The Second New Years in Vietnam

As the clock struck midnight on December 31^st and boisterous Westerners were out partying, staring in awe and anticipation as the “ball” made its predictable descent towards Times Square, and as lavish displays of fireworks lit the dark night sky from California to the Middle East, a few Vietnamese joined in the excitement, but most were happily asleep and probably had been for a while. The real New Years in Vietnam usually occurs about one month after the Western one (though this year it was about 6 weeks later) as the Eastern world moves into a new year in the lunar calendar. There is an enormous amount of anticipation of the Tet (the name of the holiday) celebration in Vietnam that is somewhat comparable to the lead-up to Christmas. People spend weeks preparing for the holiday by cleaning their houses, cooking traditional foods, and traveling back to their hometowns (in an American Thanksgiving-like fashion). Almost everyone has at least a two-week break for Tet and as a result, most stores, restaurants, cafes, and other businesses close for the entire holiday. During the holiday, most time is spent with family and friends relaxing, eating, and drinking copious amounts alcohol. And if you’re in Cao Bang, the latter is taken especially seriously. Because of the family-and-friends nature of the holiday, it was recommended to me when I came to Vietnam that I use that time to travel, so I did.  When I got to Cao Bang, though, and as the holiday neared, everyone in the community was asking about my plans and hoping that I would stay in Cao Bang during the holiday to celebrate with their families. I don’t regret leaving Vietnam during that time, and while it would have been amazing to experience the holiday with the people of Cao Bang, I think it would have been extremely overwhelming and filled with far more rice wine than I would ever wish on anyone. On top of those reasons, I felt that given my limited amount of time in Southeast Asia, two weeks was too good of an opportunity to travel to pass up. And, most importantly, my grandparents decided to come to visit me and took me on the trip of a lifetime.

I met my grandparents in Hanoi and after a few days exploring, they agreed to brave the long ride up to Cao Bang. We spent two nights (one full day) in Cao Bang during which we walked around the town and went to the Pac Bo Caves. In addition, I was glad that my grandparents got a full flavor of Vietnamese culture as my principal invited us all out to a big dinner at which several families went above-and-beyond to welcome my grandparents to Cao Bang and wish us a happy (Lunar) New Year. I was also glad that they got to meet some of the people with whom I’ve become very close like Mr. Anh (who studied in Hawaii and has really taken me under his wing here) and Ms. Tuyet (my co-worker and host whom I’ve written about before) who invited us to have dinner in her home with her family.

After the short stay in Cao Bang, we headed south to Siem Reap, Cambodia. The Siem Reap that tourists see, in my opinion, is a fairly unimpressive place that resembles a boardwalk in Atlantic City or Wildwood, NJ with bars, flashing lights, and more t-shirts for sale than you can imagine. The real downtown area of Siem Reap, though, where relatively few tourists venture is a fairly small and poor city surrounded by immense poverty. Cambodia, which was once the capital of the Khmer empire that ruled much of Southeast Asia for over 600 years, is now for many reasons a struggling country. While there’s certainly serious poverty in many parts of Vietnam, it seemed much more the norm in Cambodia as the moment we left city limits in both Siem Reap and Phnom Penh, we were witness to what seemed to be strikingly poor living conditions. What Siem Reap lacks in charm, though, it more than makes up for with its historic temples, kingdoms, and monuments. Angkor Wat, Angkor Thom, and Ta Prohm (which you may recognize from Tomb Raider) are incredible beyond words. I’m not even going to try to describe them because my writing simply can’t do justice to their immensity and unbelievable beauty. All I can say is, look them up on the Internet, and if you ever have the chance to go to Cambodia, do it—it was truly a once-in-a-lifetime sightseeing opportunity.

Our next stop was Phnom Penh, a far more developed city than Siem Reap (at least the non-tourist part of Siem Reap), but for a capital city, still not comparable to other major Southeast Asian cities (certainly not to the ones I’ve seen in Vietnam i.e. Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, and Da Nang). What makes Phnom Penh particularly interesting is the legacy of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge, and the genocide that took place under their rule from 1975-1979. The highlight (probably not the best word for it) of Phnom Penh, for me, was a visit to Tuol Sleng Prison, an old schoolhouse that was turned into a prison by the Khmer Rouge to house anyone and everyone who was ethnically, culturally or otherwise unlike them or who disagreed with them—or really just whomever else they felt like putting there. The events that are recounted in the prison are horrific and the destruction that the Khmer Rouge inflicted on their own people and on the future of Cambodia as a nation is unthinkable, and as a result, the country is nowhere near recovered. Worse yet, is the undisputed culpability of Western nations, namely the United States, for helping to cause and, even more so, for standing on the sidelines watching one of the worst genocides in human history ravage an entire population. The sickening reality of it all, though, is that despite the hundreds of battered human skulls still displayed in the prison and the thousands more littered throughout the nearby killing fields, and despite the extensive collection of horrific photos, and despite the meticulously kept records that still exist, the genocide has been relegated by the West to a historical afterthought barely worthy of inclusion in our textbooks.

Next, we departed Cambodia for Yangon, Myanmar. First, let me address the prevailing question of the name of the country. Is it Burma? Is it Myanmar? Some combination of the two? So, while this is a contentious debate that is steeped in years of history and political turmoil, I’ll do my best to share my limited understanding of it. Historically, the country has been named Burma. After the military junta staged a successful coup in 1989 and began its rule, they changed the name of the country to Myanmar. I have heard conflicting accounts of the differences between the meaning of the two names and what the country should be called. When I was in the country, I was told to call it Myanmar. It was explained to me that Myanmar was a colonial name for the country and that it meant something along the lines of “everyone.” Burma, on the other hand, according to this person, is a name that refers exclusively to one ethnic group (the dominant one in the country). Upon doing more research, though, I have seen some articles that say that Burma and Myanmar mean the same thing. In any event, most countries around the world and the UN refer to the country as Myanmar. However, a few countries, most famously the US and the UK, have continued to use Burma claiming that the junta did not have the requisite political legitimacy to change the name (interestingly, though, during a visit to the country at the end of last year, President Obama did use Myanmar). To make matters more complicated, I had heard that revered pro-democracy opposition leader and national hero Aung San Suu Kyi finally began to call the country Myanmar as well. In my limited research, though, I have not found anything to support this claim. Anyway, since I was told to call it Myanmar and since the people whom I met there called it Myanmar, you can call me a democracy-hater, but that’s what I’m going to call it.

