Life Preserver Street

Hanoi is famous for having streets that all sell the same thing. Well recently I pulled down a small side street and found myself surrounded by life preservers and life jackets. Sure there are a lot of lakes in Hanoi but how how there possibly be enough business for a half dozen shops selling life preservers and life jackets? It is definitely the weirdest goods street I've seen so far in this city.

900th Post!

I'm only gonna take a moment to recognize this milestone for Ahoy Hanoi. This entry is officially the 900th post! Personally, I can't believe I've written 900 times. The sheer amount of it just seems, well, huge. I guess it has been like building a house, you lay one brick at a time and at then end of the day you take a step back and realize you've just built a wall.

900 seems like a huge number but really how can I celebrate it with my 1,000th post just around the corner? Doing some simple math (which is all I'm really good at), if I write a blog a day for the next 100 days, my 1,000th entry will post 10 days before my wedding. Realistically though, I'm gonna miss a day once in a while (sorry, mom, but it's true). So in actuality, my 1,000th blog might be about Huyen's and my wedding. I don't know about you, but I think that'll be a pretty cool way to celebrate a really momentous milestone.

For those of you who like statistics, here's the latest from Google Analytics*:
- Ahoy Hanoi has had over 126,000 pageviews.
- Ahoy Hanoi has had over 19,000 absolute unique visitors.
- 3.37% of my readers use dial-up to log into the site. Seriously, dial-up.
- Ahoy Hanoi has been read in 133 countries including Iraq, the Palestinian Territories and Bosnia and Herzegovnia. It has also been read in places I didn't even know were countries like: Tajikistan, Greenland (It's part of Denmark, right?), Macedonia, Guernsey and Vanuatu.
- After going two years without a viewer in South Dakota, I've now got seven!...two more than in North Dakota.
- I've got more readers in California than New York and New Jersey. I guess we know who wants to win the East Coast vs. West Coast re-settlement debate!

*These stats do not include the first seven months of the blog.

Which Is More Morally Wrong: Bribery or Killing Rhinos For Their Horns...or both!

Two of the things I hate most about Vietnam were just mentioned in one article together. The first thing, corruption. The second thing, the fact that people still pay money for parts of endangered species because they think it gives them good health (and boners). You can't make this stuff up:

Headline in Viet Nam News (11/8/2010):

City business couple get life for bribery, bank fraud

HCM CITY - The HCM City People's Court has given life sentences to a business couple for bribery and cheating a bank, and 26 years' imprisonment to a former district chairman for abuse of power.
(SKIPPING AHEAD FOUR PARAGRAPHS)
Khoe took VND 1.4billion ($72,000) and half a rhino horn worth $10,000 from the couple.

Hello Medicare!!!!!!

(PICTURE: One super good looking guy...and me.)

Happy 65th Birthday, Dad!!! This is a big one -- can you say Medicare!!!! Is it strange that I'm jealous you now get government health care since finding health care for Huyen and I is now stress #16 on my list? Anyway, happy birthday, Big Guy!

It pains me every year that I'm not home to celebrate with you, Dad. Next year we're gonna have an extra large birthday party to make up for all the birthdays I've missed over the last few years. Until then though, I'll say what I always say: Not a day goes by that I don't feel lucky having you as a father. I miss you, Big Guy, and can't wait to hug you in December! Love you!

Ben

Congratulations, Anthony!

(PICTURE: Anthony and his awesome wife Elissa at the Primetime Emmy awards.)

Congratulations to my good friend Anthony Carbone for winning a Primetime Emmy in the category of "Outstanding Reality Programming". Carbone was the Supervising Producer on Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, not only a very successful show but one that Anthony truly believed in from the moment he started working on it. One of the realities of working in reality TV is that we often work on, well, crap. However with this project, Anthony felt from the beginning that it could not only be entertaining but also have a positive effect on society. And that's why this Emmy really couldn't be in better hands. Besides being an extremely talented producer and editor, Carbone is by far one of the best guys I've ever known.

A couple of years ago I went to Sicily to celebrate Carbone's wedding to his childhood sweetheart Elissa. Their wedding was definitely one of the highlights of my adult life! As I've been planning Huyen's and my wedding, I keep thinking about Anthony and Elissa's and how we can make ours as memorable as theirs was. It's going to be quite a challenge especially since it looks like Anthony and Elissa will be attending!

