Let There Be Light! ...followed by a bit more darkness.

It's one of those good news/bad news things.

Good news: our internet is fully operational.

Bad news: my laptop charger is not.

Tomorrow, I go in search of a new charger.

Oh, the woes of no internet access

So, as my friend Christine pointed out--hi, Danger Bat--I have not posted anything new in a whole, entire week. What can I say? I moved into a new place and was once again cast into the dark ages: the internet was not yet hooked up when Dave and I moved in. Now, wifi cafes abound--witness my current post--but it's not quite the same, especially since my laptop charger is once again on a downward spiral, functionally speaking. I like Vietnam, and I don't want to shock the locals by reenacting the Battle of Hue--me vs. my charger. It typically takes between 5 and 10 minutes of cursing, stomping, hurling, barracking, pleading, coercing, and smacking before the tempermental POS calms down enough to get the charger working.

Anyway, the Internet guy is supposed to come today, as he was supposed to come yesterday, and the day before, and the day before. Tomorrow, tomorrow, internet is always tomorrow, it's only a day away... When it is hooked up, I promise multiple posts, and! Even! Pictures! Once you have collected your socks, which I just blew off, I should add that my picture taking has so far been sporadic. I haven't had a ton of time yet to go out and really work my camera; whoda thunk that moving to a foreign country and starting a life there would take so much work?

Raging materialism--call me Trump. Donald Trump.

Signing a lease has never been so empowering; shelling out $1,500 has never been so easy.

Dave and I just signed a lease--finally--for our new apartment. Most of you know that I am not terribly materialistic. I mean, I like nice things. Who doesn't, right? But when I first saw this place, I thought I would swoon. My knees got a little weak; I got a little...ahem, well, I should stop there.

Anyway, I will post pics in a bit. It's still not quite finished, so mess and dust abound, but holy penthouse jesus. 4 bedrooms, 5 baths, rooftop terrace, dining room, a sort of outdoor patio in the light well, solarium...it's probably as big as my childhood home. The building has a pool--or two--hot tub, sauna, gym, shops, restaurants that deliver fat Vietnamese food to your front door for $1.50...it's amazing. I had wanted my own 2-bedroom, but really, when am I going to have a chance to live in such splendor (or even splendour--the British spelling just looks so much classier, doesn't it?) again in my life? I feel like a mogul. Besides, if Dave and I want some time apart, the apartment is so goddamn big we don't have to see each other for weeks at a time if we don't want to. Even if we get a third housemate, as we are considering, space will not be an issue.

You all might want to block out your visits now. Once I post the pics, I expect the spare room(s) to fill up mighty quick.

First impressions of Earth

I've met a number of expatriates here over the last ten or twelve days. Saigon is a very big city--far and away the largest I've ever lived in--but I don't think the community of foreign English teachers is of quite the same scale. Foreigners like to hang out at a handful of bars, somewhat segregated by profession, and thus by country of origin. Many English teachers hang out at a bar called Hung Vy on or near Bui Vien in District 1, the heart of backpackerdom in Vietnam. I've run into groups of French expats in another bar not far away from there, lamenting the lack of a good vin ordinaire. Germans live here, too, but despite the profusion of Hammer and Sickle flags, I've yet to meet a single Russian.

It's a strange little world, all its own, a kind of Neverneverland peopled by aging Lost Boys. Female English teachers seem to be a bit on the rare side; so far I've met exactly one. Whether English, American, Scottish, Australian, Irish, Canadian, or New Zealander, they seem to have moved to Asia for a narrow spectrum of reasons. And whatever the specifics, they are running from something. Something specific, like poverty, or PTSD, or a felonious past--or more generally, running from responsibility, from parts of their home country they find stultifying, from sheer ordinariness. After all, in Vietnam we are all a bit like rock stars.

We can afford to live like rock stars; when you're making 500,000 VND an hour, and a beer costs 13,000 during happy hour...well, the direct costs of drinking cease to matter. Weed is apparently very cheap here too, and also--apparently--very, very bad.

