You Know You're in Viet Nam When...

-the little kids think "HELLO!!" is one of the funniest words ever

-everything is made of coconut: coconut candy, coconut crackers, coconut lotion, coconut bowls, etc.

-the old men are red-faced and chatter merrily in Vietnamese as they ask you to take rice wine shots with them (they drink 50%, you drink 50% and pray they don't backwash)

-the old men will offer you another rice wine shot

-the ladies all wear matching pajamas at home and in public after the afternoon nap that everyone takes

-the Internet cafes are full of guys who play Dungeons and Dragons like it's their job, because it is (they achieve high levels and then sell their character to rich gamers)

-there is no tanning oil in the pharmacies; rather, you can buy all the Skin-Whitening Milk Lotion you want

-Choco-Pies and Marie Biscuits are pretty much the only kind of snack available, besides coconut candy

-everybody not only likes the pho noodles they have every day, they also cheerfully and consistently cite pho as their favorite dish

-everyone thinks that Americans are creative, gigantic and totally immoral

-every single building has the same framed illustration of Uncle Ho, right underneath the same plastic red flag with a yellow star in the center

-no matter who you are, you play badminton and you know every single Vietnamese and English karaoke song in the book by heart

-you drink coffee with 2 parts condensed milk and 1 part sweetened coffee...multiple times a day

-you refer to everyone, including yourself, with pronouns (Hi junior uncle--would junior uncle like to speak with boy friend of girl myself and girl myself?)

-you think that duck eggs with a fully formed duck inside are a delicacy

-you'd rather drink sugarcane juice than a Pepsi

-if you are happy/well/strong, you say "khoe"; if you are surprised you say "troi oi!!"; if you approve you say "dung roi!"--without fail

-you can distinguish a knockoff motorbike from a true Honda, and someone from the country from someone in the city

-you think football (soccer) is the best game ever, and American football probably doesn't really exist

-you live and breathe Yahoo Messenger

-you know more about American politics than most Americans

-if you know English, you say "necCESSary" versus "NECessary"

-every day is in the 80s or 90s, but you still say "Wow, today is sure hot!"

-you think that pig tongue is good for pregnant women and vinegar with embalmed cobras and scorpions is good for male virility

-you can't figure out why Americans don't know the same songs from the 70s, 80s and 90s like you do, and why they don't belt them out regularly

-you haven't really heard of lifting weights, more like just trying to eat enough to not blow away

-you don't really believe in any religion, but you definitely ask your ancestors for help

-waking up early, as in 5 or 6 am, is normal for any day of the week regardless of your schedule

-you think taking a girl on the back of a guy's bike is just about as romantic as it gets

-if you're a guy, tight jeans and Speedos are unremarkable; if you're a girl, scrunchis and frilly blouses are in vogue at all ages

-you love your country, your language and your people, and act as a kind, hospitable host to curious foreigners while simultaneously always reminding them they are foreign

Xtra, Xtra, Read All About It!

I love journalists. Really. I'm happy to claim Journalism as one of my majors, though I'm not sure if that'll be the career path I'll take.

Journalists follow us everywhere in Viet Nam. In Ho Chi Minh City, we walked into a random restaurant called Nha Nem to find a television crew setting up the camera angle for our table-to-be. On the last day Matt and I taught, we were accompanied by a sweet-faced journalist who filmed us doing activities with the kids.

Now, here in the middle-of-the-jungle Ben Tre, they're coming out of the woodwork.

On the first day, Kelsey and I stuffed bags full of gravel on a riverboat (now we can say "back in our days on a riverboat in 'Nam"), we jokingly sang songs to pass the time. We looked up to find two journalists scribbling eagerly and snapping photos.

"Please, would you tell me the names of the American folk songs you sang?" the male journalist asked me later.

I didn't even know I knew folk songs. But I guess "I've Been Working on the Railroad," "Ol' Man River" and "Dinah Won't You Blow Your Horn" count. Maybe not "I'm a Survivor" or "It's a Hard Knock Life", Jay-Z version.

These journalists were very curious. And, like good journalists, they asked the tough questions.

"Do American girls have sex all the time?" WHAT!!!!!

Rather shocking, mortifying, humiliating, horrifying. I told them a definite NO, not all American girls do. Clearly Hollywood speaks louder than Focus on the Family does. Thankfully my friends chimed in to help explain.

Anyhow, it was an interesting conversation. Especially when I had questions for them.

"How do you feel about the Vietnamese government's control over the media?"

"Oh, it's not control...it's regulation. Without regulation, there would be political trouble. People would disagree with the government and make trouble. There is more peace with a government-regulated media. But sometimes the government will print new laws in the newspapers, and we leave space for local people to editorialize."

"Are the editorials anonymous?"

"Anonymous? Um, no. We know who they are."

Things of that nature. My Vietnamese friends told me I should not ask such difficult questions.

I've my doubts about the credibility of these particular journalists, writing for the national Labor newspaper and Tuoi Tre, the youth newspaper which everyone reads. The article on us began this way:

"A cute girl Susie, with blue eyes and a small body, wearing rolled up pants and singing American folk songs, merrily carried bags of sand across a river."