On another note, if I can get my other Emmy award winning friend Alex to attend, this wedding will have by far the most American TV award winners present in the history of Vietnamese weddings!

Educational Differences: Bribing Teachers

(PICTURE: The bribe scene from "A Serious Man.")

In the recent Coen Brother's movie, "A Serious Man" there is a storyline about a Korean student who tries to bribe his university professor to give him a passing grade by giving the professor an envelope with a bunch of money inside of it. In the film, the professor was appalled at the attempted bribe as I imagine the majority of professors in America would be. However, after watching the film, it occurred to me that this is actually a cultural difference.

As crazy as this sounds, it is common practice in Vietnam (and I'm assuming other places in Asia) to bribe teachers for better grades. Basically students go to their professor's houses with their whole class and leave behind individual envelopes with money and their name on it. Usually they'll leave the envelope in a box in the front room of the house and then they'll meet with the professor in another room where they'll have tea. The students meet with the professor for a few minutes and then leave the house, often crossing paths with another of the professor's classes which is coming by to drop off some money.

If you talk to most expats -- and many Vietnamese -- they'll complain about the corruption in the country. However, when we usually think of corruption and bribes we associate it with the government or police. The idea of bribing teachers -- which has been told to me by various university students -- shows just how ingrained corruption and bribery is in the society here. By doing some simple math with one of my students, we figured out that professors at their university can make five figures a year just on bribes.

I know what you're asking yourself, "Has anyone ever tried to bribe you, Ben?" Unfortunately extra-curricular English classes aren't deemed bribe worthy...and that's why I'm sending in my resume to every university this week!

Educational Differences: Maturity

(PICTURE: The planet that always gets a chuckle in American classrooms -- Uranus.)

Don't let the post's title fool you -- teenagers in America and Vietnam are both totally immature. However, their immaturity is expressed in different ways. I'm not gonna even pretend to understand the cultural differences in immaturity but I will tell a funny anecdote from the other night:

Right now I'm teaching a teenage class at Language Link. The students range in age from 11-15, which is to say there are A LOT of immature kids in the class. Every class I get lots of snickers and some misbehaving which would be the same in a similar class in America. Well, the other night I was teaching a science section about the planets in the solar system and I had all of the students repeat the planets after me: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto.

The students repeated the planets without a chuckle. Not one chuckle was emitted from a classroom of pre-teens and teens who had just said the word "Uranus". Can you imagine that happening in an American classroom when a teacher says out loud, "Uranus"? While listening to the silence following the students and me saying "Uranus" I thought to myself, "This is so unAmerican." There was only one thing for me to do and that was to say, "Okay, lets try that U planet again -- Uranus." The students followed with a perfect repetition of "Uranus." I smiled to myself and said, "One more time everyone - Uranus." Yeah, I guess I'm a little immature sometimes too.

A minute later I told the students to turn over a sheet I had given out: "Okay, everyone flip over the sheet." Sure enough, one or two of the boys chuckled, "He said shit."

Educational Differences: Tutors

(PICTURE: That's me on the left.)

Here's another big difference between studying in America and studying in Vietnam: Vietnamese students have A LOT of tutors. Most of my private students have between 9 and 12 extra-curricular learning sessions per week. Some of the sessions aren't one-on-one (like when I teach them) but are done at teacher's house with a group of students. However, when they're not in "school" they're always being schooled somewhere.

As I've mentioned before on the blog, I generally teach very affluent kids but I'm pretty sure this isn't only true for the rich. About three nights a week, my cleaning lady's son has a math tutor who comes to our building and teaches him.

I've come up with a few reasons Vietnamese kids have so many tutors/extra classes:
1. Students attend school for less hours in Vietnam than in America. Most of my private students study at school from Monday-Satuday from 7:30 AM to around 12:30 PM. This is about two and a half hours less than American students generally attend school (minus the Saturday part).
2. Vietnamese value education. Education here is really as much on a parent's shoulders as it is on the child's. This hit home for me recently when I saw an award at Huyen's house that was given to her father. The award was for having raised three children who attended university (he'll probably get another now since Su was accepted to school too).
3. In Hanoi, there aren't exactly a lot of things for kids to do outside after school. Most of my students say that in their free time they either play video games or chat online. Sure there are parks all over the city but they usually seem to be void of children every afternoon.
4. Besides the university entrance exam which I've gone into detail on in the past, there is also a Grade 10 exam for many of the best schools. For example, if students want to attend Hanoi Amsterdam High School -- considered to be the best public school in the city -- they must pass an entrance exam for Grade 10.

