Three weeks of reflections

- compiled from postcards, emails, facebook messages, and journal entries, with some new text added.

3/13

"Right now I'm 'teaching' English at a university in Hanoi, Vietnam.  I am so impressed with the students here - so curious and fun!" Many of them also speak English extremely well for first year students.  They ask us questions about culture and life in the U.S. that no one in a first-year language class at home would be able to ask visitors from another country.  I know I would have a hard time asking those sorts of questions to a Spaniard in Spanish.  

The first two days we visited English classes (3/11 and 3/12), I taught with Ajaan Bob, mostly because I had very little to no voice to work with.  Talking with others from our group this was probably lucky for me, because then even if the Vietnamese students were shy and not asking questions, Bob usually was able to come up with some topic of discussion to keep the class moving and busy for the whole 2 hours. There was one folktale about a woman named Gio that was particularly helpful in this regard.  Over the course of a few days I was able to piece together some basics of the story: Gio decides to leave her true love and marry a "bad man" in order to save her family from some kind of financial trouble. Once with the bad man, many other bad things happen to Gio.  Later when her husband dies and Gio returns home to her family, she allows her true love to remain married to her sister, and also forbids someone from killing all of her enemies, deciding it is better instead to let them live, even if it risks them being evil to her again.  Basically, Gio represents the ideal woman of feudal Vietnamese society. 

Using these plot points as a basis, Bob would ask the students at what age they wanted to get married, if they would be like Gio and marry the bad man to save their family, if they would let their BF marry their sister, if they would allow their enemies to live.  It was interesting to see what answers they gave.  Many of the students wanted to marry younger than I think most U.S. students would answer.  Almost all of them said 26 or younger and 28 was definitely too old to be unmarried. 

3/14 - 3/15: Weekend in Ha Long Bay on a Junk Boat

The bay was gorgeous.  The rock formations were so majestic.  We tried to go swimming at one point, but the water was so cold!  We didn't last very long - only 20-30 minutes probably.  I also went searching for seashells, and almost missed the boat afterwards. 

All 12 of us watched the sunset together on the top deck of our boat.  It got very cold before the sun even set.  I had not brought anything at all warm enough.  One of the boat crew members came around to give the ladies manicures for five dollars.  I'm still chipping the peppermint pink polish off a little more each day. 

That evening, Emily and I had a long and interesting conversation about life, school, religion, being abroad - the life, universe and everything, essentially. It was really nice and a lot better than getting trashed, which had been the original plan.  I spent a lot of time trying to explain my understanding of free will and humanity's relationship with God... And I realized just how much Star Trek had influenced my life.  Initially this gave me pause, but then I got over it.  I was not at first successful in conveying my beliefs, but the next day I wrote them out.  Emily seemed to think it made more sense then, even if she still didn't agree.  If there is interest, I'll post them here. 

3/18

"Been in Vietnam for just over a week now. Living with 2 people in relationships... Listening to a lot of one-sided skype conversations these days.  'Teaching' English at VNU's College of Foreign Languages has been stellar, though, and now that I'm more used to the crazy intense traffic, Hanoi is a lot more fun.  I've never seen so many people in one place before." 

"I have never seen a city so full of people, traffic and activity before.  I'm really enjoying the field trips we take for class and chatting with the English students here." 

3/20: On the train from Hanoi to Sapa

"Vietnam is still a mixed bag.  I'm having a blast and learning a lot, but I'm about the only one, so I also listen to a lot of bitching, which is difficult. We've also had some drama - A-- and B-- got into a huge fight about something and are no longer rooming together.  C-- is secretly fighting with D-- who is being a bitch to E--.  F-- got very mad at G-- about a week ago, and put us all on eggshells for a bit.  They seem to be getting along better now though, which is helpful.  F-- is no fun when angry and grudgy. And my Momma Bear is kicking in so I'm getting very ready to kick some ass over all of the hurt feelings.  Oy. 

Today two people also skipped everything on our schedule.  While everyone was so pissed, it may have also been good-ish; I feel like some pressure has been let out.  There is a lot of laugher occurring on the train right now, and it would take a bit more for Momma Bear to lash out this evening, compared to yesterday."

