Hanoi Kids

(PICTURE: Huyen with our two tour guides.)

I need to write a special thanks to our two tour guides Toan and Viet. Toan and Viet both are volunteer tour guides with the organization Hanoi Kids. Hanoi Kids is a very famous student organization which gives free tours to foreigners in exchange for the chance to practice English. Tra My, one of my favorite students, is a member of this organization and helped get us two tour guides for our day around Hanoi. Originally, Tra My was supposed to be one of our tour guides but she ended up having a final exam on the day of the tour. As much as I would have loved one of my students to lead the tour, our two other guides did a great job.


(PICTURE: Toan in action, telling us about Vietnamese kings and students.)


(PICTURE: Viet perfecting the tour guide point.)

The guides were quite informative and very funny. Toan immediately made a bond with Mark and Anthony who proceeded to corrupt him with false information about America. They told him facts like, "Everyone in America has a gun" and "We all have horses like cowboys." The three of them got along great all day and by that evening Mark and Anthony told me that Toan had facebook friended them (I think by the end of the trip they had at least 30 new Vietnamese facebook friends).

Huyen and I had thought about hiring a tour guide for the day but are really glad that we went with Hanoi Kids. I had a bunch of family members come up to me and say that they really enjoyed being lead around by students. Unlike with paid tour guides, you could tell that the students also loved being able to lead around foreigners.

So, if you're coming to Hanoi anytime soon, you might want to contact Hanoi Kids about giving you a tour! Here's their contact information:

Ms Loan -Tour operation Dept.

+84 972 518 680

Ms Hà Ngân - Tour operation Dept.

+84 166 503 4898

Mr Tùng

+ 84 972 880 551

hanoikidsvngmail.com

Tour of Hanoi

(PICTURE: Our tour group at the Temple of Literature.)

As a present to our guests, Huyen and I organized a tour of Hanoi on the 17th. We hired a small bus and picked up everyone in the morning at their hotels. We started the day off at the Army Museum where our tour guides (more on them tomorrow) told us about the organization of the museum and showed us the key exhibits. The Army Museum isn't my favorite museum but I like to take guests there because of the old planes, helicopoters and tanks as well as the historical citadel tower.


(PICTURE: Enlarge the picture and you can see my Uncle Barry at the top of the tower.)

One of the highlights of this stop was that there was a local school on a field trip at the museum. As everyone knows, there's few things in life cuter than dozens of children at a museum. Seemingly, every camera soon became pointed at the kids who were more than happy to pose for pictures. However, that wasn't the highlight; the highlight was when the students' teacher came up to Paul, the father of one of my best friends, and asked to take a picture with him. Well, he sort of didn't really ask so much as pull him in front of an old helicopter. And he didn't exactly have a camera of his own; he asked me to take a picture of him with my camera.


(PICTURE: Paul getting up close and personal with a local teacher.)

The next stop on our tour was the Temple of Literature, the first university in Vietnam. I've been to this historic site no less than ten times (and went again a week later with my buddy JR) yet this time was by far the most special. Seeing all of my family and friends walk around the ruins was really an amazing site to see.

(PICTURE: Hannah and me making our frog faces; the exact same picture we took two years ago.)


(PICTURE: My dad in front of a pagoda flag.)


(PICTURE: Mark and Anthony in front of a giant bell.)

After the Temple of Literature, we ate lunch at KOTO. KOTO is not one of my favorite restaurants for food but I decided to take everyone there for two reasons:
Reason 1: It's a nice and clean place which would please some of my non-street-food-eating guests.
Reason 2: More importantly, KOTO is a charitable organization that takes street kids and teaches them skills to work in the service industry.

My parents picked up the tab for lunch for everyone and made me very proud when my father said something like, "Lunch is on us. However, on your way out, please donate whatever you want to the charity." I thought this was pretty awesome of my parents.