Yeah. The Vietnamese journalists have won my heart with the "small body" comment, but the rest...honestly. My eyes are unmistakably brown. Clearly here reality is in the eye of the beholder. They also quoted a few of us as saying rather pro-Communist comments we don't recall...odd.

They've all given us their phone numbers and home addresses, asking that we contact them when we return to the States. Could be interesting.

Is it possible for journalism to be as accurate as possible if there are vested interests, especially commercial or national ones? Maybe the purpose of journalism in Viet Nam, which is explicitly to provide a channel of communication between the government and the people, is different than that of American journalism (print the truth because it's there, relevant and helps folks make decisions). Both are forms of journalism, but personally I see a vast difference. Let me know what you think, and I can write more on this later.

Whining Just a Bit

It hasn't, by most standards, been a great day for SuzyQ in southern Viet Nam.

Awaking in a chipper mood to my cell phone's Asian ringtone at 5:30am, I swallowed my Malarone pill (ALWAYS TAKE WITH FOOD) and a quick gulp of water. Better eat soon, I thought.

45 minutes later our hosts have breakfast ready, and I'm feeling kinda funny. Concern #1.

Breakfast itself is undercooked eggs, sunny-side up, crusty bread, overly sweet yoghurt and instant coffee. Highly flavorful pho noodles and lightly cooked instant noodles are an option as well. Concern #2.

Biking to the worksite was no big thing, we chatted and evaded small dogs and children with that jerking, wobbling eagerness characteristic of unsteady beginners.

We were told at the worksite to strip the skin. What?

One of those work-orders that doesn't translate very well. Oooooohhhh, strip the bark off these sticks?! Oh, ha-ha-ha...yeah. Strip them. OK.

With either a machete or hatchet in hand, we bent over and began to shave long slices of bark from recently felled saplings. The workers had been correct in using the term "skin"--the saplings were unbearably humanlike. Under their rough bark was live, moist orange and red flesh. The knobs exactly resemble kneecaps. Whatever type they were, these trees look uncannily like fresh meat, and we were all sickened. Concern #3.

Concern #4 came when all the previous concerns amounted to a strange, heavy feeling in my stomach, zapping me of energy and leaving my hatchet in trembling, weakened fingers. A colossal sweat slid down my arms, back, throat, chest and legs (and trust me, I DO NOT full-out sweat, only glisten or maybe perspire). Definitely not good.

I basically dropped the hatchet and ran into the woods to share my breakfast with the jungle floor. Although the details are somewhat mystifying and interesting to me, I'll spare you everything but saying that it was a rare, sunflower yellow goo. I peered at it curiously and prompted added to it. Concern #5.

The Vietnamese foreman who noticed my upheavals was very worried and called over Kiley, even after I cheerfully explained to him that yes, I was sick (bi benh) but I'd be fine (duoc).

"You, girl, come help your weird friend who vomits in primary colors," he probably said.

It's a darned good thing Viet Nam isn't one of those cultures that believes it's bad luck to have women on a construction site. These guys were nice, inquiring cautiously into my welfare and comfort and pointing incessantly to the hammock nearby.

I felt so frustrated and worthless; here we are for a simple total of 15 weekdays to finish this home for a family of roughly 20 folks, and I have to be sick for 1/15 (possibly more) of those. I got up a few times and swung the hatchet, but they were wimpy swings.

A downpour started, and we moved inside the makeshift shelter the family has adopted while we build their home. After 2 minutes of sitting down on the family's bamboo-mat bed, I fell asleep. So did Kevin. And Pablo. And Phuong.

When the deluge stopped we trudged out of the shelter, slipping in a quicksand path of rich brown and black mud. The palm fronds were covered in slime and slid beneath our sandals, and the twisty roots everywhere weren't much help either.

Stepping across a single concrete beam "bridge", I suddenly went down. The mud beneath my sandals gave an operatic squelch, my left leg went straight down and my right inner thigh slammed into the bridge, bringing me shoulder-first into a mucky river. Thank God I am female, that's all I'm saying.

Stunned but smiling dazedly, I grabbed fistfuls of the muddy bank and shared some mud with Kevin's outstretched hand. "Did I really just fall off that bridge?" "Yep," said Kevin. Sympathetically, of course.

Lunch for me was a half bowl of white rice. Don't try it people, that isn't enough to keep a bird alive, but I didn't want one single grain more.

Anyhow, needless to go on with the physical misery of the day, but the nausea put me out of commission. Not sure which of the Concerns it was, but I retired back to the hotel and handed over my English lesson plans to co-teachers Tom and Hieu. The bike ride back over the bridge was exceptionally bumpy, and I dropped a shoe twice. Going back over the bridge to rescue it warranted some dirty looks from motorbike passengers. Back at the hotel I collapsed and slept for the rest of the afternoon up to dinner. Talk about feeling worthless.

We've all been getting sick here, though not illnesses of the same ilk. Poor Annalee's been diagnosed with a persistent flu, my roommate Tram's throw up more than she's eaten, Pablo and Kiley can hardly breathe through their sinuses, and Didi's got a perpetual headache. Something's up.

