I’ve been here two months now and I’ve just had an epiphany about Saigon traffic. There are three simple rules: Go Slow. Do No Harm. Don’t Hit Anyone.
There are other “guidelines” such as automobiles stay to the left of the flow and everything else, bikes, cyclos, motorbikes and pushcarts keeps to the right. There are also traffic lights, but they are for the most part advisory. These are the two structural guidelines that help ensure that rules #2 and #3 are achieved.
There is one and only one safety device - the horn. Both taxis and motorbikes use them constantly, but they too are advisory - "I'm behind you, please ease over to the side." And, your area of concern as a driver is always in front of you. Most vehicles have mirrors, but it's dangerous to look back. Your job is to avoid running into someone ahead of you. If you look in the mirror you will.
In Vietnam motorbikes go anywhere and everywhere that it is possible to squeeze in – between cars, to the left of the cars if there’s a space, on the sidewalk if there’s not and the wrong way on a one-way street if that’s where they need to go. Bicycles roll along in the middle of it all. At first I thought they would stay to the far right, but that was faulty Western thinking. They ride right down the center of the motorbike side. That’s possible because of Rule #1: no one goes fast. Even when the road looks open, which it seldom is, no one dares to go fast. There is always someone entering the road from the sidewalk or an alley or a side street. Almost all motorbike parking is in organized clusters on the sidewalk, and there’s only one way to get into traffic and that’s off the curb.
Cars obey the “go slow” rule diligently. They can do serious harm if anything goes amiss. So they go slow. Most of the cars are taxis and I haven’t been in one yet that had an automatic transmission. I don’t get that at all. In a world where everything operates in slow motion and forward progress is often inches at a time, why don’t the cars have automatic transmissions? I’ve asked the question of lots of people and no one seems to know. The best guess is that cars with manual transmissions are cheaper. I’m not buying it, but it could be true. Cars are very expensive – there’s a serious tax levied on any car that’s sold in Vietnam. Still, taxis rarely get out of first or second gear and often they stall because the driver is in the wrong gear and it lugs down. I can’t believe that an automatic transmission wouldn’t save money in the long run with all the transmission and clutch repair on the manuals.
Anyway, cars go slowly and because they travel on the left when they need to turn right they do a very slow maneuver through the motorbikes and everyone makes room or weaves around as the taxi eases across. Not only do they make this seemingly impossible maneuver in a sea of motorbikes, but they also think nothing of making a U-turn. In the US if someone tried that he would end up in the slammer or the hospital.
But that brings up the most interesting thing about Saigon traffic: road rage is unheard of. I don’t know if it is the Buddhist influence or something more basic in the make up of the people, but millions of people travel the roads every day and I have never seen anyone scowl or shake a fist at anyone else no matter how egregious the offense. It is very Zen-like to be in the flow.
Nothing is perfect; I’ve seen motorbikes down in the street, but to me it’s a miracle that there isn’t a pile up at every corner. Next time I’ll tell you about crossing the street… It's best characterized as risk management.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Flying Solo
I’ve spent a lot of my adult life traveling and more often than not it has been solo. Sometimes that was by choice and sometimes it came with the job. When I was 25 I spent 6 months wandering around Europe with my guitar and for 19 years, as a Pan Am pilot, I was on my own for dinner in strange locations at least half of every month. I learned how to do things on my own early and that probably made it seem normal even if it wasn’t.
Over the years I’ve gotten a lot of questions about how to deal with so much solo time and how to think about eating out as a solitary traveler in a strange new place. Those questions seem a little odd to me, but that may be because I’ve done a lot of it. I learned to like the quiet time that lets me savor new places, new tastes and people watching without the distraction of other voices and other eyes. I do like traveling with Marilynn because her eyes are seeing foreign places for the first time, and it adds a layer of newness to places I’ve already seen. But I still like going it alone too.
Saigon is a new place for me, and I love the newness. For the first month, while Marilynn was here, we explored it together. She’s gone now, and I’m flying solo again. As an inveterate list maker I'm working on a list of all the new (to me) Saigon restaurants. I started on September 5th, and there are 31 Saigon and 3 Danang restaurants on the list now.
There are times after a long work week when I’d rather veg out on the couch with a beer, a few pieces of cheese, and some olives than haul my ass out to dinner. But today was relaxing and tonight I tried a stylish new place called Sandals that I've walked by a dozen times. It’s in the heart of town, just behind the Opera House. If it was on Venice Blvd in Santa Monica the place would have had a line around the block, but I walked right in and got a great table on the 3rd level where the street-side is open to the air and lined with containers planted with bamboo like a tropical screen. The menu is simple, which I like. I picked the 3 course set menu – a delicious tropical fruit and grilled prawn salad, a Greek souvlaki with pita bread, and a dessert of star fruit, melon, kiwi, and coconut ice cream. I had two beers and finished with an espresso and the total bill was $20.
And did I tell you that the service was terrific and included a visit by the owner, Louie, and an absolutely gorgeous Filipino hostess named Lani? Eating alone is not always a hardship - but sometimes it can be a little lonely. Take along a book or a paper and you won't feel so conspicuous.
Over the years I’ve gotten a lot of questions about how to deal with so much solo time and how to think about eating out as a solitary traveler in a strange new place. Those questions seem a little odd to me, but that may be because I’ve done a lot of it. I learned to like the quiet time that lets me savor new places, new tastes and people watching without the distraction of other voices and other eyes. I do like traveling with Marilynn because her eyes are seeing foreign places for the first time, and it adds a layer of newness to places I’ve already seen. But I still like going it alone too.
