Hero

Thầy Hùng passed away last night.

He taught me many important lessons during my stay in Vietnam and I will miss him dearly for his compassion, his selflessness, and the love he shared for those around him.

Cái chết đến sớm, hay trể, không có quan trọng. - Death arriving early, or late, isn't important. He taught me to not fear death, for it is the impact we make on others while we are alive that is truly important.

Thầy Hùng was brave enough to take a stand in a society that ostracized the sick and poor, to be the voice of compassion where it was needed the most. In his honor and in honor of all the people who have fallen to poverty, sickness, and despair, I will continue this journey that I am on with the simple goal of making the world a better place for others, to make a difference, and to be the force of change that is needed. For the orphaned children of Vietnam, for the single-mothers living in the slums, for the grandmothers who have survived to watch over all of them - I promise you I won't forget what I saw and the stories you shared with me.

When I first met him, he told me to call him Anh Hùng, meaning Brother Hung, though he was much older than myself. In fact, he was my father's age. I took it as a sign of humbleness and I later came to call him Thầy, meaning teacher or mentor. He later introduced me to the children as Chú Lộc, meaning uncle. One day, in Thầy Hùng's absence, a child called me thầy during a brief English lesson. The words resonated within me and it humbled me to even think I could be considered his peer. I am not brave enough, not strong enough to be on the same level as such a great human being. Someday, I hope to live up to that standard, even if it's only a title.

Thầy Hùng is a hero and his lessons will live on through the lives of others. That is the greatest legacy a man can leave behind and the greatest honor a human being can have. We will miss you, Thầy Hùng, may you rest in peace.

Meanderings on Life and Death

[Originally posted last night on Dave@Xanga]

Things are getting better. My apologies to those who were worried by my last post, I haven't been myself lately. Also, my thanks goes out to the great friends who have provided encouragement and support through the times when I needed someone to lean on. Sometimes, a little extra help is needed to face up to the real issues in our lives, even when a person is unwilling to admit that they need it.

Today Professor Griego, my Public Health professor, reminded us of an important mantra that students often use while taking tests, "This too will come to pass". It's not the end of the world, we just have to weather the personal storms that we are thrown into, regardless of whether those issues are caused by internal or external factors. So what can we do when things go beyond our control? Cut our losses, accept the fact that we cannot control everything around ourselves, and adapt. Adaptation, after all, is one of the key determinants to our survival.

I have to accept the fact that I cannot control suffering and death; no one can. The other night, I received an email message from Vietnam updating me on Thầy Hùng's condition. He is in the final stages of his illness, suffering from a combination of liver cancer, tuberculosis, and hepatitis - his liver is essentially no longer functioning well enough to sustain him. He has been transferred from the public, Vietnamese hospital to a French hospital where his pain is being managed more adequately. Thankfully, he will be able to pass peacefully and with dignity, surrounded by loved ones such as Leslie, his fiance, by his bedside.

They are two of the bravest people I have ever met. Leslie is an American woman, a movie director who lives in Paris when she isn't traveling. She once told me her story during a long bus ride and I was amazed at how she has overcome great personal tragedies in her life and followed her heart with her career choices. Her decisions are remarkably led by compassion for others. She and Thầy Hùng don't speak the same language, but over the course of many years they have learned to communicate with each other intuitively through a mixture of French, English, and Vietnamese. Somehow, she always knows what he is thinking and vice versa. I believe the couple, well into their fifties, are soul-mates.

Thầy Hùng has survived war, famine, and communist reeducation in a lifetime filled by what I consider to be the greatest tragedies of Vietnamese history. I believe his illnesses are the the battle wounds of surviving through so many years of hardship. Through it all, he has started two organizations to help street children and families affected by HIV/AIDS. He has changed hundreds, if not thousands of lives and in many ways, saved people from lives of even greater poverty and desperation in the slums. Several weeks before he was hospitalized, he taught me many lessons and I remember someone asking him what Smile Group would ever do in his absence. He responded, with great conviction, "Cái chết đến sớm, hay trể, không có quan trọng." (Death arriving early, or late, isn't important.) That afternoon he taught me that no matter what happens to us, we are at the very least left with our humanity and that death is only the beginning. While he is Catholic and myself a Buddhist, I find great value in his words. If we live fulfilling lives, trying our best to make the most with what we have and helping others in the process, we will have nothing to fear when death comes to take us.

