Days and Nights in Nam

Halfway to Nowhere

2010-05-31T19:44:00.000-04:00

I just took a left. I was riding along one of the many roads that circle around the outside of the city and decided to go down a road I had passed by before. An hour and a half later I was down out of the mountains and seeing signs for Ho Chi Minh City. I had to decide between chancing the uncertain rumblings of the clouds ahead or to turn about and race the path home, potentially safe and dry. I took a few pictures of the open grasslands surrounding me and sat alone on the bike and watched the clouds roll in.

One of the many joys of my time in Dalat was the weekly motorbike rides into the countryside, cruising along remote winding roads at 40mph. I pass calmly through smalls towns and villages, pass by coffee fields, pass by flooded rice plots lined by banana trees. I can feel the warm moist air rise up as I pass by the little family farms and then quickly the feeling subsides as I leave them behind. Riding in the open air brings with it the aromas of the country. Sometimes it's a pungent fish smell, sometimes it's wild mountain flowers and pine trees. Up in the mountains here I feel as if the clouds are immediately atop of me. They seem far closer than I've felt before, and appear far more detailed, and in being alone I feel as if they are only there for me.

There are so many roads that lead to so many places. One of these days I'm going to just keep going, keep riding, follow the road and see what's around that last bend. That time is not now. I am going home and will be back in New York on the 3rd of June.

You Say It's Your Birthday, Well It's My Birthday Too, Yeah

2010-05-30T09:04:00.000-04:00

I got flowers and toy motorcycle. It was awesome.

Cam Ly Waterfall

2010-05-26T23:45:00.000-04:00

Cam Ly waterfall is one of the many that are situated in and around Dalat. Cam Ly happens to be right in the city. It's not the most spectacular waterfall, it does have one good view. Otherwise the grounds surrounding Cam Ly are filled with fake animals (such as a horse painted to look like a zebra) and various other kinds of kitsch. I wouldn't spend too much time here, but I paid it a visit anyway.

Behold a Pale Horse

2010-05-24T08:35:00.000-04:00

They show classic movies on the version of Cinemax I get in Vietnam. The other day I watched a movie starring Gregory Peck called Behold a Pale Horse. It was a black and white film starring Peck, Anthony Quinn and Omar Sharrif. I love watching these old films, because they have nothing but the story to them. Most of the movie takes place in a small room in Pau where Peck, a Spanish rebel and bandit, debates whether to go back to Spain to see his dying mother. The movie relies heavily on the story and acting for entertainment. That's why I like to watch these old black and white films, because I like the stories, it makes me feel like I'm reading Hemingway.

The types of movies I get on cable here fall into one of three categories. They are either big-name new releases, old classics and b-movies, or straight to cable movies which no one has ever heard of. One example of the latter could be a movie named Mall, where a group of people are trapped in a flooding mall with an escaped serial killer trying steal some huge amount of money hidden in a mall vault. I've seen this movie more than once. Mostly, I wonder how movies like this get funding. When I do watch tv, I watch the oldies or the Discovery channel.

Fish Hash

2010-05-21T21:56:00.000-04:00

This had a really pungent smell. It literally is a hash made from fish parts. It tasted just fine. I actually liked it once I got past the strong smell of ammonia when it was being prepared. You mix it in with your rice and it adds a salty flavor to it. Not even close to the strangest thing I've eaten here.

Something Smells

2010-05-19T22:29:00.000-04:00

Durian is in season. As you walk up and down the street the aroma wafts through the air from these little street side stands, and you know it must be late Spring in Southeast Asia. Durian is the fruit most known for its smell, which many akin to rotting dead bodies. It smells bad enough to be banned on most public transportation here. I have tried it. It's not horrible, but I'm not bringing a bag full of durian home anytime soon.

Baseball

2010-05-17T01:08:00.000-04:00

Sunny days are made for baseball. I watch baseball most mornings at 6am, if I'm not teaching. This is not the first time I've watched baseball overseas. I watched a couple games in Spain a few years ago. I been teaching a few of the locals to play catch. They look terrified most of the time. I think wherever I go I'll have to bring the game with me. I think we have to; this game more than any other defines us.

The picture is of my cousin Brendan playing little league down in Texas. Good focus, but he needs to keep his back elbow up in his stance.

Lou Dog

2010-05-14T13:30:00.000-04:00

Lou is a dog like most. Except he has a gimpy leg from when he was hit by a motorbike as a puppy. He's gonna miss me. I'm gonna miss him.

This is part of what I originally intended to publish on the blog. Lou unfortunately was hit by a motorbike and died yesterday. Motorbike accidents are a fact of life in Vietnam. Death is a fact of life everywhere, and I'm still going to miss him.

Rainy Season Has Returned

2010-05-11T11:53:00.000-04:00

The seasonal rains of southeast Asia have returned. In Dalat it usually rains sometime in the early afternoon and on occasion it begins again in the late afternoon or night. In the early afternoon, when it rains, it rains hard. The skies darken and the clouds come together and the torrential downpour begins. The rain absolutely brings everything to a halt in the city. The motorbikes clear, the cafes fill, and everything is covered and moved in indoors. There's not much to do but sip coffee and watch the drops. We'll get a full day's worth of rain in just over an hour. It's an amazing tribute to seasonal winds of the Pacific.

Clam Bake Indoors on a Rainy Night

2010-05-09T00:37:00.000-04:00

A friend brought back a load of clams and other mollusks from Phan Rang, the closest coastal city to Dalat. We lit the grill and had a clam bake indoors away from the rain. Clams and rice was fairly tasty. The clams were cooked in their own juices and the flavored with peanuts and chives. It's a little unusual eating seafood when you're a mile high into the mountains, but in Vietnam the ocean is never far away.

These Girls Are Good

2010-05-06T12:07:00.002-04:00

A major badminton tournament has been taking place at the university. Apparently they are hosting players from most of the southern provinces, and a few of these competitors play for the national team. I've watched them play and these girls are good. The local Lam Dong team lost two heartbreaking gold medal matches on Wednesday night. They were playing the underdog all tournament and in the final match it came down to extra points, and mere inches along the back line. It was hard to watch. Check out the video here- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4vIiDuZuho

Dinner

2010-05-04T06:25:00.000-04:00

Since I will be leaving in a month and because all their daughters were home, I invited a local family to a farewell/thank you dinner. We ate at a restaurant overlooking Xuan Huong lake (which happens to be completely drained for construction purposes). The way Vietnamese dinners work is everything is shared, you start with several different types of fruits, meats, and vegetables, and you end with some type of soup or stew. I have eaten several interesting meats, which I won't eat in America, and on this night I ate two new ones. I ate fried frog legs and grilled wild boar. The frog legs were actually very similar to chicken wings and tasted really good. They were fried in butter and garlic and tasted mostly of those two things. The wild boar was just delicious, as with most things here it was flavorful and spicy. Other opening dishes included grilled squid, stir fried spinach, and crispy pork. We ended the night with a stew of spicy coconut and curry base with beef, shrimp, and fish balls freshly added when ready to serve. We had a few Saigon beers and a few laughs, and I'll miss this about Vietnam.

Golden Valley Revisited

2010-05-03T00:20:00.000-04:00

I decided to return to the Golden Valley. It takes awhile for me to get out there and back, but the ride is just about perfect. The trick to finding these great back country roads is to go north. If you go north out of Dalat, you then drive away from traffic and the majority of the population. Some friends of mine were having a picnic along the reservoir we found a week earlier. I wanted to join them. After finishing some errands, I enjoyed what I think is the best part of Dalat, the mountain air. I also wanted to see if I could find the same herd of water buffalo I saw there last week. We found about twenty of them along the road wading in the mud and huddling together in the shade trying to be beat the midday heat. It's hard to beat wading along the banks of mountain lake miles from nowhere.

Building a Building

2010-04-30T04:18:00.000-04:00

They have been working on this night and day outside of where I live. They are, I believe, building a new dormitory for students. I'm not sure when it will be done, but it seems to be going rather fast. We have an empty building next to me that no one has ever used. The way construction projects work here is that some of the workers first construct a shanty like building and live on site while the work is underway. Then they begin digging and pouring concrete. Most days I just walk by and like to watch them work. Occasionally the construction reminds of the scenes in Raiders of the Lost Ark where they are digging for the ark of the covenant in Egypt, especially when they are digging at night. I'm not sure why. Mostly the construction amounts to a lot of unusual noises during day that I can faintly hear from my room.

Lawnmower

2010-04-26T21:53:00.001-04:00

Occasionally there are horses just wandering around the campus at Dalat. They kind of just meander around not really paying attention to anything, until a student or two tries to touch them. I hate to admit it, but I always imagine an annoyed horse punting one of them across campus like a football. Normally they are tied to a post and moved about the campus. They're our lawnmowers, they keep everything trim.

Dam, Buffalo, Electric Plant

2010-04-23T22:52:00.000-04:00

Most tourists never get to see the little hidden gems nestled into the mountains surrounding Dalat. They miss out on much of the beauty of Dalat, because they never dare to a rent a motorbike and just take off in any direction. I've spent the last few months exploring the back roads that line the mountains here. I've rode through minority villages, explored dirt paths that lead to nowhere, examined old French remnants of colonialism, seen remote waterfalls, and circled amazing lakes and reservoirs. One such ride was last weekend. We started off for an area called Golden Valley where they have a flower garden. We bypassed the flowers and rode further on up the road. I saw a sign and we followed it even though we didn't know what it meant. We drove down a narrow paved path covered in downed pine needles. The path followed a river that ran low because of the dry season. At the end is where we found and old French hydro-electric plant from the 1940's. Unlike many things in Dalat, this electric plant had been well maintained. The only ruins there were the old on-site housing for the workers, which were left to the elements. The plant provided a serene hideaway buried at a notch in the valley along a river. It made New York and everything else seem a million miles away. After leaving we decided to find the lake or reservoir that supplied the plant, and did so some 3 or 4 kilometers down the road. From there we rode on, and stopped when, while riding along the reservoir, I noticed a herd of water buffalo wading along the bank. We just stopped the bikes and watched them watching us for a little while. We continued farther still. We journeyed far from Dalat up and down mountainsides until we reached the end of the paved road. If we were to go any farther it would be over dirt and rocks. We decided that this would be the time to return and did so. As we ventured back to Dalat the skies turned black and the rains began to fall, terrible heavy rain, until we had to stop. We took shelter in the gateway to a small garden in the mountains, and stood there shivering. We waited for the rain to slow and then we rode on and home.

New Hat

2010-04-21T05:12:00.000-04:00

I'm going to look good in this. All of the old men in Dalat wear these style hats with suit jackets and waistcoats. I'm thinking of stealing the look from them.