Saigon is a new place for me, and I love the newness. For the first month, while Marilynn was here, we explored it together. She’s gone now, and I’m flying solo again. As an inveterate list maker I'm working on a list of all the new (to me) Saigon restaurants. I started on September 5th, and there are 31 Saigon and 3 Danang restaurants on the list now.
There are times after a long work week when I’d rather veg out on the couch with a beer, a few pieces of cheese, and some olives than haul my ass out to dinner. But today was relaxing and tonight I tried a stylish new place called Sandals that I've walked by a dozen times. It’s in the heart of town, just behind the Opera House. If it was on Venice Blvd in Santa Monica the place would have had a line around the block, but I walked right in and got a great table on the 3rd level where the street-side is open to the air and lined with containers planted with bamboo like a tropical screen. The menu is simple, which I like. I picked the 3 course set menu – a delicious tropical fruit and grilled prawn salad, a Greek souvlaki with pita bread, and a dessert of star fruit, melon, kiwi, and coconut ice cream. I had two beers and finished with an espresso and the total bill was $20.
And did I tell you that the service was terrific and included a visit by the owner, Louie, and an absolutely gorgeous Filipino hostess named Lani? Eating alone is not always a hardship - but sometimes it can be a little lonely. Take along a book or a paper and you won't feel so conspicuous.
Try to imagine what it was like...
It’s 8 o'clock on Friday night. It’s raining and blowing so hard I can barely see across the street and there's no interval between the lightning flashes and the earth shaking thunder. I’m safe inside my apartment but trying to imagine what it might have been like for a 19 year old grunt 50 miles south of Danang in 1968?
This isn't a creative writing exercise - I met that 19 year old boy today. He dropped out of school at 16 and his father put him right to work on the family farm, but he saw the writing on the wall and volunteered for the draft. Less than a year later he was on the ground near My Tam with an M-16 in his hands. That was 41 years ago.
He’s 60 years old now and the first returning Vietnam vet I’ve met since I took this job in Saigon. It’s not his first trip back; that was in 1998 and he’s been back 4 times since then. At first he came with a group called Vietnam Veterans Restoration Project. He signed on with a group of vets like himself to revisit the place that had interrupted their lives and changed them forever. And the VVRP project put them to work building homes and doing other manual labor projects in order to help heal the wounds of war – their own and those of the Vietnamese people they were working with. But after a couple of visits with the VVRP group he found his own project – helping fund and build a simple boarding facility for orphans at a Catholic school near My Tam.
He told me the story of attending Mass, during the war, in a parish church near where he was posted. He and his buddy were the only non-Vietnamese in the congregation. The only thing he remembers clearly is that the Vietnamese worshipers were staring at the barrel of the .45 showing under his fatigue jacket. It was his precaution that morning - just in case there was a VC sniper in the rafters of the church. He hasn’t forgotten.
He talked non-stop for 2 hours about how he left Vietnam on a stretcher after a landmine exploded under his vehicle, and how he left the farm to take a factory job because the family didn’t have enough money to modernize the dairy operation, and how he couldn’t understand why his wife left him when he was never unfaithful to her and took extra jobs on the weekend to provide for her and their three kids. That was 20 years ago, but he’s still confused about it and tells the story as if it happened yesterday.
His name is Jim. He's just an ordinary guy, a truck driver and factory worker from Iowa. But, since 1998 he has donated $10,000 to his school project. Tonight he’s sleeping in a $20 hotel in Saigon waiting to get up to Danang tomorrow to see if he can move his project along. I hope he can. I’m not judging him, but he doesn’t seem to have much else going on in his life and this is a really good thing to do. I’m not sure if he’ll be successful. There have been some legal and land use problems plaguing his project for the last couple of years. When I left him after lunch he was trying to figure out the Vietnamese money he had in his pocket. He was having trouble with the conversion - dropping the last three zeros and dividing by 18. When I put him in a cab I crossed my fingers that the cab driver wouldn’t take advantage of him. He’s a really sweet guy who’s doing everything he can to make things right for some wrongs that happened 40 years ago.
This isn't a creative writing exercise - I met that 19 year old boy today. He dropped out of school at 16 and his father put him right to work on the family farm, but he saw the writing on the wall and volunteered for the draft. Less than a year later he was on the ground near My Tam with an M-16 in his hands. That was 41 years ago.
He’s 60 years old now and the first returning Vietnam vet I’ve met since I took this job in Saigon. It’s not his first trip back; that was in 1998 and he’s been back 4 times since then. At first he came with a group called Vietnam Veterans Restoration Project. He signed on with a group of vets like himself to revisit the place that had interrupted their lives and changed them forever. And the VVRP project put them to work building homes and doing other manual labor projects in order to help heal the wounds of war – their own and those of the Vietnamese people they were working with. But after a couple of visits with the VVRP group he found his own project – helping fund and build a simple boarding facility for orphans at a Catholic school near My Tam.
He told me the story of attending Mass, during the war, in a parish church near where he was posted. He and his buddy were the only non-Vietnamese in the congregation. The only thing he remembers clearly is that the Vietnamese worshipers were staring at the barrel of the .45 showing under his fatigue jacket. It was his precaution that morning - just in case there was a VC sniper in the rafters of the church. He hasn’t forgotten.
He talked non-stop for 2 hours about how he left Vietnam on a stretcher after a landmine exploded under his vehicle, and how he left the farm to take a factory job because the family didn’t have enough money to modernize the dairy operation, and how he couldn’t understand why his wife left him when he was never unfaithful to her and took extra jobs on the weekend to provide for her and their three kids. That was 20 years ago, but he’s still confused about it and tells the story as if it happened yesterday.