The last time I spoke to him over the phone, his voice was weak but still alive with the fire of great conviction, he told me to try and continue helping the children and doing what I do. Even on his deathbed he is still concerned with helping others and saving the poor children of Vietnam. This, to me, is the most dignified way a person can live.

This too will come to pass - the pain, the suffering, and eventually life itself. Our greatest tragedies come in in the form of holding onto and trying to control that which we cannot. I cannot control death, and ultimately I have to own up to that reality because no matter how much I tell myself this fact, a part of me will never accept it. I will never accept that the world is not a fair place and that people have to suffer unnecessarily, especially when there is hope for change; I understand this value to be my greatest burden as well as my deepest motivation in life.

There is always hope and humanity to hold onto, don't ever forget that. If these great people have come and gone, surviving and adapting, changing the world around them for the better, all the while transcending their own personal tragedy, so can we. Our potential rests in our ability to make the most of what is set before us, even death. Where death exists, so does life, and with darkness comes the light of a better day, we just can't forget about that when our problems overwhelm us.

Fear

"They need people like you, those children do, people who aren't afraid of their illness. People like me, we're too afraid even if we know..." my barber said to me in Vietnamese.

I explained to her that it's not that I am unafraid, because everybody is afraid of HIV, it's just that I understand the risks involved in what I do and how to be careful. There is nothing to fear when we really understand the reality of working with people who are ill, so long as we are safe about it.

An excerpt from my other blog, Dave@Xanga:

I feel like my trip there taught me innumerable lessons about life, love, compassion, and suffering. In some ways, my trip to Vietnam helped return me to my Buddhist roots, grounding me firmly in some of the tenets of Buddhism through developing an understanding of the relationship between suffering, life and death. I learned about love in all forms by learning more about the lives of others, the sacrifices they make, and the choices they are forced into out of necessity and survival. I learned about the compassion of a leader for their community and the struggle for redemption. I learned about romantic love, the unexpected connection developed between two strangers that pushes every boundary, the confluence of physical, emotional, and spiritual. I couldn't have possibly been more mesmerized by Viet Nam and what it holds in store for me for the future.

I'm back in Berkeley but I feel like I left my mind in Viet Nam and my heart on a plane heading westward, somewhere in between this country and the next. We'll see what the future holds.

Home

After more than twenty hours of flying, I am home. I am jet lagged and nocturnal, darker skinned, and slightly heavier than before I left. Life as I know it, has changed. I am still having trouble feeling grounded these days. As Jackie put it, the "real unpacking" has yet to begin.

I have yet to sort out all that has occurred in the last two months. When people ask me how Vietnam was, I simply respond with "intense" because there is no other word I could possibly think of that would sum up my experiences in Sai Gon. Jimmy said I had the full experience of studying abroad - something eye opening, something educational, and something exciting. In fact, I feel blessed to have many of each.

I will continue to write in this blog as those thoughts come to me. Eventually, I will post videos of some of the homes I've seen and my adventures. I believe this journal has mostly chronicled my thoughts on Vietnam, but the full meaning of all that has occurred has yet to reveal itself. Someday, I will look back on this summer as the two months that changed the way I look at the world, my friends, and myself.

To life, love, and happiness.

Full Circle

The past two months have been amazing. I still haven't had enough time to fully reflect on all that I've seen, or as Jackie put it "fully unpack" all the thoughts and memories that have accumulated during my travels. The last two months have been crucial in terms of preparing me to follow my dreams of starting a non-profit. I am still unsure if I want to work on the local, national, or international level, but one thing is certain - I don't have to pick any single option and it is very possible that I may do all three. What is certain though, is that I am going to find a way to help this world as best as I can.

I've come to understand poverty in its truest form. With my own eyes I saw desperation and suffering, the economic impacts of foreign trade, the sick and dying, the poor and forgotten. At times it was depressing and impossible to handle, I didn't know how to sort it all out and I still don't. There is nothing more scarring than seeing a young child with amazing potential be lost to AIDS. There is nothing more saddening than seeing a community leader losing his life to cancer. Through all the suffering I see here, there is a hope that prevails through it all, a chance for survival, a wish for a better day.

Realistically, I can't solve all of these problems and I can't prevent other peoples' suffering. It would tear me apart to take responsibility and share the burden of so much suffering, but it would also be wrong for me to ignore it. What's the solution? I can try as hard as I can to make good of what I've seen, to use all of my photographs, clips and memories to share the stories of the amazing families I've met. The stories of Ba Sau, Co Tam, Thanh Thi and of all the strong people I've met will never be forgotten in vain. I can't put an end to all the suffering that I see, but I can damn sure try.

