Things you may not realize about my life in Vietnam

Paradise Cafe right across from my hotel

1. My favorite after-school snack is Iced Coffee with Bailey's, only $1.25!

Big tub and shower head...just no hot water

2. My fancy hotel does not have hot water.  At least not often.  The water heater is apparently solar powered, an exceptionally bad idea in a country where it rains constantly.  So on a sunny day, we might have hot water.  It's not a big problem, though, because I keep my room at a balmy 75 degrees, and the water is warm-ish, just not hot.

3. I have a nice cubicle with a computer at work, but no classes to teach.  I get to sit there for 8 hours each day and do "prep work".  This involves a lot of laminating and rubrics.  I don't mind too much since they're paying me, but I look forward to teaching in a few weeks when we get more students.

4. Other than beer and public transit, the type of things that I buy here are not much cheaper than in the U.S. - e.g. hairdryer $10, umbrella $5, lunch at the food court $4

5. It's SO much like Rabat.  Let me list the ways:

• lots of cute pregnant dogs on the street
• good local beer, only 60¢ a glass
• dirty streets lined with store fronts selling plastic items, snacks, clothes, phone cards, etc
• relatively overpriced Walmart-type stores (Margane in Rabat, Citimart here)
• mobile phone service that works the same way; in fact, I'm using my Moroccan phone with the little Arabic letters! It was fun to charge it up and read the text messages still on there from Molly, Leila, Romain, Andreas, and Anja. :-)
• strange middle class suburbs (see previous entry, "Suburgatory")

But of course, it's so different from Rabat in that:

• sometimes people eat the stray dogs
• there are fewer stray cats; I don't think they get eaten so much, because people keep them around to control the rats
• people here smile more and (because?) they don't live their life by the Koran (BIG plus)
• I can comfortably sit at a bar or cafe, and drink alcohol in the open air
• I can walk to work in peace.  Sure, I get a few looks and the scooter-taxis might call out to me, but when I ignore them, they continue on.
• we have access to office supplies and a copy machine at work, though we've been warned that paper limitations may be imposed
• I have NO way to communicate with the locals: English doesn't work, French doesn't work, my attempts at Vietnamese don't work, gestures don't work, and pointing at the exact thing I want doesn't always work either.  My only hope is to make some bilingual friends.

6. Though they have obviously embraced capitalism here, there are still scooters that go around blasting propaganda through a loud speaker.

7. Nothing I've eaten has made me sick yet! I haven't been too adventurous, sticking mainly to the places with English menus, but it's good to know that if washed properly, I can handle the veggies.

That's my desk at the back of our cavernous teachers' room

8. I have only 2 co-workers, an American, Don, who has been in Vietnam for 5 years (yes, with a Vietnamese wife, though they are separated now), and a lovely young Brit, Craig, who is the tallest skinniest person in the whole country and is going to have a real hard time finding trousers.

9.  Beer is served with ice.  At least it's the big chunks made from purified water, like what nice American bars use for an Old Fashioned.

10.  There are snails as big as my fist with big beautiful shells.  And yes, they eat them.