His name is Jim. He's just an ordinary guy, a truck driver and factory worker from Iowa. But, since 1998 he has donated $10,000 to his school project. Tonight he’s sleeping in a $20 hotel in Saigon waiting to get up to Danang tomorrow to see if he can move his project along. I hope he can. I’m not judging him, but he doesn’t seem to have much else going on in his life and this is a really good thing to do. I’m not sure if he’ll be successful. There have been some legal and land use problems plaguing his project for the last couple of years. When I left him after lunch he was trying to figure out the Vietnamese money he had in his pocket. He was having trouble with the conversion - dropping the last three zeros and dividing by 18. When I put him in a cab I crossed my fingers that the cab driver wouldn’t take advantage of him. He’s a really sweet guy who’s doing everything he can to make things right for some wrongs that happened 40 years ago.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
38 Babies; All Under 2 Kilograms...
Walking into the Saigon Maternity Hospital, or any other hospital in Saigon, is not like entering any hospital I've ever been to. There is no clear signage leading to the admissions or entry area. There are hundreds of people milling about and the doorways and stairways leading in and out are crowded with people standing, sitting, or drifting around. Enter anywhere and you’ll find the corridors lined with people sitting where they can, on chairs or on the floor. Families come to the hospital to be with their sick or injured family members. They come and they stay.
The maternity hospital, as you might imagine, is a place of great joy and some anguish and apprehension. The joy is self evident – healthy babies and their mothers experiencing the first hours and days of their new lives together. But I was there to visit the neo-natal unit where the joy of new birth is mixed with apprehension. Prematurely born babies are often born without fully developed lungs and consequently aren’t able to absorb the oxygen they desperately need. East Meets West has a program called Breath of Life that delivers the technology needed to help these babies get to the point where they can breathe on their own. We helped developed a CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) machine that delivers oxygen under pressure to these undeveloped lungs. We didn’t invent it, we just figured out how to build one that is inexpensive and can be manufactured and maintained in a Third World country. That's the key; you don't want something complicated that has to be sent back to Germany if it goes kaput. I went to the maternity hospital to see our equipment in action.
Saigon Maternity is not Swedish Hospital. The neo-natal ward I visited was a room about 12’x12’ and there were 38 newborn babies, some 2 to a crib, all under 2 Kilos in that space – and there were several wards just like it on the same floor. Not all the babies were using the CPAP machines, but all were in some sort of distress. Some were under the lights of phototherapy machines, also donated by EMW, that deliver light of a certain wavelength to combat jaundice, also often associated with premature births. The hospital isn’t pretty. Dr. Xuan, the doctor in charge, doesn’t even have a desk, much less an office. He’s too busy. And the life saving machines look like something in the gadget section of the Goodwill. They are dented and the paint is chipped, but they are doing the job – they are saving babies lives that might otherwise be lost.
The next time you or your baby go to the hospital be grateful. Be grateful for the care you get, but also be grateful that there are people like Dr. Xuan and hospitals like Saigon Maternity doing their work under much tougher conditions than your US hospital.
The maternity hospital, as you might imagine, is a place of great joy and some anguish and apprehension. The joy is self evident – healthy babies and their mothers experiencing the first hours and days of their new lives together. But I was there to visit the neo-natal unit where the joy of new birth is mixed with apprehension. Prematurely born babies are often born without fully developed lungs and consequently aren’t able to absorb the oxygen they desperately need. East Meets West has a program called Breath of Life that delivers the technology needed to help these babies get to the point where they can breathe on their own. We helped developed a CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) machine that delivers oxygen under pressure to these undeveloped lungs. We didn’t invent it, we just figured out how to build one that is inexpensive and can be manufactured and maintained in a Third World country. That's the key; you don't want something complicated that has to be sent back to Germany if it goes kaput. I went to the maternity hospital to see our equipment in action.
Saigon Maternity is not Swedish Hospital. The neo-natal ward I visited was a room about 12’x12’ and there were 38 newborn babies, some 2 to a crib, all under 2 Kilos in that space – and there were several wards just like it on the same floor. Not all the babies were using the CPAP machines, but all were in some sort of distress. Some were under the lights of phototherapy machines, also donated by EMW, that deliver light of a certain wavelength to combat jaundice, also often associated with premature births. The hospital isn’t pretty. Dr. Xuan, the doctor in charge, doesn’t even have a desk, much less an office. He’s too busy. And the life saving machines look like something in the gadget section of the Goodwill. They are dented and the paint is chipped, but they are doing the job – they are saving babies lives that might otherwise be lost.
The next time you or your baby go to the hospital be grateful. Be grateful for the care you get, but also be grateful that there are people like Dr. Xuan and hospitals like Saigon Maternity doing their work under much tougher conditions than your US hospital.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
A Coffee Culture without Starbucks
It’s Sunday morning and I’m hanging out, sipping my latte, and reading the International Herald Tribune at one of the Gloria Jean’s Coffee outlets in Saigon. The scene is familiar if you’re a coffee buff. There are some small tables and there are groupings of other more comfortable chairs in the corners of this fresh, modern space. There is floor to ceiling glass on two sides of the place so customers can watch the traffic outside, and there are three welcoming baristas behind the counter.
And… the lattes are world class with an artistic fern design etched into the perfect foam on top. It’s reminiscent of Monorail, Senso Unico or Vivace in Seattle.
Coffee and coffee culture are important in Vietnam, especially in Saigon. Vietnam grows a lot of its own coffee, and some shops specify that the coffee served there is Vietnamese grown. The local drink is interesting too; it’s made by the cup and filtered through a stainless filter. It’s concentrated like espresso and it’s mixed with condensed milk and then poured over ice. It’s delicious and sweet, but don’t drink it in the evening or you won’t get to sleep.
