Turkish beefsteak - as good as Spam?

I just spent about 2 hours emailing and calling people with Skype to resolve a few problems I was having with my ATM and credit cards, and it was so hard because there's this insane Turkish man two computers down gesturing wildly and absolutely bellowing into his headset. He's been on the phone for THREE HOURS now. Apparently I'm told he comes here every night and it's the same thing. It was terrible trying to use those automated phone systems because they thought his bellowing was me trying to enter my credit card information. It went something like this: "Please enter... [pause] ... I'm sorry. I didn't understand that. Please try again to enter... [pause] ... I'm sorry. In order for us to transfer you to a customer service representative, you must enter valid information. Please enter..." I'm really grateful to whoever invented the zero button to bypass the menus - if it weren't for that brilliant soul, I'd still be stuck in automated phone system hell.

The rest of us in the internet cafe keep giggling and yelling to each other, but he doesn't notice at all. I don't know Turkish of course, but I keep hearing a word that sounds suspiciously like "beef steak," which would be weird, because no one makes intense 3 hour calls yelling about beef steak... right??

Seriously though, I can't handle staying here much longer. I think my right ear is losing some hearing. Bill and I went to Sapa a couple days ago. We took the day train up so we'd see the countryside and maybe meet some people. Other than it being a 10 hour trip in a 400 degree oven, it was pretty fun. We met a nice 10 year old girl who taught us some Vietnamese. We drew pictures for each other and traded the English and Vietnamese words. There was a bit of ambiguity though. There's this strange thing that looks like a triangle with four ears that's labeled mang, with the little bowl-shaped accent over the a. Anyone know what that is? Kim?

Oh my god. Peace... He left. Ahhh... I can think again...

CRAP. CRAP CRAP CRAP. He just went to the bathroom. Oh, my poor head. I'm sorry guys, I'm going to have to stop. Hope everyone's doing well! Thanks everyone for commenting and sending emails - it's great to hear from you.