3/22: On the train from Sapa to Hanoi

"Due to HBO, Cinemax and AXN I have watched more TV while in Vietnam than I ever think I have before.  It's weird. I've started to miss it every time it's unavailable.  Gonna have to kick that habit."

3/24

"...Universal frustration towards H-- is the one thing holding us together at this point. Looking forward to reuniting with I-- in Cambodia on Friday."  Went to see the Temple of Literature, which was the first University in Vietnam on Monday (3/23).  It was a gorgeous place to visit, but not many things were translated into English; I would have gotten more out of the experience if I read Vietnamese I think.  I did learn that there are 4 holy animals - Tortoise, Phoenix, Dragon, Unicorn - in Vietnam.  Interesting that only one is real.  

"Vietnam has been a bit of a whirlwind, since we're only here for three weeks.  It's busy, and like another world," separate from the one I normally live in. It's a world where people are not critical of authority, personal space is only mildly observed, motorbikes rule the world, and Tradition is prized over, or at least equally with, Progress.

"I'm excited to head for Cambodia later this week; time to escape Vietnamese humidity," even if all I trade it for is Cambodian heat.  

"I realize that it was a bitchy and self-serving thing to do... but I have no regrets."

- fellow asia-termer

Today two of our number decided they were too cool for school, and ditched as soon as our taxi arrived at VNU.  At least one of their cooperating teachers (and possibly both) then ran around A2 looking for them all morning and we, the remainder, got to feel like shit all afternoon as our culture teachers asked repeatedly where they were and if they were okay and all we could do was look around awkwardly and tell them, essentially, that we can't respect our hosts and classmates and students enough to honor our commitments.  

I am thoroughly disappointed. 

But also pleasantly surprised by others who were just as upset by the sitch' as I was, which (let's be honest) doesn't happen very often, because I apparently have an odd sense of politeness.  

Group drama aside, today was a good day.  Andy and I worked with a third year honor's interpreting class for our morning.  I knew this must be true to some extent before, but this class showed just how much like a GIANT game of telephone translation and interpretation can be. There are simply too many nuances that get added or left behind from one language to another for it to work perfectly. 

The basic premise of this class was someone would tell a story in Vietnamese, then someone would translate it for us, then Andy and I would tell it to another student who had been outside when the story was first told (so our English was their first hearing) and finally that student would retranslate the story back into Vietnamese.  So, yeah, giant game of telephone. Most of the time it came out okay, there was one story in particular that Andy and I had a lot of trouble remembering some details - particularly numbers - because it was very long and we were not always told everything in a logical order.  When the student retelling our English story in Vietnamese finished, the original story teller was like "... Uh... No..." The teacher, who had just been listening, then explained where the mistakes had happened and what they could do better next time.  It was a very interesting experience to be there. 

They also make a distinction between "translating" (which is taught as a separate class) and "interpreting" (the class we attended).  Translating is where you have a document and you translate word by word, or sentence by sentence, where as interpreting is when you are taking in spoken information in one language, processing it and saying the same information (or story) again in a different language. I think we choose not to make this distinction as often, because we like to imagine that an interpreter is just a translation conduit, but in reality, this is not the case. How can they be?  It's the same as a 100% unbiased reporter; just not gonna happen. And I had never thought about or realized this until today when I saw the two used side by side. 

This afternoon we gave reports on our three field trips during our culture class.  The way the class was organized was very different than I had hoped/planned for, but really it was probably as much as I should have expected.  Hopefully that will make more sense when I post my report, but in short, I'm having a bit more culture shock (culture confusion?) in Vietnam than I did in Thailand.  It's not anything that disrupts my day, or makes it overly difficult to live here; it's more cultural differences that make me dislike studying here. While I'm sure some of this is me reading more into situations than I should, trying to observe and take in a foreign culture, I feel that some of my observations are valid.  I also realize I'm being vague, but I'm still working on my paper where I'm exploring this idea. I'll post it soon though, (because I have to turn it in soon) and hopefully I will be better able to express this at that time. 

This evening we are leaving for Sapa, the French-built and founded resort town. Excited. Must go pack!

Hanoi Update

Still sick today.  But much better than Monday.  