I’m new to Saigon, so I don’t know how long the current coffee culture has been ascendant. I think it’s relatively recent, because Gloria Jean’s, Highlands Coffee, The Coffee Bean, and Illy, the Italian brand, all have new modern spaces and wi-fi. Espresso is served in most of the bakeries and café’s as well as the coffee outlets and most have pretty good French baked goods as well. The local Vietnamese brand is Trung Nguyen Coffee. Their places look like they’ve been around a little longer than the competition and their outlets look a little more on the shabby chic side – but the coffee there is very good too.
What’s really great is that there isn’t a Starbucks in sight. In the interest of full disclosure I have to say that I don’t like Starbucks. It’s not the company really, it’s the founder, Howard Schultz. Starbucks is a Seattle company, but Howard never was or ever will be a Seattleite. Scratch the surface there and you’ll find a New Yorker tried and true. Give him his due, he made Seattle and coffee synonymous. He built a tiny tea and coffee emporium into a world brand and mega-company. But, he never really adopted the city where he found his opportunity. He clashed with and sued his neighbors over a remodel of his house, he bought the local NBA team and promised to build a winner, but when the going got tough he secretly sold the team to an out of town syndicate and pocketed the cash. I favor the local brand where loyalty is more than the bottom line.
My heart stopped briefly yesterday when I saw a Starbucks logo in a shop at the end of my street. No, no, I said, but on closer inspection it was the authentic logo but the shop was a frozen yoghurt place and they had two bags of Starbucks for retail sale. Still, it gets your attention.
And… the lattes are world class with an artistic fern design etched into the perfect foam on top. It’s reminiscent of Monorail, Senso Unico or Vivace in Seattle.
Coffee and coffee culture are important in Vietnam, especially in Saigon. Vietnam grows a lot of its own coffee, and some shops specify that the coffee served there is Vietnamese grown. The local drink is interesting too; it’s made by the cup and filtered through a stainless filter. It’s concentrated like espresso and it’s mixed with condensed milk and then poured over ice. It’s delicious and sweet, but don’t drink it in the evening or you won’t get to sleep.
I’m new to Saigon, so I don’t know how long the current coffee culture has been ascendant. I think it’s relatively recent, because Gloria Jean’s, Highlands Coffee, The Coffee Bean, and Illy, the Italian brand, all have new modern spaces and wi-fi. Espresso is served in most of the bakeries and café’s as well as the coffee outlets and most have pretty good French baked goods as well. The local Vietnamese brand is Trung Nguyen Coffee. Their places look like they’ve been around a little longer than the competition and their outlets look a little more on the shabby chic side – but the coffee there is very good too.
What’s really great is that there isn’t a Starbucks in sight. In the interest of full disclosure I have to say that I don’t like Starbucks. It’s not the company really, it’s the founder, Howard Schultz. Starbucks is a Seattle company, but Howard never was or ever will be a Seattleite. Scratch the surface there and you’ll find a New Yorker tried and true. Give him his due, he made Seattle and coffee synonymous. He built a tiny tea and coffee emporium into a world brand and mega-company. But, he never really adopted the city where he found his opportunity. He clashed with and sued his neighbors over a remodel of his house, he bought the local NBA team and promised to build a winner, but when the going got tough he secretly sold the team to an out of town syndicate and pocketed the cash. I favor the local brand where loyalty is more than the bottom line.
My heart stopped briefly yesterday when I saw a Starbucks logo in a shop at the end of my street. No, no, I said, but on closer inspection it was the authentic logo but the shop was a frozen yoghurt place and they had two bags of Starbucks for retail sale. Still, it gets your attention.
Living Globally
If there was any doubt in my mind that we live in an interconnected global society, today would have expelled it. I woke up at 6am and turned on KPLU-FM, my local NPR station at home in Seattle. Here, it is streamed live and I get it via the website. At 6am here it is 4pm in Seattle, so I get All Things Considered in the morning and Morning Edition at night. Upside down but I’m a day ahead of Seattle time wise.
At 8 o’clock I walked to my favorite neighborhood bakery, Tous Les Jours. They make great baguettes and croissants. It’s hard to tell you’re not in France as you tear the croissant apart and the buttery flakes stick to your fingers. But, it’s not France. There are many things French in Saigon. After all, the French were here for 100+ years. But the kicker is that Tous Les Jours is owned by Koreans and many of the staff are Korean-Vietnamese. I got my croissant and a very good latte and went upstairs to a pleasant open space where the other patrons were enjoying their pastries and working on their laptops. Most places in Saigon have free wi-fi, so every place is a work place.
When I finished breakfast I walked downtown and bought an International Herald Tribune from a street vendor. Last week I bought the IHT in a bookstore, but I discovered that the street vendor outside the bookstore will sell it for half of what I paid inside. Of course, you have to negotiate, but I’m learning how to do that and it’s all done with a smile.
I took the Trib over to the Rex Hotel fitness club and sat by the pool for an hour. The club could be anywhere in the world. It has the most up to date machines, wall mounted plasma TV’s tuned to CNN, and lots of mirrors. The pool is outside on the roof and ringed with cushy chaise lounges. If you want lunch or a drink there are several staff members to help you.
After the workout I walked across the street to a French day spa and had a sports massage and then walked home. I worked for couple of hours in the afternoon and then called Marilynn on Skype. Who could ever have imagined calling continent to continent 20 years ago on a hand held phone for no charge? It’s Dick Tracy’s wrist-radio on steroids.
Dinner was at The Sushi Bar, a very traditional and jumpin’ place on Le Thanh Ton Street where I had an Asahi beer and fresh yellowtail sashimi flown in from Japan. I finished the day by stopping by M52, a bar where two Scots were playing darts, the Acoustic Bar in District 3, where Blue Man Group was hammering away on their drums on a wall sized video screen, and Serenata, a delightful garden café next door where three young chamber players alternately entertained with Vietnamese, American, and French singers.
