Arrival at Bến Tre

Hello all,

I'm writing to you from my home for the next nine months, Bến Tre College!

Those who want to send letters, care packages, or hate mail, my address is

Jefferson Viet-Anh Day trợ giảng tiếng Anh
Trường Cao đẳng Bến Tre
ấp 1, xã Sơn Đông, thành phố Bến Tre
tỉnh Bến Tre

(Jefferson Viet-Anh Day, English Teacher
Bến Tre College
Hamlet 1, Sơn Đông commune, Bến Tre city
Bến Tre province)

The accents are super important, so please make sure they are all correct otherwise you might be saying something completely nonsensical. Also it would be great if you could let me know if you're sending something so I can ask my host for help if it mysteriously goes missing.

Requested care packages:

1. Western food, especially peanut butter and chocolate
2. English books
3. Letters, postcards, pictures.

Please don't send

1. Anything really valuable

Anyways, let's talk about the last couple days here in Hanoi!

I've been in Hanoi for a month and never noticed the bird-seller a few blocks down the street. Just goes to show how much there is to see around here.

Selling birds for good luck

Packing was an absolute nightmare, but as usual things managed to come together at the last second. I'm convinced that the longer you spend packing and the more things you pack, the smaller your luggage looks at the end.

You start out staring at your room saying "Oh my god, how am I going to fit everything into these suitcases!" and then you end up looking at two small suitcases and saying, "wait, that's everything I own?" Moving sucks.

It was Hung's birthday, so we got him a cake!

Saying goodbye to the hotel staff was hard, I had to struggle not to get choked up. This is the third emotional goodbye I've said in the last six weeks--First leaving Chicago, then leaving Boston, now leaving Hanoi--so I was wreck on the inside and it was a struggle to keep it together. I gave the hotel staff a bag of dragonfruit, and gave Jenny, Hoang and Lam each a UChicago pen. I think they appreciated it.

With my family, saying goodbye for now

I also got to say goodbye to my family, my Ong Dich and Chu Thuat were very sad to see me go. I was invited to Ong Dich's house in Son Tay, but unfortunately I didn't have time to go. I promised to come back to Hanoi soon and to come to their house. I gave a bunch of presents to Chu Thuat, including a bottle of Johnny Walker Red, which is one of my favorite whiskies. Chu Thuat said he wouldn't open the bottle until I came back to Hanoi to drink it with him. I found myself quite touched by all this. 

The flight was relatively uneventful, although i was able to chat with a girl selling snacks at the airport. Then I was totally unable to communicate in Vietnamese with the flight attendant. He was still very nice, giving me a free map of Southeast Asia for further travels, but it was a blow to my confidence in my Vietnamese. I feel like every conversation I have in Vietnamese either builds up my confidence a ton or crushes it completely. There is no in between.

At the airport I was picked up by Mr. Luan, Mr. Hoang (an English teacher and my guide for the next few weeks in Bến Tre) and Mr. Tiep. I was very grateful that they picked me up late at night, even with a long drive to Bến Tre ahead. Mr Hoang and I talked for a very long time on the three hour drive over, he has very good English and I think we will get along very well.

From left, Mr. Hoang, me and Mr. Tiep

We stopped for Pho on the way over

The gate of Bến Tre college

As expected, my accommodations at Bến Tre are more spartan than at the Rising Dragon in Hanoi. However, I have reasonable internet, air conditioning and a western style toilet, so in the grand scheme of things I have the important issues covered. I started unpacking and settled in. 

The first part of my room is an office/meeting area space

I get a bicycle

Mosquito net required for the bed

Combination bathroom, laundry room and kitchen. Efficiency!

As I was going to the bathroom, I noticed several large specks moving around the other side of the room, and four large cockroaches crawled out of the drain. Well, I had hoped my honeymoon period at Bến Tre would last longer, but I guess I am now officially introduced to rural Vietnam. Several bloody seconds later, three cockroaches had been killed and one had fled. Upon leaving the bathroom, I noticed that there was a spider about the size of my hand just chilling under the dresser. I officially declared myself too tired for this and left the spider undisturbed, resolving to ask Mr. Hoang if the spiders were dangerous tomorrow.

On Monday I woke up and called Mr. Hoang, and we wandered over to the cantina. He expressed disbelief that I did not know how to ride a motorbike, then promised to teach me while I am here in Bến Tre. He also told me that the spiders are "very bad." Oh good. 

After coffee and Hu Tieu, a pork soup with translucent noodles, we took the motorbike over to the teacher's lounge to meet the other English teachers. They were all very nice, and I am quite happy to meet all of them. I introduced myself in Vietnamese, which I think they liked. They were all teasing me about having a girlfriend, and joking about setting me up with various girls on the faculty. I quite enjoyed the atmosphere in the room, and they all speak very good English.

