Yes, I pick my nose. I occasionally do it in bed or on a couch when I'm too lazy to get up. I even do it sometimes when typing my blogs on Ahoy Hanoi. It's the truth. Now that I've said that, you might think the rest of this blog entry is hypocritical but I'm gonna write it none-the-less.
Listen up people of Vietnam: STOP PICKING YOUR NOSE. I used to think it was sort of funny how people pick their noses all the time in Vietnam. However, I think I just snapped when it comes to nose picking. A few days ago I was on my motorbike at a red light and looked around me and saw countless people picking their noses. It was like a moment of clarity right out of the Matrix. There was one security guard, sitting on the sidewalk, who seemed to have two knuckles up his right nostril. I found myself wincing at the thought of his booger covered fingers. Since that moment I've been extra sensitive to nose picking. I even have this little game in my head where I look around me and count how many people are presently engaged with a finger up their nose. Lets just say there is always at least a couple people.
Well, tonight, I finally had it. I was teaching a private student who was digging in his right nostril as if he was expecting to find an ipad in there. What he did find was a giant piece of snot which trickled down to his lip. I instinctively shouted, "DUDE! Are you kidding me? Stop picking your nose and get a tissue." After he got a tissue I demanded that he go and wash his hands. After coming back from the bathroom we got back to doing some book exercises. It took less than a minute -- and this is no lie -- before I looked over and he had ONE FINGER IN EACH NOSTRIL. I once again said, "Come on! That's disgusting." He laughed and then touched my textbook. I don't often get angry but at this moment I was kind of furious. I said, "You can't be touching my stuff right after your fingers are exploring your nostrils." My student didn't really seem to get my annoyance. I tried to explain to him that it was not only gross but also really unsanitary. I told him that's how germs spread (at this point he took out a dictionary to look up the word germs). After, I said to him, "You know when I was young we used to make fun of people who picked their noses." The student said to me, "What did you say to them?" I said, "We used to call them names." "Like what," he said. I said, "Like nose picker." And then he said, "Is that bad?", which pretty much sums up the point of this blog entry. Yes, picking your nose and touching people/people's stuff is bad. It's disgusting. It's gross. It's unhygienic. It's filthy. It's uhhhhhh.
Now, I know lots of Vietnamese people read my blog. Sometimes I write things on here and people comment, "That isn't true. It's just one person" blah blah blah blah. No, it is true that people in Vietnam pick their noses in public exponentially more than Americans or any other country (except maybe China) that I've visited. Somebody once tried to justify nose picking to me by saying the air is very dusty. Well, my nose is triple the size of any Vietnamese person's which means I'd have triple the dust. Yet you don't see me picking my nose anywhere except in the confines of my home!!!!
