SaigonNezumi.com

Last Friday was my 38th birthday.  I went to my IT class at the American International School and was surprised to find two of my students, Joy and Long, had prepared a surprise party for me.  Joy had made me some pasta with spaghetti sauce, sushi for the entire class and brought a huge cake.  Boy was I glad I skipped lunch that day.

Thanks Joy and Long!  This will be a memorable AIS moment for me to reflect upon in the future.

My Birthday Cake at the American International School, it says 'Big Belly' and 'Handsome'on the cake.

Joy preparing for the surprise party

One of my friends surprised me yesterday by sending me a birthday gift to my house.  What a way to brighten up a day.  She and her company sent me flowers and a birthday cake.  The flowers smell really good and the birthday cake was one of the most delicious birthday cakes I ever had in my life.

It is nice to have such good friends in Saigon.  Unfortunately I had to inform y friend that my birthday was on April 16th which is Friday.  Hmm, I guess I will get another birthday gift??? 

Birthday gift from a friend

Delicious Birthday Cake

Last Friday was the official Grand Opening Party at the Hard Rock Cafe Ho Chi Minh City.   Last month was the soft opening.

Leon Sikes, the Managing Partner at MNG Joint Venture Partnership, and I were given invites by the Viet Thai International Joint Stock Company, or VTI for short.  For those of you that do not know, VTI is the owner of Highlands Coffee, and the master investor for Hard Rock Cafe HCM.  MNG, which focuses on global commerce and trade, intends to distribute Highland products in Turkey with hopes in expanding to the Central Eurasian region.

Since Leon and I did not have our invitation passes, Derick from VTI walked us in.  Once inside, I forgot I was even in Vietnam.  They did an amazing job with the interior of this Hard Rock Cafe.  Since it was the grand opening, the drinks and appetizers were free.

Hard Rock Cafe HCM was a bit packed since there were actually two parties, the 6 PM and the 9 PM (for VIPs).  At 9 PM, the early group just stayed, I would not have left either.  Run-DMC was the star of the grand opening.  If you did not get an invite, you really missed a great party.

Hard Rock Cafe HCM is definitely the place to go to hang out, have a drink and listen to good much in Saigon.  Actually, I would say it beats all the other clubs in Saigon now.

Photos and 1 video below.  Sorry, I used my G1 Google Phone so the picture quality is a bit lacking.

(Hard Rock Cafe HCM from the front of the Intercontinental Hotel)

(Entrace of Hard Rock Cafe HCM)

(First band playing)

(Run-DMC playing)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXgrv2FLKyo[/youtube]

I have been quite busy the last month developing with WordPress.  Oddly enough, I had about 6 requests for WordPress sites from friend and colleagues during this time.  WordPress has come a long ways and with the large number of developers and designers behind it, WordPress is becoming the permier web content management system.  It is perfect for small to medium company websites at the moment.

During this time, I decided to play with some of the features WordPress themes and plugins are now providing to users.  When one of my clients needed to manage their photos, I found NextGen, a great photo gallery plugin.  I loved it so much, I decided to use if for myself.

Essentially I have 3 websites with pictures of my trips around the world since 1997.  I decided to aggregate them into one photo blog using the free Arras Theme.  Presto, Qeeboa is born.  Qeeboa is derived from the word, keyboard, invented by one of my students almost 2 years ago.  Since I already registered the domain name, I decided to use it for my new photo blog.

Some of you will notice that I use the name Kentai Matsunaga on the site.  Matsunaga is my family name from my Japanese mother’s side.  Kentai was my Kazakh name that I went by for two years (1997-1999).  In Kazakh, it is deprived from a word small since many Kazakhs felt I was, well, small.  It also have meaning in Japanese as well.  Ken means sword, tai means body.  I will explain later why I will plan to use Kentai Matsunaga in the future.

In the meantime, view some of the photos of the various cities I visited since 1997.  I plan to put most of my pictures there.

http://www.qeeboa.com

This is just one of those things where you just have to be there.  In the wild, this rhino should be charging me.  Here, it seems to want my help though most likely, it wanted some food.  The other rhino would not let it eat.

This rhino had a huge cut near it’s right eye with flies flying around it.  I wish there was a way to rescue or protect these animals at the Dai Nam Safari Park.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSWsHhyImGw[/youtube]

I added a video with the elephants as well.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_CEg8Xf36s[/youtube]