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June 10, 2009
Charmed by Hanoi
Vietnam's capital city captured my interest in this country when I visited as a tourist three years ago. The historic pagoda on the lake took me back in time, while Lexuses cruising down the street and a burgeoning bohemian café scene gave the city a modern feel. I recall that this juxtaposition was the subject of one of my essays that I wrote for my PiA application.
Anyway, I spent last weekend in the city that seduced me into returning to live and work in Vietnam. Visiting Hanoi as a resident of Vietnam gave me some new things to appreciate about Saigon's quaint, romantic, and refined neighbor to the north:
Language: I find northern pronunciation of the Vietnamese language beautiful. The clear, rhythmic pronunciation and sharp "z" sounds make it easy on the ears and more elegant than the drawl of the South.
Curfew: On Saturday evening, I went out with friends for drinks at a bar called Cuba. At around midnight, the manager turned up the lights and began to urge people to leave, explaining that the police were outside, and that he had to shut down the bar because of the local regulations. I like to be in bed early, so I was secretly grateful to the police for giving me a way out. Back home in Saigon, it is easy to party until daylight any night of the week, but not really my style...
PiA: Hanoi is currently home to five PiA fellows, who are working in NGO and journalism posts. Spending the weekend with them was a blast, and they showed me the side of Hanoi that I missed as a tourist here three years earlier - a running track around West Lake, a brunch café with delicious home baked bread, and the Cinematique, where I watched a production of the Broadway play "The Nerd" that one of the PiA fellows directed. I am the only PiA fellow in Saigon, so it was interesting to catch up with them and discuss the highlights and challenges of our year in Vietnam.
My plane is about to land, so time to shut off my computer. Time to start the week in the chaos of Saigon after a refreshing weekend away...
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June 6, 2009
Surfing Daydreams
"Do you miss home?" is a common response / question when I tell people that I have been living in Vietnam for the past year. I am honest with them when I answer, "Not really - I just miss my friends, family, and surfing." I must really miss surfing, because while at the beach last weekend I found myself mind surfing the tiny swells lapping the shore at Mui Ne...
God, this would be a perfect left hand point - if it were only about two meters taller...Busy with work and settling into Saigon, I missed last year's surf season, which I hear runs from November to January. I am making a promise to myself to get barreled in Vietnam this year - it is a must for me before leaving this country...This photo from Flickr makes the surf look decent...
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Shady Saigon
I can not remember my skin ever being as pale as it is now. My dermatologist back in California would be pleased at this solar sabbatical - especially given that I spent my first quarter century soaking up UV rays at the beach in Hawaii and California. Why has it been so difficult to bronzer (I love the French verb for tan) while living here in tropical Southeast Asia?
The most obvious explanation is that I have an white collar job and spend the majority of the daylight hours in an air conditioned, fluorescent-lit office. My lunch break is usually when the clouds gather for the afternoon rain shower, blocking the direct sun. Finally, I suspect that the heavy particulate pollution in Saigon - produced by lumbering diesel trucks, two stroke motorbikes, and construction dust - absorbs some of the sun's rays before they can arrive to darken my face.
I have identified another factor that helps to explain my pale skin - the Vietnamese tendency to protect themselves from the sun. This idea influences design and behavior, making it difficult to get a tan in this country. For example, it is impossible to find a café terrace in this city with tables in the direct sun - all patios are covered by a canopy of umbrellas.
Determined to enjoy the sun's rays as I lunched on a clear day, I deviously moved my cafe chair and table from under shade out into the light. The wait staff approached me to ask that I replace the table - not out of frustration with me breaking the rules, but out of genuine concern for me sitting in the sun. Obstinate in the face of their pleas to move, I remained steadfast, savoring the sunlight and my sandwich...
Medical professionals would laud this country-wide effort to shade skin from the harmful effects of the sun. The conical hat - one of the iconic images of Vietnam - is designed with precisely this function in mind. Much more effective that sunscreen or the billed hats we wear in the US...
While health consciousness contributes to the Shady Saigon phenomenon, there are also aesthetic motivations at play. My Vietnamese colleague explained to me that the reason she (and most women) wears a birka-like scarf around her face and fingertip to shoulder gloves when she rides her motorbike is to prevent her skin from tanning. When asked why she goes through this trouble, she replied "Ask Vietnamese men."
The prevalence of soaps on store shelves that profess to have "whitening" qualities confirms that many people here find lighter skin more beautiful. I am certainly not a social anthropologist, but I suspect that this has to do with status within Vietnam rather than with a desire to look more Caucasian. In a long-time agrarian society like Vietnam, the lower classes have always spent long days in the rice field, browning their skin. Light skin was reserved for those wealthy enough to be able to spend their time inside, and therefore a mark of status.
Anyway, skin color is inevitably a touchy subject, so I will leave it here. It is Saturday afternoon, and against the better judgment of my hosts, I am off to worship the sun. It must be the Hawaiian in me...
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