Our First Phone Call

With the establishment of our Yahoo! Voice account we are finally able to make international calls and my first call, since I had already talked to my parents on Skype, was to T-Mobile.

I brought my phone from Atlanta here to Vietnam, no so much because I thought I could use it, but because I want to be able to make calls from the airport before we left the U.S. But upon arriving in Vietnam, I learned that I can use my phone here, I would just have to contact T-Mobile to ask for permission to unlock my phone to other SIM cards. Easier said than done.

Without trekking all the way to the backpackers area in the middle of the night (when T-Mobile would be open in the States), I hadn't discovered any other way to make international calls. Everyone kept saying that they used Skype, but since we weren't able to add any money to our account necessary for PC to Phone calls, we could only call PC to PC. Finally I learned about Yahoo! Voice and after three days of waiting for my credit card to be verified and finally being able to put money on our account, we were set up to make international calls from our computer.

I called T-Mobile's Customer Service number and heard the familiar recorded voice on the line. Since I had no phone to dial numbers (and hadn't yet discovered that I could dial with a virtual keypad on the screen) I just yelled "representative" into my headset until I was put through to Customer Service.

I explained my situation to the woman on the other end of the line and she listened patiently finally explaining that the connection wasn't good and that she could only catch part of what I was saying. She asked me to give her my phone number, but with the spotty connection, 404-543-5381 became "4,4,4,4 yes 4. Zero, Zero. Zero. 4,4." "Ok I've got 404." "Now 5, 5, 5, 5. Yes 5....". It took me a few minutes to get the whole number across, but she was very patient and understanding. She went through some procedural questions about the reason for my request and the length of my stay. Then she asked me for a sixteen digit number on the inside of my phone. "1,1,1,1,ONE. Yes 1...". Finally the transaction was completed and she told me that I should have my password within 24 hours.

The next day, I went with Steven to buy a new SIM card. On Monday, during my break at school, I saw that I had received my password and was finally able insert it and unlock my phone. The first call I made was to Steven and it was so nice to be able to just dial his number and get him on the line. I remarked to Steven that after four and a half years, we were just now having our first cell phone conversation on our very own phones. It was a historical moment. Please welcome Mr. Jenkins to the age of cell phone technology.

A month in Vietnam

Steven and I have been in Vietnam for almost four weeks. Even as I write that my brain tries to wrap around the number. Has it really been four weeks? Has it only been four weeks? What day is it anyway? It has been difficult for me to keep track of the time here where day is night and night is day on the other side of the world. I plan to put a calendar up in the kitchen at home this afternoon.

When we arrived in Vietnam, our priority, besides sleep, was to get our bearings and, for Steven, learn more about his new school and his new job and, for me, to find a place to live. Once we found a place to live, we immediately began our respective teaching positions, Steven at his new job as a middle school math teacher and me, as a substitute for a new third grade class until a qualified teacher could be found.

Now, four weeks in, Steven is working on putting systems in place, learning how to teach things he knows, but hasn't taught before; trying to juggle teaching, the administrative work that comes with teaching, with some down time for balance. I am thankfully, now freed from my temporary position, with the arrival of the new third grade teacher this morning and looking forward to having some free time to seek out local Non-Governmental Organizations, register us to vote, figure out the bus system and find the closest spring roll cart to 147 Nguyen Tri Phuong.

In this time we have accomplished quite a bit; we've found an apartment, developed a relationship with our landlords, found a local market, found some good vegetarian restaurants, made some friends, located the schedule for HBO Asia and ESPN Asia (and managed to catch some of the Rugters game last week - no UF or LOU so far in VN), settled into our new apartment, and found our way back and forth to each school. But we still have a lot to do. We are hoping to begin twice-weekly Vietnamese classes this week or next, we need to register to vote (yes, I've said that already, but it is now top priority!), pick up a bus schedule (the buses are 3,000d to go anywere, about 20 cents), figure out how to receive calls on our cell phones, find a bike pump to pump up our tires, take our bikes for their maiden voyage on the streets of Siagon without getting killed or run over, get a moto-license, get away to the beach for a weekend and so much more.

So far the only detriment to being so far away from home is being so far from our friends and our families. We are hoping to figure out the phones and set up our web camera soon, so we can keep in touch on a more regular basis.

National Day, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

National Day of Vietnam is celebrated on 2nd of September. September 2nd in Vietnam symbolizes the August 1945 Revolution and Vietnam National Day. On this day in 1945 President Ho Chi Minh read the Declaration of Independence in Vietnam at Ba Dinh Square in Hanoi, proclaiming the birth of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

On the anniversary of this day, each year, the Vietnamese take a national holiday from work and dust off their Vietnamese flags.

