Black teeth in the Air!

Do you remember that scene from the Titanic when Leonardo was teaching Kate Winselt how to hock up a loogie of spit? Well, basically that is what everyone in Saigon sounds like. I always wondered what was up with that until recently when I wanted to spit up my lungs too. My voice sounds like I am going through puberty and it’s constantly hurting like I am sick. For a while I thought it was from yelling at my children all day until I did some research. Vietnam has the one of the highest rates of pollution in the world.  With motor bikes being the only way of transportation and the remnants from Agent orange following the Vietnam war pollution is a major problem. Also, the whole “Go Green” phenomenon is the least of their problems right now. Ho Chi Minh (Saigon) has an accounted population of 8 million (It’s said to be closer to 10-12) and 7.8 million motorbikes on the streets,  if that puts things into perspective. Friends of mine who have been living here for a year talk about their hair falling out in clumps from the pollution. Millions of fish are wiping iup on the shore dead. Due to the Vietnam war and the effects of agent orange farmers can no longer grow anything organic. The soil is permanently ruined , forest degradation, water pollution and air pollution are a major issue. You can literally feel the pollution in your throat, skin and inside of your body. I come home and use the saying “I have to go shower Saigon off of me!” People and myself carry around baby wipes to keep their skin moderately feeling clean and to avoid breaking out. I should also mention the rate of Diabetes  in this country is on an increasing and dangerous high. Sugar here is equivalent to being ignorant to the dangers of smoking in the previous decades. The people, do not realize how much sugar they are using nor how bad it is for them.  Condensed milk, about 5 Tablespoons of it is used in an individual cup of coffee. It was good for a while until I literally felt it clogging my arteries. They pour sugar into their drinks, foods, and everything you possibly consume here. I would die for some Kale right about now. My children’s teeth are black. Mainly from the sugar, possibly the pollution in the water but also because the superstition they believe. I was told by the Vietnamese that they let the baby teeth rot otherwise they will not fall out and therefor the children will never grow adult teeth. I know,  yes it’s true. Even some of the educated and wealthy population still believes in this.  You will also see families of 4-5 on the motorbikes. The adults will be wearing helmets but never the children.. I asked multiple sources why the children, even infants, I am talking about, are never wearing helmets? I  found that it is a superstition that if they put helmets on the children it will stop their skulls from growing!! I know, this culture! The things you can only learn by living here!! The learning just never stop!! AHHH VIETNAM I LOVE YOU--- BUT PUT HELMETS ON YOUR CHILDREN!!!!

NAMaste with some Vietnamese culture for you!

Ride or Die....Literally

Ride or Die
Yesterday was one of the best days and worst days of my life. I can now officially say I have experienced what ‘ride or die’ literally means. For a month I have been afraid of riding a motorbike out on the streets of saigon where motorbikes rule cars about 100 to 1. With no traffic lights, laws or violations it looks really scary coming from an outsiders perspective. For the past two weeks I have been driving  back and forth to work so I started to feel more confident about my riding skills. Yesterday a group of friends and I decided to take a day trip along the country side about an hour away from our residence. With google maps not being that great,  it ended up turning into a six hour trip. During that time I really turned into an excellent driver. I was in such bliss just riding along with my friends with the wind in my hair. I felt like I was in a  real life video game if you could imagine. Dodging trucks, getting 10 points for every idiot crossing the road that I hit, to dust and pollution in your face causing you not to see.  For the first time I didn’t have a care in the world except for the bike and the road. That was until my near death experience. “Hey pretty girl” said a driver next to me. I ignored him as I thought he would go away. “Beautiful, come with me.” I ignored him again, and increased the speed of my bike letting my friends know this man was harassing me. The next thing I know this man whips out a samurai sword that was about two feet long with an old  wooden handle. He had it raised in the air and I thought he was going to stab it right into me on the bike. My body naturally went into a state of panic. The only thing I could think to do was to speed up and get passed him. He kept following me and following me. My friends heard me screaming, realized what was happening and surrounded me with their bikes. I probably almost crashed I was going so fast but my body was in flight or fight mode. Shortly after my friends protection he went away and we stopped. I jumped off the bike, my body numb shaking and instant tears down my face. I couldn’t breath, I was hyperventilating. Never in my life have I been so scared. Of course, the instant I felt safe on that bike I had to experience an unheard off incident. People in Vietnam are so nice and kind but like all countries there are crazy people out there. So, why the best day of my life too? I really became an expert on that bike that day, looking like a natural. I got to explore the countryside of Vietnam with my housemates/brothers. I do not know what I would of done without my roommate Sinaed there to take me out of my state of panic. “At least you have a good story for your blog now, Katie.” Yes, it’s a great story now but that was such a horrible experience. The best part, I am no longer afraid of riding anywhere in this city. Nothing can come worse then that incident. I took myself on a ride today into District 1. I put google maps on in one head phone and let the lady give me directions the whole time. (Thank you Kayleigh for the tip!!) Not to brag but I am pretty proud of my recent riding skills on the motorbike after being afraid for over a month. Never give up!!

