home and happy

To anyone who may happen to come across this even though I am already home, I wanted to write about my transitioning back home to this wonderful nation, the United States of America.

I'm back. Back in the land of absorbent toilet paper and cold toilet seats. There are other things about this nation that are different, but those really stick out.

I have already eaten at Bojangles and Cosmic Cantina, which has satisfied my hunger for Southern fried chicken and burritos. I have yet to get chips and queso from Armadillo Grill and a burger from Elmo's, but all in good time. I did enjoy my mother's delicious sweet potato biscuits and ham last night as well as a whole lot of chocolate which was never Vietnam's strong suit.

The transition back in the sleep department has been fairly easy. I thought the jet lag was really going to get me, but I've been sleeping pretty normal hours. I get tired every once in the while in the early afternoon, but that could be due to my proficient napping skills.

All in all, I am glad to be home among family and old friends. They ground me and keep me sane.

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season. Merry Christmas!

still looking for godzilla...

Maeve and I arrived in Tokyo very early Thursday morning not having slept much at all. Uncle Michael met us at the airport, and immediately took us for sushi at the largest fish market in the world. There was a long wait because this restaurant only has about 12 seats, but it was absolutely worth it. We sat down at this sushi bar to watch the masters at work. We ate four kinds of tuna (varying amounts of fat), the best eel ever to exist, shrimp, and more stuff that I can't even remember. I would have remembered better if I hadn't been so busy with the party in my mouth. I also would have remembered better if I were able to take pictures, but I was not able to do so due to the very large and adamant signs that prohibited cameras.

We walked around the market a bit to survey what was available:

I don't know if Tom Robinson had ever been to this particular market. It seems likely that he had given that he  has been just about everywhere. At the very least, he would have known about it. I like to think that he was with me for the sushi and with me in the market. He would have really enjoyed it all.

After the market, we took in a garden. It's right in the middle of the city, so all the backdrops were skyscrapers. It was a really neat contrast. I missed the colors of fall in NC, but Tokyo was kind enough to oblige.

In the garden, there were public bathrooms. Tokyo has the nicest public bathrooms of anywhere I have ever been. The Warmlet is a toilet with a warmed seat. This Holy Grail of toilets is the best thing that I could have ever come across. It makes all other toilets seem ordinary and uncool. It also has two different bidet functions and can make a flushing noise if you need to hide whatever sounds you are making. Basically, I need there to be one everywhere I go. 

After the garden, we took a boat ride down a small river to look at some of the buildings and sights around Tokyo. We then hopped a number of trains to get home considering that we hadn't slept much at all in the past 24 hours and were in the process of crashing. I fell asleep on every train (read subway) we took, which is not usual for me. We took a short nap and then headed back out to go to an English class that Michael teaches. It had three adult students in it with whom we exchanged stories and thoughts. They knew we were coming, so they brought us all sorts of cookies and rice snacks and other goodies. They were absolutely lovely, and I can't think of a better way to spend an evening. Michael made us these seafood, cabbage and other stuff pancakes for dinner. Amazing.

Yesterday, we went to a Shinto shrine in the morning. One must wash one's hands and mouth before approaching the shrine.

There is a large tree around which people hang these wooden plaques with their prayers and hopes written on them. A quick walk around the tree shows plaques with so many different languages from Japanese to Thai to Portuguese to English and many others. Maeve and I added our prayers.

We spent the afternoon walking around in one of the fun shopping areas. There are so many places to spend money in Tokyo and most of them require that you spend a lot of money. It is a very consumer-friendly place. We only shopped with our eyes, but we were tempted. Then we went for a dinner of "shabu shabu" and "sukiyaki." I didn't spell those correctly, but just go with me on this one. The idea is you get a pot of hot broth in which you cook meat and vegetables. It was so delicious!

Today, we went into one of the nicer shopping areas. Tokyo has these massive department stores that are unlike anything I've ever seen. It's an experience just to walk through one. We peeked into massive electronics stores and expensive clothing places. We went to the top of this extremely high building to catch the sunset. It had a perfect view of Mount Fuji and the city night lights if you stayed long enough.

Dinner tonight was so many wonderful things including sake and different forms of chicken, some of which were raw. There were also these delicious ramen noodles that were unlike the instant noodles we call ramen at home. These noodles were delicious and could have been eaten many times in a row. We wandered about the streets for a little while longer before catching the trains home.

I love Tokyo. I would love to just stay here. That would displease my mother.

Reasons I love Tokyo:

1. It's clean.

2. the Warmlet

3. It's orderly.

4. People respect the line.

5. There's so much space.

There are other reason, but I won't bore you with them here. I am so sad to be leaving Asia tomorrow. So many things that I will struggle to process in the coming weeks. As I journey home, keep me in your thoughts and prayers. Give me grace and space to process, and I will most likely be seeing you soon. 

I have a few more hours in Tokyo, so I promise to keep both eyes open in search of Godzilla. There are so many thoughts going through my head.

and so, here we are

Maeve and I flew into Saigon yesterday around midday. We went out for pho and a walk to see what Saigon feels like when you are awake and not excessively jet-lagged. The truth is, it's much calmer than I remember. I can cross the street easily because there are traffic signals that are mostly obeyed. The sidewalks are less crowded than in Hanoi. It does smell different here than in Hanoi, and it is so much hotter here. It's so funny how different it seems when I am not walking around like an overwhelmed, exhausted zombie.

We went to one of the rooftop bars here last night for drinks and the view. I passed on the drink and got a piece of lemongrass cake instead. It was so tasty! Today, we walked to some of the places we remember from the first trip: the cathedral, post office, one of our favorite lunch cafes. A quick stop by the big market here proved that it was every bit as overwhelming as I remember.

I have not yet processed leaving Hanoi or Vietnam. It hasn't hit me that I will be home in five days. I guess, I'll just process this later. Maeve and I are leaving for Japan tonight. That is so crazy.

ha longin and stuff

Our final weekend in Vietnam was spent in Ha Long Bay. Recently voted one of the 7 Wonders of the World, Ha Long Bay has much to offer in the way of grand views, caves and lovely boating. It was a four-hour or so bus ride to get to the dock from which we took a small motor boat to our cruising vessel. It was a good-sized boat with two floors of rooms and a top, observation floor. The second floor had a dining/hanging out room as well as a few sleeping rooms. There was plenty of space for those of us on the small side, but it was still a cozy fit.

