Tiger Beer

I'd like to use today's blog to address a common misconception among many tourists to Vietnam: Tiger beer is NOT a Vietnamese beer. Tiger beer is a product of Singapore.

Countless times over the last couple of years I've had to correct people when they've told me, "Tiger beer is my favorite Vietnamese beer." I believe that this is an easy misconception since Tiger beer can be found all over Vietnam. However, Heineken can be found all over Vietnam too and nobody mistakes that as Vietnamese.

Now I'm not knocking Tiger beer. I'm merely saying that when you visit Vietnam you should try some Vietnamese beer like Hanoi Beer or Halida or 333 or Saigon Red/Green or Huda. Now that said, I'm also pretty confident most of these beer companies are all owned by some parent company in Europe since I think now that all the major American beer companies (Bud, Miller, Coors) are European owned.

Long's Surprise Birthday/Going Away Party

(PICTURE: Huyen and Long at the party.)

Last week I wrote about my friend Long leaving Hanoi. On the night before he left, his girlfriend Vicky planned a surprise party for him since his 30th birthday was just a few days away.

All of Long's friends gathered in a seventh floor karaoke room about an hour before Long and Vicky showed up. People blew up balloons and tried on random wigs that were brought to the party.


(PICTURE: Me wearing a Beatles-esque wig. I'm only putting this picture on the blog for comments from my mom about when I dressed up as Miss USA in elementary school.)

When Long and Vicky came to the karaoke place some of the workers asked them if they wanted to go to the room with all the foreigners. Vicky, quick on her toes, said no and somehow this didn't tip off Long that a surprise was coming. Vicky and Long were then placed into another karaoke room while the rest of us continued to wait upstairs. Finally we gave a note to a worker who went to the other karaoke room and handed it to Vicky. The note said that the room they were in was already reserved and they would need to move upstairs to another room. The funny part about this whole interaction is that Long speaks Vietnamese and Vicky doesn't. Long could have asked a few questions but instead let Vicky do all the talking. It all worked out though because Long was definitely surprised when he walked into the room.

I got it all on video but unfortunately someone (cough cough Nicky) forgot to flick on the lights!! You can hear myself and one or two other people yelling at him during all the commotion. Anyway, it was a great night and by far the most fun I've had doing karaoke in Vietnam...and I didn't even sing until a group rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody to close out the night.

To top the night off and to send Long back to Australia in style, Long agreed to have his cake smashed in his face. Yup, it's on video here too.

Hong

(PICTURE: Hong fruit.)

As I'm sure my mother will comment on, as a youngster I loved climbing trees. In the backyard of my first house on Longacre Drive, we had two evergreen trees. I'm pretty sure I climbed each tree about 1,000 times. In fact, I think me climbing those trees may be one reason my mother went a tad gray (before her hair naturally turned back to brown).

The morning after my day of horrific stomach pain, Huyen's dad force-fed me hong fruit. We don't have this fruit in America so I'm not sure what the English name for it is.
I like hong fruit but I was a tad skeptical when Hong, Huyen's father, encouraged me to eat it. A week or two earlier Huyen and I ate this fruit in Hanoi and Huyen told me that it was a good source of fiber. I'm no doctor but loading up on fiber when one has horrific dirrhea just doesn't seem like a good idea. However, Hong encouraged me to eat four hong. Well, they did the trick. After eating the fruit I felt a lot better...although it might also have been because I ate four bowls of plain rice and took anti-diarrhea medicine too.

(PICTURE: Hong collecting hong.)

Later that afternoon, Huyen's parents suggested that we go to her old house and pick hong fruit from their garden. As Huyen and I started to leave, her father said he was coming along. Now, I love my father and think he's an amazing man but there's no way he could do what Huyen's father did on this day. Huyen's dad scampered up the hong trees and collected a huge bag worth of hong. Hong (again Huyen's Dad, not the fruit) is 57 years old and easily climbed these trees way better than I ever could climb when I was in my climbing prime...roughly eight years old.

(PICTURE: That's me climbing about fifteen feet lower than Huyen's dad.)

Diarrhea

There are few things worse than having horrible diarrhea. However there are many things that can make having horrible diarrhea even worse. Here's a couple that uh, um, a friend of mine experienced the other day:

Making Diarrhea Worse #1: Riding 50 Kilometers on bumpy roads to visit the future in-laws.

Making Diarrhea Worse #2: Being force fed dinner upon arriving at the future-in-laws.

Making Diarrhea Worse #3: Being force fed all the parts of a fish that you normally consider gross but Vietnamese consider the best parts (i.e. the egg sack inside the female fish).

Making Diarrhea Worse #4: Having to sit on the floor, cross legged, while your girlfriend translates "Ben has diarrhea" to her parents. I mean, "Ben's friend has diarrhea."

Making Diarrhea Worse #5: Being given traditional medicine by your girlfriend's parents. The medicine (I'm pretty sure Tiger Balm) is applied by rubbing it directly onto your stomach. After a couple of minutes your stomach starts to burn. So your stomach and butt are now on fire.

Making Diarrhea Worse #6: Having explosive fart noises which most likely could be heard through wooden doors in a large house and can definitely be heard through a screen door in a small Vietnamese house.

Making Diarrhea Worse #7: Having to share a bed with your girlfriend's brother while your stomach feels like it could erupt at any minute.

Goodbye Dong Da Lake!

(PICTURE: One day children living on Dong Da Lake will think this picture was altered in photoshop.)

Last week I wrote a post about the disappearance of Dong Da Lake. I had been told that it was just being cleaned and this was reinforced by a blog reader's comments. However, I have just been told by a reliable source (a thirteen year old boy who I tutor around the corner from that lake) that in fact Dong Da Lake is gone forever. There are signs posted near the lake saying that a railroad station will be built where the lake is. Needless to say, this makes me very very unhappy. If the railroad station was actually a subway that could help the traffic I could potentially be swayed into the necessity of destroying the beauty of the city. However, that is not the case. Goodbye Dong Da Lake. I really loved you.

Bear Bile Update

Last June I wrote a blog about the horrific practice of extracting bear bile for traditional medicinal means. Well, there appears to be some good news -- organizations are starting to crack down on this practice in Vietnam. My friend Sam sent me this article from the Huffington Post:

TAN UYEN, Vietnam — The three tractor-trailer containers sat in a row, divided with metal partitions into 19 tiny, sweltering cells.

Massive claws and furry black noses poked between the iron bars: 19 rare Asiatic moon bears awaiting their next gall bladder milking. Their bile is a coveted traditional medicine ingredient used to treat everything from hemorrhoids to epilepsy.