Unsure of what to expect, we were promptly welcomed by a fascinatingly idiosyncratic society. Men and women wear kilt-like garments called longyi, they drive on the right-hand side of the road but with British-style cars in which the steering wheel is also on the right side of the car (this was really bizarre), almost everyone, no matter their age or gender, wears a yellow chalky makeup called thanaka that they often apply in different patterns on their faces, and a huge percentage of the population chews betel (a piece of betel nut, wrapped in a betel leaf, mixed with some lime juice and tobacco) and the streets are literally stained red from the dark red color of spit that chewing the mixture produces. Of our three stops in Myanmar, Yangon was the one at which we got the most feel of Burmese life, culture, society, and history. Yangon is a fairly large city with a distinctively British (or just European) feel (Myanmar was a British colony until 1948). The two major takeaways from Yangon, for me, were a sense of the political struggles in Myanmar and the overwhelming role that Buddhism plays in Burmese society. The first time we rode in a cab, the driver started talking to us and in no more than 30 seconds of conversation said something along the lines of, “I hate this bullshit government.” This kind of talk, though not necessarily as blunt, didn’t waver over the course of the visit. Sadly, it is very clear that virtually nobody who isn’t in a position of power has any respect or admiration for their historically (and currently) oppressive government. Next, Myanmar is about 90% Buddhist and of that 90% almost all are practicing. Almost all of the Buddhists (therefore the large majority of the country), at some point in their lives, spend time living and studying in a monastery or a nunnery. This means that people of all ages in Myanmar, for their entire lives, move between civil society and these religious institutions making for a unique cultural dynamic. Sightseeing in Yangon was highlighted by visiting a monastery and a nunnery and by a trip to the truly remarkable Shwedagon Pagoda.

The next stop was Bagan. Bagan is a much smaller city north of Yangon that is a pretty dry, dusty, desert-like place. But, Bagan is known for its thousands of Buddhist temples that scatter the landscape. One evening when we climbed up to a high point on one of the temples our guide challenged me to take a picture (without shooting straight up or straight down) that didn’t include a temple, needless to say it was impossible. For the most part, we spent our time in Bagan just exploring all of these different and beautiful temples. The highlight of Bagan, by a huge margin, though, was a hot air balloon ride that we took at sunrise over the many temples.  

For the last stop on our journey, we went east to Inle Lake. Inle Lake is a gorgeous lake that is surrounded on all sides by mountains. What makes the lake so special, though, are the communities that have been built in and around it. There are entire neighborhoods of stilt houses and waterways in the place of roads. I can’t imagine a more relaxing spot to end an unbelievable trip. The trip was, without a doubt, one of the major highlights of my year here and I will be forever grateful to my grandparents for coming to visit, for bringing me on the trip, and for joining me on this yearlong adventure in Southeast Asia.

When I returned from the trip, the people in Cao Bang were reaching the tail end of their celebrations of Tet. Luckily, I was invited to join my co-workers one afternoon as they travelled, as a group, to each other’s houses. There were ten teachers in the group so we went to ten different houses and the routine was basically the same at each one—talk together, eat snacks, drink rice wine, and give children “lucky money” (I had exchanged some Burmese money for American dollar bills in Myanmar so that I could hand out singles to the kids when I got back and they were a big hit). I felt really lucky to be welcomed into this group and to get a first-hand experience of the Tet traditions.

March and April were pretty relaxed months and I spent most of them just hanging out in Cao Bang. There were a few exciting events and celebrations like Vietnamese Women’s Day and the anniversary of the founding of the Communist Youth Union that mostly just consisted of some big dinners and celebrations at the school. Finally, I got the chance to do some amazing sightseeing in Cao Bang that included a trip to a beautiful lake nearby and a weekend hiking trip into the mountains to an extremely remote village home to people in the Lolo ethnic minority group.

Teaching has been much of the same since my last post. I enjoyed teaching about the spring holidays and other fun events like March Madness and April Fool’s Day. In addition, this spring has been a time for some very rewarding teacher development opportunities. First, a few of the ETAs gathered in Lang Son (a province that shares a border with Cao Bang) for a workshop organized by fellow ETA Anna who has spent her year there. In addition to being an extremely well run and well-organized weekend, the workshop gave us a really interesting opportunity to get to see Anna’s school, meet her co-workers, and see Lang Son. In addition, since this year marks the 20^th anniversary of the normalization of formal diplomatic relations between the United States and Vietnam, the embassy decided to give us each up to $500 to execute micro-grant projects that contribute to our work in our provinces or our schools. I decided to use mine to start an English Teacher’s Club for English teachers from all over the province of Cao Bang. In late March we had our first event and it was a huge success. There were about 40 teachers in attendance and we all met in a restaurant to discuss challenges that we face in the classroom, how to overcome those challenges, and some ways that we can lend students more opportunities for leadership in the classroom in order to allow them to take more responsibility for and ownership of each lesson. In addition to the great conversation and exchange of ideas, the event was a really fun way for the teachers to get together (many of them had never met), enjoy a nice meal together, and practice their English. We will have another event this coming Saturday and I’m really looking forward to seeing how it goes.