We played at a beach and climbed a mountain, kayaked around a small portion of the bay, explored caves and ate a lot of seafood. The kayaking was so great. There were a few people going on the kayaks who had never kayaked before, so I put my Ontario Pioneer Camp skills to use once again and gave a mini-safety briefing on kayaks and what to do if you unfortunately happen to no longer be in your kayak. I didn't foresee too many problems, but safety is always important. Kayaking made me really miss camp!

The story is that a dragon set down in the bay. That's why there are so many humps sticking out of the water.

Maeve is super duper excited.

My time in Vietnam is coming to a close. Tomorrow, Maeve and I will be flying to Saigon where we will spend a night before flying to Japan to spend a few days in Tokyo with her uncle. The McGarry/Harrison clan has been gracious enough to let me join in on these wonderful plans. I am very excited to see something new but very sad to be leaving my friends and my room here. I'll head for dinner at the fried rice place one last time before leaving. So many goodbyes to say!

visiting uncle ho

This morning, I woke up early. That in and of itself is quite the feat, but the story does not end there. The reason I got up early is because Ho Chi Minh welcomes visitors at his mausoleum in the morning. The body of Ho Chi Minh is, in fact preserved and visitors are marched through the beautiful, marble mausoleum during morning visiting hours. He lays, encased in a glass box, in a room guarded by several guards of the Vietnamese military who correct the posture of visitors to be most respectful to the fallen hero. There is so much pomp and circumstance surrounding a visit to the mausoleum. As we walked out, I turned to a friend of mine and said, "I don't think he would have wanted that." It's not that I knew Ho Chi Minh personally or that I am well-versed in the history of his life, but he lived as a simple man in a house on stilts rather than in the presidential palace where the people wanted him to live. I'll come back to this later, but I have to tell you about the rest of my day first.

The morning was spent watching a documentary about lesbians in Vietnam. This documentary was made by CSAGA, an NGO that I believe I mentioned in a previous post. Their organization works against domestic violence and violence against women in general. It was their (among other groups) circle painting event that I attended a short while ago. This documentary is the first of its kind in Vietnam. Gay men have recently gained more attention due to the HIV epidemic, but lesbians are not talked about much at all.

We went to the The Gioi (pronounced: te zoi) Publishing House to hear a very old (93) Vietnamese historian who gives a one-hour lecture on Vietnamese history. I was a little late due to map complications and being farther away from the place than I thought I was, but I heard a good deal of it. I can now pick up my story from earlier. Among other facts and stories, this historian told us that in Ho Chi Minh's last will and testament, he wished to have half of his ashes scattered in North Vietnam and the other half in South Vietnam in hopes that his country would one day be reunited. I didn't quite understand why he was in his mausoleum when his last wishes were not to be. When I asked for an explanation of this at the end of the lecture, Howie (Dr. Bennett's husband) explained to me that Ho Chi Minh's last will and testament was suppressed until the 1990s, until long after the mausoleum was built and had become a place of great reverence. I want to learn more about Ho Chi Minh in general, so I bought a few books at the publishing house: his final testament and his prison diary (both translated into English).

I am now in my favorite cafe and plan to hunker down to write more of my paper and put my presentation together. I wanted to leave you with a long-awaited video. I promised I would post the video of us doing Thriller for our roommates once it was made available. We've got it going pretty well in the beginning but then lose it towards the end. If you watch long enough, you can see us walk up to our roommates after the dance and their completely blank stares as the majority of them had no idea what we were doing. Also, note how we strategically slipped out from the party and hid ourselves all around the middle courtyard so that we could zombie walk out and surround Burcu who is screaming in the middle.

Enjoy!
Thriller

pangolins and kids

This past weekend, we took a break from the loud crazy of Hanoi to escape to Ninh Binh (about 2 to 3 hours outside of Hanoi) to visit the Cuc Phuong National Park where there is a wildlife preserve. This was the weird monkey sign that we saw when we got there.

Pretty much looks like the original Teen Wolf, if you ask me.

We went to visit the monkeys first. There are five main primate species in Vietnam, and three that are kept at the center. The three at the center are the loris, gibbon and macaque. The lorises are nocturnal, so we didn't get to see them, but if you have never seen the video of Slow Loris, you should click here. Needless to say, I was really hoping that we would play with a loris, but the other monkeys were cool, too. One of them really, really looked like an Ewok

Then we hopped one section over and visited the carnivore and pangolin section. In case you don't know what a pangolin is (because I didn't before Saturday) here is a picture of one that I found on the internet:

It's my new favorite animal. I would want to play with one, but they are super endangered because it's believed that their scales have all these curative powers. They are big game in the international, illegal animal trade. They are pretty much the cutest things in the world. 

We got lunch at a restaurant in the national park and then drove to somewhere else. It's hard for me to remember the names of all these places. We got on boats and were paddled all around these cliffs that supposedly had monkeys on them, but I didn't see one most likely because it was cold outside. I liked to call the cliffs we were paddling around THE CLIFFS OF INSANITY, but that's just me.

It was a lovely day to be out in the world.

Today, we had our last English class with the kids. We sang songs, played hangman, and had a party with hot dogs and salad to finish it out. We gave each of the kids a book (in English) to peruse and swap whenever they wanted. They gave us pictures that they had drawn and Christmas cards to send us on our way. The kids sang a few songs for us in Vietnamese and then performed some of the songs we had taught them over the past few months. We were doing great until the good-byes came around. One of the little boys said to me in passing, "I'm really going to miss you." I assured him that I would miss him as well. He gave a few hugs, but then started pacing in a more empty area of the room. He eventually walked outside, and I knew it was game over. I've done enough camper good-byes to know that this was about to go down. We went out and comforted him, but he was almost inconsolable. I was very proud of us for not breaking down right there on the spot, though I know there were those among us (Maeve McGarry) who were really struggling. It was a sad time, but I have loved working with them so much. I wouldn't have traded our time together for anything.