Here are some pictures from this year's National Day Celebration.

Hello, I love you, won't you tell me you're name?

One of the things westerners of all stripes must get used to on the streets of Vietnam is the ubiquitous "Hello." You get it everywhere from everyone. It was amusing at first and I would smile and say "hello" back, but I've now learned that "hello" on the streets of Vietnam doesn't always mean "hello."

First, there is the "hello" from the xe om drivers, almost inevitably, but not always, followed by the question, "Moto?" and the accompanying "Vroom. Vroom" hand gesture in case you didn't catch their meaning from the word "Moto." This "hello" means, "Look at me. Let me take you to wherever it is you are going." For money, of course.

Then there is the high pitched "hello" from children in shops, on the sidewalk and riding by on their bikes. These "hello"s are often innocent and curious from children wanting to get a better look at the strange person walking by, but can also be mocking and not at all friendly.

Then you have the "hello" I've fast learned to ignore. The "hello" that comes from a group of men sitting in chairs facing out on the side walk or a group of people around a table drinking beers. Theses "hellos" are often mocking, or suggestive, the speaker hoping to get the attention of/a longer look at the strange person walking by. Yesterday, Steven got a "Hello. I love you" from one of these groups.

Finally you have the more rare of Vietnamese "hello"s, that born of a genuine desire to greet you or of a desire for a brief connection of greeting between strangers. This last one is my favorite.

Our Rich Neighbors

For the last eleven days, the total days we've been living in our apartment, Steven and I have gone shopping at Co-Op Mart almost every other day. We buy food for dinner, but we can't buy too much because our fridge is half the size of a fridge in the States and the food is fresh and has been sitting out so it doesn't last long if you don't cook it soon after you buy it. We've also bought things for the house: organizer drawers for the bathroom, voltage adaptors, a surge protector, hangers, spoons, a strainer, a colander, a trash can for the bathroom, etc. Each time we go, we walk by all of our neighbors sitting out in front of their shops or their stalls, or people at the restaurants on our street, with two big bags a piece full from the supermarket. I wonder what they think when they see us walk by. Do they think we have lots of money to go shopping every other day? Do they wonder who we're hiding in our apartment that we need so much food for two people? Or do they just not care at all one way or the other?

Fort Knox, Vietnam

Our new apartment is on the second floor of a wide, concrete, 8-story building with eight units, adjacent to another building of identical character. The building sits on a wide, busy street with a constant flow of traffic. It appears to be a more commercial district, with a hospital across the street and stores lining the first floor of the buildings on each side, than a residential one, but with residential alleys tucked between each building. It is clean and relatively well kempt, for Ho Chi Minh City. It would not appear, to the average visitor, to be unsafe. But there is a woman in our building who apparently thinks differently.

In order for Steven and I to leave our apartment, we have to first lock our front door. We then lock the accordion gate outside of our front door. Finally, we secure the padlock that secures the accordion gate to the side wall. After all this, we are merely outside of our own door. We must then walk down the stairs to the front door of our building, which is a big metal, padlocked double door. The door has a hole about four inches by four inches through which you can reach to reaffix the inner padlock once you have unlocked it, opened the door, shut the door behind you and re-latched it on the inside, from the outside. The first day we entered our building we joked about the tight security. Little did we know it was only to get worse.

Our first morning of work, we locked our door, our gate, our padlock; walked down the stairs and found not one, but three padlocks between us and the outside world. Unfortunately, we only had a key to one of them. After a few tense moments, Steven was able to get the attention of the woman we had see come up the stairs as we were heading down and convey the message that we were trapped inside the building with no way to unlock all of the locks.

The woman came down and took the keys for the locks off of her key chain and handed them to Steven. Not knowing how she would get out without her own keys, but understanding by her gestures that we were to take them, we set about unlocking all of the locks and let ourselves out.

That evening, after an early dinner, we came back to our building to find that the woman had again locked on three locks on the door. Now, in order to understand the complexity of the dilemma that we face on these occasions, you must picture the inside set-up of the door. The door is a haphazardly constructed door of metal bars, covered by an iron sheet that blocks your view of the inside except for two openings on the sides with limited visability. The iron plate has the afore mentioned four-by-four inch hole which allows you to reach in and open the lock on the inside from the outside. All of the padlocks are on the inside. The first, main, and in our opinion, only necessary, padlock is on the latch that opens the door, directly to the side of the hole. The second, extraneous lock is below the latch, and consequently, the hole, forcing you to reach through the hole and down to get to the lock. This lock is made all the more difficult by the fact that it is a square key with only one correct way to insert it, leaving you with four possibilities and that much more time standing out on the street. The third and final lock is the most difficult. It is positioned well above the hole and you need two hands to open it, so you have to plunge both hands through the hole up to your elbows an incredibly awkward angle, learning against the door for support and feeling your way, completely blind, to the key hole. This whole process takes about 5 - 10 minutes (or maybe just feels that way) leaving us vulnerable to the muggers who our paranoid neighbor is trying to keep out in the first place.