Mom, tell me if I'm wrong but I think I had only one tutor growing up and that was for the SATs. And trust me, I'm not complaining. For me, Vietnamese kids study too much. My family valued education (my father was on the Board of the Board of Education for most of my childhood) but also understood the necessity of balance in life. I can't tell you how many times I've felt thankful for growing up in a suburb where my friends and I could play roller hockey in our driveway or on a school blacktop after the final class bell. Often in Hanoi, I feel like kids don't get to be kids a lot of the time.

Educational Differences: Summer Vacation

This summer I noticed a huge difference in the Vietnamese educational system and the American educational system. All of my private students spent the summer reading and studying the textbooks for their upcoming academic year. The kids were basically teaching themselves Math, Physics and Chemistry from the moment one grade ended to the beginning of the first day of the new school year. My students told me that they have to teach themselves the material first before the teachers teach it in class. They said that the teachers basically review the material and check for understanding from the students. To be honest though, I'm not sure if this is true for all Vietnamese students or just my private students who happen to attend some of the best public schools in Vietnam.

This is vastly different than in the states where generally our summers are spent goofing around with only the occasional required schoolwork to be done (i.e. read "The Agony And The Ecstasy" for AP European History).

Happy 2nd Birthday, Lilah!!!

Happy 2nd Birthday to my super cute niece Lilah!!!!

(PICTURE: Lilah wears sunglasses at night too.)

Recently Huyen and I have been skyping with Lilah. It's pretty cool to see her on skype especially since she knows my name. However, to be honest, Lilah is never as excited to see Huyen and me as we are to see her; Lilah is most excited to see a stuffed animal monkey that we have at our apartment. One of the first times we skyped with her, Huyen brought the monkey into the conversation and since then Lilah has requested "monkey" every time we talk. The cool thing is that I know what to give her for her 3rd birthday when I come home next year!


(PICTURE: My big brother and his special ladies.)

Vietnamese Ingenuity

I'm constantly amazed at Vietnamese ingenuity. The saying, "If there is a will, there is a way" applies here more than any place I've ever been.

When we went to Huyen's grandfather's village, someone brought a bottle of Da Lat wine. The problem with Da Lat wine is that it is sealed with a cork. All of the wine that is usually drunk in Huyen's Grandfather's village is from twist off bottles so hence nobody had a wine opener. The lack of a tool though didn't dissuade the crew of wine-thirsty men who quickly proceeded to figure out another way to open the bottle. The quickest and most logical way they came up with was to use a screw:

The Real Mr. Miagi

(PICTURE: On the left, Huyen's Grandfather. On the right, his brother.)

I have written in the past about Huyen's Grandfather's unbelievable strength. The last time I commented about it he was lifting himself up to a third level bunk bed on a train to Hue. Well, last weekend he proved to me that he is not only incredibly strong but he also has amazing hand-eye coordination.

On Sunday, Huyen and I went to her Grandfather's village for lunch. While eating outside, a lot of flies started to swarm around the food. Most of the men in my circle just waved their hands near the flies so that they would fly away. Not Huyen's Grandfather though. I personally saw her Grandfather eye at least four different flies and then catch them in his hands. I was dumbfounded at her Grandfather's skill and tried to imitate him -- I was totally unsuccessful. In fact, I tried so many times that all the old men around me started to laugh. One finally commented, "Ben doesn't like flying black beans."

Wedding Update: The Photographer II

(PICTURE: The first picture that shows up when you google wedding photographers.)

One thing I forgot to mention yesterday is that most wedding photographers DO NOT TAKE PICTURES AT THE WEDDING! This is a huge difference between American weddings and Vietnamese weddings. I have been to some wedding here that have a photographer/videographer but that is not part of the usual package that most wedding shops offer.

It is definitely possible to get someone to take pictures at the wedding and we're looking into this. My mom also suggested having everyone take pictures and then I can put together an album on Snapfish or some other website and print out a few copies for our family and Huyen's. Personally I think this is a great idea since a lot of my friends (especially from LA) are fantastic photographers. I'm hoping that one or two of them will come to the wedding and can take pictures. So if you're reading this LA people (Sam, Tom, Sebastian), you better be coming out to 'Nam!

