How to Make a Good Transition into a New School and a New Country-according to Janet

The count down to the last day of work at our current school is on. (75 days as of this blog posting) We are excited to close this chapter in our lives and to move on to greener pastures.  I have been thinking a lot about the transition to our new school.  This year alone, I have observed several new staff members begin at our current school.  Their success at the school depended on how they transitioned into the school and the city.

Here are some good transitional behaviors-in my opinion:
1. Get to know the local staff-they have been here the longest
2. Learn and say everyone's name correctly-practice it until you get it right
3. Ask questions- what is already working well-no need to reinvent the wheel
4. Look at the big picture-myopic viewpoints are problematic
5. Ask what makes a good leader/teacher/person according to the local staff-Here in Hanoi, a smile makes you an effective leader regardless of what you actually do.  Even if you don't understand it, you need to respect the local customs.
6. Get out into the city you now live in.  Explore!
7. Respect the experience and insights of staff members who have been in the city longer than you, but also take their advice with several grains of salt.
8. Be honest about your work history and your reasons for teaching overseas
9. Know that you do not speak for your entire country, you only speak for yourself but people will judge your country by what you say and do
10. Shake off any negative things  you may have gone through at your last school-new country, new school, new outlook

Alright, now all I need to do is get through the next 75 working days and then I can use my own advice.
~Deep breaths~

Isn't this post Hue over due?

Get it? The title is a pun on a town in Vietnam. You pronounce is h-ay. Exhale on the "h" friends and say "-ay". I guess it doesn't matter how you say it. I won't be there to see you/correct you. We haven't posted about our Tet trip and our adventures in Hue and Hoi An. Well.....time slips a-hue (get it???) when you are busy/coaches of a soccer team/reading novels/not doing your taxes/etc. I haven't been that enthusiastic about writing a post. Who is reading these posts any way? Family members and spammers. Shout out to the family members....holla! Thank you for your support. Anyway.....let us go back to February when I was supposed to post this............ Jeff's Uncle Jon was visiting us and his visit coincided with Tet.  You've read about that.
We ventured off to the ancient city of Hue.  The last king's of Hue gave their name to most of the Vietnamese, Nguyen.  They took the name in honor of the king who the people liked.  The history of the last king in Hue and their relationship with France is quite interesting to read about.

  Jeff is trying to fit into the Vin Moch tunnels. The tunnels were used by villagers during the Vietnam war. It was awful. They had to live in there during the war. Jeff and I could both barely stand up and Jon's claustrophobia flared up too badly for him even to attempt the tunnels. I don't blame him. I hated every second I had to spend in the tunnels and it wasn't even close to the amount of time other people had to spend during the war. Yech.



We went to Hue to see the Imperial City. It was so cool. We got to dress up as Emperores and Empress. I really loved this part. I think everyone did as evidenced by our epic photo shoot:

In a word: awesome.  If you go to Hue, visit the Imperial City and have your very own photo shoot.

Preconceived Notions About Vietnam

About a year ago, we were interviewing for international teaching jobs.  Once we accepted our current post, I began reading.  I mean READING about Vietnam.  From internet blogs to every.single.book. in our city library and some I purchased from the internet.

Here is a list of things I found to be commonly held beliefs about Vietnam:

1. You (big fat Americans, or anyone over 5'8") will not be able to find clothes or shoes to fit you.

False!  I bought an absolutely cute skirt and a pair of boots last weekend.  It was in our 'western' part of town, but it is a part of Hanoi: 2012.  Plus, you can get anything you want tailored.  If I wanted to, I could get shoes cobbled.  Seriously, cobbled.  I just have to go to Shoe Street or Hoi An (a city famous for their tailors and cobblers).

2. There are no imported foods like cheese, cereal, tortillas, or salsa.

False!  Our local shop has most of these things and I know where to find the other items....just down our road.  Prices are high and selection is low, but these things are available.

3. Everyone is going to scam you.

False!  Admittedly, some Vietnamese people are trying to scam you .  By saying that everyone is, you are painting an entire country with the same brush.  Who hasn't been scammed in some other city, (by gasp), a non-Vietnamese person. Just be careful and pay attention to where that taxi is taking you.  If you see the same side of the lake twice or they don't run the meter, get out!  Otherwise, there are a couple of other scams running in the Old Quarter run by girls who speak English really well-they ask you to buy toothpicks and then try to snatch your wallet.  Just walk away from these girls.  If you don't stop, you won't get robbed, by them at least.

I've heard some people say that the higher prices for foreigners is a 'scam'.  I disagree.  Yes, the prices are a bit higher for us here than they are for local people.  However, prices are super low here on everything except for gas.  I don't really mind paying a couple of extra cents more.  That is all it really amounts to.  Quibbling over a nickle is not worth it to me.

