Salute Your Local PCCC

It must be Fireman Appreciation Month or something here in HCMC because those posters have been appearing everywhere.

Personally I find it hard to imagine a full-sized fire truck threading it's way through Saigon traffic in time to save a building; maybe they have smaller trucks. Or maybe the constant rain and humidity prevents fire by itself.

In a way it reminds of Crassus, the old Roman gangster who would set fires and then surround the building with toughs so that the fire brigade couldn't get in, and only step upside if the owner paid protection money. I wonder if a similar scheme runs here?

I do like the artwork though. I haven't seen even vaguely Realist public art in a long time. I don't know how effective it is but is does add character.

Yes Sir...I Mean, Yes Very Sir!

Today I showed up to Vietnamese class wearing my Obama t-shirt, which the teacher found hilarious. He decided to use it as a jumping-off point for teaching us a number of political words suck as 'election' (cuoc tong tuyen cu) 'president' (tong thong) and 'prime minister' (thu tuong chính phu).

However, I soon disgraced myself by referring to the Vietnamese Prime Minister by using only the respectful form of adress (anh), not the very respectful form of adress (ong) such a situation demands.

There was awkward silence for about ten seconds, then my foreign ignorance was forgiven and we continued with the lesson, and I learned to say 'Bush khong la thông minh'.

By the way, there haven't been alot of pictures here lately. That should change soon.

Beer Ahoy?

Anyone who spends a good deal of time in Vietnam cannot avoid the Bia Hoi, cornerstone of Vietnamese male social life.

A bia hoi (literally 'fresh beer') is for all intents and purposes a beer hall. In fact, the Vietnamese apparently got the idea from the Czechs. Within, on the usual plastic chairs and aluminum tables, one can find a 90% male clientele cheerfully consuming large quantities of very cheap, light beer and having the best time.

One thing about Vietnamese drinking: there are alot of toasts. People frequently clink their glasses with cries of 'Yo!' and, if someone yells '100%!' they will drain their glasses to the bottom.

Beyond this, most bia hois have expansive menus spanning much of the animal kingdom - the usual beef, chicken, pork and shrimp but also frog, snake, various other birds, squid, and other things to offend the squeamish.

In short, they're wonderful.

There are Some Moments of Hilarity (for me, anyway)

Two in one day, sometimes.

Lesser:

During a game of Taboo, in which the player tries to make his teammates guess a word without actually saying it, one of the words was 'wife'. My student began by saying 'It's the woman, who is in love, and she marry -" another student burst out with 'Lesbian!'

Greater:

One of my favorite students turned in a short paper about his trip to the aquarium. The title/ "I Go to the Museum of the Fish". I laughed my ass off for about five minutes. In this business, you take what you can get.

Learning Tieng Viet

Anyone who has ever tried to explain the English language to a non-native speaker knows what a frustrating experience it can be. The grammar is confusing, there are a ton of irregular verbs, the spelling makes no sense and the pronunciation is a nightmare.

BUT, at least, even if your pronunciation isn't perfect, you can still be understood fairly well. The sheer volume of accents present in English attests to that.

Vietnamese is not like that. Very vowel and consonant has to come out exactly right or the words is different or unintelligible. It's terribly frustrating, though rewarding in its own way.