Some paced nervously inside the cages, panting and foaming at the mouth with wild bloodshot eyes. Others laid in their urine and feces, resting on the cool concrete floor. They devoured the bananas and chunks of watermelon – including the rinds – offered to them, a welcome treat from their usual diet of rice gruel.

The bears were found at an illegal Taiwanese-owned operation in southern Vietnam. On Friday, four days after being hoisted onto tractor trailers and driven 1,240 miles (2,000 kilometers) north, they reached a new home with grass and tire swings at a rescue center about two hours outside of Hanoi, the capital.

The newly rescued bears – two of them missing limbs and one blind – were sedated and removed one-by-one from their tiny cages Friday at Tam Dao National Park. They are joining 29 bears already at the rescue center.

Ultrasound tests found evidence of thickened gall bladders, a telltale sign of milking, said Animals Asia veterinarian Heather Bacon. She said some may need to have the organ removed because of extensive damage.

Many of the black bears, some standing 6 feet (1.8 meters) tall on their hind legs and weighing 330 pounds (150 kilograms), have been caged since being snatched from the wild as cubs up to seven years ago, said Tuan Bendixsen of Animals Asia Foundation in Vietnam, which rescued the bears this week.

Bear bile has been used for thousands of years in Asia to treat fevers, pain, inflammation and many other ailments. In the 1980s, China began promoting bear farms as a way to discourage poaching. The bears were housed in small cages, and the green bitter fluid was sucked from their gall bladders using crude catheters, sometimes creating pus-filled abscesses or internal bile leakage. Many bears die slowly from infections or liver ailments, including cancer.

The idea caught on in Vietnam and elsewhere as demand grew alongside the region's increasing wealth. Bear bile products are also illegally smuggled into Chinatowns worldwide. An informal survey by the World Society for the Protection of Animals found 75 percent of stores visited in Japan selling bear bile products, followed by 42 percent in South Korea. In the U.S. and Canada, it was about 15 percent.

Bear bile harvesting remains legal in China, where the government says 7,000 bears are milked on about 250 farms, though animal welfare groups say the real number could be double that. Demand for illegal wild bear bile, believed to be more potent, is also increasing, they say.

Amid international pressure, Vietnam outlawed the milking practice in 2005, and some 4,000 bears in captivity were implanted with microchips to help identify any new bears added illegally. Owners were warned not to tap them for bile. But the practice continues, and a black market thrives.

"We want this industry to end. Government has decided to phase this out, and we understand it's going to take time," said Chris Gee from the World Society for the Protection of Animals in England. "Across the whole of Asia there's probably 20,000 bears on bear farms."

Last year, a farm in northern Vietnam was raided for selling bile to busloads of South Koreans, who watched it being extracted as part of their sightseeing tours. Some of the farms in Vietnam are owned by South Koreans and Taiwanese.

"They're more organized and bigger. They're run like a business now," said Bendixsen. "It's part of a package tour."

Bear bile contains a high concentration of ursodeoxycholic acid. A synthetic version is sold as a pill and used in Western medicine for treating gall stones and liver ailments.

The pill is sold in China but cannot be used in traditional medicine because it is not derived from a natural source.

In a paper published last year, Yibin Feng from the School of Chinese Medicine at the University of Hong Kong suggested herbal substitutes that produce the same healing elements for various ailments could replace bear bile.

Another option is to use bile taken from slaughtered pigs or rabbits, which contains lower concentrations of ursodeoxycholic acid, or use artificial bear bile, which has a similar chemical makeup and produces the same medicinal effects.

"We found some animal bile and plants have better effects than bear bile in some diseases," Feng said. "Given all these, people in China should accept these alternatives. Of course, some people in mainland insist that no matter how close those substitutes can be, it is still not as good as the real ones."

The moon bears, named for the tan crescent-shape marking across their chests, will remain in quarantine for 45 days. They will then be moved to a building with large living cells where they will learn to mingle with other bears, before moving to a bear house where they can play outside in an enclosure with trees, grass, tunnels and swings.

They'll also be spoiled with dollops of honey and peanut butter.

Cars, Cars, Cars

Despite the government changing the traffic patterns in the city, traffic is getting worse. In theory, the traffic patterns might have worked but there is one intangible the government didn't take into account -- cars.

I arrived in Hanoi in April of 2008. In nearly two years, I would say that that amount of cars in Hanoi has at least quadrupled. Two years ago nearly every car you would see would be a taxi. Now there are less taxis than regular cars. It seems that every upper middle class family and higher has bought a car. This morning I consciously took note of all the different brands I saw. There were GM cars, BMWs, Mazdas, Mercedes, Toyotas, Lexus, Mini Coopers and a few other companies I didn't recognize.

The increase in cars is a huge problem. Besides the fact that they take up more space on the road when they are being driven, they also take up space when they're parked. This city wasn't built with car parking lots which means cars are parking on sidewalks, sides of the road and basically any free space they can find to occupy.

Are You Serious?

(PICTURE: A garbage can in the stands.)

I've mentioned on my blog before that the Vietnamese like to throw garbage on the ground. It is just what they do here whether it be on the street or in a restaurant. It's part of the culture. You're in a restaurant and blow your nose in a napkin, chuck it to the ground. You're on the street and finished with your water bottle, toss it on the curb. This is the hardest part of the culture here for me to adapt to. I've gotten more than a few looks when I've kept a dirty napkin on top of the table rather than chucking it on the ground where it belongs.

Well, at the soccer stadium I got a taste of my own medicine. When we went to the Vietnam vs. China soccer game, Huyen and I had bought some roasted nuts outside of the stadium and brought them into the game with us. After I shelled a nut I threw the shell under my seat -- you know how we do it in America. I immediately heard a gasp to the right of me followed by, "What are you doing?!" Huyen was appalled that I would throw the shell on the ground. I actually wasn't sure if she was serious and brilliantly asked, "Are you serious?" She said yes and told me to put the shells in the garbage. Sure enough, there was a garbage a few feet in front of us. If only there were garbage cans on the streets in Hanoi...

By the way, one thing I found really interesting about the soccer stadium was that they made an announcement banning smoking at the stadium. Smoking isn't banned anywhere in Vietnam. To me this was a huge progressive step forward for the country...that is until seemingly every male lit up a cigarette at halftime (not in the stands but in the corridors, bathrooms, refreshment area, etc). Even worse than people smoking though was that the vendors were selling cigarettes despite the ban. One step forward, two steps back.

Vietnam vs. China

(PICTURE: Huyen and I at My Dinh National Stadium.)

