One Rising Star

#thisisVietnam Tết, also known as   Vietnamese New Year , is the most important celebration in Vietnam. For most expats living here (especially teachers), it means time off to travel around South East Asia, but for the locals, it means so much more - spring cleaning, family reunions, greetings, lucky money, lion dancing, flowers, traditional games... While most of my friends and colleagues headed out to explore other countries, I finally welcomed my first guest and discovered a bit more of Southern Vietnam and its traditions.     Here are some of my highlights:    -Taking the city bus;    -Getting a wonderful hair wash;    -Seeing beautiful flower arrangements around HCMC  (*picture on left);        -Going to  Phu Quoc for 3 days;    -Staying in a cute bungalow directly on the beach;    -Walking along the beach in the mornings;    -Watching sunsets in the evenings;    -Island hopping and snorkeling (*picture on left);    -Swimm

#abetterversionofme2018 This past Saturday, I competed in a team Crossfit competition at my gym - Saigon Sports Club. 9 teams of 3 (2 males + 1 female), from 2 different Crossfit boxes (CrossFit Q7 and CrossFit Thao Dien), were registered to compete. In the days leading up to the competition, I started to get really excited; I've improved tremendously over the last 12 months and I looked forward to being put to the test. That was until Friday night, when the 4 events were posted on Facebook. I looked forward to event #1, I absolutely dreaded event #2, event #3 didn't look too bad, but then, event #4 looked like WAY WAY WAY too many burpees for my liking! Upon my arrival at the gym Saturday, nerves definitely set in.  I didn't want to let anyone down - not my coaches, not my gym buddies, not my teamates and most definitely not myself! EVENT 1 I thought I did pretty well in the first event; within the 15 minutes timeframe, I was able to work u