Thankfully, as I write this post I'm fully better now and have enjoyed a full day of skinning more tree limbs (to serve as beams for the roof of the house), returning to a more-than-rice diet, and teaching English. We've all got medicine and doctors close by, but sickness in tropical Viet Nam is no picnic. The food is mostly made with juices, sauces and oils that curdle any Western stomach that isn't feeling 100 percent, and the most elegant bathrooms here in rural Viet Nam are usually free of toilet paper, a lid, flushing capability, etc. Yeah. Makes you really think about those famed women who'd pop out babies in the midst of rice paddies.

Gotta be tough to get through 'Nam, that's what we're learning.

V is Very, Very Extraordinary

Alright, so I took the title of this post from a song again. But it was on purpose! The fact is 1) we do a heck of a lot of singing in this place, and 2) we do a heck of a lot of cheesy English songs in this place, and 3) most of the time our work here requires us to be resourceful, not to reinvent the wheel.

It's our third full day in Mo Cay, a small town in the rural Ben Tre province. Every day we wake up about 5:30 and groggily get our stuff for the day together, then eat a varied breakfast at 6am. Usually the fare is something along the lines of Vinamilk yoghurt (quite fond of it now--thinner than American yoghurt), bread&egg sandwiches, pho, strong instant coffee or Lipton milk tea, and chom choms (rambutans).

We ride our rickety bicycles over rough roads and 2 decaying bridges for about 20-25 minutes to reach our worksites by 7am. The palm and banana trees lining the road are just glorious, and the morning sun is pretty gentle.

To reach the house building site, we take a left off the road straight into the jungle. We go over bridges about 4-5 feet wide, splash up mud through giant puddles, veer around snarling dogs and around ladies carrying the morning basket of chom choms for the family. (Chom choms are kinda ubiquitous.)

The past few days we've just been moving supplies to the house assembly-line style. The first day we moved a ton of gravel, the next day sand and more gravel. Bricks are coming soon, and I'm not particularly eager. Today we made reinforced concrete columns to support the family's new home, and to take a break we taught the little kids the macarena. They lapped it up. The kids don't really understand that we don't speak Vietnamese, they just think we're stupid. They chatter away at us and giggle like mad. The grandmother of the family is one of the smallest elderly women I've ever seen--her feet can't be much bigger than the head of my hammer. She has one good eye, and she chews this stuff called betel juice (fruit and nut mixture that is addictive) all day, spitting out red sputum. It's nasty. She's fond of us, though, and encourages me frequently to wear bug spray. Which I do, though only some of us have had a problem with the bugs.

We finish up morning work at about 11am, then mount our bikes for a 20-minute ride further away from our hotel. I typically almost collapse at the table heaped with bowls of rice, tofu and green beans, beef and noodles, pineapple, sometimes fish and, you got it--chom choms. We try to drown ourselves in water and tra da (iced tea).

After eating and washing the dishes ourselves, we bike a short ways to an outdoor coffee shop, which has hammocks! Chilling there and ordering the delicious and hardly nutritious ca phe sua da (coffee with milk and ice), we take a nap/lesson plan.

At 2ish we divide into middle school and elementary school groups. Tom, Hieu and I are having a MARVELOUS time with our precious and precocious primary little people. We've thus far taught them "Hello my name is ____", "I am ____ years old", their colors and their numbers. Plus some extras like "hop," "clap", and "beautiful." I'm sure we'll be on to Chaucer and the nuances of politics by next week. :)

The 17+ kids, ranging in age from 3 to 11, are all black-haired, brown-skinned and snaggle-toothed, but they are so incredibly different! Little Danh (a boy) has the widest smile and answers really fast, even if he doesn't know the answer (he usually does). Little Yen (a girl) enthuasiastically watches out of big eyes and talks A LOT. One of my favorites, Dat (a boy), pretty much has no idea what's going on but always jumps up and down and say CO OI!!! (Lady Teacher look!!!). Some are brother and sister. We haven't had any criers yet, either (*crosses fingers and knocks on wood*).

Hieu, Tom and I have some different pedagogical approaches, but so far we're learning more and more what our strong points are and how to delegate teaching most effectively. Synergy, baby. We're all about it. For instance, Tom is excellent with drawing and teaching songs, Hieu kinda speaks Vietnamese and so explains virtually everything as well as inventing some terrific games, and I'm kinda the boss/word pronouncer/compliment giver/materials hander-outer/hugger and high-fiver. It works well. :)

The classroom is an austere little number with 11 benches (practiced that in our counting activities) and some dried chom choms on the floor. We've got a blackboard, but we bring all our own materials (chalk/scissors/paper/markers/crayons/tape/rules, etc.).

Tom, Hieu and I have it lucky. My friend Tram teaches a middle school class in which the children's grandmothers come in and chatter. They ask her all sorts of questions and then gossip about her right while she's teaching!!

"My, what a big butt she has. Wonder what she eats? Does she have a boyfriend with that?"

AWFUL. At least I can't speak Vietnamese...and the grandmothers don't attend my primary school class. Tram's a trooper.

I have had some awkward encounters with motorbike passersby on the bike ride home. This old dude, maybe 50-60, kept time just to my left and stared me up and down, before driving off wordlessly. I was just about to give him the classic "How DARE you!" before he tootled off. Some people.

Afterwards we bike 30+ minutes home (remember we biked away from the hotel after the worksite), jump in the shower, get a shake from the market, go the Internet cafe, and snag supper together at 6pm. Afterwards we lesson plan or do karaoke or watch movies in our laptops. Yeah. Not much going on. There's also a toad who hops around our hotel at night named Marco. You get the picture.