Cafe Moc

2010-04-18T08:32:00.000-04:00

There isn't much to do in Dalat. There isn't much nightlife. One thing they do have is coffee, and with it, cafes. Cafe Moc is situated in the cellar of an old French style villa. On Fridays they have live music, and of particular note is the guitarist. It's mostly traditional Vietnamese love songs, or more accurately songs of unrequited love. They will also do instrumentals of old Spanish music or Mediterranean music. In Dalat, on occasion, it is hard to remember that I'm in Asia and not somewhere in the northern Basque region.

Rodney Dangerfield of English Teachers

2010-04-16T01:43:00.000-04:00

I was looking through my class pics and then I noticed this one.

Tiger Falls

2010-04-14T10:24:00.000-04:00

While we may not have beaches in Dalat, we do have many secluded and sometimes hidden waterfalls. One such waterfall is Tiger Falls. It is located about 20K east of the city with only a minor street sign marking the turn off along a narrow mountain road. It is worth the trip and the ride, if one wants to find themselves alone in the woods surrounded by the sound of falling water. Just be careful crossing the rickety rope bridge.

Back to School

2010-04-12T20:46:00.000-04:00

These are the four classes I teach. This semester I'm teaching four sections of Speaking 4, public speaking. Just about no one likes speaking in public, so this should be interesting.

I'm in some of these pictures. You can probably spot me.

AVK 32A

AVK 32B

AVK 32C

AVK 32D

The Philippines

2010-04-09T23:39:00.000-04:00

I'm not going to say much about my trip. I was nervous about returning home to the Philippines after twenty something years. It ended up being just about the perfect trip.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Ta Keo

2010-04-07T20:47:00.000-04:00

Ta Keo is what is called a "temple mountain," it represents Mount Meru in the Hindu religion. It's only about 140ft to the top, but it's really steep and this is the only temple they tell you is dangerous. I really wish I didn't climb to the top, because you have to climb back down.

Angkor Tom

2010-04-05T22:05:00.001-04:00

Angkor Thom means "great city" in the Khmer language. It not only refers to the Bayon temple pictured below and most recently brought to popular culture by the movie Tomb Raider. It actually refers to the entire city complex of palaces, terraces, temples, libraries, etc. The Bayon at Angkor Thom was massive, yet not nearly as large as Angkor Wat. What it lacked in sixe when compared to Angkor Wat, I felt it made up for in its unique design. The large countenances built in to the temple towers gives you the awkward feeling of being watched the entire time you climb through the temple. Not to mention I was able to get good pictures of the wall reliefs since many of them were outside.

Before the Sun Rises

2010-04-03T23:21:00.001-04:00

I awoke at five. I showered and eagerly ate the stale pastry I bought the day before. My tuk-tuk driver was waiting outside to take me on my morning tour of the Angkor temples. I was dressed with the heat of the late morning in mind, and felt chills in the air from the cold wind. We arrived and in the dark distance some shadows of the temples loomed. I crossed the long stone bridge out to Angkor Wat careful as not to twist an ankle. I was early even for most tourists. I climbed through the temples gates and walked towards the main part of the temple complex. There were some vendors selling drinks and breakfast and some other tourists. I found a seat on the some stones by the edge of a shallow reflecting pool. I sat and waited. As the sun began to rise the temples came more and more into view and the colors of the sky changed from purples to reds. The only annoyance was three male college age tourists behind me complaining about how early it was. I found some irony in their annoyance. I didn't wait until the sun was late in the sky to enter the temples. I took advantage of the patience and sleepiness and toured the temples while most were still sitting in their comfortable chairs waiting for the sun to be full in the sky. I was nearly alone in the massive temple complex of Angkor Wat. I ventured through it and was to photograph relief after relief in peace. A temple guard asked me if I wanted to go up to top of the complex before it opened and while I normally might not do so, I paid him five dollars to take me to the top illicitly. So while most were watching the end of the sun rise from outside the temple, I was able to view it from the very top of the temple with full views of the surrounding plains. The temple was eerily quiet and peaceful considering this is the very reason many had come to Cambodia. Check out the FLICKR photostream for more pictures of Angkor.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Before the Sun Sets

2010-04-02T09:29:00.000-04:00

Phnom Bakheng is an eleven hundred year old temple which sits atop a hill. It has become a favorite place for visitors to watch the sunset from. Despite being one of the older temples at Angkor it is in surprisingly good condition. So I joined the throngs of visitors and climbed the mountain temple to enjoy the views of the surrounding valley and all that once was Angkor in its glory. When climbing the steps here I thought they were steep and rather dangerous for the older tourists and at this time I had no idea what lay in store at other temples. Even though I was surrounded by tourists I felt this place had not lost its mysticism. I could feel all the history and the sense of accomplishment the Khmer must have felt standing atop their mountain temple. I suppose it's the weight of history and humanity that we feel at these sort of places.

The Wire

2010-04-01T05:16:00.001-04:00

Someone asked me the other day why Baltimore was so violent. My guess is that they have been watching The Wire as I have the last month. I didn't think of this at the time. I told them that Baltimore was like most places, good and bad. I have cable television here and they have been showing season 3 of show. Season 3 is probably my favorite. The Wire for all its grittiness is just beautiful in its honesty. This show and The Simpsons are the two greatest shows in the history of television.

Click on me- Ending Montage Season 3

Cambodia, Initial Thoughts

2010-03-28T09:11:00.004-04:00

Cambodia at first sight is unimpressive in its dust blown flatness. In under a day I had traveled from the green mountains which surround Dalat to the flooded rice fields of the Vietnamese delta and finally to the dry heart of Cambodia. I spent seven hours on the bus traveling to Phnom Penh in the early morning. I was the only westerner on the bus. I watched the flat plains and stilt houses roll past. In the front of their homes were water holes that provided a small reprieve for cow and man from heat of the dry season. Something that stuck out about the bus ride was the ferry crossing. It made me think I was entering a different world somehow. When I arrived in Phnom Penh I was greeted by tuk-tuk drivers that were advertising the local tourist spots. The first thing offered to me was a hotel and a tour of the killing fields. His selling point was the shooting range at the killing fields. That turned me off to the idea. I don't know if one can really fire a gun at the killing fields, but I'm sure I wouldn't want to. I decided to instead to take a shower and eat a full lunch. I walked around the city for a little while before stumbling upon the 700 year old stupas of Wat Phnom. Inside of the largest stupa are the remains of one of the kings of the ancient Khmer empire. Today it's a park and the center of a surprisingly modern eastern capitol. What actually excited me about the park was the monkeys jumping from tree to tree and the elephant in he park. At first they excited me and then they drew my interest and I began to think on them. The elephant had been reduced by its owner to a beggar in the park. As I got closer to it, I imagined that its countenance was not a happy one. Then I also saw a mother monkey holding its dead baby in her arms as she desperately tried to awake it. This went on for some time before she took him away with her. In both instances the monkey and the elephant seemed very human in their actions. I felt for them. I felt like these animals were suffering some sort of public embarrassment, and then I realized that animals don't suffer all the ills of city life that we do. I spent the night in some bars by the river and then took the bus up to Siem Reap the next morning.

Vietnam at Night

2010-03-24T20:11:00.000-04:00

alleyway in Saigon

traffic and exercisers in the park in Saigon

backstreet in Dalat

karaoke and street in Dalat

flag at night

model boat store

traffic and flower festival in the park

sweet rice stand in Saigon

Disco Buddha overlooking Dalat

turning circle in Dalat

Jason taking his shot at Guava in Nha Trang

Badminton Tournament

2010-03-20T21:58:00.000-04:00

Bao Luc vs. Dalat. A regional tournament was held at Dalat University. So one of my neighbor's daughters, who happens to be one of the best players in Lam Dong province, was playing in the tournament. I've tried playing her in badminton. I lose every time, and lose badly. I mostly end up sweaty, tired, and sore. My prior badminton experience is limited to high school gym class, but it still doesn't feel good to get destroyed by a 16 year old girl. Lin won two gold medals and a bronze at this tournament.

After The Leaving

2010-03-18T20:38:00.000-04:00

"No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow." - Lin Yutang

This being Jason's first time out of the country where no one was shooting at him. We discussed the lull we often feel after returning home from a trip. We should be happy to be home, but there is a sort of let down. There should be a happiness to be home, but instead there is often a remorseful reminiscence of the recently ended trip. It makes me wonder what it will feel like when I am home after Vietnam, this being the longest of my trips. I imagine it'll be strange and awkward at first and then increasingly comfortable.

Why so Tall?

2010-03-16T07:07:00.000-04:00

We probably underestimated the height and steepness of Lang Biang mountain. We probably started a little too late in the day. We probably should not have bothered to climb up to both peaks. Somehow we ended up finishing our climb at dusk and walking back down the mountain in dark. Jay and Ian rented some motorbikes and we all rode there in the late afternoon. Most people pay to take one of the jeeps up to the top. We decided against it. The walk up to the top was paved but rather steep. It did provide spectacular views of the surrounding valley.

Buddha on the Hill

2010-03-13T19:22:00.000-05:00

I live at the top of a long hill the stretches away from the center of the city. From where I live I can see most of the city laid out between the hills. There are two Buddhas within a stone's throw of my apartment. They watch over the city and its inhabitants. The larger of the two is the smiling sitting Buddha. From what I can research and tell from his pose, this Buddha stands for meditation and wisdom. In particular it is most likely a reference to Buddha flower sermon where he said nothing and simply held a lotus flower in his hand. It makes me think of the Bible passage I included at the start of this blog, "as for man, his days are like grass, /he flourishes like a flower of the field; /the wind blows over it and it is gone, /and its place remembers it no more." I suppose that's a good reminder to have sitting at the top of the city.

Mekong Delta, Cock Fighting, and a Karate Master

2010-03-10T03:31:00.000-05:00

Even though I live in Vietnam and am technically not a tourist, (I am though) I still think tours are a good way to see different things. I oscillate between wanting to experience new places in the authentic local way and just wanting to take a cheap easy, "foreigner special" tour. So that is what we did. We took a nice air conditioned bus to the delta city My Tho. As we sat on the comfortable bus watching the rice fields pass us by, I noticed that Jason, Ian, and I were the only ones on the bus talking. The tour was made up mostly of Australian and Japanese tourists and I wondered at what people thought of our random pop culture babble. At our first stop we were encouraged to mingle while they served us tea with honey and kumquats, and some rice wine. They also played some traditional music on traditional instruments. This is where we first met Juan the South African muay thai fighter. He was pretty cool and hung out with us the rest of the tour. From there we took a small four person boat down a tributary to a an island where they make coconut candy. There they let us take pictures with a very large snake.