Last week Huyen, me and about twenty foreigners went to My Dinh National Stadium to cheer on the Vietnamese national soccer team against China. The game was a qualifier for the 2011 Asian Cup. Unfortunately Vietnam has already been eliminated from qualifying and thus the stadium was 80% empty. Regardless we saw a really exciting game.

Vietnam put early pressure on China and had a few very close scoring chances. However, China quickly countered and scored two goals before halftime. In the second half, Vietnam came out with a fire that they didn't show in the first half. The Vietnamese team turned up the physicality level of the game and it seemed like a minute didn't pass without a Chinese player dropping to the ground while I Vietnamese player was issued a yellow card. The medical cart came out no less than four times in the second half. If you ask me, the Chinese players have been watching the Italians play too much. In fact, after about the fifth yellow handed out to Vietnam, the refs issued a yellow to a Chinese player for diving.

On one play a Vietnamese player was issued a red card for some apparent foul. Clearly the fans didn't agree. However, playing shorthanded seemed to inspire the Vietnamese. I could go on and write a blog how the Vietnamese historically like to be the underdogs in battle but will only just state the fact that Vietnam dominated the second half once they were down a man. With only fifteen minutes left a Vietnamese player was fouled in the box and issued a penalty kick. The player took the kick and it was saved by the Chinese goalie. However, a Chinese player had entered the box before the kick and the referee granted Vietnam a do-over. The player didn't miss again and Vietnam halved the scored.

In the final few minutes Vietnam had a couple extremely close chances. Twice the ball skidded along the goal line, somehow not going in. In the end, China held on and won 2-1.

Goodbye Long!

One of the hardest parts of living abroad is that friends come and go. Out of all my close friends from last year only a couple are left in this city. Sadly, that number is about to drop again. My good friend Long is leaving Hanoi today.

Long leaving is personally sad for me. However, Long's departure is actually a huge loss for all of Hanoi. More than anyone else I have met here in the last couple of years, Long is the nucleus of the Hanoi expat world. In Hanoi we don't play six degrees of separation to Kevin Bacon. We play six degrees of separation to Long. It seems that every single person in this city either knows Long or has a friend who does.

As I've written on my blog once or twice before, the best thing I can say about someone is that they're a good guy. Long is great guy. Since I met Long, I've never heard him say a bad thing about anyone. How many people can you say that about? I guess Long can find the good in everyone...which is probably why he has so many friends in Hanoi.

Good luck back in Australia, Long!

Dengue Fever

I was too nervous to blog about this when it happened but I'll blog about it now:

One night when I was in Japan, I skyped with Huyen and she didn't look so good. She said that her head was hurting and actually started to cry while we were on Skype. I was extremely worried and encouraged her to call her sister and to go to the hospital. Huyen is as tough as they come and seeing her cry I knew something was wrong. There's nothing worse than being far from someone and feeling totally useless when they are sick.

Huyen went to the doctor and got diagnosed with "Petechial Fever" from a mosquito. She ended up having to take ten days off and go for IV drips ever day. The first few days were really scary and I started to look into flights back to Vietnam. Luckily Huyen rebounded and soon got better. I had never heard of "Petechial Fever" and did some research online and emailed some doctor friends. There was very little online except for talk about a rash that occurs during the fever. Well, after some more research I asked Huyen if she had Dengue Fever. Huyen looked at me on Skype and said that's exactly what she had. Apparently she had looked up her illness in a dictionary and it had two translations. The first was Petechial and the second was Dengue. As soon as I learned that she had Dengue I started to freak out. I don't know too much about Dengue but I know it is really painful and potentially fatal. I emailed my mother's cousin Herb who was a US Army doctor in Southeast Asia for many years. He emailed me right back and told me that Dengue is often called "Break Bone Fever." Herb told me that he had Dengue twice and wasn't embarrassed to admit that it brought him to tears because of the immense pain.

This was a few months ago and Huyen is now back to 100%. However, dealing with Dengue was very scary and something that most people outside of Southeast Asia have not heard of. Unfortunately that might now be changing because Dengue has been spreading outside of this region. My sister emailed me this article in Newsweek:

Dengue Fever Could Be Next Public-Health Threat

Andrew Bast

Last Spring the threat of swine flu sparked a panic: the World Health Organization declared a pandemic, universities and drug companies kicked into overdrive to develop new vaccines, and governments raced to stop the virus's spread. Meanwhile, another global public-health threat proliferated virtually ignored: dengue fever, a potentially lethal mosquito-borne disease traditionally found mostly in Central America and Southeast Asia.

The numbers on dengue's expansion are staggering. While the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control reported that H1N1 had killed 11,749 people as of December 2009, the WHO reports that "explosive outbreaks" of dengue hospitalized half a million people last year. Forty years ago, the disease struck only nine countries; it is now endemic in more than 100. And it's not just a disease of the poor south. Dengue has spread into a large swath of the U.S. (39 states) and has climbed to the second most common illness that European travelers bring home. If global warming continues and the mosquito's habitat spreads, more than half the world's population will be at risk, according to the Sydney-based Lowy Institute. While London, New York, and Beijing pour millions into warding off swine flu, dengue's scourge--and spread--continues. It may not threaten to shut down the global economy, but it's a growing killer that deserves some attention of its own.

Universal Health Insurance

Congratulations Scott Brown on winning the Massachusetts senate seat and most likely fucking over universal health care.

In a case of perfect timing, today I had to go to the hospital with Huyen. Huyen woke up this morning and had a big cyst-like bump under the skin on her neck. I immediately freaked out and told her we had to go get her checked out at the hospital.

I've written about Vietnamese hospitals before and told about how crowded they are. The hospital we went to today was packed but in the span of less than two hours, Huyen was able to see two doctors and have blood work and a biopsy done. I'm happy to report that the thing under Huyen's skin is benign.

Vietnam has universal health care. The hospitals might be dirty but at least anybody can come into the hospital and get treatment without having to mortgage their house.

I try to keep my blog from being too political but I just felt like today was a great example of why America needs to look itself in the mirror from time to time. There is no doubt that if you have money in America you can get the best treatment for any condition. However, for those who don't have the most money, you're screwed when you don't have good health insurance.

I'm not saying that the Health Care Bill is perfect. In fact, I think it is too compromised because way too many Democrats sold out. However, what I am saying is that today I saw dozens of poor people at the hospital in Hanoi who got treatment and only had to pay a minimal fee. In America, that doesn't happen and now won't happen for probably a much longer time.

Hanoi Gyms

There are a few levels of gyms in Hanoi.