I miss you all TERRIBLY. It's a tiring lifestyle compounded by intense Vietnamese heat and the biking distances we've got to cover. I'm under the impression that this is really a Robertson get-fit-fast program. :) Not really, but it's a nice by-product of making a difference and learning a tremendous amount of Asian culture. Viet Nam is turning out to have so many benefits I never could've dreamed--eating tasty fruit, playing with adorable kids, teaching my favorite language, learning a new one, studying religion and the media when restricted by the government, getting a tan, getting called DEP QUA! (beautiful!!!!) even when I'm dusty and disheveled, etc. Still coming up with a succinct answer to the original "why did you come to 'Nam" question.

I will get photos to yall eventually!!

Miss you, miss you, miss you.

Under My Um-ba-rella, Eh Eh Eh

We've been singing Rihanna's new hit, "Umbrella," for nigh 3 weeks now. Her single, a fascinating juxtaposition of lifelong love and promiscuity bordering on pornography, is not what I'll talk about here. Rather, I'm going to stay surface-level with yall: it rains in Viet Nam ALL THE TIME.

I used to say that the things I say most in Vietnamese are as follows:

Khong, cam on, anh. (No, thanks, man--I don't want a motorbike ride.)
Em la nguoi My. (I'm from America.)
Lam on noi cham. (Pleeeeeeease talk slowly!)
Xin loi, cho toi mot ca phe sua da. ('Scuse me, I'd like one iced sweet coffee, please.)

Now, in Ben Tre province, that's all changed. Here I mostly say "Mua nhieu!!! (Rains a lot!!!) and "Chao ba" (Hello grandma). This place is the mecca of adorable old women--they are everywhere, with their shuffling little walk, their matching polka-dot pajama attire, straggling white wisps coming from under their rice-hats, and raisin-y brown faces that light up in a smile when I say hello respectfully. (Flippancy or mispronunciation will get you a severe frown or look of perplexity, the most common being the former.)

We arrived in Ben Tre with the abundant grandmas just last night, coming from a 2-3 hour bus ride and two ferry boats down to the Mekong Delta area. We're staying in a MAJORLY SKETCH hotel. The hotel boasts rare amenities such as a Western-style toilet (like a pot of gold), air conditioning (like the breath of heaven), comfy beds (cloud nine), even a TV per room (it doesn't really work, but it's still nice to have around). However, the sketchiness comes with the extra amenities. Like the portaits of naked women in some people's rooms. And the strategically placed mirrors in bathrooms and bedrooms. And the condom wrappers in some trashcans.

Yep, we're staying a in multipurpose hotel. Suitable for do-gooders like the Green Summer students/Robertsons, and also functional in the off-season for nighttime workers. Awkward. Thankfully mine's a bit more low key--no condoms, no nude prints.

Anyhow, this morning we blinked our eyes open to a 6am breakfast of pho, bread, eggs, nhan(longan fruit), yoghurt and seriously caffeinated instant coffee. We ate in the hotel's garage-turned-dining area.

We split into two groups: the social activities group, which will go to do short-term chores for public areas in the community, and the building group, which will construct a home for a family. I've chosen to be in the building group.

We biked for maybe 20-25 minutes through a forest rife with banana and coconut trees (I saw ripe oranges too!), as well as deeply-dug canals with muddy water. Our bikes are mostly decent-quality, but the windy, thin path dominates us every time. Plus there are teeny little bridges over rapid creeks everywhere. I've only lost my balance three times, no falling yet. Can't say the same for all of us.

The family has been living in a bamboo-and-thatch thing for a while. Their floor is dirt, they have a couple stools and a bamboo bed and a table, and they have a tall bamboo TV antennae.

That's the odd thing about most of these homes; we ride by and all we see is a flat-screen on the wall entertaining an emaciated boy sitting on the floor in dirty clothes. No chairs, little food, little furniture, and majorly malnourished people, but MTV and HBO and HTV (Ho Chi Minh channel) are going strong. Not sure where these priorities are from.

Anyhow, we destroyed the walls of the family's home. Have to destroy it to save it, we say. We're going to build the new house on the same site, so they will live a few feet away in a makeshift tent. We took down the thatch-walls by unwrapping the sharp wire from the bamboo stakes, then stacking the walls elsewhere. We moved the furniture (unearthing a hissing, giant mama gecko in the process--promise, I nearly died), played with the kids while it rained, and waited for the supplies to come.

And waited. And waited.

Finally a riverboat came up to the shore nearby with a boatload of gravel. Just sitting in a pile on the boat. We came up with an assemblyline formation and started passing along the bags of gravel. I was on the boat shoveling and dumping the gravel into the bags, then tossing them to the front of the boat where Kevin handed them to shore. Great back-and-ab workout, by the way. We sang songs the entire time, everything from "I've Been Working on the Railroad" to "I'm a Survivor" to "Ol' Man River" to whatever that song is that says "...give me the beat boys, and free my soul...I wanna get lost in your rock n' roll..." Etc. The accompanying journalists from the Labor newspaper and Tuoi Tre lapped it up.