In addition to my travels over the Tet break, I had some unexpected time off at the end of April that I used to see some new parts of Vietnam. First, I visited Can Tho, the largest city in the Mekong Delta where I hung out with fellow-ETA Ophir. Then we both went up to meet most of the other ETAs for a workshop that was organized by Sonia. We spent the weekend with an organization called PeaceTrees Vietnam that works in a province called Quang Tri removing and destroying unexploded ordnance (UXO) that is left over from the war (no, we were not doing the de-mining). Quang Tri and its neighboring provinces form one of, if not, the most heavily bombed areas on the globe. Apparently 80% of the land has yet to be cleared of UXO and the organization, which has been operating for 20 years, finds and destroys between 150-250 per week! For every UXO they find, they plant a tree in its place (though they didn’t trust us with the de-mining, we did plant a swath of land with new trees). The weekend was a sobering reminder of the destruction that the war caused in many areas of Vietnam and the efforts to recover that are long from over. After a few days in Hue visiting the Imperial City and many of the other beautiful tombs and temples that the city houses, we made our way to Hoi An for a night before I continued north to Sapa for a night—a town in the mountains of northwest Vietnam known for its stunning beauty and its large population of ethnic minority groups. All in all, it was a great and fairly impromptu trip that allowed me to visit many of the places in Vietnam that I once worried I’d have to skip.

Finally, as I wrap up my time here, I’ve thought a lot about what it will be like to return home (officially now on June 22^nd). I’ve been away for a long time. For the most part, other than missing my family and friends and the expected challenges along the way, being away from home hasn’t been so difficult. Of course, there have been events I’ve wished I could’ve attended and experiences that I’ve wished I could’ve had, but it’s not like I didn’t expect that. What has been tough about being away, though, maybe the hardest thing of all, was watching what’s gone on in Baltimore over the last few weeks. I’ve been in Vietnam since before Michael Brown was killed last August. It was hard enough being in Vietnam and watching the protests in Ferguson and the unfortunate string of all-too similar sequences of events in different cities around the country. But watching from Vietnam as civil unrest erupted in Baltimore was something different (let alone trying to explain, to the Vietnamese, what was happening). I can’t fully explain how I felt, but to say I was disappointed and sad to be here during that time is an understatement. I don’t even know what I would’ve done had I been home, but it was a time that I felt I needed to be there just to be a part of the community and I couldn’t. My connection to the communities of Baltimore City and Baltimore County, the two communities in which I’ve spent my entire life until these ten months, was reduced to depressingly simplistic Snapchats, texts, and Facebook statuses and miserable international news coverage. I’m sending my greatest hopes that we can all work to affect positive change in the immediate future and that communities across our country can work to become better, stronger, and more equal.

On a lighter note, knowing me and if my lack of blog-posting consistency is any indicator, this will likely be my last post from Vietnam. I’ll certainly have some wrap-up from home, but for now, thank you to all of you who have been so supportive of me throughout this experience and I look forward to seeing you all soon. What an incredible journey this has been.

With Ms. Tuyet and her family

Sunrise over Angkor Wat

Trees growing out of temples at Ta Prohm

Angkor Thom, known for its smiling faces

The Royal Palace Complex in Phnom Penh

Monastery in Yangon

Nunnery in Yangon. Note: the women shave their heads too

Aung San Suu Kyi's house where she served two lengthy terms of house arrest that were routinely extended by the government

Shwedagon Pagoda at sunset

Balloon ride over Bagan

Sunset from marshes on the banks of Inle Lake

Teachers who came to our first English Club event

The First New Years in Vietnam

While Mother Nature neglects to show any signs of mercy in her battle with much of the Eastern Seaboard, the spring is beginning to creep out from behind the mountains in Cao Bang. Among the seemingly endless number of criticisms that I heard about Cao Bang from Hanoians and other Vietnamese before I came here (most of which turned out to be absurd) was the warning that winters here were dreadful. I took the warnings into consideration, but wasn't too scared. After all, I am used to winters where it is not unusual for the temperature to creep towards 0 degrees Fahrenheit whereas the temperature during the winter months in Cao Bang never even gets to 0 degrees Celsius. People from Cao Bang have never seen snow and they were warning me about cold winters? I confidently kept my sweaters and jackets in my suitcase and figured I’d give them the season off. My hope that I would skip a winter, however, was nowhere close to coming true. It wasn’t that the actual temperature was that cold, but there was just no way of getting warm—ever. Given that no building has heat or any sort of insulation living essentially turns into winter camping. While there were a handful of awful days where the temperature was in the low-mid 30s, when there’s no reprieve from the elements, anything below 50 is pretty rough. Needless to say, I gained a new appreciation for hot food and blankets. I should say, though, that although it was cold while it lasted, the winter was fairly short as it was warm through about mid-November and only really consistently cold until about the end of January.

Thankfully, I had an amazing break from the cold weather, which came in the form of a visit from my family. At the end of December my parents and sister came and began their trip with a quick visit to Cao Bang. After a day-and-a-half of watching/helping me teach, taking a trip to the Pac Bo Caves, and exploring Cao Bang, we headed south to Hanoi. While I have gotten fairly familiar with Hanoi, I was glad to be able to see the Ho Chi Minh “Complex” for the first time. The Complex consists of Ho Chi Minh’s mausoleum in which his body is embalmed and on display for visitors, his old house, and the Presidential Palace—a beautiful building built by the French that Vietnam now uses to greet high-level foreign visitors. The reverence for Uncle Ho, as they refer to him here, is almost religious and the chance to tour the Complex gave me a deeper understanding of his life, values, and accomplishments. Regardless of what anyone thinks of Ho Chi Minh’s political alignments or choices, there’s no denying that he was, by all accounts, an amazing individual.

