Motorbike Injury Hospital

(PICTURE: Just a random picture to get the point across.)

Motorbikes are dangerous. Yes, I know you all know that because I've mentioned it a hundred times on my blog. However, recently I had a chance to see exactly how dangerous bikes can be.

I mentioned the other day that Huyen's grandmother was recently in the hospital because she had foot surgery. You may recall that I've talked in the past about how the hospitals in Hanoi are organized by specialties. There’s the eye hospital, the heart hospital, the nose/ear/throat hospital, etc. Well, Huyen's mother was at the Orthopedics hospital specializing in foot/leg/arm injuries. Upon entering the hospital for the first time (I went three times to see her), I immediately realized that the place should be called the Motorbike Injury Hospital. Nearly everyone in the place had been in some kind of traffic accident.

Frankly, the place was gruesome. Nine out of twelve people in Huyen's grandmother's room were wearing some kind of archaic looking cast on their surgically repaired legs. The worst case in the room -- STOP READING HERE IF YOU GET NAUSOUS EASILY -- was a twenty-something-year-old boy who had his leg run over my an automobile. The car or truck (I'm not sure which) had ripped off all of the skin from the boy's calf area and presumably broken his bones there too. The surgeons had had to take off the skin from the boy's thigh to replace the skin from his calf.

As horrible as that story is, it doesn't compare to a patient in the other room who everyone was whispering about on my second visit to the hospital. In the other room was another twenty-something-year-old boy who had gotten into a motorbike accident with a car. I'm not sure what exactly happened but the boy had to have both his legs amputated.

I think I'm writing this blog because I'm clearly a little spooked out after going to the hospital. I've felt awful for the second boy for a week now. On my third visit to the hospital I saw the boy laying in bed and could literally feel my heart sinking for him. Later that night, Huyen and I had dinner with our friends David and Elissa. David has been trying to work-over Elissa for a few months to allow him to get a motorbike. Elissa, rightfully so, is nervous because David had a minor motorbike accident last summer which resulted in some knee surgery. Having come right from the hospital, I basically shot David's chances of getting a bike to hell by talking about all of the motorbike injuries. Elissa had a brilliant idea upon hearing of the hospital. She said that all high schools should have to take a field trip to the hospital to meet patients and hear/see their stories.

Now, Mom, I'm sure you're gonna be a little worried after reading this post. However, the vast majority of people who drive safely on motorbikes don't get into accidents. That said, I'll be just as happy as you are once I give up motor biking for good...

Experiment Over

(PICTURE: These are the temporary walls the city put up at major intersections.)

Last August I wrote a blog post on how Hanoi had changed many of the traffic intersections during the three months that I was away visiting my family. You can read about the genius city planning efforts in my August 10th, 2009 blog post titled, "Cha Cha Cha Changes." Basically the city had decided to get rid of many major intersections by putting up barriers to force people who wanted to go East/West into turning North/South and then making a u-turn. I thought this solution was, well, not so smart. It did more or less decrease traffic jams but also probably led to a lot more accidents as motorbikes/cars/bikes/buses had to now u-turn into faster traffic.

Well, after a little less than a year, the city has seen the error of its ways and officially re-opened the intersections. However, there's one small problem I've noticed so far with the "new" intersections: they forgot to install traffic lights in some. Yeah, I'm serious.

Success!

(PICTURE: Me with my Level 2 class and a few special guests.)

Last week we finished the first cycle of Apex English. Overall, the past three months were quite a success. I can honestly say that almost every single student improved their English skills. There were a couple of students who vastly improved with their speaking, listening and writing. It feels good to see big results in such a short period of time.

I learned a lot over the last three months and I can hopefully apply my new knowledge during the next cycle of the school. Most of the students have expressed interest in taking another class with Apex and ideally we'll be able to recruit more students. I've already decided to lower the cost of classes almost a $1 per class. Apex was already the cheapest language school with a native speaker and will be even more so with the new price tag.

To celebrate the end of our semester, I took both of my classes out to dinner. Here's some pictures from our farewell parties:



(PICTURE: Me with my Level 1 class and freeloading Huyen!)

(PICTURE: I dressed down while everyone else dressed up.)


(Picture: The girls in pink. Huyen and Jamie...who will be doing a guest blog soon!)

World Cup

(PICTURE: Two things I packed -- my safari shirt and USA jersey!)

Four years ago I went to the World Cup in Germany with my buddy Devin. The World Cup was such an amazing experience that we promised each other that we'd make it a tradition to go to every World Cup. Well, four years have passed and today I'm flying to South Africa!!!

I have always wanted to go to Africa and what better opportunity than this? However, as excited as I am, I feel terrible that I can't bring Huyen along. The price tag on the World Cup is ridiculous and frankly I can't afford it myself. If it wasn't for my very generous sugar daddy (Devin) this trip would never have happened. To rationalize going solo, I've decided that this is going to be my three week bachelor party. What could be a better bachelor party than watching sports for a month?

Here I come South Africa!!!


(PICTURE: My buddy Nicky bought me an inflatable giraffe to prepare me for the real thing.)

Things That Really Piss Me Off: PART 2

Here is the second installment of "Things That Really Piss Me Off."

I get it: People run red lights in Vietnam. This happens at every single intersection every single time a light goes from yellow to red. I came to grips with this a long time ago and am now as guilty as millions of other for speeding up at a yellow despite knowing I have no chance of being through the intersection until after the light has turned red. I blame my law breaking on the realization that I had a much better chance of getting into an accident by stopping at a red light than by going through it. When I used to be a good law abiding citizen I had a few close calls of people nearly slamming into me because the last thing they expected was for someone to stop at a red light. I call this type of infraction a LEVEL 1 RED RUN.