I did not want my picture taken with it. Ian and Jay made a new pal in the friendly reticulated python. Afterwards they took us to another island where we had lunch and a few beers. For entertainment they decided to hold a cock fight for everyone. Don't worry this was just a sparring match and neither of the roosters died. Juan told us stories of his fights and parties in Thailand where he was well connected. He also suggested that we should come out to South Africa for some beers and barbecue. Apparently South Africa is known for it's barbecue. After lunch we drifted back towards My Tho and the highlight for me was the children swimming in the channel retrieving some watermelons that had fallen off of a boat. Even Jason reached down and plucked one from the river. It was a pretty cool Vietnam experience.

Long Beach

2010-03-07T07:01:00.000-05:00

The last time I was here there was only maybe twenty of us on the beach. Today there was a flood of Vietnamese vacationers enjoying what little time they are spared from their jobs. This did little to soil the beauty that is a secluded and pristine beach along a peninsula in the shadow of a lush mountain. Part of the beauty of going to Long Beach is the forty minute ride down the coast. The highway is sandwiched between the coastline and the hills and mountains that seem to rise up from the sea. At one point in the highway just before you reach Cam Ranh we pulled off of the street and down some narrow dirt roads. From the street one could completely pass by this beach with out ever knowing it was there. As we approached the ocean it was not yet in view but the sounds of the wave beating upon the beach grew more and more apparent. Bamboo and wood bungalows line the main part of the beach closest to the highway. In the bungalows sit reclining chairs and tile topped tables, made so they can easily withstand the small wood coal barbecues we would cook with. I like to walk out along the length of the beach (it goes for miles) until the bungalows and all the people are only a speck, a memory in the distance blurred by the heat of the sun. There one can swim and be completely alone with the great Pacific ocean. That is the beauty of Long Beach. Also Jay and Ian fell asleep and I had a complete stranger take a picture posing with them, that was cool too.

very large fresh whole shrimp

shrimp, crab, and fresh squid

Tet

2010-03-05T00:29:00.000-05:00

Tet is the celebration of the lunar new year in Vietnam. It is their most important holiday and preparation begins weeks in advance. We were able to spend Tet with a local family that has kind of taken me in. We ate traditional foods and shared a few drinks. Tet is celebrated like our Thanksgiving or Christmas in America in that everyone goes home to visit their families. So in Dalat all the students went home for about three weeks starting at the beginning of February. Which means Dalat was basically a ghost town. So much so that almost every business including the large corporate ones were shut down and locked up. Somehow a really relaxed city turned into a even more eerily quiet hill station. Some of the traditional foods we had included some sort of sticky rice cake, candied coconut, candied ginger, and pig head cheese. The cherry trees blossom, people go home, they have large parties, and eat sweets. It's probably the most wonderful time of the year in Vietnam.

The Sun is Really Hot

2010-03-02T08:16:00.002-05:00

Hey kids, do you think sunburn is cool? Then you'll love Jason Vilbig. If you don't think sunburn is cool, then you'll just find this amusing. The reason the beach at Nha Trang is so nice and calm is in part because of the outlying islands that protect the beach from sea swells. So while in Nha Trang we took a four island boat tour that occupied most of our second day there. These tours are popular with foreigners and locals alike, but when they decide which boat we will take they separate the locals from the tourists. This is because tourists tend to like a more rowdy, alcohol fueled tour while the locals prefer the scenic, easygoing picnic style tour. At the beginning of the tour you get to find out where everyone is from and we happened to be the only Americans, let alone New Yorkers on the tour. I like to think we reinforced whatever unfair positive or negative stereotypes the other Europeans and Australians already had about Americans. As one of two people on the boat that actually lives in Vietnam, I have been able to view tourists in a different light and I take their opinions with a grain of salt. The first island on the tour was a stop at a small aquarium shaped like a pirate ship. They actually had some monster sized fish there and a few sharks. The highlight for me was the moray eels and sea turtles, curiously placed together in the same tank. This was not a petting tank thankfully. The island was beautiful and the boat was calm and relaxing. Imagine this boat tour was basically created solely for foreign tourists. I think the most surreal moment for me was when, travelling between islands, they played "American Pie" by Don McLean. Jason is now about four beers deep. At the second island we docked at small fishing barge just off shore from a fishing village and were given snorkels. For some strange reason most of the tourists seemed to be waiting for someone else to lead the way into the water. A Canadian named Matt was the first to jump in, followed by Jay doing a back-flip off the bow of the ship. I was third or fourth in the water, back-flip off the barge. The water was infinitely clear and beneath us we were able to observe coral and an array of sea life.

We stayed here for some time, long enough for us to make some friends and for me to ride a jet ski. There was only one point in which I nearly flipped it when I cut a turn too fast and the nose dipped in the water. We partied on the barge for a while with some of the other tours. I am one beer deep now, and Jason is about nine deep and his back is starting to turn red. The next place we docked was just off some uninhabited island for lunch and a floating bar. The lunch was actually very good considering it was prepared on boat. It included local Vietnamese fare of a more western flavor served family style. Still some of the other tourists seemed hesitant when trying the different dishes. I offered my suggestions as to what I preferred to eat. Jason is now twelve beers deep and still refusing sunblock or a t-shirt. After eating the tour guides set up a floating bar, which only served one type of mystery cocktail, in the ocean and gave us all floats so as we didn't drown while drinking in the ocean. It was a lot like being in a regular touristy bar here except you had to pay attention to how much you were drifting. After a long day in the sun you finish the day on a private beach on the last island. There are reclining chairs and people selling food and souvenirs. After a long day in the sun it's kind of a nice relaxing way to end the day. After some time on the island at around four-thirty in the afternoon we headed back to the harbor. I finished the day at three beers. Jason's tab has been totaled up and the final tally was seventeen beers, not a new record for the boat but still impressive. Also his back is crab red by now. It was the worst sunburn I have ever seen. I like boat rides.

The Nature of Travel

2010-02-26T23:33:00.000-05:00

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain

What storms await us when we venture far from home? Before the trip often we visualize what will befall us on our travels. We try to think of what we will do, imagine what the sights, sounds, and smells will be like. I cannot see the pictures Jason and Ian conjured up in their heads. I can think back on when I was finishing my last preparations to leave and every moment was daydreams of what awaited me in the far east. Sometimes I think of the movie The Beach (admittedly because I never read the novel) and think of the best and worst of travelling, and really the best and worst of people. What I like is the interaction with locals and the sharing culture and experience. What I dislike is the traveler that is there only to act such as Columbus and take from the places they visit. Vietnam is a very good place to encounter both of these aspects.

Cu Chi Revisited

2010-02-26T23:26:00.000-05:00

M60 and a Chud. That's all I have to say about him. I have been to the Cu Chi tunnels previously, but decided that Jason and Ian should see them. They are an interesting part of the history of the Vietnam War, and besides the little propaganda video to start off the tour, rather enjoyable.

Ian shooting the AK.

Dirty Life and Times

2010-02-23T22:12:00.000-05:00

Hardly seems like Vietnam

Walk off any of the main streets in Da lat and you're in the countryside

Next two pictures are across the street from each other

Only a hundred yards from where I live

Kids go home for lunch in the middle of the day

A back alley shortcut

Down some lonely road in the middle of the city

View from atop a hill

Pitchers and Catchers

2010-02-21T08:49:00.000-05:00

"They'll pass over the money without even thinking about it: for it is money they have and peace they lack. And they'll walk out to the bleachers; sit in shirtsleeves on a perfect afternoon. They'll find they have reserved seats somewhere along one of the baselines, where they sat when they were children and cheered their heroes. And they'll watch the game and it'll be as if they dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick they'll have to brush them away from their faces. People will come Ray. The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it's a part of our past, Ray. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh... people will come Ray. People will most definitely come." Field of Dreams.

People will return once again to the fields of their childhoods to cheer for their heroes. We'll watch games that mean nothing in standings and be thankful that we have one more time emerged from the doldrums of winter. The snow will melt and our heroes will journey north with the first birds of the season and bring with them the game we all love, and we will watch them and wish it were us running on to those fields. It's hard for some to understand the special connection with baseball that America has; it's hard for most to understand how even the seasons seem to have revolved around it. Baseball has returned and with it another youthful Spring of optimism. I may have left America for now, but I have brought the game with me. Go Yankees!

Flower Festival

2010-02-19T00:38:00.000-05:00

Every two years in Da lat they host a flower festival in January. Think inundated with fragrant flowers and Vietnamese tourists. Literally every hotel room in Da lat is filled and the streets are overrun with tourists. I live in a very small city, and for about a week every two years it is insanely swamped. I suppose it's good for business though. I have to imagine that all these hotels that spend the majority of their time empty need this flood of tourists like the ancient Egyptians needed the Nile floods. The city prepares for the festival by dressing everything up, planting new flowers, and actually turning on the large fountain we have downtown. I have only ever seen it working once. All along the lake in the middle of the city there are shops set up selling flowers and anything you could need to grow flowers. At night their is a huge pageant with dancers and music and it is one of the few times that Da lat will make it on to the national television stations. There is also a convention set up with vendors from all around Vietnam selling a variety of goods. The only thing I bought was some fried hot-dogs.

Worst Road

2010-02-15T19:45:00.000-05:00

The road from Da lat to Phan Thiet goes through some mountain passes and some of the more remote and impoverished areas I have seen here. Going through these remote villages (if they even are that), I couldn't help but think how anyone ended up there. One of the more substantial settlement looked like it had built by the government for a local minority group. The road twisted through this hard land, and for itself it seemed as if time and government had forgotten it. There where parts of the road entirely missing, parts where it was safer to drive off the side of the road, and parts where it appeared the pavement had erupted forming a crater with a ring of debris. This made the going tough, but none of the students on their way home for the holidays seemed to mind. One young man sat the entire six hours on the bus with a desktop computer on his lap. I took this to and from Phan Thiet. To make matters worse on the way back as we were leaving the worst section of road behind us and winding our way up steep mountain terrain we became stranded by a piece of bridging that had fallen off the back of a tractor-tralier. We pulled up to find a line of trucks stopped in the road. I followed the bus driver and out of the bus to get a stretch of the legs and noticed that the truck drivers had logs behind their tires indicating to me that we were going nowhere anytime soon. Whatever goods the trucks were carrying, most likely seafood from the coast, were beginning to thaw and dump water along the road. They had already brought a crane in, but it seemed as if they were to be here a while. I watched as a car pulled up to bring some of the men dinner, and found this to be an ominous omen. They sat and played cards and one slept in a makeshift hammock under the bridge section. Things could have turned out worse for us though. We were lucky. It happened that a bus of equal size to us was on its way to Phan Thiet and trapped on the other side of the accident. We managed to switch buses and cargo and once everything was settled between the two parties we were back on way along the worst road I traveled so far in Vietnam.