If you want to twist your mind, just remember that this is a communist country. Weren’t we locked in a deadly battle with them for control of the planet? Going global has gone viral. We’re all in the soup together.
At 8 o’clock I walked to my favorite neighborhood bakery, Tous Les Jours. They make great baguettes and croissants. It’s hard to tell you’re not in France as you tear the croissant apart and the buttery flakes stick to your fingers. But, it’s not France. There are many things French in Saigon. After all, the French were here for 100+ years. But the kicker is that Tous Les Jours is owned by Koreans and many of the staff are Korean-Vietnamese. I got my croissant and a very good latte and went upstairs to a pleasant open space where the other patrons were enjoying their pastries and working on their laptops. Most places in Saigon have free wi-fi, so every place is a work place.
When I finished breakfast I walked downtown and bought an International Herald Tribune from a street vendor. Last week I bought the IHT in a bookstore, but I discovered that the street vendor outside the bookstore will sell it for half of what I paid inside. Of course, you have to negotiate, but I’m learning how to do that and it’s all done with a smile.
I took the Trib over to the Rex Hotel fitness club and sat by the pool for an hour. The club could be anywhere in the world. It has the most up to date machines, wall mounted plasma TV’s tuned to CNN, and lots of mirrors. The pool is outside on the roof and ringed with cushy chaise lounges. If you want lunch or a drink there are several staff members to help you.
After the workout I walked across the street to a French day spa and had a sports massage and then walked home. I worked for couple of hours in the afternoon and then called Marilynn on Skype. Who could ever have imagined calling continent to continent 20 years ago on a hand held phone for no charge? It’s Dick Tracy’s wrist-radio on steroids.
Dinner was at The Sushi Bar, a very traditional and jumpin’ place on Le Thanh Ton Street where I had an Asahi beer and fresh yellowtail sashimi flown in from Japan. I finished the day by stopping by M52, a bar where two Scots were playing darts, the Acoustic Bar in District 3, where Blue Man Group was hammering away on their drums on a wall sized video screen, and Serenata, a delightful garden café next door where three young chamber players alternately entertained with Vietnamese, American, and French singers.
If you want to twist your mind, just remember that this is a communist country. Weren’t we locked in a deadly battle with them for control of the planet? Going global has gone viral. We’re all in the soup together.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Networking: Saigon Style
The expatriate community is pretty tight all over the world. We are the foreigners, usually westerners, who work in countries other than our own. You can be an Expat in the Europe but it's really in Third World countries that the name sticks and has meaning.
When your skin color or size makes you an object of curiosity you know you're not in Kansas. What seems to happen then is that you bond with the other Expats because you're all in the same boat. Last night we were literally in the same boat - a 3 hour cruise on the Saigon River hosted by EuroCham, the European Chamber of Commerce.
There is a lot of networking and there are a lot of networking events in Saigon. There are also a number of Chambers of Commerce. There is AmCham, the Americans, CanCham, AusCham, EuroCham - you get the idea. And, the Chambers all host networking events at least once a month. So there is plenty of opportunity to meet and mingle with other Expats. In an American city a formally described "networking event" would have a contrived, forced air about it. Real men and women don't go to networking events to meet people and make meaningful connections. But, here they do.
Last night about 40 of us boarded a double decker Chinese junk with dark polished wood surfaces and salons open to the outside air. It was a beautiful night, but it was preceded by 2 hours of hard rain so our timing was good. As we entered the lower salon we were greeted by servers offering special mango cocktails and trays of small appetizers. After we got underway the cocktails were replaced with beer and wine and a beautiful small buffet was laid out.
In the middle of the evening one of the servers approached me and asked if I would like a massage. I tried not to look surprised and after I recovered my composure I said yes and was led to the stern where a woman had set up a chair and was giving 10 minute shoulder and head massages. Now this is my idea of networking. As I returned to the salon a magician was setting up to do a short show of card and coin tricks. I rolled my eyes at first, but the guy was really good.
I had never seen Saigon from the river. At night it's quite beautiful, and I did meet a handful of interesting people that I will follow up with. This is networking Saigon style.
When your skin color or size makes you an object of curiosity you know you're not in Kansas. What seems to happen then is that you bond with the other Expats because you're all in the same boat. Last night we were literally in the same boat - a 3 hour cruise on the Saigon River hosted by EuroCham, the European Chamber of Commerce.
There is a lot of networking and there are a lot of networking events in Saigon. There are also a number of Chambers of Commerce. There is AmCham, the Americans, CanCham, AusCham, EuroCham - you get the idea. And, the Chambers all host networking events at least once a month. So there is plenty of opportunity to meet and mingle with other Expats. In an American city a formally described "networking event" would have a contrived, forced air about it. Real men and women don't go to networking events to meet people and make meaningful connections. But, here they do.
Last night about 40 of us boarded a double decker Chinese junk with dark polished wood surfaces and salons open to the outside air. It was a beautiful night, but it was preceded by 2 hours of hard rain so our timing was good. As we entered the lower salon we were greeted by servers offering special mango cocktails and trays of small appetizers. After we got underway the cocktails were replaced with beer and wine and a beautiful small buffet was laid out.
In the middle of the evening one of the servers approached me and asked if I would like a massage. I tried not to look surprised and after I recovered my composure I said yes and was led to the stern where a woman had set up a chair and was giving 10 minute shoulder and head massages. Now this is my idea of networking. As I returned to the salon a magician was setting up to do a short show of card and coin tricks. I rolled my eyes at first, but the guy was really good.