Level 1: You have your basic, dirt cheap Vietnamese gym. These places resemble American prison gyms but not nearly as nice. These gyms cost about $10 a month to join and are usually open from 5-7 AM and 3-9 PM. These gyms usually have ten shirtless dudes standing around every free weight, waiting for their turn to lift it for thirty seconds.

Level 2: Hotel gyms. There are many hotels that offer gym memberships. The problems with these gyms is twofold: 1) They're expensive 2) You have to go to a hotel to work out. There aren't too many hotel gyms I've been to in my life that make me shout out, "This gym is awesome!" Certainly there are none that I've been to that are worth paying over $100 a month for.

Level 3: The recently opened super nice gym in Vincom Tower. This gym has everything including a lap pool and a $200 a month price tag.

After scouting out a whole bunch of gyms, I finally found a "western style" gym called Actilife. I joined for the year for about $400. The price is pretty low because I joined for off-peak hours which means I have to work out before 2pm every day. The gym has been pretty good so far but there have been a few reminders that I'm still at a Vietnamese gym:

Reminder 1: The other morning a guy was smoking a cigarette in the locker room. In defense of the gym, there is a no smoking policy in the gym. In defense of the guy smoking, he's Vietnamese so he thinks he can smoke anywhere.

Reminder 2: There was a guy running on the treadmill completely shirtless. Men love being shirtless in Vietnam. Eventually I'll have a post about guys who take their shirts off at bia hoi restaurants. It's always one of my favorite things.

Reminder 3: The other morning I showed up at 7AM and all the lights were off. I thought I had come too early but actually the power was just out. I asked the staff when it would come back on and they told me 3pm. I worked out by candle light.

Have I Mentioned How Much I Hate Karaoke?

This video is the most fun I've ever had doing karaoke in Vietnam for a few reasons:



1. It was an English song so I actually understood what was being BOOMED into my ears a billion decibels too loudly.

2. The room was smoke-free. Thirty minutes later the Vietnamese boys would be puffing away on cigarettes.

3. This took place in the first hour. I always say I can stand karaoke for an hour. After an hour I want to shoot myself.

4. It was just Huyen and me in the room (actually it was just me and then Huyen walked in) since we were the first ones to show up. Having an empty room allows you to be extra stupid. We were actually slow dancing while singing some cheesy romantic song when her first friend came into the room.

I'm pretty sure if there is a hell and I end up going there, I'm going to be spending all eternity in a Vietnamese karaoke room. Seriously, I f@*&^%g hate Vietnamese karaoke.

Please add to my resolutions from a few days ago: I will karaoke as little as possible this year.

Changes of Biblical Proportions

Ryan and I lived a one minute walk to Dong Da Lake. Dong Da lake is one of the biggest lakes in Hanoi. You may recall me talking about the lake during the floods last year because fish from the lake were swimming in front of our house. Anyway, here's a picture of what the lake looks like:

Actually, let me take that back. That was a picture of what the lake looked like. I drove by the lake the other day and it was gone. Yes, gone. The whole lake was drained. Here's a picture I took from the only part of the lake that didn't have a huge barrier around it (I'm assuming this is where the tractors and cranes enter from):

Huyen thinks that the city is cleaning the lake but I'm not so sure. I wouldn't put it past Hanoi to be using this giant area as a place to put more tall buildings which seems to be the M.O. these days. One of my favorite things about Hanoi are the lakes all around the city. If in the name of development, Hanoi starts draining these one by one, this place is going to quickly lose its charm.

New Year's Resolutions

Every year I make a resolution and usually quickly forget it. However, I figure if I post my resolutions on my blog I'll have to follow through with them. So here they are for the whole world to see:

1. Learn Vietnamese -- It is embarrassing how bad I am at Vietnamese. When I first came I took some classes but then become lazy figuring, "Hey, I'm only here for six months and this definitely isn't something I'll need in the future." Frankly I want to learn Vietnamese so I can talk to Huyen's family more. It's about time that I didn't need Huyen to translate, "It's good to see you."

2. Use less plastic -- This is something we all can do. The fact is that we all use way too much plastic whether it be water bottles or plastic bags. This year I will always bring a bag with me to the supermarket and I will buy as few plastic bottles as possible. Before I left Japan I bought this stainless steel thermos:

I've already refilled it about 100 times between traveling around Japan and since coming back to Vietnam. Not only is drinking out of metal healthier than plastic but it is also good for the environment. Lets say for arguments sake that in the last month I've used 10 less plastic bottles because of this thermos. Well, if just Americans over 18 years of age did that over the last month we would have used TWO BILLION less bottles. Wrap your head around that. That's one month. Two billion bottles! Lets all use less plastic...


3. Open my own English school in Hanoi. Yes, this sounds like a huge goal but in reality I'm just renting a classroom and hoping to get at least thirty motivated students to teach. Don't get me wrong, this is a HUGE undertaking. However, I'm confident that I'll be able to teach a great curriculum of my choosing and get faster results for students than at any of the language schools here in Hanoi. There will be A LOT more on this coming up in the next few weeks. All I can say now though is that classes will start on March 1st for teens and adults. By the way, if any readers are in Hanoi and interested you can email me for information: [REDACTED]

4. See my family at least two times.

5. See my family with Huyen by my side. Hopefully this year we can get her a visa.

6. Keep exercising and living a healthy lifestyle. Since August I have lost nearly twenty pounds and plan to stay fit for all of 2010. Perhaps I'll eventually be able to run a marathon with my sister.

Good luck to me and everyone else who has lofty resolutions for 2010!

Shame

On the night that Huyen's Great Grandmother died, I had tea with a 68-year-old man wearing a green jacket and a traditional Vietnamese bamboo army helmet. The man shook my hand many times and then began to tell everyone who would listen a story. The man started to talk about the war with America and how he had served in the war. With great pride he told about how he had given two American P.O.W.'s sandals because they had no shoes.

Two days later, at the funeral, Huyen mentioned to me for the first time that her Great Grandmother had just two children. One of her children was Huyen's Grandmother who I have spent lots of time with. Her other child was a son who was killed in the war with America. Like Huyen's Uncle who died fighting America, his body was never found. When I learned this, it was a kick to the gut. Huyen's Great Grandmother was always so good to me -- she would hold my hand as we drank tea every time I would visit her -- despite the fact that my country killed her only son. In Vietnam, having a son is of the utmost importance. A son is the person who will take care of his parents when they get old. America changed Huyen's Great Grandmother's life for the worse and she held no bitterness towards me.

