It was a couple of days ago and I was with about half of my students from a reading class I teach.  We were visiting a museum and I got to chat with each of them a little during that time.  However, one thing was consistent in several chats with them:  asking about my return to the US.  Those were difficult conversations for me to have.  Not because I didn't know the answer, but what the answer meant. 

They are people I ultimately enjoy being around, but I'll be leaving them.  While I know I'll still be in contact with several of them once I'm back in the US for the time I'll be back, it doesn't take a fool to know you lose something by not being physically present.  That was definitely true from being away from the US, and I know it'll be the same for here.  Unlike my relationships in the US, the possibility of returning to Viet Nam in the future is pretty uncertain.  It's possible, but nothing a few years from now is revealed to me yet. 

What that leaves me with now is continuing to enjoy the people I have in my life here and seeking to be genuine with them, not letting it get painted differently as some sort of "send off."  I'd like to think of it in a way my time with the students ended a couple of days ago:  sitting in a park with them sitting at all angles around me, getting to chat with them. 

I forgot to share some pictures from the past week.  Monday was Vietnamese Women's Day, a very scary day for me when 95% of the people I know are Vietnamese women.  Fortunately, I wasn't forced to buy flowers for the endless hoard of people, and in fact was invited to a party of my very small class of seven young women. 

You can see a new album posted to the right.  These were taken by one of the students.  There are repeats where I tried to doctor up some of the images. 

Sometimes I wonder about what's really happening when I notice changes going on around me.  I think I'll always wish I was more different in those areas that persist in being my own problems, but it's nice to see some positive changes.  A schedule has taken some kind of shape now and should be in full swing next week, yet there continues to be blessings that aren't so teaching related. 

The thing I sort of worried about this year is how much I'd get to stay in contact with former students, or simply older students I'm not going to be teaching again (or never did).  I've been grateful to have more opportunities to connect with people I'd either wanted to stay in contact with, or to get to know better.  In many ways, it's the students that I'm around more than other foreigners who I get to know the most (except, of course, the students who are foreigners), and who hopefully get to know me as well as can be.  Maybe I'm just finally accepting that.  A little odd, considering I'll be 27 in a couple of months. 

Times can be a bit of a downer now and again, so I'll welcome these changes.  As I think about it, these blessings awaken me more to greater Goodness that can be so evasive in life.  Not merely that relationships with all kinds of people are themselves "Goodness," but how Good can come out of them.  Same same, but different (now I need to buy one of those shirts in Thailand, don't I?). 

I was just informed that today was one of my student's birthday, but I didn't learn about it until she told me about it.  So, I'm feeling a little embarrassed/aloof, but I wanted to do this to publicly tell Chix "happy birthday."  I've included links to some videos and pictures from it to let y'all share in that, too. 

YouTube - Chị ong nâu và em Chix
YouTube - Oc + Tet hat 2 con than lan con
http://s72.photobucket.com/albums/i185/Dooxii/SN%20Chix%202008/

Even with little-to-no actual planning for classes this week, it's been a very involving experience in the sense of enduring.  Though nothing awful, there's been a sense of repetition and pressing on with presentations given.  That is saying nothing against the presentations themselves, but the sheer quantity of them has been MASSIVE.  I want to pay as much attention as I can, and I have been, but . . . it takes its toll.  So, after tomorrow, next week is my final week of classes for the semester, itself a week of review and no presentations whatsoever. 

I feel like this is due, and maybe for my students as much as me.  While I keep returning to the realization of how I need time to relax and wind down, the arrival of that is almost something I approach with uncertainty, being unable to really assess whether I can rest now.  I definitely still will, but I sort of want to ask, "Can I really relax now???" 

Then, after next week, two weeks of no teaching, and administering a final exam.  Finish up my final assignment for graduate school, then, HOPEFULLY, depart for the US late at night on the 13th.  That is, of course, trusting I get my new passport back soon, and my Vietnamese visa shortly after that.  It'll be tight, and I would appreciate keeping that on your heart. 

This morning I was recorded for a video segment of an electronic textbook that will be used in high schools throughout Viet Nam (more details will come through the mail in due time).  There was supposed to be more foreigners involved, but the crunch to get it done seemed to prevent that (I still need to send an e-mail out to people here about that, but sending e-mails has been finicky lately).  Still, the experience was undergone, and I got what maybe amounts to 15 minutes of "fame."  We'll see.  In the process of preparing and presenting for the recording, I very quietly got to touch on where my students are truly coming from, but it didn't come about until this afternoon. 