A LEVEL 2 RED RUN is much more dangerous and frankly idiotic. A Level 2 Red Run is when people just grow impatient while waiting at a red light and randomly take off into the sea of criss-crossing traffic. I would say that a Level 2 Red Run happens probably 50% of the time at every major intersection in Hanoi. Guys (rarely ever girls) will just dart into oncoming traffic because they're in such a rush to get wherever they are going. Usually the red-light-runner will get across the intersection just a few seconds before everyone else who waited for the light to turn green. It's insane. It's obnoxious. It's dangerous and frankly it frustrates me. However, only the LEVEL 3 RED RUNNERS really piss me off.

A LEVEL 3 RED RUNNER is someone who goes through a red light with a baby on board their bike. The other day I was going home and nearly slammed into a guy and his baby who were running a red light. I slowed down and gave the guy a hard confused stare. I was hoping the guy would be able to interpret my body language which was meant to convey this message: "Hey you fucking idiot! It's one thing to do something stupid to kill yourself and maybe me. It's another thing to kill your few month old baby."

Okay, I feel much better. I'm glad I got these two things off my chest. I promise no more angry ramblings for at least a couple of months.

Things That Really Piss Me Off: PART 1

Every once in a while I need to use the blog as a way to vent. Well, today and tomorrow seem like a good time to let off some steam since I don't have my computer to upload pictures with.

There are plenty of things in Hanoi that piss me off but recently two things have taken the cake. Today I want to ramble about smoking.

One of my claims to fame in life is that I've never smoked a cigarette. I'm pretty damn proud of this; admittedly probably more so than I should be. When I moved to California I couldn't have been happier when the state changed the public smoking laws. No longer did I need to come home from a bar and shower because I smelled like an ashtray. No longer did I need to excuse myself from a group conversation because one of the people was blowing smoke in my face. No longer did I need to break close friends' cigarettes and obnoxiously tell them that "smoking isn't good for your health."

In Vietnam you can smoke everywhere. Seriously everywhere. That's a fact. Think of a place that you think you can't smoke in...go ahead, think of the one place you would think nobody in their right mind would smoke in...go on...keep thinking...


...Okay, hopefully you said, "A HOSPITAL!". Nobody would smoke in a hospital, right? Well, in Vietnam they do. Last week I went to a hospital two times to see Huyen's grandmother who just had foot surgery. In her room -- which had eleven total patients -- there was one fifty something year old guy and his friends who kept on smoking cigarettes. The first time they lit up I think I said out loud, "Are you fucking kidding me?!" But no, they weren't kidding. They were smoking away despite a few "No Smoking" signs in the room.

The only thing that makes me madder than people smoking in a communal hospital room is when I see fathers smoking while holding their babies. This is a regular sight around Hanoi and always makes me shake my head. I mean, sure, you smoke. But can't you put down your baby first and then enjoy a cigarette?

On a final smoking note, I am always a little surprised when I see the personal trainers at my gym standing outside puffing away on cigarettes.

So this blog goes out to all the men in Vietnam: Stop Smoking!...especially around elderly women in hospitals and while holding your babies.

Why do something right the first time?

I'm currently in the midst of my annual computer crisis. Two years ago I had my laptop stolen. Last year I spilled water on my computer while I was home in NJ. This year, well, the computer just decided to go on hiatus. Basically I was typing an email last Thursday when the screen zapped off. Despite my best efforts at resucitation, the computer wouldn't turn back on. I had a moment of panic and called Huyen who told me to relax. She said she would take the computer in to the ishop after she was done with work (I was on my way to teach).

That night, Huyen had good news for me -- there was nothing wrong with my computer. The shop had apparently just hit the power button and it turned right on. Clearly I had tried this but it hadn't worked for me. I then hit the power button on my own and magically my computer turned back on...only to fizz out again one minute later.

The next day Huyen and I went back to the ishop with the computer. We showed it to the same "tech" guys who once again hit the button. This time it didn't turn on. We asked them if they could take a look at the computer and they said, "Oh no, you have to go to to the other ishop across town." It was too late to go to the other ishop so Huyen and I went the next day (this past Saturday).

On Saturday we went to the other ishop and met with the "tech" guy there. The guy hit the on button and stated the obvious, "It won't turn on." We thanked him for his genius observation and asked if he could fix it. He told us that the man who fixes hardware only works Monday-Friday.

During my first moment of free time on Monday morning, I headed to the ishop. I went up to the same tech guy who looked confused to see me. I handed him my laptop and once again he stated that it wouldn't turn on. He then told me that hardware issues could only be fixed at another shop. Yes, this is not what he had told me 48 hours earlier. Luckily the other shop was only a ten minute ride away. I hopped back on my motorbike and shot over to the Mac repair shop.

As soon as I walked into the shop I realized it was the right place. There were a whole bunch of macs on shelves with repair labels on them. I talked to the supervisor who took a look at my mac and gave me a run down on the possible issues and how much each would cost. He told me it would probably take two days to fix which seemed about normal to me. Well, a few hours later he called me and said they fixed the problem and it would be $100. I was more than happy to pay $100 since I know repairs can cost up to $500 or more if there is a major motherboard issue. Upon picking up the computer the man told me that it was now under warranty for three months with his shop. He even placed a sticker on the bottom of my computer to help guide me back to the appropriate place the next time I had an issue.

Well, I have no short term memory problems because the next day I remembered exactly where the shop was. I had to remember because my computer once again had the same problem. The computer isn't getting any power from the power chord and is thus draining the battery. The power chord works and so does the battery so it is something inside the computer that is messed up.

The computer is presently at the shop being repaired again. It has already taken longer than the first time I left it. My fingers are crossed that they don't find any additional problem and that this time, they can fix it correctly.

The point is: 1. I hate computers. 2. There might not be any pictures on my blog for a few days.