My Driver

(PICTURE: My "Easy Rider" driver)

As I mentioned, yesterday I took a day long motorbike tour with this company called "Easy Rider" (They named themselves after the classic movie). Well, my ride wasn't so easy post lunch following this conversation:

Ben: So how long have you been an easy rider?

Hung: Seven years.

Ben: What were you doing before that?

Hung: I was teaching in high school. Mathematics. Eight years. But boring. 

Ben: So you became an easy rider after that?

Hung: No. I was taxi driver. But I got in accident and killed a man. So I become a motorbike driver. Lets go...

And then we got on his bike and rode off. 

Da Lat

(PICTURE: The Future Mrs. August?)

Lana in Cambodia has a new rival. Mom, Dad meet Kalak. I met Kalak today on my bike tour of Da Lat. One of our many stops was a minority village (there are something like 70 minority tribes in Vietnam. I don't have my guide book with me but that number sounds vaguely familiar) and I was given a private tour by Kalak. Not only was she cute and sweet but she spoke English really well (learned just from tourists) and had a great sense of humor.

From talking with her I found out that she's the fourth of seven daughters in her family. Her three older sisters have gotten married already which means she's next. She told me that women in her tribe need to give a dowry of 6 buffalo, twenty scarves and something else ridiculous to the future husband's family. I asked if she knew who she was going to marry and she told me this: "No. If I buy the buffalo I get to choose my husband. If my parents buy the buffalo they get to choose." For those of you who are curious, she currently has bought three buffaloes for herself. A buffalo costs roughly $350. That's an insane amount of money for anyone in Vietnam and especially for people in her village. So, if we all chip in a few bucks we could help contribute to Kalak's future happiness. Oh, FYI, Kalak also hinted to me that her friend from the village married a tourist and now lives in Seattle. Zev, how would Rocky and Bella like to have some buffalo to play with in your back yard?

Good, Bad and Worse News

The Good News: I didn't have to ride the awkward sleeping bus from Mui Ne to Da Lat today.

The Bad News: The girl in front of me on the bus got car sick and puked into a bag.

The Worse News: The bag broke and splashed on to my foot.

Mui Ne

(PICTURE: The Sleeper Bus)

I'm sitting in a travel agency/internet shack in Mui Ne typing on a computer, circa 1985, that may actually be my family's Apple IIe with a Dell sticker taped on to it.

The lesson of this blog is that sometimes it pays to listen to the guide books. Yesterday I booked an "Open Tour" from Saigon to Hanoi. Basically, I paid $31 and can get on and off a bus from city to city. Lonely Planet suggested using a company called Sinh Cafe. I went over to the Sinh Cafe office and it was over flowing with Westerners. It just seemed like anyone with a guide book was here, booking their tickets. I grabbed a brochure and quickly skimmed through it. Moments earlier I had passed another travel agency called Hanh Cafe. Outside of the office was a brand new double-decker couch bus and each seat looked like it reclined into a bed. Inside the office were Asians, and Asians only. Being the adventurer/idiot I am, I decided to book an open tour with Hanh.

That night I told Hien about my decision and how the bus influenced my choice. I said how there were two overnight trips on the bus and I thought it would be much more comfortable sleeping on this luxury coach then the Sinh Cafe standard bus. Hien looked at me and said, "Those beds are made for Vietnamese people." Hien's words could not have been truer. Yesterday morning I boarded the bus and quickly realized two things:
1. The bus was not a double decker but merely a very tall bus with three rows of bunk beds.
2. I don't even come close to fitting into my chair. To recline, I have to basically lay with my knees straight in the air or my head hanging over the end of the chair onto the feet of the person sleeping behind me. Yes, this would be much easier to understand if I had a picture (which I have plenty of) but sadly my Apple IIe from 1985 doesn't have a USB port.

Five hours and multiple stiff muscles later the bus arrived in Mui Ne. This beach side resort is famous for its white sand dunes and gorgeous beaches. I had made a reservation at a Lonely Planet suggested hotel two days ago that is a bungalow right on the beach. I showed up at the hotel, towing all my bags for the first time in a month, and was told that there were no rooms availabe. To quote Seinfeld, "They know how to take the reservation but they don't know how to keep the reservation. Anyone can take a reservation. The hard part is to keep the reservation." The owner of the hotel suggested I go across the street and check into his hotel today. Luckily the guest house had rooms...which isn't that surprising since it's the ONLY hotel not on the beach.

That said, it's quite beautiful here despite a lot of garbage on the beach. I went swimming yesterday and saw this ominous white object swimming up to me. My first thought was that it was a large jellyfish. Turns out it was just a white plastic bag. I'm not sure which is worse.

Last night I went to a Vietnamese BBQ restaurant. It was delicious and it gave me a great opportunity to practice my new Vietnamese skills. Trang, my waitress, looked at me funny when I asked her, "Ban ten gli?" (what is your name minus the accent marks). I repeated it multiple times. Turns out I was asking the question correctly but she was confused since she was wearing a large name tag.

Off to the beach and then to the sand dunes later this afternoon.

Ben

P.S. The Bruins got screwed in Game 2 against Montreal. I'm a bitter fan 10,000 miles away.