4. Street food will make you sick.

Jury is still out on this one.  Jeff and I haven't been very sick while living here but we mostly go to places were we can see them cooking the food.  Plus, we cook (ahem) Jeff cooks a lot at home.  I don't really understand people's fear of street food.  I love Bun Cha and they cook it all on the side of the road with couple of hot coals.  Love it!  We get chicken on a stick from our "chicken on a stick lady" and she laughs at us and our attempts at speaking Vietnamese.  I think we are a novelty and she expects us to speak Vietnamese because we eat like Vietnamese people.  Pull over our motorbikes and get a couple of sticks of meat.  Get back on the motorbikes.

5. You will get robbed.
True- Most people I know have been robbed here.  Including me!  I know part of the blame was me and the way I was holding my purse on my motorbike.  The other part of the blame was the robbers (of course).  Now, I do things differently when I get on my bike.  I have down sized my purse so it fits either in the seat of my motorbike or inside my jacket. I think for hot weather, I will put it in my bike seat.  Of course, I have to remember to take it out of the seat when I get off the bike.  Breaking into my bike seat is easy.

Here are some other precautions we take when going out and about.  We don't pack more than one ATM card.  Either I take one or Jeff takes one but not both of us.  That way, if we do get robbed there is still an ATM card at home.  This isn't only because we might be robbed, but getting a new ATM card is a huge pain due to banking hours and locations.  We could leave both at home but sometimes we need extra cash.  Depends on what we are doing that day.  Jeff puts his wallet in a buttoned pocket or his front pocket.  We try not to have a lot extra cash with us.  Just enough for the day's activities.  A lot of the time, I won't even take a purse if we are going to the Old Quarter.  Although, thieves wouldn't notice me in the sea of backpackers walking around the Old Quarter with their backpacks and giant cameras screaming rob me instead of Janet.

Those are just five things I read again and again about Hanoi and Vietnam.  I'm not sure if they were written by people who were just here for a few weeks or by people who generally didn't like Vietnam. Regardless, it is nice to see how things really are for yourself.

Teacher, Tailor, Solider, Spy?

This year for Christmas, Jeff and I decided to get some clothes tailor made for us.  Buying off of the rack in Vietnam is, well, impossible for us.  Even if I could shoe horn my way into clothes, they would be too short. Neither of us fit in the mold here.  No worries though, there are enough tailors in this country willing to outfit us in style.

Before we went on our Christmas vacation, we ventured into the Old Quarter.  In the past, the Old Quarter has usually resulted in tears (for me) and general unhappiness (for Jeff).  The Old Quarter is a rough place.  It is jammed packed with people, motor bikes, and a heap of backpackers.  We typically get lost, hungry, and dehydrated.  Never the less, we sallied forth to Hang Gai street.  Hang Gai street is a street devoted to silk and tailoring.  Jeff was the first to be outfitted.  He ordered a suit and three shirts all for $320.  We picked them up today and the suit and shirts fit Jeff perfectly!

We picked out every part of the suit, from the cloth on the outside to the silk lining on the inside.

Every girl is crazy about a sharp dressed man!

My tailor adventure was less successful.  I ordered three dresses and I was really excited about all three of them.  Unfortunately,when I showed up at the shop only two dresses were made.  They were two simple dresses and the tailoring quality just wasn't there.  The dresses cost about $28 each.  Not too bad but I won't go back to that shop.  I think my next tailoring adventure will be at the same shop that Jeff got his suit made at.  

Overall, our day in the Old Quarter was a success.  No tears on my part and we actually knew where we were.  A huge improvement over almost every other trip! 

Rules?

I think I've posted this quote before.  I know I mention this quote 8-11 times a week.  In The Big Lebowski, John Goodman utters the phrase: "This isn't Vietnam...There are rules."
Although he was talking about the Vietnam War (American war as it is known here) the comment still holds true, there are no rules.

Coming home from school on Wednesday I saw two things.  One, in Ciputra where the school is (a very nice, gated community) a 4 year old girl was squatting and peeing into the fountain.  Nope, it was around the back of the fountain.  Nope, her dad wasn't shielding her from everyone watching.  He was simply sitting on his motorbike, not even pulled over all the way.  The fountain, by the way, is the center point of a round-a-bout so she was dead center in the middle of traffic.  Two, we see this everyday, but it really struck me this time.  We come home on the lake road.  All along the road lovers stop on their motorbikes and cuddle.  Enterprising women sell drinks and snacks to people who are lounging on floor mats.  And...cars think that they are tiny.   No cars should be allowed on the road.  It is often barely wide enough for 1 car.   Two cars passing each other is common though.  Both hike a wheel up on the sidewalk and at about 2km an hour they ease past each other.  The motorbike community can't seem to understand why they must go slowly so from both ends, people honk through the whole ordeal.  This happened about 7 times on Wednesday.  It is terrifying when an SUV (overkill of a car in a city where the top speed is 45km and roads are repaired quickly) and a bus passed each other.  Restrictions on where to drive: none-there are no rules.