I now need to buckle down and finish my final paper. It's a big kahuna, but I can do it. It would be so much easier if 1) all my adult friends hadn't decided to have babies and put copious pictures of them up on facebook for me to look at and 2) A Knight's Tale wasn't on TV. The struggles of my life are real.

travel fail

Well, I don't have much to report of the last few days. I was writing a paper for a while, got sick and spent a day in bed, and generally have slept a lot. Excepting the getting sick, all of these things are good. I now have one small assignment and a large paper to conquer in the next week before I leave. AHHHHHHH! Who knew that four months would go by so fast?

I was going to spend this weekend in Singapore, and I got all the way to the airport to find out that because my passport expires in February, it does not last for the full six months Singapore requires. Unfortunately, that meant that Singapore was out of the question. I dejectedly refunded my ticket and rode a taxi back to the school. I am now comfortably snuggled in at a homey cafe full of delicious taco salad. All in all, it could have been worse. This just means that I have even more of a reason to come back to Southeast Asia so that I can see Singapore and some of the other nations around here.

The real story of today is the taxi ride to the airport.
WARNING: If you are my mother, you don't want to read this.

Danielle and I got in the taxi and had a hard time communicating airport, but eventually got it across and we took off. Within minutes, we hit a car, leaving visible damage, but continued on. I must have seen my life flash before my eyes about 13 times throughout the ride. I kept hearing the chug of the car indicating that the driver needed to downshift, but he didn't. When dad was teaching me to drive a standard, I remember struggling for a while, but we didn't leave the neighborhood while I was struggling that much. This guy was on major highways. It was as if he not only didn't know how to operate a standard vehicle, but also lacked the necessary knowledge to operate a car in general. I just about kissed the ground by the time we got out.

The only redeeming thing about the ride was the fact that this guy was driving at around 15 mph the whole way to the airport making a 45 minute ride last for about an an hour and fifteen minutes. Generally, this would have been really awful, and it pretty much was, but it made me hearken back to a childhood memory of mine. Erich, Dad and I were in Pensacola, and I was a wee youngin. We were leaving a museum where Daddy's name was on a plaque and heading to his friend's office, which I understood to be on base. We had spent a long time in the car driving to Pensacola, so I wanted to know how long it would take to get to his friend's office. He responded with something bogus like 8 or 12 hours. Perplexed, I asked why it would take that long if we were already on base. His response: "Because we are going to go this fast." We were moving, but our antiquated honda didn't even register any speed on the speedometer. A we crawled through the parking lot, I laughed and laughed at how silly my dad was! I believe we did eventually make it to our destination, but it was the getting there that I remember.

Also, NEWSFLASH: It's cold in Hanoi today.

on the town

Friday night, I went with a few friends to Hanoi Rock City, a bar/concert venue near West Lake. It was this neat, half-unroofed venue with mural-covered walls and and upstairs, enclosed concert room. This particular day was a mustache party dedicated to men's health during this fine Movember. I didn't have a mustache, but there were many people there (Vietnamese and foreign) who had painted mustaches on or had giant, fake ones. We snuck into the concert room and watched as a band took the stage. The woman at the lead mic was incredibly slight and looked more like a Buddhist nun than anything else. She seemed quiet and unassuming, but then opened her mouth. We were at a Vietnamese death metal concert. She screamed as loud as possible while the band backed her and the back screen showed stop-motion videos. After they finished their set, we headed downstairs and met an American woman who had been working in Hanoi for about a year in something to do with HIV. She was really lovely and glad to meet some other Americans. I then ate a hotdog. It was delicious.

On Saturday, Maeve and I joined Ngan's family on a trek to her mother's home town. (I forgot my camera unfortunately.) This one was only about an hour away from school. It used to have another name, but a few years ago it was incorporated into Hanoi. Ngan's uncle was kind enough to show us around the town for a little while. We saw some old structure, hung out with the village's buffalo, and went into the pagoda. I watched Ngan place offering money in strategic locations around the pagoda and was given three sticks of incense. I followed Ngan's uncle around the pagoda and put my incense sticks in three different locations.

It turns out that Ngan's uncle is the village historian, photographer and writer. He gave Maeve and me each a small, tape-bound book of poems that he wrote during and after the War. It's all in Vietnamese, so I can't read it, but he signed it. I got Ngan to translate the title and what he had written, a well-wish for my life as a student. It is truly a treasure. I'll have to find someway to translate a few of the poems so that I can tell what they are about.

We eventually walked to one of Ngan's relative's house. We ate lunch of a yellow, tofu soup of green bananas, snails, potatoes and probably other stuff. There was a boiled duck (I'm convinced that boiling a bird gets rid of everything good about it). I realized that what I had thought was liver last time was, in fact coagulated pigs' blood. There was also papaya salad with peanuts and beef with morning glory. It was all delicious, and we finished it off with bananas and pomelos. As with every time I go with Ngan to one of her family homes, we were sent upstairs to rest after lunch. Just like every other time, I told myself that I wouldn't be able to fall asleep and then passed out very quickly.

On our way back out of the village and back to Hanoi, we stopped at one of Ngan's mother's friends to get some fruit and pick up a chicken. We walked back to the car with a bag full of pomelos and star fruit while Ngan's mother carried a live chicken by the feet. When we got back to the car, Nagn's mom put the chicken (still alive) in a plastic grocery bag. At first, I was worried that the chicken would suffocate because it was in a plastic bag, but then she tore a hole for its head to stick out of (though I imagine that chicken was not long for this world).

I have two papers, a presentation, and two assignments to complete in the next two weeks before I leave for home by way of Japan. I have no more weekends to spend in Hanoi given that this weekend I will be in Singapore and next weekend we will all be in Ha Long Bay. This program is rapidly coming to a close, and I don't know how I feel about leaving the home I have here. At the same time, it will be nice to be in the land of Southern food and quiet while sleeping.

thanksgiving chewicide

For those of you who don't know, "chewicide" is the action you take when you are completely full and then decide to eat more. This unfortunate affliction overtook a small group of students and their roommates in Hanoi around dinner time last night. It was a sad, delicious evening.