We are hoping to figure out her bed time so that we can be sure to leave the building after she has turned in for the night (which has been as early as 8:00 p.m.) so that we can unlock all of the locks and re-lock only the main lock to keep her safe until our return.

Why Vietnamese Women Wear Pants

For the first week of school, I wore pants. On Monday, I decided to wear a skirt. Only when I got downstairs and out on the sidewalk did I realize why most Vietnamese women wear pants.

Riding traditional style on a motorbike in a skirt is, if not impossible, very risqué, depending on how high you have to hike it up to get one leg on either side of the bike. In my case, traditional style wasn't an option because my skirt was of the wrap around, pencil straight variety and spreading my legs in any fashion was not an option. So I did what I had seen (very few) Vietnamese women do and got on side saddle with my feet to one side, feet resting on the same foot rest, and held on to the back of the seat for dear life.

Our initial take off was a little shaky and I kept imagining my skirt getting caught in the spokes of the wheel and me getting thrown off the bike, head first, on to the pavement just in time to be run over by the next mass of motorbikes. After a few minutes though, I gained a little confidence, tucked my skirt between my calves and loosened my death grip on the bar.

I found that riding that way can be both more interesting and more disconcerting. For one, since you are facing to the side, you have a full motion picture view of one side of the street and all the goings on. But conversely, you also have a full view of your feet which are pointing precariously out into the space which every other motorist wants to be in, giving you lots more material for your "thrown onto the pavement face first" macabre fantasies as you ride along.

I made it to school fine and didn't think about the life threatening characteristics of my wardrobe again until it was time to go home.

After school, I decided to stop by a new grocery store to see what exciting things they had on their shelves. I walked home with some other teachers and they pointed me to the CityMart near their home. After spending 45 minutes or so marveling at all the interesting products on the shelves (and being horrified as I watched a roach literally climb out of a potato I was about to select), I decided it was time to head home.

With an arm load of papers to grade and two grocery bags, filled with vegetables, juice, cheese, crackers, eggs and banana chips, I headed out for the long walk home.

Walking in the rain, burdened as I was with an armload of papers and food, still thinking that it might not be time to test out my just-now-feeling-better foot, I decided to take a xe om driver up on his offer to take me home.

He put one bag of groceries on earth handle bar, handed me a helmet and waiting as I secured it, jumped on side saddle and tucked my skirt. As he took off in the rain, grocery bags dangling, across a lane of oncoming traffic, I watched a bus ride within inches of my bare toes and thought, "if only my Mother could see me now."

AIS Grade 3C Continued

By Friday, I felt I had gotten the hang of the third grade teaching thing and was enjoying myself and the kids. It was fun to come up with things to keep them amused and learning. On Monday, I gave math and language arts assessments and planned for Tuesday. I enjoyed grading the assessments and seeing what they knew and what they still needed to learn.

I found myself taking notes on the kids to give the new teacher:

Jorge* often seems as if he is taking a much longer time than it should to do his class work, but if you look closely, you will see that he has five first drafts of his work hidden in his desk, he wants everything to be neat.

Matthew is very smart, but is easily distracted and often acts up when he gets bored. He needs to be kept busy and stimulated. He likes to help the teacher and loves to cut things out.

Shelly has a very low level of English proficiency, so she often looses interest or fails to follow directions. She needs targeted, directed assistance with extra ESL content. She loves math and is very good at it. She also likes drama.

Anne is extremely smart and well behaved. She wants to please the teacher and will always raise her had to answer questions. She is often finished with her work early and likes to read silently or have other challenging work to do.

Michael is also extremely smart and well behaved. He seeks out independent study at age 9 and always wants a challenge.

Matt is quiet and often appears bored and uninvolved. He needs direct encouragement to become involved, but will step up if encouraged.

And so on...

When I learned Today, Tuesday, that the new teacher had accepted the job and was scheduled to arrive on Saturday, I was immediately a little sad, but then, once it sunk in, I was relieved that the kids would have someone to take over who was capable of really teaching them and handling all of the kids at their different levels. I was also happy to know that next week, I can get back to the business of taking care of general life things like learning Vietnamese, finding out how to get a drivers license, registering to vote and finding a job (or volunteer work at the least) in my field.