At the funeral, Huyen's Grandfather and some other relatives took me over to the cemetery where many members of their family are buried. They pointed out who people were and lit incense on their graves. As we started to leave, I saw that one headstone was missing the ceramic box that contains the deceased person's bones. I asked why the box was missing and Huyen's Grandfather's brother told me that the person had died from the effects of Agent Orange. The government had recognized those who died from Agent Orange as deserving to be buried in a military cemetery and had thus moved the box. If you're counting, including Huyen's uncle, that's at least three relatives of Huyen's who died because of America.

One thing that I learned in Japan is that the Japanese have a great shame about War World II. One time over lunch with my Professor friend, talk of War World II came up. Basically the conversation went from me living in Vietnam, to the Vietnam War, to me saying something like, "Many countries including Japan have a history in Vietnam" (referring to the Japanese occupation of Vietnam during WWII). The Professor looked at me and with great sadness in his eyes said, "Japan has a great shame."

It occurred to me at the funeral that the majority of Americans don't feel a sense of shame about the Vietnam War. When Americans talk about the war we often say how it was a tragedy that nearly 60,000 Americans died and hundreds of thousands were injured for an unnecessary war. The media usually references the Vietnam war as what the American military shouldn't do again. i.e. Get in a war we can not win. Rarely do the majority of Americans or the media talk about the millions of Vietnamese we killed and frankly, the countless war crimes we committed like the use of chemical defoliants that have poisoned the ground here for decades. America has a great shame when it comes to the Vietnam War and shamefully most Americans don't feel it.

In America we have a saying, "Proud to be American." Frankly, there have been many times while living in Vietnam that I have not been proud to be American. I have a great shame about what my country did to the people of this country.

The Funeral: After Party

(PICTURE: Huyen and her Great Grandma.)

Being white and a half a foot taller then everyone usually gets me a lot of attention when I leave Hanoi for the countryside. To be honest, I usually like this attention. However, at Huyen's Great Grandmother's funeral the last thing I wanted to be was a distraction.

Before the funeral I got lots of puzzled looks from the older generations that gathered at the house. I can say with 99% certainty that I'm probably the first foreigner to come to this village since the American P.O.W. that Huyen's Grandmother told me about in September (that story is here: http://ahoyhanoi.blogspot.com/2009/08/war.html). A couple of people waved me over to drink tea with them but besides that everyone let me blend in. Although there was one funny moment when Huyen's Uncle -- who her Great Grandmother had lived with -- turned to me and said, "My Grandmother [the deceased] told me that she's happy you came today." Everyone around us got a good laugh.

After the funeral, it was another story. It was as if a light switch had turned on and the sadness temporarily ended. The women who were wailing stopped shedding tears and the men quickly replaced the tea with wine. Everyone sat around eating food prepared by the neighbors, catching up and having a good time. For those who had been paying little attention to me it was as if all of a sudden this giant awkward foreigner had materialized in order to cheer everyone up. With my one-year-old Vietnamese child's vocabulary in hand, I proceeded to smile a lot and play my role as a special guest. Everyone wanted to have a drink with me and hear me use my limited vocabulary. After a couple of hours of eating, drinking and shaking hands, people went back to their homes and started their days at work.

When I think about it, a Vietnamese funeral has many similarities to a Western funeral: Family and friends gather, they make their way to the cemetery and afterwards gather at the grieving family's home and try and temporarily alleviate the sadness with food and family stories. It's moments and experiences like this that remind me how similar human beings are everywhere in the world. We may do some things a little bit differently but when you scratch the surface we all care about our families and hurt to see someone leave us.

The Funeral: Process

(PICTURE: A Vietnamese funeral. The graves you see are not where a person is buried though at a funeral. Read below.)

Let me take you through what happens to a Vietnamese person after they die:

Step 1: The day that a person passes away they are laid out in the family home. Friend, neighbors and family come to the house to spend time with the person grieving (This was my blog two days ago).

Step 2: The day after the person passes away they are put into a decorative wooden box. This box is kept at the family home and has a glass window that allows you to see the person's face.

Step 3: Two days after the person passes away everyone gathers again and has a procession to the rice paddies. The person is then buried in the rice paddy.

Step 4: Three or five years (depending on what a psychic says) after a person is buried in the rice paddy, their box is dug up. The box is then opened and all of their bones are washed. The washed bones are then placed into a small ceramic box and laid to rest in a cemetery or a nice tomb in the rice paddies. The picture above shows these nicer tombs.

As I mentioned yesterday, a lot of people -- mostly family -- gathered together two days after Huyen's Great Grandmother passed away. It was pouring rain on the Thursday and there were so many people that they could not possibly fit in one house. All of the neighbors set up tarps and put out tables and chairs for people. The neighbors also cooked food for everyone to eat after the funeral.

Huyen's Great Grandmother was in the box, still inside the house. It was like two different worlds: inside the house women were wailing and hysterically crying. Outside of the house people chatted away and tried to stay dry. While all this was going on a six or seven person band played traditional Vietnamese music on very old instruments. The instruments gave off an eerily beautiful sound that could be heard underneath the crying.

An announcement was made and it was time for the funeral procession to start. Men gathered and lifted up the box and placed it on top of a wagon. In front of the wagon were dozens of women from the local pagoda who carried colorful flags. The band took their places in front of the wagon and played as we walked out of the village and into the rice paddies. We walked about 3/4 of a mile, constantly stopping on the way. Eventually we came to the rice paddy where Huyen's Great Grandmother was laid into the earth. Like in Western burials, the coffin was placed completely under the ground. However, unlike Western burials, a giant mound of mud and dirt was piled on top of the coffin. The workers dug out a moat of sorts around the grave. All around us were other giant piles of dirt with incense burning on top of them. We were literally surrounded by everyone from the village who had died within the last five years.

The Funeral: Family

(PICTURE: Men wearing headbands at a funeral.)

Just when I started to think that I understood Vietnamese culture pretty well, I realized once again that I'm totally a foreigner. Two days after Huyen's Great Grandmother passed away, we went back to her village for the funeral. As I packed to go I deliberately left my camera on my desk. Usually my camera goes everywhere with me but my Western instincts told me it would be rude to take pictures at the funeral -- boy was I wrong. As soon as I arrived at the house, I was asked by multiple relatives if I had brought my camera (After taking pictures at many family events and printing an album for Huyen's parents I'm now associated with my camera). When I told them I didn't have my camera I could tell they were a little disappointed. Apparently taking pictures is the thing to do at funerals. Luckily Huyen's family wasn't counting on me to be the documentarian because they hired a videographer and a photographer to capture the event.

