They See Me Strollin'

03/15/12, 12:38 p.m.

                This is a post about why I hate Vietnam.

                This is a post about why I love Vietnam.

                After a really wonderful beach weekend in Mui Ne, I was floating on fond memories. I could almost still hear the sound of the ocean when I was grabbed by the scruff of my neck and yanked back down to earth. I hadn’t opened my purse since Sunday night before we left the hostel, and when I opened it again on Tuesday I felt my stomach contort. My iPod and all the cash that was in my wallet (around $50 because I had just gone to the ATM) had vanished. The key chain was even neatly placed back inside the wallet the way I keep it, and it was zipped up again. Thanks for cleaning up after yourself, I guess. Being from LA, going to a fairly urban high school, and living for three months in Cape Town, all without incident, I was kicking myself for letting it happen. To be fair to myself, after we had to check out of the hostel at 11 a.m., we were told we could keep our bags in a locked room until we left on the 1 a.m. bus. At the time, leaving my purse there inside my backpack seemed like a better option than walking around at night with valuables on my person, but in hindsight I should have taken the option of looking like a target by holding a purse. After all, the staff and everybody else who was storing a bag could get in if they wanted as well. $50 isn’t a fortune, but it’s enough to be sorely missed, especially in a country like this, and my forlorn 5-year-old Classic did have a lot of music that isn’t on my iTunes. My travel insurance doesn’t cover “mysterious disappearance” of “personal effects,” and the owner of the hostel wouldn’t help at all because it can’t technically be proven that they were stolen on his property. The bright side of this pretty sour situation is that I outsmarted this upstanding member of our society in terms of hiding my debit card and passport. And, above all, there was no force—unlike my friend Hannah who had her handbag, and about half her shirt, grabbed off her by a motorbike on her second day here.

                Feeling really lousy about scammers in Vietnam, I went to a karaoke bar Tuesday night with a bunch of volunteers and program staff for a birthday party. The karaoke itself, with renditions of the Beatles, The Little Mermaid, Sonny and Cher, and “Gangster’s Paradise,” was a lot of fun, but we ran into some trouble with the one taxi company one should be able to trust here. Kevin paid the cabbie on the way there, and realized afterwards that he accidentally handed over a 500,000 VND bill instead of a 50,000 (all the zeros do get confusing sometimes) for a 45,000 trip. The driver didn’t give back any change at all before speeding off. On the way to our next destination, the driver tried to take us on the most winding route possible to a place that we had been to before, so we knew it should have been a straight shot. We finally made him stop and let us out, and we all paid only a fraction of what the meter said. On our way home that night, we had a man who spoke Vietnamese tell our cabbie that we knew where we were going, and—surprise, surprise—received a very reasonable price indeed. Working here for a month, I’d appreciate it if people didn’t always assume we’re tourists who stumbled off the tarmac yesterday. When that happens, both here and when I was in Cape Town, I want to flail my arms and shout, “I work for you! I’m on YOUR side!” It’s easy to brush these experiences off scornfully as being common occurrences in a country like Vietnam, but in general crime here is actually pretty rare, and volunteers who have been here for months can attest to that. With a culture that values order and honor, Vietnam is a far cry from being the lawless frontier. Thus, I will move forward from this experience with my debit card, passport, computer, and wisdom in tow.

                Plus, there’s nothing like a happy child to make you forget about scheming adults. I usually spend most of my volunteer time at the pagoda taking children on walks by foot, stroller, or wheelchair around the temple so they get some fresh air and sunlight. They never want to go back inside, but my conversations with them are mostly monologues, so I’ll sing to them as we circumnavigate the premises. Having exhausted all the songs in my mental catalogue, I have started composing songs for a “Ky Quang Pagoda: Greatest Hits” album. Vietnamese chart-toppers include “She’ll Be Comin’ Around The Temple When She Comes,” “They See Me Strollin’, They Hatin’,” and a little ditty to the tune of the Colonel Bogey March:

                                Strollers, they go very fast!

                                Strollers, they make the fun last.

                                On strollers, we are high rollers,

                                We are gangsters, and we like to go drifting.

Maybe the rhyme scheme isn’t perfect, but the last line is true. In the muggy heat, nothing here happens very fast, so it’s conspicuous when I charge past with a kid shrieking gleefully in a wheelchair and spin around like a sports car to go back the other way. Old women and staff alike all think it’s great fun to watch the silly white chick swerve around the Buddha statues and make engine noises, so everyone wins. I’m not brash enough to do it in front of one of the orange-robed, shaven-head monks, but whenever I walk by with a child they always smile down lovingly at them and nod to me in approval. This is in contrast to some cruel, repulsed looks from visiting adults and teasing from wicked able children that I’ve sometimes come across on these walks. I am working in settings where these kids are lucky enough to be getting attention and acceptance, but I know all too well that

6:26 p.m.

Sorry, Karly and I had to flee the café where we were sipping iced coffee and relishing the AC, because we realized we only had 10 minutes left until we had to leave again for our afternoon shift. I then came back to the Peace House, had dinner as usual at 4:30, and then went to the park with some staff and volunteers to kick a shuttlecock around like a hacky sack. That’s really popular here, and by the time we had to leave the original six of us were outnumbered by joining passersby. Before I smacked my computer shut, I meant to say I know all too well that outside the walls of places like this, these children can be completely ignored, or even worse, abhorred. Even in the clinic, some children are being diagnosed with what translates to “retarded syndrome.” Thank goodness that the vast majority of them have inspiringly sunny dispositions. At LTK, the clinic, a child named Long who doesn’t speak will nonverbally ask me every time I leave in the morning if I’ll be back again at 2:00, and there is always much hugging after the “yes” answer. At the pagoda, I taught a small blind boy how to beatbox, and now all he wants to do is sit on my lap and make music. Plus, there is nothing more flattering than after merely making eye contact with a child rolling spastically on the floor them laughing hysterically. I don’t know, maybe I just have a funny face.

The thunderstorm this afternoon dispelled the humidity and acted as ablutions of the recent negative experiences. The insistent drumming on the roof of LTK was triumphant and optimistic about the prospect of the next two weeks.