Wedding Update: The Photographer

(PICTURE: Huyen in front of the photo shop we'll be using!)

Last weekend Huyen and I went to a few photographers and frankly didn't like any. I've made fun of wedding photographers/books in the past on my blog because:

1. Wedding books are taken weeks or months before the actual wedding. The books aren't so much about the wedding but are more about looking like models in often over-the-top actions shots.

2. The books often have English in them. The English is generally spelled wrong and often nonsensical. Even worse, I had one student show me her book and she had some rap lyrics on a page which she probably thought were romantic...but were basically about "tapping that..."

3. The pictures are completely photo-shopped. Half the albums we saw were either in sepia tone or drastically over colored.

The positive part about getting a photographer is that their services include:
1. Hair and make-up for the wedding and rehearsal dinner.
2. Ao Dais for all the girls at the rehearsal dinner.
3. A wedding dress for Huyen (if she doesn't want to make one)
4. A giant picture of the two of us that will be put at the entrance of the wedding.
5. A bunch of other small stuff...

After feeling like it was impossible to get a good photographer, we got a recommendation from one of Huyen's coworker. We went to the shop and were immediately won over. The pictures the photographer took were beautiful and didn't have a trace of photoshop. On top of that, there was only a little English in the albums...which still had spelling mistakes.

We immediately booked the photographer and will be taking pictures in three weeks. We'll have a half day shoot at a few different locations in Hanoi. Regardless of how it turns out, it should be a fun day!

Wedding Update: My Fat Fingers II

(PICTURE: They had these circle things which sized my fat fingers.)

We found a place that can make us wedding bands! Check one of forty things off the list...

Actually scratch that. We now we have to add something more to the list: Thinking up a good inscription in Vietnamese. Huyen and I have thought up some sayings we like but unfortunately their Vietnamese translations are a little too long for an inscription. Anyway, we've got 15 days to think of something good because that is when our rings will be done...

Immitation Is The Greatest Form Of Flattery

(PICTURE: The August/Zucker middle children's girlfriends.)

Shortly after my cousin Justin visited me in Hanoi, he returned to America and found himself in a relationship with a Vietnamese girl. I can only assume that Huyen's whit, charm, sense of humor and a thousand other qualities I talked about in our marriage interview inspired Justin to look for a similar girlfriend. From all accounts, everyone has told me that Kim, Justin's lady, was indeed a fantastic girl...and this week I got to verify the reports myself.

Kim, who emigrated to America when she was five, is spending about a month in Vietnam visiting family and touring the country. The other night, Kim was in Hanoi and Huyen and I took her out to dinner, dessert and drinks. Kim was as sweet and intelligent as billed by my cousins. I personally found it funny watching Kim and Huyen interact for a few reasons:

1. Kim speaks a southern dialect of Vietnamese which can be quite hard to understand for a northerner. Equally Huyen's northern dialect was a little hard for Kim to understand. Both were hard for me to understand.

2. It was really interesting to listen to things Kim likes as a Vietnamese American woman that Vietnamese girls don't like. For example, Kim's love of the sun...which I need not remind you is not popular here.

3. Since Kim is from the South and Huyen is from the North they inevitably got into a fight. Huyen stabbed Kim with a chopstick and Kim poured scalding hot water on Huyen's legs...okay, that didn't happen. In fact, Kim conceded that she liked Hanoi's pho better than Saigon's pho. This is a huge battle between the two ends of the country and considered blasphemy to betray your home region's pho.

It was great to meet Kim and Huyen and I were excited to hear that she's 50/50 on returning in December for our wedding!

Always The Tour Guide

(PICTURE: Me and the soon-to-be mother-in-law in front of the Opera House.)

I'm pretty sure there hasn't been a month that I've lived in Hanoi where I didn't play tour guide to a visiting friend or a friend of a friend. It seems that there are always people in town who are separated from me by just one or two degrees. In fact, over the last month, there have been three different people who I've shown around the city. Yes, this can get exhausting but it is always nice to give someone a tour; as I know from my own traveling there is nothing better than knowing a local in a foreign city.

Not too long ago, Huyen's mother came into Hanoi to visit her mother who was in the hospital for a foot operation. Despite living only an hour away from Hanoi, Huyen's mom has spent little to no time in the city. This is like living in Livingston, NJ and never going to New York.

