Opening Ceremony

Buses transported us to the Sports Stadium were the Opening Ceremonies and the competition will occur. Upon arrival we were greeted with much hospitality as we walked through a receiving line of hosts waving flags. It felt like a "red carpet" walk, not that we know what that feels like! In the background, Lions were dancing to the heavy beat of the drum while larger than life chess pieces decorated the area.

We were escorted to our seats in the stadium where we waited for an hour and a half before the official ceremonies started. The event was to be brodcasted over Vietnamese National TV. The stage was magnificent as was the show. Drummers, pop star singers, dancers - very "Vegas-like".

The opening ceremonies were much more than I anticipated and was quite impressive. Two thirds into the show, we saw people getting up and leaving. It was quite puzzling as we
thought it was quite rude to leave early and the quality of the show was not the issue. We later found out that people were leaving early to catch the buses back to the hotel. In hind sight, that was what we should have done also as we staye for the entire show and ended up stuck in the streets unable to get to the hotel.

The streets were filled with people and a mass of scooters! We were unable to make our way through the crowds and were asked to wait until it dispersed. It felt like being stuck downtown during the annual fireworks festival. We eventually made our way back to the hotel grabbed some dinner and crashed close to midnight.