My study abroad trip has been a journey more than anything. As this journey nears its end I can only reflect on what I've seen while being present for the finale. Tomorrow, I'll be stepping onto a plane back to the US, but a part of me will always remain in Vietnam, more than words can say and more than pictures can hold.

We'll see what the future holds, not just for me, but for this country and these people as a whole.

Photo Update

Photo update!

Summer '07 in Vietnam: Part 5: Rice Pot

• Cat Tien National Park
• Lan's visit to my internship
• Lan's grandfather's home

Thinh's mother lovingly asked me to take her son back to America with me. I politely declined. As I left their home that day, he cried. I wonder if he understood.

Bước Chân Của Mình

I have three days lefts in Vietnam. The past eight weeks have been very hectic and there has been very little time for me to sit and reflect on all the changes that have occured since then. The last two weeks have been especially intense as I've been wrapping up my internship, schoolwork, and my extra curricular activities in Vietnam. I've been writing in my journal every chance I get, jotting down ideas and feelings, a quick reflection of a moment that has just passed. The vividness of those moments will never occur again and I'd like to think that in those moments when I am writing, part of me is truly present with the world around me.

I don't know how I'm going to say goodbye to this place, the friends I've made, and the bonds I've formed. Nothing is final - we'll all see each other again someday, hopefully. It just might be a little while. I am of the mindset that whichever roads we choose to follow in life will curve and wind, intersecting again and again with roads we've been on and roads we have yet to see. Life becomes an adventure, a dream to be boldly chased after, a journey without a destination.

The past is past, all that's left are foot prints to be washed away with the next rainstorm.

Six Days

Six days left and I'm stuck in a Saigon love story.
Four days left and she's going back to Hawaii.

Life in Vietnam, for all it's worth, is complicated.
But it's alright because I have many stories to tell and many adventures to speak of.
Stories of being a gentleman and being caught in the rain to catch a taxi cab, of salsa dancing in the best night clubs in Saigon, and of waking up in the rain forest under a mosquito net. I have ghost stories, family stories, and personal histories to tell...

In due time.

"Goodnight," I say...

... as the door shuts behind me, the thud of the metal lock echoing down the hallway. The rain starts to fall as I step out into the road leading away from the hotel. I can feel the heat pressing against me, the cool rain dripping into my hair from the trees above. The bats are awake, flapping around chaotically, chirping like birds and disappearing into the hollow sky above. I walk slowly at first, not minding my steps and mumbling to myself, "I must be crazy". My pace quickens as I get to the street, rounding the corner that will take me home. I'm getting wet, but I don't mind the rain because my head is filled with too many thoughts, too busy to notice the weather but awake enough to notice a child sleeping on the sidewalk and the prying eyes of a xe om driver looking to meet his meager profit margin for the night.

Every night is the same and yet every night is different. For a few hours, I'm no longer consumed by the suffering of this city. Instead, I am dreaming awake, looking forward into the future and talking about my plans. Somewhere between the past and the present, I became jaded by my own complexes, worn by a world that has lost faith in itself. Searching for love without sin is like looking for clean mud, nothing is both so simple yet unwaveringly complex as the human heart. I walk home, reflecting on the last six weeks of my life and how they have changed me, prioritizing my worries and making a list of burdens. I conclude that it's pointless, I'm holding onto my own suffering and giving myself a bigger headache than I need.

I walk home quickly, carefully stepping around the broken pavement and downed power lines, humming "Norwegian Wood" to myself as the rain comes down even harder. I wonder if the last few days have been a figment of my imagination, a dream meant to remind me that I don't need to be so jaded. I'm still young, there's no need for despair, it's a waste of time.

Lottery

Yesterday I visited the home of one of the many women in Sai Gon who sell lottery tickets. Since they are taken as solicitors, treated as another annoyance in the street, few people notice that they carry their children along with them. Long and I had a conversation about one of these people yesterday, and I never expected the opportunity to be welcomed into this kind woman's home.

