Four Day Weekend

Today is 30 April 2012.  For most Americans my age, it probably doesn't even tingle as any particularly important day in history. As a matter of fact, if it weren't for my lot in life, the day wouldn't mean much, if anything, to me either.

But, since I may or may not have your interest now, I will endeavor to educate.  Today is what we Americans call "Fall of Saigon" Day and the Vietnamese call Liberation Day. So the little history lesson is that on this day in 1975 the communist rolled their tanks through the gates of the Presidential Palace in Saigon and claimed victory over the Republic of Vietnam. Forget about the fact that they could have just walked through with no opposition or that they had to stage the event to film for posterity's sake, because in the end Saigon fell and the country became as one.

Counter to what one may think, I sped through the streets to work and back home with little or no attention cast upon me. There is no animosity - no bad feelings to share with this white boy from Alabama. I only mention this because I have been often asked whether the Vietnamese hate me.  In fact, even in the early 90's when the state of the country was still very bleak and economic recovery from the war was still ongoing, I can't recall anyone ever showing me ill-will in Hanoi, Saigon or Danang. There were one or two occasions in Quang Binh when I - as a member of a team - had a farming tool shaken at me and certain mean-sounding words shouted at me (no idea what was said at the time as I was new in country and the Quang Binh farmer's dialect isn't the easiest to comprehend - especially when angry), but as it was explained to me later the man had lost his entire family to the effects of bombs falling from the sky. I guess that would make it pretty personal for him.

Today, things were very normal. The only notable things in my daily routine were: 1) It was perhaps one thousand degrees outside on my way back home (I know this because my skin was cooking off of my arms as I maneuvered my way through the streets), and 2) Since it is a holiday, people were swimming in the pool when I got back. This second thing was notable only in that I was not able to enjoy this hottest day of the year so far by frolicking in the cool water.  Frankly at my age and weight, I don't think frolicking is the most accurate term to use, but it'll do.

Tomorrow is May Day (Labor Day), another holiday for the masses. I can't help but to think General Giap delayed the push into Saigon to get a four day weekend in perpetuity.

Tetanus

Diep left for Saigon on Friday to commemorate her father's death anniversary.  This is the second or third time she has been to Saigon this year, the last time was during the Tet or Lunar New Year holiday. While she was home last time she took her mother for a physical examination and they kept her for observation for a couple of days because of poor vital signs.

I just got off the phone with Diep this morning to learn her mother is back in the hospital. This time in the Ho Chi Minh City Hospital for Tropical Diseases.  Mom, from what Diep was telling me, stepped on a nail last week and contracted tetanus.  This is the first time I have ever heard of anyone, anywhere getting tetanus, mostly because the disease has been all but eradicated in the U.S.  An easy inoculation prevents infection.

After a quick search on the internet I found statistics stating seven people in the southern region of Vietnam died from tetanus in 2011.  Other information indicates most deaths occur in infants and elderly.  Wikipedia painted a pretty bleak picture of what one goes through in the course of infection and the month long recovery.

Vietnam has had an active inoculation program since 1992 that has greatly reduced instances of tetanus in the country, but the 10 year booster is something I imagine many people forget about or neglect to take the time to take care of.  I know if I didn't work for the U.S. Government I would probably be one of those neglectful individuals.

The good news is Diep had the insight to purchase health insurance for her family a couple of years ago.  Having to recover from such a physically debilitating disease is hard enough without worrying about the financial fall out.  Her mother has a long road to recovery ahead.  My heart and prayers go out to her.

My Living Calendar

I didn't realize when my little Megan was born that she would be my living calendar.  I won't sit here and pretend I remember every detail of that day in April 1996 sitting out in the Tu Du Hospital waiting area in Saigon while Diep gave birth.  Or that I remember with great clarity any single event that has occurred with her no matter how significant or seemingly insignificant it was at the time.  The great truth is that I remember most things in a very broad stroke and let my mind fill in the holes, as I believe most people do. There are what I would like to refer to as little vignettes that I have stored in my mind throughout my life as early as when I was two or three years old. I can go through them when they come to mind and I reminisce.