Huyen and I couldn't let her mom come to the big city and not get a tour so we convinced her to leave the hospital for an hour and to come with us. We whisked her around the town and showed her a few famous places like Hoam Kiem Lake and the Opera House. However, Huyen's mom was much more interested in the food so we grabbed a couple of our favorite treats that weren't too far from the hospital. Despite only having an evening to play tour guide, it was great to give my future mother-in-law a tour of Hanoi!

Printer-Ink-Man

(PICTURE: Printer-Ink-Man in action.)

My printer ran out of ink the other day. I told Huyen we needed to pick up another ink cartridge and she told me that they were too expensive. Instead she said she would call the Printer-Ink-Man.

Remember the other day when I was talking about Vietnamese ingenuity. Well, this is exactly what I was talking about. The Printer-Ink Man's job is to go from home to home and office to office refilling ink cartridges. It saves the consumer money and creates a job! Genius!...except for the fact that my printer is now printing pages a little bit funny.

Wedding Update: My Fat Fingers

(PICTURE: Huyen rejected my first choice for wedding bands. I thought it would be a good homage to Ahoy Hanoi.)

This past weekend Huyen and I began to do some of the more "fun" planning and preparing for weddings. Well, that's unless you consider driving twelves hours to drop off paperwork and be asked somewhat intrusive questions fun.

Huyen and I both want to get very simple, matching wedding bands. Personally, I hate jewelery. Minus my college pocket watch and the occasional trendy necklace in my youth, I've never worn jewelery. Frankly, I don't like the way it feels or looks on me. Thankfully, Huyen doesn't really wear jewelery either so we're on the same page on this. The two of us started our wedding band search by going to one of the biggest jewelery stores in Hanoi. We immediately spotted bands that we liked and asked to try them on. Well, it didn't go so well. The band couldn't even fit on my sausage-like pinky finger. The store clerk told us that if we wanted the ring in my size it would take 7-8 months to have imported from France. Yeah, no thanks. She also told us that we were going to have a very hard time finding any rings my size in Hanoi. So, the challenge is on!

Huyen and I will be going to some other jewelery shops soon to see if a) they have my size OR b) can make me a ring. Worst case scenario, my internet guru mom has found a good site for us to order rings from and have shipped to New Jersey. I'm just a littler nervous though about not trying on a ring until a few days before the big day. The point is, even the simple parts of wedding planning don't end up being so simple!

Wedding Update: Scouting Hotels

While in Ha Nam last week, Huyen and I scouted some hotels for the wedding. As I've been doing some planning for the wedding, I realized it makes more sense for people to stay close to her home the night before the wedding since we'll be going there for the "rehearsal dinner" the night before. Instead of driving more than an hour in unpredictable traffic to and from Hanoi, we can all save time by staying a few minutes away in Phu Ly.

I've come up with something I call "The Brett Test." I think to myself, will my friend Brett be willing to sleep/eat in this hotel/restaurant. I was pleasantly surprised by the hotel that Huyen and I found and I'm pretty sure it'll pass the Brett test. Brett?

It's got a nice-ish lobby:


Clean beds and bathroom:



And a nice view:



That said, I would suggest bringing your own pillow case. You can buy a new one with the savings since this hotel costs about $15 a night for the suites.

Boy Genius!

(PICTURE: Genius in the flesh. I'm talking about the guy on the right.)

Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for Su!!!! Su is officially a boy genius -- he passed his university entrance exam and will begin university in the Fall!!!!!!!!

Needless to say, Su was ecstatic yesterday when I called him. It'll be great to have Su in Hanoi in the near future. Su is a great kid and I'm excited to be able to take him around the city and introduce him to lots of new things.

As I've written on the blog in the past, passing the university entrance exam is a pretty tall feat. This hit home yesterday when Su told Huyen and I that 50% of his classmates did not pass their exams. I can't imagine if 50% of the people I graduated with couldn't get accepted to a university.

Congrats again to Su!

A Very Peculiar Grapefruit

The other night Huyen peeled a grapefruit and discovered that inside the grapefruit was a smaller undeveloped grapefruit:

(PICTURE: The baby grapefruit on the right was inside the big grapefruit.)

Does anyone else find this really strange? I'm pretty sure I've never eaten a fruit that had an identical twin growing inside of it.

