Now I’m on my journey to Hanoi. We decided to take the train from Saigon but we stopped at Nha Trang for Christmas on our way to the north. Overall I have mixed feelings about Saigon. In some ways it is a very lively and nice city to live but I wouldn’t say it has so many interesting places to see. My dad and I spent a lot of time just walking around and stopping at cafes.
It is definitely a good place to have a good time when you’re on vacation. District 1 seems to be the epicenter of the tourist scene. I am not a huge fan of that area but there are some cheap bars, as well as plenty of places that will rip you off. I was staying just on the border of District 1 and 3. I liked where I was because it was overwhelmingly touristy. I was kind of sequestered to that area though I didn’t really have time to travel around to different parts of the city. I’m sure there is more to the city than I was exposed to. It’s funny how almost everyone keeps telling me that going to Hanoi is a bad idea. They say the weather is cold. The people are cold and not friendly. Most of the people that told me that are people that I don’t really respect anyway so I take what they say with a grain of salt.
There was a French girl staying in my cabin on this train who was telling me just the opposite however. She is working as an au pair in Saigon but she was telling me that she regretted leaving Hanoi.
“Hanoi is a poetic city.” She told me and we discussed for various experiences we had in Asia. While we were talking, the American guys who were ardently trying to convince me that Saigon was much better than Hanoi were getting obnoxiously hammered in the dining car and embarrassing themselves. They are not people I take seriously.
Sorry, I’m getting ahead of myself. Before I even got on this long 26 hour train to Hanoi we spent two nights in Nha Trang which is a small beach town. It is quite a nice place and I was surprised how lively it was for Christmas season. The problem with Vietnam is that it isn’t as tropical as a lot of people might imagine. I had hoped for a nice, hot day on the beach for Christmas but instead it was quite windy and even a bit chilly. It was nice in the morning but by the afternoon it would get positively cold. I saw Western families there who probably expected some tropical paradise but hadn’t done their research. I still like Nha Trang but beach season is definitely in the summer.
After parting ways with our Canadian friend we got on the train to Hanoi. There are four of us heading to Hanoi. I’m travelling with two other American guys and an English girl. I think we have a decent group dynamic and we are all going to help each other out in finding a job/place to live. I will probably end up sharing a place with the English girl. We both have a tight budget but she does have a few more things she considers necessary that she would like in her apartment; such as hot water, clean bathroom, and a kitchen. I’m hoping we can find a couple rooms open in a house with some other European expats and a shared kitchen. I really enjoyed my living arrangements in Manila even if they were quite basic. I also liked living with other Filipinos since they always offered me good advice about the city. I think it would be harder in Hanoi to share an apartment with local Vietnamese. I have heard that foreigners are pretty much sequestered to one part of town and it’s technically illegal to live in other parts of the city. I’ll see how much of this talk is actually correct.
Vietnam is an interesting place. At times people seem very xenophobic and at other times they overly welcoming and friendly. I was discussing the Vietnam War with the French girl I mentioned previously and I told her that I was surprised that there wasn’t more animosity towards Americans here. She was surprised as well that most Vietnamese she talked to consider the war “ancient history”. It wasn’t more than 40 years ago that the war was still going on so it really isn’t that long ago. But she said something that I agree with: Vietnamese people are constantly looking to the future. For the last twenty years Vietnam was been quickly developing and the people have a strong drive to push their country to first world status. Vietnamese people are anything but passive. However I do sense a bit of an inferiority complex among a lot of Vietnamese people.
My supervisor from the course I took in Saigon is going to the Philippines for the first time two weeks from now. She told me she was nervous to go to a “big country”. The Philippines is probably a bit bigger in terms of land area but in terms of population Vietnam and the Philippines are about the same. In overall GDP the Philippines might be a bit stronger then Vietnam but I think per capita Vietnam is stronger. The wealth seems to be distributed a bit more equally over here; probably a legacy of communism. I didn’t see the vast disparity of wealth in Saigon that you see in Manila. There were far less beggars on the street and I hardly saw any street kids that are all over Manila.
I have made some progress in my real goal for coming to Vietnam. I didn’t come here to teach English. I came here to better understand how microfinance operates and helps alleviate poverty in the Vietnamese context. I want to only teach part-time and use my free time to volunteer at various NGOs that work in microfinance. While my dad was here, he was able to meet with an Australian guy working in a pretty prominent microfinance institution in Saigon. He gave us some insight to what we should expect. According to him there isn’t much demand for an academic paper like what my dad and I would have cooperated on but I take what he says with a grain of salt. My dad wants to work with me to eventually publish something about microfinance. If this will come to fruition is really up in the air. My first goal is to better understand by volunteering for some different offices. Whether or not we can construct a coherent academic study from what I discover depends on how much information I’ll be able to access and the feasibility of making a meaningful people from those findings. Everything seems ambiguous at this point and I will first have to better learn Vietnamese and establish the necessary connections. The eventual outcome is still shrouded in a haze but I am confident that whatever happens I won’t settle for mediocrity.
Overall my stay here has been enjoyable but not without its hardships. It is really difficult for me to be away from my girlfriend Kristine. She is the love of my life and she is on my mind continuously. I talk to her when I have the opportunity but it is difficult while I’ve been travelling. Hopefully when I settle into an apartment I’ll have a more normal schedule. Through hardships such as these I believe our relationship can become stronger. I would not do anything to lose the best aspect of my life.
No comments:
Post a Comment