Ode to ants

Dear Mr and Ms Ants---wait, just Ms because all the worker ones are female, right?

I have tried to be patient with you as you wander around aimlessly in my room but it’s time you recognize your place. I don’t mind you existing and furthermore, I don’t mind you crawling around in my general vicinity. However, if I am doing work, I would very much appreciate it if you don’t crawl across the paper I am currently looking at. It rather distracts me and my task then becomes determining a way to remove you from my target paper. I did try to be nice at first and give you a smooth transition to another suitable place to crawl but now, I feel that I must resort to flicking you away. I hope you land somewhere safely and can continue your little ant-like mannerisms in an area not quite so close to my area of work.

Also, please try not to crawl on my computer. I know this is a paranoid sort of thought but you buggers are tiny, and when I see you crawl about there, I imagine you going into the little cracks and crevices of this complex device and somehow causing utter destruction from the inside. Insane? Probably. But beware of more aggressive attacks if you dare venture onto said computer.

Now some positives for you ants, since this note has been full of so many negatives (and no one wants to be a negative Nancy). I appreciate your smallness. It makes you cute in a sense and if I had the time, I wouldn’t mind playing with you like I once played with ants as a child. Your smallness also makes you undetectable when you crawl upon me which I believe is a plus because I don’t freak out as much. And lastly, I commend your durability. I flicked one of your fellowants just recently from my computer and she landed somewhere else and continued her trek to…well wherever it is she wanted to go. Oh, and I think it’s really cool how fast your little legs move. I try and think about how fast humans could walk if we could move our legs at the same speed, and the thought really is rather comical.

Best wishes,

Your sometimes (and reluctant) exterminator

A little contemplation

I suppose a little contemplation is needed at the moment. I just went to visit my aunt's cousin (I don't know how that relates her to me title-wise--second aunt?) and she and her family are absolutely lovely. She is a Vietnamese American like me who came to Vietnam 10 years ago. She had intended to stay only for a year but she started teaching and met her husband and well, now she's got two adorable halfsie kids living in a beautiful neighborhood.

Meeting and talking to her has made me think a bit about the life of foreigners and their children here. Most (if not all) send their kids to international schools where they are taught in English and rarely get exposed to Vietnamese. I don't blame them for this since there are some things that I don't agree with in the ways Vietnamese handle their education (e.g., strict memorization, lack of creativity). Most foreigners don't speak Vietnamese themselves, so at home, they get English as well. My friend is in a different situation since she speaks Vietnamese quite fluently and has got Vietnamese nannies to help keep the kids bilingual. However, it seems that in most cases, you get children who grew up in Vietnam but don't speak it much, and I have no idea what that must be like. I haven't met any adults with this background yet since I'm assuming that this is something of the current generation, but I wonder what kind of upbringing that's like. It seems so opposite in the U.S where immigrants and their children (especially) are often eager to learn the language and the ways.

So is this a question of superiority? Stubbornness? Familiarity?

I've got a couple of ideas but I think I'll stop here for the sake of not endlessly going on. Anywho, just some food for thought as to the dynamics of assimilation between foreign and native populations in a different setting...

To Vinh Long

I just got back from visiting my parent's hometown, Vinh Long. On my mom's side, I've got a fair share of family there and two aunts from my dad's side. I was there for four days so didn't get the chance to visit everyone properly--another visit has been demanded.

So a couple of revelations from being in Vinh Long.

1) My mother really was incredibly pretty when she was younger. I never got to see any photos of her before she had come to the U.S. and it was great to see the few photos her family had taken of her before she left. Being in Vietnam has allowed me to learn tons more about her and I've come to admire her very much...To devote your youth to taking care of your family, helping your parents make an income, raising your younger siblings (the youngest was born when my grandma was almost 50!), refusing suitors because getting married would mean being unable to continue supporting your family...and then leaving Vietnam against your father's wishes in hopes of raising them out of poverty. I wish I had the same sort of passion and strength she did.

Here is my Ma Mi when she was around 20 years old. She is in the center wearing a salmon colored ao dai. The aunt I live with now is on the right of her.

2) Vietnamese people (or at least my family, both here in Vietnam and the U.S.) are incredibly adept at picking out little differences in physical features. For example, every time I visit my grandma, I'm either skinnier or fatter (which is what they prefer considering my paper thinness). I apparently I have a very good and pretty nose that I got from my dad. And I'm also getting too dark. From the encouragement of my aunts and cousins, I combatted the darkening powers of the sun with this get-up:

3) Riding a motorbike is tougher (for me) than I anticipated. I think my lack of balance and easily spooked nature doesn't help.

4) I really enjoy having cousins my age. In the U.S., everyone is either much older or younger than me. Having Tam around has been a lot of fun and it allows me to goof off. I'm glad I've finally met these guys:

So now, I'm back in Saigon and trying to get things set up for beginning work. It's good to be back here since it's like home now and to be away from the mosquitoes who love Viet Kieu (people who are Vietnamese by ethnicity but don't live in Vietnam) blood for whatever reason.