I was having class as usual this afternoon, working through a lesson taught two days prior, and then I got pierced.  As students were at the front of the class presenting and I was in the back watching, the kind of struggles and difficulties they faced were demonstrated the same as they'd always been in my class, but something larger was revealed through this morning's television venture:  empathy.  In the same way I struggled and fumbled through an orderly display of English for teaching purposes, so too were they working through the same sort of restrictions as they found them within themselves. 

Though different in nature, we both had to deal with constraints as we found them.  For me, it was trying to be both natural and keeping somewhat to a script.  For them, it was sticking to what they knew, and doing the best they could with what they had.  Tenderer parts of me wanted to cry at that moment.  It was then I understood them with their struggles, and the limitations they wish they could help but can't.  I thought that would come through studying Vietnamese.  I was wrong. 

They do the best with what they have.  It may not always appear to be in a manner you can touch or admit, but they're making do.  Not for lack of effort--they're working because it takes effort.  A particular student from today comes to mind when I think of that, but I don't feel the liberty to share about that.  I'll just say she epitomized the sentiment I'll describe as "advancing simply." 

Those lessons you can't find for looking, and touch on a level that can't be measured. 

I just wanted to post this as a heads-up that this coming week is probably going to be rather busy for me, so I'm unsure exactly how much regular communication there'll be during the week.  If you need or want to contact me, please still do, but there may or may not be a week or so delay (depending on the urgency of what you write, obviously).  Then, the following week, I'll finish teaching my second-year class, and will be giving the final lesson of any new material to my first-year students.  After that, it's all review, and, I hope, less choppy waters. 

Simply letting y'all know!

I've tried to get done with a paper due on the 1st of April, and I'm very nearly done except the conclusion.  The only problem is . . . belabored mental exhaustion!  I'm ready to be finished with it, but there's some internal disputes going on in my mind.  After awhile, I may just need to stop fussing and give what's left to give, barring unreasonable expectations I may lay overtop of all this. 

At that . . . continue on with what I signed up to do for my students' benefit, present and future. 

I'd learned just now that one of the male students I taught at Da Lat University named Trieu died last week, specifically on the 23rd of November.  According to the student who informed me of this, he was riding at night, and a tree was blown down during a storm and was on the road.  He didn't notice the tree there until he crashed into it.  Specific cause of death from the accident appeared to be that a broken bone had punctured one of his lungs, killing him. 

I know that motorbike-related deaths are very common, but this is the first time it's been with someone I knew, particularly a student.  He was a third-year student, and, for what I remember, a Catholic.  He was a good-natured guy.  Can't say I've processed this yet . . .

It's raining outside.  A little bit appropriate. 

Trieu is the guy in the gray jacket.

Today the men and women at the university were technically required to dress formally, with the women wearing the traditional Vietnamese ao dai, and the men wearing a white button-up shirt with dress pants.  Not everyone did, but most dressed up. 

That announcement came much to the chagrin (what a frequently used phrase there) of the female students.  I know throughout secondary school it can be a requirement for female students to go to school in a white ao dai, and I saw that everywhere at Da Lat.  Yet, as much as I heard the groaning's, I looked outside my window today and saw multitudes of female students getting their pictures taken in their ao dais, and they seem to be excited and smiling about it.  As an observer, I need to admit they do all look very beautiful, even though I know it's a stereotypical image of Vietnamese women. 

So, as I did two years ago in Da Lat, I again donned my ao the at a university, this time to join in their suffering.  I tried coordinating that with my first-year students, but that message somehow got lost in my text messaging to monitors.  However, it did work out for my second-year students, and here is the proof. 

On Friday evening I had to turn away a student I randomly got in communication with a few months back.  It was one of my foibles months ago where I was polite and chose to talk.  When it became awkward for me (as it often does with strangers), I eventually stopped communicating with this student.  With my own students I'm different, but it's another thing with strangers. 

How this student got in contact with me again that evening was she sent me a text in Vietnamese asking me to help her on a mid-term exam she has this Sunday.  She said she was afraid she'd fail it, that she didn't understand the class, and wanted to talk to me.  I relented and said "okay," but only if we spoke in English (made sense, given it was an English test).  I didn't realize what she wanted until she came by, and basically asked me to give her the answers for these review sheets.  At that point, I had to decline, knowing one hour of conversation wouldn't make up for half-a-term of confusion (if so, that'd mean my students would be incredible; oh, fanciful thoughts).