Following lunch we went to the Hanoi Hilton, the famous prison where John McCain was imprisoned. Following our brief tour their, we boarded the bus and went to the Water Puppet Theater. If you're a long time reader of my blog, you'll know that I've always been anti water puppets. This hatred stems back to my first weeks in Vietnam when I saw an atrocious show in HCMC. However, I must admit, with the live music and the artistry of the puppets, the show in Hanoi was actually quite entertaining.

After the puppets finished, the tour ended and everyone had a couple of hours to relax before dinner...

My Wife's Name

(PICTURE: This picture makes more sense later in the blog entry.)

Before I begin to blog about the wedding, I need to take a step back and address an important issue: my wife's name.

In the past, the issue with Huyen's name was how to pronounce her name. Clearly her name isn't easy to say since most westerners have never known someone named Huyen. We covered this issue on September 18th, 2008 on a video on the blog. Check out that video for a quick refresher on how to say Huyen's name. Many of my family members used to say Huyen's name incorrectly but for the most part everyone has gotten it down by now.

But that's not what this blog is about. This blog is about knowing that her name is HUYEN and NOT NGUYEN. Nguyen is Huyen's last name. It is a very common Vietnamese last name that I'd say roughly 25% of the population has. For some reason though, in the last few months people keep emailing me, "Congrats to you and Nguyen" or "Tell Nguyen congrats" or something like that. Seriously more people have been calling Huyen by her last name than first. Recently one of my friends who spent a WEEK with Huyen emailed me, "Congrats to you and Nguyen." This sort of put me over the edge because my friend had spent considerable time with her so there really wasn't an excuse. I emailed him right back and said, "Dude, her name is Huyen!" My friend then immediately wrote back and apologized. He said, "I was 99% sure her name was Huyen but I looked on Facebook and it said Nguyen Huyen so I thought I had always been calling her by her last name."

Sooooooooo, let me just set the record straight: In many Asian countries, people put their family name first and their first name last. Yes, this can be confusing for us westerners but that's the way it is out here. Think about it this way: Do you know the famous basketball player Yao Ming? On the back of his jersey it says YAO, not Ming. That is because Yao is his family/last name. Ming is his first name.

Anyway, I appreciate the kind words people have emailed me but please in the future call my wife by her first name -- Huyen! Thanks.

For those of you who thought this blog was about Huyen taking my last name, that's not gonna happen. For one, I've always said that I would want my wife to keep her last name. Personally, I wouldn't want to change my last name so why should she unless she had a big desire to. Secondly, I can't imagine the paperwork headache we'd have to go through with immigration for her to change her last name. That's a hurdle I have no interest in jumping over. Thirdly, in Vietnam, women don't take their husband's name. Finally, I love Huyen's name just the way it is.

Okay, now without delay, the wedding posts...

Glowing

(PICTURE: The soon-to-be married couple a few days before tying the knot.)

Huyen and I went back to work on Monday despite being absolutely exhausted from the last couple of weeks. During my first class, my students naturally asked me a lot of questions about the wedding. I began to tell them everything and was absolutely glowing with happiness while recounting some of the stories (which haven't been recounted on the blog yet!). Well, after I finished smiling/talking for a solid 10 minutes, I turned to my student who had gotten married two days before Huyen and me. I said to her, "So ___ how was your wedding." She looked at me, gave a slight smile and then said, "Not good." My heart immediately sank and I felt like a total jerk for glowing about my wedding. I then said, "Why wasn't it good?" She then let out a little exhale and said, "Well, my husband and I were supposed to go to Sapa for our honeymoon but he had --- what's the word in English --- diarrhea and we couldn't go." I couldn't help myself but I let out huge explosive laughter. I thought she was going to say something like, "We called off the wedding" or "He got cold feet." Instead she told me (and her four coworkers in the room) about her husband's three day bout with the runs. After she finished describing his ailment I said to her, "I guess you had a pretty shitty honeymoon."

Over the next week or two (or as long as I can drag out these wedding posts) I'm going to try and recount all of the stories from the wedding and "honeymoon." So many things happened in a week that I'm sure I'll forget some things. However, I'll do my best to blog about all the highs and lows of the August-Nguyen wedding!