Mui Ne

2010-02-12T23:23:00.002-05:00

Mui Ne is a former remote fishing village turned resort town. There is really only one road in and out of the town and it is lined with resort hotels and restaurants. The most interesting thing about Mui Ne is it is the one of the best places for wind and kite surfing in the world. It is nestled into a notch along the coast of Vietnam located about 20k north of Phan Thiet. On one side of the town there is the beach and on the opposite it abuts red sand dunes. Which is symoblically appropriate because Mui Ne is a major tourist destination for Russian tourists. Many of the signs can be read in Vietnamese, English, and Russian. Just to be clear I didn't stay overnight in Mui Ne because I simply can't afford it, and in truth beyond the small fishing boats on the horizon, it doesn't feel like Vietnam to me. No we were in Mui Ne because Te Chung, Tony's former professor, was treating us to an amazing lunch. We started the meal with bit of raw fish wrapped up in rice paper with some greens. Then came pieces of grilled squid. The third course was some sort of fish, related to cod we thought, cooked in soy sauce and vegetables. Everything was as fresh as possible, we even picked the fish we ate. To finish the meal we topped everything off with some seafood fried rice. Delicous meal, beautiful surroundings, cold beer, volunteering has been really hard on me.

view from the restaurant

small piece of a very large squid

a very ugly, but very tasty fish Te picked out for us

Swimming in the South China Seas Before 7

2010-02-09T21:25:00.000-05:00

I took a short weekend trip down to Phan Thiet. I went there for a housewarming party the developer was throwing for a friend. It was a pretty big party since it was in part for potential buyers of the complex. They had a whole gourmet dinner, which included delicious grilled tiger prawns. There was a band and karaoke and of course dancing. What really made the trip something special, besides the free beer, was the next morning getting up at six to go for a swim in the ocean. The housing complex is kind of out of the way and the only thing near it is a small fishing village. So there we were swimming in the south China sea before seven along side the bowl shaped fishing boats/baskets. They resemble large woven baskets. The men go out in these boats at midnight and bring in the nets repeatedly until about seven in the morning. While they toil in the sea, the women sit on the beach with their children and animals waiting to negotiate prices on their paltry catches. The fish I saw them bring in were long and slender and looked to be nothing much at all, but I suppose they'll go towards making fish sauce, for which Phan Thiet is known. We stopped and watched the negotiations, as they passed fish to and fro and I could only imagine how many of these narrow fish were needed to bring in one's salary. It was us, the fishermen, the negotiating women, their children, their dogs, their motorbikes, and their cows. It was the first time I have ever seen cows walking along beach in the early morning. I walked picking seashells, digging up starfish, and wondering at the events in my life that had brought me there at that moment.

Tony petting his new friend

empty beach, late afternoon

Goodbye Barbecue

2010-02-06T23:41:00.000-05:00

"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past." -F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

The nature of travelling means that you make friends you may never get to see again. Last month we had a goodbye barbecue for our friend from Tawain, Liang Yi. She was probably my best friend here in the first few months. This would be funny if you knew her. She's not the type of person to be hanging out with the likes of me; I'm rock and roll and she's Star Trek. Before she left she had a few laughs with all of us, I kind of told her this was the American way, grilling meat and drinking beer. Anyway I make a mean side of pork here.

Jet Airliner

2010-02-05T22:26:00.000-05:00

"May you live all the days of your life." -Jonathan Swift

Jay and Ian are coming to visit. Generally before you have guests visit one would take the time before to clean and prepare for their arrival. I suppose I should do the same. A more creative writer than myself might take this opportunity to speak metaphorically about cleansing one's mind and taking stock of ones life to prepare for the arrival of friends. I think that's for another blog. I always liked going to the airport, even if I'm not the one going anywhere. I like to see all the different people going here, there, and everywhere. I like to think of their individual stories and think about where they might be going or where they're coming from. A lot of them will sit next a person on their flight and never say more than a few polite words. There is that bit of social awkwardness to overcome, I suppose. There are those that are just so self absorbed that you might not want them to talk. I think a lot of people are just nervous and don't feel they have an interesting story they wish to share with a stranger. Too often we confuse what is interesting with the dramatic and tragic. I suppose in being a ELA teacher that I should be a good story teller. Maybe I am, but what I like to do is listen. I like to hear the boring details of people's lives. It is in these details that we find the true heart and soul of a story. Their are billions of individual stories in this world. That's what people should talk about.

You Playing The Foosball?

2010-02-02T21:02:00.000-05:00

January is a month for birthdays. Recently we had a birthday party for three of our teachers. A lot of people were invited so the original plan was to have an outdoor party. It started raining early in the morning and rained for about two days straight. It was the first rain we've had in Da lat in two months. We were able to move the party into the library and everything worked out. The only thing we didn't move into the library was the foosball table that we borrowed from a local bar because it was really heavy. I know because I carried up and down the stairs. The Vietnamese are all really good at foosball. I am embarrassingly bad at it. Watching them play was like watching an actual soccer match.

Send My Mail Here- On the Road Part 5

2010-01-31T07:47:00.002-05:00

My little road trip around the south eastern tip of Vietnam ended where many things end, Saigon. I spent much of my time in Saigon searching for a special kind of sandwich. I'm not even going to pretend that I'm doing big important things here. I have no delusions of grandeur as far as my self importance goes. We ended our trip eating kobe beef and sea urchin at a Japanese restaurant in district six. We knew the chef so we downed a bottle of saki and a few beers together, and then we made our way home. It was another night of eating and drinking well with great company. That's more than good enough for me.

The restaurant was part of some resort built on the grounds of an old French villa along the Saigon river.

Writing this entry made me think of this song:

"With Tennesee Sour mash Whiskey on my Breath,

And Rosalee, Suzie and and Lucy on my mind,

I drove my old car down the dusty streets of this old border town.

But I never thought I'd get stuck here such a long long time.

I've got a million-dollar bill but they can't change it.

And they won't let me leave until my tab is paid,

So I might as well settle down

And buy the house another round.

Send my mail to the Rosarita Beach Cafe.

It was one of those hot dry dime-a-dozen Mexicali days,

When I fell through the doors of the Rosarita Beach Cafe.

And I got myself a table with a view of the breakers on the bay

And another cold Dos Equis on the way."

Warren Zevon, "The Rosarita Beach Cafe"

Ugly Shirt

2010-01-27T12:40:00.000-05:00

I bought this shirt off some women selling dress shirts on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. I think it was prudent financial decision.

(detail of the flower print below)

I can't tell if this is a woman's shirt or not. Nobody seems to care here either way.

What it Means to Have an Address- On the Road Part 4

2010-01-24T21:58:00.001-05:00

I have an address, sort of. It's the address of the university and actually doesn't apply to where I live. Taxi drivers never know where my building is since I am not on the main part of campus. I pick up my mail from a box, with a lot of other boxes around it. I have a box which I share with all the other foreign teachers at Da Lat. This is not an address, I suppose. Te Chung the professor from San Francisco who brought Tony and myself on this journey did so to inspect a home he is building for himself in Phan Tiet. I look at this house as a reward for a lifetime of teaching. Then I begin to think and wonder if at the end of my career I'll have earned something like such as this home. I'm not sure that even I were to own a house here that I would feel at home. I'm a visitor here. I don't speak the language. I don't know the customs. I'm just another American expat pretending to be something resembling Fitzgerald's "lost generation," save for replacing post war France for the far east. I'm not sure if I'd feel at home in this house, or in any other house abroad. I can live abroad, I can live and adapt to most places, but I can't make a home abroad. I think I'm stuck as an American.

View from between two cafes in Phan Tiet.

Vietnam is long and slender and has many serene beaches such as this one just south of Phan Tiet.

Bitter Melon and Chicken Roti in Phan Rang- On the Road Part 3

2010-01-21T03:53:00.000-05:00

Phan Rang is a small coastal city which is located a few hours away from Da Lat. As you approach Phan Rang the countryside appears to go through a change. The lush greens of most everywhere in Vietnam turn into sandy wind blown desert with rocky outcrops, scrub brush, and cacti. Our stop in Phan Rang was brief. We stopped to eat at a small corner restaurant which served us chicken roti and bitter melon soup. The bitter melon is gross. It is really tough to eat and one of the few foods I don't like in Vietnam. Chicken roti is rice and spicy fried chicken Vietnamese style. The city is small and we were in an out of it quickly and off into the desert.

These region in Vietnam was at the heart of the Champa kingdom. The Cham are an ethnic minority in Vietnam now, but at one point ruled the southern coast. Their kingdom began to solidify in the 2nd century AD and lasted into 18th century, with its height being the 11th and 12th century. What is unique about the Cham is their precipitous fall from power and their belief in the Hindu religion. The south eastern coast of Vietnam is dotted with Cham towers exhibiting medieval Hindu art. The Cham kingdom for centuries was a stop for merchants travelling and sailing along the spice route. Columbus could have stopped in Phan Rang had he gone in the right direction.

On our way we made a short pit stop to inspect an old railroad bridge and interview some locals.

Bun Bo Hue

2010-01-18T20:29:00.001-05:00

Bun Bo Hue is one of my favorite foods and I probably eat it every other day or so. I usually go down to a little family owned shop on Bui Thi Xuan (pronounced similar to "booty swan"). I go there often enough that they no longer ask me what I want, they just assume it's Bun Bo Hue and a Saigon beer. The soup starts with a broth that sits simmering all day long in large cauldrons. It is flavored with a mix of spices and herbs, and because it is from the city of Hue it is usually made very spicy. To make it one starts with a bowl of rice noodles, then adds cuts of beef, chives, pepper, and a hunk of liver. Add to this the broth that has been simmering all day for however long a family has been handing down their recipe. After this it is up to the patron to decide how to finish off their meal. I usually add shredded lettuce, some fermented red pepper, and a bit of lime juice. It's designed to be a full meal in a bowl, carbs, veggies, and meat altogether. This cost me about 15,000VND, less than a dollar. This is dinner most nights.

"Ocean in view! O! The Joy!"- On the Road Part 2

2010-01-16T19:31:00.000-05:00

The road bends through small mountain towns and minority villages. We stop to take pictures, and the people look and gaze at the travelers. I can't tell if they're staring because were obviously Americans well off the beaten path or if it's because I'm wearing my ridiculous flower shirt. From Da Lat there was short drop down, but now we have to journey upwards to crest the mountain and gain full view of the valley ahead of us. At a bend that juts out over the declining vale sits a small Buddhist shrine. The shrine was far from people and empty when we arrived. From the carved mound which it sat adjacent to, one could see the whole of the valley from the road hence we came to the windy Pacific ocean. I could see all of the coast and how far we still had to go to Phan Rang. I understood why their had been a shrine here always.

Street Scenes, Da Lat

2010-01-13T21:44:00.000-05:00

Picking Flowers and Onions- Road Trip Part 1

2010-01-12T10:15:00.000-05:00

"Why think about that when all the golden land's ahead of you and all kinds of unforeseen events wait lurking to surprise you make you glad you're alive to see?" -Jack Kerouac, On the Road.