So, I can remember the time Megan burned her hand on the iron just outside the bedroom of the rickety little house we rented in Cau Kho Ward in Saigon. As I remember walking around with her in my arms at night in Saigon, riding with her in her little motor scooter seat on our Honda Dream II, and seeing her land in the U.S for the first time.  I have some DVDs of home movies we made right after getting to the U.S. and some evidence of how quickly Megan learned English. I have some video somewhere of Megan riding a bicycle without training wheels at Municipal Park just after she turned three, and a whole slew of memories since then.

Now Megan is 16 and I use her age to place me on my chronological map:  Diep and I lived in Saigon when she was born; we moved to the U.S. when she was three; we returned to Vietnam when she was six; we lived on Kim Ma Thuong Street when she was seven; we moved to Tay Ho Street and lived there until she was nine; we lived in Co Co Village until she was 14 and now we live on Tay Ho Street again.  I find myself figuring out the year something happened by working out how old she was when it happened.  I guess that might be an indication of how important she is to me.

I think about how she was almost four when we saw the turn of the millennium in Mobile.  That was 12 years ago and she was a little chubby, sweet-hearted child.  She is grown up now and still has the sweet heart, minus the chubbiness.  I think about how fast that twelve years went by and, in my mathematical mind, I can pull a string along that timeline from the year 2000 to now, release the string on the 2000 side, holding the present and draw it out to my 58th year.  Pretty depressing for me, because that time flew by and I can only imagine how quickly the next 12 years will move.

At the age of 16, Megan is just now moving into the chamber that will propel her into the future at a blinding speed.  How well she gets situated in that chamber will play a huge part in her quality of life. She does well in school but more importantly she has a social sense and grace that I never had. I am proud of her and I couldn't have asked for a greater gift from God.

Why Can't You Just Say, "I'm Sorry"?

I have to admit that last week wasn't the best week I have had, and I could probably even go so far as to say it was one of the worst in a while, and definitely the worst since the new year. I won't go into detail, but it has a lot to do with work.  The thing about things not going well at work is that frustration tends to spill into home life.  That never goes well for me, because Diep doesn't console, at least not me.  She often explains to me how I was the architect of my own woes.

Anyway, given my frame of mind, it made it even harder for me to be understanding when I got home to see a memorandum from the apartment management explaining that the pool maintenance was done, stating that it was on time with the time frame spelled out in the previous memo; however, they were unable to fill the pool with water due to an issue with the Hanoi Water Supply Company.  It wouldn't be so bad except we had informed the apartment management that we were going to have a pool party for Megan on Saturday; AND the fact that the complex had all of February and March to do pool maintenance.  They decided to put it off until the weather was good.  Rather than focus on their failure to make the pool available on the weekend, they took the tact of saying the maintenance was done on time.  A simple apology would have been much better.

So, after that piece of bad news, Diep and I went to the Hanoi Club to eat dinner. Diep got the chicken curry and rice, and it looked very good when it got out on the table.  The only thing is, the chicken was practically raw on the inside.  Diep had the waitress take it away to cook it some more, but it just went down hill from there. After five minutes, the waitress brought the dish back out, but it was still not cooked as well as it should have been.  That, on top of the waitress explaining that it was cooked well... just the drumstick was too big to cook all the way through.  This was a poor attempt at skirting bad preparation and potential bio hazard.

I feel Americans are much better at apologizing.  It would be easy to say they apologize, but don't really mean it; but they usually do and show it by putting their money where their mouth is.  I have been on the bad end of much less serious inconveniences in stateside restaurants and had meals comped for me.  This was not at my suggestion, but rather the discretion of the manager who, on his/her own came out to deal with the infraction.

I am not sure when so-called high end service providers in Hanoi will learn that an important part of customer service is accepting when you have made a mistake and showing that you really want to make it right.