She is HIV positive, living alone with her son in District 12. Her husband died of HIV two years ago and since then she has been selling lottery tickets in the evening from 4:30pm until 10pm. She rides her bicycle around the city from District 12 to the air port, son in tow. Since the price of lottery tickets has gone up to 5000 dong, it has become harder and harder for her to sell them. Somehow, she manages to sell about 40 or 50 tickets a day - which would seem like a lot of money, but in terms of profit she probably only makes a few pennies. The single, dark room that she rents in the back of a narrow alley costs roughly 200,000 dong per month, in one of the cheapest places in the city. The bathroom is outdoors and the neighborhood reeks of raw sewage, which seeps into the black waters of a nearby stream.

She is living solely for the survival of her son, though see grows weaker and more desperate every day. She loves him as any mother and is saddened by the fact that she has no family to turn him over to. During our conversation, while sitting on the cool cement floor of her room, she half-jokingly asked me to, "Take her son with me to America and turn him over to someone else". I could only respond with a smile, saying that a college student is not fit to take care of a child and that he would be better off in the arms of his mother. We continued putting together the wire flowers sold during the New Years festival, which take hours to make but only sell for a few thousand dong per kilo (roughly about 50 cents for several hours of manual work). She was kind enough to let me take pictures of her and her son, her house, and her life.

The experience, above all else, has been humbling. I'm glad I followed Thay Bac's advice when he told me to ask questions, talk to people, and try to understand what their lives are like. This is how I am learning about Vietnam - through the lenses of the common person. It's moments like this when one realizes that the person on the street bothering you during your lunch is more than an annoyance, they're human beings whose livelihood weighs roughly on minor decisions such as whether or not to buy a lottery ticket. They'll never win the lottery that they sell tickets for.

Tuoi Tre

Yesterday, there was an article about Smiling Group in Tuoi Tre, one of the largest news organizations in Vietnam. The article can be seen online here:

Tuoi Tre Online: "Niu tay nhan ai giua doi"

The article is in Vietnamese with dictation for those of us who can't read very well (ie. myself). This is so exciting!

Jude

It's amazing how I can run away to the other side of the world only to find out that my life changes very little no matter where I go. All I can say is that my experiences here are getting more and more intense as I only have two weeks left in Vietnam. Honestly, I can't wait to get home, curl up in bed with a burrito and take a nice, long nap. The stress is starting to get to me a little bit and I wish the BSP family was here with me. In some ways, it is - I've noticed a common thread among community leaders here, one that emphasizes health and happiness over financial progress. There is so much to talk about, so much planning to do for the future and build upon my dreams. Before I left for Vietnam, Linda DiMello, director of the ALS Association, was kind enough to send me a quick note wishing me well on my trip. She gave me the simplest, but most useful piece of advice I received before my departure, "Be bold".

I have been very bold with some of the decisions I've made, but I really wish I had a bit more time to reflect on what's been going on. As amazing as my internship is, I've been having some difficulty lately as my supervisor has fallen ill. We went to go visit him in the hospital the other day and I realized that he has a combination of tuberculosis, HIV, and liver cancer. His illness has been hidden from the public eye. As far as everyone who is not staff is concerned, he's at home resting. There's been a lot of talk lately and I have the feeling that they are organizing a change of hands within the group and requesting more foreign aid from their benefactors in France. It's saddening watching a hero grow weaker, but if there's anything that life has taught me, it's that death is not to be feared and there is much we can learn from the passing of others, even if it is deeply disturbing in some regard. We can approach death with boldness, stare it straight in the eyes, and understand what is going on instead of turning a blind eye. Life, in all it's glory, can reveal itself most candidly in these moments.

It is quite obvious that he's not well. Maybe it was the hospital environment, the fact that he was laying in a hospital bed in the middle of the hallway of Cho Ray hospital, a place where the open air reeks of the mixture of bodily fluids, death, and rain water. I don't know why any sick person would go there, but I'm hoping he gets better soon.

----------------------------------------------

"Do you ever go numb to it?" she asked.
"No, never."

I hope I can keep my resolve.

Pictures!

I've been very busy lately and there's much to blog about. There are so many intense experiences here that are beyond words, beyond pictures even and I only wish I had more time to write about them. Life here, much like life in the States, gets split up between work, school, family, and friends.

Rest assured, it all goes toward building up my dreams and plans to live a life of service. Many of the lessons I've learned in Vietnam have not been written down here. They've moved me in ways that nothing else can.

Sometimes it takes something, someone to let you know that your dreams aren't yours alone. Dreams can be shared, ambition can grow.

