Tid bits.

Some tid bits:

• Did more taekwondo today. Today was sparring day. Full contact sparring, barefoot on the concrete with only a chest guard and a helmet. Warmup was full contact sparring with no pads.
• I got ax kicked in the face today, but it's okay, because I returned the favor by plowing the guy with a jumping back kick moments later.
• I made a new friend today. His name is Hieu. He took me out to get sugar cane juice with him after practice and wants to teach me Saigonese slang. Perhaps I'll gain some street credibility in the process.
• I took a pictures of poor children begging outside a market. Usually you don't give them money because they will surround you and follow you everywhere for the next half hour. I gave the kid money for letting me take a picture of him. I don't know if this is a morally wrong thing to do, but I feel that the world needs to see these children and their poverty needs to be documented.
  
• I feel like an asshat for taking pictures of children begging in the street and giving them money for being helpful.
• Someone asked me today if I was Korean, completely outside of the context of taekwondo. My response was to laugh maniacally.
  
• I'm beginning to think that my Vietnamese name is lucky because I keep hearing stories about other "Loc"s who have walked the streets of Saigon doing amazing things.
• There's a lady who sells xoi (sweet rice) outside my door every evening. When the police come, she has to run off because she's not allowed to sell there. She sells about 10kg of rice every night and makes about 30.000 VND (a little less than two dollars USD) a day. The other day, the police caught her and took away the roof of her cart. It was pouring wet outside.
• I'm getting used to being really, really dirty all the time.
  

A young man reacts to the preserved fetuses from Tu Du hospital, displayed in the War Remnants Museum, HCMC. The exhibit on display shows the effects of Agent Orange, aka. Dioxin, a chemical defoliant used by the US during the Vietnam War to clear patches of jungle. The chemical remains in the environment today, causing birth defects and hare lip formation in places the chemical was used. Photograph taken on June 28, 2007.
- Dave Tran

Lộc

I met a xe ôm (motor scooter) driver the other day while commuting to my internship. The cheapest, fastest way to get around Sài Gòn is by hopping on the back of a motor scooter, though negotiating with them can be frustrating if you're in a hurry or you don't know where you are going. The driver's name was Lộc - the same as my Vietnamese name.

The usual question I get, if not preceding my name, is what country I am from. I am neither indigenous looking enough nor fluent enough to pass as a local, so I've learned to be comfortable with admitting that I'm an American studying in Vietnam for the summer. The next question is usually about my parents, ie. when they left the country and what cities they were born in. While some may take this as communist paranoia, it's actually an attempt to figure out your accent. So far, I talk like someone from the 70s because the language has changed tremendously since my parents immigrated.

On the day that Saigon fell, while my parents where climbing on the boat that would take them to America, Loc was a soldier in the South. He wasn't in Saigon at the time, but he remembers seeing people climbing onto boats and attempting to flee the country. People left their cars and belongings in the road and there were looters everywhere. Loc took the opportunity to joy ride around in these cars until they ran out of gas, at which point, he would find another car and repeat the process. He was still young at the time, and had he known any better, he would have gotten on the boats too, except he just didn't know why people were fleeing in such a rush.

When asked if he saw dead bodies and carnage lining the road, he simply replied, "Có thấy, nhưng mà còn trẻ, chưa biết sợ." (I saw it, but I was still young enough not to understand what fear meant.) The next two decades were spent living in poverty, with barely enough rice to eat, if only that. These days, he drives a motor scooter that doesn't even belong to him. He told me that if his scooter breaks down, then that's it, he'll have to find another way to survive.

Nhà Thuốc Tây

Supermarkets here don't have pharmacies in them, so if one gets sick, they can procure some medication via a Nhá Thuốc Tây - which literally translates to "House of Western Medicine". You come in, tell the pharmacist your problem, and they hand you a bag full of unmarked pills for roughly 10,000 đồng (about US$ 0.60).

After going home and checking the medicine on the web - it looks like they gave me pills for bacterial dysentery, anti-diarrheals, and a mystery medicine which I think is a live culture of Lactobacillus. He only gave me a days worth of medicine and I already feel better. When in Rome, do as the Romans do.

Dai Den Khong Co Chu (Black Belt Without Words)

Following the advice of a trusted friend, I decided to take a day off today. I wasn't feeling too well after class and just called in sick at work. There's something about having diarrhea and various tropical diseases for the last few days that really starts to wear on a person. So I slept in, watched TV for an hour, and went to taekwondo practice.