Freakin' Birds

With the warmer weather, Diep and I have been spending a part of our mornings before I go to work sitting on the balcony and drinking coffee.  The pool below and the surrounding palms and other plants attract a small variety of birds to our sanctuary.  The serenity of the morning silence broken only by the numerous birds calling to partners and singing to the world gives me a positive outlook on life, if just for a moment.

With my new 300mm telephoto lens I recently acquired, I wanted to capture the image of one species of crested bird that I find particularly pretty.  Normally in the morning they are everywhere to be seen and heard, often lighting on the tops of the ornamental fir trees in the complex.  With the hope of capturing this bird on digital film, I went to my bedroom, changed out my lens, got my monopod ready and headed back out on the balcony only to be greeted by silence. Not one bird to be seen and only those in the far distance to be heard.

Diep attributed the absence to the camera and the keen senses of the birds. Initially, I laughed at the thought that the birds could recognize the camera as a possible gun or other hunting tool, but the longer I waited out there with not one bird coming even close, the more I thought she might be right.  After 30 minutes I decided to head in and try again tomorrow.  I don't give up easily, so I figure I will eventually get a picture of this bird.

This crested species is also very common at the office. They fly around in the sapoche tree (also known as the sapodilla) playing all day while I have to work. Sometimes I feel like they taunt me with their freedom; and only once did I feel they aren't as clever as they appear when one flew into my office window leaving a poop streak the length of the pane.  The sound of his head crashing into the glass scared me out of my chair, but when I walked outside to check on him, he had already flown away. This, no doubt, was one of those "oh sh*t!" moments that even a bird brain won't forget soon.

Every now and then a tree squirrel will also show up.  This is all amazing to me because 20 years ago you would never see a bird or a squirrel in the city.  When we were on our compound also known as "The Ranch" we had a goodly portion of property with trees and plants all around and high walls to keep out the riff raff. It was a very special occasion indeed if I ever saw even a common sparrow.  Those were desperate times and those of God's creature foolish enough to wander into downtown Hanoi became the dish of the day for some lucky city dweller.

Oh, and I did get my photo... finally:

Weekends Are Good!

Too many days without a real break is bad. I hit a point where I didn't want to do anything at work and I was on the verge of serious burnout. That is why this past weekend was so good. The weather held out with slate gray skies and no rain. It was hot, but not too hot; and it was humid but bearable.

Saturday morning I played tennis for the first time in about a month. I am not a great tennis player, but I was encouraged by new strength and control in my serve. I am good at running around the court and scooping nearly impossible shots, but my weakness lies in the serve. I keep telling myself I can be a reasonable player if I ever get consistency in my service. While I still have a lot of work, I think the time off from the game did me some good and I hope to carry this over into my next match tentatively scheduled for Wednesday.

After my morning tennis, Diep and I took a long ride on the motorbike. We both enjoy riding around the city, and her holding on tight around my waist makes me feel like a teenager again. The traffic does seem to be getting worse, however, and that puts a damper on the fun. It isn't so much that the streets or bulging with cars and bikes as much as it is the total chaos and maneuvers the Vietnamese make without any consideration of their surroundings. Sudden moves from the outermost lane through to the center lane, wrong way traffic and u-turns without any indication other than the flick of the head are the norm. It can drive a person nuts.

The rest of my Saturday was lazy, with a dip in the pool at the end of the day.

On Sunday, Megan and I went to the movies and watched Battleship. It was entertaining, and Rihanna was a much better actor than I expected. I really enjoy spending time with Megan, but it is pretty hard to get the time on the weekend between my TDY schedule and her school events. After the movie we had lunch together and got back home.

Megan turns 16 next week. Sweet sixteen isn't as significant here as it is in the U.S. because you aren't able to get a drivers' license here until you turn 18. As a matter of fact, most kids just ride around on motorbikes without a license anyway. I am still not sure how we are going to work Megan's DL issue out. I don't want her getting back to the U.S. without any skills in the car. That is something I will have to work out, sooner or later. Hopefully we can get her a permit this summer.

