Anh Buồn

Anh Buồn means "I'm sad." Why am I sad? Thanks for asking. I'm sad because lately I've had too much downtime. Too much time to reflect on my life. Clearly, I can quickly remedy this situation by working more and busying myself with random affairs, but that would be just brushing it under the rug.

I haven't felt this depressed since my early days in Vietnam. When I wondered if I should stay or go. Since then, I've been fairly busy with school, teaching and just hanging out with friends. And not worrying about too much because well, there wasn't a lot of time for that.

Now, this week, I'm changing my schedule. So, I have fewer classes for the time being. In addition to this, three friends have hit the high road and left Vietnam. One of them, my buddy Reuben from Australia, was my partner in crime on Monday nights. We'd go out after work and explore different restaurants and bars.

In the past, I found I really enjoyed my alone time. More recently, I am discovering I want to be around people. I still know, however, when I'm done, I'm done. I need to be removed from my immediate surroundings at once and be placed in bed or be allowed to vegetate in front of my computer.

So, what is my problem? Well, I don't have a lot of friends. Story of my life I think. I seem to know everyone, but am close friends with few. I don't know why this is. Either I am afraid to open up, am unwilling to open up or other people are at fault for those same reasons.

I certainly don't mind eating a meal by myself. Or having a beer by myself on occasion. But I find I do this far too frequently. I want to share more moments. Not every moment, I have to ease into it, but I certainly could stand to be a bit more social.

Loneliness is an interesting thing. It's up to the loner to change the situation I guess. And branch out and put yourself out on a limb. But in my old age, I find it even more difficult to find people whose company I enjoy. And so, more often that I should, I opt to be alone.

I'm also finding I'm tired of sleeping alone and showering alone and motorbiking alone. Time to find a blow up doll or at least a big pillow. Seriously though, I could use some company. I could use a mate from both sexes. I know life is meant to be shared and I'm tired of hogging all the covers.

It's official

Well, I am now the proud owner of a Vietnamese bằng lái xe. That means driver's license. It's an enormous piece of plastic to be carrying around in one's wallet. I'm just glad it's over because it took far too much effort on my part. Once I got started and invested both time and money, I had to see this through to the end. If I knew what I was getting into, I never would have bothered in the first place.

But now that I have it, I suppose I'm happy I went through all the rigmarole. Now, when I get into my next accident, I won't be automatically at fault just because I'm a foreigner and driving illegally. Not that that is the reason I got it. I don't really know why I got it. Just because I guess. Why not?

Traffic jelly

This evening, I experienced the worst traffic I have yet to experience here in Vietnam. It was ridiculous. Stop, go, stop, go, inhaling more exhaust than I'd inhale in a month back home. Going around the traffic circles was insane because every entrance was jammed full of people. As soon as a gap opened up in front of you, you HAD to lurch into it. Or you'd be left behind.

So after numerous lurches, a couple love taps on other people's fenders and rubbing my wheel all over someone else's, I finally made it to school in the spitting rain and lung-blackening fumes. It was fun though. Fun to run red lights with everyone else, fun to mutter what the fuck with everyone else and fun to just be a part of the madness.

People are insane here. It's just a fact of life. And you notice the insanity even more when everyone is jammed together like that. Like the guy who drove his 4-wheeled bicycle through a red light and made everyone else stop for him. When he made it through he turned around and laughed at his buddy who had intelligently stayed behind.

Or to see motorbikes coming at you in the wrong lane of traffic between you and a bus going in the right way. Just veer to the side. It's normal. But it was nice to see this lady stick out her tongue in slight recognition of the absurdity of it all as she tried to make her way to the appropriate lane. It made me realize that I'm not the only one out there who is shaking his head and laughing all the way to work.

I live next to a freeway

At first, I thought it was great to be tucked away down an alley somewhere in the middle of District 3 surrounded by throngs of locals. I suppose anywhere you go in this country you are going to be the midst of many. There is no escaping that and I'm not saying that is a bad thing. Just to clarify.