Any road going to or exiting Da Lat involves a journey through the mountainous countryside. We started off the morning with a quick breakfast of noodles mixed with seafood and pork, and with full bellies we journeyed out on highway 20. I sat in the cool comfortable back of a Ford SUV carefree in not having to drive. Instead my only duties were to observe and participate in the intermittent conversation. It was a Monday morning. We were surrounded by life, constant life, small family farms, lush forest and jungle trees, people here and there working and relaxing, and always the effervescent sun. We got off the highway on to some back road in a minority area of Lam Dong.

There were four of us. Myself, Tony, and Tony's former professor from San Francisco State University, and a driver all rode in a Ford. Tony works with me. He from California and is Viet Kieu. It was his professor's trip, and we both referred to him as Te or teacher, and that's what he was for much of the trip. He videotaped, he interviewed, and he taught us about this foreign land. Our driver, who was very cartoonish, had to stop to ask directions every time we turned on to a new road. When I say cartoonish, I mean smoking constantly, raising his shirt to scratch his stomach at every stop, and seemingly angering every waitress and waiter we encounter by his loud yet brusque manner. Our goal, beyond travel, was to film the everyday lives of the people that populate this country. Our first stop was a small farm in the shadow of the mountains that cradle Da Lat. They were harvesting chives on a 40 by 40 plot. The young woman we met was a migrant worker from the north. She couldn't have been more than a young twenty. Her pay was about 2/3 of what I make in a month as a volunteer at the university, a decent salary. She was talkative and in good spirits. The reality of the situation is Vietnam is a country of 80 million and while their economy is booming this good fortune does not extend to everyone. Vietnam has every man's dream problem, a surplus of young women, but not enough employment and money for the lot of them. Many leave crowded homes to find enough work to support their simple lives. I wondered how it was possible for her to do this on her pay, but I figure that was only because most Americans have no concept of the simple life. I am as guilty as anyone of this claim. She seemed happy.

Our second stop was at small coffee shop in a secluded mountain town. Cafe Sua Da for everyone, iced coffee with milk. Next to the coffee shop was a women selling dress shirts by the side of the road. Thirty thousand VND a piece, under two dollars. We picked through and my friend Tony found the one shirt that did not belong. It was some sort of flowered patterned button down from the 70's or whenever those things were in style. It'd probably been in that pile forever. I'm not even sure it's man's shirt. He insisted I buy it. I said absolutely not. I bought it and wore it until we reached Saigon.

New Year's 2010

2010-01-10T07:08:00.000-05:00

I welcomed in the new year sipping vodka tonics in Nha Trang with a group of Canadians from Vancouver. Early in the day we took about an hour long trip outside of Nha Trang to a quiet and secluded beach in the countryside. We ate fresh seafood enjoyed the beauty of living in the tropics. We started the night off with an "expensive" gourmet dinner for everyone. It cost under $20. Dinner costs me an average of about a dollar. There were dragon dancers, champagne, and sword swallowing (which horrified me). I think all told there were about thirty or so of us partying together, most of them from Vancouver. We then moved to a bar called Guava, owned by one of the Canadians, and started the party. It was a little weird ringing in the New Year with almost total strangers, but everyone was cool and I make fast friends. It was an interesting mix of backgrounds, but it worked. It also helped that I was partying with the owners of Guava and they were very cool and inviting. I ended the night on the beach watching the waves roll in.

I'm This Far Out of the Boat

2009-12-27T03:55:00.001-05:00

My Sunday drive is a motorbike journey through the mountains and hills of the Vietnam countryside. It's not what you may be thinking. I don't live in the jungle. It's the dry season in Da Lat, and often I get the feeling I'm in old Mexico or somewhere else, because I can't believe that I'm here. I cruise through the little towns and back roads, past the everyday Vietnamese fellaheen, past the ethnic minorities and their children, past the man sipping coffee in a shady cafe along the side of the road. I relax, lean back and cruise along dusty roads out of the city and away from the busyness of modern urban life. The wind smells of flowers from the numerous farms and greenhouses that blot the hills like so many dots from a Seurat painting. There are children walking home for lunch carrying their schoolbooks in little knapsacks. All the while the sun beats down on this December morn reminding me of Spring somewhere else. I picture it all from the back of a horse in some spaghetti western, except no gun fights, no nothing.

sipping coffee at a roadside cafe

old church across the road from a much newer and more impressive church

minority town and horses

local soccer pitch

family walking away

Christmas In The Tropics

2009-12-21T09:24:00.000-05:00

It's a little tough to convince myself it's Christmas when it's 70 and sunny. They don't really celebrate it here, but they do like to decorate. It doesn't feel much like Christmas this year.

Banh Mi Thit Nuong

2009-12-15T19:40:00.000-05:00

Banh mi means sandwich. Thit means pork. Nuong means grilled. I would have to describe my favorite food in Vietnam as a crazy good barbecue pork sandwich. They do a surprisingly large amount of cooking over wood coals and that's how this sandwich starts. You then take some hero sized french bread and smother it in chilies, chili sauce, soy sauce, and meat sauce that's been simmering all day. Follow this by throwing on some mint leaves, cilantro, shredded papaya, sliced cucumbers, and some fried onion bits. Finally add the pork and place the whole thing over the coals. Eat while warm. I eat one of these just about every day from this particular stand.

Teachers For Vietnam

2009-12-12T00:33:00.003-05:00

The organization I work for is Teachers for Vietnam. Our mission statement is "Teachers for Vietnam is dedicated to building bridges between the peoples of Vietnam and the United States through higher education." This organization has paid for all my travel expenses and made my arrangements here in Vietnam. They have been able to set me up with a terrific post in Da Lat. Yet I'm still a little surprised they sent me here. I have been working on building bridges by showing my students Hollywood movies, teaching them to trash talk in sports, and playing American football with them. Still Da Lat University, the school I work for, seems to be pleased with my performance.

My average day here in Vietnam usually starts off with some early morning teaching, class starts here at seven. I then grab some lunch, usually a barbeque pork sandwich (banh mi thit nuong in Vietnamese). I might then watch some cable television or hang out and drink coffee with the other teachers. Maybe I'll then hang out downtown at the market, and eat again. At night I usually either watch a movie, go to a bar, or just watch some soccer. Most of my day involves eating and enjoying the perfect weather here in Da Lat. I live in constant Spring time. The relaxed life here is quite the contradiction from New York.

This street is the backpacker section of Da Lat, and this is about as busy as it ever gets. Recently the head of the board of directors for Teachers for Vietnam, John Dippel, came to visit me and meet with the university. I had the task of showing him around Da Lat. Within the city itself I have to admit there isn't as much to do as advertised. Most people spend their days relaxing and drinking coffee. The real action occurs outside of the city, since it's surrounded by many waterfalls, mountains, bike trails, lakes, and valleys. I've known John Dippel for quite a few years now and we spent most of our time walking around the city, enjoying the weather, and talking about the economic/political future of Vietnam. Vietnam is rapidly changing and growing in its infrastructure. Vietnam was one of the few economies that showed growth in the last year. They are steadily modernizing and becoming an economic power in Southeast Asia, all the while reestablishing its cultural identity beyond the Vietnam War. It puts your work in a different perspective when you realize you are contributing to the economic and cultural revival of a nation. I might be overstating my importance.

School Scenes

2009-12-01T22:30:00.004-05:00

I'm squinting because it's incredibly bright during the day.

the library

I always want to set up my speakers in here and blast CCR's "Fortune Son."

the multimedia room where I show movies

The view from school...

Buddha in the distance

The greenhouses here are filled with roses.

The close of the day.

In Vietnam, They're Thankful For Teachers

2009-11-25T03:33:00.000-05:00

The pay in America may be significantly better, but here in Vietnam we have Teacher's Day. It's a big holiday here. My students sent me emails, text messages, and one even gave me a present in celebration of Teacher's Day. On the eve of Teacher's day the department of Foreign Languages had a ceremony for us where the students presented us with gifts and preformed for us. They mostly did song and dance routine to Vietnamese style hip hop. One group of students preformed a new twist on a traditional play in Vietnam. It was all in Vietnamese so I understood none of it. I think the highlight of the evening for me was some of the more traditional dancing they did. There was one called the Peacock Dance. There is a picture below. Whenever they have these events they always ask the teachers to offer some performance, usually they want us to sing. Some of my colleagues sung a religious song. I volunteered to read a poem, I chose "The road not taken" by Robert Frost. The following day the department took us all out for lunch. The way these lunches usually run is that since I'm one of two Americans who drink, I have to sit with the male Vietnamese faculty and drink many, many toasts with them.

Remnants of a War- Saigon Part 5

2009-11-20T04:42:00.000-05:00

In Ho Chi Minh City there is the War Remnants Museum, formerly the museum of American War Crimes. It's basically a whole museum devoted to horrors of war. They of course only offer one side of things, because this is a museum of propaganda. This does not mean the realities of war presented here are not true, they are just not presented in the full context of what the Vietnam War means to America or Vietnam itself. I have the luxury of living in the southern part of the country, that still remembers a better day. I'm not going to offer some commentary on the correctness of war, I've never been in the military and it would just be arrogant of me to do so. I will say that war takes a toll on all those involved, and that for all our turmoil the world is a better place because of the United States. Thank God for these United States of America.

"The Price is Wrong, Bob"

2009-11-18T10:25:00.000-05:00

I showed my students the movie Happy Gilmore, a cinematic gem. They seem to really respond to people being physically injured or people behaving in a silly manner. I had been showing them action movies, because those are the movies where dialogue matters the least. I think their favorite scene may have been watching Adam Sandler get beaten up by Bob Barker. Even without knowing who he is, they loved it. They like the action scenes, but tend to turn off when it comes to plot points. In this way I think we're all the same. They also love children's movies, and I think this is kind of a kid's movie. Maybe adult size children, such as myself and most of my friends.

P.S. I don't care how old he is, I bet Bob Barker is tough.