I am grateful for this experience and glad that I accepted the temporary position. It was a real learning experience and it turned out to be much less painful than I had initially imagined!

*Not their real names.

Ms. Sharon vs. The Kids: Round 2

On Wednesday evening I learned that the teacher they had offered the position to had turned down the job and they wanted me to stay for another week. I agreed out of guilt and a sense of obligation to do the right thing and then spent the evening in a black cloud grumbling about how I didn't like kids in groups and wasn't a teacher and had so much else to do instead of being stuck in a classroom and I had a bad foot and shouldn't be on it all day, grumble, moan, self-pity, grumble. Poor Steven had to listen to me all night.

When I woke up the next day, I hadn't quite shaken the cloud, but I dragged myself out of bed and out to the sidewalk to catch a xe om to school.

My initial plans for the second day included reviewing the rules and handing out more "getting to know you" worksheets. The first one was "Things I did Last Summer" and the other was "This School Year" where students could put what they wanted to learn, their favorite subject, etc. The rule review went well and afterwards I introduced my "Classroom Super Star" poster, which got a lot of attention.

After the worksheets, I decided to get them out of their seats and explained a vocabulary building game I had found on line the day before. I had seven vocabulary words from the social studies lesson the day before written out in two syllables, one syllable on a different piece of paper, totaling 14 pieces of paper. I taped a piece of paper on each student's back and kept on for myself. I then explained that they couldn't look at their own back's, so would have to put the words together using the word parts on other students' backs.

The kids ran around looking at each other's backs for a minute or two, but weren't quite sure how to put it together, so I jumped in with a hint. "I have "C-U-L" on my piece of paper. What word did we learn yesterday that starts with C-U-L?" Silence. "How about CULTURE? Who has T-U-R-E on their back?" Once we found the first pair, they caught on and it was more fun. Unfortunately, with only 13 kids, it lasted about 10 minutes.

After the word game, I gave them all word puzzles to do at varying levels of difficulty. I had three, the first being the easiest and so on. I asked them to quietly raise their hands when they were ready for the next one. Fifteen minutes later, they had completed all three and I still had 35 minutes left in the language arts portion of the class. I decided to sit them down and read a few books, which got us to the end of the hour.

Next I introduced the math lesson. I asked them to think of all the ways they would use math when they were grown up and on their own. We came up with a list including counting money, shopping, weighing things, travelling, etc. I then had them make Math Posters, asking them to draw whatever they thought of when they thought of math. After a little more explanation, they went to work.

While they were making their math posters, I googled an easy Sudoku puzzle on line and ran off 13 copies (I am all about the fun worksheets). When I returned to the class, I noticed that the lines on the puzzles had not come out on the copies, so for the next 10 minutes, I had the kids drawing the lines in the puzzles until it was time to go to Computer class.

While the kids were in their computer class, I tried to do the Sudoku and found it almost impossible. I decided to scrap the whole thing and find an easier puzzle. I just hoped the kids didn't ask where their puzzles went and why they had wasted 10 minutes drawing lines.

After lunch, it was time for Social Studies. I was introducing the "Eight Strands of Social Studies: Culture, Economics, Government, Geography, etc.," and defining each strand, when I caught myself on "Government" saying, "In the United States we have a Democratic Government and in Vietnam you have a Comm....." (mental dialogue, "Oh Damn. I am in Vietnam! Crap! What am I getting myself into?) "...unist government." Followed by the inevitable, "Ms. Sharon, what is a commernist governemnt?" "Um, well, er, eh..a Communist Government is one where the government has a lot of power to take care of the people." "Oh." Whew.

We then went over communities and the definition of a community. We talked about what things you find in a community and I assigned the homework, to read the first few pages of Chapter One in their book on the community of San Antonio, Texas (using US Text Books in Vietnam is a little surreal) and make a ven diagram of HCMC and San Antonio listing the similarities and differences in each community. They used up half an hour just copying the list and the homework off the board. (Note to self: copying things off the board takes up lots of time.)

Finally it was time for Vietnamese and I was able to pat myself on the back for another day without any real drama. I even came out with a card from two of my female students that read: "Dear Ms. Sharon. Welcome to AIS School. We all love you. You are very kind. We are very happy that you are our teacher. You are good teacher. You are so creative and smart. Your birthday is we birthday. You know. You are very nice."

Maybe kids aren't so bad after all.

Steven's Experiences

I have asked Steven if he wanted to post his experience and he says he does, but he is busy now with new teacher duties. I could post his stories, but I would rather he tell you them himself. Stay tuned for posts from Steven.