The last two days have been spent leading discussions and answering questions in Vietnamese English classes in the morning and attending Vietnamese culture class in the afternoon.  It's a lot of fun, but also draining.  We spend 8:00 a.m. until 5:30 or 6:00 p.m. at and commuting to and from the University - that's a way long day coming from our about 3 hours of class and volunteering in Thailand and the four hours a day of class at Coe. 

Sorry this is short, but roommates want to go get dinner.

This weekend: Ha Long Bay

Disease II

We used to call Patricia "Disease." She had gotten a stomach bug around the beginning of february and was miserable for about a month after. Today, Emily got home from the university, walked into our hotel room and said to me "Hello Disease." Yup, Vietnam made me ill. I have a fever, sore throat and sinuses, and everything hurts. I am el pissed. I stayed home from class today because I got nauseous after breakfast too. Oy. After a day of sleeping, I'm feeling semi-functional, but just the trip to get food a couple of blocks away wore my body out more than it should have.

Well, I'm headed back to bed and cough drops. Hope you all are in better health. :)

For your sanity, today has been removed from the calendar

Catherine, Patricia and I voted today off the calendar. In the words of Patricia:

"The list of indictments are as follows:
1. It made Catherine get harrased at the airport for having diabetes.
2. It made Heather's plane rides less than enjoyable.
3. It gave us all travel edge [including my panic attack on the bus into Hanoi]
4. It promised us cake, and then pulled us out of our rooms for said cake and said cake had no serving utensils, and thus will be postponed until tomorrow, hopefully.
5. It teased us with the last 4 minutes of a great English language movie on TV
6. It convinced all technology to work against us.
7. It allowed Vera to almost not get through Vietnamese security (because the immigration official didn't believe the woman in her passport photo matched the woman standing in front of him)
8. It, in general, royally sucketh the ass."

That was a pretty hefty list

The one positive - it's 10-20 degrees cooler here than in Chiang Mai, so you no longer drip just from walking outside.

Hanoi feels so foreign right now. This might be an exaggeration, but it feels more foreign than Bangkok or Chiang Mai. Some of this I'm sure comes from the fact that I understand the fact that I'm not going to learn this language, and that my professors do not know Vietnamese either. Which is a little freaky. To me at least. No one else seems miffed about it. Also, I cannot deal with all the horn honking. I swear they (the Vietnamese) are carrying on conversations with their car horns. It's insane. It's the opposite of the states, where using the horn is taboo - something assholes do, or you might, maybe do to an asshole that almost kills you. Here though, everyone honks at everyone. I'm not really sure why. And there are no visible lane markers - I mean they're there, but they're so faded that you can't really see them ever and no one follows them anyway. It just sounds so angry and looks so chaotic to me. I'm really not looking forward to driving to the University tomorrow during what (in the west) is rush hour. Cringe.

I am very excited to see Hua and Trang again. They were the first Asia Termer's guides around Hanoi and the next year came to study abroad at Coe. Both women are so sweet and it's really nice to see a familiar face.

The other thought for today. As we were gathering in the Chiang Mai airport and chatting amongst ourselves this morning, we started discussing TSA and Homeland Security types, which prompted Bob to tell me this story:

Once there was a woman from an Arab country, living in the US. Her husband was very abusive, but she couldn't find a way to safely leave him. Then Sept. 11th happened. So the wife calls DHS and tells them that he's a terrorist. Abusive husband gets arrested and deported. Wife lives happily (?) ever after.

As Patricia said, as I stood there and looked confused, "You just blew her mind - she doesn't know whether it's funny or inappropriate, a good story or a bad one. You can almost see the wheels turning." *giggles*

Me: "Yeah...."

Getting ready to ship out.

I currently have 43 mosquito bites, or scabs in the case of the three-week-old ones; seven patches of heat rash; and one area of massive allergic reaction from dust (at least that’s what I think it is... it developed while I was at AIDSNet and coated with a thick layer of the gray stuff). It sucks. Really if the ten or so itchy bites would stop itching and the heat rash would stop itching, I would be golden... But, alas, that’s not how these things work. Oh yeah. And I got most of those bites while wearing bug spray. And my foot is still sore from being run over by the elevator three weeks or so ago. My baby toe isn’t as swollen anymore though, which is stellar.