I met one expat from England who smokes three or four J's an hour. Living in an amiable fog, he's charming and friendly, the perfect dissolute old Public School boy. Old darling, he calls me as he introduces himself for the fourth time in 15 minutes. Old chap. "I say," he says, "my best mate's name is Owen. We served in the Royal Artillery together in Wales."

"I know," I tell him again. "You've told me."

"Terribly sorry, old darling...what did you say your name was?" I tell him. His handshake is firm. His eyes are vague. "Owen--that's my best mate's name. We were in the Falklands together."

I have joined their ranks. I'm in the club, provisionally. A lifer, people tell me: I'm a natural, adapting quickly to this strange antipodean existence. And if this is Neverneverland, does this also make me a Lost Boy? The waitress brings me a beer in a sweating glass. An ice cube the size of my wallet sits in the mug. To drink, I have to hold it out of the way with my nose. A drop of meltwater slides down and into my eye. I eat quail eggs; salty snacks and cold beer, perfect on a hot day, even in a strange form.

I'm not sure I like the idea. Are they happy? Do they ache at the sense of displacement? After all, everything is different here, and yes, superficially better for us white, male, English-speaking foreigners. Nevertheless... Do they use the cheap beer to float away the nagging sense that they could not succeed at home? Am I staring at one possible future?

What does being here say about me?

Two weeks in, and what have I learned?

I haven't caught up with all the older posts I have semi-typed-out in MS Word, but cool, interesting, funny, and/or vaguely embarrassing stuff keeps happening.

Briefly, then: I'm talking with one of the other teachers at AHS. I tell him that I've been in Vietnam for all of two weeks.

He is surprised. "Well, what have you learned in those two weeks?"

A lot, really, but the most surprising thing just pops out. "Riding a motorbike doesn't leave me sucking my thumb and hugging my teddy bear anymore. It's actually gotten to be kind of fun. You know, risking death on a minute-by-minute basis and pulling it off through manly courage and cat-like reflexes is pretty invigorating."

He shakes his head. "That is a bad, bad sign."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you'll either die here, or never want to leave. Either way, you aren't going home."

Asia's newest TV star...

is me.

I'm joking, of course. Nevertheless--I'd just finished up work on Tuesday when I got a text to come down to the office at AHS from the campus manager, one Ms. Yen (pronounced EEN, as far as my whitey ears can tell.) When I get there, she tells me they have something different for me to do Wednesday, and would I be interested?

Never sign a blank check. I know this. Normally, I don't do it. But one of the promises I made to myself was to be adventurous, to experience as much as I can, to move outside my comfort zone--though not, of course, outside my morality--and try new, even unthinkable, things. So, even though I had no idea what sort of 'something different' was in the offing, I agreed.

Fantastic, Ms. Yen says. She hands me a nametag, the sort all teachers wear at these schools. Apparently, my name is Jovelino...still somewhat confused, I start to ask what exactly is going on, but Ms. Yen cuts me off. She'll email me the details that evening.

When I get the email, it simply tells me to report to the Saigon International University campus at 8:20 Wednesday morning, and that I will be there all day. Oh, be sure to adhere to all Asian High School dress regulations: dark slacks, black shoes, black socks, long-sleeved white dress shirt, red tie.

Getting to SIU is worthy of a post itself, but for now I will content myself by saying this: Lewis and Clarke? John C. Fremont? Livingstone, Burton, Speke, Gordon of Khartoum?

Beginners. They never navigated their way across half of Saigon with malfunctioning GPS, chased by bribe-seeking cops, lost, hungry, alone.

So, hours later, and 300,000VND lighter, I reach SIU. I wait in the office for a while, then am summoned to the front steps where a crowd of people bustle with purpose. They set up rails, cameras, even some outdoor lighting. I blink.