1 month mark!!

It’s so amazing what a month of teaching and living in a foreign country can do to you. I remember the first day, I arrived, when I was too scared to even leave my house alone.  I remember getting on the back of a motorbike literally holding on to the old man missing teeth, both hands wrapped around his waist, practically groping him, in fear of my life. Now, I am riding my own bike around Saigon and showing the ropes to my new house mate. (Mate—I know.. you can blame my English and Irish friends for the new lingo). I remember my first week at school  and going home almost in tears  thinking that I was failing at teaching. I have adapted so much to the Vietnamese culture and how to teach them. I never realized that when I was quickly giving my students English names (which is a thing) that that name would remain their English name, for the rest of their school years and forthcoming. Forever there will be about fifty kids in Vietnam running around with names, named after my x-boyfriends and Disney characters. My children have just became so creative. You can see it in their work everyday. They do not just copy off of me anymore and draw American flags to represent themselves. They create their own work and it gives me the chills to see. I really take the time to  dig into their little brains and interests as much as I can. I much rather have a child come up with, turtle’s, for example,  then copy “traveling or teaching”  when teaching the core value—Passion. I can’t say it enough. I think it is so great that this school, VAS, is bringing core values and creativity into their school curriculum after many generation of teaching just  basic education.

Short and sweet this week but I have to go bring out America!!
NAMaste Hello 4th of July!!!
Miss you America and Philadelphia especially

The Charades Game

Week three! That’s a wrap! This is the first time in my life where I can say I have experienced the living versus the holiday. Saigon is literally unreal and everyday continues to be a full blown adventure. It’s the little things about this city  that gets me sometimes. Like how the dogs – I kid you not, look both ways before crossing the streets of saigon. Last night I dropped into a quick mart at 2am in the morning to have Vietnamese children congregate around me. Starting with two kids to about fifteen of them. Please just try to picture me sitting on the floor of this 7/11 type store teaching them how to give a high five and  take a selfie. This is literally my everyday.  I walk outside still and it’s I am famous for literally being the only white person in this town.  I went to order a smoothie yesterday and yes, of course, it turned into an hour production. Combining two different fruits is like asking them to make me a cake topped with 100 dollar bills. Everyday life has turned into playing the charades game as the locals do not even know the word “hello” in English. I end up taking so much time to find ways of communicating with these locals. I have to  point to what I want behind their cart, physically put the fruits into the blender and act out blend. When all was said and done my smoothie was amazing and the ladies probably wanted to kill me. There was a little left over, she was about to give it to me but I acted out “you try” to have them  taste my concoction (avocado, apple, banana, and yogurt) and everyone was saying “yum” and rubbing their tummies with smiles and laughs. I am really learning patience and to let go of some of my obsessive behaviors out here (that is besides how I like my smoothies). To be honest the language barrier can be bliss sometimes. I can’t complain about the route the uber driver is taking,  how I like my food prepared, or my nails done, because I do not know the language. You just have to take things how they are which adds a lot of  simplicity to the chaotic town.

