Zero The Wanderer

Sorry for the long time since I last wrote. I spent I few days longer in the mekong than I expected, and the day that I returned to Saigon I came down will a minor case of pnumonia!. I am much better now, after taking antibiotics and spending a horrible day in a Saigon hospital and seeing firsthand the brutal results of Saigon traffic accidents, including a man who had most of his face torn off, and a woman bleeding profusely from a wound to the temple. I wish the best to them and others! Today I begin my wanderings, and leave the city behind. I did however, break my promise today and buy a map, because I needed to choose a location outside of saigon to start my journey from. I pinpointed a little town ... read more

Here are the pictures I promised in my last post. Today I met a university student here studying to become an english teacher. He took me to meet his classmates who where all very friendly and eager to practice english with me, and we all had a good time making friends. Later he invited me to come with him to visit his home in the Mekong Delta tomorrow! He said not to worry about money and that we can share the cost (he looks fairly well off himself). He promises to show me around the mekong and teach me about the local culture, maybe even go fishing. With that kind of invitation it would have been hard to turn him down, so of course I said yes. We will be there for three days and then ... read more

It hit me like a speeding train tonight that I only have 3 days left in Saigon! Time has gone by so very fast! Just as I predicted my vietnamese practice has been getting harder and harder. I spend a lot of time these days visiting with a vietnamese friend I had made on the first day that I arrived in Saigon. He doesn't speak english, but he has been my best teacher of vietnamese, and is always so very patient with my ability. I think now, I should explain how to travel on a "shoestring" or "small and ever-shrinking" budget! So here is my advice! Take it or leave it... Don't drink (beer/whisky/wine). Don't smoke. (anything!) Eat local, also called eating outside. Eating local is by far one of the best ways to save money, ... read more

Last night I met a man sitting on a lawn chair in front of a heavily tourist frequented resaurant. Like other people I have met here he was very interested in the fact that I am learning vietnamese. However he also spoke fairly good english himself. We talked for a while in a mix of vietnamese-english and learned quite a lot about eachother. He was originally from Hue in central vietnam and had come come to Saigon around 15 years ago, but somehow or another he fell upon desperate times. He had no family to turn to anymore, besides his aging mother in Hue. Since his working permit had expired and because he did not possess a Vietnamese ID card, he was was now homeless and would be arrested if he tried to work anywhere in ... read more

One more thing about the Vietnamese language before I move on to my next topic: I have become recently aware that I am picking up what one might call a "street accent" of vietnamese. That is, The people whom I mostly talk to here belong to the lowest social and financial class. The few times I have spoken to the more educated vietnamese, such as large business owners and university students, I have had a very difficult time understanding them and vice-versa! They tell me that my vietnamese accent is very bad, and yet my lower class frends say that it is very good, and have no trouble understanding me! I can only hope that the accents in the counryside will not be too different! The following quote is from 'Le Bouddhisme au Vietnam' published in ... read more

"The golden key that unlocks a thousand doors".... even this may not be enough praise for the value of learning the local dialect when traveling. When combined with with a smile and an open personality, the thousand doors easily becomes a million and more. I have been here nearly one week so far, and the initial rush of being back in asia is beginning to wear off. Although I cannot altogether discount the 3 months of intense study I undertook before I arrived, I would never have expected to learn conversational vietnamese as fast as I have. The language itself is very difficult the pick up for the average foreigner, containing many subtle sounds and nuances not to mention the tones. My studies haved only helped slightly in that aspect since I was not fortunate enough ... read more

So here I am. We shall start my adventure here. Ho Chi Minh City/Saigon, a massive center of organized chaos. I have been here only 4 days. And athough this is my second time on the Asian continent, I am still shocked by the number activities happening literally everywhere I look. Imagine, if you can, 7 million people all crammed into the same place, and trying to make a living by any means possible. There must be at least 200 venders on my 100 meter block alone, selling anything they can get their hands on whether it's bunches of fresh parsley, fried rice, sodas, watches, books, candy, cigarettes, clothes. Anything! and again this in only on my block! It is the sheer amount of it all that is truly amazing. The really wonderful thing I have ... read more