Though we all knew that it wouldn't be quite the exact same as what was happening at home, we decided to organize our very own Thanksgiving dinner. We spent several weeks in planning, had a team go out to buy all the groceries, rented out an industrial kitchen, invited all our roommates and put together a feast to remember. This was no small task. We were all in the kitchen for four hours working like a well-oiled machine. There was not a single crisis. Some memorable items on our menu were deviled eggs, salad, garlic bread, fruit salad, cornbread, chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing and corn, green bean casserole, mac and cheese, and batata casserole. As far as desserts go, we had both banana and chocolate pudding, yam pie, apple crisp, coconut cake and pineapple upside down cake.

Ann and Sami peeling potatoes and apples.

Kavya makes Pineapple upside down cake while Divya and Joey plot how to dominate their coconut cake, Paula Dean style.

Just a few of the dishes like cornbread, fruit salad, garlic bread, deviled eggs and curried cauliflower.

My contribution was the batata casserole. I was going to do a sweet potato casserole, but we couldn't find sweet potatoes, and batatas are pretty much sweet potatoes only they are a little more starchy and white. I had a recipe, but I mostly just winged it. The batatas, once peeled, were turning crazy colors which made me think they were rotten, but they still smelled and tasted really good, so I persevered on. It turned out really well, and I was really proud of myself! The truth is, it's really hard to mess up something that involves brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg with a walnut, butter, sugar and flour topping. I would have had to work really hard to make that not taste good.

Tara was kind enough to give a pre-meal speech about the story of Thanksgiving and what it means for us. We then went around the room and had to say two things: 1) something we are thankful for and 2) something silly that we are thankful for. Many were thankful for the food, the new friends, the opportunity to be in Hanoi, family, and so on. Some of the memorable silly ones from our roommates involved discarded diets and friends who tell us that we are cute.

All in all, it was a wonderful evening. I thought that I would be more homesick because my Thanksgiving at home is a marathon of good food, great friends and so much family. However, this was just a new way to do Thanksgiving. There was so much joy and friendship to celebrate! I whole-heartedly say that I am thankful for all of my friends in Hanoi, both Vietnamese and UNCers. We came together to pull of one of the best holidays I could ever have asked for. My body is still trying to process the butter (25 sticks for the whole meal) and dairy that it hasn't seen for the past three months.

Let the Christmas music commence.

painting in circles

First of all, Happy Thanksgiving! I will have a Thanksgiving post, but I'll do that one tomorrow and instead tell you about my morning in this post.

I went to an event to raise awareness about violence against women and girls. It was a circle painting event. These happen all over the place as a venue to get the word out about domestic violence and the like. I heard about this event because the other day in class, we had some women from the NGO CSAGA come and speak about domestic violence in Vietnam, and they invited us. The concept of a circle painting is basically that there is one large canvas in the middle of a circle of people. Everyone contributes a little to their section, and then you rotate and add some details to another part of the canvas. There was another area where people were painting conical hats. It was a similar system where you would paint on one hat and then rotate the circle and paint on another one. Before painting each time, we collectively recited a mantra:

Art for all

All for art

Love for all 

All for love

Happiness for all

All for happiness

This mantra was in Vietnamese, so mainly I just tried to repeat sounds that I heard in an organized fashion. Someone eventually explained what it was, though. 

The hosting artist in the middle under the even banner.

Instructions being given for the circle painting.

Painting of conical hats.

I painted in this corner. The funky, red, sqiggly thing in the upper left is definitely mine.

I didn't paint this one, but I thought it particularly beautiful

There were lots of people around and so many beautiful colors!

dads

In order for today's story to make sense, I have to let you in on a little something about myself: I love watching men interact with their daughters. To see any parent delight in his or her child warms my heart like nothing else can, but especially dads and daughters. I saw this for years at camp as I watched my little campers joyously run into their fathers' arms at the end of a long week of fun. This is not just something I've seen at camp. Dads and daughters are where its at, and I am most definitely speaking from personal experience.

Last week, we had an American presenter in one of our classes, and he brought one of his Vietnamese colleagues with him. Huong sat in the back of the class for the first part of the presentation, next to Maeve, and asked her at the end if she and a few friends would like to go to his house for dinner to speak English with his daughters. She gladly agreed, and they set the date to this evening. Joey, Maeve and I went o his house where his beautiful wife made us dinner and his adorable daughters entertained us. 

Brace yourself for the waterworks on this one: Before we ate dinner, we were sitting with Huong and his daughters in the living room. These girls are 7 and 9 and spent the last three years living in the States. They speak impeccable English but were shy like any young kids around strangers. Huong was sitting with his arm around his daughter, G, encouraging her to speak with us and look us in the eyes when speaking. He was encouraging her and she was being silly and they were both smiling. What happened next was like the snowball that just wouldn't stop rolling: Maeve started to laugh; I looked at Maeve; I started to giggle too; Maeve went from laughing to crying (still smiling bit definitely crying); my eyes were watering from laughter ( I was laughing at Maeve in the most tender way because she was crying); my eyes started crying a little too; we both feared we wouldn't be able to stop crying (we were still laughing); we both pulled it together. Basically, Maeve started it. These tears were the really good kind. Dad and I had a very similar if not the exact same conversation when I was little.

Dinner was pork and tomato soup to put over rice (kinda like a gumbo or chili), sew sew (sp? it's a leafy vegetable), beef with carrots and papaya, fresh spring rolls with shrimp and sweet beans. I was asked if I wanted a beer to which I replied that I was fine with water but thank you after which I was given a beer. It was the most delicious, refreshing, enjoyable dinner I've had in a long time. I was with family. The girls were adorable and told the entire story of The Little Mermaid as it spanned three movies (prequel, original, sequel). 

When it came time for us to leave, the girls whispered to their father, who told them to pose the question to us. One of them then asked if we would come back for a sleepover to which we emphatically replied that we would love to come back. Huong and his wife explained that the girls were really missing their friends from the States and that sleepovers aren't something that kids do in Vietnam. I don't know if we will get to spend the night, but I can't think of anything I would love more than to hang out with this family some more.