The next stop on our journey was Da Nang, a city of about 1 million in the central region of Vietnam. Da Nang is a rapidly developing city on the coast that is quickly becoming a hotspot for tourism and business. We were incredibly lucky to have sunny days in Da Nang in what was the heart of the rainy season. Other than the beach and the city, highlights of Da Nang were exploring the beautiful Son Tra Peninsula, Marble Mountain, and a complex of Cham ruins—which were, incidentally, bombed heavily by the American forces during the War—called My Son.

After Da Nang, we took a short car ride to Hoi An, an ancient town that lies just south of Da Nang. Hoi An is a small town that served as one of Vietnam’s main port cities between the 15^th and 19^th centuries. The ancient architecture has been surprisingly well preserved and the beautiful town has maintained its uniquely ancient look with its buildings, small bridges, and ubiquitous paper lanterns. For all that Hoi An has preserved in its appearance, though, at least in my opinion, it has lost in its culture. Actually, in many ways Hoi An remains a hub for trade, but instead of spices coming from India and China, now vendors and tailors have taken over the ancient storefronts to entice the mobs of tourists to overpay for something that they will inevitably regret having bought at all.

The tension between the tourism industry and historical preservation is particularly relevant in Southeast Asia right now. All of the countries in this region are developing quickly and, as a result, are opening up to throngs of tourists. In order to have any success in the tourism industry, countries must make traveling comfortable and easy for their guests. But the more they try to do so, the more they risk diminishing the cultural/historical/natural value that tourists are seeking in the first place. As an aside, this is part of the reason I love Hanoi so much. In my mind, they’ve managed to weave the tourism industry fairly seamlessly (or at least more so than I’ve seen anywhere else) into authentic Vietnamese life, culture, and history. For me, Hoi An has crossed the line, but obviously I shouldn’t become a tourism consultant because if selling crap is a skill, the people in Hoi An make boardwalk vendors at the beach look like amateurs and they clearly aren’t scaring very many people away.

After Hoi An and a quick brush with bad weather we headed to Ho Chi Minh City—the largest city in Vietnam. Most of the people reading this will probably be quicker to recognize Ho Chi Minh City by its former name, Saigon. The name was officially changed in 1976 after the expulsion (or withdrawal—whatever you want to call it) of American forces and the reunification of Vietnam (which happened in 1975). Interestingly, in the north of Vietnam most people refer to the southern metropolis by its official name, but in my experience almost everyone in the south still calls it Saigon. While they’ll tell you that they call it Saigon because that’s just what they’re accustomed to (as if 40 years isn’t enough time to break a habit), when you press further you hear things like, “Ho Chi Minh wasn’t even his real name” or “he was never our leader.” This small act of resistance represents the lingering divide between north and south in Vietnam that, though slowly disintegrating, definitely still exists. For this reason, for someone like me, it is very important to remember where I am and with whom I’m speaking. The choice of what to call the city, like it or not, sends a political message. By no means am I suggesting that I’m going to get into any trouble if I say Saigon to a northerner, but when you’re trying to build relationships and trust, represent your country, and engage in genuine exchange, these are the sorts of little things that you don’t want to screw up.

Anyway, we arrived in Ho Chi Minh City and the following morning headed to the Cu Chi Tunnels. Cu Chi is a suburban district of Ho Chi Minh City and is known for its massive systems of tunnels that were used by the Viet Cong in order to fight against the Americans during the War (again, choosing whether to say Vietnam War or American War carries the same sort of baggage that I described above). The Viet Cong were southern revolutionaries who fought for the north against the Americans. Though I have not gotten fully satisfying answers about the distinctions between the official Northern forces and the Viet Cong, much of the ground fighting and guerilla warfare during the War was between the Americans and the Viet Cong. Fighting covered almost all of the central and southern regions of Vietnam, but the Saigon/Mekong Delta area, at least in my understanding, saw a disproportionate amount of ground fighting. In Cu Chi, where ground fighting was constant for a long period of time, local Viet Cong utilized an enormous network of tunnels (many of the tunnels were actually built during the ‘40s while Vietnam was fighting the French) in order to hide from and attack the American troops. This area was also the sight of many of the famous human traps that were used to capture and imprison enemy soldiers. Apparently about 75 miles of the tunnels have been preserved and the area is an impressive tourist destination that showcases the ways in which the tunnels were built, used, and maintained as well as the impact that the War had (and still has) on the lives of the locals. The outdoor museum is both fascinating and haunting. There is perhaps no better example of the tension between tourism and history (that I was writing about in reference to Hoi An) than at Cu Chi where they have built a gun range for tourists to shoot guns similar to the ones that were used during the War (yes, you read that correctly). Needless to say, the sight of Americans (and everyone else, but especially Americans) lining up and paying money to shoot guns on the very ground on which our peoples spent years killing each other didn’t resonate very well with any of us.

Following the tunnels we made our way around Ho Chi Minh City to visit Reunification Palace (the old residence of the Presidents of South Vietnam), the War Remnants Museum, and two beautiful buildings built by the French, the Saigon Notre-Dame Basilica and the Saigon Central Post Office. Of these sites, the War Remnants Museum was by far the most striking. Though not void of political bias, the War Museum is well organized and incredibly powerful leaving all of its visitors with a sense of the extent to which the War ravaged Vietnam and the many ways in which the country continues to fight through its wake.

The following day, our last full day together as a family, was spent on a trip to the Mekong Delta complete with a boat ride, a bike ride through a rural village, and a visit with a fruit farmer in his orchards. The next day we parted ways as I headed back to Cao Bang and my parents and sister flew home. During the time that my family was here, I completed my 5^th month in Vietnam and I cannot think of a better way to have celebrated the halfway point in my grant than exploring the country with them.  