I have a nice balcony overlooking the alley below and I thought it would be nice to sit there on occasion and watch the action. Now, I realize this "alley" is actually a major artery connecting two busy streets and so it is often jammed with people in a hurry, also known as assholes.

I move over to the side to let the person coming at me pass me easily. But the dumb fuck behind me honks at me and goes instead. This has happened a lot already. A lot of dumb inconsiderate fucks. There is way too much horn blowing around here. They are used way too often.

I mean, seriously, imagine hearing one of these prepubescent squeaks of masculinity all the time. Well, at least I don't hear them from midnight to about six in the morning. But at six, the fun begins again as do the dogs and it's only wishful thinking that keeps me in bed until I rise.

I'm hoping I'll get used to it. Or maybe I'll start working in the mornings. What do you do if you can't beat 'em? You join 'em. I wish I could beat 'em though. With a stick. A long, hard, knobby stick with thorns at the end. Then I'd be laughing well into my dreams.

But the more likely scenario is this. Overrun with sleep deprivation in a state of delirium, I will jump off the balcony onto a honking motorist, a barking dog and a crying baby and put us all out of our misery. Or maybe I'll start wearing ear plugs again. Or I'll find some sleeping pills.

Fun with the webcam

The nose knows

Hey, I have a question for you. Do I have a big nose? Cause the other day in class, while playing change chairs, one of my students said "Change chairs if you have a long nose" and then he stared at me. Thanks buddy!

And then on this game show, the makeup lady said she needed to do something with my nose to tame it down a touch. Apparently, it was stealing all the attention. You say damn! I say, don't be jealous.

I'm going to be on TV

Coming soon to Vietnamese television: me looking like a fucking ass. Yeah, I signed up for it so I can't complain, but I will bitch about my day and the people associated with this stupid fucking game show. I would be less irritable if I had won the contest and felt that the judging wasn't biased and that the game wasn't seemingly rigged from the beginning.

Whatever, I'm just blowing off steam. I still won some money, 2 million dong to be precise, but in the moment I wanted to piss on that money and/or wipe my ass with it. But that would have been hugely disrespectful considering that most Vietnamese don't make that much money in a month. It is about $120. It wasn't so much the money, it was losing that gets me.

I don't feel like I lost. This show was all about embarrassing two foreigners willing to try and speak Vietnamese. I know I'm not good, but if I'm worse than this girl, put a fork in me, I'm done. It really deflates my confidence. Not only that, but I think the female judge that gave me the low score had it out for me. The bitch. I wish I could have stomped on her face.

I really am a poor loser. When all was said and done and they announced the winners, I couldn't even fake a smile. They gave us the statues, pictured here, and I almost snapped the fucking head off. I kind of wish I did even though I respect the handiwork involved to create the thing in the first place. It would have been a show of my utter lack of appreciation of being on the show.

They asked us for our comments on camera after the announcement of the winner. I could barely manage anything positive. Since the air was so full of bullshit, I added a little bit more, but with a straight face and stopped short of saying I had a mind-blowing experience. I can't wait to see myself on tv looking like a fucking idiot. It's too bad the viewers won't see all the clowns involved.

Yay, look at my fucking trophy! Yeah, I'm bitter.

Please Mr Policeman

Well, so much for the myth that the police don't bother with foreigners. Myths are meant to be dispelled anyway and now that I've dispelled this one, maybe I'll chill out a little. Maybe.

It was a long day. It was spitting with rain. It was about 9:15pm. I was anxious to get home and eat the street food that I had in plastic baggies hanging off the hooks of my motorbike.

I was on the home stretch and I was tired of sitting in second gear behind all these slow pokes. So, I gunned it from gear to gear in the lefthand lane designated for four-wheeled vehicles.

Then this guy with a baton blows his whistle and waves me to the side. Aww, shit. He points to the speedometer and writes 30USD on his palm. I laugh at his suggestion. And I pretend like I don't understand.

Although it is clear that he wants some money. Fortunately, I only had about 130,000 dong, or about $8, in my wallet. So I took out two 50,000 notes and showed him my near empty wallet.