Lunch was with the social activities group at the home of Ma Bay (Mom #7), the nickname for the sweet woman who will cook us lunch each day. Tom, Hieu and I washed all the dishes afterwards.

We had a quick coffee-break (3.000 dong for ca phe sua da, around 20 cents), then went to the middle and primary schools.

Because of a miscommunication, some kids didn't show today. Tom, Hieu and I prepared for 20+ students and today taught 8 angelic little girls and 1 angelic little boy.

After basic introductions (Hello, my name is Susie. What's your name? My name is Ngoc. My name is Danh. My name is Quyen. My name is Nguyen. Etc.), we taught them the colors. We used flashcards, a catchy song Tom knows about rainbows, and rainbow coloring sheets. We then played Red Light, Green Light--a huge hit. We pretended to be xe may (motorbikes) and xe buyt (buses), by either asking the kids to pantomime riding a bike or putting their hands on one another's shoulders in long chains.

We then played Duck, Duck, Goose--they already knew this, only it's Meo, Meo, Chuit (Cat Cat Rat). We added a few cho (dog), trau (buffalo), ca (fish), and ga (chicken), in there. AWESOME.

Afterwards we had a quick coffee break (I know, I know--I promise I'll brush my teeth hard to avoid coffee stains) and debriefed.

Dinner and karaoke in honor of Rob's birthday are tonight.

Talk to yall later--much love and many apologies for no photos--can't get my laptop to connect to wireless, and the Internet cafe won't let me upload camera photos.

Take care and God bless! Unbelievable--it's starting to rain again.

"When the sun shines we'll shine together, you know I'll be here forever, you can stand under my um-ba-rella..."

Two Women and a Dog Make a Market

It's often said in Viet Nam that two women and a dog make a market. In other words, if you get two women together they will chat and discuss things so much that it's as noisy as a market. Not really sure why the dog is there, but hey.

Our Vietnamese friends have started saying that living with us is like having two foreigners and a Vietnamese student make a market. Apparently we Robertsons plan, discuss and reflect ad nauseum. We're seeing this perceived disparity especially in our plans for the Green Summer campaign in the Ben Tre province. There we'll build houses, do community service work and teach English. Thus we're arranged in trios of two Americans and a Vietnamese student teaching elementary and middleschoolers basic English.

Even in these pre-teaching preparations, it's apparent that all of us having widely-variant backgrounds and ideas of pedagogy, especially Vietnamese versus Americans. Some of us prefer the kids to remain absolutely silent while lecturing, others want the kids to ask questions throughout. Some of us feel that the alphabet is especially key to learning English, others think that listen, repeat and recognize would better serve the kids' situation. How about the merits of colored pencils versus markers? Should the kids have small chalkboards and chalk or should we destroy the rain forest by distributing reams of paper? Mostly minutiae, you see.

We're going to have a difficult time communicating exactly what we mean to each other, but the result will be a mixture of both cultures. We can't teach English without the Vietnamese to explain it, and the Vietnamese can't convey the meaning of English fully without us. It'll be a market of haggling, language-mongers who'll bargain for the best.








Just for fun, here is a photo of two I took recently at the Binh Tanh market. They sell LIVE frogs and other animals for food, along with various fruits (which I adore) and vegetables.






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For our last few days in Saigon before going to the Ben Tre province to participate in the Green Summer community service program, we are soaking up Ho Chi Minh City.

This past Sunday I woke up nice and early to head to the nearby Nha Tho Duc Ba, or Cathedral of the Holy Father, for the 7:30am service. My first Vietnamese language teacher, a sweet lady named Van, went with me. The Vietnamese service was pretty much incomprehensible to me, but I definitely grasped the liturgy common to every Catholic church. I felt strangely about taking Communion. Sitting there on the hard bench watching rows of reverent fellow Christians, I really wanted to go up and share in the symbolic acceptance of bread and wine as a renewal of one's faith in Christ, but I remembered I was in a Catholic church. Even if I couldn't speak their language and they weren't about to interrogate me as to my particular faith, every Catholic church holds that the table is for church members only. My church promotes all Christians to join, and I have always felt slighted and upset by Catholic communion tables' off-limits status.

My teacher, a good Vietnamese Catholic who has attended since she was younger than ten years old, told me it was good for me to go up. Not only "not a problem," but "good" for me to go up. She said the priest hadn't said anything about only Catholics attending the table, and I believe in the Priesthood of All Believers doctrine put forth by Martin Luther (Speaking of which, I just bought the ripped-off DVD of "Luther," which is fantastic!). Thus I took Communion in a Catholic church for the first time, half a world away from my home. Communion in a nation renowned in American textbooks for being long under the stringent yoke of socialist restriction, and no communion in the land of opportunity and freedom from sea to shining sea.

After church my teacher walked with me to a nearby cafe for breakfast. She ordered the standard Vietnamese dish of pho bo (Vietnamese noodles with lightly cooked beef), and I went after the bun noodle special with crab spring rolls. Deeeeeelicious! We had a wonderful conversation spanning family, weddings (apparently brides usually wear red), the differences between "lease" and "rent" in English, and other random topics. We get along great, and we both hope to stay in touch no matter where in the world we travel.

We stopped by a bookstore to find CDs for her to use in her lesson planning. Van teaches Vietnamese to American students such as myself, and she also teaches English to younger kids. The bookstore was filled with a plethora of books in Chinese, Korean, French and Japanese.