At first I thought this was odd but it soon started to make sense to me. A funeral, more so than any other event including a wedding, brings out the whole family. I would estimate that there were roughly one hundred relatives who showed up for the funeral. At a wedding you get a bunch of relatives but you mostly get friends and coworkers. Maybe you're asking yourself, "How do you know people were family and not friends?" Well, it's easy to tell who is who at a funeral because family all wear headbands and shrouds. At a funeral, like many things in Vietnam, there is a hierarchy and distinction between ages:

Immediate Family (children, brothers, sisters, husbands, wives) wear white shrouds and headbands.

Second Generation Family (grandchildren) wear white headbands.

Third Generation (great grandchildren like Huyen) wear gold headbands.

Fourth Generation (great great grandchildren like Huyen's nephew) wear red headbands.

One of the things that was really interesting to me is the age differential between people wearing the same colored headbands. Sometimes people who were 40 years apart in age were wearing the same colored headband. The reason is pretty simple: before most people had only two children in Vietnam, families would have lots and lots of children. Huyen's grandparents for example had 8 kids. Someone else I met had 12 children. Sometimes the oldest child would have their first child before their mother was finished having her last child. This means that sometimes in one generation a nephew is older than his/her uncle or aunt. Its one thing to wrap your head around that in theory, but it's another thing when Huyen is calling someone just ten years older than me the title of "Grandpa." It is even weirder when Huyen's father has to address this same person who is twenty years young than him as "Anh" which men say to another man older than them.

It didn't take long for Huyen to turn to me and say, "Don't ask me who people are because I have no idea who they are." I would say half the funeral people spent introducing themselves and figuring out how they were related and what title they should call one another. The point is though, nearly the whole family came out for the funeral.

Huyen's Great Grandmother

(PICTURE: Huyen's Great Grandmother, Grandmother, Huyen and me back in August.)

Last Tueday, about ten minutes before Huyen was supposed to come home, she called me and said, "I have some bad news. My great grandmother passed away." My stomach dropped as I felt of the loss that Huyen and her family had just encountered.

Over the next couple of days I'm going to blog about the funeral and death in Vietnam. Yes, it's a downer of a topic right upon returning to Hanoi, but it is the single most Vietnamese experience I've had in my time out here.

When Huyen returned home we immediately got on her motorbike and drove an hour out to her grandparents' village. As we drove through the darkness I asked Huyen to teach me the appropriate thing to say in Vietnamese to a grieving person. She told me the sentence -- which roughly translates to, "Let me share your sadness" -- and I practiced over and over again during the hour long drive. When we pulled up to her Aunt's house (where her great grandmother had been living) there was already a crowd of people going into the house. Before I could even take my helmet off, Huyen's Grandmother approached me, wailing out "Oh God" in Vietnamese as tears streamed down her face. I tried to say the line that Huyen had taught me but it didn't come out right. Frankly it didn't matter though because she was inconsolable at that moment. Huyen's grandfather came out of the house, shook my hand, and escorted his wife back into the house.

A group of men called me into the house and sat me down to drink tea. As they poured me a glass I couldn't help but notice that only a few feet away were all the women standing and crying with her Great Grandmother's body which was laid out on the bed, draped by a mosquito net. Huyen's aunt (not the one the great grandmother lived with but another who lives around the corner who Huyen always tells me takes care of everyone) was laying with the body, wailing louder than anyone I have ever heard wail. In fact, I'm pretty sure this is the first time I can really say that I've ever seen anyone wail.

Huyen's great grandmother was 100 years old as of January 1st. No matter how old someone is, it's always too soon when somebody you love passes away.

(PICTURE: Huyen and her great grandmother last November.)

Happy Birthday, Huyen!!!!

Come on, everyone, sing along with me:

Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday dear Huyen. Happy Birthday to you!

In the last year Huyen cut off her hair, traveled abroad for the first time, changed jobs three times and moved in with me. It's been a pretty darn good year!

It's Good To Be Back

NOTE: I have been back in Hanoi for a week already but decided to let my Japan blogs play out as I settled back into life here in Vietnam.


(PICTURE: Huyen and me in our new apartment.)

After more than three months away, I can finally say, "It's good to be back."

Despite all its faults -- traffic, pollution, dirty streets -- I love Hanoi. Obviously Huyen being here is the cherry on top of why I love this city. I'm gonna take this first blog to tell an anecdote about how great my girlfriend is:

A few months ago, Huyen and I decided to live together when I returned to Hanoi. Her roommate was moving back to her hometown and it just made sense for us to live together rather than both of us finding a new apartment. As I'm sure you can imagine, a Vietnamese girl living with her boyfriend is extremely unheard of here. But, well, Huyen is without a doubt the most liberal thinking Vietnamese girl I've met so it made sense that she was willing to give living together a shot. On top of that, if we're going to take things to the next level I think it only makes sense to move in together. Its better to find out now about intolerable cultural differences than down the road when say there is a little Nguyen/August running around.

Over the last month or so, via the internet and friends, Huyen started to scout out apartments for us. As much as I wanted to live in my amazing house from last year, I didn't want us to live with strangers. My experience with the people I lived with before and after Ryan taught me that it is better to live in a smaller place than in a bigger place with disgusting slobs.

Huyen checked out a whole bunch of places and we finally settled on an apartment in a quiet neighborhood about five minutes from my old house (I'll blog about the apartment in the coming weeks). Before I left Japan, Huyen and I talked about our plans for the next week. First things first, we were gonna spend the day after I arrived moving all of our stuff into our new place. Huyen took a few days off of work so we could spend time together and get our house in order. Well, after picking me up at the airport, we headed straight to the new apartment. When we got to the apartment and the door swung open I immediately saw that all of my stuff was not only there but it was unpacked and organized. It only took me a second to connect the dots -- Huyen had single handedly moved everything into the apartment. Mind you, we live on the third floor of a walk-up and between the two of us we have A LOT of stuff.

I was in slight shock that Huyen had done this and can't adequately describe the look of pride and happiness she had on her face. I'm sure it was only matched by my feeling of pride for her and happiness that I didn't have to spend my first day back in Hanoi lugging boxes. By this act alone, I can safely say Huyen is gonna be the greatest roommate I've ever had.

It's good to be back...

Sayonara Japan

This is it. This is my last post about Japan before Ahoy Hanoi goes back to its roots.

It was a great three months in the land of the rising sun. I've already written about my time in Koryama so this post is strictly about my ten days of traveling. I went from Koryama to Kyoto. Kyoto to Nara. Nara to Osaka. Osaka to Kobe to Hiroshima. Hiroshima to Myajima and then to Tokyo. Despite going to six cities in ten days, I know I only saw a fraction of the country. However, the fraction I saw was pretty darn cool. Here's a quick photo montage of some of the highlights from my trip:



I'm gonna miss you Japan...