Just a Good Stretch of the Legs- Saigon Part 4

2009-11-15T19:08:00.000-05:00

The Vanilla Gorilla and I took a page out of the Lonely Planet guidebook and took a walking tour of Saigon. It starts off at Pham Ngu Lao park which is right on the border of the backpacker area and ends at the Jade Emperor Pagoda, which is situated in the heart of urban, non-touristy Saigon. The tour altogether is about 5km, but with the heat and all the sights it'll feel about double that. The first real stop on the tour is Ben Thanh Market, which includes everything from live fish to every type of clothing one might want to buy. From there you pass a statue of Tran Nguyen Hai, who from what I can look up is famous for being the first person in Vietnam to use carrier pigeons. I could be wrong. Then its off to the Fine Arts Museum which besides having a lot of contemporary art inspired by the war, has a nice collection of medieval art from Vietnam. Afterwards we walked through the open air street market, which is filled with little shops serving food, fresh vegetables, and beer. We walked by the Municipal Theatre and on to the Museum of Ho Chi Minh City. After lunch we saw the War Remnants Museum, which was formerly the Museum of American War Atrocities. I will comment on this in my final entry on Saigon. We went to the Reunification Palace, and the brick Cathedral of Notre Dame;we didn't go inside either of them. We quickly saw the old central post office, which is in the French colonial style. We took a chance to explore the Botanical Gardens/Zoo in Saigon. After some walking we finished at the Jade Emperor Pagoda which is tucked away in some unassuming back alley. That was pretty much our walking tour of Saigon.

We Have Monkey- Saigon Part 3

2009-11-11T21:35:00.002-05:00

There is a zoo in Saigon, and no it doesn't have pandas. It does have monkey. It seems strange to me that someone would keep an animal at the zoo and also eat it at the dinner table, but then again I bet monkey is delicious. The Saigon Zoo doesn't start off too impressively. It's in the middle of a park and it's not as organized as I am used to in the states. The first thing you see is a couple of ostriches and giraffes tucked away in a pen. From there you can't really see any of the other pens or animals and your not even sure they have anything else at first. It's a bit of a walk to find the other pens, and unlike I expected, they seem to have no one monitoring any of the pens. Once you start walking though you can see a plethora of wild jungle cats from all around Southeast Asia. This includes the wild jungle cat, which looks exactly like a normal house cat, except with leopard spots and claws to tear your face off. The zoo has a raised walkway above some African grazing animals, wildebeests, gazelles, and others. The zoo is populated with many, many bird cages filled with lots of large exotic looking birds. They have African elephants, a couple of hippos and even a white rhino. Which makes me wonder how the zoo here was able to attain a white rhino. The stars of the show have to be the lions and tigers. They are kept in a different area from the other wild cats and even have bigger cages. What was interesting to see was the drunk trying to get the male lion to strike at his hand. Unlike zoos in America where the big cats would be in a pit and you might be ten to twenty feet back from them, at the zoo in Saigon you're within arm's reach of the cage and there is no one around to tell you that lions are large dangerous animals. So after throwing a rock to wake the lion up, the drunk proceeded to bang on the metal bars of the cage in an attempt to get the lion to strike at him. In my mind I am still picturing the lion eating his hand. The zoo was fun.

Pretty much the only thing separating these animals and us were these electric fences. Check out Tommy's blog- http://novahongkong.blogspot.com.

Vietnamese 70's Rock Cover Band? Check. Magician? Check. Crazy Drunk Australians? Check. Halloween on the Beach? Priceless.

2009-11-07T21:40:00.000-05:00

It's a little unusual celebrating a holiday like Halloween in a foreign country. Apparently not everyone dresses up like a luchador and begs for candy. I wish I could have found a luchador costume. Instead I dressed up as a guy who had just been beaten up, torn shirt, and fake blood galore. I spent Halloween in Nha Trang, a beach resort city. It's really touristy and normally wouldn't have been my bag, but I was there visiting friends. I went to a party at the Sailing Club, a luxurious bar that sits right on the beach, and caters mostly to foreigners. On the beach they had tables set up, with a dance floor, and a stage for the house band. They played mostly covers of seventies rock tunes, and I was kind of having my Martin Sheen at the USO moment from Apocalypse Now, but it turned out to be a hell of a lot of fun. The place was packed and I was hanging with a group of people that included both locals and expats. They had a costume contest. I voted for the chubby guy in the bikini, because lets face it he deserved it for having to look ridiculous all night. He didn't win though. The Vietnamese seem to value scary over funny and creative. We also had a group of dancers preform "Thriller," which while I hate Michael Jackson as a person, this is a great song. Following this was Dragon Dancing and a magician who had come in from Ho Chi Minh City especially for this night. I stayed out till like three in the morning so this was the latest night I've had since being in Vietnam, so it was a lot of fun. There is of course the unusual contrast between natural beach paradise and constructed tourist trap in Nha Trang to contend with. I dressed up as a guy who had just been beat up, Aileen in the picture is the Black Dahlia, and Mai was Waldo from the books.

New York Yankees World Champions!

2009-11-05T05:50:00.003-05:00

"It is played everywhere. In parks and playgrounds and prison yards. In back alleys and farmers' fields. By small children and old men. Raw amateurs and millionaire professionals. It is a leisurely game that demands blinding speed. The only game in which the defense has the ball. It follows the seasons, beginning each year with the fond expectancy of springtime, and ending with the hard facts of autumn. It is a haunted game, in which every player is measured against the ghosts of all who have gone before. Most of all, it is about time and timelessness. Speed and grace. Failure and loss. Imperishable hope. And coming home." Ken Burns' documentary, Baseball.

As they say, hope springs eternal and in four months, thirty teams will lace em up again. They'll play through slumps, injuries, and those moments when the season seems to drag on, but they'll play, because this our game, and the feeling the Yankees' have right now is what we all hoped for, when we first put bat to ball. The Yankees are world champions.

Bats in the Belfry- Saigon Part 2

2009-11-03T03:13:00.000-05:00

About an hour and a half outside of Saigon you will find a unique and disturbing piece of war history, the Cu Chi Tunnels. There's some irony in what these things become when tourism and spectacle overrun our sense of good taste. That said, here is my description of things.

In traveling to the Cu Chi tunnels you leave the bustle of the city for the peace and calm of the flat countryside. The time of day, the heat, and the lack of industry conspire to keep the sleepy country villages sleepy. Hammocks and hazy cafes line the street, and I find myself tired from a long bus ride not really watching anything at all. About an hour into the trip we stopped at a handicapped-crafts store. This is a workshop for the handicapped to work with lacquer, paint, and wood carving. They create beautiful and cheap works of art for tourists. We arrive and observe the war zone turned tourist complex. The first thing they ask you to do is watch their educational video on the tunnels and the war. Afterwards you assemble into groups according to language and your tour-guide explains the intricacies of ambush jungle warfare. They show you multiple types of traps and pitfalls, clever inventions of injury and death. You can see 20ft craters, the leftovers of B-52 bombing missions. The highlight of the park are the tunnels. If you are brave enough and small enough you can crawl through the darkness.

Originally an Australian tourist had volunteered to go down in the tunnels, but after entering he quickly thought better of himself. Myself and two of Tommy's friends then decided to crawl the thirty feet through this section of tunnel. Before entering the tour guide mentioned casually that there might be bats in the tunnel. For whatever reason, maybe it was the tone of his voice, maybe it was the casual manner in which said it, but none of us believed there would actually be bats down there. I was in the rear, and in the dark. Hayes had only a little flashlight at the front and I couldn't see a thing. I could hear him shouting about the numerous bats that lined the ceiling walls and were apparently flying all around us now. The tunnel itself was dark and damp, and barely tall enough for me to crawl through. On the floor of the tunnel I could feel rotting leaves and bat droppings. When we entered the tunnel we were told that there was only one way to go and as it turns out this was not true. At the end of the tunnel there's a fork and in the pitch black of the tunnel it's creates inside of you a feeling of panic. There are hundreds of feet of tunnels surrounding you, and only a few small exits hidden amongst the darkness, and you hope for daylight. After exiting the tunnel I asked the tour guide how they keep the snakes out of the tunnels and he promptly told me that there are snakes in the tunnels all the time. Awesome.

Oh yeah, and afterwards we took the opportunity to shoot off some Ak's.

I'm Starting a Motorbiker Gang

2009-11-02T10:28:00.000-05:00

"Looking out at the road rushing under my wheels/ looking back at the years gone by like so many summer fields/ in sixty-five I was seventeen and running up one-o-one/ I don't know where I'm running now, I'm just running on/ running on- running on empty." - Jackson Browne, Running on Empty.

I bought a motorbike. It's a Honda Wave Alpha and it's a fun little thing to go cruising around Vietnam on. Da Lat is probably one of the best cities to go riding in. While it is a city it is surrounded by farmland and mountain roads that lend you to believe this anywhere and everywhere. At night the lights in the city dim, and you suddenly become aware of the dim glow of greenhouse lights as they awaken the dark countryside. Dozens of greenhouses filled with hundreds of flowers line the gentle rolling hills, and you ride further on up the road into the darkness. The roads are empty and only the lonely drone of the engine competes with the sound of wind passing you by. The wind is cool, and you're alone. At some point you have to stop...You can't go around that next bend...You should head home. You throw one foot to the ground, hit the gas, and swing the bike around. Maybe you just keep riding. I like the bike and I do have to admit it is real hard trying to look tough on a 100cc engine while wearing a glorified bicycle helmet.

Tonto and The Vanilla Gorilla Ride Again- Saigon Part 1

2009-10-28T11:43:00.000-04:00

The Vanilla Gorilla, for those who don't know is my cousin Tommy. This is a self imposed moniker. Tommy is studying, business I believe, in Hong Kong for the semester, and in his travels around Asia was able to make it to Vietnam. Tommy and his friends Rod, Josh, and Hayes have actually seen a good deal of Asia already. You can find details on their travels at Tommy's blog- http://novahongkong.blogspot.com.

So I took the midnight bus down from Da Lat to meet up with them in Ho Chi Minh. The buses here are not what you may think, they are quite nice. The bus company picks you up, and drops you off back home. The give you a blanket, a bottle of water, and sanitary wipe for your face. The seats lean really far back and no one complains about leg room, because Asian folks are short. I was able to sleep through most of dark dreary nighttime drive. I awoke some time outside of Ho Chi Minh, and could see in the hazy morning light the beginnings of the day. It doesn't matter where you are, when you see people commuting to work and opening their businesses, you realize that people are just people, wherever they may be.

Hot Pot Lau

2009-10-25T05:59:00.001-04:00

Lau is a Vietnamese staple, and a few weeks ago a group of students came over to make it for me. They were very cool about it. One student offered to make me lunch, and I think about eight or nine of them showed up at my door. It was alright though. They brought everything to make Lau with them. I explained to them that I literally had nothing to cook with in my apartment. I've been lazy about buying cooking supplies, utensils, plates, bowls, or even cups. I mostly drink Tang (Tang is the closest thing to orange juice I can find) out of the side of a pitcher. I think I've been lazy, because to eat out in Dalat costs less than a dollar for a full meal, to cook for one person costs about the same. So they got right to it. They started to break down all the vegetables, cut up the chicken, and boil the broth all while squatting on the floor. The Vietnamese seem to have no problem squatting here. While some prepared the Lau, I entertained the others, I guess. I had them go through my music collection and see if their was anything they might like to hear. My one student Muan asked me if I had "I will survive." I did, so I played the only version I had, Cake's cover of the song. They seemed to dig it, and my one student sang along. Some of the other students were curious as to what my "Perfect Push-ups" were. Yes, I brought them. I figure they were the one ridiculous item I carried twelve thousand miles around the world, so I don't feel too weird about it. All my students gave them a try. None of them could use them. I played them some more music, and they kept asking if I had Taylor Swift, apparently she's popular in Vietnam. They weren't into The Pogues. They definitely weren't digging Sabbath. But they didn't mind the Zappa. I'm considering that an initial success.