"So handsome," murmurs the cameraman, the director, or possibly a random dude from the street--I have no idea. "Perfect for commercial."

I find myself agreeing without totally understanding, as I do quite often here. Perhaps an exchange of compliments is required? Not that I want the guy to think I'm hitting on him, but... "Thanks. You look good, too."

"Stand here. Talk with student. Act natural." He gestures at the camera equipment.

"Um," I observe trenchantly. "Act natural is an oxymoron." He stares at me. "Seriously. It's like, acting is all about artifice, right? Unnatural. Pretending. So act natural..." He stares some more. "On top of the steps?" He nods, flashes me a toothy grin.

I find myself surrounded by a swarm of fairly attractive coeds in their early twenties. All right, I think. This isn't so bad.

"Talk! Pretend you are teacher, they your student," the cameraman yells.

"I am a teach--never mind," I say. "Hey, ladies..." The girls whisper. I try to engage them in conversation. No luck, they understand me. Really. I'm certain of it.

"So...you all go to school here?" Nothing. "Are you all from Saigon?" Silence. "I'm from California." I keep trying as the cameras roll. The same students walk up the stairs over and over, every few minutes for an hour. Each time, we wave. At first, we pretend to be friends, but by the end, I swear they know me on a deeply personal level, and care about my well-being.

The girls still don't really talk, so I fill the silences. Shooting stops. The director grins, and waves me back inside. Finally, one girl steps forward. "We want to ask you question," she says, with many nervous glances back at her friends. Her English is fairly good.

"Sure," I say. At last: interaction.

"Do you know you spill coffee on your shirt?"



The rest of the day improves upon this moment. I had, in fact, spilled coffee on my shirt (I don't think Marco Polo ever had to deal with the hazards of drinking ca phe sue daa while riding a motorbike on the gritty, crowded, potholed Ha Noi Highway) but only a couple drops, hidden behind my tie. Over the next five hours, I play a chemistry teacher, a progammer, a computer-repair instructor, a wise teacher pontificating in the library, a dynamically-striding young professor surrounded by a coterie of eager young minds breathlessly waiting for me to impart wisdom. I also get more and more bored, and begin inventing backstories for the various roles I'm asked to play.

"Now you are in big meeting with other teachers," the director's assistant says.

"Mmhhm. What's my motivation in this scene?"

"Excuse me? I do not understand."

"Because I was thinking that I could be a Young Turk, hell-bent on remaking the department...or destroying it. Like, my young wife is pregnant, but I'm so driven by The Truth that the potential consequences of alienating the rest of the faculty don't really affect my crusading nature. Or maybe I'm not married, and having a torrid affair with one of the female professors, and that sexual tension underlies this scene--"

"You play teacher in big meeting with other teachers."

"But wait, what about--"

...I ended up playing a teacher in a big meeting with other teachers.

When these commercials air, I will get copies of them; I want to see if the dramatic complexity with which I tried to imbue each character, each scene, shows up. But really, I just want to make sure that damn coffee stain does not.

I have a job, just like that.

Note: still not caught up with present day posts...and in fact, I've been posting what I wrote a bit out of order. But you're capable of piecing it together.

The title of the post should say it all. I applied on Monday, interviewed on Tuesday, did a demo-lesson on Wednesday, and started Thursday. I teach English--reading, writing, pronunciation, and vocabulary--and drama at Asian High School. The campus is a five-minute walk from Sean's apartment.

I'll be starting at another campus on Monday. So far, so good; one class is a pain, but the rest are good kids. Once I get my work permit, I should be making $25 to 27.50 an hour--teaching Drama earns one a bonus, for some odd reason. This is 2.5x what I made in California at my last job. Vietnam rocks.

Casa de Sean

I should say a few words about Sean, mine gracious host. Sean is a friend of my cousin Dave's, and kindly agreed to let us stay here until we find a place. This is possible because Sean's housemate is currently back in England so one bedroom is going spare. If Tom were here, then it would be too, too crowded. As it is, with Dave, Sean, me, and four people's belongings, you have to open negotiations well before you cook, open a door, or turn around.

