Normalization Processes

Every morning, I get up with Steven and begin my daily process of normalization. With my t-shirt and running shorts, I stand out more in my neighborhood than I do in pants, but since dailing running is one of the ways I stay healthy, both physically and mentally, not running is not an option, so my neighbors are just going to have to get used to me.

When we see strange things for the first time, we often can't help but to look (stare) at them, but once we've seen something every day, we stop feeling the need to look (stare) and it just becomes part of the scenery. I am working on becoming part of the scenery.

Each morning, I walk out of our apartment and down the alley next to our building; right at the next street and walk about a block to the main road, which I have to cross to the park. I've stopped looking at people as I pass because more often than not, I find myself at the end of a hostile stare.

I run over to the park, dodging couples sleeping on the sidewalk, yipping dogs, crowds of nursing students, low hanging tree branches; crossing the street multiple times, each time winding through crowds of honking motorbikes; turn around and head back through the gauntlet and I've been running for 10 minutes. To get to twenty, I turn around and repeat the sequence, but for the last 10 I have to be creative. I run around the block, to calls of "HELLO!" sidestepping fresh piles of dog poo, wishing myself invisible. By this time, I am dripping sweat from my face, elbows and legs, making me even more of a spectacle to the Vietnamese, whose women regularly wear pants, long-sleeved shirts, jackets, hats, facemasks, gloves and flip-flps (with socks) in 90 degree weather and don't break a sweat.

By the time I get to my dark smelly entrance way, I am thrilled to be home.

A few more weeks of this and maybe I won't be "What IS that thing!?" and I'll just be, "Oh that's just the sweaty American who runs in the park every morning."