Thursday, March 19, 2009

I'm Back and Here for Good!

My internet has finally been fixed! First it was my keyboard, then the internet connection.
It's like Buddha has a personal grudge against me.

The tech guy literally left 2 minutes ago. Sorry, I should call him my friend, as he said he wants to be my boyfriend (I just assume he means guy friend, Vietnam is not that type of place).

I've cancelled my ticket back home. I've decided I'm staying in Hanoi for a while. I am both not ready to go back to Montreal and also want to experience a little more here in Vietnam.

I've been applying to jobs here and there. Hopefully I get snatched up by something.

There will be more posts to come, and I promise to update more often.

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Gratuitous Video Scene #3: Van Hung Commune Teaser



Sorry for the delay in posts. I've now bought a USB keyboard.
Here's a short teaser from Van Hung Commune.

Every workshop I have attended here (all 2!) has had someone come up and sing traditional Vietnamese songs during the break. Just some random participant. I was hoping they would ask me to come up and sing some Celine Dion.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Scoring Cheap Food #2

Armed with my new knowledge of numbers in Vietnamese, I decided to venture out to the street market near my house. I wanted to make a soup for lunch and I was missing some key ingredients.

I surveyed the street quickly to decide which vendor I would buy my produce from. I decided on a smiling old lady who didn't seem frightened by the prospect of communicating with someone who obviously had a loose grasp on the Vietnamese language.

I pointed to everything I wanted and shot numbers out like a rookie. After having picked a lot of vegetables, I panicked. shit. I only left the house with the equivalent of about $2.50 Canadian. I was a little ambitious about being able to haggle to a low and acceptable price. I didn't know how to say i'm really sorry, but I just realised I only brought 30,000 dong. I surely had passed that price, even if she were ripping me off. I pulled out what I and was making a face and gestures and saying xin loi to excuse myself.

She pulled the 30,000 out of my hand and then gave me some more bills back. I imagined she would then only leave me with the kilo of potatoes and I would shamefully be on my way back home. But then she dumped all the veggies I had chosen into by bike basket, and sent me off on my way.

I guess I had enough.


The damage: 26,ooo dong (2$ Canadian) for a kilo of potatoes, 4 tomatoes, 4 hot chilies, a handful of green onions, a yellow onion, and a giant bunch of some sort of spinach-like vegetable.