From left to right: Oanh, Huong, My and G, me, Joey and Maeve. Best night ever.

a smile

A smile changed my day today. It's so great when that happens. After blowing through some serious cash at the craft bazaar this weekend, I needed to go to the bank, so I went after class. The way this works is every time I go to the bank, I withdraw 2,000,000 VND (Vietnamese Dong). The ATM gives it to me in 500,000 VND notes which are pretty useless because no one wants to make change for 500,000 VND when I am only paying 20,000 VND for something (about $1 at home). So, I go to the ATM, get my notes, and then walk into the bank to change them all for 100,000 VND notes. The bank guy has caught on to my game. I walked into the bank today, and he smiled really big and emphatically asked me how I was doing. He knows that I want to change my money for smaller bills, and he is a counting ninja. He gets the right count every time but always asks that I recount it just to be sure. When I was leaving, he wished me a great rest of the day, and I knew that he really meant it. It was such a lovely encounter and started my day in the best of ways! I'm going to have to start spending more money so that I can visit the bank more often. (*Daddy*)

After the bank, I caught a bus to the Old Quarter to spend my afternoon in the warm embrace of Joma for a second day in a row. They sucked me in with this great promotion where if I brought my receipt in from the previous day, I could get a free coffee the next day. You better believe I got that free coffee, and it was even more delicious than every dollar I didn't spend. Rather than working on anything of great importance, I read Pride and Prejudice. Scratch that statement. Pride and Prejudice is really important. 

I went to English class today, which came with a mixed bag of results. The workbook lesson went pretty well and Pictionary was well-received. After the game though, I got up and taught them the Great Big Moose song. This is an Ontario Pioneer Camp favorite. I've been singing it since I was 11 and have sung it with my campers every year that I am on staff. It's one of my absolute favorites because it is so absurd. A moose named Fred drinks juice while he's in bed and then spills it in his hair and gets all sticky. It's so silly! It's a pretty simple song, but the kids were just not having it. They busted a move or two during the WAAAAYY-OHS in the middle, but it was a tough sell. I guess sometimes Canadian stuff just doesn't translate. Oddly enough, the moose was not the part they were struggling with. Who knows...

Maeve and I were at English class with Sami today. Sami is a dancer specialized in Polynesian dance (the HULA!). For the last ten minutes or so, she taught us and the kids a few Hula steps. It was so much fun! In my mind, Maeve was the Stitch to my Lilo. The kids did really love the dance moves (it was a sad day for Mooses everywhere...). 

feeling home

In the exceedingly wise words of Maeve McGarry, it's good to know that if I'm abroad and homesick, there's somewhere I can go that will always be constant. That place is church. Though I wasn't feeling super homesick, I was feeling the need for some Jesus, so we went to St. Joseph's Cathedral in the Old Quarter of Hanoi.

We were planning to leave at 8am, but both of us overslept our alarms and headed out at 8:20 to catch the bus to the Old Quarter. As we were crossing the street, I saw the bus pull up to our stop, and I knew it would leave if we didn't make a run for it. The street was uncommonly clear at that moment, so I bolted after the bus and got there just in time to bang on its back as it was driving away in true Hanoian style. It kindly stopped and the bus driver and worker laughed with us as we got on. 

The service at the Cathedral was entirely in Vietnamese, though I recognized certain times when things were happening. At one point, we sang the Celtic Hallelujah, which I know from countless services at the Church of the Holy Family. Maeve and I sat next to this adorable family of two parents and a little boy and girl. Further proof that the DeHart women don't pay attention in church when sitting anywhere near cute children. I watched as the little boy palmed his sister's face and held on for a long while. She, rather than getting upset as I might have, seemed resigned to her grabbed-face fate. We took Communion and stuck around afterwards to take pictures.

Mass was followed by that great, American pass time called bagels and coffee. Maeve and I were told that there was a bagel place near the Cathedral, so we undertook an intrepid search for this Holy Grail of meals. After asking directions from an open tourism shop, we found Jomo. I got a bagel with cream cheese and a large coffee that came with a free refill. As I sat down with my first cup of coffee, Bon Iver was playing over the bakery's speakers. As I sat down with my second cup of coffee (to which I added a chocolate chip cookie), Louis Armstrong was playing. It could not have been more perfect.

We were walking home and saw this which takes weird and creepy to a whole new level.

There is a whole street of these mannequin stores. It's freaky.

I now sit in my room with a contented heart and a delightedly full tummy. I will spend this afternoon being productive and getting work done. Hopefully....

listening

This weekend has been a mix of going out into the real world and curling up in my room to get some much needed alone time to rest and recharge. I love snuggling up to immerse myself in the lives of Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy. It's never going to get old.

When I did venture out into the real world, I saw some interesting stuff. Maeve and I went to the Women's Museum to check out the women of Vietnam. We didn't get to see too much because we were a little late, but the coolest thing I saw was an exhibit on the women's roles during the war. The exhibit was really well organized and told the stories of individual women and what they did for the war effort. One was the story of Doctor Dang Thuy Tram, whose published war diary, Last Night I Dreamed of Peace, I read this summer before coming to Vietnam. She graduated from the Hanoi Medical School and then went to the South during the war to serve on the field. Her story as well as countless others were represented as you walk around the exhibit room. Women guerrilla soldiers, protesters, doctors and political activists were all present.

After the museum, we wandered around, found smoothies and ate noodles for dinner before hitting the Cinematheque for a movie. I know I've been doing a lot of movies recently, but how can you argue with living, breathing history when it's available to you? We went to see the movie The Times of Harvey Milk. This is the documentary of Harvey Milk's political life released in 1985, the story which was recently made into a drama with Sean Penn and Josh Brolin. This documentary focused much more on Milk's politics rather than his personal life. It was a great film, and it was such an amazing evening because one of the people who worked on the movie, Robert Hawke, was there to talk with us about his experiences and the making of the film. I could have asked him about his life and listened to him tell stories all day, He was so engaging. Joey, Maeve and I stuck around and talked to him for a bit after the Q&A. He was so wonderful to talk with! He is a preacher's kid, and I am a military kid, so we bonded over having moved around a lot as kids. He said he wanted to make a documentary about kids like us. A second point for military kids.

Today's venture outside was to a craft bazaar at the Ethnology Museum in Hanoi. This museum details the lives and history of the ethnic groups in Vietnam, of which there are 54. The main group are the Kinh people who are what most people think of as the Vietnamese people and then there are 53 other ethnic minorities who account for about 12% of the total population of Vietnam. Today was a special day where the outside courtyard was converted into a handicraft market, where a number of ethnic groups were represented with their traditional crafts as well as typical Vietnamese crafts such as silk work and lacquer paintings. I did some serious damage, people. That craft market didn't know what hit it. I have bought so many gifts, but the problem is going to be how could I ever part with all my gifts? Mom is definitely going to have to help me on that one.