From that, I wonder if I've gotten hard-hearted towards strangers.  I want to say "my door's open to anybody," but it seems like my various "doors" get shut by my own doing.  A part of me couldn't help thinking back to a student two years ago in Da Lat who wasn't one of mine that I lost contact with, but then showed up at my door asking for a similar thing:  a quick conversation with a foreigner to prepare them for a test.  Like last night, I declined once I learned what he wanted. 

Such memories after a week of mid-terms for my first-year students, and other miscellaneous tests and projects with the second-year fast-track class I teach.  I'm not responsible for all that either group does, but there's a part of me that chooses some degree of responsibility, trying to be some expatriate superhero who swoops in and saves the day.  It's at these times I struggle with my very human limitations, and, honestly, find myself resistant towards steps of faith. 

My confusions from trying to be all things to all people . . .

Rain in Viet Nam claims another victim in the realm of plans.  It's not uncommon for things scheduled with students to dissolve under a day's rain, but it's still a bummer sometimes.  Not a huge bummer, but one of sorts.  The reason why that's a little more telling than normal is from things with mid-terms and neither my students nor myself feeling as readily available.  Feeling like you're there for students is a challenge during these moments.  Oh, alas . . .

I just learned I won't really be doing any work next week due to the mid-terms being administered to my students.  Granted, my week then is made a little simpler, but I felt/am feeling the crunch of trying to adequately set them up for it beyond normal classroom review activities. 

Perhaps the bigger struggle there is lack of information.  It's something I'm used to while being the foreigner, having to fill in the gaps, but I'd prefer there not to be too many when it affects my students.  So, I felt myself scrambling a little bit with trying to get my students informed of a writing test next week beyond "look in the Course Outline," the answer I've been given.  The same is the case for the listening exam with "it's some old recordings, some new," and the realization it's been decided teachers don't need to be in class for the pronunciation presentation preparation next week.  I guess that means my addressing the pronunciation presentation will cut into my lesson on the shopping unit.  Oh the inhumanity of it all!!!

Blah . . . Probably just my hoping the students do well.  I'm always a little off about my students being administered tests my hands never touched at any point in the writing of them. 

A pet peeve I've acquired with ferocity is excessive texting.  I've gotten to share that with students in some way, shape, or form, and they know to communicate in other, less expensive ways.  My problem is when I get texted by students who are not my students, and they . . . don't . . . stop . . . TEXTING! 

Since Monday night, I've been assailed by one such student, and I'm on the verge of being mean to her (I know it's a "her" because my stalkers have always been "hers").  I text a tiny phrase, she sends a novel, and I get . . . a teensy bit irritated, let's say.  If I could reply with a short version of "text me all you want, but you buy the cards to recharge my account," boy would I! 

Anyone who considers such communication "cute" never had a Vietnamese teacher's salary.  All the same, my final recourse is no recourse:  I won't reply.  About the only way I can resolve this with dropping more coins on my phone. 

I already posted these photos on my Facebook page, but I figure I'd include a blog post on them, as well.  It's from the frighteningly-uncommon experience of me going to a beauty contest on Thursday.  It was all in good fun and support for my one student who was in it, so no worries.  There's a picture at the end that felt a little too much like a prom photo, but she suggested.  Actually, she pivoted herself in the position, and I said ". . . okay . . .," while quietly thinking "how did I arrive at the prom?"  NO IDEAS from any of you (Mom). 

There are days I'm rather oblivious of the foreign-ness I represent, particularly with students.  I may approach the classroom in a normal manner--be it "is this going to work?" or simply starting class--yet quietly forget the shift it is for my students. 

A part of me is set on that frame of thinking from a time with students during and after dinner, and only one of them was mine.  To them, it seemed a prized thing to have a foreign teacher for one of their courses, as much as it is a nerve-racking thing to say the same thing--"my teacher is a foreign person," adding "and I don't understand what he's saying!"  How someone can be both a commodity and a fear is beyond me, but it appears to be the case here.  Maybe it'll be cleared up by them actually having a foreign teacher and realizing "this ain't all it's cracked up to be!" 