The month of January went by fairly uneventfully, but highlights included a visit from long-time friend Matt Mathias, eating a snake and drinking its blood (quite an experience), a provincial volleyball tournament, and a couple of weekend trips to Hanoi. On the teaching front, there were not very many new developments, but I began to work with small groups of 10^th and 11^th graders (much like I did with 12^th graders in November/December) who are preparing for a provincial English competition, I taught about MLK Day and the Super Bowl, and I began some very basic English lessons for a small group of non-English teachers at the school.

It’s hard to believe that it’s already the middle of March and that I only have 2.5 months left, but time is flying by and thankfully my experience here has remained incredibly rewarding, enriching, and fun. I’ll write again soon with an update on the Lunar New Year in Vietnam and an incredible visit from my grandparents.   

The Dragon Bridge--Da Nang

Fishing "boats" line Da Nang's coastline with Lady Buddha in the distance 

Lady Buddha 

Cham ruins at My Son

The iconic Japanese Bridge in Hoi An

An entrance to one of the tunnels in Cu Chi

Reunification Palace--HCMC

Inside of the Saigon Central Post Office

Snake blood, nicely garnished with a spring onion

Friends and Adventures

I realize that it’s been quite a while since I last wrote so I figured that another post was long overdue. The last two months have been filled with many new experiences, adventures, conversations, and relationships. A lot has happened in the last two months and I’m going to do my best to categorize this post (at least in a way that makes sense to me) in an effort to share as much as I can.

Time

Time is something that has been on my mind a lot recently. It’s very hard for me to believe that I’m beyond the halfway mark of my time in Vietnam. I remember thinking, in August, that it would be incredibly daunting to finish four months here and know that I had half-a-year left. Luckily, the four-month mark came and went and I have not felt intimidated by the length of time that remains in my stay.  In fact, it occurred to me at the beginning of December that I had been in Vietnam for about as long as a study-abroad semester. I was comforted by the thought that I needed more time. Sure, there are times at which being home would be nice, but if I had to leave now, I would have a really strong sense of unfinished business. I feel extremely lucky to be content with being in Vietnam (at least for now)—it would be a long 5 months if I didn’t.

It’s also interesting to reflect on my daily life in Vietnam and how my own perspectives have changed. As I’ve settled into a daily routine in Cao Bang and have gotten more comfortable as a member of the community here, events and experiences have, in some ways, gotten much less special, and in other ways have been just the opposite. In case that made no sense, I’ll try to explain my point relative to this blog. In the beginning, trying new foods, finding new places to hang out, and sharing initial classroom highlights were novel experiences worthy of a blog post—now they’re not. On the other hand, meeting people, developing relationships, and finding a community were not what I deemed most important to share with readers of this blog—now they are. Mostly, I think that reflects a certain level of comfort (or desensitization) to some of the things that I see, experience, and deal with here. In other ways, though, I think it shows a shift in my priorities—what used to stand out as important and new doesn’t anymore and what seemed low on my priority list now seems paramount. I don’t think the relationship between the exciting and the banal is quite as inversely proportional as I’m portraying it, but I hope you get the point.

Community and Culture

Almost immediately after my last blog post, I started to notice a shift. I was finding it very difficult to move past superficial interactions and develop strong relationships. I was tired of every person whom I met asking me the same 10 questions and tired of having 600 tour guides who all wanted to show me the same city and “introduce” me to the same “traditional foods” (some of which were definitely not unique to Cao Bang or Vietnam). I was also feeling like I was having trouble being understood and having trouble understanding the people with whom I was interacting. I could not understand why people were asking me, “Can you eat rice?” or “Do you know how to use chopsticks?” How did they not know that rice is a fairly universal food and that Americans learn how to use chopsticks? Even more surprising, do they really think that using chopsticks is some kind of monumental kinesthetic accomplishment? Better yet, do they think I planned to starve myself for ten months all because of an insurmountable difficulty of using chopsticks? I haven’t found the answers to these questions, but I have found that people have become much less shocked by my existence here. As a result, I feel like I’ve been able to form a really solid group of friends.

For the most part, I hang out with many of my students, some recent university grads who have moved back to Cao Bang to work, and several other members of the community who have reached out and befriended me. In addition, I’m also very thankful for the few other ex-pats who are living in Cao Bang now. There are four other Americans, a 24 year old from Luxembourg, and a man from The Netherlands and I spend time with all of them on a fairly regular basis. What’s nice, though, is that even when I am with the other foreigners, there are almost always Vietnamese people with us. Whether it’s going out to dinner with the other Americans and my students or eating dinner with the Europeans and their Vietnamese co-workers, I’m really glad that I’ve been able to develop great relationships with people from both the East and the West. 

In addition to developing relationships, I (along with all of the other foreigners) really feel adopted by the community here. One of the perks of being in such a small town is that everybody knows everybody (this can also be a major frustration) and as such, I’ve been able to become friends with restaurant owners, families, and many other community members.

One highlight was in late October when I helped to organize an “English Party” at the local pizza restaurant. The owner, who is always looking to practice his English, wanted to close his restaurant and invite as many people as we could find to get together to speak English. I invited many of my students, fellow English teachers, and all of the other foreigners and we all had a great time. It was so much fun for me to see all of my students able to relax and have fun. With the absurd pressure on the students to attend “extra classes” and to study, they almost never have time to socialize with each other. I was glad that community members from all different cross-sections of Cao Bang could come together just to have a good time.

A few days after the English Party was Halloween. Given that most people in Vietnam are relatively unfamiliar with Halloween, I wanted to have a Halloween celebration at the school. Thankfully, the school agreed and the English Club helped me to host a party complete with costumes, pumpkins, and candy. The students really impressed me with their costumes and makeup artistry and (no surprise) put my costume to shame.

