Kevin Mulqueen

I've been teaching English for 48 years - in England, Egypt, Tanzania, Argentina, Venezuela, Ghana and now Vietnam. At 71, I'm still going strong and have no wish to retire. I enjoy my job, which gives me plenty of time to relax and travel. In toto, I've visited 68 countries. I'm married to a Vietnamese woman and have been living in Ho Chi Minh City since 2001.
Outside of work I am a chess fanatic (Tanzanian National Champion in 1991), devotee of blues and jazz music, imbiber of fine malt whiskies (especially from Islay), bibliophile (Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy, Brian Moore, Philip Larkin, Dick Francis, M.R.James, Jonathan Raban are among my favourites), vulcanophile (I've climbed Tambora and Mt Mayon), traveller, writer (mainly of travel and nostalgia essays) and armchair sportsman (I love football, cricket, tennis and boxing).
Other influences on me, apart from the abovementioned authors, are Jeff Hawke (Daily Express cartoon strip), Doctor Who, Monty Python, Muhammad Ali, Noam Chomsky, George Monbiot, Joel Strauss (authority on blues and jazz music, U.S. politics and Tanzania) and, last but not least, my dear old dad.
If anyone would like to contact me, my email is: kevinmulqueen@yahoo.co.uk

My Life in the Air

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City June 9th 2023

Hotel Krasnopolsky

Kevin Mulqueen

Born in 1951 to working-class parents, I spent my youth travelling by train and bus. We never ventured outside of England for holidays, so it wasn’t until I started travelling by myself to mainland Europe that I boarded a plane for the first time. I can’t remember my first flight. It wasn’t going to Holland and Germany on a school holiday circa 1966, when we crossed the Channel by boat. It wasn’t going to Ireland in 1970, when I was violently seasick on the Fishguard to Rosslare ferry. I have no memory of plane travel until 1974, when I visited Norway with my friend, Julian Russell. We took the ferry from Harwich to Kristiansand but returned to Blighty by air from Copenhagen. An unmemorable flight – just a convenient way of getting home. In 1975, I ... read more

Auntie Chrissie

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two June 2nd 2023

Auntie Chrissie at 36 Hatherley Road, Reading

Kevin Mulqueen

I have one photo of Auntie Chrissie, my mother’s elder sister. It is Blu-tacked to the display case in my living-room, coincidentally (and ironically, as you will see) next to a bottle of Laphroaig whisky. I put it there because I like looking at it – a memory of my youth in Reading and a memory of her. Seeing that photo yesterday, I decided to write down my memories of Auntie Chrissie. Growing up in Reading, U.K., with my Irish parents, I was cut off from their families, who lived in Ireland and never ventured abroad. I never knew my grandparents, who all died young, but my father had two siblings, Tommy and Bessie, and my mother two more, Willie and Chrissie. The only time as an adult that I ever met Tommy and Bessie and ... read more

Martin Amis

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two May 22nd 2023

'Experience'

Kevin Mulqueen

When I went to the Guardian website yesterday morning, May 21st 2023, the lead story was the death of Martin Amis. I was shocked because this was the first I’d heard of his being ill. He died of oesophageal (U.S. esophageal) cancer – the same as his pal Christopher Hitchens and his father’s friend, Philip Larkin. Amis had chosen to keep his cancer a secret. Good for him, I say; I think I would do the same. I immediately posted the following tribute to Amis on Facebook: Martin Amis has died, aged 73, of oesophageal cancer. I had no idea he was sick. Like some other people I can think of, he kept quiet about his infirmity – which I admire. Although Martin Amis is not one of my favourite writers, his early fiction gave me ... read more

Soundtrack of My Life

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two May 16th 2023

'Wonderful_Land' - the First Single I Ever Bought

Kevin Mulqueen

Music has always been an important strand in the tapestry of my life. I have never sung (except for one disastrous day in the Primary School choir) or played a musical instrument but, since an early age, music has stirred my emotions, thrilling me to bits or making me tearful. I’ve been an English teacher since 1975, a profession that has its genesis in my love of literature, but I often wonder which means more to me: the written word or music? I’ve written numerous blogs about music and musicians but now I want to chart my musical development in roughly chronological order – from childhood up to the present day. I am going to single out the pieces of music that have had the greatest impact on me. I have decided to include music that ... read more

