Merry Christmas, Ho Chi Minh!

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Well, here we go, the first blog entry in nearly a month. I can’t quite explain how I’ve managed to neglect it for so long, suffice to say that I tried writing a new entry twice and both times shut the computer before finishing the first paragraph. I think it has something to do with making the transition from traveling abroad to living abroad and in doing so, I find myself chronicling my experiences a lot less. An increased workload is also a factor as it seems my free time these days is for the most part spent lying on my bed half asleep, wishing I had more free time before my next class. But enough is enough, today is the triumphant return of the blog! I was thinking of writing two separate entries - an update on accommodation/work and a Christmas special - but now I'm leaning towards a mega +4000 word super-blog, so you might want to grab a cushion and use the bathroom before settling into this. I'm feeling good so far, at home on Christmas Eve, with a bed full of snacks and a bottle of red, and a new writing playlist on shuffle - let’s do this.

To begin with, a brief description of 16 Tran Khac Chan, our humble abode. The building in which we reside is technically a “house” but really, it’s more like a hotel corridor turned vertically and wedged between two other buildings. Seven near identical rooms branch off a set of very steep stairs that run from my room on the basement floor to the magnificent rooftop deck. The first floor has a kitchen area that leads to a living room setup with a corner couch and a television (I should note: in Vietnam, the “first” floor is not the ground floor; it is the first floor above the ground floor, which in turn is usually referred to as the basement. It’s always fun to ride with an American in an elevator going down and give them a look as the doors open on Floor 1 and nobody gets out, a look that says “Really? You must be new here”). Each room in our house is fully furnished with a bed, closet, desk, television, air conditioner, and a bathroom full of rocks. That’s right, each bathroom is its own Pacific Northwest beach, with a thin layer of rocks covering the moldy linoleum flooring. The owner must have done the math and reasoned, “Why take the time to tear up and replace the floor when some cheap quarry labor and a couple of wheelbarrows will hide the drab? Besides, it looks exotic!” With some practice, one can work a half-decent massage into the arches of the foot while showering, though I do still find myself instinctively checking for mussels by the drain.

The rooftop is where we tend to socialize as a “family”. There are seven people in all - in the top picture, from left to right: Leanne (born in Vietnam, raised in Australia), Kate (Washington D.C.), myself, Michelle (Atlanta), Lindsey (Chicago), Emily (Washington D.C.) and Charlie (Boston). We are all LanguageCorps graduates, with everyone except me meeting in Cambodia the month before I was there. It is nice to live with other teachers because we can share experiences, materials, tips, warnings, and, most importantly, funny stories about students/other teachers. These are usually reserved for “roof talk”. Our house roof is high enough above the surrounding buildings that an evening breeze is almost always in the air. That the breeze brings wafts of exhaust, garbage, and dead animals is beside the point. Even with the city haze, of which there is plenty, we can get a nice view of the city. And it is always delightfully warm. On nights where it’s too early to sleep but too late to go out, I might wander up to the roof with a beer to just lean on the railing and wait for an inevitable accident and possible ensuing brawl at the treacherous five-way intersection half a block from our house. Sometimes I wonder why people ever bother with TV in this city.

Continuing that thought on traffic, the basement area outside my room serves as a garage for our bikes; out of the seven of us, five have bikes. It is really a varied group. Charlie, ever the alpha male, rents a motorbike from a friend of Hien for about $50 a month. The rest of us ride electric bikes, which are smaller and consequently slower, but are able to be plugged in at night and charged up like a cell phone. Some electric bikes, like Emily’s and Leanne’s, are designed in China and are quite nifty, with two seats and a front plate and body similar to that on a motorbike. Kate has a lighter model, more like an actual bicycle, but with similar kick and acceleration to the others’. And then there is mine. The bike I ride was actually acquired from an older LanguageCorps graduate named Rich who had wanted to rent a motorbike while keeping his old electric only to find out from his landlord after coming home with a rental that he was not allowed to hold two bikes at one time, so he let me borrow the old bike. The bike is a real one-of-a-kind, custom made at a shop quite near us and unlike most other, newer electric bikes, proudly displays the bulky silver battery pack on the back grating, which I have since jerry-rigged into the base of a passenger seat with the help of some Styrofoam, two bungee cords, and an old bicycle seat. The brake pads have long since lost their grip and when fully applied, grant the bike a stopping capacity roughly equal to that of a cross-country freight train, not the most endearing quality in a driving culture that tends to enjoy mercilessly cutting off one another. Fortunately, a warranty was included upon purchase because between Rich and I, the bike has been repaired roughly nine times. The most recent drop by the shop was a couple weeks ago on my ride home from work after the engine, when throttled, began to emit a loud, abrasive noise similar to what I imagine filling a blender with ball bearings and pushing the “liquefy” button sounds like. After poking and prodding the bike for about half an hour, the shopkeepers decided that if the throttle still turned the back wheel, the bike was not actually broken and sent me home, a ride I remember half expecting to lose a couple limbs in the event of the bike going the way of the Space Shuttle Challenger. But at the time of this writing, the poor thing is still going, croaking and wheezing me to work each day, the horrible engine noise sounding other drivers two blocks away of my arrival; it reminds me of Little Miss Sunshine when the van horn gets stuck.