Asthma

I know that there are some doctors reading my blog so I'm gonna pose this question to you: Is the rate of kids with Asthma higher in Hanoi than in most other places in Vietnam/The World/Developed countries? I ask because I've noticed that at least 50% of my private students have inhalers.

If the rate of Asthma is high here it wouldn't surprise me at all. As most people who have been to Hanoi know, the air is not clean here. I would think having grown up in this environment could not be good for your lungs. In fact, I have felt that my breathing in Vietnam sometimes feels strained compared to when I lived in America or Japan.

But on the other hand, my private students are quite affluent and I wonder if their parents take them to more expensive doctors who prescribe them unnecessary medications. This has been something I've wondered about for a while so I thought I'd throw it up on the blog today.

Wrong Lane, Officer?

(PICTURE: Motorbikes are supposed to drive in the shoulder...where the police car is.)

Take a good look at the picture above. Notice that there are two lanes and a shoulder on the highway. Well, for as long as I can remember, Vietnamese people have told me not to drive in the shoulder because many people get flats or blown tires because of glass and rocks on the shoulder. Basically, it's more dangerous to drive in the shoulder. As an American, this comes as second nature to me. The shoulder on American highways is for emergency use only. Well, after driving for over two years in Vietnam, I learned something new: It is illegal for motorbikes to drive on the road and not in the shoulder. I learned this because Huyen and I were pulled over on our way to our wedding interview. This was really annoying to me for a few reasons:
1. There were no cars on the highway in sight when we were driving in the right lane (although there is a truck in the picture above which passed us as we were paying our fine).
2. The only car in sight at the time was the police car which was PARKED IN THE SHOULDER! I literally saw a few motorbikes driving in the shoulder, pull into the road and then get pulled over for not driving in the shoulder.
3. The road was much better paved than the shoulder. AKA much safer.
4. I saw the cops pull over about 7 people. There literally wasn't a motorbike that passed that didn't get pulled over. However, some of the drivers knew better than me. As soon as they were pulled over they immediately turned on the gas and flew back on to the highway. The cops just shook their head but never gave chase. Man, I wish I had the guts to just fly by the police!

This little brush with the law cost us 100,000 VND or roughly $5. Not too bad for breaking the law but still annoying. I can also promise you this, I will still drive in the right lane and not the shoulder the next time I'm on the highway.

Wedding Update: The Interview

Huyen and I finally had our wedding interview and it didn't disappoint -- it was hilarious.

First off, the city officials told us that we needed a translator for our interview. The city supplied us with an expensive translator who was clearly friends with someone in the office. She also clearly spoke and understood about half the amount of English as Huyen does. Upon meeting the girl, I asked her some basic questions I might asked a prospective student I was placement testing. The girl answered some of my "How" questions with "When" answers. She answered my "Where" questions with "What" answers. It didn't take a long time for me to realize that this girl wasn't going to be giving word-for-word translations of what I was saying.

Huyen, the translator and I were brought up to a conference room in the city office. The three of us took seats at a table across from our two interviewers who had a laptop and our marriage applications. Without any introduction, they told us to answer questions truthfully. The interview then began. To the best of my memory here are the questions I was asked:
1. When did you arrive in Vietnam?
2. When did you meet Miss Huyen?
3. How often did you talk with Miss Huyen after meeting her?
4. How did you talk with her? On the phone?
5. Did Miss Huyen come to your house for dinner or lunch? Have you even gone to her house?
6. When did you first know you loved Miss Huyen?
7. Who expressed their love for each other first?*
8. Where did you express your love?
9. Have you taken any long trips with Miss Huyen? Where?
10. Have you met Miss Huyen's parents?
11. How many times? (I said 20 or 30)
12. You can't remember exactly how many times?
13. How old are her mother and father?
14. What do you know about Miss Huyen? How old is she? Where does she work? etc.
15. What characteristics about Miss Huyen do you like? (I said, "She's honest. She's funny. She's very kind...)
16. Can you tell us more characteristics and be specific? (I rolled my eyes here and began a list...)
17. Have you or Miss Huyen cheated on the other?
18. Is anyone paying you money to marry Miss Huyen? (I said, "I wish.")
19. Nobody is forcing you to marry Miss Huyen?
20. Where do you plan on living after getting married?
21. What is your plan for starting a family? When will you have children? (Here I wish I said, "Did you talk to my mom before this interview?)