'Irish Heartbeat' - the Chieftains Meet Van Morrison

The Old Stourbridge Public Library

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two May 9th 2023

Old Stourbridge Library

Kevin Mulqueen

Living in Vietnam, far away from my native England, there are certain things I miss about English life: friends, pubs, birds, art galleries, cathedrals, live jazz, secondhand bookshops and public libraries. Here, in Ho Chi Minh City, there is no public library on a par with the great public libraries of England. Growing up in Reading, in the 1950s and 1960s, I had three libraries to choose from: the Children’s Library in Blagrave Street, the Central Library next door and the Palmer Park Library. Then, when I went to Leeds University to study English, there was the wonderful Brotherton Library. In 1975 I began my first teaching job – in Stourbridge, West Midlands – and fell in love with the small public library on the corner of Hagley Road and Church Street. It had a limited ... read more

My Favourite Drinking Perch

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two May 5th 2023

Bonjour - Lan on Left

Kevin Mulqueen

For many years, I’ve been drinking Saigon Red beer, mixed with 7-Up, at 169 Bui Vien Street in the Pham Ngu Lao Ward of Ho Chi Minh City. Until recently, the establishment was called La Vang, but now it goes by the name of Bonjour. I prefer the former moniker because it is Vietnamese, unpretentious and full of meaning. La Vang may mean two things. It could mean ‘yellow leaves’ or it may refer to Our Lady of La Vang, who has a shrine at La Vang in Quang Tri Province. Circa 1800, many persecuted Catholics sought refuge in the rainforest of La Vang. While hiding there, the community gathered every night at the foot of a tree to say the rosary. One night, in the branches of a tree, a lady appeared, wearing the traditional ... read more

The View from the Balcony - when Trung Nguyen was there

Scammed

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two April 13th 2023

Kevin Mulqueen

Several times in my life I have been on the receiving end of a scam or an attempted scam. A couple of these scams – where women have taken advantage of me - are too painful and personal for me to talk about. However, I have no qualms about sharing what happened in Mombasa, circa 1992, and what happened twice on the internet very recently. I was a teacher at the International School of Tanganyika in Dar es Salaam between 1991 and 1995. East Africa was my playground, and I made frequent trips to Kenya. Once, by myself in Mombasa, I was sitting in an open-air restaurant when a young African man sat down opposite me and poured out his tale of woe. He was a refugee from war-torn Somalia or Sudan (I forget which) and ... read more

Two Novels: 'Klara and the Sun' and 'Waiting for Sunrise'

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two January 28th 2023

'Waiting for Sunrise'

Kevin Mulqueen

Have just finished ‘Waiting for Sunrise’ by William Boyd. This is only the second new(ish) novel I’ve read in a long while. The other one, a few moths ago, was the ghastly ‘Klara and the Sun’ by Kazuo Ishiguro, who in 2017 won the Nobel for Literature. Quite undeserved in my view. Almost as bad as giving it to Bob Dylan. At the time I wrote the following about 'Klara and the Sun': Have just finished ‘Klara and the Sun’ by Kazuo Ishiguro. Very ordinary indeed. I read it to the end only because I had to - two of my students are studying it for IBDP English Literature. A very poor choice for an exam text IMO. It is a) quite long (300 pages) and therefore not student-friendly b) boring in every respect – boring ... read more

A Memorable Tết 2023 in Tân Châu

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two January 28th 2023

Drinking Ut Mai's Banana Wine

Kevin Mulqueen

Here I am again - in Tân Châu, my wife’s home town, celebrating Tết, the Vietnamese New Year. This is perhaps my 14th annual Tết visit to Tân Châu . Thuy has been part of my life since 2005 – for many years my girlfriend, since 2013 my wife – and, when Tết arrives, she always returns to Tân Châu to be with her parents, sisters, son, grandchildren, nieces and nephews. Although Tết is, in many ways, an alien festival to me (I can’t speak Vietnamese and do not understand the Tết customs), I feel it is my duty to be beside Thuy during the week of Tết. If I make Tết sound like an endurance test, that is not so. I get vicarious pleasure from the knowledge that Thuy is delighted to be back home ... read more

'The Mayor of Casterbridge'

Asia » Vietnam » Southeast » Ho Chi Minh City » District Two January 27th 2023

Alan Bates as Henchard

Kevin Mulqueen

Yesterday, January 26th 2023, I finished reading Thomas Hardy’s ‘The Mayor of Casterbridge’ for the fifth or sixth time. I first read it for my English Literature ‘A’ level in 1969. It didn’t make a strong impression on me then, which I find odd, but I became a Hardy fanatic in my twenties, after leaving university, and read all of his major novels. Later on, I discovered his poetry, which I adore. I've read ‘Tess of the d’Urbervilles’ at least four times and consider it his finest novel - although I must put this opinion to the test by rereading it soon. I've read ‘Jude the Obscure’ probably three times but will not read it again. Unlike John Arlott, who described reading it as an intensely emotional experience, I think it is deeply flawed. I like ... read more

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