As bikes are a way of life in Vietnam, and especially Saigon, they are used as status determiners for all those who ride them. Only those too poor or too young to buy a motorbike get around by bicycle. On the other hand, for those who can afford a top-notch machine, say, the Suzuki NightRider, it is seen as a loss of face to ride anything less expensive. The same is true for clothing and shoes: people wear what they can afford, nothing less. As a frequent shopper of Value Village and Goodwill, this concept is a little discordant with my lifestyle. A Westerner who rides the rickety bucket-of-bolts that I do is basically saying to the Vietnamese, “I have no idea how your socio-economic culture works.” And maybe in saying that notion is not true in my case, I’m giving myself more credit than I deserve. But I have put in effort to adapt certain particularities of my former life into this new one; hell, I even learned how to wear a tie. And for a short time I thought of purchasing a nicer, more expensive replacement bike, one in particular named the “Little Overlord”, but after a test drive I realized that despite flaws too many to count, I really enjoy riding the bike I have; the form-follows-function approach is somewhat indicative of who I am and like a good captain, I think I’ve chosen to, in effect, go down with my ship.

Funny enough, electric bicycles are held in such disdain by the masculine contingent of the city that their riders are pardoned from most driving laws (and by “most” I mean all three). Riders of electric bikes do not have to wear helmets, as is the law for motorcyclists. The idea behind this is, as far as I can tell, that riding an electric bike actually causes ones head to bounce harmlessly off anything remotely hard upon impact if one should ever be hit, therefore rendering a helmet quite unnecessary. Makes sense, right? If the States followed the Vietnamese strand of logic, drivers of hybrid cars would not have to stop at red lights and their passengers would be able to enjoy a breezy drive on the interstate with their torso and head propped out of the sunroof.

Additionally, anything short of slinging Ho Chi Minh’s dead body into the passenger seat and riding around reciting lines from Apocalypse Now through a megaphone, Vietnamese policemen will never pull over riders of bicycles or electric bikes. They just aren’t worth the trouble - the “untouchables” of the road, as it were. Which, to be frank, is just fine with me. At the moment there is a large crackdown on foreigners riding motorbikes without licenses, and since the processes and paperwork needed for a foreigner to obtain a license are all in Vietnamese (coincidence?), most foreigners who do ride motorbikes can expect to be hounded by the law. Rich told me a story in which he was pulled over for no reason and after spending several minutes futilely trying to understand what the policemen was saying to him, he eventually comprehended that it was the phrase no foreigner living in a socialist nation ever wants to hear: “You pay for your mistake.” After asking how much, the policemen told him 500,000 Dong (about $30), an outrageous sum. Upon request, Rich was allowed to drive to an ATM so long as he promised to return and pay the officer - a promise that I believe both men understood as, you get out of here quick before I run out of memorized English phrases to recite.

Learning to drive a motorbike in Saigon is a lot like learning to swim in the ocean during a hurricane; one either becomes an expert very quickly or dies a horrible death in the process. That said, after the first two or three heart-arresting trips, driving around in the middle of traffic becomes a lot less intimidating than standing on the side watching it fly past. Once moving, the bike current sweeps riders along and at that point it’s a matter of simply weaving around obstacles such as pedestrians, slower bikes, and accident victims lying in the street; it’s a little like conquering the river in the last stage of the classic computer game Oregon Trail - watch out for those rocks! The two most difficult components I've found while driving in Saigon are learning to handle getting nudged in the rear every time while coming to a stop and dealing with the incessant honking from bikes, cars, and trucks. After over a month of riding in traffic, I still find it difficult to not take it personally when taxis honk from behind to notify me of their presence. In the States, the gesture would mean, “Hey moron, watch where you’re going!” whereas here, it is taken as, “I could potentially kill you with one flick of this pedal, and I don’t think either of us want that, do we? So tread carefully!” Still, I find myself consistently fighting the urge to display a certain finger every time a horn blasts two feet from my ear.