The way Lau is eaten is you keep a pot boiling on a burner in the middle of a circle. You put some of the ingredients in the pot and some noodles in your bowl. You pour the broth and some of the veggies and meat over the noodles and it cooks them. Rinse and repeat as necessary. As the Lau in the pot starts to run out you just add more ingredients and the broth builds itself back up. Their seemed to be an order to things. It seemed like we started with the rice noodles and the greens, then more noodles with some meat, then more noodles with less greens and more meat, then wheat noodles, and the process started over. It was cool, it's a very communal way to eat. At the end we polished everything off with some tart-mango, which is just unripened mango, and some "dragon's eye." Dragon's eye are little fruits that grow on trees in Southeast Asia and they are so named because they resemble eyeballs. You have to peel them and then suck off the gooey whitish substance that surrounds the pit. It sounds really appetizing, I know, but they taste good too. I actually like them a lot so I have been buying them at the market. All in all, it was a pretty good Saturday. The students seem happy just to be spending time with you, and hell I got free lunch, so you can't beat that.

Bag O' Food

2009-10-21T05:36:00.000-04:00

"The belly rules the mind." -Spanish Proverb

So the matriarch of the family I have been spending time with here in Da Lat keeps handing me food when I stop by to say hello. So far, she has handed me a cob of corn, a small plastic bag with a couple of potatoes in it, and many random fruits. The latest fruit was something that looked like a red pepper but tasted like an apple. I was actually on my way to dinner with some of the other teachers when she handed me the fruit. I can't help but laugh because I am constantly reminded of that scene in The Wedding Singer when Adam Sandler gets handed a meatball by Drew Barrymore's grandmother. That's kind of what I've got going on, but then again, I had never eaten a potato like it was an apple before, so that was a new experience.

Lonesome Traveler

2009-10-17T04:41:00.002-04:00

"Its scope and purpose is simply poetry, or, natural description."
- Jack Kerouac, Lonesome Traveler.

I was hanging with some teachers from Volunteers in Asia, another program with teachers here in Dalat. I walked home late last night. In the cool calm of the late evening air I strolled among the empty streets and the blank houses. The bustle of the day's activity long over, the streets where now barren, empty of the vendors and their exotic fruits and leafy greens, empty of the half wild pet dogs, empty of the busy people, empty of drone of motorbikes, empty of everything and everyone. I walked in the middle of the road where the street-lamp light shone, away from the dark along the shuttered up storefronts. The occasional light lit a window or two along the street, a television flickered in the distance, and I walked. It’s three O'clock and all's quiet, no late night revelry, no shouting, no noise, no nothing to worry about. I walked, and climbed the high fence as the night guard slept at the gate to our campus, and as I walked I wondered if they had locked the door to my building, and felt relief when I found that they hadn't. I slept well that evening.

Bark at the Moon!

2009-10-14T13:15:00.000-04:00

The Mid-Autumn festival takes place in Vietnam every year in early October. It's a lot like Halloween with dragons and cakes in the shape of pigs. What's supposed to happen is that the moon is at its fullest on the 15th day of the 8th month according to lunar calendar. This is when the moon is at its brightest, and crazy people are at their most worried about the Werewolves of London. What happens is that for about three days dragons wander the streets entering every place of business (all the business in Dalat are open walled) trading good luck for tribute money. They dance, a drummer drums, and some guy dressed in red waves a fan at the dragon. Large groups of people begin to amass behind the dragons and suddenly the mythical creatures has an entourage. The crowds get so large that they stop traffic and the occasional wealthy man in a car gets upset. In this case the dragon will dance on top of the car until the driver concedes and pays his tribute. This happens until the dragon is satisfied.

What it is, is groups of male children get together and practice their dragon dances so that they can go around from store to store getting money from the shop owners. This is supposed to bring them good luck for the upcoming year. Following the three and four person dragons will be a drummer, a man in red who tames the dragon, and an entourage of children and adults excited to see the dancing. Also during the Moon Festival groups of young adults get together to make floats out of bamboo and colored saran-wrap. They make mostly stars, ships, and fish. I saw one fish that was over twenty feet in length and required a week and ten people to complete. They spend a lot of time on these floats and the students follow them, which make me think of the Rose Bowl or some other type of college homecoming parade. A lot of people, particularly children carry candle lit lanterns with them, (see the picture in the photostream). Most everyone eats moon-cakes during the festival. Moon-cakes are bread like cakes filled with some sort of sweet filling either made from rice, coconut, or flowers and spices; these are the ones I have tried. It's actually a lot of chaotic fun. I got sing some type of Swiss Family Robinson "hello" song with a group of students and I was invited to eat lunch with a local family, who served something exactly like lumpia. So I had a good time, plus a got see someone's lantern burst into flames.

Larry's Bar at the Sofitel

2009-10-11T10:30:00.000-04:00

I feel alienated and separated. Once a week, on Friday, we've been going out to get American style food and this past week we went to Larry's Bar at the Sofitel Hotel. Larry's is described as the place where all the expats hang out. The food was excellent (I had the buffet), the service was top notch, the atmosphere was fun, they had Jenga and a pool table, and I felt like I was back home somewhere. Yet I felt a distance from the actual wait staff and cooks, who were Vietnamese. I felt like I was a member of the colonial aristocracy that once ruled this country. I enjoyed myself, but spending the extra cash to go there and the seeming distance Larry's attempts to create, made me feel a little guilty. I also lost at Jenga which didn't help.

Lighten up Francis

2009-10-09T05:55:00.001-04:00

All my students speak really softly. I tried to explain to them that they have to learn to talk like Americans, boisterous and with complete confidence in the validity and importance of all their words. To get them to this point I borrowed an exercise from a fellow teacher and brought all my students outside so as they could yell at each other. Just for shits and giggles I decided to make the one group of students sing "Do wa diddy." I got the idea from watching Stripes, it has been on every other day or so. I only know the first few sets of lines, which is about all my students were able to do. Don't get me wrong the Vietnamese like all Asian people love singing. Every other place around here has karaoke, whenever they have assemblies they ask for impromptu exhibitions of song, and when we have "Teacher Day" I will be asked to sing something to the entire school. For now, my students are pretty serious about me going out for a night of karaoke with them. I said I would bring the teachers I live with, the other teachers seem hesitant, but willing, so expect another post after karaoke night.

The Last Guy I Knew With A Greenhouse Wasn't Growing Flowers

2009-10-05T03:38:00.001-04:00

"Dear common flower, that grow'st beside the way,/ Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold." -James Russell Lowell, American poet and cage fighter, from To The Dandelion.

One of the attractions here in Dalat is the flowers. The city itself has a flower garden for tourists, but it is mostly famous for exporting its flowers all over Vietnam and Asia. The landscape in Dalat is marked by lines upon lines of greenhouses that mark each little plateau carved into the hillsides. At every few shops that line the street you can buy small bundles of chrysanthemums and the occasional rose of every variety and color. I think that at some point in January they will have a flower festival here in Dalat, which will actually be more fun than it sounds, because any festival here involves drums, floats, food, and dancing.

Cha Ram Bap

2009-10-04T10:49:00.000-04:00

I constantly say this wrong. "Bap" is corn in Vietnamese. "Cha Ram" refers to the fact that it's wrapped up like a spring roll or lumpia, if you're Filipino, and fried crispy. So it's like having an egg-roll that's been filled with just corn. I know this doesn't sound appetizing, but it is. What happens is they give you a huge plate of various greens (one of which looks suspiciously like poison ivy), some rice paper (that feels like plastic), some veggies (that look like apple, but are not), and peanut sauce. Mix some chili paste into the peanut sauce, wrap it all up in the plastic like rice paper, and you have Cha Ram Bap. Some students of Bria's showed us a little restaurant down a dirt side road, which we would have never found ourselves, that has become our "go to" dinner hang out.

Is Typhooning a Word?

2009-09-29T06:22:00.001-04:00

Every so often a typhoon hits off the coast of Southeast Asia. In this case it's Typhoon Ketsana, which hit the Philippines first and was described there as a "once in a lifetime" storm. So far we are experiencing rain and extreme winds. The typhoon managed to knock out the power in the middle of class today and uproot a 70ft tree on campus. It has been blowing down tree limbs all day, I personally saw one nearly hit a student today. I don't feel as if I am in any real danger though, and all the Vietnamese seem to accept this as a fact of life. There is something that is of constant annoyance. They don't seem to believe in door knobs and latches here, and the front door to the building flies open and slams shut constantly. Their door locks consist of two metal loops and a pad lock. I live in a four-story building with a front door that doesn't shut. Something we have to look forward to is that we have only a month left before the dry season, nothing is flooding in Dalat, and I don't live on the coast, so I guess I shouldn't complain about the rain, for now.

Do We Have Liter a Cola?

2009-09-28T01:48:00.004-04:00

"Beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." - Benjamin Franklin, Founding Father and World Class Drinker

There is a place not too far from where I live that serves a liter of home-brewed beer for roughly 56 cents a liter. For those not familiar with what a liter of beer looks like, I would describe it as a large mug fit for a German, perfectly poured so as to exhibit a nice head. I must say that in this case I am enjoying the metric system, and in fact that they have totally bypassed the European pint as my favorite receptacle for draughts. Way to go Vietnam, you may not have mastered the whole sewer system thing, but you have this off of your list.
Let me set the scene. There is a Vietnamese family sitting behind us, with two children who won't stop staring and smiling at Bria and I. Then there's the table of drunk Vietnamese guys to our right seemingly arguing about something, talking and arguing sound similar in Vietnamese, and then we have the waitresses who speak no English and most of the time don't even give us a menu because they think the only thing we order is the liter of beer. The toilets are filthy and in the woman's bathroom, so I'm told you have to straddle a washer-machine to use the toilet. It's alright though, because we still love this place.

Why Don't You Call Me When You Have No Class?

2009-09-25T00:41:00.000-04:00

I've taught Vietnamese students for about two weeks now. I have only had two classes each week, both sophomores and both "Speaking 3." My initial observations are that everyone speaks very softly, my classes are filled with girls, I can't say any of their names, and that everyone, boy or girl, giggles whenever I say anything about myself.

Some Favorite Rodney Dangerfield Quotes:

I tell you, my wife and I, we don't think alike. I mean, she donates money to the homeless, and I donate money to the topless.