Home Cooking!

(PICTURE: Masumi and Kensuke at the army museum.)

A couple of days before they arrived, Masumi emailed me asking if she could bring me anything from Japan. Without hesitation, I emailed back something like, "Anything that you or your mom want to cook!"

While I was in Japan, my blog basically became a food blog thanks to Masumi's amazing cooking. Almost every week I dined at their house and stuffed myself with delicious Japanese food and tasty sake. Well, while waiting for my sister in the lobby of the hotel on the 16th, Kensuke ran upstairs and brought back a bag of goodies. First, there were five delicious rice balls that Masumi had made (two tuna and three apricot). Secondly there was a plastic bag filled with Masumi's mom's carrot and squid salad which was also scrumptious. Besides that though, Masumi and Kensuke gave Huyen and me a HUGE bottle of my favorite sake. This was a very thoughtful gift but it made me a little bit sad because every time I drink the sake, I'm going to be wishing Masumi and Kensuke were there with me to drink! Finally, they gave us a beautiful wedding gift - gorgeous ceramic chopstick holders for our home. Now every time we eat a meal we can always think of them!

Huyen and I were really honored that Masumi and Kensuke came to our wedding. Although they live in Asia, it is still a very long trip for them. In total, between a night bus to Tokyo and their flight, it took them 19 hours to get here. Besides that though, the end of the year is Kensuke's busiest time at work. I remember last year he often was working until 2AM in December. Basically his job all year long is to prepare an event for their city which happens right after the New Year which means December is crunch time. Kensuke put in extra time at work in the weeks prior to the wedding so that they could take five days off and come to Hanoi. I was truly touched by this. I've said it before and I'll say it again, although I was in Japan for only a few months, I made some of the best friends I'll ever have in Masumi and Kensuke.

Hannah's Ao Dai: Part II

A couple of months ago I wrote about getting a traditional Vietnamese Ao Dai made for my sister Hannah. I had asked her for about twenty different measurements, which she obliged me with by using a tape-measure and emailing me the numbers. I gave those numbers as well as some nice fabric to a seamstress in Hue and picked up the dress the next day.

Hannah and I were both skeptical that the dress would fit her; Hannah brought a spare outfit to wear to the wedding and I had prepared some time the day after her arrival to go to a tailor for alterations. However, just moments after Hannah arrived at midnight on the 16th, she tried on the Ao Dai and it fit perfectly!! Indeed everything was coming together for the wedding...

Dvorak Night

(PICTURE: Back row from left to right: Sebastian, Mark, Huyen, Me, Masumi, Kensuke, Herb, Anthony and Mark. Front/Middle row from left to right: Barry, my mom, Donna, Pat, my dad, Heather, Paul and Urszula.)

By the 16th, fifteen people had already arrived in town. As a present to the early arrivers, Huyen and I took everyone to see the Vietnam National Symphony Orchestra at the Hanoi Opera House. As I've written on the blog before, going to the opera house is one of my favorite things to do. You can often see amazing performances for extremely low prices. When the Opera House announced their December schedule, I quickly snatched up tickets for everyone thinking it would be a relaxing way to adjust to the craziness of Vietnam. Well, between jet lag and the calming sounds of Dvorak, it turned out to be too relaxing for some. At some point I turned around and saw no less than half of my guests sleeping! Yeah, I guess listening to classical musical on a few hours sleep isn't the best idea.

In a case of it being a very small world, the conductor of the performance that night was Honna Tetsuji who is the music director and principal conductor of the the Vietnam Symphony Orchestra. When I emailed my guests to see who wanted to go to the symphony, I got a very excited reply from Masumi and Kensuke who told me that Honna Tetsuji was from Koryama, the city they're from and that I lived and worked in last year. Masumi and Kensuke actually emailed Honna Tetsuji and then briefly met up with him backstage after the show.

With just a few days to go before the wedding, everything was really coming together!