The driving experience is really one that I cannot describe to anyone outside of the city and so one day driving to work I had an idea. I brought out my camera from my bag and was able to snugly affix it to the inside of my basket with my necktie. Setting it to video mode, I rode a little ways down the street in the hopes of giving others an exclusive first-person view of what it looks like carving through city traffic. Here is the video - (I’ve just learned how to YouTube!) Keep in mind that honestly, I’m not trying to be daring or show off for the camera; this is my every-day commute and actually, the traffic was fairly sparse that afternoon. That said, I chose this shot cause it’s really got it all - jumping between nose and rear, sidewalk detours, shooting the gap. It’s a shame that the majority of city noise is drowned out by the death rattle of my bike but hopefully it gives some idea of what it’s like to ride to work every day.

Speaking of which, I should take some time to talk about my experiences in joining the Vietnamese workforce. Unlike Thailand and Cambodia where teachers are paid in salary, working as an English teacher in Vietnam is a sporadic, oft-fortuitous, pay-by-the-hour job that, if played right, can reap lucrative monthly earnings. A teacher basically starts with a completely blank-slated schedule and it is for the most part up to them how many hours they choose to work each week and at what times on which days. There are three general departments of the English language business: teaching at a private language center, teaching in a public school, and giving individual private lessons. By next month, I will be juggling all three at once.

There are scores of private language centers throughout the city but only a few really large, multi-campus schools - two of which I work at: VUS and Cleverlearn. These schools are structured to hold many different leveled classes, each class meeting once or twice a week for 10-12 weeks. Generally, a teacher will carry the same class throughout the term. Textbooks are used in the classroom and although teacher creativity is encouraged, a syllabus must be adhered to stay on track and cover the material purchased by the students (or rather, their well-off parents). The perk of following a textbook is that lesson preparation work is significantly reduced, as one is not required to design the material by hand. However, that is not to say the textbook teaches the class by itself. Many times, the lessons given are underwhelming and frankly, terribly thought out. For example, the textbook might give instructions for students to pair up and practice asking, “What’s your name?” “My name is Thung. What’s your name?” “My name is Phuong.” This would be just fine except the textbook instructs students to practice in pairs for 45 MINUTES! Apparently, textbooks these days are geared towards lobotomy patients, not jittery children who surf by riding their morning caffeine rush, bouncing off the walls until they inevitably crash with 10 minutes left in class. In some cases, I feel the textbook hinders more than helps, and so a great deal of creative practice, physical activity, and playing games is required by teachers to hold some semblance of attention over the three-hour class. It is rough but rewarding work.

Starting in January, I will be teaching public schooling on weekday mornings. I’ve heard widely contrasting opinions of the experience, ranging from a couple I met at a restaurant who had been public teaching for two years and loved it, to someone who seemed to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown, eyes darting wildly, tearing up at the mention of a public school classroom. So I feel that it is something I should take the time to explore for myself and if it isn’t what I’m looking for, I’ll back right out the door. It sounds like a fantastic time though, lots of singing and games all class - maybe I should invest in a purple dinosaur costume.

Lastly, I am giving individual private lessons twice a week, an endeavor that came around quite by chance and is a story humorous enough that I cannot pass up recounting it here. A woman at Cleverlearn contacted me about taking on a private lesson already in progress because the previous teacher was moving to Japan. I had heard from Rick in Cambodia that one-on-one lessons could be a nuisance and sometimes not worth the time, but not having anything else to do from 2:00-3:30, I decided to give it a crack. She told me over the phone that I was to meet her at 10 Diem Biem Phu and we would talk to the student about the lesson plan together. I hopped on my bike the next day and set off to find the place. Riding down Diem Biem Phu, I passed 16, 14, 12, then an auto-dealership, followed by 8, 6, and then the end of the street. Thinking I had overlooked it, I checked again, then a third time. After pulling up to the front doors, I discovered that the auto-dealership was indeed 10 Diem Biem Phu. And it wasn’t just any dealership - this was Mercedes-Benz, Haxaco division, selling the finest cars in the city for prices only a select few could afford. It was like running into a Le Cirque 2000 in the Kitsap Mall food court. I walked in and found Chung, the woman from Cleverlearn waiting for me and together we walked to a meeting room that featured a counter full of hors d’oeuvres and a fridge stacked with water and juice. After piling a plate full, I sat down and felt it was time to figure out just what was going on:

ME (between bites of spring roll): So what exactly are we doing at the Mercedes-Benz dealership? Are we meeting the student here?
CHUNG: Yes, he will be down shortly.
ME: Down? You mean he works here?
CHUNG: Yes, he works here.
ME: What does he do? Is he in sales or something?
CHUNG: Sort of. He’s the General Director of the company.
ME (wiping crumbs from my chin): You wouldn’t happen to know where the restroom is, would you?

Mr. Duc walked in a few minutes later and after going over the logistics of the lesson, Chung left us alone and we chatted for a good hour about all and everything. As it turns out, Duc is having trouble speaking English with his German partners and so he basically wants practice casually conversing, which I figure I could be obliging enough to help him on. And that is how I ended up meeting twice a week with the Mercedes-Benz Director of Vietnam Operations. I later asked Chung why she assigned this job to me, a new teacher, and she replied, “Because you seemed like his type.” Which is an accurate assessment, I suppose; we actually get along very well and he’s been a great resource so far: the company has given me business cards and recently I’ve actually been working under the table to correct the abysmal English translations in their vehicle model booklets - I finished sections for the new C-Class just last night. Apparently no one in the entire country had bothered to check the translations with a native speaker and so Duc was quite surprised and, I dare say, embarrassed when I soaked each page in red pen, highlighting spelling and grammatical errors. On the whole, it’s decently enjoyable work and for the small fortune they’re paying me, I’m not in any hurry to move on quite yet.

The religious makeup of Vietnam is roughly 85% Buddhist and 8% Christian, with the other 7% made up of, well, “other”. That said, it could be that the entire Christian contingent of Vietnam lives in downtown Saigon because beginning in early December, the whole city is transformed into a winter wonderland of Christmas decorations, music, and attire. Though the high majority of Vietnamese have never laid eyes on an ounce of snow, shopkeepers put up Styrofoam and cotton balls for wobbly plastic reindeer and Santa dolls playing saxophones to stand on. Many restaurants and bakeries dress their begrudging employees in Santa hats or deer antlers and establishments sometimes hire a “Santa” to walk around the grounds handing out toys or food. There’s something about a rail-thin man who cannot grow so much as peach-fuzz on his chin dressing up in a baggy red suit and bushy white beard that I find strangely endearing and I made an effort to have my picture taken with as many Vietnamese Santas as possible. People in the city seem to enjoy Christmas songs and carols but only when placed behind a migraine-inducing dance beat and accompanied by synthesized arpeggios in the background. It is a common thought in sales here that volume attracts customers and so many times competing stores will invest in larger and larger stereo equipment until the beats are so loud that the merchandise is bouncing off the shelves. As I always say, ‘Tis the season for tinnitus.

About two weeks before Christmas, the downtown hub of Le Loi heading up to Pham Ngu Lao was decked out with massive amounts of Christmas lights in the boulevard and a large lit-up green dome in the roundabout covering a hokey nativity scene. Walking down the street at night, one might mistake it for any urban American district during the holidays - inflatable snowmen, plastic holly and berries hanging from above, and of course endorsements everywhere you turn. Lindsey and Kate bought Santa hats for the house and personalized each with paint pen. Feeling festive and merry from a few bottles of Dalat red wine, we hit the strip and had a grand time taking pictures under the lights and acknowledging the “oohs” and “ahhs” from locals admiring our coordinated attire. On the way home, I dropped into a Christmas concert held in the courtyard of the Pink Church near our house; I don’t know if that is the actual name of the building or not but everyone calls it as such because it is a beautiful, old church painted a nice Easter pink - it looks like the centerpiece of a blown up Polly Pocket collection. The concert itself wasn’t that interesting, mostly comprising of bland Vietnamese song and dance numbers, but I did enjoy my viewpoint from a tree that I climbed and took one video of a choir performance in which I loved the image of the conductor’s silhouette against the singers. Many of the pieces were performed by children and it was fun to see them captivated by all the magic of a holiday that they likely know very little about. To Vietnamese children, Christmas is all about lights, music, and presents from Santa. In other words, Christmas means the same thing to Vietnamese children as it does to 95%!o(MISSING)f American children. Which is just fine, I say; why let all the historical/religious mumbo-jumbo get in the way of a mind-warping techno remix of “Here Comes Santa Clause” pumped at 295 beats per minute? I find there is something new I learn each day about the celebration of the Vietnamese Christmas and I must say I’ve enjoyed every minute of it so far.