The best part was looking at the cutesy, girly notebooks covered in poor, misunderstood English. I bought a notebook that says "Let is have a funny time with us!" and is covered in strawberries, and I also bought a pink polka-dotted notebook with a small yellow chick proclaiming "Pancakes is my fdourite." Awesome!
















Later that afternoon my friends Phat, Tram and I visited the local Cao Dai temple in HCMC. You'll remember that in an earlier post I documented for you a worship ceremony at the heart of Cao Dai, the Tay Ninh temple. The one pictured here is much smaller but retains the same basic structure, a trifecta of Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism with sprinkled elements of Catholicism, Hinduism and more. (Don't be alarmed by the multiple swastikas; the Buddhists have been using the symbol for long before Adolf took a shine to it.)




















There was an entry portrait of three especially venerated figures in Cao Dai: Victor Hugo, Nguyen Binh Khiem, and Sun Yat-Sen. All three leaders and writers, uniting in the search for Harmony, a universal God, Peace and that many-splendored thing, Love.


















The shrine to the right is dedicated to the founder of the Cao Dai religion, a man named Ngo Van Chieu. He had a vision, which he ascribed to divinity, of the East and West uniting under one common religion. Thus it follows that the primary figures would be Victor Hugo (representing Europe and the West, and even more so the French influence upon Viet Nam), Sun Yat-Set (representing the East, and especially China and its changes since the revolution), and finally Nguyen Binh Khiem (famous poet laureate of Viet Nam).

Anyhow, things are going well with me, if you're curious for personal details. Had a bad egg sandwich the other day from one of our favorite street vendors, but that's fine now. Happily entertaining questions from concerned strangers (just yesterday a man I've never met asked me "why no hat?" in Vietnamese. He didn't understand why I wasn't vainly preserving my white skin). I'm ready to leave Ho Chi Minh City for a time to see a different part of Viet Nam, but I'm sure glad we're coming back after our 3-week stint in Ben Tre for about 6 days in the city.
















Oh, and the performance for the Green Summer opening ceremony on Friday the 13th? (Good thing I'm not a triskaidekaphobic, or I'd've been nervous to perform in front of 20,000 or something.) Check out this article if you want a really great photo of Tom and myself:

Click this for the article on the Vietnamese Communist youth newspaper Tuoi Tre to see photos of Tom, myself and some real celebrities


Tom and I really did dance and lip-synch to our recorded version of the Backstreet Boys' "I Want It That Way" in front of just under 20,000 folks. Our friends' parents called to say that they all saw the televised program as well. YIKES! Yikes especially 'cause of our grossly baggy lue t-shirts representing the Green Summer campaign. You know I'd have gone for the Britney Spears or X-tina Aguilera look for my pop debut had I the choice. :) Not.

And heck yes, we had a mosh pit! One boy even ran up on-stage to hand me a glowstick.

People have already approached Tom on the street, asking for autographs and hugs. Thankfully I look like a lot of people with my average height, weight and coloring (well, not so much here), so I'm keeping a low profile. :)





Apparently it went well though...our interview beforehand in Vietnamese and English (for which we were told what answers to give, which we somewhat obeyed) was fine. I even used a little bit of Vietnamese slang, which the crowd loved (biet chet lien = I'd die if I knew). Tom was his charming self and told everyone he loved the national noodle dish, pho. They asked us why we chose "I Want It That Way" which, you'll kindly remember, we were commanded to sing. So I answered sweetly that "we thought it was most appropriate to honor your compelling invitation." Something along those lines. :) Thanks for your prayers.

I've now checked off being an Asian pop star from my list of things to do before I die. As for me, I "never want to hear you say, I want it that way." Yeah.




P.S. I know there's a ton in this entry, but there's a possibility I'll be offline for 3 weeks, returning to Saigon on August 5th. Thus, here are some extras:

Annalee and Kevin found an infant kitten in the trash yesterday. His name is Boom and he's coming with us to improve the world, starting with Ben Tre. If infant cat care is your specialty, speak up!









Miss yall!

Sing It Softer...Now Slower...Ok, Just Better

In a few days our Robertson group will embark on the Green Summer campaign in the Ben Tre province of Viet Nam. We'll be working with Vietnamese students to contribute to the community by building homes, teaching English to kids, and doing general, per-request fixer-up work in the town.

I'm very excited about the upcoming work, and I'm also interested to see the Ben Tre province from which my beloved roommate, Tram, hails. However, there are certain obstacles that we've had to overcome in order to participate in this program.

First, we're informed that the director of the Green Summer campaign is throwing an auspicious kick-off ceremony featuring multiple dance and musical groups and speeches. There will be 25,000 people in attendance and a televised recording to celebrate Green Summer's start. Yay!

Second, we're informed that we are going to be one of those dance and musical groups in front of that 25,000 and televised audience. And that if we choose not to contribute our musical abilities, we won't get to participate in the Green Summer campaign and will ruin chances of involvement for the Robertson Program as long as the director is the director.

WHAT. RIDICULOUS. LEVERAGE.

You'll kindly remember our stressful but successful performance for the IYC program (see earlier post), and how on the day of the event we threw together a better-than-decent rendition of "Seasons of Love" and moved around enthusiastically on-stage in an imitation of dancing.