I had never seen Saigon from the river. At night it's quite beautiful, and I did meet a handful of interesting people that I will follow up with. This is networking Saigon style.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
The Skyline Tells a Story
America was wrong about Vietnam in 1965. Now, no one seriously disputes the idea that the "American War" was a battle for independence. It was a civil war, but at the time American leadership was obsessed with the idea that the dominos would fall and all of Asia would be dominated by Mao and the Chinese dragon. Didn't anyone know how much the Vietnamese disliked and distrusted the Chinese? They had been rivals for a thousand years (or was it two thousand?).
But this post isn’t about the war – exactly. It’s about the skyline of Saigon. As I was sipping my beer last night I looked out at the tall buildings dominating the skyline. The four tallest buildings, emblazoned with logos, were Dai-Ichi Life, the Caravelle Hotel, the Sheraton Hotel, and SUNWAH Tower – a Japanese insurer, a French luxury hotel, an American hotel chain, and a diversified conglomerate based in Hong Kong. I couldn’t help but wonder what Ho Chi Minh would think if he could see the city that bears his name?
The Vietnamese fought and won wars against the Japanese, the Chinese, the French, and the Americans, and now the Saigon skyline is dominated by companies from each of these four countries. It’s not about who won or lost; it’s about the tragedy and irony for Saigon and all of Vietnam in 2009. I can’t judge whether today’s Vietnamese think the price they paid was worth it. I think they probably believe it was. 60% of today’s population was born after the end of the war. It’s history for them. I can say that it was not worth the lives and price the American people paid in that war or the damage they caused to this country.
Now Vietnam has its independence and it’s finding its footing in the world. The country is on a roll. It is definitely on its way, but the irony is that its former enemies are leading the charge. Make no mistake, there is a lot of talent and entrepreneurial drive in Vietnam, but the Dai-Ichis, Caravelles, Sheratons, and SunWahs had a head start. They didn’t have to invent and reinvent themselves after 30+ years of civil war.
But this post isn’t about the war – exactly. It’s about the skyline of Saigon. As I was sipping my beer last night I looked out at the tall buildings dominating the skyline. The four tallest buildings, emblazoned with logos, were Dai-Ichi Life, the Caravelle Hotel, the Sheraton Hotel, and SUNWAH Tower – a Japanese insurer, a French luxury hotel, an American hotel chain, and a diversified conglomerate based in Hong Kong. I couldn’t help but wonder what Ho Chi Minh would think if he could see the city that bears his name?
The Vietnamese fought and won wars against the Japanese, the Chinese, the French, and the Americans, and now the Saigon skyline is dominated by companies from each of these four countries. It’s not about who won or lost; it’s about the tragedy and irony for Saigon and all of Vietnam in 2009. I can’t judge whether today’s Vietnamese think the price they paid was worth it. I think they probably believe it was. 60% of today’s population was born after the end of the war. It’s history for them. I can say that it was not worth the lives and price the American people paid in that war or the damage they caused to this country.
Now Vietnam has its independence and it’s finding its footing in the world. The country is on a roll. It is definitely on its way, but the irony is that its former enemies are leading the charge. Make no mistake, there is a lot of talent and entrepreneurial drive in Vietnam, but the Dai-Ichis, Caravelles, Sheratons, and SunWahs had a head start. They didn’t have to invent and reinvent themselves after 30+ years of civil war.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
They Are the Same the World Over
It doesn’t seem to matter where you are; a small group of drunks can poison the atmosphere of a place for everyone. Whether it’s a bar on San Pablo Avenue in Berkeley, an Upper East Side hangout in New York, a Berlin kneipe, or the Rooftop Bar in Saigon the effect is the same; it turns a good time in a good place into a tooth grinding disappointment. At the moment my pick for the most obnoxious group of drunks in the world goes to Vietnamese businessmen. That’s because I’ve had two spoiled evening meals in less than a week because of them.
I like the Rooftop Bar at the Hotel Rex in Saigon. It’s an old hotel and the open air bar is a little dated. It’s not the glitzy Caravelle or the brand new Sheraton. It has a well worn feel and it’s notorious for being the place the army brass went to drink and watch the fireworks during the “American War.” There's a canvas canopy covering the center tables in case of rain but the edge is ringed with tall tables and high stools where you can look out over the hedge at the traffic on the divided boulevard below.
For the second time this week my evening was spoiled by a table of 8 or 10 grown men in white shirts standing across the table from each other trying to shout each other down. It’s not as if you can ignore 10 grown men shouting at the top of their lungs. I didn’t. I finished my beer and left, but I left a gorgeous cool evening in great surroundings because I couldn’t stand the doltish behavior of grown men who should know better. I've seen the same thing in all of the places I mentioned but there is something especially annoying about the behavior when it starts to become the norm in a place. This was my third similar experience in less than a month. I'm not perfect. I committed the same sin a few times years ago, but I wasn't a grown man in business attire. Still, it does serve as a reminder that we can all do better.
I like the Rooftop Bar at the Hotel Rex in Saigon. It’s an old hotel and the open air bar is a little dated. It’s not the glitzy Caravelle or the brand new Sheraton. It has a well worn feel and it’s notorious for being the place the army brass went to drink and watch the fireworks during the “American War.” There's a canvas canopy covering the center tables in case of rain but the edge is ringed with tall tables and high stools where you can look out over the hedge at the traffic on the divided boulevard below.
For the second time this week my evening was spoiled by a table of 8 or 10 grown men in white shirts standing across the table from each other trying to shout each other down. It’s not as if you can ignore 10 grown men shouting at the top of their lungs. I didn’t. I finished my beer and left, but I left a gorgeous cool evening in great surroundings because I couldn’t stand the doltish behavior of grown men who should know better. I've seen the same thing in all of the places I mentioned but there is something especially annoying about the behavior when it starts to become the norm in a place. This was my third similar experience in less than a month. I'm not perfect. I committed the same sin a few times years ago, but I wasn't a grown man in business attire. Still, it does serve as a reminder that we can all do better.
