Vietnam

media type="file" key="vietnam voice.m4a" width="300" height="50"Van McSweeney Levinson Vietnam I awoke from my slumber in a nice comfy bed in a large hotel. I had just arrived last night, and I was on vacation in Vietnam. I hopped up out of the bed, put my clothes on, and headed out. We already walked around the town for a little bit, and because I woke up so late, most of the workers were already more than halfway done with their shifts. In Vietnam, most people prefer to work early in the morning until early in the afternoon. After about an hour of going into random stores not really finding anything we liked, we decided to go in to the famous theatre of Vietnam. We walked in and picked out a play. There were a few different ones, but we didn’t really have any idea on which ones were going to be good or whatever because we had only been there one day, so we just picked a random one. We paid, and then went into the theatre. As soon as we sat down, we realized that this was no ordinary play. There was tons of dancing and singing, much, more than in an American play. Everybody seemed so energetic and happy. Everything was so crazy that the storyline was almost impossible to keep up with. It was quite a long play I had no idea how these actors kept up their energy it was almost like they were screaming the songs running around. After the play, we went outside and got to meet all the actors, and I have to say, they didn’t smell the best. They were sweating like they had just ran a marathon. We talked to them; trying to understanding them through their thick Vietnamese accents. They kept talking about how they used to like the theatre much more before it was owned by the government. I don’t really know what they meant by that, but if I had to guess I would has something to do with their communist government. Later, we went back to the luxury hotel and I took a long, hot bubble bath. Vietnam was a surprisingly pleasant place to vacation, and their customs were very different, yet interesting. I would highly recommend going there over vacation sometime media type="file" key="Narrative for vietnam.m4a" width="300" height="50"Zoe Cross Spring Rolls

View From The Top Of Phan Xi Pang

Xuan Son Hanoi National Park

Vietnamese Woman

View From The Top Of Phan Xi Pang

Vietnamese Woman

Xuan Son Hanoi National Park

Vietnamese Food ==

Vietnam Map =A Promise Of A Future= Waking to to cars driving all night and motorbikes weaving in and out of traffic, was no different from my life back home in New York. However a clear difference, is that the morning sun feeds in slow and unfocused, not through my window blinds at home, but through my permethrin impregnated mosquito net. Although it is barely audible, I hear Loan, the women with whom I am staying, enter the room and she near forces me to get out of bed and come to the family meal table for breakfast. I comply, but not before stretching and yawning. Dragging myself out of bed and through the door I be sure to not sit with my feet facing the family alter while eating a breakfast large enough for six people. Breakfast is very important" to the vietnamese and it commonly consists of Pho which is a rice noodle made of a special type of rice called "goa te", vegetables, such as carrots and parsley, and meat, such as beef and chicken. Today is no different. I have learned to use chopsticks since I came here one month ago, because it was quite embarrassing asking for a fork and knife in the first week, but Loan taught me how using chopsticks should be treated as if it were an art. Boa, Loans husband sits across from me. In all o the days that I have been here I have never seen him miss a day of work. I asked Loan about it. "If we don't work we don't earn money." She replied as if she didn't even understand why I would ask such a question. After breakfast I walk to the orphanage. My handmade shoes slap the pavement as I continue my trip and weave my way through the hundreds of motorbikes crowding the streets. I feel the wind on my face and I think about the two beautiful girls I am adopting. Lihn and Kim are twin sisters. They are three years old and were born May 16 2008. I can't wait for them to come live with me back in the states. When I arrive I am greeted with many hugs and kisses while they urge me to give them piggy-back rides and play with my earrings. They run around just like hyper children should when they are young and I can't help but be saddened by the fact that they will not remember this place when we leave. I know they will eventually grow curious as to who their mother is and where they are from, just as I did. I think in a way I am saving myself as well as them. I see my face in theirs and I know, that even if I barely remember my time in the vietnamese foster child system, I am saving them from what I suffered as a ten year old child. Their arms wrap around me as my arms wrapped around my mother and father, and Their eyes sparkle with a promise of tomorrow.

Business in Vietnam

I woke up, eyes open to the sun. Head sweaty, but what else is new. And again like every other morning in this hell hole the humidity stood up and smacked me in the face. This ‘tropical weather’ was a shock o my body which had become content with my New York penthouse temperature of a steady 68. But you as I am, wondering how and why I’m here in this hell hole called Vietnam. Well, it all started when my boss told me I was going to be one of the few people in our office to go into the field and off to far off lands to see how our workers are and the moral. But this was the farthest thing away from that possible. And now look. I’m in the middle of a sauna 24/7 and can’t get out. But no use complaining. I put on my khaki shorts and my boots although not a lot, felt like wearing a carpet. I got up, walked out across the wooden slats the covered my bunk from the ground, elevated a few feet above the ground. To keep dry from the rainy season. And so on went my shirt. Still wet from the sweat from the prior day. I took a deep breath thought about my family back at home and stepped outside. As I slopped through the muddy field and went deeper into the kiddy pool for a field I knew this day wasn’t going to get any better. I looked up from my rubber boots into the field and saw one thing. A bunch of white domes dipping up and down. Under these hat domes, there were Vietnamese workers in our rice field. I walked by each one. All for some reason wearing black. I guess to keep from burning in the hot weather. None seemed happy. The way I figured, they knew no matter how hard as they worked they knew they couldn’t beat the communist society in which they lived. All the hours of picking sweating and basically dyeing in the field to only know that if they work they won’t get fired. But no more. After a while of slopping through the field a man came across me. He asked me my name. I responded in question, “Mark?” to this Stanger who was walking through the mud in his loafers and suit. “And yourself?” he didn’t respond just kept looking me over. “Good, follow me.” He directed. As confused as I was I followed what he said and started walking. At the speed I went it made me think he didn’t want me to see what was happening. So I followed his lead and continued on. He took me to a building. No windows. Florescent lights flickering, and told me to sit. I did. He told me that all the production in the factory was up to snuff and that there was nothing to worry about. But I did. He spoke to me for the first time person to person. “You can report to your people that our production is at its maximum and that there is nothing to worry about.” At least that’s what I think he said through his thick accent. He brought me a coffee. But not like any coffee I’d ever seen before. This one had big brow chunks of semi-ground coffee in it. I drank the Luke warm coffee down. He asked if I had any questions. “I don’t believe so, can I go back out into the field to see how everything is. Your number are great but I’d like to go.” He allowed me to leave but very hesitant at that. He told me one last thing as I tried to walk out. “Watch your step” he said with a slight grin on his face “as you might put it, Charlie may have left you’re a little gift that he forgot to pick up.” I knew exactly what he was saying as I open the squeaky door back into the heat looking upon the large mountain line in the distance. The fog from the moisture almost made the hills disappear. -   “Yes Mr. Johnson, everything was ok with me” I spoke over the phone to my boss on the plane home from my ordeal that had just come to an end. But all I could think of while he blabbed along was how bad everything there was by our standards. But the look in their eyes, all I knew is that there was nothing that I could do.

chris vogt