I told my psychiatrist that everyone hates me. He said I was being ridiculous - everyone hasn't met me yet.

I remember the time I was kidnapped and they sent a piece of my finger to my father. He said he wanted more proof.

I could tell that my parents hated me. My bath toys were a toaster and a radio.

A girl phoned me the other day and said ... Come on over, there's nobody home. I went over. Nobody was home.

Oh, this is the worst-looking hat I ever saw. What, when you buy a hat like this I bet you get a free bowl of soup, huh? Oh, it looks good on you though.

Can I get Four Whole Fried Chickens? And a Coke?

2009-09-20T23:03:00.000-04:00

On any average Vietnam weeknight you will find most of the college students out walking the streets in packs, seemingly going nowhere. Everyone else you will find huddled around a television somewhere, watching cable no less. I have cable television, and I find myself tonight watching The Blues Brothers, a classic. My favorite part may be when Ray Charles nearly shoots the little kid for stealing. For the record there is a Blues bar here in Dalat, the V-Cafe. They serve American food and get American musicians to play there. The house band is the Curtis King Band, and coincidently Curtis is now the owner. They're fun and the music swings, so what more could I ask for. The Blues scene may not be nearly as good as the scene was in Krakow, and it's not the Turning Point, but it's my little corner for the Blues.

Turning Japanese?

2009-09-16T03:41:00.001-04:00

For the first two weeks the only people living in my building were myself, Bria, and two older Korean men. Now there are students on the upper floors, a Taiwanese teacher, and a Japanese teacher, Keiko. Since we are all roughly the same age, we have been hanging out and working through our language differences. The other night Keiko treated us to dinner at what I believe is the only Japanese restaurant in Dalat. Yes, it was weird going out for Asian food other than Vietnamese, but the restaurant is excellent. It's called Restaurant Ichi and its owner Tomohiro Suzuki is actually from Japan by way of Brooklyn. He speaks good English and seemed so genuinely thrilled to have Americans and Japanese customers that he gave us a 20% discount on our bill. The food was actually a lot better than the western food which we've been eating once a week. The only drawback is that they have no Sushi or Sashimi, but as Bria asked me "would you really want to eat raw fish in Vietnam?" I suppose not.

Keiko and the Taiwanese girl, whom I'll call Lee because I am unsure of how to actually say her name have been more than tolerant of our American customs. I think they're somewhat curious and probably find us a little weird. The first night Keiko was hanging out with Bria and I, we watched Step Brothers, probably not the movie we should have introduced ourselves with.

Central Market (Night) The Meat on a Stick Edition

2009-09-12T01:05:00.000-04:00

"Meat on a stick," these are words to live by, enjoy, and indulge in. Bria thinks I might be a little crazy and will most likely get sick at some point, but she has never tried the meat on a stick and does not know the simple joys of its heavenly design.

Now the night market is similar to the day market except there is no produce, or live animals to buy. It's mostly clothes, and little stands selling fruit and processed foods for cooking, stands selling crawlers, doughnuts, and French pastries. For me there are the little women selling the grilled wares of various meats skewered upon wooden sticks, mystery meat, chicken feet, the organs of a chicken or duck, and probably some animal that I might not normally eat.

Funny Thing About the Rain

2009-09-09T11:02:00.001-04:00

“THROUGH the shine, through the rain/ We have shared the day’s load;/ To the old march again/ We have tramped the long road;/ We have laughed, we have cried,” -Edwin Arlington Robinson, Twilight Song.

It's rainy season here in Dalat and the funny thing about the rain is that it rains every day. Every morning I wake up to the heavenly view of clear blue skies and gentle white clouds, but every afternoon the clouds turn dark and fill the sky with rain. There is a certain peace in this knowledge. The sun will rise tomorrow. It will be beautiful in the morning. It will take its afternoon siesta. It'll revisit the day. It will fall for the night, and the night will be clear. It's a rhythm kind of thing, I suppose.

Snakes on a Plane, but no Samuel L. Jackson's

2009-09-07T05:13:00.006-04:00

There's a dead snake in the courtyard of where I live. For those that might not be aware of this, snakes are easily my worst phobia. It's nothing special. It's shriveled and only about a foot and a half long. I hope in a country filled with Asian cobras, that it's just a common grass snake. This did however make me Google search Snakes/Vietnam and what I found is that people are actually trying to sneak snakes into the country, via airplane and lots of them. Most are destined for the kitchen, apparently there is just never enough snake to go around the dinner table.

Central Market (Day) The Fish Frog Edition

2009-09-01T11:06:00.012-04:00

The central market here in Dalat is a mixture of early 19th century grocery/hardware store and far east bazaar. It smells. I'd like to lie and tell you different, tell how I've immersed myself in the culture, but it still smells to me. What is kind of cool is that you can buy every sort of fresh local food imaginable there. Besides the produce which is everywhere, there are large metal basins in which fish splash about as alive as ever. Disturbing to me, but still interesting in its own way, are the bins with the eels in them. They slither and slime each other in these basins reminding me of disgusting and terrifying spaghetti. Bria is working on some way of getting them to dump a bucket of these on top of me. Awesome. I don't like her. So if you want fresh fish, eel, crab, frog, or even rat (yes, enormous ones), come on down to the central market because they'll be there tomorrow. I may not.

I Know Why the Dog Sticks his Head Out of the Car Window

2009-08-31T05:39:00.012-04:00

Easy Rider Tours are a popular attraction here in Dalat. They allow you to see much of the country from the back of a motorcycle. They take you to holy Buddhist temples, to a waterfall with a precarious climb on wet, slippery rocks down to it, to factories and cottage industries where they make everything from silk to rice wine, to see the fields of flowers, coffee, and produce of numerous varieties, and through the endless mountains that seem to cradle the city within them. To be out in the country, among the people, among the agriculture, on the back of an old yet purring motorcycle allows one to be alone with his thoughts. It’s difficult to describe the sensation of feeling at peace during the moments in between treacherous mountain bends and close calls as we zip by the wild village traffic.

To anyone who should visit Dalat they get my recommendation. It’s $25 and I would look for some Easy Riders (we had Peter Binh and Mr. Lulu) hanging outside of the Peace Café. It’s worth it. Unfortunately Captain America and Billy the Kid don’t ride here, just Pete Binh, Lulu, and the rest of the Easy Riders.

The Whitest Guy I Know

2009-08-28T06:25:00.006-04:00

I live on a hill over looking the city. Sitting in front of my building is a giant white Buddha and his temple. His particular Buddha pose is said to represent the Wheel of Dharma or the Wheel of Law. The righteous path by which we are supposed to live. His temple is a luxurious one, surrounded by modest gardens. He's my neighbor, and I his.

Every Morning Looks Like This

2009-08-27T01:50:00.012-04:00

"Beauty seen is never lost." - John Greenleaf Whittier, Sunset on the Bearcamp.
I am in Dalat. When speaking with some of my Vietnamese colleagues, I couldn’t help but regret the fact that I did not have better
words to describe their city. It is simply beautiful. The weather is clear, sunny, and that perfect temperature you might remember as late Spring. I sit atop a hill upon which I live in the center of the city looking out over this foreign land. The mountains, jungles, and pine forests that surround the city provide a dark green backdrop that contrasts with the light blue sky. The city itself is a mix of architecture with rooftops that rise and fall throughout the city giving one the feeling that they themselves were something organic. The Vietnamese themselves have been beautiful and rather helpful in our struggles to adapt. I have already been invited to dinner with the family that owns the little convenience shop outside the school. Pictures are always better than words, check out the photo-stream. àà

Night in the HMC

2009-08-26T08:28:00.005-04:00

Flying half way around the world to move to a completely foreign country can be intimidating enough without having to deal with the Ho Chi Minh City traffic. For those who have not seen it, I can only describe it as a haphazard, scary jumble of automobiles and motorbikes/scooters. There are no real rules such as don’t cross the double yellow, or speed limits. The only rule people appear to follow is the bigger your vehicle is the less you have to move for others. This rule basically means if you are driving a van, you honk and the flood of motorbikes in the street is supposed to move to the right side so that you may pass. So vans and trucks never move to the side. Cars will sometimes move. Motorbikes have to move. Pedestrians have to pray. Crossing the street is one of the most thrilling and scary things any visitor can do in the HMC. The rules for a person crossing what is a frightening amount of traffic are just step off the curb, go at steady pace, don’t run, don’t stop, and watch out for vans, trucks, or cars. It takes what amounts to a leap of faith to cross the street because if you break any of the rules you get hit by a motorbike. I find myself having to fight the urge to run hurriedly across the street in a fit of a panic.

With the traffic still fresh in my mind I would now like to tell of my perfect first night moment. After some orientation and showers myself, Kristen, and the Teachers for Vietnam proceeded to go out for some drinks. The other teachers were feeling the jetlag and called it an early night. I did not. Kristen and I went to dinner with some other expats living in the HMC. She left to pick up a friend at the airport and I went out with her friends to the T&R Bar, to get there we took motorbikes. Riding on the back of the back of a motorbike in the calm air of a Saigon night was an experience worth the flight and the lousy traffic. You ride amid a pack of locals hurriedly racing to and fro, each local turning to get a look at the American on the back of bike, myself looking back at the throng of reds, greens, blues, yellows, and every hue in between marking each helmet and rider like some jumbled, flowing, and living Seurat painting. There was a certain beauty in being a part of it, being as they were, carefree on a cool night in the HMC.

The Dude Abides

2009-08-18T23:56:00.003-04:00

As for man, his days are like grass, /he flourishes like a flower of the field; /the wind blows over it and it is gone, /and its place remembers it no more. Psalm, 103:15, 16.

So I have finally given in and started a travel blog. I have read the blogs of others, and generally enjoy them. I would encourage all who read this to write comments bordering on the absurd, irreverent, and inane. I prefer snide remarks that rebuff my writing, quotes from movies, and random thoughts posted without context. To the person who either writes the funniest comment or has the funniest username, I shall give them one small Asian child. Let's see what you all come up with.

P.S. If you join the blog you can add a picture and pick your username.

Upon a Leaving

2009-08-18T23:04:00.002-04:00

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding spiders across the stars..." - Jack Kerouac, On The Road, 1957

I have found this quote appropriate when I think of my life. I've had my last weekend in New York, and I now live the tedious last week at home preparing and packing for my travels. I am not only packing what I will bring with me, but I am packing away what I will leave behind. Add your own meaning to this seemingly obvious metaphor, as I don't wish to be sentimental. I've added this quote at the beginning of my travels because I feel Kerouac personifies best what I hope this blog will become. He wrote about the American road with a passion and honesty that endeared him to a generation of Americans. I hope this blog will be half as interesting and twice as clean for the sake of my mother and grandmother. Enjoy what you read, and thank you all.