Taekwondo practice in Vietnam? You betcha'. Except without nice rubber mats, bags or sparring gear. I get to practice at the youth culture center across the street from my place for roughly US $3/month. I'm ordering a nice embroidered Adidas uniform and belt for roughly $9.00.

I got to practice on a cement playground and do knuckle pushups on the wet ground. At the end of practice, I was dirty as hell but I felt good. Then again, it's 90 degrees outside and 100% humidity, so a good sweat was in order. The best part about taekwondo (and sports in general) is that techniques are understood across cultures and even though I found myself quite capable of communicating with the other students, it was good to learn the "Vietnamese way" of martial arts.

Some notes:

• Viet fighters use their front leg more than their back leg
• tucked knees = extremely fast short range kickers
• they like to block with their shins
• they practice taekwondo on cement, they play soccer on cement, it wouldn't surprise me if they slept on the cement too
• almost everyone is my size or smaller

I'm feeling much better now.

Stressing

Vietnam can be very stressful. Right now I'm balancing my internship, studying abroad, getting to know my roommate, hanging out with family, and attending to friends who happen to be in Vietnam this summer. Unfortunately, not everyone is aware of the social pressures a person could encounter here. While I'm usually not the type to care what other people think, I'm also the type to have a heavy conscience when someone I care about has been offended or is hurting. In a country such as Vietnam, the culture is group oriented in its mindset, with leaders having jurisdiction over the group as a whole. There is very little regard for individual decisions.

So when you say you're going to hang out with someone you respect, you really shouldn't flake. This place is wearing on me a bit, as I find the social atmosphere here to be very stressful at times. In fact, it makes me just a little home sick (literally).

Here are some things I miss:
- my friends and family
- food in Berkeley
- organic food in Berkeley
- NOT having traveler's diarrhea
- knowing that most of the food I eat will not kill me

Things that stress me out here:
- anyone older than me, as I have to figure out what to call them by. The Confucian hierarchy makes for a lot of messy social blunders (ie. you don't want to call someone "granny" if they're barely older than you)
- good food that I can't eat. My stomach isn't ready yet. I have having diarrhea.
- the balance of family, friends, and school. I suppose life is hardly different from at home, but there's even more insecurity here because of the social pressures.

Black Butterfly

I started my internship on Tuesday. Nguyen Van Hung (Anh Hung) is the one-man army behind the Smiling Group, a non-profit organization that raises awareness about HIV/AIDS and gives funding to disadvantaged people in Sai Gon. The organization is a way for about 90 people to receive medication, childcare services, and a community of emotional support for people living with HIV. My first day working with Smiling Group gave me a look into the world of Anh Hung and the public health crises of Vietnam. I was briefed on what we were doing that day, but I never expected it to be as intense as it was.

We started off by visiting the house of a diagnosed HIV patient living in the slums. Apparently she had been detained for the last five years and just got out of prison, only to find out that she caught HIV from a heroine needle in jail. She lives with her nine-year-old daughter and mother in a small, one room house no bigger than my closet. She was very ill and her throat was almost swollen shut so she needed immediate care - we took her to a local clinic, Anh Hung and I on his motorbike and the young woman and another volunteer on another bike.

It wasn't so much a clinic as it was a big open space with dividers between the rooms and no ceiling. People were smoking cigarettes and children were running around. I realized I wasn't standing do much in a clinic as I was a hospital. The other volunteer, Nhi, and his beautiful wife, Thiep were helping the patients. Anh Hung makes a point to positive around his patients, even if they are dying, he can be there as a patients advocate and liaison between patients and healthcare providers, or simply offer a tissue and a pat on the back to help clear the mucous from their throats.

Because the woman didn't have the proper paperwork, and in fact wasn't supposed to be living in Sai Gon after being relocated to the countryside by the government, she wasn't able to get the drugs she needed. As a matter of fact, without the papers, her daughter can't go to school either.

We went to a second clinic, this time a local NGO. I got to sit in on a conversation with the care provider as they discussed possible options. Our new friend was able to get a handful of ARVs (Anti-retrovirals) to last her about three days until the episode cleared up. The typical AIDS patient in the US gets put on a consistent ARV cocktail for the rest of their lives. She had three days. As for opening up her airways, they didn't know what to do without the proper healthcare medication. Anh Hung suggested using a children's asthma medication in higher amounts to clear her airways, and I interjected that it would only clear her lungs and probably wouldn't help with the swelling in her throat.