Friday, October 9, 2009
A Hard Dirt Floor and a Table with a Light
Less than 15 years ago East Meets West was a shoestring operation doing humanitarian aid work in Vietnam. Now it is the largest NGO operating in Vietnam. It has expanded into Laos, Cambodia, and East Timor. It has built or renovated over 300 schools. It has built a state of the art medical center in the ancient capital of Hue, a pediatric hospital in Hanoi, and expanded the capacity of several other medical centers. It has developed simple technologies that are saving countless premature babies annually. It offers scholarships to over 5000 impoverished school children and supports their education from the 3rd grade through high school and even provides bicycles if the distance to school is greater than average.
Today I visited one of the elementary schools where EMW provides scholarships to poor students. It was a modern, for this part of the world, school with attentive students and teachers. There are 800 students in the school, but only 34 of them are in the SPELL program. Students are selected by a local organization when they are in the third grade. The criteria is simple: are they from the bottom 10% of impoverished families and therefore likely to drop out of school because they cannot cover the low cost of fees, uniforms, supplies, etc. A local organization identifies the candidates and then East Meets West re-checks the criteria and visits the families. If selected, EMW provides the student with a scholarship until he or she graduates from high school as well as tutoring to make up for any lack of preparedness.
After we visited the school we went to the home of one 4th grade SPELL student, a beautiful boy with flawless copper skin and a SPELL baseball cap. The home was a simple one room hut where he lives with his mother, father, two grandmothers, and three siblings. The hut has a hard dirt floor and a corrugated tin roof but there is a table in the corner where he sits to do his homework. I met his mother and grandmothers. All of them were smiling and welcoming and obviously grateful for the help their son was getting with his education. When we left the boy jumped on the back of the local official’s motorbike for the ride back to school and we drove to Hue to look at the hospital. How can you not love this work?
Today I visited one of the elementary schools where EMW provides scholarships to poor students. It was a modern, for this part of the world, school with attentive students and teachers. There are 800 students in the school, but only 34 of them are in the SPELL program. Students are selected by a local organization when they are in the third grade. The criteria is simple: are they from the bottom 10% of impoverished families and therefore likely to drop out of school because they cannot cover the low cost of fees, uniforms, supplies, etc. A local organization identifies the candidates and then East Meets West re-checks the criteria and visits the families. If selected, EMW provides the student with a scholarship until he or she graduates from high school as well as tutoring to make up for any lack of preparedness.
After we visited the school we went to the home of one 4th grade SPELL student, a beautiful boy with flawless copper skin and a SPELL baseball cap. The home was a simple one room hut where he lives with his mother, father, two grandmothers, and three siblings. The hut has a hard dirt floor and a corrugated tin roof but there is a table in the corner where he sits to do his homework. I met his mother and grandmothers. All of them were smiling and welcoming and obviously grateful for the help their son was getting with his education. When we left the boy jumped on the back of the local official’s motorbike for the ride back to school and we drove to Hue to look at the hospital. How can you not love this work?
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Danang Redux
I’m back in Danang this week. It’s different and so am I. Typhoon Ketsana blew through here a week ago and uprooted trees, tore off roofs, beached seagoing tankers, and flooded the countryside. I visited the Village of Hope orphanage today. It’s been funded by East Meets West since 1993. There are 150 kids from impoverished families living there. 34 of them are hearing and speech impaired. It breaks your heart and buoys you up at the same time. I visited classroom after classroom where I was greeted by smiles and the sign for "Hi". They were engaged in their work but very curious about the white face and shaved head looking in on them. Mr. Jack, that's me, wrote his name on the blackboard for them and they, in turn, wrote their names on the board for me. They all giggled when I butchered the Vietnamese pronunciations. The storm that hit Danang uprooted two huge trees at the school but the buildings and the kids were spared.
Tonight I returned to the same restaurant I wrote about two weeks ago. But, for me, tonight’s visit was of a different order. The bait was still parading in her tight silk dress and 4 inch heels, but that’s all she is – tight dress and heels. There is a second echelon there represented by two very good looking young women in the uncommonly beautiful national dress called the ao dai. You’ve seen it – silk trousers with an over-dress that is almost floor length with a tight bodice and flowing panels slit on the sides to just above the hips. The outfit is gorgeous and the girls who wear them are almost universally thin. The two ao dai clad women in the restaurant are mostly decorative, like the bait, but attentive. The real attraction however are three young girls in what looks like school girl uniforms – white untucked blouses with big red bows, loose fitting knee length red skirts, and Keds, yes, Keds.
These three girls, who look like teenagers to me, are the workhorses of the restaurant. They take orders, pour beer, deliver meals and ask if you’re happy. One of them approached me tonight to ask if I could explain an English word she didn’t understand. The word was "visualize". I told her it meant to see something in your mind, to picture it in your mind’s eye, to imagine what it would look like. She nodded and it left me wondering what she might visualize. It probably isn’t what an American teenager would visualize. Later, the cutest of the three came over to say that the two ao dai girls and the three schoolgirl waitresses wondered if I was lonely or sad because I always came to the restaurant alone. I told her that I was a little sad because my girlfriend left Vietnam this morning to go back to the States but other than that I was quite happy. She smiled and said that she was glad and that she wished me to be happy. Now how’s does that stack up against a twinkie in a short dress and you-know-what-pumps?