One of the classes we are currently in is an Oral History class. Oral History, as a field, started as a way to represent those who didn't have a voice in the grand arena. For this class, each of us is paired with someone working in Vietnam in the field of public health. Everyone is paired with a Vietnamese person except for me. The person I'm working with is an American working at an international NGO here in Vietnam. I don't know how much I can tell you because it's confidential. (I've always wanted to say that.) But really, it is. I can tell you that it has been an unbelievable experience so far. I finally understand how much my high school history teacher loves talking to World War II vets and hearing their stories. I also realized that I've been doing this since I was a kid. I didn't have a recorder, but I hung out with my dad and a veteran who landed Higgins boats at Normandy, soaking up history. History has a way of being ever-present if you listen enough. This is especially true of military veterans, a group which I am forever blessed and honored to get the chance to spend time with. I love stories of every shape and form (probably a large part of why I love movies so much) and continue to fall silent at a table of my parents' friends, lost in the stories they tell on one another. The class is helping me learn the right questions and how to ask them. So, just know that I'm listening when you talk to me.

the usual, please

I am a regular at a food establishment. It has always been a goal of mine to be able to walk into a restaurant, sit down, and say, "I'll have the usual." E-Mack and I tried for an entire semester to be regulars at Ye Olde Waffle Shoppe on Franklin Street, but we kept switching up our orders and a different person would serve us every time even though we sat at the same table every time. Do I want the M&M pancakes today or not? This question haunted me and prevented my ever having a regular order. The good news is, I have a usual order at my favorite fried rice place. I need only walk up and I am greeted with smiles as my beef fried rice begins its delicious crisping process. (I should mention that I always get beef fried rice even though my insufficient mastery of the Vietnamese tones meant that I often ordered "fried rice with father".) The only thing that could make my being a regular any better is if everyone shouted my name Norm-style every time I walk up, but I'm not going to be picky when it comes to regular-status.

The other day, our lecturer was an American Vietnam War veteran who lives and works in Hanoi with Project Renew. Project Renew is a program that works to remove unexploded ordinances in Vietnam. I learned that the problem in Vietnam is not undiscovered landmines, such as is the problem in Cambodia, but is rather the bombs and such that were dropped during the war that never exploded. Strangely enough, the website is www.landmines.org, but I think that using "land mines" was a way to catch people's attention. The really large bombs that sank into the ground are relatively harmless. They need to be removed safely but pose little immediate threat. It's the cluster bombs that are truly dangerous and must be dealt with immediately. They continue to explode and will either severely maim or kill any person in their path. Project Renew also has a number of educational programs to teach kids to identify unexploded ordinances so that they can call them in to the organization and has a mushroom growing program to help family's affected by the ordinances to generate revenue. 

I couldn't help but ask the Vet at the end of his presentation what branch of the service he was in. Turns out it was Army- Military Intelligence. The majority of Vets I know from Vietnam were Army Air, which would make sense given that I hang out with the Army Aviation Heritage Foundation (AAHF). I told our speaker about AAHF and how they still fly Vietnam-era aircraft for tactical displays in airshows and do Huey rides for anyone at those airshows. He was surprised that anyone was still flying the old aircraft. Sha-bam, I just spread some knowledge. I also felt great that I understood pretty much all of what he was saying when the military jargon came out. One point for military kids everywhere.

Today's lecture on drug use and mental health brought a really fantastic moment. The speaker mentioned that the Sheraton holds the only nightclub that actually has a dance floor in Hanoi, and that dancing at clubs isn't really allowed in Hanoi. He then asked if any of us knew why dancing wasn't allowed, to which, without any kind of filter engaged from brain-to-mouth, I blurted out "Footloose?". Thankfully, today's lecturer was from Boston and knew exactly what I was talking about. In point of fact, there was a police raid of a dance club where a lot of illicit drugs were found, so Hanoi kind of outlawed dance nightclubs. Kevin Bacon is the greatest.

A few of us were going to go see a movie this evening. We were first going to watch a Vietnamese film whose translated title is Hotboy Rebellion. It's about a gay Vietnamese relationship and has come up several times in conversation in our classes. We called the movie theater and on the second attempt were connected to someone who spoke English. This person informed us that the movie had no English subtitles. So, we re-adjusted our plan to go see the new movie 50-50 with Joseph Gordon-Levitt in it. It's a movie from the U.S. so one would think it would be in English. Upon arriving at the theater, we were told that it had been dubbed into Vietnamese. This was not the case with the previous movie we saw at this theater, but we dejectedly bought some kettle corn and made our way out to the lake to sit and talk for a while. Other than the one man who stopped in front of us to stare for a good ten minutes as we sat on a bench, it was a relaxing evening.

Top Three Things I won't miss upon returning to the U.S.:

1. Durian, the world's most repugnant fruit. It is a disgrace to fruit everywhere. Even calling it a fruit makes other fruit sad. It smells like nothing I could ever describe and makes me want to gag. Ew.

2. Traffic- I've discussed this at much length before, so I won't go into further details here.

3. Getting Stared At- I always thought I wanted to stand out and be noticed, until I got to Vietnam. I want to go home and fade into the background for a while. I want no one to look at me ever.

it just so happened...

I have a handful of stories to tell you that I've been holding onto. The good news is, I have only one more paper to write for the semester and then my oral history project. The work is slowing down which will hopefully mean there will be an upswing in fun and, therefore, more to tell you about.

The first story is one I like to call How Randolph the Rat Met His End (he was most likely a mouse, but there is better alliteration if I call him a rat). We have been chasing him out of our rooms for the better part of the last few months. He left a trail of nibbled food wrappers and muddy prints everywhere he went. On this particular day, he had stationed himself under Alison's wardrobe, and her roommate My went to get the guards to see if we could rid ourselves of the beast once and for all. I was sitting in my room and was only alerted to their presence by the terrifying sound of a loud electrical discharge. My first thought: Somebody is getting tased. My second thought: I need to see what's going on. I ran out of my room and into the hallway in time to see the older guard proudly holding Randolph's lifeless body by the neck as the younger guard discharged a taser at random intervals. I was then told that they shook the wardrobe until Randolph run out and the older guard grabbed him with his bare hands and snapped his little neck. Who knows what the taser was for.