After Halloween, the next big celebration was Vietnamese Teacher’s Day. Teacher’s Day falls on November 20^th and is a celebration that is taken extremely seriously in Vietnam. As my fellow ETAs and I have experienced, being a teacher is probably the most respected job in Vietnam. Telling someone that I am a teacher, for example, immediately changes the nature of our conversation and our relationship as the Vietnamese have a truly impressive level of respect and reverence for their educators. Teacher’s Day is the best example of this respect as students put on elaborate performances, give all of their teachers gifts, and even visit their teachers’ houses to show their appreciation for them. I was initially a bit skeptical about Teacher’s Day and whether it would feel forced or exploitative of the power dynamic between students and teachers. I was very impressed and relieved to notice, though, that the day felt incredibly genuine. I will also remain grateful to and humbled by my students for going out of their way to make sure that they expressed their gratitude to me.

Teaching

For the most part, my teaching experiences since my last post have been much of the same. However, for the last two months, I have had the pleasure of intensively teaching 6 students who have been preparing to participate in a national English competition. The competition is a series of national exams and at each stage a certain number of the students are eliminated from the field. The competition culminates in one final test that is taken by 6 students from each of Vietnam’s 63 provinces. Based on their scores on the exam, it is my understanding that students can “test out” of having to take the university entrance exam and can even win scholarships to some of the top universities. This national competition exists in several different subjects and all of the students who are preparing spend months preparing for the test all day every day (they do not attend their other classes). Usually, at least from what I’ve observed, this preparation means sitting in a room all day doing worksheets on their own with no teacher instruction or guidance. To make matters worse, in rural provinces like Cao Bang, student motivations and expectations for these exams seems fairly low given the fact that they will have to compete against their peers from big cities with far more resources who attend at far more advanced schools. Regardless of the fact that the process of administering and preparing for the test seems to me to be at best odd and at worst pointless, I relished the opportunity to be a part of it. I had so much fun teaching long classes with just 6 students who are all among the best in the school at English. For about 6 weeks, I only taught the students for a few afternoons each week. For two weeks, though, I spent all of my teaching hours just working with the group. It was such a great experience for me to be able to watch my students make tremendous progress, but it was also refreshing to develop some really good relationships with them. Needless to say, I felt that my time was much better spent with these 6 than with the almost 600 that I had been teaching prior.

Travel

As I mentioned in the last post at the end of October (embarrassing, I know), I had not left Cao Bang “City.” November and December, however, were filled with both provincial and countrywide adventures. First, in early-November, I went down to Hanoi for a long weekend. The weekend gave me a chance to meet up with some friends including two juniors from Hopkins who were visiting Hanoi as a part of their study-abroad semester in Ho Chi Minh City. After more than 2 months in Cao Bang, the weekend provided a very refreshing dose of English-speakers, Western food, and relaxation.

The following weekend was spent visiting Pac Bo Caves and Ban Gioc Waterfall (the background picture of this blog)—the two most famous sites in Cao Bang. I should also mention that in the second week of November the family of one of my students was gracious enough to lend me a motorbike for the rest of my time here. Having a bike has been incredibly liberating and has allowed me to explore the city and the province to a much greater extent. First, I went with my friends Ryan and Quang to Pac Bo Caves. The Pac Bo area sits northwest of Cao Bang City and just 3 km south of the border with China. Pac Bo is where the former President of Vietnam Ho Chi Minh lived (in a cave) for several months in 1941 after his return to Vietnam from China. Pac Bo is beautiful, but beyond its natural beauty, it provided me with a great sense of our incredibly close proximity to China and it also offered a great introduction to the legacy of Vietnam’s national hero and the beginning of his quest to unify the country. Two days later, I had the chance to visit Ban Gioc Waterfall, which is northeast of Cao Bang City and is on the border with China (the southern half of the falls belongs to Vietnam and the northern half to China). The waterfall was an incredible sight, but the ride there was at least as impressive.

The next weekend was Thanksgiving and after a week of teaching my classes about the history and cultural traditions of the holiday, I celebrated with most of my fellow ETAs in Hanoi. As a special treat, we were welcomed into the home of the Deputy Chief of Mission (who was the Acting Ambassador at the time—we’ve since welcomed a new U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam) who prepared, even by American standards, a truly incredible Thanksgiving spread (which was all the more impressive given that Thanksgiving ingredients don’t exactly align with Vietnamese cuisine).

A week and a half later was our Fulbright Mid-Year Enrichment Seminar. For the few days prior to our conference, I spent some time on the beautiful beaches of Nha Trang before taking an exhilarating bus ride along narrow mountain ridges to Dalat. This was the first time that the entire ETA cohort had been together as a whole since August and it was great to spend some time with everyone and to hear about everyone’s very different experiences. The conference was a great opportunity to share best practices, vent about frustrations, plan for the second semester, and just have some fun as a group. It was also a nice introduction for me to the different weather, culture, and food of southern Vietnam.

2014 was capped off by an amazing two-week trip with my family through Vietnam from which I just returned. I will have to add another blog post soon highlighting our trip. For now, though, if anybody has made it this far in the post without finding something better to do with your time, thanks for reading (and I hope you find more exciting endeavors soon). I also promise to do my best to be more diligent about my blog posting in the 2015 portion of my grant. Finally, no matter which holidays you celebrated, I hope they were fun and meaningful and I send my best wishes to everyone for a happy and healthy 2015. 

The beach in Nha Trang

One of my students and me at the English Party

My motorbike

Halloween Party

"Pumpkin" decorating (Cao Bang has an awfully weak selection of pumpkins)

Teacher's Day Performances

Ban Gioc Waterfall with Mr. Anh who has taken me under his wing

There's a path through the woods to climb up to the second level of the waterfall where this was taken.

