and promotions for them. Although this resource was available, they didn’t use it until later. Now United has a strong global presence because of their ability to forecast the importance of the Asian market and they were able to adapt accordingly to it.
For dinner, we were invited to have a birthday party with Dr. Pham’s family at her dad’s house. It was a party for Chance, Mai, Tom, and me. There was amazing food and I was so touched by the event, I cried. It’s hard to be away from my family especially on my birthday so all of them made my day very happy.
The relationships as well as memories have been worth it, traveling to a developing market and making friends and experiencing Vietnamese culture and food have made the journey amazing. I would love to return to Vietnam in the near future, it is an amazing country full of life.