Yet again, I don't know, as I got to visit the room of these same students, the majority being English majors (not common to have the same majors sharing one room).  The anxiousness was definitely there for them (I've kind of gotten used to it), but it seemed to level out a bit later on.  Then came the exchanges of phone numbers, and receiving a text from a student who wanted me to come over to visit after realizing I was on the same floor as her (I didn't get this message until maybe 30 minutes later). 

What is there about being foreign?  This is my fourth year overseas, so it shouldn't still be that way (right???), but it's a common bit of strangeness.  I walk around, see, and am seen, not realizing who these familiar strangers are until they say something like "I'd seen you before in the cafeteria, but I didn't know you were a teacher here until now." 

Curious expectations there . . .

Especially when they're happening so close to you that, given a good throw, you could peg someone in the head with a rock.  The lot outside where I live is turned into a motorcycle parking lot for those attending the "feast" of singing in the open playing area across the street.  I'd been told that a famous Vietnamese singer was going to sing, named My Dung, but I'd been away for a fair part of the evening, so likely missed her.  Now, as it's edging towards 10 PM, it maintains its veritable open-air KTV atmosphere.  Yippy . . . I guess this isn't the type of thing the IR department would tell me:  "Oh, and on some nights you will only be able to sleep until a rock concert says you can." 

Why do people gather publicly to listen to people sing along to a recording?  Should we give Milli Vanilli and Ashley Simpson a call to work in Asia?  No, wait, that's different.  Their bands are real, but it's their singing that's recorded.  My bad.  Let's hope they don't go to Asia, then, because then what would happen if both recordings stopped working? 

To be true, though, I am really wondering how many Vietnamese folks actually play musical instruments publicly, in bands.  Then again, if people are willing to attend things like this, who am I to be an advocate for instrumental talent?  How utterly offensive of me to suggest, especially when they're recycling old 80s synthesizer parts for their recorded material.

I think I'm going to get sick again . . .

I'm sitting at my desk at my final locale, listening to the rain outside for what will hopefully be where I will work for the next two years.  It's a little odd writing that knowing others who've been in Asia the same length as myself are nearing their third or fourth year at the same location.  In a way, that kind of tempts my sense of productivity, though I know the choices that have resulted in my moving around weren't approached lightly. 

With that, I'm presently trying to redeem my "slacker of the year" status (as so awarded by a male of the 100% Dutch origin, who shall remain nameless) by talking to the head of the first-year English students this afternoon about my mighty schedule of teaching 7 periods a week.  There are options available, but there are challenges with both of a different sort. 

Fearful symmetry . . .

Lately, I've realized how I've needed to be a little more selective with who I spend my time with. The reasons for that is sometimes you get those people who are more interested in you being a human tape recorder for them to practice English than someone to actually talk to.

Things that brought it up are different times in the past when some acquaintances or "friends" have wanted me to meet a friend of theirs, who ends up being someone who just wants to practice English with me. If I didn't have any control over the meeting, I'd be cordial, exchange phone numbers, but then "let the field go fallow," if you will. Those types of relationships are not really too great because they're often only focused on language development, when I'm more interested in just hanging out and talking. Don't get me wrong: I don't have the least problem with their English being helped in the context of a genuine relationship.

What's sad is two students I'd met from a university here have done that with me, and it kind of hurts my trust, especially if they seem to have dropped off the planet with me until now. One had a "cousin," whom she apparently couldn't remember how old he was (a little weird), that she didn't let me know until already there that he wanted to work on his English. Now, I have a student wanting me to meet a friend of her's, whom she says wants to "know more about America and her language." Yet, when I asked her in text messages about simple details, she's elusive with me.

So, this morning, thinking I'd get a good perspective from my Vietnamese teacher (who also teaches at a university here), I asked her about it during break. Well, apparently, students here never do that with foreigners. If anything, there's no problem whatsoever when those students only want to use English. I may even be able to work out a mutually-beneficial situation where I make them practice Vietnamese with me. "Here, let us be tools unto each other!"

Anyway, once she started plugging away at the point that I should work out a price for my tutoring them, I began to see we were having two different conversations (though she refuted that with her point that I needed to make it 50/50 Vietnamese and English . . . ?). This was all in Vietnamese, so it's possible something got lost in translation, but I don't think so.

At any event, given her description of these students, I added a new Vietnamese word from it I'll italicize: "Nhung sinh vien do khong co ron!" ("Those students don't have belly-buttons!") All this time, I never knew I was dealing with flawless people. And I thought Eden no longer existed.