Hokkaido Highway Blues

A few months ago my good friend Dan Gotlieb read Will Ferguson's "Hokkaido Highway Blues" while traveling around Japan. After reading the book, Dan ordered it for me online and had it delivered to my Koryama apartment. When the book arrived I was in the midst of reading "The Satanic Versus" and decided to hold off on "Hokkaido Highway Blues" until I was traveling around Japan myself. It was a wise decision.

I read "Hokkaido Highway Blues" as I left Koryama and traveled around the main Japanese island. As I turned each page of the book I felt like the kid in "The Neverending Story." I can't tell you how many times I would be somewhere and would simultaneously be reading about the author in the same place. Even more than our similar geography, Ferguson often seemed to be noticing and commenting on elements of Japanese culture that I was experiencing.

I don't often make many "must read" claims but this is a "must read" book if you've spent any amount of time in Japan. I think to fully appreciate the book you need to have lived in Japan. I'm not claiming to know everything since I was only there for three months but there are some things that you can't see/taste/hear/feel without really digging down into the society. Again, I was there just three months. Ferguson was there for years.

All of that said, let me put a disclaimer on the book: As much as I enjoyed it, I personally think the author comes off as a Grade A prick. There were many moments when I cringed and thought to myself, "I hate expats like him." I'm hoping that Ferguson took some artistic liberties with his retelling of conversations because there were definitely a handful that struck me as him being a total a-hole. To his credit though, usually it is hard to enjoy a book if you don't like the protagonist. I didn't really like Ferguson but I still liked the book.

25 Kilograms

(PICTURE: My bags at Narita airport.)

When I left for Japan I had one big bag that weighed 25 kilograms. Between shopping, receiving presents, buying things for my apartment and purchasing gifts for Huyen, I was ready to leave Japan with two bags each weighing 25 kilograms.

25 kilograms is the number that stuck out in my head whenever I would get anything in Japan. I kept thinking to myself, I have 25 extra kilograms to accumulate before going back to Vietnam.

So here's a really funny story: Being an August, I arrived at Narita Airport three hours early for my flight to Hanoi. You can go back and read my first ever blog entry about how us Augusts like to be on time. Well, I showed up at the Vietnam Airlines ticket counter with my two huge bags that I figured were both around 25 kilograms. I put the first bag on the scale and it weighed 28 kilograms. I put the next bag on the scale and it weighed 23 kilograms. I looked at the ticket agent and said, "Can I just take a couple kilograms out of one bag and put it into the other?" The woman gave me a strange look and nodded. She then took out a pen and paper and started to do some math. After she finished tabulating whatever she was tabulating she looked at me and said, "You can only bring 25 kilograms." "25 per bag, right," I asked. "No, 25 total." I looked at the woman as if she was crazy having realized I had an extra 26 kilograms of stuff to bring. The woman then showed me her math work and pointed at a number. The number was 98,560. She then said to me, "If you want to bring the extra weight it will cost you this much yen." I'm not sure if I started to laugh right then or just blurted out, "Yeah right!" 98,560 Yen is $1,059.47.

I quickly grabbed my bags off the belt, snatched back my passport and told the woman I would check-in later. I quickly made my way to the end of the airport terminal where the Japanese delivery companies were. I figured it had to be at least 10 X's cheaper to send stuff then to put it on the plane. Unfortunately the Japanese equivalent of UPS told me they don't deliver internationally. My back-up plan was to send it from the post office. Unfortunately the post office wasn't open yet. My back-up, back-up plan was to dump approximately 20 kilograms of stuff in a garbage can.

I found a somewhat empty section of the extremely busy airport and proceeded to unpack all of my stuff. First, I threw away everything I didn't absolutely need. This included some books I had read, some toiletries, hangers, a clothesline and nearly all of my kitchen goods from Japan minus my rice cooker and expensive pot. The rest of my kitchen -- plates, bowls, silverwear, etc. -- were left on top of a garbage can for a lucky passerby. Next I decided to use two day backpacks as carry-ons. I loaded everything heavy into these bags to the point that I thought the zippers would break. In fact, my one bag wouldn't close at all so I ended up tying the zippers together with a shoelace. I then took out my winter coat and STUFFED all the pockets with underwear and socks. I then filled the sleeves of the jacket with sweaters and sweatshirts. Finally, I put on a few layers of clothing and headed back to the check-in counter. I sneakily kept all of my carry-on stuff hidden below the counter while I put my two bags on the scale. The first bag weighed 11 kilograms. The second bag weighed 16 kilograms. I started to think about wearing four pairs of underwear when the ticket agent said, "We will let you bring this extra weight." I smiled from ear to ear and thanked her profusely. I'm pretty sure if I carried anything else I would have passed out from exhaustion.

But that was only half the fun. Next I had to go through passport control and security checks looking like a homeless man. I'm not trying to make fun of homeless people but it is the best way to describe my look at the time. I had two bags filled to the brim with pots, a yoga mat, and other stuff coming out of every pocket. Not to mention my coat which was stuffed with clothing.

When I went through security, I actually passed the metal detector before my bags went through the machine. I watched as the security agent looked at my bag for about thirty seconds. Clearly he must have been confused why a rice cooker stuffed with underwear inside of it was going through the machine. Somehow no red flags were raised though -- despite this being the day after the failed terrorist attack on the Detroit flight -- and I got my bags through without a problem.

Moral of the story: It is good to show up to flights very early in case you need to repack your luggage.

Drunk In Japan

(PICTURE: My favorite sign in the Japanese subway.)

Out of all the Asian countries I've been to, Japan had the least amount of puzzling signs in public. Usually when you wander around Asia you see really odd English that you can sort of figure out the meaning of. However in Japan, a country that really values perfection, the signs usually make sense.

One sign that I saw a few times in the Japanese subway was this:


This sign totally makes sense. The message is very clear. However, that doesn't stop it from being really funny to me. I love the Japanese honesty in this. To paraphrase the meaning: It is okay to be a drunk idiot but just do it at home.

LH in KY

This morning I awoke to a comment from my longtime reader LH in KY. For those of you who read my blog daily, you know that LH in KY is a Vietnam Veteran who often posts extremely insightful comments on my blog. When LH started to read my blog it really took my blogging to the next level as I constantly thought to myself, "I hope my mom and LH in KY like this post."

LH in KY has asked all of my readers to pray and send peaceful thoughts to his family who are going through a tough time right now. I hope that everyone can just take a moment after reading this and think of LH and his family.

LH, if you ever want to write a more private email to discuss anything my email is: [REDACTED]

Peace be with you and your family, LH.