My next story is about a delicious dinner and a really great mom. Two of my mother's friends from the VA Hospital in Durham were in Hanoi for part of this past week working on a collaborative effort to share education and experience internationally. They were able to steal away for a night to get dinner with Maeve and me. We went to the outdoor grill place where we had been before to get the chicken and ribs that were so scrumptious. Graciously, they met us at the school and walked there with us as I don't know if this place actually has a name to which I could have directed them. It was so nice for Maeve and me to see someone from home and be able to discuss some of the information and experiences we've gathered in these past few month (I actually retained a lot of stuff!). Our two guests were lovely enough to bring me Moravian cookies from my mother. Moravian cookies, very thin ginger snaps, are my family's equivalent of Christmas cookies, so it really feels like home when I eat them. So delicious!

On Saturday, I went to the Silk Village with some of my classmates. We walked around appreciating the beautiful colors and soft fabrics. We bargained and disapproved of prices until we were able to get what we wanted. One of our favorites phrases is "Tôi là sinh viên. Không tiền." "I am a student. No Money." It works well and often people are willing to help us out. That day, I picked up a bunch of scarves, and I touched just about everything.

Yesterday, we went to the Hanoi Cinematheque where Dr. Bennett (our program professor) had arranged for us to watch two Vietnamese films and then speak with the filmmaker about his choices and career. We watched When the Tenth Moon Comes and Nostalgia for the Countryside by Dang Nhat Minh. The first was my favorite. It was set in a rural area of Vietnam during a time of war. A young wife learns that her husband has died on the battlefront but doesn't know how to process that or tell her family, so she goes on acting as if her husband is still alive. His depiction of loss and grief was portrayed in such a universal way. The wife's inability to let go of the hope that her husband will return is not unique to Vietnam. It was a wonderful film that I suggest you watch if you can find it. The Q & A with the filmmaker after watching the movies was a really neat experience. We got to ask about his process and thoughts about the films. It made me flash forward to when one of my good friends will undoubtedly be discussing his films with engaging college students. They may ask him about his inspirations and personal experiences, how he got his start and how he goes about bringing the stories to life. Yeah, Will's gonna be famous.

The movies were followed by a pizza dinner across the street. It was some good pizza.

on the road again

Sorry for the blog hiatus. I was away for the weekend in Sapa. Sapa is a beautiful place in the mountains of Northern Vietnam where a large population of ethnic minority people live. It was a magical weekend for which I left my computer in Hanoi and was completely unplugged for several days. The only electronics I had with me: 1) a camera to document my journey and 2) my Nook so that Jane Austen would be with me every step of the way.

I'll let the pictures do most of the talking for this one, but I do have a few things to say. We took an overnight train to get there. It was surprising comfortable because the train beds were more cushy than our beds at school. We trekked 14 km the first day through some mountain trails, stayed overnight at a home-stay, and trekked 5 km the second day. The second day, we stopped at this gorgeous waterfall to enjoy the sight and the sound of the rushing water. The scenery  in general was absolutely amazing. The people in this region grow rice on terraced fields, which gives what would be rolling hills more of a block-ish look. It would seem that you could climb rice field steps until you reached heaven. The third day, we went to a market to buy all sorts of crafty goodies. I would have spent more money if I had more time there. We returned via the overnight train and fell into our school beds around 6 in the morning on Monday to get some rest before class that afternoon. Now, some pictures:

Enjoying the train!

There were so many baby pigs running around. They were all so very cute. If George Clooney can do it, then so can I. I want a pig as a pet.

The terraces rice fields looked more like intricate puzzles in some places.

It was an absolutely lovely weekend of enjoying the cool, clean, mountain air! I got some much needed rest, and recharged for the weeks and papers ahead. 

trick-or-treat

I went back to the UN today. Just kidding! It was another lunchtime seminar. This one was on male sexual networks in Hanoi. If one can draw see networks of sexual partners in a given area, then one can better understand how to disseminate information about HIV prevention and self-protection. It's really amazing that this research is happening.

In the United States in the early 80s when the first cases of AIDS were recognized in gay communities in San Francisco, there was this toxic belief that AIDs was killing "all the right people." At that time, the epidemic was localized to gay men, African-Americans and Haitian immigrants. I remember hearing Cleve Jones (gay rights and AIDS awareness activist) speak at UNC saying that this phrase was even on bumper stickers in San Francisco. Not only are there a host of issues with this statement, not the least of which is the fact that the targeted populations are, in fact, people and deserve to be treated as such, but also the ignorance rears its ugly head in believing that the epidemic was going to stay in those populations. The thing is, injecting drug users also have sex. Men who have sex with men can also have sex with women. People of different races have sex with each other. Do you see the trend here? We've come a long way, but I'm just saying that sometimes we need to get real and be honest about what's happening so that we can dialogue about how to best solve problems.

Because today is actually Halloween, we did some Halloween-related activities with the kids in English class. We explained costumes and trick-or-treating as well as pumpkin carving. Because we didn't have pumpkins to carve, we ended up drawing monsters instead. It's still artsy, but doesn't involve knives. Each person would go up and draw one part of the monster. They were hilarious! The kids would laugh hysterically as each new part of the monster was added. Kim's mother, who visited this past week, had brought candy to Hanoi from the States, so we brought the candy to kids. There were Snickers, Kit Kats, M&Ms, and Reeses Cups. Kim went outside the room, we lined the kids up, and got the kids to knock on the door, say "trick-or-treat," and then do something scary before they could get their candy. They did an amazing job and certainly earned their candy!

