June 4, 2006 Postcard
Hi:
Wow! Time does fly (and I am feeling my age). It's been a little over two years since I arrived at the Nha Trang airport (which was in the city then, rather than 30 kilometers down the coast at Cam Ranh Bay) with two “big” suitcases containing everything I thought was worth salvaging from 70 years in America. Actually, I left a lot of family things with the younger generation, so they are still in the family for awhile yet.
Now I have a beautiful wife and a beautiful new home that we love more every day as well as a huge Vietnamese family. The two years have been very good to me and Dung.
***
A couple of things from our recent European trip to share:
First of all, travel in Europe is expensive. Gas is more than $6 a gallon and restaurant food is outrageous. However, there are a number of hotel chains in France with a smaller number of units in Germany, Spain, Holland, Denmark and the U.K. that charge around 30 Euros. Don't buy the 4 Euro breakfast! The dollar dropped while we were traveling so the dollar cost kept changing but they are still a bargain.
Italy is a nightmare for the traveler without a fixed itinerary of reservations and has nothing like these chains. Also, McDonald's are everywhere, even Italy, and their European food is 10 times tastier than in America.
Again, if you travel like I do, that is loose, you'll find an annoying number of little places where your American-issued Visa or Mastercard won’t work. European banks have adopted a card with a security chip embedded in one end that can be inserted into a slot to park your car, rent a bicycle from a rack on the street, pay a toll and to use in a lot of places where no attendant is present. At hotels and restaurants it isn't a problem but at some self-service gas stations it is. In checking with my bank, I was told the American credit card industry sees no need for this change but the Europeans say it has reduced credit card fraud dramatically.
Again on the credit card: I slipped up big time in Venice. We ate lunch in a self-serve diner that was doing a huge business, not far from San Marco Square. There were a couple of additional charges on my ticket and when I questioned them I was told they were for the table setting, which I found annoying and said so. At the end of the day, when we were vaporetting (the boat buses) back to the parking garage, I discovered my Visa card was gone. Panic! When did I last use it? Finally, I realized it had been at lunch. By now it was 7:30 PM and boat travel back to the square takes about 45 minutes. I was afraid they'd be closed but we set off. When we got there they were still open. The same old woman was still cashiering and she spoke no English. Finally, an English speaking Italian patron got her to "understand" what I was saying. She acted at first like she didn't know me or understand, then just as we were about to give up, she opened her drawer and produced my card. I would have liked to strangle her but instead, we said, "Thank you." and left.
She had been annoyed when I questioned their table charge and when I forgot to pick my card off the counter, she kept it, rather than send a bus boy to us or give it to Dung when she passed her going to the restroom. Remembering to always pick up my card right away is easier now because of her malicious little stunt.
***
Back here in Nha Trang, life is so different. One hundred thousand dong is, relatively speaking, a lot to spend for something. It is about $6. A cab ride usually costs less than $1 and the driver probably doesn't have change for a 100 thousand note.
Our Toshiba washing machine, two years old, wouldn't turn on. A service man came, identified a defective capacitor, brought back a new one, fixed it, $15. Dung complained it was too much.
I stocked up on soda the other day. Coke is expensive at 25 cents a can. I bought some orange soda that rang up two prices. Some were at 20 cents, the right price, but others were ringing 25. The poor clerk had to consult with everyone in the store to figure out what to charge me.
Some English friends sent a check, made out to me for 250 Pounds, as a gift for the new church building. It will take three weeks for our bank to clear it. Not too promising if the country is to join the W.T.O. this year.
***
We had two friends visit from Saigon and Singapore recently. One was Dung's oldest and dearest friend, Ruth. She just finished her Master’s of Divinity in Singapore and brought Grace, one of her professors, to see what Vietnam was like. Grace is a delightful little lady who is interested in everything. Dung arranged for one of our students to take her on a motorbike tour of Nha Trang, then we took a car with two students and the four adults to Yang Bay Falls. I've mentioned the falls before as a spot I really enjoy. It was less so this time. It has been identified as a major tourist attraction for Vietnamese tourists, which will obviously be the vast majority of tourists, and they are slowly ruining it.
They had constructed a well-designed, unobtrusive walkway to the top of the major falls but someone in the bureaucracy decided it wasn't wide enough, so they have torn a good part of it out and are widening it by filling in along the natural stream. Apparently the work was started some time ago and isn't progressing much past tearing up and leaving debris along the stream, like mining waste. In addition, there are now vending stands at the foot of the falls, one of which has a loud speaker system in a tree above that periodically plays loud music and announcements. To top it off, the traffic to the area has increased the number of "less cultured" visitors who aren't very interested in nature but just want to picnic and they leave their garbage everywhere, in spite of the numerous receptacles. I was very disappointed at the change for the worse and won’t be in a hurry to take family trips there again. After the falls, we took Grace to the mud baths. She was delighted with the whole day but recognizes the cleanliness gap between pristine Singapore and "untidy" Vietnam.
***
One of the frequently occuring events that are so enjoyable happened this morning so it is fresh in my mind. (Otherwise, I'd have forgotten it already.) I was swimming along the shoreline, among an all-Vietnamese body of swimmers and some children noticed my western face. They exchanged a hurried conversation and one of them called, "Hello" to me. You get a sense of what is going on in these situations. Sometimes they are just teasing each other, sometimes they are just being polite but sometimes they want to practice their English skill. It isn't always easy to tell so I always pause and say, "Hello, how are you?" The response they've learned is, "I am fine, and you?" Then we can go to "What is your name?", "How old are you?" "Where are you from?" etc., depending on how much they know. Often there will be consultation between them before asking or answering. It is always a delight and sometimes, if they seem particularly good and interested, I will ask Dung to invite them to our morning English lesson.
I am especially fortunate that Dung is so loved by so many people and has such a wide circle of friends. I have been experiencing some fluctuations in my blood pressure rate and trying to adjust my medication accordingly. We bought our own "arm cuff" and Dung has tried to learn how to read it but every day a young nurse, Phi, from the hospital, who is engaged to one of Dung's favorite Bible students and one of my English students, comes and checks. We've decided I should see someone here in Nha Trang. As luck would have it, Phi's uncle is Dr. Son, the head of cardiology at Nha Trang hospital and trained in the U.S. and France. More later on my visit with him.
Please keep in touch.
Dick & Dung