A stream outside of Pac Bo caves. The water looks like it has food coloring in it, but apparently it has something to do with the water running over limestone.

Fulbright crew and the Deputy Chief of Mission in Hanoi for Thanksgiving

Settling In

The past few weeks, for the most part, have been more of the same. I’m continuing to get to know my students, my colleagues, and the town. Overall, I’m enjoying myself. As I’ve mentioned before, Cao Bang really seems to be a small and tight-knit community. Everyone I meet does their best to make me feel welcome and to get to know me. As a result, I’ve been invited into the homes of students for dinner, been on many bike rides with students, shared meals with colleagues and community members, and played lots of basketball. I’ve loved getting to meet new people and I continue to be impressed by the friendliness of most people here. A few highlights include: going to breakfast and coffee this past weekend with a local doctor who interrupted me while I was running to say that he had studied in Hawaii and that he wanted to get to know me, joining one of my classes for a lunch that they cooked themselves, and befriending the owner of the local pizza shop (for Vietnam, it’s pretty good).

The flip side to all of these newfound friends is that most of the relationships feel superficial. It’s not that they don’t mean well, of course they do, but there are a number of factors that I feel have been really inhibiting my ability to develop deep relationships.  With my colleagues, the language barrier prevents me from carrying a conversation (let alone developing a relationship) with all but two of my fellow teachers (and I feel closer with those two than the others, though teachers are very busy between school and their families).  With my students, the age difference is difficult, but they are also incredibly busy with school (7am-4:30pm and sometimes night classes). However, hanging out with students in the little time that they do have has been great and I’m enjoying getting to know some of them better.

The time commitment of the students has also made it hard to organize any activities outside of school. Part of my job description is to facilitate extra-curricular opportunities for the students like an English Club or American Movie Night, etc. The students’ lack of free time makes this difficult and potentially impossible.  The school is supposed to be helping me to organize an English Club that will begin soon, but I’m not holding my breath—a lesson that I’ve learned repeatedly here. In the meantime, I’ve given a few students The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snickett, a book that I loved when I was younger, and have been discussing it with them as they make their way through it.

Teaching continues to be fun and interesting, but the school decided to change my schedule so that I’m teaching 18 different classes (every class in the school) for 45 minutes once per week.  This was in contrast to my first few weeks when I taught 18 lessons to 15 different groups of students (I taught the English majors twice per week).  Now, not only am I teaching about 600 students, but I’m only spending 45 minutes with them per week. I really don’t feel like this schedule is a good use of my time, or of the students’ time, and I’ve voiced my concerns but to no avail so far (I have hope that it will change back next week).  Once again, though, I’m not holding my breath, mostly because I can’t express my concerns to the “decision-makers” because they don’t speak English well enough. That being said, I’m starting to sense that some of my classes are making some progress and it’s always fun when students surprise me with ability that I didn’t think they had.

Despite plenty of frustrations, I’m really looking forward to the next few months. I’ve established a level of comfort here and have settled into a nice routine. I’m also hoping to travel to some of the famous places around Cao Bang as I haven’t gotten outside of the town since I’ve been here. In addition, I’m excited about trying to work out the kinks in my teaching responsibilities. Mostly, though, I’m looking forward to developing the relationships that I have made (however superficial they may feel now).

Speaking of relationships, ever since I found out that I would be coming to Vietnam, people told me that this would be a “life-changing” experience. I never knew exactly what those people were talking about, and I guess they didn’t necessarily have anything specific in mind either, but what I did know was that they would prove to be correct. As I’ve gone through this experience so far (and I guess it also helps to have plenty of time with only my thoughts), if I’ve noticed anything that has been profoundly “life-changing” it has been the way in which I approach relationships here. Mostly, I think that as an outsider, I have reason to (and do) feel vulnerable sometimes, especially when I meet new people. But this vulnerability shines a light on those who are just genuinely nice people.

For example, on one of my first days here, a man basically assaulted me in the street after he had stopped me to talk and shake my hand (while true, it sounds worse than it was, but it makes the story better—the rest, I promise, won’t be embellished).  As I was running away from the guy with whom I had the encounter (who was following me), and after ducking into a store and successfully losing him, I was walking past another store and looking over my shoulder to make sure that I had gotten away when I heard someone say “Hello.” I turned around and a different man was extending his hand to shake mine. I’ve never been so hesitant to say hello or shake someone’s hand in my life. I was terrified, my adrenaline was pumping, and I came very close to just ignoring him and walking away. I didn’t and as it turned out the man just wanted to say hi. As we were standing in the street talking, he eventually invited me to eat dinner with him some time. It was a contrast that I’ll never forget.

To borrow a sports saying, my head is “on a swivel” here like never before and I’ve found myself skeptical of some people whom I've met. What I’ve realized, though, is that the smallest and most seemingly insignificant gestures can transform someone in my mind from potential assailant to new friend. So, I’m not quite sure how that’s “life-changing,” but if nothing else, it’s clearer to me that it doesn’t take much to be nice and when you are you’ll often have no idea that you were.