Do not fear, through all the heartbreak and suffering I've witnessed in this country, there is always something to smile about and be thankful for. These lessons, like I said, are more than words can say, so I've just been posting what's been most important to me. I actually have a lot of fun here, but would prefer to be a student instead of a tourist. If not, there's always attempting to learn how to salsa dance with a rice pot.

Enjoy the pictures! (via Facebook)

Summer '07 in Vietnam: Part 2 - Central Region Study Tour
Summer '07 in Vietnam: Part 3 - My Tho
Summer '07 in Vietnam: Part 4 - Mekong Delta Study Tour

Updated galleries, previously posted:
Summer '07 in Vietnam: Part 1 - Sai Gon, etc.
Smiling Group/Nhom Nu Cuoi - Fighting HIV/AIDS in Vietnam

Mekong Delta Tour

This weekend I will be going to the Mekong Delta or as Perry put it, "Stalking the Mekong to finish up what Rambo couldn't". I don't know if I will have internet access but I'll try and update if I get the chance.

In the meantime, I've posted two albums of my travels and internship:
http://berkeley.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2194330&l=32325&id=1201936
http://berkeley.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2194327&l=bf25a&id=1201936

Next up:
Cai Lay
Can Tho
Hoa An (Biological Research Center!)
Vinh Long
Cai Be
Mo Cay/Dinh Thuy

I'll even be participating in a fundraising event held by the Vietnamese Language Studies school called the Fun Run. A 3km foot race in the heat? I'm down.

Người Dân

Tonight I bathed to rid myself of the dirt, the filth of degradation and the stench of corruption. I bathed to find purity, to search for the innocence of the street children. I bathed in search of sanctity, for the Vietnamese women who lose their virginity to a stranger participating in the sex trade, not knowing that they've already lost their lives to HIV and drugs. I wanted to cleanse myself of the impurity, praying that their children be spared from the degradation.

Tonight I felt anger and hatred. I hate the backpacker bars, I hate the sixty-year-old men spending their life savings reliving their glory days with young Vietnamese prostitutes. I hate the people taking pictures of children dancing on pool tables and selling cigarettes. I hate the woman who forcefully pulled Hao and me in for a picture; she only did it because we're Vietnamese, even though we don't look at all like locals. I am angered by her ignorance, by my own degradation, by my own loss of dignity. I am no dog, I am no novelty. I hate the backpacker district, for every child and woman lost in the struggle for survival, for every man paid to keep his own people out of the nightclub.

They are no novelties, they are human beings. They are daughters and mothers, neighbors and friends. You, dear backpacker, may see a beautiful woman sitting by herself near the pool table, a prostitute waiting for work - another whore in the street. I see a woman lost to corruption and desperation. I see a single-mother coming home from work, I see a hungry child, I see the slums. I see a person, a human being dying of AIDS. I see exploitation and suffering.

I think of Thuy Cuc, Thuy Truc, Vi, and Thanh Thy. I think of the beautiful children who want to become doctors and teachers, I think about how much they deserve a voice in the world. I pray, oh I pray, that they will never have to suffer so. That they live as long as they can and receive the opportunities that we have. I pray that I never see them in a bar, sitting by a pool table. I pray I never see another three-year-old dancing at three in the morning to sell gum.

I stood in the shower, water running down my back, head in hands. The water of Vietnam cleansing me, the stench of cigarette smoke still in my nostrils. The cigarette burns a hole in my mind, a pockmark to remind me that scars never wash away.

Ghosts

Tonight I will return Sai Gon from the beautiful resort town of Hoi An, our last stop on the Central Region Tour. A recap of the last twenty-four hours:

• Going to a beautifully empty beach near Hue (Bien Lang Co).
• More swimming in the pool at our resort.
  
• Drinking the best mojitos in the world in a beautiful South-American-styled cafe while dodging the rain.
• Getting custom fitted for a pair of sneakers and a new pair of sandals, both for about $25 USD total.
  
• Hitting on a drop dead gorgeous 28-year-old Viet Kieu from Philadelphia. She is the hostess of the Mango Room (home of aforementioned best mojitos in the world) along with her boyfriend (doh!). After examining and wrapping her sprained ankle (what's a gentleman to do?) we had a wonderful dinner conversation and she gave our whole group a round of drinks on the house.
  
• Her boyfriend is a great host and burly at that, so I didn't push my luck and invite her back to the hotel for a swim.
  