The whole experience last for an hour and felt like some odd version of "The Newlywed Game". It occured to me about halfway through the interview that this must be what a meeting with a rabbi/priest is like before a wedding.

The whole point of the interview was to make sure that Huyen and I are in a legitimate relationship and there isn't some ulterior motive for getting married (i.e. some Chinese and Taiwanese men marry girls here to be able to buy property and start businesses). However, the whole process was pretty moronic since Huyen was IN THE ROOM WITH ME! Huyen heard all of the questions and my answers. After they finished questioning me, they questioned her. Clearly she was going to agree with everything she just heard me say (which of course was the truth).

The two interviewers were very serious during the whole process. I managed to get a smile or two out of them during the interview but that was about it. However, their all business attitude didn't translate into their work since I found that they had spelled my name wrong on the official document. I pointed this out to them and they fixed it.

Anyway, now that the interview is done, supposedly we just have 20-30 days until we can pick up our marriage license. Can you say last month of being single!!!!

* I loved this question because it reminded me of high school and college. I remember the immature embarrassment of being the person who said the L word first. Being a stubborn idiot back then, I remember taking a firm stance that I would never say, "I love you" first.

Skin Lightening Cream

I meant to post this blog after my "Waiting In The Shade" entry a few days ago...but I forgot.

This article caught my attention on CNN the other day: Vaseline skin-lightening app stirs debate. Basically, as the title says, Vaseline has an application that shows people how lighter their skin can be if they use their product. It is no secret that in Asia people think light skin is beautiful. In Hanoi recently, I've noticed that more and more beauty shops are offering whitening skin treatments. In fact, I'm pretty sure one of my private student's moms is getting whitening treatment because her face has become lighter and lighter every time I see her.

Shortly after reading the article above, I noticed this huge billboard on a major road in Hanoi:

(PICTURE: An add for Vaseline's skin lightening cream.)

It's not surprising to me at all that Vaseline is advertising their cream in Hanoi. All one needs to do is walk into the supermarket and see how seemingly 75% of face washing creams contain the word "whitening" in them. Personally, I prefer looking tan. However, over the last couple of years I've tried my best to put sun tan lotion on whenever I think it's going to be a sunny day. However, despite that, I still often get remarks from Vietnamese people that I'm "dark." Perhaps I should give whitening cream a shot?! Okay, that's not gonna happen...

Spring Cleaning In Summer

(PICTURE: Cleaning up the clutter.)

My mom always used to love to tell her friends how great of a cleaner I was. As a kid, about twice a year, I would wake up with cleaning inspiration. I used to take apart my room and completely reorganize it from top to bottom. I would always end up with bags of stuff to give away and/or throw away. On top of that, I always used to move everything in my room around that wasn't nailed to the wall...which was everything except my desk.

Well, the other day I had a flashback of cleaning inspiration. Huyen and I were hanging out at home when I said that we should go through all of our stuff and start to declutter. I'm pretty sure this moment was inspired by my excitement to ideally move back to America in about a half a year. I started to think about what I would need to bring back with me and more importantly, what Huyen would need to start her life in America. The pretty obvious fact is that we've got more than our airline allotment to carry back with us unless we ask wedding guests to stuff some of our clothes into their carry-on bags on their way home.

So, Huyen and I took to our shelves and began to throw away and sort things out. In the end, we had a trunk full of stuff to give her brother, a big bag full of recyclable paper and another bag full of my books to trade/give to some fellow expats. As much as I would love to bring books back with me, I'm pretty sure my sister doesn't want to carry a Webster's Dictionary from Vietnam's capital to America's capital.

Grilling On The Street

Recently my buddy Nicky introduced Huyen and me to a streetside BBQ shop. Basically the shop has a whole bunch of different meats that you can grill over a coal fire. We ended up eating frog, goat and pork ribs with a bunch of lady fingers (vegetables) and buttered bread. The meal was quite good and reminded me of Japanese yakiniku restaurants. The big difference between Vietnamese grilled meat restaurants and Japanese grilled meat restaurants are:
1. In Japan you're actually in a restaurant.
2. In Japan you don't grill on a plastic table...which began to partially melt.
3. In Japan you pay a whole bunch of money. In Vietnam it cost us $3 a person.
4. In Vietnam, you have a wider assortment of meat.

Head to head, I've got to give the edge to Japan. The meats in Japan were absolutely outstanding especially at the yakiniku restaurant that Masumi and Kensuke took me too. That said, this grilled meat shop is now on my restaurant rotation and I'll be sure to bring some carnivorous friends there in the near future!