Saigon is really starting to become home for me.  My VAS  friends have taken me in like I am one of theirs and they remind me so much of my friends from home. I have these days where I am exerting so much energy I honestly do not know where it ever is ever coming from on  4-5 hours of sleep. I thought I had a lot of energy in general but teaching 50 kids with a language and cultural barrier everyday has taken something else out of me. A dear friend of mine Tim, re-wrote the sports curriculum for me taking it back from  kickball to bounce, catch, throw. During relay races on Friday my kids were physically bouncing a ball for the first time. I know it sounds so silly but these kids did not know those three words (bounce, catch, throw) nor how to physically do it. Two weeks ago if you would of thrown a ball to them they would let it just hit them in the face. So yes, seeing my children properly bouncing a ball was very exciting. In comparison to Philadelphia the learning curve is so different. The major one is street smarts versus academics. In Vietnam, the children are strictly taught to the book. Creative thinking, imagination and again with the physical education is not touched on. Where in Philadelphia these kids come in never been read to a day in their lives but they can survive the rough streets and become the next Allen Iverson. VAS is doing a wonderful job adding this camp program. Team building activities is very difficult for these children. They struggle to be creative and create their own work. We were making journals that are meant for teaching core values. I told them to draw things that represented them. I showed them mine as an example and lets just say I now hold 30  journals with an American Flag, an airplane and a picture of the world. (AKA they just copied mine if you didn’t get it).

 Teaching creativity and critical thinking has truly been an honor these past couple of weeks. In Vietnam, individuality is not as important and valued as it is in Western parts of the world. Anything a Vietnamese does, he does out of consideration for the welfare of the family, rather than for himself alone. They even all hold the same birthday year. They celebrate their birthday on the same day, the Vietnamese new year, despite the day or month one is born.

 I understand how people live here for years and never want to leave. My European (well English now) friends crack me up. There is literally a different word for everything and I love when they mock my American accent.  They think I am such a typical American and everything I do reflects right back onto Americans (sorry guys) haha.

P.S Tim, I hope you are honored that you have been officially mentioned in my blog.

Namaste with me onto week Four!!

From Beach to Brothel

“Are you alive?” “Yes, I am are you?” “Is she satteling you too?” “Yes, can you please just check every 15 minutes to make sure I’m not taken?”Literally the conversation between my friend Jeremy and I this afternoon. Only in Vietnam do you go from flying in from Ha Long Bay back to Saigon to find yourself in an environment that is a massage parlor by day and a brothel by night. The place looked so nice downstairs and was only 4 dollars for an hour long massage so we went for it. The upstairs though… literally was a scene out of the movie Taken. The scummy bathroom, separate rooms, men in uniform yelling something in Vietnamese. Please don’t ask me why we stayed but we did and I am still alive! Ah never again!!!

This past weekend a friend and I took a trip up North to an Island called, Ha Long Bay. Do you see the background of this blog? Yep, that is it. We flew up North Friday night and spent all day on the bay Saturday. Hạ Long Bay,  is known for its emerald waters and thousands of towering limestone islands  (I will let the pictures speak for themselves). The craziest part of this adventure was the picture taking. The Vietnamese and other Asian travelers were obsessed with taking pictures of my friend Kayleigh and I. On our cruise boat, without asking, Mothers  would just plop there children on top of us and start taking pictures. Others would straight up ask if they could take their picture with me, and some would from a distance picture us. It was like they have never seen white people in their lives before. I had a couple people come up from behind while I was laying out and they would pose beside me while having  their friend take the picture from afar. As this would probably annoy most Westerners, lets just say I didn’t completely hate it…   Does Katie not like attention?” HAHA I loved it. I started posing for them with my American peace sign and huge smile. Lets just say, I made a lot of friends this weekend. It’s nice to be back in Ho Chi Minh city now. This place has become such a home for me. When I said, I was ready to go back home my friend thought I was talking about Philadelphia. Nope, It was Da-Blend in Ho Chi Minh that I was referring to.