• Walked to the swimming pool at the resort in a silk robe while holding a handle of Absolut Vodka - enough said. The pool here is very nice.
  
• My roommates and I were haunted by a ghost in our hotel room at the resort last night. I'm just going to say that we both simultaneously woke up at 3am screaming bloody murder, which resulted in us not sleeping at all last night and huddling together in the hotel room. At 5am, we all ran out of the room screaming into the hallway. Good times.
  

Bach Ma

Hue is the most beautiful place I've ever been. The women are more beautiful there than in Saigon, the food is better, the people are friendlier, and it's peaceful. Beer is 10,000 dong (roughly about $0.60USD) because a lot of the beer in Vietnam is brewed there. We spent two nights there and I took a lot of pictures of the Imperial Palace. I wanted to stay longer, but today we went to Bach Ma..

Bach Ma National Park is gorgeously located high up in the mountains near Hue. Today we went hiking in the jungle on a crazy trail full of steep, slippery rocks that would drop you in the river. At some point, there were wooden ladders to help us down as we walked along the river, but most of them were broken, mossy and slippery. Parts of the trail were littered with broken bridges and after each descent, we'd find ourselves at the bottom of another waterfall, a beautiful lagoon, and a playground of trees, rocks, and vines to swim from. We ended up at the top of a 300m high waterfall overlooking the mountains. Everything I saw today was well worth the hike and I'm certain this is one of the most beautiful places in the world.

The wildlife there is abundant and lush. So abundant, however, that we ended up having to leave our hotel at the top of the trail because the water got shut off, the walls of our rooms were covered in moths/butterflies/stick bugs/leaf bugs half the size of my hand, and my buddy Long found a scorpion in the corner of bathroom while he was on the can. I didn't want to know what creatures I'd wake up in bed with the next day. We drove back down to sea level, by the ocean, to stay in a nice cushy hotel with running water and bars nearby.

Now we're in Bien Lang Co (Lang Co Beach), I can't wait to see what this place has in store for us...

Huế Ơi!

I'm in Central Vietnam for the next five days, posting will continue one I return.

Your name on my cast and my notes on your stay
Offer me little but doting on a crime.
We've turned every stone and for all our inventions
In matters of love loss, we've no recourse at all.

Blind to the last cursed affair pistols and countless eyes
A trail of white blood betrays the reckless route your craft is running
Feed till the sun turns into wood dousing an ancient torch
Loiter the whole day through and lose yourself in lines dissecting love.
- The Shins, "The Past and Pending"

A Nuclear Family

This photograph was taken inside the home of one of the families I visited. The grandmother takes care of her three grand children and husband, who is retired and was sleeping upstairs when I visited. The twins, Thuy Truc and Thuy Cuc, and their younger sister are from different fathers who have long since left. Their mother and both fathers are HIV positive. Their grandmother works all day, spending the morning salvaging bottles and cans to sell. She spends her afternoons cutting vegetables as her second job; in the evening she comes home to take care of the children and cook with the meager supply of vegetables she is allowed to bring home.

To add a sense of scale, I was sitting against the opposite wall when I took this photograph, and their entire upstairs is where they sleep at night. Two elderly people and three beautiful children, all crammed into a tiny home in the back alleys of Sai Gon. Amazingly, they are happy, loving, and welcoming. In this home, I learned that love really does hold a family together more than anything. The three children dream of becoming doctors and teachers. Thank goodness they aren't sick.

I drew pictures for the little girls and tore them out of my notebook. They returned the favor. They little one said she would color in my drawings of gorillas and dogs and stick them to the wall upstairs. They sent me home with a handful of their own drawings and I plan to do the same. We all have something to give to each other...


This small home houses six brothers and sisters and their grandmother, who lives outside on what appeared to be a wooden platform surrounded by tarps. The second story of this home is also wooden platforms surrounded by tarps and at night, the children all sleep together. If you look closely, you'll see a picture of Jesus - this is where the back wall is. The children were kind enough to show me around and take pictures with me. I later found out that this entire community was built on top of a cemetery. I'm not even sure if the children noticed because they were busy running and playing as children do. This home reminded me that home is truly where you make it.


It was the Fourth of July and a few hours later I was sitting in a swanky restaurant eating my second gourmet hamburger of the evening. I didn't know what to feel knowing that I'd probably eaten a month's worth of someone else's wages in one sitting. It's not my fault, but I'll be damned if I ever take for granted the blessings I have in life.