His apartment is in Binh Tan, right across a 'river' (read: open sewer/floating dump) from District 1, the heart of HCMC. The building is huge; if the air was clear, you could see all the way across Saigon to yet more Saigon, halfway to what is purportedly the edge of Saigon. I don't believe the city has an edge, but I've been told it's not endless, just impossible to get out of.

Anyway, Sean: Sean is an experienced expat, a lifer. He's all of 28, and has lived here since he was 19. Sean is an English teacher, too. Sean is made of moxie, vodka, and awesome.

I'm sure I will have more to say about Sean.

Sheer raving terror

Note: I wrote this post on the 15th.

I rode a motorbike for the first time yesterday. I feel weak, and brave, and grateful; it took me an Alka-Seltzer, a hug, and 24 hours of quiet meditation to recover.

Dave and I picked up my bike on the major backpacker street, a place called Bui Vien. I was confident--here's where the years of playing Excite Bike as a kid pay off. And even if it was bad, Google Maps said that the distance from the bike rental place to Sean's apartment was only 6.5 kilometers. 10 minutes, it said, of driving.

It lied.

The unrelenting insanity of Saigon traffic is impossible to convey in words. I hinted at this in an earlier post, with my usual restraint and understatement, but let me just say the reality does not hit you until a wall of bikes surges across an intersection from five directions at once, with you in the middle.

Then the reality hits you again, and again, and again, because the next intersection is even worse. Old ladies walk with nun-like calm across a stretch of pavement that's probably seen more crashes than NASCAR. Dudes on 50cc bikes balance three tons of boxes and a monkey on the front of their scooters. A family of four ride on an ostensibly single-seat bike. Trucks pass so close you can check your shave in their rear-view mirror--the one inside the cab. Motorbikes cram 8 to a lane, even as a jumbo tour bus threads through. Breathing in rewards you with a delightful mixture of ozone, hydrocarbons, and powdered cement; sweat runs grey; mysterious chunks of stuff hit you in the eyes. Streets are narrow, and shops, stalls, and parked bikes reach into the gutters and beyond. Cracks and sink holes abound, and construction crews tear up the streets, carved up intersections, spill sand on the road.

After two minutes, sheer raving panic sets in. After twelve, you've become a creature of pure reflex; instinct has crowbarred your terrified consciousness away from control of your motor functions. After thirty, calm sets in. Ranks of angels sing, and guide you through an 18-inch gap between two city buses scarred and splattered with the remains of other, less fortunate bikers. Capering sprites tell you where to dodge, and when to break to avoid the deaf old man taking his afternoon constitutional in the middle of the road. It all seems easy--like a videogame, for real! If only I had a banana peel, it would be just like Mario Kart!

Once the adrenaline wears off--bike parked, helmet off, feeling restored to your extremities--after that, the real fear begins.

Dave, of course, assures me that he loves riding motorbikes. Better than a cup of coffee in the morning, he avers.

Enstrangement

The speed at which life can change is amazing. It seems we do not often pause to notice this, or the casual miracles that allow such alteration. Yet every now and then, we see with new eyes--what Shklovsky called defamiliarization--and these miracles are thrown into sharp relief.

One week ago, I was in California. One week ago, I put on rubber boots and a jacket to go outside, wading through icy mud to feed the horses, walk the dogs, gather kindling for the wood stove. At night, I hated have to pee because that meant crawling out from under my two down comforters, walking into the sub-freezing night, and standing on an icy deck in my underwear. And yet, I had adapted enough to the cold that this was preferable to putting on my clothes and grabbing a flashlight to head to the outhouse. I would go to sleep to the sound of the roaring creek; I would wake to the sound of birds (and occasionally dogs;) my nearest neighbors were a 5-minute walk away through the woods; the air was clean, the water pure, the night sky glowed with stars. One week ago, I had to drive for half an hour to get into town, and it only took ten minutes or less to drive all the way through town. A traffic jam might involve 20 cars--trucks, really--and extend that driving time to perhaps 12 minutes. Maybe 15, on a bad day. The town had two supermarkets, two drugstores, two bookstores, and one movie theater that played three movies, once per day. One week ago.