Tonight I returned to the same restaurant I wrote about two weeks ago. But, for me, tonight’s visit was of a different order. The bait was still parading in her tight silk dress and 4 inch heels, but that’s all she is – tight dress and heels. There is a second echelon there represented by two very good looking young women in the uncommonly beautiful national dress called the ao dai. You’ve seen it – silk trousers with an over-dress that is almost floor length with a tight bodice and flowing panels slit on the sides to just above the hips. The outfit is gorgeous and the girls who wear them are almost universally thin. The two ao dai clad women in the restaurant are mostly decorative, like the bait, but attentive. The real attraction however are three young girls in what looks like school girl uniforms – white untucked blouses with big red bows, loose fitting knee length red skirts, and Keds, yes, Keds.
These three girls, who look like teenagers to me, are the workhorses of the restaurant. They take orders, pour beer, deliver meals and ask if you’re happy. One of them approached me tonight to ask if I could explain an English word she didn’t understand. The word was "visualize". I told her it meant to see something in your mind, to picture it in your mind’s eye, to imagine what it would look like. She nodded and it left me wondering what she might visualize. It probably isn’t what an American teenager would visualize. Later, the cutest of the three came over to say that the two ao dai girls and the three schoolgirl waitresses wondered if I was lonely or sad because I always came to the restaurant alone. I told her that I was a little sad because my girlfriend left Vietnam this morning to go back to the States but other than that I was quite happy. She smiled and said that she was glad and that she wished me to be happy. Now how’s does that stack up against a twinkie in a short dress and you-know-what-pumps?
Saturday, October 3, 2009
What a Week!
It started last Saturday with a meandering walk along the promenade in Danang on a clear soft morning, and it ended last night in downtown Saigon thronged by huge crowds celebrating the Moon Festival. In between, I managed to lose two debit cards - my lifeline in a country that doesn't live on credit or the extension of it - while at the same time the center of the country was being ravaged by a typhoon.
My personal anguish was over the debit cards. I made the discovery on Friday night as we were going out for a quiet drink and dinner, and it ruined the evening. I really felt sorry for myself and got snarky with Marilynn in the extreme. What started out to be a relaxed night out for the two of us, turned into a nightmare of anxiety and self hatred. How could I lose two debit cards at different times in just two days?
Just when I was feeling truly sorry for myself it all came into perspective. This week the blue sky in Danang turned ugly as the Ketsana Typhoon hit central Vietnam and took down almost everything in its path leaving that part of the country under water and without power. This is not an area where building codes address things like the 100 year flood or construction is ever much more than some piled bricks and a galvanized tin roof. Over 100 people died during the storm, and a school for ethnic minority kids in Kon Tum province built by East Meets West was cut off by a raging river where there was once a trickle of a stream. Those kids and their teachers are still marooned. They had enough food to hold out for a couple of days, but we are going to have to mount some kind of rescue mission to get them connected to the world again.
I'm very proud of the people of EMW this week. Everyone has a very full plate, but once the storm passed Danang and long before the power went back on they were mounting a full scale disaster relief effort and letting everything else go to the back burner. People and businesses are pitching in with money, food, and strong backs to deal with the devastation. My co-worker, Van Ly, canvassed everyone in her Rolodex to see if she could find help - and she did. The effort is ongoing. It will be a long time before the region recovers. Many of the people here are subsistence farmers in the rice growing areas and live day to day. The rice paddies are out of business with the flooding and the farmers have nothing to fall back on. It's a true tragedy.
Life goes on and while the center of the country deals with Ketsana thousands of people crowded downtown Saigon last night to celebrate the Moon Festival, a mid-autumn celebration for children. With one of the highest birthrates in the world Vietnam is teeming with kids and they were all downtown last night sporting balloons and sandwiched between their parents on motorbikes - sometimes 5 to a bike. It was noisy, chaotic, fun and friendly. It was really just an amped up version of Saigon daily life.
My personal anguish was over the debit cards. I made the discovery on Friday night as we were going out for a quiet drink and dinner, and it ruined the evening. I really felt sorry for myself and got snarky with Marilynn in the extreme. What started out to be a relaxed night out for the two of us, turned into a nightmare of anxiety and self hatred. How could I lose two debit cards at different times in just two days?
Just when I was feeling truly sorry for myself it all came into perspective. This week the blue sky in Danang turned ugly as the Ketsana Typhoon hit central Vietnam and took down almost everything in its path leaving that part of the country under water and without power. This is not an area where building codes address things like the 100 year flood or construction is ever much more than some piled bricks and a galvanized tin roof. Over 100 people died during the storm, and a school for ethnic minority kids in Kon Tum province built by East Meets West was cut off by a raging river where there was once a trickle of a stream. Those kids and their teachers are still marooned. They had enough food to hold out for a couple of days, but we are going to have to mount some kind of rescue mission to get them connected to the world again.
I'm very proud of the people of EMW this week. Everyone has a very full plate, but once the storm passed Danang and long before the power went back on they were mounting a full scale disaster relief effort and letting everything else go to the back burner. People and businesses are pitching in with money, food, and strong backs to deal with the devastation. My co-worker, Van Ly, canvassed everyone in her Rolodex to see if she could find help - and she did. The effort is ongoing. It will be a long time before the region recovers. Many of the people here are subsistence farmers in the rice growing areas and live day to day. The rice paddies are out of business with the flooding and the farmers have nothing to fall back on. It's a true tragedy.
Life goes on and while the center of the country deals with Ketsana thousands of people crowded downtown Saigon last night to celebrate the Moon Festival, a mid-autumn celebration for children. With one of the highest birthrates in the world Vietnam is teeming with kids and they were all downtown last night sporting balloons and sandwiched between their parents on motorbikes - sometimes 5 to a bike. It was noisy, chaotic, fun and friendly. It was really just an amped up version of Saigon daily life.
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