The ease of the unknown
Hanoi is no stranger to visitors and it shows. The motorbike drivers are as persistent as the dirty old men hanging out on the street corner in Buenos Aires and our homeless population in San Francisco. But the fact that people from all over the world are drawn to this precious city means one thing for me personally (and possibly you when you visit, cause you know you will!); the ease with which you can float through this culture.
For example. When I moved to Taiwan my boss or a local friend had to come with me everywhere to do practically everything, daily tasks like laundry, meals and such exclused. But finding an apartment, transferring the scooter to my name and more were impossible for me to do solo due to the limited amount of English spoken in Tainan, the city I lived in. But it wasnt just the language barrier. There was a way of doing things that was thought as the “right” way and since I was a foreigner and did things differently, even the slightest of adjustments to the local method of any transaction caused a deer in headlights affect to whoever I was trying to communicate with, thus the companion to assist in situations such as this.
This is why I find if kind of funny when a dear Taiwanese friend of mine emailed me this week and said that she thought that Vietnam was “40 years behind Taiwan.” In what way? I want to ask her, and will. But I need to know. Cause, to be honest, if we’re talking about modern urban life, or mindset and openness to a global existence, no way sister, Vietnam is not lagging. Not a centimeter. In all fairness, I have been here about 2 weeks, but I have had more hand gesturee conversations understood and more in depth English conversations in this short time than my entire 10 months in Taiwan. No offense folks, but NO ONE CULTURE IS SUPERIOR TO ALL OTHERS. And this mindset was part of the problem last time around when I was in Asia, or rather, Taiwan.
I know y’all get grumpy on me when I get this specifically negative about a place, but I consider this more blunt and telling than negative. I could tell you a trillion things wrong with my own culture if you like, but I am afraid that this would be a most boring post indeed.
^^^ View from my balcony ^^^
It is entirely possible that foreginers puzzle the Vietnamese just as much as we do any other place we lay our backpacks and demand clean water. But, generally speaking, they are more tolerant to curious here, in a way that is heartfelt and downright fucking adorable. There are oodles of folks trying to scam me on a daily basis, but somehow this annoying injustice melts away quickly when I tap into the vibe of this city.
Add to this that simple things like my new cell Veitnam cell provider has a few pages in their instructions manual in English. And part of these instructions are how to change the recorded menus on my phone to English, so I can check my balance is such a minor thing, but is SO appreciated. Do you know that in Taiwan this was not even an option? Instead I had to memorize what numbers to press to get to my voicemail and ignore the Mandarin instructions. Yes, this could all be avoided if I would spend all waking hours learning the local languages, BUT when you first arrive in a new country, this kind of thing is just friggin wonderul.
Now if you will excuse me, I have a written assignment for class that is due on Monday that I have about an hour to do now. This was the reason I hijaked my friends computer in the first place, but got seriously distracted with email, paying bills and MUSIC. God, I love music. More soon.
