Life at Latitude 10: Friday Rituals

Fridays are filled with rich ritual and tradition in our household. Some might call this predictable but we call it well-planned enjoyment. If you visited us on a Friday, this is what you might see:

4:00 am -- Wake up and drag our butts to boot camp. (Bootcamp = running 1km to a local empty parking lot where Heidi channels her inner Jillian Michaels and for 50 minutes, we sprint, jump, and punch our way into a sweaty mess often to the locals amusement).

5:15 am -- Make it back to our apartment (Where Adam typically Skypes with his mother as he is sweaty and shirtless in the kitchen, chopping fruit for our snacks and food for our breakfast, never staying on the screen for more than a few minutes at a time).

7:00 am -- Work (Wah, wah).

11:30 am -- Lunch (The highlight of the workday - no, SERIOUSLY! Adam and his coworkers walk the 3 blocks to "Fried Chicken Friday." For under $2 the crew of 8-10 are served heaping piles of fresh ga ran, salads, and rice complete with chili dipping sauce, all you can drink iced tea, and most importantly, a cold-wet towelette. At this point, when the owner sees the mass coming on Fridays, he does not take orders but just starts placing chicken on the table. This chicken is legit. In fact, the Atlanta representatives claim it might be some of the best fried chicken they have ever had. Good thing there is no real restaurant or sign advertising this man's cart and aluminum tables because it would probably become too popular and crowded).

4:00 pm -- Work day ends (Cheers ensue. Adam rushes over on Flowanda to pick Heidi up from the elementary campus and they do "highpoints and hopies" on the bike ride back to the apartment).

5:00 pm -- Happy Hour (We meet all coworkers at a sports bar in District 1 for happy hour. Friday's deal is 20,000 VND house pours. For $1, we enjoy a celebratory cocktail or two and adhere to the strict rule that we have at this sacred place -- NO WORK TALK. Sometimes we are able to catch a game or two, as we did with the Blazers dominating the Lakers last week. Always we are able to catch the free appetizers they come around serving and always do we pretend that we have never seen the likes of free potatos and calamari before in our lives. We laugh. We don't know if the waitresses do).

7:00 pm -- Dinner (Hop in a taxi and head to our eating establishment in HCMC -- Orange Awning -- where when we pull up, the security rushes to the cab to open our door. We point, they plate, and we dine on delicious cuisine that satisfies our cravings and fills our stomachs. Often, a "free" item is brought to our table to try and comment on -- sometimes fruit, sometimes fish. The team at Orange Awning have become our second family).

8:00 pm -- Home (Put on comfortable clothes, curl up on the couch to watch a movie, and guaranteed that Heidi will be asleep and drooling by 8:45 pm at which point Adam wakes her and we both head to bed by 9:00 pm).