OK, we think. For this Green Summer business we can just do that again.
No, we're told. The director was something "more formal," "practiced" and "maybe wearing uniforms". Nevermind that we're not professionals and at least one of us (me) doesn't have a lick of dancing ability.

After protesting vehemently and explaining repeatedly that we are not a professional group and would just do the best we could, the director relented. OK, we're told, the group doesn't have to perform. But Tom and Susie, the two soloists from the IYC performance that the director happened to have attended, will perform. And it will be good, it will be practiced, it will be entertaining and professional.

Tom and I are somewhat chafing under these surreal demands. How can someone in a position of importance such as director of the Green Summer campaign enforce such demands on guests who clearly aren't musical pros and just here to study and do community work? It takes a very special, puerile show-off, that's how. Just guess the song this guy has the nerve to request/command us to sing.

You are my fire
My one desire
Believe when I say
I want it that way


Heck yes, I'm serious. Tom and I will be performing the Backstreet Boys' once-upon-a-time hit, "I Want It That Way." Well, I for one do not "want it that way." Incredulous queries met with the mantra that if we don't sing and cause trouble, there'll be no Green Summer.

Tom and I reconcile to the idea and agree, we'll impersonate a former band of four males who sing like females with lyrics a three-year-old ought to have no trouble with. We'll take one for the team.

On Tuesday evening, we left class early to go rehearse with the band. This isn't so bad, we think. We'll get to practice with a band, see the venue, get a feel for setting up our performance on Friday. What does 25,000 seats even look like?

Our taxicab takes us to the address, stopping in front of a small clothing store. Huh?

Through the clothing store we walk, coming into a small recording studio. A recording booth stands in the corner as a Vietnamese rock-chick screams out lyrics into a mike, ears covered with giant plush headphones like an airplane pilot would use.

A savvy, gelled-and-mulleted man nimbly adjusts dials on a recording machine, watching neon sound waves travel across his computer monitor. Oh yeah, we're really in a recording studio, one of the worst torture chambers for a musician, because you hear your voice over...and over...and over...







When the singer was finished in the booth, Tom and I were told we'd be making a recording because, since we'd let them know we weren't professional, if anything went wrong on Friday we'd having this recording. Oh, and didn't we know we were lip-synching?? And please, you both can't sing together. After singing: would Susie please go lower, and would Tom sing that "tell me why" just a few more piercing pitches higher, maybe fifty times more?

We're also told, in frustrated, broken English, to just try...try to sing it...BETTER?







The best part of the evening: after an hour and a half of annoying lyrics sung soulfully in a sweltering sound booth filled with black egg-crate-covered walls, Tom's voice gave a terrified jump in the midst of "tell me why." Immediately the man at the controls put this embarrassing clip on a loop and played it over and over. The guys at the controls threw back their heads ad laughed uproariously, singing along an accented "tell me why", mocking Tom mercilessly.




Torture. Torquemada would be proud. We've reached beyond the heights of ridiculous and falsely said we "wanted it that way." Luckily Tom has a saint's patience and the good nature of good nature itself.









After creating an unusual but satisfactory version of the song and discovering a newfound admiration for remixing pop, we relaxed at Pho 2000, a franchise proud to have served former Pres. Bill Clinton. Very hearty pho there--we'll be back. I'll keep you posted on our Friday evening performance in front of the 25,000 on HTV (popular Vietnamese station). Please keep us in your prayers and send us all the pop mojo you've got.

Rain, Rain, More Rain, and a Rainbow

Our third day in the central region consisted of a trip to Bach Ma mountain. In the morning we went hiking in chilly, biting rain for just a short time up to a small but picturesque peak. The mixture of rain and morning mist kind of obscured our vista, but you can still see the lagoon among the mountains and if you're really good you can see the rice paddies as well.


















Our guide for the morning was an unbelievably toned, tough, buff, muscular, compact little man who introduced himself as Quyen. Although his English was superb, his accent squeezed out "Queen" rather than how you'd think Quyen would be pronounced. Hence the rest of the trip due to his musculature and nomenclature we dubbed him "Mighty Queen." He loved it. Or he didn't get it. Either way.




The hike was lovely. We crossed streams, stepped through leafy puddles, turned on steep paths that practically turned on themselves, and avoided tricky roots. And it rained, rained and rained.


About halfway to our destination of the beautiful Bach Ma waterfall, Annalee and Kelsey alerted us with screams that we were not alone on the path.

Countless stringy, slimy and dark creatures were inching through puddles and down tree bark to wriggle into our sodden socks and unprotected ankles. These intelligent, one-track minded leeches were small but indomitable. They attached themselves with horrific efficiency, drawing blood, which attracted more of them, and resisting being swatted away by continuing to wave their circular mouths around in search of sweet skin.

It was ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLE. I know I'm hounding this point, but those things are nasty and ought to be obliterated. Happily I only sustained one bite on my ankle, but the other bite was a mysterious location on my left ribs. That's TERRIFYING to realize they can travel so far, and what other territory they are capable of reaching...Pablo and Annalee attracted the most, getting somewhere in the range of 14 pinprick bites apiece.

