Howdy from Vietnam again

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Morning all,

How's things? Hope you're all fine and/or dandy.

It's been a heck of a while hasn't it? Thanks for all your replies, they are always welcomed and it's good to hear that they are read every now and again. To all those that have written and I have yet to reply, sorry, it's been a busy few weeks and I will try to get to them.

So yes, it has been busy. Work has been busy, but outside of work there have been assignments, procrastinating from doing assignments, sleeping, procrastinating from doing assignments, eating, and procrastinating from doing assignments. And of course there was entertaining to be had, but that can hardly be called a chore 😊

And yay, assignments are over so I can chill out now, I'm very pleased because I can now live the ultimate bachelors dream: lying on the couch and watching tv. Oh sweet tv, you are such a good friend. But fear not, that's not all I've been doing, only most of what I've been doing. I'll be back in Melbourne at the end of july for a week so let me know if you wanna catch up.

Anyway, this week's entry is thus:

Me at a tennis club, trying to speak in my very bad vietnamese.


Me: anh oi, biet noi tieng ang khong? (Hey mister, do you speak english?)

Tennis Dude: khong. blah blah blah tieng viet khong? (no, do you speak vietnamese?)

Me: uh, khong. (uh, no.)

(Both of us smile and nod, a universal term for 'we don't understand a word the other one says. What the f*(& we gonna do now?'. After a little while, Tennis dude points to the manager's office).

Tennis dude: blah blah blah blah blah blah blah ang blah blah. (Speak to my manager, he speaks english)

Me: uh, cam on anh. (Uh, thanks mister)


I'm so pleased. In the 5 or so weeks I've been here now, I get the impression my grasp of vietnamese is no better than a pet dog's grasp of english.

Owner: Hey Fido, blah blah blah blah schmacko! (Hey Fido, if you get into the car so I can take you to the vet to get desexed, I'll give you a schmacko!)

Fido: Woof. Grreeowwl, Woof! (Awesome man, I'm gonna get Schmackos. Hey Spot, did you hear? I'm gonna get schmackos....)

Spot: Woof...Woof Woof? (What's the point man, I lost my nads yesterday. Hang on a minute, did you say schmackos? How do I get some schmackos too??)

Anyway, I digress....


This is probably the first seriously free weekend I've had since being here that has enabled me to get out and do some of the things I love the most, namely finding new places to eat 😊

I headed down to pham ngu lao road (backpacker stretch) to just soak it up a bit and see if there was anything I may have missed along the way in terms of eateries. I like it there because I like watching the western tourists, some huddled in touristy pizza and burger joints looking completely shellshocked, some taking to the local food stalls on the tiny stools, tucking into their bowls of noodles with gusto.

What I dislike a little about that stretch is the fact that I will get spruiked just like any other tourist when I'm down there, and it's because they all think I look korean, and they'll speak to me in korean. There's no real point telling them I'm from Australia, because they look at you and they say, 'but no, where are you really from?'

I like to imagine there's someone out there who suffers the same affliction, like maybe there's a Kenyan out there who was born in China and lived there all his life, speaks only in chinese, loves listening to canto-pop stars aaron kwok and jackie cheung, and he walks the streets in India, and he always gets spruiked to buy sunglasses and cigarette lighters, and the dude says to the vendor 'But I'm Chinese!!'
And the vendor says, 'no really, where you from?? America??'

Anyways, to not garner too much attention from people offering me tourist goodies, I stopped at a noodle stall chock full of locals for a break. At the stall they served pho bo kho, which is basically a tomato, carrot and beef stew with rice noodles that was really really good. I don't get bothered for a period of time while I'm enjoying my noodles. Halfway through slurping my noodles down though I still get a tug on my shirt by a youthful looking shoe shiner on his haunches. He points at my sneakers and grabs his brush suggestively.

'But they're sneakers', I tell him in english.
He points to a bottle of detergent he has, with more motioning that they're really grubby (which they are a little), and that he's hungry.
'Bao nghieu?' How much? (I have no idea if i'm spelling these words properly in vietnamese by the way)
'Mot Nhan' Ten thousand (80c).
'Yeah ok' I tell him in english. He then helps me take my shoes off, and gives me his thongs and takes my sneakers to the side of the road to clean.

I go back to my noodles and halfway through a mouthful I have a thought:
Aw, the bugger's gonna steal my sneakers isn't he?? Maybe he's got a deal with the local sneaker salesman around the corner and he goes around stealing tourists' shoes??

I look over, and he's started down the street! Just kidding, he was still there dutifully scrubbing away with a toothbrush and some detergent of some kind. Phew, I didn't have to try and wear his grubby size 5 thongs to the closest adidas store just yet.

I eventually get my sneakers back and they look pretty much the same, but I pay him 15000 dong (1.10) anyway and continue with my noodles, and a theory comes to mind. Maybe in developing countries, wealthy people generally don't walk or do any of their personal hygiene/upkeep themselves??

This would explain a few things. It explains the shoe cleaning while I'm having lunch, it explains being able to get shoulder rubs on the street, it explains being accosted in India by a guy trying to clean my ears whilst we were at a market haggling for a bed spread. It explains being spruiked for a motorbike or taxi everywhere I go. The truth is, I like cleaning my own ears, and I need to walk so I can exercise my pudgy pins, so they can help my pudgy butt support my pudgy gut, but I get the feeling it will take a while to learn how to say that in Vietnamese, or in any Indian language.

Anyway, that's more than enough, I'm spent. Til next time, chao cac bat (bye all).

Ben

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