Aside from wanting to rip my legs off just above the knee, this week has been pretty good. Big accomplishments:

- took the final in Thai Language...didn’t completely bomb the interview part (we covered the second half of our textbook in about a third of the time we took on the first half, which meant that the train of knowledge kind of zoomed past us), and our two skits went really well. Not as fabulous as Ian, Nathan, and Ajaan John’s, which was kick-ass and incorporated pre-made props, but all things considered, it was fun. Catherine played a puppy that I was selling to Jenna. She (C.) made this part of the skit 100x better by looking unhappy when I allowed myself to be bargained down, and “barked” with happiness at the big bag of dog food (ahaan maw) rather than the small one. After that, we cut to the Doctor’s office, in which the doctor-patient consultation ended with “Head, shoulders, knees, and toes” in Thai. That’s right. We translated it - tones and all.

- Since we finished our language class, we’ve now moved on to Thai Writing. We thought the language was difficult... yeah. Whatever. Speaking is easy peasy compared to writing. Aiy. If I learn any letters or am able to read any words, I’ll be impressed. I just have no idea how I’m going to master a new alphabet. (Tips?)

- I have all of my laundry clean. Yes! No needing to pack dirty clothes in my suitcase when we leave for Vietnam!

- I discovered a way of getting through HR class without leaving frustrated - doodling. I write and doodle my angry ideas, rather than get into arguments. Not only does it make me feel better, sometimes my ideas congeal into less angry and more coherent thoughts as I doodle and so not only do I not get angry, I’m also articulate. Woo!

- Today was my last “official” day at AIDSNet. *Tear* AND -- I finished the resource center project! I am the most proud about this achievement. I really wasn’t sure I was going to finish before we left for Vietnam and Cambodia, but I did. And they threw me a “going away party” and want me to come visit. Amazing. I understood little of what was being said around me in Lanna-Thai (the northern dialect they all speak), but everyone was laughing so much, that it was contagious. And they gave me a Thai nickname - Mahlee - which means “Jasmine,” which I find to be the perfect correlation. I’ve also gotten through both booklets on paper once, so I can hopefully finish editing for them in Vietnam.

- Really, I cannot express how much I loved working at AIDSNet...I wish I could take them up on their offer to go back.

"Go a-way! Go a-way!"

- Ajaan Rien, paraphrasing the first King of Siam

Two weekends ago, we packed up all of our belongings, tried really hard to make them all fit back into our suitcases (mostly everyone failed), and moved to the hostel located on CMU's campus - Uniserv. This move was necessitated by the lack of air-conditioning and over 95 degree weather that started a week or so before we left and should continue to rise until after we leave in April.

As soon as our luggage was safely in Uniserv storage, we headed out (all 12 of us from Coe and a group of five A-jaans from CMU) in two vans to survey the sites of Sukhothai and other ancient cities. The Dean of the Humanities - Ajaan Rien - was a tour guide before landing his cushy job at Maw-Chaw, so he was able to tell us all of these amazing (and sometimes not so amazing stories) about the places we were visiting. Some of the basics:

Before Thailand became Thailand, back in the 12th century or so (Europe's middle ages, he reminded us), the first Kingdom of Siam was founded, with it's capital in Sukhothai. Other related kingdoms include Ayudaya and Lanna. Both Ayudaya and Lanna were founded after Sukothai, and eventually Ayudaya became dominant. But Sukhothai was first, so it still maintains a lot of prestige (unlike Lanna, which is important to the Northern Thais and some Lao, but not really anyone else, apparently). While most of Sukhothai and its satellite cities - S... something and Pitsanulok, which I'm sure I misspelled, was burned down by the invading Burmese army during the Ayudaya period, the temples still remain. Why the temples you ask? Well - in Sukhothai, there were three classes of building - those for normal people, those for royalty, and the temples - and each of these classes were made with differing building materials. The Palace was built with teak wood, and normal buildings were made from bamboo and thatch, so they either were burned down by the Burmese, or decayed over time. The Temples on the other hand are special and were made of stone, dug from the ground - natalite... or latelite... something like that, so they're still standing.

