Crew Cut

(PICTURE: With my friend Lori nearly five years ago when I was sporting a crew cut.)

Before I left Vietnam I had a haircut from my local street barber. The guy chopped off all my hair which isn't what I wanted him to do, but gave me a good reason to save $20 on a haircut in America. The day I returned to Hanoi, Huyen and I drove to the barber to get a trim. However, it must have been his one day off during the year because he wasn't there.

The next day we randomly pulled up to another street barber and asked him to cut my hair. I told Huyen to tell him to just cut a little. She told him that and gestured how much to cut off. He said that he understood and then chopped off all my hair. Huyen said to him, "I said just a little!" The barber said, "Yeah but he will look better without his curls." I now have the shortest haircut I've had in a good three or four years. Looks like I won't need to get another haircut until after Japan!

Fuzzy Fruit

Yesterday I mentioned how expecting parents should beware of giving birth on certain days of the lunar calendar. Well, here's a second warning: pregnant women should not eat fuzzy fruit unless they want hairy children. Actually that's not totally true -- you can eat fuzzy (or hairy as they say here) fruit as long as you remove the skin.

We're talking about the future of your children so heed the warning! If you want hairy children eat a peach every day. If you want hairless children stay away from the fuzz!!!

No Peanuts In The Pool

When I went to Cape May with my family last month, I remember that Lilah was required to wear a certain type of diaper in the pool at the complex we stayed in. Silly me thought that all diapers were water-proof and didn't realize there's extra special water proof diapers for pools. In America they're such sticklers for hygiene (read that sentence with sarcasm).

As you can imagine the rules for kids aren't as stringent in Vietnam as they are in America. The other day I went to a pool with Huyen's family. The pool was huge and packed with probably a hundred Vietnamese people. I attempted to swim laps but there was really no shot it was going to happen. I was also slightly grossed out by the bottom of the pool which clearly hadn't been cleaned since...well, maybe ever.

Huyen's nephew Viet Hoang decided to he wanted to "swim" and was carried around in the pool by Huyen. Viet Hoang kept saying, "Let me go. I can swim." Huyen, using her better judgement, didn't let go since Viet Hoang would have sunk like a rock.

After a few minutes, Viet Hoang's dad took Viet Hoang out of the pool and much to my surprise took off his bathing suit. It was an even bigger surprise when he then encourage Viet Hoang to jump back into the pool. It was then an even bigger surprise when Viet Hoang proceeded to jump towards me! It was like slow-motion as this naked three year old catapulted in the air at me. I caught him in my arms and gingerlly held him at arms length until Huyen took him from me. I was then an even a bigger surprise when the lifeguard -- the lifeguard himself being the biggest surprise of the day since I've never seen a lifeguard in Vietnam -- blew his whistle and ran over to us. I thought to myself, "It must be against the rules to swim naked in a community pool." The lifeguard said something to Huyen and Viet Hoang's dad and they both started to laugh. I asked what he said and Huyen told me that, "There's no peanuts in the pool." I then asked if Viet Hoang needed to get out and she said, "No! He was only joking."

Yup, no rules.

For the record, in defense of Vietnamese people, I asked if Viet Hoang knew not to pee in the pool. Huyen told me that he knew that and said that Vietnamese people don't pee in the pool...and well, that's more than I can say for all of us Americans!

The Lunar Calendar

Despite having lived in Vietnam for over a year, I'm still constantly hearing things that make me shake my head and say, "Really?"

The other day Huyen told me about her co-worker who just gave birth to a baby boy. The coworker was very concerned because the boy was born on the first day of the lunar month. According to Huyen, it's very bad if boys are born on the first day of the lunar month because it means they're going to be "strange" and "difficult to raise."

If you're curious, it's equally worrisome to give birth to a girl in the middle of the lunar month.

A little advice from Ahoy Hanoi for those of you who are starting to think about having a baby: I would suggest consulting a lunar calendar before conception. As crazy as some of the things I hear out here are, there's often some truth to them!

The War

People don't often bring up the war with America but sometimes stories are told. While at Huyen's uncle's house this past weekend two things were said. First, Huyen's 98-year-old great grandmother said to me, "The Americans left thirty or forty years ago. Why are you still here?"

