With A Little Help From My Friends

    Since I have never traveled in Asia I have no standard of comparison, and Hanoi may be similar to other big Asian cities, but there is no doubt that  Hanoi is INTENSE.  The level of activity, the density of motorcycles, people and shops  and the apparent chaos of it all make it both exciting and stressful. My introduction, however, has been made much (much) easier by the help of two individuals. Dr Nghia  (Nghia is his first name – the practice here is to use an honorific together with the first name – thus I would be Mr. or Dr. Ross), my main contact at the Hanoi University of Science, came by on Saturday morning with his nine year old daughter, Lam to help smooth my transition. His presentation of an envelope from HUS with some Vietnamese bills in it for me to use as spending money meant that I didn’t have to change money immediately.  After he went out on an errand to pick up an adaptor plug for my computer, his daughter, who had refused to talk at all, suddenly became very verbal. In the midst of our conversation, she looking around my hotel room and noted that there were two large beds. “There are two beds. When your wife come next week will you sleep in one bed or two?” Whoa, I’m thinking, “I’ve traveled (literally) half way across the world to discuss my marital relations with a nine year old?” When I ask her how she has learned such good English, she reveals it is all due to the Disney channel (eat your heart out PBS!).

   The second person who has made this transition much easier is our friend Mary Gallagher who spent last year teaching English in southern Vietnam and is spending this year teaching computer science at Truong Dai Hoc University in Hanoi. Before I even got here, Mary had purchased a cell phone and SIM card for me and left them at the front desk of the hotel (no small effort since I am at least 45 minutes by bus from where she lives). Mary came in to meet me on Saturday afternoon to show me the Old Quarter and teach me how to cross the street. Those of you have visited Hanoi know that this is the most essential skill to learn here. Indeed, there are two kinds of tourists who visit Hanoi. Those, who on the first day they arrive suddenly  discover that they subscribe to the life philosophy that everything they need is already on their side of the road and there is no need whatsoever to cross any street, and those who suffer from delusions of invincibility.  There are very few traffic lights here and the ones I have seen appear to be taken as suggestions, not commands. From the various guidebooks, I know that the trick to crossing a busy street is to walk slowly and at a steady pace without stopping so that the thousands of motorcycles and scooters can swerve around you. To that Mary adds the most important rule (missing from the guidebooks!) – you do NOT step in front of any car, bus or truck because they cannot swerve to go around you given that they are surrounded on both sides by scooters. The U-tube video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4ud844wlAg

Shows the idea, but the road these young women are crossing is virtually empty compared to what is the normal pace of traffic.  I have now crossed the street twelve times and have begun to realize that everything I need in life is indeed on this side of the street.

    Tomorrow I start my work at the university. They have me scheduled from 9 – 5 every day so it should be a busy (and interesting) week. I do hope I have something useful to tell them.