Ajaan Rien told us how the French - the first Farang in Thailand - didn't believe the Thais when they said they dug the stone from the ground. It looks a lot like volcanic rock, and Thailand is mountainous, so the French said "No, you got that stone from the volcano." To which the Thais said "Silly farang. There are no volcanos in Thailand." Rather the stone is found 2-3 meters below the ground soil. When it is in the ground, it is somewhat clay like and a little pliable, allowing blocks to be cut out. Once above ground they bake and harden in the sun and then are solid as other rocks and used to build temples.

There is a lot of Khmer (Cambodian) and Chinese influence in the architecture of the time. These two groups both worked to influence, and in the case of the Khmer, control the area. As an act of defiance against the Khmer, the later buildings are almost all in a pseudo-Chinese style, called Sukhothai style. This creativity in architecture and decoration was meant to show that the Thai kingdom was separate and independent from the Khmer kingdom, similar to the Declaration of Independence, but minus the Revolutionary War. Apparently the Khmer didn't care about North/Central Thailand that much.

In Sukhothai we saw what is supposed to be the most beautiful image of the walking Buddha. It was pretty nice; huge too. But as we biked around the park containing all the Sukhothai ruins, Patrica, Emily, Holly and I found one that we decided was more beautiful. It was smaller, much more graceful and actually caught the movement of "walking," unlike the big one, which just looked like Buddha standing. The four of us also sneaked off the beaten path to a quiet corner, found an empty pedestal (you'd be surprised how easy that was!) and formed the group of us into our own huge "subduing Mara" (evil, the devil) Buddha. Then P, E, and H posed as the Holy Family, to ensure we were equal-opportunity blasphemers.

Just outside the old city of Sukhothai, we saw the biggest Buddha image in Thailand (maybe anywhere?). If I had been standing on its pedestal, Buddha's knee (as he sits crosslegged, lotus-style) would have hit right around my upper arm or shoulder. We're talking gi-normous Buddha. Gi-normous Buddha is known in Thai as the Talking Buddha, and not because his pose is of Buddha giving a sermon or anything. No, Buddha's just doing his usual thing - Subduing Mara. The story of the talking Buddha is my favorite from the trip, and goes a little something like this:
One day, the Burmese army comes invading - as the Burmese army is wont to do according to Thai history. (I'm pretty sure if they taught history in Burma/Myanmar, they would say the same about the Thais, but since they don't (which is another post entirely), who can say?) And the King (I believe it is the king of Ayudaya at this point, but don't quote that), he's having none of this "invading, burning everything down and taking all your land" business, so he runs ahead of his troops and tries to cut the Burmese army off before they can burn down Sukhothai. The King thinks to himself, "Hey, the Burmese army isn't going to listen to my plea, so how else can I get them to leave us alone?" Then he finds himself at the gi-normous Buddha, and decided that perhaps the Burmese would listen to an order from Lord Buddha himself. So, the industrious King scrambles behind the gi-normous Buddha (supposedly seconds before the Burmese would have seen him, if Ajaan Rien's retelling is to be believed), and starts bellowing "Go a-way! Go a-way! Leave! Leave!" The Burmese army is reluctant to attack in the face of a giant, "talking" Buddha telling them to scat, so they peace out and live to pillage another day.

Isn't that great?! I love it.

Another fun moment was when Ajaan Rien was explaining why the windows in the temple were so small and narrow - "We Thai people were not so good at maths" was the inital response. When that warranted blank looks, he explained more thoroughly, that they hadn't discovered how to build larger windows and hold the roof up at the same time - much like medieval castles in Europe. The phenomenon had never been put to us in that fashion before, and it caught us off-guard.

When not touring ancient ruins, we ate a lot of Northern Thai food, drove a lot, and spent a ton of time in hotel swimming pools (usually playing chicken). The weather that weekend was wicked hot (forecasted over 110) and you would drip just from being outside, so the pool was really the only place to be.

Returning to Chiang Mai and Uniserv we discovered the main drawback to moving - less internet, which is why the posting has fallen completely off the band wagon. One project for the week - Get caught up before we leave for Vietnam. :)