Weekend Errands

There's no Walmart and I'm OK with that.

Saturday I wanted to pick up an AC adapter and a patch cable. The adapter's for Nancy so she doesn't have to keep recharging batteries to run her portable CD player. The cable's so I can transfer some cassette tapes to CD. I have a course coming up that relies heavily on tapes and it's a pain trying to find the right place on a cassette.

Nancy's been battling a flu the last few days, so also I needed to pick up some stuff for her and get some groceries. One stop at a super store and it's covered, right?

Well, like I said, there's no Walmart (or Wegmans, Price Chopper, Target...).

• First stop: A tiny shop around the corner from the school guesthouse to get some milk and juice for Nancy. Got milk; they're out of juice.
• Second stop: The local open market for a carrot, 2 red bell peppers and some fresh basil. I can make supper out of that and the green beans and pork we've got at home. On the way out of the market, I buy a couple of pomelos (think grapefruit only bigger, more seeds, and a little sweeter). That will give Nancy some Vitamin C.
• Third stop: After dropping the food at home, I hop on my bicycle and head for an electronic shop down near Hai Ba Trung Street. I could probably find an adapter and cable closer to home, but I know that if they don't have it they can tell me who does. The guy and girl who work there are really nice so that's been my shop since I've come to Hanoi.
• Fourth stop: The computer store near the VKO center for a $10 webcam. (My electronics shop doesn't carry them.) It's a little busy inside because they've got a dirt-cheap special on USB drives if you show them a student ID.
  
• Fifth stop: The bun bo nam bo shop for two bowls "to go." It's near home, so I don't have to balance it on my handlebars very long.

It all took only about 1/2 hour longer than it would have on a Saturday morning in New York.

Some parts of life aren't super-exciting. It's just life - probably like where you are. But at least you get to meet a lot of people along the way!

My Other Blog

I've started a blog to see whether it will be any help to my students. You can take a look at http://myenglishclass.edublogs.org/.

(It was originally posted on blogspot but there were some problems accessing it so I moved it over to edublogs.)

20 Floors Up and Still Honking

We don't get to too many luxury hotels - only when we have to attend a meeting at one of them - but Sunday night one of Nancy's friends invited us for coffee at the Summit Lounge on the rooftop of a place she used to work. At twenty stories above West Lake, there were no mosquitoes, a nice cool breeze and still the omnipresent honking of motorbike horns coming from hundreds of feet below.

But it was nice and we enjoyed spending the time with them. The menu prices made me think that we're not going to be seeing much of the place though.

Can't take credit for the photo. We were there later in the day when it was dark and they didn't come out. I stole this one from http://www.flickr.com/photos/marvincouldwell/441795840/.

I Used to Speak Vietnamese

It's not been a good language week for me. And it's only Monday.

Saturday night one of my classes invited Nancy, me, Robyn, Rick and Karen to dinner and karaoke to celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival. (I think Rick may have been the impetus behind it.). Karaoke is far from my favorite activity, but I'd like to get to know this class better and this was a good opportunity. An existential side benefit was the deep meaning of singing, "When I'm Sixty-Four" now that the words are starting to have a whole new meaning for me.

We met up with the students in front of the school and walked over to a restaurant along the lake for some fried rice. Along the way I was chatting with some students and realized that they were having trouble understanding me. Now, I've always known my vocabulary was limited, but my pronunciation used to be "pretty good for a foreigner." I do not want to be that guy who thinks he can speak well but no one can understand a word he's saying!

So, I need a new plan. I've been meeting with a young couple once a week so I can help them with English and they can help me with Vietnamese but that's really not enough. Once things get settled with the schedule at school...

It's a lot easier to teach a foreign language than learn one.

Connecting Old Friends With New

Last night we had a small party to introduce some of the friends of last year's teachers with this year's incoming teachers. A lot of food, a little singing, some pictionary, and a stab at Catch Phrase. Nancy has more pictures posted at her Picasa page. It's been really nice to be back at the same school and reconnect with people from last year - a little more like our UTP experience.