QUESTION: What do Yao Ming, Kobe Bryant, Osama bin Laden and Hitler Have In Common?

 (PICTURE: A belated -- and very odd -- picture from China)

Answer: You can buy a t-shirt with their picture on it in China. 

I took this picture a while ago but finally decided to post it after a conversation I had yesterday with my students. I've been quite lazy over the last weeks and haven't shaven which has grown a sort of beard--or as much as a beard as I can ever really grow--on my face. I asked my students whether or not they liked my beard. The answers were:

1. "You look handsome, sir."

2. "It is very dirty, sir."

3. "It is nice, sir."

4. "You look like (something not understandable), sir."

After the student said #4 all the other students started to laugh and agree. I asked who I looked like and they all started to say the same non understandable name. I asked who that person was and started to pick up clues. Clue #1: "Muslim." Clue #2: A hand gesture showing a big beard. Clue #3: Terrorist. 

Well, it turned out the students thought I looked like Osama bin Laden. Yeah, it may be time to shave.  

Karaoke: The Most Awkward Moment Ever

(PICTURE: Two of my favorite students getting their karaoke on)

Karaoke was amazing this morning. Basically how it works here (and in many places in the states) is you book a private room in a karaoke club and have waiters cater drinks and food to you. The room was about thirty feet deep with a giant horseshoe couch facing a television. Two microphones are attached to the TV with long wires that are passed to whoever is up to sing. 

As soon as we entered our room a few of our students broke out into Vietnamese pop songs. When they finished singing the karaoke program gave them a rating on the screen. We were told that if you got a 1oo you got a free prize. Well, the cool thing about being a teacher here is you can do no wrong. Despite winning the Mt. Pleasant Elementary School vocal music award in 5th Grade and singing in Carnegie Hall in 7th grade, I have one of the worst voices ever. Frankly I'm pretty sure I'm tone deaf--which on a side note makes learning Vietnamese that much harder. Well, to these kids I was Frank Sinatra. I picked up a mic and joined one of the students singing a Vietnamese song and the kids went crazy. Next Ryan and I sang Joan Jett's "I Love Rock And Roll" and had all the kids up and clapping. It was by far the closest I'll ever come to being a rock star. Even stranger than having people actually like hearing me sing was when the karaoke program gave us a score of 100. It was like winning both showcase showdowns. 

Well, everything was going great until the most awkward moment ever. Ryan and I had scouted the karaoke song book and pointed out a bunch of good songs to each other. Being from NJ I naturally pointed out that they had Springsteen. Specifically they had "Born in the USA." Not telling me, Ryan programmed the song in and in a few minutes it was our turn to sing. Immediately I knew this was going to be a very very bad song choice. For those of you who are confused why, it's probably because you never studied the lyrics to this classic song. Let me save you the google search and write down the first two stanzas:

"BORN DOWN IN A DEAD MAN'S TOWN

THE FIRST KICK I TOOK WAS WHEN I HIT THE GROUND

YOU END UP LIKE A DOG THAT'S BEEN BEAT TOO MUCH

TIL YOU SPEND HALF YOUR LIFE JUST COVERING UP

BORN IN THE USA (X 4)

(HERE IS WHERE THE PROBLEM IS)

I GOT IN A LITTLE HOMETOWN JAM

AND SO THEY PUT A RIFLE IN MY HANDS

SENT ME OFF TO VIETNAM

TO GO AND KILL THE YELLOW MAN."

Yes, the lyric is "TO GO AND KILL THE YELLOW MAN." Not exactly the line you want to be singing to a roomful of Vietnamese kids. 

Prior to that stanza all the kids were singing along with us and belting out the chorus. Then the words came on to the screen and Ryan and I looked at each other and completely froze. We just stopped singing as the words flashed across the screen. Luckily I don't really think anyone-- except one fellow American in the room--understood what was being sung. Regardless it made for one of the most, if not the most,  awkard moments ever....in the history of time. 

A Little Slice Of America

A couple of really quick anecdotes: 

1. Last night Ryan and I were mesmerizing the girls with tricks that fathers do to their children when they are 1-4 years old. The girls had never seen the tricks and were completely stunned. The first one that got them all excited was the classic dislodged thumb. I showed Au my two hands and removed my right thumb. She screamed out, "how'd you do that!"

My next trick was even better. I put my thumb between my index finger and middle finger and told Au that I took her nose. Au immediately grabbed her face looking for her nose. Yes, it's a "had to be there" moment but was hilarious. 

2. We just taught the girls about American cooking--we made them guacamole. They had never tasted, let alone heard of the dish. We decided to make it for them after I spotted some avocados at lunch yesterday. I asked the girls what they used them for and they said, "shakes." Yup, they drink avocado shakes here. I immediately ordered one and shared it with Ryan (that's what couples do) -- it was actually quite good. 

3. Last night was my final teaching night here in HCMC. After class the class pet came up to me and gave me a sealed envelope with a note inside (yes, the note will be posted but it's at the hotel at the moment). I felt really good that I had my first student with a crush on me...that is until Ryan told me he got the same note from the girl. 

I just took my Vietnamese language final and got a 99%. How, I don't know. I can speak about twenty words and understand about three...I'm really gonna make it out here...