"I took the other pills you gave me, but I didn't feel better so I took another one, and another one until I was out."
"This is western medicine, dear. You can't eat them like candy, you have to wait a few hours."

If you thought the American health care system had its issues, there are still people living in the slums here who have probably never seen Western medicine in their lives. If you think this story sounds crazy because she was taking a mixture of children's asthma medication and a small number of ARVs to clear up her episode, then you're right, but in desperation for survival, there are no other options but to make due with what you have. Unfortunately, she has no money for the basic staples of rice and vegetables, let alone a consistent amount of medication. The NGO was running low on its supplies but was able to give her a small package of dried milk.

The woman is only 24 years old. She has a nine-year-old daughter, a cute little girl who doesn't know that her mother is ill. She lives in the slums with her mother in a community that fears and ostracizes those who are terminally ill and potentially contagious. I have never seen such poverty or desperation in my life.

Then Anh Hung's phone rang; it was time to visit someone else. We hopped onto his motor bike and sped off into the Sai Gon traffic. While riding on the back of the motor scooter, weaving in and out between the cars, I saw a black butterfly flying alongside our motorbike.

The second case was a young man, Quang, who suspects he has HIV. We met up with him at a cafe and sat down to talk with he and his mother. He is jobless, has a girlfriend he can't marry yet, and lives with his mother. Anh Hung was trying to persuade him to get tested so he can live a longer life. He was scared and said he would think about it. Anh Hung invited us back to his home, where Anh Hung tested him for opiates. Quang left with his mother but came back moments later to let Anh Hung know that it was time to for him to know for sure. Anh Hung gave him some suggestions for making money as well.

While sitting at the cafe with Quang, Anh Hung, and his mother, I got to hear Anh Hung's story. He recalled how in his youth, while war was going on, he used to live recklessly. He used to race bikes and smoke opium (because heroine had not been introduced to Vietnam yet), so he can relate to the many people he meets, mostly prostitutes and heroine addicts. After the war ended, he was imprisoned in a reeducation camp. He recalled a story about how you weren't allowed to go to the bathroom without counting out loud, because there would be an armed guard on the other side of the door who would shoot you if you became too silent. If attempted to run away, wading through the shit, you would be shot dead. After many years, he was released, and spent about twenty years selling travel guides on the street. He realized that he couldn't do that the rest of his life, and it was time to move on.

He is by all means a humble man. People respectfully call him Thay, meaning teacher. He refuses to let me call him Thay, and insists on Anh, meaning older brother, even though he is old enough to be dad. By his own accord, he started the Smiling Group and drives around from early morning until late at night, helping children and young people get tested, and running the many counseling and tutoring programs that the program offers. At night, he sleeps in the small, tiled space next to his desk at home.

I used to hold a certain disdain for drug addicts, but I now realize that people do these things out of desperation. After meeting their families, their children, their parents - one must realize that there's more to a drug addiction than a single bad decision, but a socio-political circumstance which victimizes the lower class as a whole. There's no room for judgment or bullshit here, only compassion.

"You can hide things from your family and friends, you can avoid talking about them and ignore the problem, but you cannot run away from yourself," he said to Quang, slowly sipping his coffee, and speaking with the conviction of a preacher.

Pool

Last night I went with some students to check out the local bars. Since we're conveniently located right in the center of downtown Saigon, in what used to be the guest house for the American embassy before 1975, there are a tremendous number of Western-style bars and establishments in the area. They decided on going to the more popular bars that foreigners are known to frequent, the Underground, Apocalypse Now, and Volcano. I missed out on Apocalypse and Volcano, but got to hang out at the Underground instead.

Truthfully, it's not my scene, and perhaps I'm too heavy hearted to enjoy the atmosphere the way a true Westerner does. Maybe it's because I'm not old, white, and surrounded by 18-year-old prostitutes. It was hard to enjoy my drink when I was too busy feeling disgusted by the fetishes of elderly men feeding the human trafficking and sex industry. Through the eyes of a Viet kieu, they're nothing more than rapists with money, disgusting human beings with no regards to social responsibility. I didn't feel like walking over and explaining that these young women didn't join the trade by choice as much as by coercion and kidnapping. I've never been so ashamed to call myself an American.