Today Burger King opened!  After our softball games (one planned, two against a Taiwanese A/B team who happened to be on the adjacent field) I went to the new Burger King with our school's PE teacher and his kids.  Oddly enough he lived 3 doors down from me in Indonesia in the mid-90's.  I was so excited for BK that I didn't think about the price.  Whopper JR in the USA: $1 Vietnam: $4.  Large coke in the USA: actually large Vietnam: size of a US small.  Anyway, I was just so pleased that it tasted exactly the same.  So price gouging: no rules.

Janet's motorbike ran out of gas on Friday (gas gauge doesn't work).  It was a surprisingly easy problem to fix.  I took a large water bottle, went to the gas station, and they filled it.  The attendant's only question was: "full?"  and "How long you live here?"  It was not the least bit odd to him that I was getting gas put into an unapproved container that would actually melt if I left the gas in it overnight.  He also asked if I spoke any Vietnamese, his English was good, good enough that he should have asked: "Why the hell are you bringing a water bottle to get filled with petrol?!?!" and "You crazy American, you are going to start a fire!"  Nope, I just strapped the green liquid (petrol is yellow in the USA, green here) to the rack on my bike said "Com-un" (Thank you) and zipped off.  There is a rule against this everywhere else in the world!!!!  In Vietnam, there are no rules.

Cooking Vietnamese Street Food

We had a fun weekend of playing tourist again.  We took a class at the Hanoi Cooking School with some fellow teachers and some tourists.  The menu was Vietnamese street food which was makes sense.  We started off with some iced-...tea(?) made from a licorice tasting fruit that smelled like figs.  It wasn't bad, it wasn't good, it was unique.
First, we went to the local market in the Old Quarter.  It is a big version of the market that we shop at with a few more animal parts available.

How we buy our veggies if we don't go to Metro - we stick with cucumbers, tomatoes, onion, potatoes, peanuts and cabbage.  We don't bother with the muddy greens or tofu.  The veggies are fresh as ever, but you have to wash a lot of dirt off most or them, especially potatoes and onions.

Bored of chicken eggs that have been laid?  No problem, we've got chicken uterus and un-laid eggs.  They are... fresher(?) than laid eggs?

We also had some eggs that were on the other end of the spectrum, but we'll get to that later.

Could one of these toads escape?  Of course!  One was hopping along the ground just seconds after I took this picture

In the market that we shop at, the toads aren't in bags.  They are tied together with plastic string and left to hop around.  If they could only hop in the same direction, the could escape, but alas, toads don't cooperate with each other.

Plastic string is used to tie up these crabs.

Tripe being made into sausage.

Chickens.

Prawns!!!!!  Not to cheap though, 7 bucks a pound.  Still less than half of what it would be in the US though.

If you're tired, just sleep next to the fish.

Escargo.

 Fish.

Clams in large flat shells, not sure what kind of clams they are.

Goose eggs in the closest basket.  Chicken eggs to the right and fertilized duck eggs in the bag in the second basket.  (we'll see the inside of those eggs soon).

Piggy ears.

Quail eggs are cheaper than any other type.

Lungs, intestines and everything else you find inside a pig.  I've never seen lungs for sale but everyone here had them.

Squirmy eels.

This pig is missing his eyes.

Pig face, should your recipe call for it, it is available in Hanoi.

If you're not into everything else.  You can also get normal cuts of meat.

We went back to the cooking school.  The class was a mixture of demonstration and preparing our part of the meal.  Everything was in dishes (sugar/fish sauce and such) and we did a bit of cutting and mixing.  It was fun and informative.  We had looked at other menu options that may have taught us more about cooking, but this was the most appropriate menu to learn even if it was quite easy.

 Rice vinegar with sugar dissolved into it.  Then add fish sauce, diced chili and garlic and fancy green papaya and carrot.

Those eggs I mentioned.  The fertilized duck eggs were weird but delicious.  It was boiled for about 15 minutes.  Long enough to cool the yoke and the tiny baby duck.

 

See the little duck guy in there?  With a dash of dried chili and salt it tastes like hard boiled egg and duck.

We also made some normal food.  Spring rolls:

Vietnamese green papaya salad (with the same sauce as the dipping sauce).

Flambeing some bananas covered in sugar.  These were later simmered in coconut milk with nuts.

West Lake Prawn cakes are a batter that is mixed with sweet potato strips.  Stick two prawns on top and deep fry  - eat without peeling the prawns.  The exoskeleton just adds to the crunch!