So I was laying in a hospital bed today, curled in the fetal position and groaning in pain when...

I realized that there are always unresolved things in our lives we must take care of before we pass on. I'm lucky because if something really did happen, then I would be content in knowing that I've done as much as I can to help others in my short time on this planet. There's always that one topic that I will remain unsure of though, because I'll never be able to say anything, and even if I did, it wouldn't make much of a difference. Funny how that's what passed through my mind, when I was laying in a hospital in excruciating pain, thinking that I might have a kidney infection, a kidney stone, a broken back, or something equally as painful or life threatening.

It appears I've thrown out my back, ironically, for no reason at all. I woke up Saturday morning a little stiff, and by Sunday night I was moaning and groaning with every turn. By this morning, I could hardly brush my teeth without almost crying so I decided to go to the local "Western" clinic across the street.

They took two sets of X-rays and ran tests on my blood, urine, and poo only to find... well, nothing. The doctor, the nurse, and the orthopedic specialist were all confused by how I couldn't roll over in bed without screaming when I came in, but hours later after an IV full of Volteran I could sit cross legged on my bed reading the newspaper. The orthopedic specialist (a foreign doctor I only knew as "Dr. Claudio") was even more confused that it didn't seem to have to do with any specific kind of trauma.

They suspected kidney stones or a possible kidney infection so I figured I'd be in for the long haul. Surprisingly, I actually received very good service while I was here, or at least more personal attention than a hospital in the states would give me.

I was doing martial arts the night before my back started getting sore, but if I pulled something then I would have known then and there. In fact, I've been doing martial arts for the past two weeks without any problems. Either way, the pain developed over a period of several days. My urine, blood, and poo came back clean so there was no internal problem to account for it, and my X-rays showed no associated bone fracture or malformation that would show any problems with my spine. On the plus side, they gave me enough ibuprofen to numb a baby elephant and sent me on my merry way.

On the plus side, I don't have any tropical diseases, AIDS, hepatitis, or tuberculosis (which is what I work around) so I should be alright. My back is feeling much better after sleeping the whole day and I've got a good supply of ibuprofen to last me a week, so we'll see how the progress goes. If I feel better by Wednesday, I'm going on a tour of Central Vietnam to see the waterfalls and touristy spots around Hue.

Don't worry! It's probably just a pulled/strained muscle in my back. Most likely, it will resolve itself with antiinflammatories and pain medication...

Creature Comforts

Weird shit I've seen in the hallway outside my room and in the vicinity of the guest house:

• geckos
• a dragon fly
• a frog
• a cat
• a cockroach the length of my index finger
• mosquitoes
• more mosquitoes
• a rat

Weird shit I've seen on the back of motor scooters (and sometimes the front):

• a wind shield - for a car
• a desk
  
• a refrigerator
• a large flat-panel television
  
• four grown women
• four people and a dog
• a man and four children
• babies standing on the back, no hands
• me, trying not to crap myself and holding on for dear life
  

Independence

Just thought I'd post a picture that one of the kids I work with took. The children are incredibly sweet, and the little youngin' here wouldn't let me put her down during the whole visit.

When they saw the camera, they went nuts and totally wanted to play with it. For the most part, they take pretty good pictures! The children took me by the hand and showed me around the neighborhood, leading me through alleyways until we ended up outside of a small Buddhist temple in the middle of the slums.

More pictures to come later (I promise)... Happy 4th of July!

Rust

During last Sunday's meeting in the park, Anh Hung had me take pictures of each and every family that attended, so when I met them later on I could recognize where they came from and who they were. Yesterday I had the opportunity to make a house call with my internship at Smiling Group. I visited the home of an older woman and her eleven-year-old granddaughter, Thanh Thy.

They live in a small house in the back of a church and school, pretty standard compared to the homes I've been in recently. The pale blue paint on the walls was peeling with rust. The other women of house were sleeping on the floor and retreated to the small loft upstairs as I came in. Thanh Thy's grandmother gathered two glasses of water and we sat together on the floor. Her 60-year-old grandmother calls me Anh Loc out of respect for Anh Hung (who she calls Thay), and Thanh Thy calls me by Chu Loc - I'll never get used to that.