Which of course is not to say that this holiday season has gone by without missing family and friends from home. Typical, isn’t it, that the one year I am away for winter break the Northwest receives a foot of snowfall and the Christmas Eve Eve Bowl is played on a frozen tundra, ideal backyard football conditions. I find myself missing many things from our holiday home: Mom’s mincemeat pies, Becky’s champagne binge, Dad’s roast potatoes, Jack’s impending new video-game marathon, and oh so, so much more. How lucky I am to be part of such an incredible bunch and I feel slightly spoiled in receiving from them two bulging packages in the post - I look forward to opening them tomorrow! I will also miss the annual Christmas phone calls from family in England but on that note, I received three cards during the writing of this entry, back during the Mercedes-Benz story, one from Grandad, Donie, Rachel, Ruth, and Joze, one from Grandma and Shane, and one from Heather with some pictures from Grandad’s service back in March (frightening looking at me then, I think I’ve lost weight here!) It was very kind of you all to write to me so far away and know that I am proudly displaying the cards on our TV stand upstairs and thinking best Christmas wishes for everyone.

Tonight is a very exciting night for Vietnam: the national football (soccer) team plays Thailand in the first of two games to decide the champion of the AFF Suzuki Cup, basically the Southeast Asian World Cup. Charlie has just returned home wearing a newly purchased red jersey to compliment my white one (which I coincidently seem to be wearing in just about every picture in this entry) and we are going to head down to the little corner bar to watch the game and then hopefully participate in the celebrations downtown when Vietnam wins!

That said, I am going to leave you all with a video of my favorite holiday moment so far in Saigon. It brings a smile to my face every time I watch it and I hope it does the same for you!

To everyone, have a very Merry Christmas and a fantastic New Year!



All the best from Saigon.




FOLLOW UP:

Alright, I should have known not to stop writing before game night on Christmas Eve, which ended up as the outright craziest night in Saigon so far. The game was fantastic and Vietnam pulled it out 2-1. We celebrated goals in the bar and then caught a motorbike downtown to Pham Ngu Lao which by that point was in absolute pandemonium. Fueled by excitement and Tiger Beer, we ran through the streets giving high fives to motorcyclists waving flags while shouting “Vietnam hai, Thailand mot!” at the top of our lungs. The party roared on all night down the streets and into crowded bars and bumping clubs. It was an incredible night by all accounts until around 1:00 on Christmas morning when, all in the span of about one hour, I had my foot run over by a motorbike riding in one of the many cavalries, was groped in the street by a prostitute who, in doing so, was kind enough to relieve me of my wallet, and was then shoved from behind by a taxi driver who didn’t want to drive us all the way home and felt that I slammed his door just a little too hard upon exiting the vehicle in a huff. You could say my Christmas morning had a slight change of pace this year - whereas at home I might excitedly pop out of bed, run upstairs to open my stocking, and sit down to a nice glass of Buck’s Fizz, this morning I gingerly pedaled down to the bank to freeze my account and apply for a new debit card, then met Charlie for some hungover fast food where we recounted the night’s events and I was finally able to laugh about all that had happened the night before. Saigon is a city that will chew you up and spit you out, and really, the only thing to do sometimes is put a smile on your face and just go along with it.


Again, Merry Christmas to everyone!

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Comments

[anonymous]

Thom, I've gotta say this is my favorite part of the entry: Additionally, anything short of slinging Ho Chi Minh’s dead body into the passenger seat and riding around reciting lines from Apocalypse Now through a megaphone, Vietnamese policemen will never pull over riders of bicycles or electric bikes. I just have this Weekend at Bernie's style image of o Chi Mihn rolling around on your electric bike and everyone looking at you like you're insane. EPIC. Merry Christmas in Vietnam.