Then one of the group members decided to go hit on the beautiful women before him, only to come back and have me translate. Not realizing his moment of cultural insensitivity, I decided not to start the program off with half-drunken diatribes about sex trafficking and be patient with him. It was time to leave.

Later that evening we took a cab to another bar we heard of, more of a hangout for Europeans and Viet Kieu, instead of a brothel for dirty old GIs spending their retirement reliving their glory days. I forgot the name of the place, but it's down Duong Pham Ngu Lao. There was a small child dancing in between the tables with a packet of gum in his hand. He would approach table and dance for the guests of the bar, looking you dead in the eyes the way only a three-year-old could. Eventually he was dancing up on the pool table; I didn't know what to think anymore, because I wasn't amused. It was 11pm and there was a young child dancing on a pool table in the middle of a bar for money.

Off to the side, his mother was watching him cautiously. I've never sensed such desperation from any person in my entire life, but then I realized - this is why I came to Sai Gon. I don't care about living richly and being on vacation, I'm not here to do that, I came to understand the street culture and the lifestyles of people here.

I ended up back in that area again tonight, after a friend noted that she was looking for a good bar to hang out at. Since Pham Ngu Lao is full of bars and very friendly to Westerners, I figured I'd give it another gamble. We were sitting on the neon-lit patio of the Go Go2, when I noticed a small child working his way between the tables. It was him again, and he approached us.

Da khong, em. (No thank you, child) I said, and he went dancing away back in the bar, weaving between the tables. His mother was standing directly in front of me.

[Translated]
How old is he?
Just three-years-old, but he's smart, so very smart.
I can see that, he knows how to make money...

I began talking with the mother because I was curious who she was and how this situation arose. They do this every night, frequenting the bars where Westerners go until nearly midnight. Her son, at three years old, can speak a few American phrases and often understands what the tourists are saying, a skill that she does not have. They take two taxi rides during that time, which cost them dearly (my guess would be probably close to 30,000 dong - about US $2). She has him in bed by midnight every night and they're saving up so that in two years, when he is five, he can go to school.

He came over and looked up at me, speaking in broken English, "my name?!"

Em ten la gi?
Quy.
Anh ten la Loc.
Va day? [points at my tall American friend]
Anh nay ten la ---.

I spoke to her for a few more moments and she asked me if I was Vietnamese or American. I said yes, I'm a Vietnamese-American, and it seems like everyone here can tell. She said yes, they can, but there are many Vietnamese here from many different countries. She suggested I visit Hanoi or study in the north once my program is finished, noting that the South is like the end of the trail, where all the different dialects meet, whereas in the north, I will have a better grasp on the origins of the language.

Then the restaurant manager came out, yelling at the woman and her friend standing nearby, baby in one hand, packets of gum in the other. I noticed a police officer coming closer, so I bailed out back into the bar. I felt sorry for her because in Sai Gon, everyone is trying to get by, and she like everyone else is doing it the only way she knows how.

While many will question her ability to serve as a mother, no one can question how much she loves her son. She looks upon him with pride and hope, a glimmer of happiness in a difficult and harsh world of poverty and corruption. In truth, she may even be protecting him, as I get approached by scores of young boys every night, selling flowers and walking the streets barefoot. Young Quy has shoes and clothes. He doesn't look hungry. Though the lifestyle isn't something I can agree with, I'm beginning to realize that these atrocities are born out of necessity.

"She's probably just lying to you for money," a friend said.
"I don't care," I replied, "It may seem naive, but through this all we learn some shred of truth in understanding her situation."

It doesn't matter who tells the truth here because it's nothing personal - everyone is trying to get by however they can. It's just another night in Sai Gon.

Sai Gon Oi! (Pt. 2)

Yesterday I visited my 78-year-old uncle, Cau hai (Uncle 2). He lives with his family in an old building that was converted to a storefront that sells fabric. The upstairs and back of the home all belongs to his family, and when asked to see the rest of the house, he took me on a brief tour of his home.

They sleep on tatami mats laid on top of the wooden planks of their bed frames. "I used to have a Western style mattress like you young people use, but it was too hot! So I got rid of it!" he said, which made me realize that he was elderly but certainly not frail as he climbed the metal staircase up to the roof. The power was out and the inside of the house was sweltering except for the warm breeze that swept through the darkness from the back door through the storefront. The middle of the house didn't have a roof, save for a piece of sheet metal covering the top, which would drain away rain water and give space for air to flow through the house.

