Sometimes shrimp hits the spot a tofutti cutti misses.

Many of you know that Leslie and I were vegans before this trip. And we were pretty hardcore about it: we made dinner every night from scratch, using organic ingrediants and scanning labels to make sure no gelatin or whey slipped into our diets. We replaced honey with agave, cheese with nutritional yeast, and even went so far as to buy vegan Worchestire sauce for one measly vegan meatloaf dinner. Anyway, the point is that we knew we couldn't sustain ourselves on this diet in the land of fish. We began our exit from veganism with a package of Nutter Butter cookies at the Seattle airport. From there, we dabbled in fish sauce, shrimp and eggs in our fried rice, a piece of fried squid every once in a while. We are definitely being good about eating nonvegan foods; while we haven't had any meat, we will eat soup with chicken broth, and if a kind Vietnamese family makes us dinner, we will eat whatever is served. But for the most part, we remain mostly vegan with some cheese or egg or fish every once in awhile.
Two nights ago, I was drawn to a floating restaurant in Cat Ba, Vietnam, where we arrived that afternoon. There was nothing special about it- no twinkly lights or giant fake martini glass adorning the roof- just another raft with a tin roof floating in the water. It was very hard to see it from the dock, and maybe that's why I wanted to go so badly. After two or three boat drivers asked us if we wanted to go across as I gazed longingly at it, Leslie, Bryce, and I finally said yes. We were taken to the restaurant, which turned out to be (basically) someone's house with some chairs set up in front. A family of ten or so were crowded around the television, which spewed what looked like a Vietnamese soap opera. We had already eaten dinner, so we planned on having a drink (our thoughts from afar were that this was a floating bar). A family member hopped up when we came over, and when we tried to seat ourselves at one of the metal tables, he motioned to us to follow and said the word "menu". The "menu" turned out to be a small aquarium of assorted fish in the floor of the restaurant. In separated nets, there swam crabs, tiny fish, small fish, big fish, gigantic fish, shrimp, and larger shrimp. We explained we had come for a drink, which we got and returned to our table. Meanwhile, vegans 1 and 2 decided that a trip to a Vietnamese floating restaurant which specializes in the freshest fish in the sea would just not be complete without said fish in our bellies. So I made my way back over to the menu and told the server (pointed, rather) that we wanted some shrimp. "One kilo?" he asked, and since I had never ordered live shrimp from a hole in the floor, I nodded, assuming this was the right amount for us. Fifteen minutes later, he arrived at our table with a giant platter of shrimp. It was enough shrimp for a wedding party. They were pink and had their heads and legs and tails still on. I quickly remembered that I had only been a vegan since January; prior to that I ate everything under the sun, including said shrimp. So while Leslie (who has been a vegetarian for ages, and a vegan for two years) sat back and admired our abilities, Bryce and I peeled every last one of those shrimp. And we all ate them all.