Namaste.

New friends and new perspectives

Days and now weeks have gone by and I still feel like I am living one big dream. I can’t tell if this is what feeling alive feels like, or if there is crack in my coffee. Either way, I am so completely out of my elements of comfort and normalcy, that my body and mind still can not catch up, leaving me in a constant dreamlike state of mind. I thought after graduating college and finishing my fellowship year was the behold of life challenges. That is up until these past three days. Never in my life did I imagine working at a school  as a camp counselor would be my challenge in this trip to Vietnam. How could it be? Five years of teaching experience in low income schools of Philadelphia, and going and working at a day camp my whole entire life. Little did I know… To put things into perspective “stand in a line” and “hold hands and form a circle” is a foreign language to my first graders. I have spent the past three days teaching kids what forming a line means and looks like. Yes, these students are bilingual but at the age of 6 a lot of language is still developing. Any language related to Physical Education or team building activities has never been introduced into their worlds. Their  focus has been on education and how to behave in a classroom. For many, this is their first time they are hearing such vocabulary.  I thought possibly for sports I could have them do a simple obstacle course, until 30 seconds later I found they did not know the language aspect or the physical aspect of “bounce a ball.” I have also failed to mention—NAMES!!!! Learning Vietnamese is a very difficult language as it is a tone language. You can pronounce the word correctly but if you do not have the correct tone it changes the meaning of the word. So yes, I have 50 students whose names I can not pronounce to save my life. So, on top of my language barrier, and inability to “form a line” I am calling all of my kids by “Hey you.” I have been doing my best to find nicknames for kids like spiderman, pop-star, Elsa etc. I guess coming from my previous camp experiences I didn’t expect to be playing duck duck goose all summer (The only successful activity I’ve had thus far). My cooking teacher today put things into a great perspective for me. She said “Katie, parents drive around on mopeds with their babies not wearing helmets. It’s okay). Since then, I have relaxed a little. It’s camp and the only thing that is important is that the kids are smiling. And that they are. I know it will get better. It has each day. I asked myself back in the states for a new challenge, and sure did I get it. On the brighter side of things, my directors and staff are fn wonderful. I think the concept of adding a camp curriculum into their academic setting is genius for these children. Down the road, this camp is only going to prosper.

I love spending time with my new camp friends and getting to know people from all over the world.  We were talking about the Orlando shooting yesterday. It came to my attention that America is the only country with these mass murders going on. My friends from Ireland, England and the UK never witness this. They say not even police carry guns. No one even knows anybody who owns a gun… it’s just not a thing.  It made me sad that people think of America as a scary place. They are shocked and blown away by the fact that my students have to walk through metal detectors each day before entering school. Times have changed and so should our amendments. How are we still following the same set of rules that were written in 1776?

NAMaste with ORLANDO .

Kindergarten Tables

I walked by myself to camp last Friday without the help of my “two bodyguard” friends. I felt what it was like to be a minority in a foreign country. It was almost like everything stopped and people would without shame just stare at me with an entire 180 head turn. I couldn’t walk past one cart or store front without getting full on looks from the natives. The thing is though, its not scary here. The Vietnamese people are very nice. They appreciate attempted language, gestures and big smiles. They are not bitter about the Vietnam war. At first, it was a bit scary, I think  because of the overwhelming environment and language barrier but a week later I feel very comfortable here. The street food is something else. They are known for their alley ways of pho, banh-mi sandwiches (thank you France for the bread), and iced coffee with condensed milk that comes in a bag. These alley ways crack me up as they are all filled with kindergarten sized tables and chairs. I am thankful for only being 5 feet tall but my 6 foot friends (bodyguards as I call them) are definitely struggling. 

Today, I attempted to ride/rent a motorbike today. You can rent them for $50 a month. I failed terribly on my first attempt and decided it wasn’t the best idea. This is like the worst place in the world to learn. Mom, you can rest easy for now.