We all went out for coffee after the meeting.  I am never good with names, so I struggled a bit to remember everyone's name, but they all teased me about it and I will learn as we go forward. I'm looking forward to working with all of them. In particular I will be teaching with Mrs. Thu, Mr. Hoang, and Ms. Y. I was invited out to lunch with Mr. Vu, and I went with him and Mr. Hoang. We took a motorbike through the town to a restaurant on the river

This restaurant is gorgeous

The lighting is terrible, but Mr Hoang is on the left and Mr. Vu on the right

The Mekong in all its splendor.

Lunch was fantastic, we had stir-fried beef and fish soup, and all of it was fantastic. Mr. Vu and Mr. Hoang both speak very good English and they were very good sports about me practicing Vietnamese as well. Mr. Vu also invited me over to his house on September 2nd, which is Independence Day, so I am very happy about that! 

Mr. Vu also told me that the giant spiders aren't dangerous at all. So...I don't know.

After dinner I went shopping for comfort food at the supermarket with Mr. Hoang, and then came back to finish unpacking my room. We were planning to play soccer, but unfortunately plans fell through. We should be playing tomorrow. My room was feeling a little bare, so I decided to put up some photos. I've never been a big person for hanging up pictures, but it seemed like an appropriate time to do so, and I am glad I did. 

The pictures over my desk. My desk is out of frame because it is currently a total disaster. 

I think it brightens up the room quite a bit. Thanks Mẹ for giving me all these photos!

I was on my own for dinner, so I wandered out of campus, looking for a street stall. Just from my first impressions I can already tell that Bến Tre is different from Hanoi. Keep in mind these are first impressions, and are subject to evolution as I spend more time here. 

First of all, the language is different. The southern accent is very different from the northern. In the north, when "r," "gi" and "d" start a word they all make a "zuh"-sound. In the south, "r" is an r-sound and "gi" and "d" are "yuh"-sounds. That means you hear a lot of "yuh" in the south, which you never hear in the north, and that my already limited Vietnamese skills are challenged even more because of the different accent. 

Secondly, it is really dark here. I had complained before about how dark Hanoi streets get, and how few of the street lamps work. Oh lordy, I was such a fool. You don't know what dark is until you're on a street that has no street lights. It's a little terrifying. 

And finally, no one seems to know what to do with a foreigner. Everyone can pick out that I don't quite belong, that I'm clearly not Vietnamese because of what I wear, what I'm carrying, especially when I start speaking. However, in Hanoi when people realize you're a foreigner they start trying to sell you things, offer you motorbike rides or try to sell you fruit or something. Here, when people realize you're a foreigner, they just stare, like they're trying to figure out why you're here. 

It was a little disconcerting to have slowly gotten used to Hanoi and then to realize how different Hanoi is to here. 

Today I also had the first Vietnamese meal I did not thoroughly enjoy. I employed one of my favorite strategies, which is to wander into a random street stall and sit down, and see what they give me. Normally this works out wonderfully. This time I got chicken feet

I saw that the sign said "chân gà," and I knew that "gà" meant chicken, so I figured that whatever it was, it would have chicken in it, so it would probably be pretty good, right? Well, I learned today that "chân" means foot. Sigh. 

I had seen my grandparents eat chicken feet before so I knew how to approach it, and it actually didn't taste bad. Isn't something that I would seek out, but I wouldn't be forced to turn it down if someone offered it to me. And the small child running around there was adorable, he asked me in Vietnamese  where I was from and when I responded that I was from America he got this big grin and ran away. So yeah, it wasn't a total loss.

On the way back I stopped at a bánh xèo place, Vietnamese pancakes. I had had those before, so I knew what to expect. No surprise, it was delicious.

I also bought some jackfruit and sugarcane juice from a very nice lady and her mother. The grandmother asked if I was a teacher in Vietnamese, and I said I was from the college. It was the first time anyone has called me teacher, so I was unduly proud.    

Getting jackfruit in the middle of the night

The quintessential Vietnamese woman: rocking her grandchild to sleep while also running the store

I felt quite good coming back to my room with a bag of jackfruit, a full stomach and an evolving understanding of the province I'm based in. Then I walked into the bathroom and saw a giant spider in the middle of the floor. Sigh. Several seconds later, the spider was dead as was a cockroach that wandered by the scene. Nothing in Vietnam is ever easy...

So it's been an eventful first day in Bến Tre, some ups and some downs but more ups than downs. I am looking forward to getting to know this province, this college and the people who work and study here. It's going to be a fun and interesting nine months.

Stay tuned!

Thanks for reading,
Jefferson