He accepted the 100,000, waved me on and the eyes in the back of my head saw him put the money in his wallet. Tyler, slow down.

One month later

Well, here I am a month later after my accident. It's actually been five weeks, but who's counting? My leg has healed and almost everything is back to normal. There is only a small pain in my right thumb like it has been slightly jammed. Overall, I am happy with the way things have turned out.

Now, I have a nice manly pink scar on my leg. I'm actually trying to reduce its size and color by applying saffron root, which gives it a nice orange hue and makes it stand out even more now, but less later. We'll see about that. In the meantime, I'm driving a little slower and stopping to smell a few more flowers along the way.

Almost licensed

Today was my driver's test. I fortunately didn't have to take the written test. That would have been a disaster. Instead, I had my Oregon driver's license translated to Vietnamese and apparently that sufficed. But since I am only licensed to drive an automobile, I had to take the driver's test to be properly licensed to drive a motorbike, even though I've been driving one for the past five months.

I know how to drive a motorbike, despite already having had two accidents. I'm far more conscious than most of the people I see blindly entering roads with their whole family in tow. These instances still don't cease to amaze me as I mutter under my breath and swerve to avoid them nearly going under the wheel of a much larger vehicle or running into another family of four.

So, anyway, like I was saying, I'm pretty comfortable on the bike. But all of a sudden, I have to take this test in front of at least a 100 mostly Vietnamese onlookers and other test-takers. And it's blazing hot at only 9am and I'm starting to feel nervous. They have this whole track set up and you have to drive it staying within the lines and without putting your feet down.

I didn't put my feet down, but I lurched and wobbled around the figure eight in first gear, made it out of that sweating bullets, dropped it into a much more manageable second gear, gunned it through the straight away, made the tight turn into the left, right, left weaving section, made another tight turn and then semi-gunned it through a straight away with speed bumps. Done. Finished. Take that.

I didn't know if I passed cause my performance in the figure eight was a tad pathetic. But I did and I will be the proud owner of a new Vietnam Driver's License in 10 days time. To celebrate, I will buy a new helmet and a new wallet. A larger wallet is needed to properly accommodate the over-sized licenses they have here. Good thing the wallet I have now is in need of replacement.

Laundry

What?! I have to do my own laundry? Nobody told me...this is bullshit! Yes, for the first time in over nine months, I have done a load of laundry. And it was quite painless. And the clothes will be dry soon cause it is fucking hot, as usual. Unless it rains - that is always funny. Seeing all these faces popping out of windows to pull in the laundry before it gets just as wet as it was before.

It's actually a good thing I'm doing my own laundry, well I think. Now I can control what my clothes will smell like. The last place really overdid the floral essences. And the little tags they put on each item of clothing were quite annoying. I'd realize I hadn't found all of them when my armpit would begin to itch in the middle of class. But now I have to iron and that kind of sucks. Where's a girlfriend when you need one?

The new pad

This is the view from my balcony. Nothing glamorous, just overlooks an alley and my neighbor's laundry. I'm happy to have a balcony though. It makes my small living space more tolerable. And it sounds cool to say you have a balcony.
This is my bedroom. I'd say it's a little on the small side, but at least my new mattress doesn't sag in the middle. And there aren't any ants on my toothbrush. And I have a ceiling fan that doesn't squeak. And I have fast internet connection. And the air is not nearly as stifling as inside my old room.

I do kind of miss the prostitutes coming in and out of my old place. It added a little something. However, on the whole, I am more comfortable here and that's what matters. We have a housekeeper that comes three times a week, we can come and go as we please and we're more immersed into real Vietnamese living.

Farewell

Goodbye District 1. You were still enjoyable even til the day we parted ways. But this moment was inevitable. I longed to be away from you from the beginning. I will miss many things about you, but I promise I will visit, whether passing through or visiting one of my old haunts. I will see you soon.

Last Sunday, I finally made the move to District 3. It does border district 1, but I am a good 10 minute drive away from the area I know well. This is good. I need to experience new things. I will miss the view from my old guest house and the occasional sunset I was fortunate enough to see.