When she asked the question everyone had a good laugh. I'm pretty sure she didn't intend to be rude and I didn't feel insulted in the least. I think she was generally curious why I was in Vietnam. In fact, Huyen's great grandmother actually really likes me and often holds my hand. She also told me this past weekend that I have a really nice smile.

The other mention of the war came from Huyen's grandmother. Her grandmother told us that during the war an American plane was shot down in her village (the village we were all gathered in). The pilot survived the crash and the villagers took him out of the cockpit. She said the injured pilot was too heavy to carry so they put him on a plow/cart, pulled by a water buffalo. She said that as they pulled him through the village all the children would run up to soldier and yank out his leg hair. The way she told it, the children weren't trying to be mean, they were just curious about this hairy person who had dropped from the sky.

I asked what happened to the soldier and she said they took him to a prison.

I think she told this story not because she wanted to talk about the war, but because she wanted to talk about hairy foreigners. I was wearing a t-shirt and my hairy forearms were on full display. Vietnamese, like most Asians, aren't exactly hairy. I'm a hairy beast out here and many times people have randomly felt my arm hair. I think Huyen's grandmother looked at my arms and it triggered the story.

Magical Moment

Enclosed in my suitcase on my return trip to Vietnam were a bunch of presents for Huyen's family. One of the presents I had was for Viet Huong, Huyen's nephew. My mother bought Viet Huong a copy of her favorite children's book, "The Runaway Bunny" by Margaret Wise Brown.

I gave the book to Viet Huong on Saturday and he looked less than interested. He can't read English and the book was less exciting to him than the licroice Nibs I gave him (which he didn't end up liking!). Well, the next day Huyen and I met up with her family again for the anniversary of her great grandmother's death. We drove out to her Uncle's house and spent the afternoon with her mother, brother, sister, brother-in-law, nephew, great grandmother, grandparents, aunts and cousins. When I first saw Viet Hoang that day he was still clutching the book. This made me feel a lot better that my mother had chosen a good gift for him. Well, it got even better.

After lunch Viet Huong came up to Huyen and sat on her lap. He handed her the book and asked her to translate it for him. We ended up having story time. Five children gathered around us and we began to read the book. I would read a page in English and Huyen would then translate in Vietnamese while I showed off the pictures. To say the children were mesmerized would be an understatement. When we finally finished reading, Viet Hoang announced, "I'm going to runaway!"

Reading the book out loud took on additional meaning for me. For those of you who haven't read the book (and you should yell at your mom for not reading it to you) it's about a bunny who runs away from home but is always followed by his mother. The lesson is that no matter where you go your mother will be with you. I wouldn't say that I've run away from home but I'm 10,000 miles away from [REDACTED]. And while my mother isn't physically following me around the globe, she's obviously always in my thoughts.

But reading the book this past Sunday took on even more meaning. While at her family's house, Huyen's sister was giving me a hard time about one day moving to America with Huyen. Huyen's sister is already mad at her other sister because she lives in Hue, about a fourteen hour bus ride away. To say she isn't happy with the notion of her sister being a 24 flight away would be putting it lightly. Huyen's family obviously wants her to stay in Vietnam and it's going to be really hard when she and I eventually live in America. Being a "run away bunny" isn't easy for anyone!

Cha Cha Cha Changes...

I was away from America for fifteen months yet there weren't any big changes in how it looked to me. There were only two significant things that I noticed:

1. In New York City, around Time Square, Broadway was closed and turned into a pedestrian area. Where there used to be a lot of traffic, people are now congregating and hanging out on lawn chairs. The traffic, well, it's been pushed to all the surrounding avenues.

2. In Livingston, under the guidance of Mayor August, the town is constructing a huge Town Hall/Police Station/Court House.

Besides these two things all seemed about the same back in the good old U S of A. Well, things aren't as stagnate here in Hanoi. I was away for only three months yet the city has changed a lot. Specifically, in an attempt to combat the horrific traffic, the city has changed the flow of traffic all over the city.
(PICTURE: These metal barricades are a common fixture on the streets of Hanoi these days.)

I've noticed about ten places already that used to be four way intersection but are now just two lane roads. I keep riding around on Huyen's motorbike, finding myself having to make U-turns or use alternative routes to get places. A couple of the changes are fantastic and you can really see tangible results in the flow of traffic. Some other places though really make no sense. In two former big intersections there is now a steady congestion of cars and bikes making U-turns into head on traffic. One thing hasn't changed though -- riding a bike keeps your heart pumping!