I met my cousins, Phi Tien and Nam Tran, my aunt, and the family cat, which didn't have a name except for my cousin calling to it, meo, meo (cat, cat). So we're all sitting together in the kitchen of this small house tucked away in a market place, with no electricity, and motor scooters driving by the back door, which was left open for he breeze but scared the hell out of me everytime a motor scooter passed by. It amazes me that such a narrow alley can accomodate a both a noodle stand and a passing motor scooter, considering that it was hardly a few feet wide. Though I'd been advised not to touch animals in Vietnam (for fear of getting bitten by a rabid animal), I pat the cat on the head and it took off outside into the alley.

It returned a short time later and laid a dead lizard at my feet.
Chac con meo cho Loc cai qua, khe... (It looks like that cat has left me a gift).

After that we went out to eat, where I got to eat beer battered shrimp that you had to peel with our bare hands. Chi Ty taught me to the proper way to peel a whole shrimp, so as not to waste a single morsel. She can peel many shrimp in only seconds, and we laughed together as I fumbled around with the slippery, hot, beer-battered shrimp glimmering at my fingertips. Lemon, salt, and pepper were used as a dip.

Having traveled half way across the globe and not having a proper rest for three days, she sent me home with a full belly. Instead of sleeping, I went for walk outside to think about things.

Sai Gon Oi!

I've made it, after nearly 24 hours of flying. I left on Tuesday night at 1am and ended up here on Thursday morning at 11am. I suppose I lost a day but my body can't tell the difference (thankfully).

I'm staying in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building. I was going to take a taxi here, but my cousin in Saigon miraculously found me among the crowds of people, motor scooters and taxis. I'm not sure if I would've made it without Chi Ty, she even made sure to walk behind me so I wouldn't get pickpocketed. After receiving the standard warnings from her about theft and crime in the area, she let me rest for a while. We're going out to eat tonight.

Some interesting quotes I've already heard (without tone marks - for now):
"Loc co an pho khong? Pho o day het xay!" - Do you like to eat pho? The pho here is like no other!
"Day nguoi ta khong co dan vo, ho dan ban giao." - People here don't do martial arts, they fight with knives. (In the southern Vietnamese dialect, "vo" and "giao" are both sounded with a "y" sound and I thought it was neat that this note of caution was also a rhyme.)

I'm glad to know there are people here watching my back. I nearly dropped a brick on the ride here from the airport watching people on scooters nearly crash into, well, everything. I even saw someone with an entire desk tied to the back of their scooter, weaving through traffic.

Good grief it's hot here. I thought I would be alright after going to Korea two years ago, but it's MUCH hotter here, and more humid.

More to come...

Berkeley

Hey everyone! I'm writing my first blog post from Berkeley, I have about nine hours left in California before I leave for Vietnam. I'm curious about comparing this photograph taken just now with one after my trip to see if I come back darker/thinner/fatter.

I didn't sleep much last night. There's a lot on my mind at the moment and I spent most of last night finalizing my preparations. The last thing I have to do is buy a new memory card for my camera so I can take as many pictures and videos of life in Saigon as possible. I'm also bringing a sketchbook and a written journal. I want to document everything I see.

This trip has taken much time and effort to prepare for, everything from writing scholarship essays, finding plane tickets, getting vaccinations, finding a good hiking bag, etc. - it's taken months of planning. I'm not only going to represent myself over there, but my friends and family as well. In an attempt to become more of a global citizen, I will also be representing the student organizations and causes I believe in. It's a big part of who I am.

It's hard to believe that in twenty-four hours, I'll be halfway across the planet in a place I've never been to before. People have asked me if I speak Vietnamese, and I do, much better than I used to but still not quite perfectly fluent. It's strange to come to a country that is familiar yet also so foreign. I am, afterall, a young American just like most of my friends. I am also a Viet kieu, (literal translation: overseas Vietnamese) a word that I will have to get used to despite it's many connotations. I won't understand what that means until I'm over there.

I suppose that would be a good way of summarizing the purpose of this trip. The culmination of a lifetime of understanding Vietnamese culture, my own culture, in terms of "I won't understand until I go there". It's time to see things with my own eyes.