It's Not Green Bay, But...

Here's a picture of what the sky's looked like for the last month or so. The tall building that's so hard to make out is a little over a mile away. I don't know if it's overcast, cloudy, smoggy, or what, but it's been a long time since the sky has been blue!


If you're curious what winter here feels like, lower your thermostat 55-60 degrees Fahrenheit, run a humidifier to keep the humidity at about 75%, and keep those settings there for a couple months. I know, 60 doesn't sound very cold, but when it's that temperature inside and out, it does make it hard to get out of bed in the morning.

But, on Friday, Nancy and I leave for Chiang Mai, Thailand for physicals, two of weeks of meetings, training, and a couple days off. It will be nice to be warm and see the sun again! (And, hopefully, we'll get to see Josh and Crystal.)

Thầy nào trò ấy means...

..."like teacher, like student."

Last spring when we were thinking about a logo specific to the Vietnam Teaching Fellowship (VTF) as opposed to its older brother, the China Teaching Fellowship (CTF), we thought that this traditional Vietnamese saying might be a nice thing to add. After all, we're not just about teaching, we're about sharing what we've been given.

Which Semester Is It?

Hard to tell. After having a couple of weeks of down time around Christmas and New Year's, I started the spring term with one of my classes (juniors) last week. A second class (sophomores) starts next week.

At the same time, I'm still finishing up finals from the fall semester - one for freshmen International Relations majors last week and another one for Freshmen English majors next week.

One reason the schedule's so complicated is because, at the beginning of the year, the freshmen have mandatory military training (which just looks like a lot of marching around from what we see). That means they go a month later at the end of the term. Another reason is that students have intensive lecture classes on subjects like politics, law and economics that get tacked onto their term as the lecturers are available. The only sure thing is that the term is 15 weeks long, so at least we know how many classes we have to teach.

The funny thing is - funny unusual, not funny ha-ha - is that some of us get just a couple weeks off, some get about a month. Melia finished the end of November (except for some finals) and won't start again till after Tet! But she had 5 writing classes last fall; after all that grading, she earned some rest.

VTF Santas Part 2

Deena was able to go down to Ha Nam province with the CAMA Services staff on December 18 to hand out the gifts we wrapped. I finally got around to putting it on YouTube. What you don't see is the older kids acted out the Christmas story in Vietnamese.

Thai Nguyen Wedding

Wednesday morning Huyen called to invite me to her brother's wedding. Short notice is pretty normal (the wedding was Thursday*) but she had told me before Christmas that he was getting married soon after the New Year. Fortunately, I've not started up with the second semester yet, so I went downtown, bought a card and went to bed early.

The ride up was sunny but cold. Since the family is well-connected in the steel business, the house was pretty crowded. The first face I recognized was Huyen's little cousin (who is not so little any more!) She greeted me with an enthusiastic, "Hi, David!" quickly followed by, "Where's Nancy?" She was Nancy's cultural guide in the fish-eye story and they've spent quite a bit of time together over the years.

This was the most elaborate Vietnamese wedding I've been to so far. Live traditional folk music, tea tables separate from the banquet tables, an improvised kitchen 3 times the size of my classrooms...

The customs, of course, were the same. Guests visit and eat as the groom and his family move from table to table to greet them. At the appointed time, the groom goes off with some of the older members of his family and a few close friends to get the bride and bring her back to his house. Then they go inside and the families have a short ceremony at the ancestral altar. More and more couples are doing the western wedding cake bit afterwards and these guys had a huge cake.

Weddings aren’t my favorite event because, the longer they last, the drunker some of the guests get. Then, one after another, they come by your table wanting to drink with you. The organization I work for has a no drinking policy, and I don’t drink anyway, so it’s always a pain. Even sipping doesn’t count – “Mot tram phan tram” is the standard ( “One hundred percent!”).

Still, this wedding was one I didn’t want to miss. And it was fun, for the most part. I was able to slip away to a quieter place in the house and chat with some uncles, cousins and grandkids before going in to the banquet. I'm so grateful for the chance to have learned some Vietnamese last year so I can talk with people now! It was a good chance to see some of my old students, friends, and to continue to cultivate small seeds among those who are still far from the master gardener.

* Two VTF teachers were invited to go to
Ha Long Bay today; the invitation came
at midnight last night.