Being the last cast-member selected, I have to admit is a little befuddling.  When I first received the news that I was the newest cast-member I was more than ecstatic, but after the initial shock wore off I had a million thoughts stampeding through my head. “Where is Thailand? I’ve got to get immunizations. Where am I going to come up with some money?” And to top off all of the excitement, my computer decides to go on the fritz. So who else to call but my lovely grandmother. I ended up having to borrow $500.00 from my grandmother to buy a new computer. Needless to say I am stressing out! It looks like someone is going to have to work the streets in Thailand. NOT!

I’ve always been pretty adamant about not stealing anything, and that used to include MP3′s, bootlegged DVDs, and books. Well, it seems that the whole of Vietnam is pretty keen on photocopying and burning discs, so I succumbed to the desire to get whole books for about $2-$3 each. At home, most of these would probably cost about $15, and I proudly spent that cash to support the authors that I love. Now, I’m supporting families with cheap photocopied book purchases in the local stores of Saigon. Sorry all of my beloved authors, your words have touched me, but my being broke as all hell has gotten the better of me in Vietnam!

On the other hand, you get what you pay for. There are quite a few pages that you can’t read because of paper jams placing multiple copies on one page, other pages that have been folded over to hide that the paper was cut wrong, and even misspellings on some of the covers.

Ah the page that sticks an extra inch out of the binding....

Now that's some hot page on page action.

Book selection à la Jen Cheng and Serene Hayes