(PICTURE: Vietnamese grill.)

(PICTURE: My first yakiniku in Japan.)

Wedding Update #2

(PICTURE: Nope, this isn't the same picture as yesterday. We're just standing in front of the same government building and I'm wearing the same shirt.)

After receiving our final stamp, Huyen and I drove back to Ha Nam in the middle of the week. We showed up at the government office first thing in the morning so that we could quickly drop off our paperwork and then drive back to Hanoi to go to work. Well, in Vietnam nothing is ever that easy. After three different people looked over our paperwork, we were given another set of applications to fill in which took about an hour.

(PICTURE: Huyen with our completed application form.)

Finally, after one more office worker looked over our application, we officially handed in all of our paperwork. We were told that we would be called within a week to come back to Ha Nam to have an interview. The interview is supposed to prove that we really love each other and will involve Huyen, myself, a government worker and a translator. As ridiculous as that interview sounds, I can't wait for it because a) it'll make a great blog b) it should have taken place about two weeks ago. The call "within a week" has already turned into three weeks.

Wedding Update #1

(PICTURE: Take 1 on getting married.)

Today is Huyen and my 27 month anniversary. On such a momentous occasion I think the only appropriate posting should be a wedding update:

Let me start off by stating a simple fact that I'm gonna complain about a lot over the next couple of weeks: All the paperwork/bureaucratic stuff Huyen and I have to do to get married in Vietnam must be done in Ha Nam (Huyen's home province) and not in Ha Noi. Basically, there is something in Vietnam called a "Family Book" and one must do legal paperwork for weddings/etc. in the province that your family book is registered in. For Huyen to switch family books to Hanoi would take a little bit of time and a few million VND. So what's the problem with having to do things in Ha Nam? Well, there's a few problems which I'll talk about over the next couple of days. The first most glaring issue though is that we must drive 3 hours roundtrip to submit any paperwork. In a perfect world, going into the process, Huyen and I figured there were three necessary trips. Well, add one more trip because the first one was totally unsuccessful.

When I say there is a mountain of paperwork we have to fill out, I really wouldn't be exaggerating:

(PICTURE: Those sixty pages are our marriage application.)

Huyen and I have a copy of the Vietnamese marriage laws in both English and Vietnamese and thoroughly prepared our documents. This required weeks of preparation and about nine notarizations from different offices. Well, turns out, we should have had ten notarizations. After showing up at the Ha Nam government offices, a man went through our paperwork and quickly pointed out that we were missing a stamp from Vietnam's Foreign Affairs office...in Hanoi. Nowhere in any of the paperwork was this office ever mentioned. Basically -- and this totally makes sense -- the Foreign Affairs office gives a stamp saying that my Affidavit of Being Single from the US Embassy is legit.


(PICTURE: Huyen holding my document which needed one more stamp.)

Huyen and I had to drive back to Hanoi and a) Had to find the office b) Had to wait 48 hours for the stamp.

So that was our dress rehearsal for turning in our marriage paperwork. Stay tuned for opening night tomorrow...

Kickstands

(PICTURE: Kickstands are only for parking.)

One of my hobbies recently has been to look out for fellow motorists who have forgotten to put their kickstand up before driving. Why do I do this? Well, I'm not really sure but it definitely makes me feel like a good Samaritan. You see, Huyen has told me 38,433 times that driving witha kickstand down is "really really dangerous." Apparently if you make a left turn and your kickstand is down it can end pretty tragically. I must admit that I've forgotten to put my kickstand up a few times and have had a very bumpy and nearly dangerous left turn. Once or twice someone has ridden up to me and told me that my kickstand was down. Every time this has happened, I've felt pretty thankful. To return the favor, I've developed an eagle's eye for kickstands in the down position. This week I've told four people to fix their kickstand. In return, I've been told once that mine was down.

I wish I had a video of me being a good kickstand Samaritan but it usually goes exactly like this:
BEN: Hey, Mister/Ms.!!!!
STRANGER: (Look at me strangely wondering why a foreigner has ridden up next to them and is yelling at them).
BEN: (Points finger at kickstand)
STRANGER: (HUGE SMILE) Thank you!

I then ride away as fast as I can to save them from having to offer me coffee or gold for potentially saving their lives.