If every day were like today...

Saturday morning, I met Marjie, one of Steven and my friends from his school for an outing. Marjie lives in an amazing neighborhood with narrow streets, a flourishing local market, cheap massages, great restaurants and apparently her own personal tailor. Steven and I have both enjoyed partaking in the cheap massages, incredible restaurants and fresh vegetables at the daily street market, but we had yet to venture into the world of personal tailoring. It was something I was very much looking forward to.

The night before I had spent an hour on the websites of Anne Taylor, Banana Republic, Dillard's, Sierra Trading Post and more, bookmarking outfits that I would love to have, but would never be able to afford. I knew that I wouldn't be able to print them out for the following day, but I wanted to be prepared for the Pandora's box of shopping possiblities that I knew was about to open before me.

Since I didn't have any print outs, at 10:00 on Saturday morning, I jumped on the back of a xe om with my favorite t-shirt and skirt, which I'd heard could be cloned with incredible skill into one of a dizzying array of fabrics.

I met Marjie and Shannon at Marjie's house and we set off through the Saturday morning market to meet the women she buys fabric from. Tuy and Than were seated up against the side of one of the buildings in a side alley behind a table covered with fabric. Fabric also lined the shelves behind them and spilled over under another table to the right of the first. Marjie introduced us and I handed one of the women my skirt, which both Shannon and I decided we'd have made in another color.

Tuy examined the skirt and then pointed to a row of fabrics from which we could choose. We each picked out a color and then we showed them my shirt and a pair of Shannon's shorts and we repeated the process. Armed with $15 worth of fabric for two shirts and a skirt, I followed Marjie and Shannon back through the market to Marjie's tailor.

We entered a small store front room with a sewing machine set up along one wall, various fabrics and garments hanging from a rack on the other and a curtain of sorts dividing the front shop from whatever lay behind. Again, Marjie introduced us to the women in the shop who greeted us warmly and then set about measuring us and asking questions about our garments, "same, same?" To which we replied that we wanted the exact same size just different colors.

We left our fabric with Marjie's neighborhood tailor and went to catch the bus to visit her other tailor near the Ben Thanh market, to whom she entrusted more complicated designs.

Once at the bus stop, we bought spring rolls from my usual spring roll lady and munched on them as we crossed through the traffic to the market. While Marjie talked with her second tailor about a dress she wanted, Shannon and I flipped through magazines of dresses. As I flipped through the pages, I remembered a game I would play with my friends when I was younger, when we would flip through a magazine and would choose one thing on each page that we would buy if we had to choose. In my mind, I choose a dress from each page, amazed at the thought that for about $15 a piece, I could actually HAVE each dress custom made from my choice of material and tailored to my exact measurements. My latent consumerist urges began to shake off their covers and stretch their arms towards the light.

From the tailor, we went into the market, where Marjie showed us where to buy cotton, silk and who to go to for material specific to the tailor we had just met - the tailor's sister. Having decided to limit my initial foray into the world of personal tailoring to the three garments I had already set in motion, I passed on purchasing anything more.

As left the market, we made a last minute detour from our path to the bus stop to stop into a frozen yogurt place we spotted on our way past the market. For 25,000 per 100 grams, we could choose from a variety of flavors of frozen yogurt and an array of toppings. Again I was transported back to my youth, but this time to a TCBY for one of my near bi-weekly parfaits with hot caramel and Reese's peanut butter cups.

After our yogurt, we caught a bus back to Marjie's and saw Shannon off before taking a seat at a little seafood stand tucked into an alley just a few turns from Marjie's house. A freestanding metal counter held bowls of oysters, mussels, scallops (still in the shell - who knew?), and a variety of other shellfish. We pointed to two dishes of scallops and a plate of mussels and sat down on small plastic chairs around a folding metal table to wait for our food.

As we waited, Marjie ask me if I had tried some sort of bean drink, to which I replied that I had not. She let me around the corner to another metal stand, this time with a frosted plastic front that hid bowls filled with what looked like various types of beans, small fruits and other unidentifiable gelatinous substances. Not one to shy from new experiences I agreed to have one of whatever she ordered and we went back to our table.

Our drinks and food arrived almost simultaneously and tucking into both, I was again reminded of one of the reasons I love Viet Nam. The food is phenomenal. The drink, what I will hereby refer to as "my little glass of heaven," was a mix of fresh coconut juice, a ton of sugar and loaded with beans that must have been soaked in sugar for days and some other jelly like blobs that just added to the mystery and experience of my new favorite drink. It tastes much better than it sounds. The mussels and scallops were grilled with garlic and scallions and accompanied by a bowl of chili-laden fish sauce, lime and salt and pepper and were as tasty as any I've ever had. When we were finished, the entire meal cost us the equivalent of $1.50 a piece.

Marjie and I parted ways at her apartment and I went back to the main road to catch the bus back home, but not before confirming that we would all meet up that night to see a movie at Bobby Brewer's for dinner and a movie.

As I walked down the road to the bus stop, I thought, "I could stay in Viet Nam...if every day were like today..."