Anyhow, we courageously continued our damp trek, making frequent leech-removal stops. Speculation on their bloodthirsty avarice included the facts that it was raining and leeches are attracted to water, we'd already had a bite or injury or two that probably smelled like lunch, we stopped in puddles where they thrive, we didn't all wear long socks or long pants to thwart them ever so slightly, and so forth.

We reached the start of the steps descending to reach the waterfall. The steps were slick, smooth stone steps varying in height from a half-foot to two-and-a-half feet high.

SIX HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-FIVE STEPS LATER...and heck yes we counted...we reached an amazing view of the waterfall. And it kept raining the entire time.


Here's the view, which you get with considerably less effort than our soaked, Herculean efforts:


And then we had to climb SIX HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-FIVE STEPS back UP. Irregular, stone-hewn steps in an unrelenting ascension up a recently rain-washed mountain. It was tough on the ol' quads, but felt great when we finished.


The waterfall was lovely, yes. But when we returned to the only hotel next to the only restaurant on the mountain (both having proven themselves hospitable to leeches) and we pulled off bloody socks and determined leeches hanging on for the meal, we had to wonder if it was worth it.

I'm glad I did it; I love being outside and seeing the gorgeous sights God's created. Good things take work...blood, sweat and tears sometimes.

Plus, we saw this peaceful sight when we returned.

Quirks of Royal Tombs

Our lunch in Hue on the second day was filling and rather fascinating. We had sticky rice paste wrapped in banana leaves (not my favorite by any stretch of the imagination; the texture and taste reminded me of old raw oysters, YUCK) as well as delicious fried rice with vegetables ("the best fried rice I've had in Viet Nam" --Kiley) and spring rolls, which I'm always crazy for. The spring rolls (cha gio) here are totally unlike those in the United States. Here they are fried very delicately, are much less greasy, have more meat than breading, and are generally rewardingly wonderful.

Anyhow, the restaurant Lac Thanh was somewhat of an oddity. The sign outside (as you may be able to read in the photo provided) that the owner was blind and mute, but his daughter could speak and even speak English well.

Most likely popularized through the positive description in the Lonely Planet guide to Viet Nam, the restaurant has seen more than its fair share of international travelers. The walls are covered in red markered comments, ranging from dirty graffiti to glowing reviews of the food to poetic vignettes from people's time in Viet Nam. Lots of them were very nationalist, and more of them were not the sort of thing you'd like quoted at your grandmother's funeral.

After lunch we traveled to the tomb of fourth Vietnamese emperor Tu Duc, ruler from 1848 to 1883.

As you can see, his tomb's entrance is pretty darn fancy. The emperor built a small lake filled with lotus at the entrance to his complex. The small island in the center served as his personal hunting grounds, and the building directly on the lake was used for meditation/breakfast/storing hunting gear.

Every day his servants would go to the trees beside this building and collect the dew from the leaves, which they would then use to make his fresh morning tea. Talk about extravagance.


The complex also housed his collection of concubines, who didn't seem to have the best deal (see "renovated" housing quarters to the left).













The emperor's office, pictured to the right, seems far preferable to me.













The emperor placed a number of stone statues surrounding his tomb, adhering to the ancient idea that the stone figures would aid him in the afterlife (khiep sau). I have my doubts about an emperor who puts his reincarnated future in the rough hands of stoned soldiers. :)

Here are two of my pals showing off their enviable Chinese knowhow. Much of the Tu Duc tomb is engraved with Chinese characters, as these were used widely prior to French colonization, which brought about the Vietnamese adoption of the Roman alphabet and later quoc ngu, or the written form of Vietnamese.

Behind Pablo's intense gaze is the actual tomb of emperor Tu Duc, a slightly raised stone dais that locals argue doesn't really hold his body. Who knows?






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We then continued on to the tomb of emperor Khai Dinh, a far more impressive edifice than that of Tu Duc. The tomb/palace is situated in the midst of heavily forested mountains, and it is a striking contrast with the financially strapped community near it.









The inner walls are possibly the most gorgeous mosaic of glass, ceramic and polished stones that I have ever seen. Here's just a glimpse at the intricate artistry that speaks of the wealth and sophistication these emperors demanded.















Here is my friend Samson perched atop one of the giant stone dragon, one of the requisite protective guardians that defends the entryway to Khai Dinh's tomb.












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Not the best-quality photo I've ever taken, but the above shot lets you know just how jam-packed was the market we visited after the temples. Take your pick of any gewgaws, trinkets, baubles, tchotchkes, etc. The stalls are alarmingly full of items, and the vendors are even more alarmingly eager to snag a foreigner's arm and wring the cash out of their wallets through persuasion of many kinds.

I made it out (with no prior intentions to buy) with only two small items and an ao dai silk shirt, so I count myself among the lucky ones. :) My only defense was to helplessly state that I was just a college student (sinh vien!!! em hoc o truong dai hoc!!!! khong tien!), which somewhat put them off.

Finally, to finish out our wonderful evening, we decided to take rickshaw rides through the city of Hue. Our drivers were considerably jolly and unsurprisingly wiry and strong guys, eager to chat with us in Vieglish. The nighttime air was cool and breezy, probably thanks to being so close to the river that runs through Hue.

It's no wonder to me that the Vietnamese monarchs chose Hue as their home and imperial city.