The funniest part of this was that none of them like the Reeses Cups, solidifying the fact that these children are not from the States. Not a single one of them liked the peanut butter cups. This boggles my mind. Maeve, Kim and I decided that this was because there isn't actually peanut butter here. For a country with so many peanuts, there is almost no peanut butter, unless it is imported, and what is from here is really oily and not pleasant. It was still a crazy realization that they didn't like the peanut butter cups.

you're paralyzed cuz this is thriller

Yesterday, a number of us took a bus to a residential area of Hanoi to prepare and eat lunch with Huyen's family. Her house had hardwood floors. Is is culturally inappropriate to lay down and caress someone's floor? Too late. We all gathered on the kitchen floor, cutting vegetables and mixing things. We made fried spring rolls, vegetable stir fry, fresh spring rolls and some assorted fresh vegetables. We sat on the floor of her living room and ate to our hearts' content. She has the sweetest family. They took such good care of us and made us feel completely at home. Then I got really sleepy and took a nap upon returning to school.

This morning, I got up early with Kim and Maeve to go to the Hanoi zoo with the kids in our English class. We walked around looking at the different animals, but there wasn't a whole lot of animal diversity. So many of the cages held the same animals whether they were deer, tigers, or macaques. There most definitely were civet cats, though (shout-out to Mom!). We eventually made our way to a gazebo. We sang some of the songs we learned in class and played some games. The big winner was Simon Says. One of the boys was laughing hysterically at every turn  of Simon Says. The Vietnamese people at the zoo that day would stop and watch us at the gazebo. It was our turn to be the animals on display. The zoo was followed by a restaurant for lunch where we got bun cha and nem. Nem is the word for the fried spring rolls, and these ones had seafood in them.

We had a Halloween party for our roommates to celebrate one of our favorite holidays with them the way that they celebrated Mid-Autumn Festival with us. Due to my limited costume resources, I decided that I had jeans and a hoodie and could easily pull off Justin Beiber. I then decided that since we were going to do Thriller, I would be the zombie Justin Beiber. I back-combed all my hair to make it stick out like crazy, put on some heavy eye-liner for the dead effect and got Maeve to draw a scar on my face. It was a successful costume. There were a lot of other really great costumes as well. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures, but Maeve did, so they will get disseminated at some point. At the party, we ate ice cream, had a costume contest, drew on pomellos (since we weren't able to carve pumpkins), danced to both Thriller and The Time Warp and watched Bettlejuice to finish it all off.

The funny thing is that we had been learning/practicing Thriller for about a week. We started off hiding in bushes and behind cars around the courtyard. When Burcu ran out screaming, we all zombie walked in to zombie attack her and then got into position to begin the dance. The beginning of the dance was fantastic. We lost it a bit towards the end, but recovered fully. It gets really fast at this one part, and it's hard to keep up. Someone did film our performance, so, if you are lucky, it just might get uploaded at some later date. The only sad part is that I don't think any of our roommates had ever seen or heard Thriller. They all seemed rather confused when we finished dancing.

Regardless, a great time was had by all. We had so much fun learning and performing Thriller, the ice cream was amazing and who can pass up the opportunity for some Halloween movie-watching?

happy diwali!

October 26th, we celebrated Diwali! Diwali is the Indian festival of lights. I don't fully understand the history behind it, but is is a celebration of the triumph of light over darkness. The day began with an Indian film, Jodhaa Akbar. It told the story of the romance between the Mogul emperor and his Hindu bride, a match made in order to unify the empire. It was a fabulous movie! So well-done and with so many rich colors and wonderful music. I suggest you watch it if you can find it!

The movie was followed by dinner at an Indian restaurant in Hanoi. I didn't know that I wanted Indian food so badly until I was eating it. I ate with my fingers to mirror Divya, who sat right across from me. Dinner ended with so many Indian sweets like jilebis and carrot halva. So scrumptious! We got back to school and erupted into a sparkler/dance party. I learned some bangra (a type of Indian dance) moves and just generally broke it down to some great beats. A fantastic time was had by all! I already knew that I would go to India at least once in my lifetime because of how much family history I have there, but I've now decided that I will be in India for at least one Diwali during my life.

Maeve and I spent the morning today walking to the Old Quarter in hopes of going to a museum. It was raining but not very hard, and we were determined to get out for a bit. It keeps happening that the beautiful days are ones when we have oodles of work to do and the gross days are the ones when we actually have free time. By the time we got to a place we wanted to get some lunch, the rain was torrential and we had given up any desire to be outside. We happily caught a taxi, which was warm and dry, back to school.

We got together to watch Inside Job, a documentary about the financial crisis in the States. It was obviously made by someone with very sure intentions, but there are irrefutable facts presented as well that back up almost point made in the movie. It takes a critical look at Wall Street and every Presidential administration back to Reagan. It was fascinating and depressing and a call for change. It's a good watch as well, though I suggest you watch Jodhaa Akbar first.

We went for an end-of-term karaoke party with some of the faculty and staff at the school who have helped us so much. The two classes taught by the Vietnamese professors have finished, so that's why it's end-of-term even though we have 6 or 7 weeks left in the program. It was great fun to sing along to some of our favorites (still no You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling) with some of our favorite people at school!

morning party

There are few things in this life that I like less than getting woken up and being kept from sleep. I always wake us disoriented and uncoordinated. You can ask anyone, I just shouldn't be messed with until I have been awake for at least ten minutes, and it's preferable that I've eaten something. So, here's the story of my morning:

The way the school is set up, there is one courtyard around which all the buildings sit. My dorm room has a window and a door facing that courtyard, neither of which are sealed in any way, shape or form (I've watched a rat run right under the balcony door), and our walls are paper thin and echo-y anyway.

There was some kind of ceremony yesterday that we were told was graduation. Graduation only lasts one day right? That's what I thought, but apparently, that is not the case. This pounding bass began shaking my room at 7:10 am (I didn't have class until 9am). The bass was followed by some impossibly loud announcer, what I can only imagine was a form of karaoke (much wailing involved), and then a song on repeat as the names were read. I had so many fantasies of getting up, becoming Godzilla and just going on a rampage in the courtyard. I had some serious, early-morning rage, which only compounded with my disoriented, uncoordinated wake-up state.

The rest of the day went much better. We spent the afternoon at the offices of FHI 360- Vietnam. I'll be spending more time in this office later in the semester as my interviewee for the oral project is the Country Director for FHI 360 here in Vietnam. We got the chance to see a different side of the HIV epidemic: the NGO response. We heard about their funding, projects, and strategies for the future. It was a fascinating day!

If you want to learn more about FHI 360 and what they do, check out their website:

http://www.fhi.org/en/CountryProfiles/Vietnam/index.htm