Thanh Thy is only eleven, but she's so small I could've sworn she was six. She was resting from school that day because she was tired and didn't have the energy to study anymore. Her grandmother brought me water and we sat on the floor talking while she showed me pictures of her daughter and son-in-law, Thanh Thy's parents who passed away eight years ago from a combination of tuberculosis and HIV. Her mother was a tailor and her father was a driver. She also lost her newborn brother to tuberculosis during that period; she was only three at the time. I flipped through the family album, a handful of postcard sized pictures that I realized were Thanh Thy's only connection to her parents besides her grandmother. Thanh Thy is not yet old enough to understand that she also has HIV, she just knows that she has to take a lot of large orange pills three times a day.

Her grandmother was extremely welcoming and trusting of me. She told me all about her family, leaving each question thoroughly unanswered as I wrote gradually everything down. Looking through the album, I saw a picture of Thanh Thy's brother's funeral, a picture that both moved and disturbed me by the resolve at which her grandmother spoke about it. The picture was of Thanh Thy's mother, being held back and sobbing as the small red casket bearing a white cross was set down next to her son's body. The conversation was weighted by what they had all gone through as a family and that Thanh Thy's grandmother managed to raise her with the help of her uncles.

I sat and talked with them for about an hour. Her grandmother asked me questions about my life in the states. She asked me about my career plans and why I came to Vietnam, who my parents were and how we ended up in California. I got to learn more about the Vietnamese family structure as well, and I realize that my family is an anomaly in itself, especially by Vietnamese standards.

"You live so far away from your family. Don't you get sad?"
"Not really, I'm used to it. I can take care of myself. I know how to cook and clean."
"Oh, that's right, in America young people move out of the house when you are eighteen. Here, everybody lives together until someone gets married. Families here are much closer..."

I discovered that Thanh Thy has beautiful handwriting. Her grandmother proudly showed me the notebooks she brought home from school and we laughed because I couldn't understand most of the vocabulary words and after glancing at my notebook, they noticed that my handwriting is barely legible.

"Do you like to draw?"
"Yes...," she said, with a shy smile.
"What do you like to draw? Cats, dogs, elephants..."
"Elephants!"
"Do you want to draw one for me?"
"I can't! It's too hard!"

So I drew her an elephant standing next to some coconut trees and a happy little stick figure. She giggled and somewhere inside of me, a small child with a rough childhood came out of hiding. This is healing.

This Thursday, July 5th, should have been my father's 60th birthday.

Plans

There were some things I wanted to take care of before I left for Vietnam, but they never got resolved. It's not to say that they won't be resolved in the future, because ultimately, nothing lasts forever and these ideas will work their way out over time. One way or another, unresolved issues will always return to the forefront of our consciousness, whether we want them to or not.

"...you cannot hide from yourself," Anh Hung said. Even if the statement had nothing to do with me at the time, it struck a cord. I am on the cusp of something both dangerous and beautiful, something that I can't hide from, even if I travel half-way across the globe to hide among the masses of a bustling, polluted city. Some things never change no matter where you are.

Cũ Chi

Yesterday I took a trip with the program to Cũ Chi to visit the old tunnels used during the war. It's amazing what people do during war and I got to learn about the different booby traps the VC used. All of them involved spikes.

The best part was walking through the forest and seeing all the different kinds of wildlife and giant bugs running around. We found a lizard and a bunch of giant millipedes, which I suppose were small by VN standards.

I kept hearing gunfire and as we walked through the forest and thinking there was a loud speaker somewhere, I asked the tour guide about it. It turns out the gunfire was real - they had a shooting range! I got to fire a gun for the first time in my life, even though I generally hate guns. With the exception that the ear muffs they provided were useless and we nearly went deaf, it was actually kind of fun.

Trẻ Em

Find the Viet Kieu!

I'll give you a clue, he's the pale one in the center being smothered by small children.

Today I got to go to a meeting in the park for children with families affected by HIV. The talk among adults is weighted by the sickness and death of loved ones, but the experience is positive and the atmosphere is joyous and loving.

Things like this are good for the soul. These children live with HIV in their lives and deal with immeasurable suffering, but their innocence still remains. They love people readily and easily - given the chance, they will climb all over you and ask you questions.

It's even funnier that they call me "Chu Loc" and I get to call them "con" - because, you know, I'm and adult and all. They were so excited to meet me and I got to spend several hours playing games and holding hands and singing with the children. Even though I woke up at 6:30am (on a Sunday at that) to get there from the other end of the city, it was a good recharge.

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.