Tsukiji Fish Market

(PICTURE: This man was as perplexed at the size of this fish as I was.)

Heading into Tokyo, the only sight I really wanted to see was the Tsukiji fish market. Tsukiji is the famous market in Tokyo where all the fresh fish is sold every morning. In retrospect, I'm not sure going to the market was such a great idea. Honestly, my rationale at the time was that I love sushi so it would be cool to see where it comes from. Well, this was faulty logic. The sushi comes from the sea, not from Tsukiji. Tsukiji is basically an enormous butcher shop for seafood. I now realize that my thinking was basically the equivalent of this: "I love steak, let me check out a slaughterhouse." Yeah, bad logic.

Sure it is probably good for all of us to see where our food is killed. I think many of us would quickly become vegetarians. In fact, as I walked around Tsukiji I thought to myself, "People who eat fish yet call themselves vegetarians need to come to this place." To get what I mean, watch this video:

Tokyo on Fast Forward

(PICTURE: Onryan and me eating octopus balls in Tokyo.)

I only had two days to explore Tokyo...which is actually one more day than my students in Koryama told me I would need.

I took a twelve hour night bus from Hiroshima to Tokyo and was met my Onryan -- my friend MyongFa's sister -- at the Kokubunji train station at 9AM. Onryan was a fantastic host from the moment she met me at the train station until the moment she dropped me off at the train station two days later. I was pretty tired and told Onryan that on my first day I only cared about eating delicious food.

Onryan took me to a neighborhood that I would best compare with SoHo in New York. Seemingly every few minutes we would stop and eat something which was exactly the right medicine for my lack of sleep.

At night Onryan prepared a delicious shabu-shabu dinner for me and her 14-year-old daughter. Yeah, I can't believe she has a teenage daughter either. I thought Onryan was my age when I first met her. What is even crazier is that I was able to stay at her apartment because her 16-year-old son was at soccer camp!

After dinner we hung out in Onryan's living room where I proceeded to argue with her daughter about J-pop. J-pop for those of you who don't know is Japanese Pop Music. It's basically the equivalent of Britany Spears and Justin Timberlake except in Japanese and with much less rhythmic dancing. Frankly I find J-pop to be hilarious. The costumes and make-up are over the top and just to reiterate, the dancing is awful!

The next morning I woke up early and went to Tsukiji Fish Market (I'll blog about that experience tomorrow). After the market I walked all over the city. First I went to eat monja, an okonomiyaki like dish that Masumi recommended I eat in Tokyo. There is a "monja street" in Tokyo that has about thirty different monja restaurants.

(PICTURE: My monja street map in front of the restaurant Masumi recommended.)

Masumi had recommended one to me but unfortunately it was closed. I then had to choose another on my own and selected the one with the most newspaper clippings about it posted in front. Perhaps this was a bad idea because although it was delicious, it was quite expensive.

(PICTURE: How could I not go into this one? Look at all the press it got!)

(PICTURE: Me with my expensive but delicious monja.)

After lunch I walked across the city to the Emperor's Palace. You can't actually go into the palace but there is one really picturesque view of it that one can soak in for a few minutes:

(PICTURE: The Emperor's Palace.)

I had intended to go to the East Gardens of the Palace but unfortunately they were closed on Mondays (Thanks for the heads up Lonely Planet).

After my failed entrance into the gardens I jumped on the subway and headed towards Asakusa. Asakusa is the most famous temple in Tokyo...it is also the most crowded with tourists. When I entered the grounds of Asakusa I realized that I had already surpassed my quota of temples. I think I literally breathed a giant sigh and muttered, "Great another temple." That said, it was a cool temple but it is hard to find peace and tranquility with thousands of tourists snapping away silly photos and buying overpriced souvenirs.

(PICTURE: The tourist path to Asakusa.)

Finally at night I headed back to Kokubunji and ate the only appropriate last meal in Japan -- Korean food. Onryan, her friends and I ate at an amazing Korean restaurant. The coolest part, besides the food, was that we all got to wear bibs like we were eating lobster. Oh, Mom, you'd really have liked this dinner. No, not because of the food but because all three of the people I ate with are occupational therapists (FYI: My mom is a physical therapist).

(PICTURE: Onryan, her friends and me eating Korean food.)

Miyajima

The Japanese say there are three great sites in Japan. In my second week in Koryama I went to one of the three places -- Matsushima. As you may recall, I thought it was pretty overrated and basically a tourist trap. You can read about my experience in Matsushima here.

While in Hiroshima I had the opportunity to go to the 2nd great site -- Miyajima. Miyajima, unlike Matsushima, was indeed breathtaking. Miyajima is famous for the giant orange floating tori gate in front of Itsukushima Shrine. I got to the island early in the morning which meant it was still low tide. Since the water wasn't up to the shore yet I was able to walk almost all the way up to the tori. By the time I left the island, the tori was completely surrounded by water.

As great as the tori was, the highlight of the day was hiking up to Mt. Misen. The hike took approximately an hour and a half and was straight uphill. There was a cable car to the top which I decided not to take. When I got to the top of the mountain I was dripping in sweat...whereas everyone else seemed to be pretty fine considering they just had to walk fifteen minutes from the cable car station.

Minorities in Japan

When it comes to minorities, there is a huge difference between America and Japan. In America, if you are born in America you are American. In America, if you go through the naturalization process you are American. One of the great things about America is that it is a collection of people from all over the world who can call themselves American. This is not the case in Japan.

In Japan, you are only considered Japanese if you are of Japanese descent. No matter how long your family has lived in Japan you are not Japanese unless your genes are Japanese. I had first heard about this from my friend MyongFa about a year and a half ago. I was very confused as she told me that she was born in Japan but was Korean. She went to a Korean school and had a Korean passport. During my travels in Japan, I met many other Korean people. In fact, I hung out with Koreans in three different cities. All of the Koreans I met were the second or third generation born in Japan. However, none of them had a Japanese passport. Like me, a temporary worker in the country, they had to carry an ID card at all times.

Think about this for a second: In my family, I am the third generation born in America. All of my grandparents were the first generation born in the country with their parents having immigrated from different countries in Eastern Europe. I consider myself to be an America. My parents consider themselves to be Americans. My grandparents consider themselves to be Americans. All of us hold American passports -- or are eligible to hold American passports -- and all of us call ourselves American. However, if our situations were identical in Japan, none of us would hold Japanese passports and none of us would call ourselves Japanese.

The irony of this blog post -- and yes this is a big generalization -- is that the Japanese are in denial about themselves since the Japanese are ALL of either Korean or Chinese descent originally.