My Husband Carried 8 Huge Blocks of Ice on One Motorbike—Just Another Day on Our Cargo Ship!

Welcome back to my new video, dear friends. I hope you’re all having a peaceful, healthy, and happy day. Early this morning, I woke up, folded away my bedding and mosquito net, and immediately went to check on my little tray of mung bean sprouts. I was so happy with what I found. The tiny white sprouts had grown beautifully — fresh, crisp, and packed closely together. My first attempt at growing mung bean sprouts aboard the ship was a success. I rinsed them carefully, harvested some, and immediately added them to a bowl of instant noodles for breakfast. They were wonderfully fresh, crunchy, and naturally sweet. It was such a simple breakfast, but eating something I had grown myself made it feel very special. Soon afterward, the workers arrived by their small speedboat to continue loading mangrove wood. Today, however, only three workers came. With fewer workers and this new crew’s schedule being less consistent, my cargo may take a few extra days to finish loading. This is something outside my control, so I simply have to be patient and make the best use of the waiting time. Meanwhile, my husband borrowed a motorbike from a kind local resident and traveled about 5 km to buy eight large blocks of ice. He carried all eight blocks back by himself on the motorbike. We use a surprising amount of ice because I prepare sweet iced tea and cold drinking water for the workers while they’re doing this heavy work. Altogether, I prepare about four 20-liter containers each day, so those big blocks of ice disappear faster than you might imagine. Around lunchtime, I returned to my little kitchen and prepared another simple meal aboard the ship — Vietnamese sour soup, small shrimp cooked in a sweet and savory sauce, and white rice. By afternoon, the workers finished for the day and headed home to rest. And apparently one successful tray of bean sprouts wasn’t enough for me. I prepared another tray of mung beans and started the whole process again. The following morning, the workers didn’t come to the loading site, so there was another quiet day of waiting. One of the men who cuts the mangrove wood borrowed my angle grinder to repair a small composite boat. Water had been leaking into it while carrying heavy loads of wood from the mangrove forest out to the loading site, so he ground and prepared the damaged area before reinforcing it again. Days like these remind me that life aboard a cargo ship isn’t always about moving. Sometimes we sail. Sometimes we load cargo. And sometimes we simply wait. But even during the waiting, life continues around us. There are meals to cook, equipment to repair, bean sprouts quietly growing in a little tray, and people helping one another with whatever they have. And here in the Mekong Delta, even an ordinary day can be beautiful. Along the roads and riverbanks, there are wildflowers, tropical fruit trees, and so many little scenes that are easy to overlook when we are busy. Perhaps that is one thing river life keeps teaching me: not every meaningful day needs to take us somewhere. Sometimes we just need to notice what is growing around us while we wait. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for spending another ordinary day aboard our cargo ship with my husband and me. Goodbye for now, dear friends. I’ll see you again tomorrow in the next video. Diễm An ❤️❤️