Phase One: Complete

So today was my last day of the CELTA course, a sweet finish to an intense but fun four weeks. I've definitely learned a ton about learning and teaching a foreign language which will probably help me on my quest to become completely fluent in Vietnamese. The students have been great, eager, and entertaining to chat with and so have my classmates. I've definitely learned tons on this course and I'm excited to start teaching (hopefully little ones =P)

Here is the last class I taught--these guys were great fun and energetic.

On our last day of the course, we took out all the classes to karaoke. Definitely discovered some hidden talents amongst us. I took a go at an old Vietnamese song, "Khong," which basically is about a guy who doesn't love a girl anymore: "No. No. I don't love, I don't love, you anymooooore" is literally how it goes.

My cousin, Tam, has also been a very gracious guide during my time here. We've gone out for yummy food, coffee, drinks, frozen yogurt, and so forth. Here we are at one of the many outdoor cafés:

Now that I'm finally done with this demanding course, I've had a bit of time to explore HCMC a bit. Yesterday, my cousin, Chi Tu, took me out to the market. It was probably what you would expect a market would look like in Vietnam: crowded, teeny aisles, small cubicles with clothes draping all over the walls, food vendors of all sorts, beautiful fabrics for making ao dais...And if you can't imagine it, here is a small visual:

I also went and got my hair cut and permed. I thought, why the hell, it's rather cheap to get those things done here. I'm not quite sure if I'm happy with the perm since at the moment, it's a bit of a poofy mess but eh, regardless, it's not a big deal and it was a fun (and long, say 4-5 hours?) experience. A picture of my sexy ridiculousness:

Perhaps after the hair has calmed down, I'll let you see the result. =P

Amongst the whirlwind of things

Favorite quote so far during my time here:

Anh Binh (my cousin's husband): [about pets in Vietnam] If they help us, we love them. If they don't, we eat them.

So for those who have wondered, yes they eat dogs here. They also eat field rats from the country. Apparently those are rather good. I'll let you know when I've tried some (not dog though, don't think i'll be eating that).

An interesting thing here is that people are very keen on keeping their skin as pale as possible. If it's sunny outside, I'll go out wearing a tank top and shorts and I'm an obvious foreigner. Locals here will have gloves, jackets and whatnot to cover their skin and to keep them from tanning. Funny how in the U.S., everyone's obsessed with being tan and here, everyone's all about being like Snow White. It's especially interesting that for me, I find white skin more attractive while I'm in Vietnam but I think the reverse is true when I'm in the U.S. Is this the context/environment getting to me or do Americans actually look better tan and Asians better pale? It's probably the former, isn't it?

I get mini panic attacks when I'm on the motorbikes here. Think streets like the game Frogger. I have total faith in my cousin who skillfully maneuvers around the streets, pedestrians, and drivers but I really do freak out a bit when he's off telling me about some landmark or building and doesn't have his full attention on the road. There have been a lot of almost accidents but I've yet to witness a collision, which is a good thing.

I'm getting more and more comfortable teaching. The first day, I was incredibly nervous and after I had finished, was completely skeptical of the reason I was doing the course even though the lesson had went well. Now, I'm feeling more confident and all my lessons have been generally successful! There really is a lot of thought that is put into teaching though, so I've got to pay much more respects to my teachers/professors now that I've been put in their shoes.

Phew...

It's been one week since I've been here and this CELTA course definitely kicks butt. I was able to use my slightly off circadian rhythm to my advantage since I've been needing to wake up early to prepare for teaching practices (so waking up at 6AM hasn't been a bad thing at all). Teaching has been fun, but boy, it's definitely tons of work.

The students, and everyone in general, have been rather curious about me. The first day I taught was an introductory lesson where they got to guess some facts about me, e.g., nationality, number of siblings, etc. For nationality, they all guessed Korean or Japanese and it was a surprise for them to hear that I was a Vietnamese American. When I go out to the streets and speak [my broken] Vietnamese, I often get asked where I'm from as well. Some are especially nice and say that I speak Vietnamese well, but I know they are lying. =P

On my first day out, my cousin, Tam, took me around Saigon. Unfortunately, I didn't realize where to place my feet on the motorbike and I just put them wherever. I noticed them getting a little hot but thought nothing of it. When I got off the bike, however, I realized they had slightly melted one of my sandals because I had put it on the exhaust. It's OK though. I can still use them. In fact, I'm wearing them now.

To Janny, Anni, Varni and Shuk, I've yet to try squeezle. I don't know if they have it here and don't know how to translate. However, I will ask around to see. Plus (this might be because I haven't really been out all that much yet) I haven't seen the on the street karaoke. I know there are a lot of karaoke places though...maybe I'm in the wrong district?

Preparations

Exactly two weeks from now I'll be on my way to Vietnam. It's rather bittersweet-- a lot to leave behind, a lot to look forward to, but overall, I'm glad to be starting something new.

Because I will be disappearing to the other side of the world shortly, I've decided to start a blog about my experiences, thoughts, and encounters during my time there in order to keep my friends and family updated. Hopefully I can regale you with my stories and photos and would be more than happy to hear what has been going on on your sides as well.

I'm starting to feel the crunch and really should get to packing. I've got a suitcase that's stuffed with random things, including 20 icy hots (not for me-- my aunt wants to send them to relatives in Vietnam and I am the convenient courier), but I should get a more concrete idea of what I'll be bringing...

Anything that I should be sure to bring? Let me know!