Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Vietnamese Old People



One of the things that I was most impressed with in Japan is how fit Japanese senior citizens are. The senior citizens there climb mountains, ride bikes around town and appear to be twenty years healthier than their actual age.

In Vietnam, well, not so much. One thing I've noticed in Vietnam is that Vietnamese people do not age well after about fifty-five. This is not to say that older Vietnamese people aren't strong, this is just to say that they look older than their age. I'm sure it is a combination of medicine and lifestyle but seemingly when people pass sixty they age exponentially faster than other senior citizens around the world.

This is interesting to me because younger Vietnamese people look much younger than people their same age in America. When I look at Vietnamese college students I think that they look like American high school students. When I look at Vietnamese high school students I think that they look like American middle school students. If one could draw a graph it would be fascinating to see at what age Westerners and Vietnamese look the same age and at what point Vietnamese start to age faster. That's my deep thought for today...