Finally Teaching

Since I last wrote, I've continued to get more comfortable in Cao Bang.  Meeting new people and discovering new places to eat, places to hang out, and things to do has been a lot of fun.  Two weeks ago, I spent the week observing classes.  I only saw one 45 minute class a day (which left me with a ton of time with little to do), but the observations served as a nice introduction to the teaching styles of my co-workers, the classroom environment that students were used to, and the level of English among the students.  I was not surprised to see that the teachers, for the most part, simply did exactly what their textbooks told them to do.  There was little student participation, little student-to-student interaction, and no critical thinking.  The students would listen to a recording and fill in some blanks or practice saying a scripted conversation and that was pretty much the extent of the "learning" that went on. There is also a huge amount of time wasted on things that just don't matter.  For example, for some reason handwriting is really important and even accounted for in students' grades.  Another example of something that doesn't matter is the enormous focus on pronunciation. Obviously English speakers need to pronounce things in such a way that another person can understand, but beyond that, "correct" pronunciation not only doesn't exist (there are a million different accents and people pronounce things differently), but it is totally unnecessary. The goal for students should be the ability to communicate as opposed to sounding like a native speaker (whatever that even means). In addition, though this also wasn't a surprise, the teachers used way too much Vietnamese in their classrooms.  Granted, sometimes and in some classrooms it's appropriate and necessary to use the native language, but repeating every direction in Vietnamese only reassures the students that they can just tune you out when you're speaking in English!  The teachers were not only unwilling to explain things or rephrase things in English, but most of them simply can't. Almost none of the English teachers are anywhere near being fluent and there are students in each class whose English skills are far better than their teachers.  Needless to say, this is a HUGE problem. And not only is it a problem for the students, but it's a problem for me when it comes to communicating anything to most of my co-workers.  As a result, scheduling issues, concerns of mine, expectations about teaching, and everything else that I need to talk to people about is very hard and often impossible.  This has been really frustrating, but on the flip side, ignorance is bliss and it gives me an excuse to just play dumb and do things however I want. The one exception to all of this is my direct host Tuyet with whom I do not struggle to communicate and who teaches with a more interactive style. It's definitely refreshing to be able to work with her and my experience here would be infinitely more difficult without her here. My final observation was that the physical construction of the classrooms, also not surprisingly, reflects the style of teaching.  Permanent desks are squeezed into two rows in classrooms barely big enough to fit them with one small aisle in the middle. Obviously, this limits the ability for any teacher to do any activity that requires the students to stand up, let alone move around!

Watching the classes combined with ample free time also allowed me to take some time to think about and prepare for my first week of teaching.  I should also note that until Wednesday or Thursday of the week in which I was observing, I didn't have my teaching schedule for this past week!  When I did finally get my schedule, it was only for one week so I didn't know whether I would have the same students consistently or whether I would have a completely different schedule every week (although once again, I only know my schedule for the upcoming week, it appears that I'll have the same classes each week).  Anyway, I'm teaching 18 45 minute lessons each week to 15 different groups of students.  I teach the section of English majors from each grade twice per week (6 lessons) and then I have three sections of non-English majors per grade per week (12 lessons). All this means that I'm teaching hundreds of students which will make it difficult to measure progress, build relationships, and give more individualized attention. My suspicion is that they wanted to expose as many students as possible to me as a "native speaker." This brings challenges, but it also allows me to meet more people and to work with some really talented students who happen to major in subjects other than English. While it's frustrating that I was told that I would be teaching mostly students majoring in English and that's turned out to be far from true, I've learned that the best English speakers aren't necessarily the ones who major in English.  The English students are more consistent in their ability (sections of English majors have less of a range of ability within the class), but they aren't necessarily the most developed. Anyway, teaching was fun and definitely challenging, but I think it went pretty well. The biggest things I think I need to work on are: time management, balancing how much I rely on the textbook versus how much I just do my own thing, making sure everyone participates, measuring progress, and dealing with a wide range of abilities (both from class to class and within each class). An example of the latter is that one highlight of the week was having a great discussion about the positive and negative effects of economic reforms, but I also walked into another class and said (probably a little too quickly) "How's everybody today?" and they looked at me as if they didn't have the faintest clue as to what I had just said.  Overall, though, students seem to be less shy than I was expecting and many of them are also much more advanced than I was expecting.

It was also interesting to have my co-workers observing my classes this past week.  I'm really thankful that they took the time to come to my classes and they gave me some great feedback on the students and my teaching. However, in a few classes (two teachers in particular) would almost translate everything that I said.  Not only that, but they would often sit in the back and give students the answers to the questions that I was asking them. It really blew my mind that they actually thought that they were helping the students and, in fact, the students really didn't need their translations or help with the answers.  This was just another reminder of this environment where getting the right answer is all that matters.  It's really a shame that failure does not seem to be seen as part of the learning process here. Teachers come down HARD on students who don't get the right answers or act out of line and it's clearly surprising to both students and teachers when I try to embrace students' failures in the classroom. What those teachers who translated my directions don't understand is that I want some students to turn to the person next to them and ask their friend what I just said. I want to be able to rephrase directions until students can understand, I want students to disagree on answers, and I want them to think for themselves. While I probably need to do a better job of politely expressing my displeasure with my co-workers, I'm hoping that this does not continue to be a problem.

Part of my job is supposed to include organizing opportunities for cultural exchange outside of the classroom.  While this is proving difficult (getting things done in Vietnam is just generally difficult), it's in the works. I am trying to revive what seems to be an inactive English club and hopefully host some American movie nights. We'll see how it goes, but I really hope that I can make these things happen.

In my free time, I've been hanging out with both teachers and students and just exploring by myself. It has and I'm sure will continue to be difficult to build close relationships here.  Teachers are mostly busy with work and their family lives (not to mention me not being able to communicate with them), and the 4-6 year age gap between my students and me isn't ideal. However, many people have gone out of their way to look out for my well-being. Teachers often invite me to have meals with them (I've seen some interesting dishes--congealed buffalo blood on one occasion and bees on another) and students have shown me around town and included me in many activities. 

All in all, I'm really enjoying being here and continue to be thankful for all of the incredible experiences as well as the rewarding challenges.

The view from one of my classrooms. Also, I live just behind the building on the far left.

One of the rivers that runs through the town

A fun activity that I did with my students

The other river that runs through the town

One of my students took me to play badminton--never have I felt so athletically inadequate. These guys are really good! It was nice of them to include me, but I had no business being on the court with them.