I flew halfway around the planet into a different world. Saigon is outside of my experience. I could see very little of it from the plane from my aisle seat, through back pain and spasms. Once in the cab, heading towards Dave's friend Sean's apartment, the city seemed endless and indivisible. No landmarks stood out from the endless ranks of shops and high-rise apartments--I cannot quite say tenements--nor could I see street signs through the endless boil of motorbikes, scooters, taxis, and trucks. I expected to see a fatal accident every half-minute, yet they weave in and out, ignore lights, cut each other off, pack ten bikes wide into two lanes, and generally behave as if traffic laws are something to give the finger to as you speed by..without a scratch or a pause. Traffic moves, here, though it looks as though every major street should be a parking lot until after Tet.

The city is crowded--14 million people unofficially call Ho Chi Minh City home. It is loud, it is dirty and chaotic and deeply strange. I am illiterate here; what signs I could see meant nothing to me. Worse than illiterate, actually, because I cannot begin to guess anything, not even sounds, from the combinations of letters I see. Every letter is buried in a salad of tone and accent marks, none of which mean a damn thing to me.

The differences are made all the sharper because of the ease and speed with which I accomplished the move. To cross the ocean in a day is a miracle of almost inconceivable magnitude--I was going to add 'a hundred years ago' but it still is miraculous. We don't look at it head-on, yet our scale of time, motion, space, and velocity as human beings is the same as it was. Machines don't change this, or at least planes don't; we see the end result, but we don't experience viscerally how fast and how far the plane really travels.

Except, sometimes, if we are lucky, we step off that plane onto the far side of the world, into a new and uncertain life, and we allow ourselves to understand once more how amazing it all is.

Secundus.

Or, an explanation.

Really, I started this blog a week ago. I pondered, I wrote, I took pictures, and was very clever. What I did not manage to do was start the actual, you know, blog.

So, for the next several posts, bear this in mind. When I refer to, oh, being in California a week ago, this is because when I actually wrote the post, I had only been here a week.

Now that I've been here for two whole weeks, of course, my perspective is ever so much wiser and more refined.

Primus.

Or, an introduction.

This is my first blog. Once upon a time, I sneered at blogs as a symptom of an increasingly privacy-free world. Have a blog? Then you want attention too badly.

Then I realized that they are, in fact, convenient. Rather than elbowing my way into your email inbox every few days with a new update from Over There, I can simply let these pearls of wit and wisdom accumulate here for you to admire at leisure. In other words, you no longer have to feel guilty about not reading everything, because hey! it's a blog. Either way: goodbye, mass emails.

Though I expect most of my readership will be family and friends (hi, Mom. Hi, Dad.) I feel I should still say a few words about who I am for the new readers. At the supposedly grown-up age of 31, I sold most of my possessions, packed up the rest, and flew from my former home in California across the Pacific Ocean to Vietnam.

I had no job, no place to live, no contacts in country save for my cousin Dave, and limited funds. I speak no Vietnamese--I can order coffee and tell people to shut up--and my ignorance of culture and custom cannot be overstated. What I had was a plan, and--let's be frank, here--unbridled courage, confidence, charm, intelligence, resourcefulness, good looks, and modesty. Also, my touch cures rickets, and I just might be made of Love.

In short, I was well prepared to upend my life and start a new one. I urge you to sit back and read away, because these pages are about to blow up. It's performance art, it's history in the making; it'll make you laugh, cry, and think...all at the same time; it'll teach you about sharing, living, and loving; it will set up totally unrealistic expectations and have you on a plane to visit in no time flat.

Whoever you are.