Monday I started block two of You Are Your Own Gym. Ten weeks of block one went well after I got over the initial soreness. Some of the core exercises made me hurt in my extremities. As a matter of fact, I was so sore I had to make sure I was properly positioned before I sat down and at one point I thought I might have testicular cancer. After a week I got better and I feel better than ever now. On completion of block one, I took two weeks off of the program and did some maintenance exercises just to stay loose. I didn't lose much weight, but I did drop from 23.5 per cent body fat to 20.1 since I started the program. I would like to be below 18 per cent, but at least I am in the normal range right now.

PTSD

When the average American thinks about PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) they probably think about soldiers who experienced difficulties dealing with things they experienced, witnessed or did in the heat of battle. Though I am not a doctor, that pretty much sums up what I believe to be PTSD.

It never really occured to me that my wife could suffer from mild PTSD until just a few days ago. I should have recognized the signs before, and I will go into that, but it sort of hit me the other day when she said something that struck me as odd. It happened when she was looking through my facebook photos of the C-17 military airlift cargo plane that carried teams, cargo and remains back to the U.S. after our most recent field activity. She said that she was frightened by the color of the plane. For some reason it clicked this time that certain colors, noises and objects will put her in a heightened state of alert, or even fear.

During her first Blue Angels air show a little over ten years ago, I saw the first signs of this fear. At the show, she was initially okay with the F-18s and enjoyed the smaller aerial acrobatic single engine turbo prop, but when the CH-47 Chinook came out she jumped and was visibly shaken. Not long after the appearance of the "two headed airplane" (máy bay hai đầu) she had seen enough and made us leave a little over halfway through the show. As we were headed back to the car, an F-18 did a pass 500 feet off the deck and she was on her hands and knees kissing the ground.

Once we were in the car, she shared with me her fear of the Chinook. She explained that as a little girl whenever they heard the distinctive sound of an approaching Chinook, her grandmother would yell at the top of her lungs for everyone to get in the bunkers. I imagine this was pretty serious business no matter which team you were playing on as a villager on the outskirts of Saigon. I don't think a lot of discrimination was exercised by door gunners who took on small arms fire from below. Diep's father was an ARVN armored vehicle driver, but I don't think anyone would know that from the Chinook. I am not sure if she ever saw a Chinook in action, or if it was just the fright and flight everytime one appeared that causes her to react like this now, but the fear is very real.

Diep's family suffered as much as any in the war. Her father was ARVN but many of her cousins were VC. It was a fairly even split between her parents siblings. She tried to explain to me how they would ignore those differences within the family as much as they could, but after the war the differences were more apparent. The memory of seeing two of her uncles shot, laying dead on a bridge down the street from her house seems to be still very vivid to her. She also remembers her father in re-education camp and the second-class education she was afforded as the child of the puppet regime.

No doubt, the 1980s in Vietnam proved that no one was truly a winner. The implementation of communist idealogy and communal cooperation in agriculture failed to a large extent and not until Doi Moi Policy or the Renovation in 1986 did things even think about getting better. If the situation was hard in the north during this "Thời Bao cấp" with ration cards and endless food lines, you can only imagine how hard it was for the people who landed on the wrong side of victory in the south. By the way, I still say those ration lines where the ones at the end of the line often went without are the reason most Vietnamese don't believe in queuing to this day.

I didn't get to Vietnam until 1991 when things were just starting to get better. I remember how everyone, especially in Hanoi would react to loud noises. If a book fell from a shelf or a carbonated bottle of soda busted, the whole room would go into a squatting position. It occured to me then that this was probably a learned reaction; for many probably after the 1972 Christmas bombings on the outskirts of Hanoi.

Things are better now. I can't remember the last time I saw someone go into a squat after hearing a loud noise. Those times are behind the Vietnamese and they are moving quickly towards the future. Most of this youthful country cannot remember much about the war and that is probably a good thing.

Rip Tides in Danang

As I mentioned in an earlier post, our mission personnel have moved to a new favorite hotel in Danang, the Hyatt Regency.  As it turns out, the term "favorite" hotel is a little generous given my unofficial census of those who favor the Hyatt over the Furama. According to my statistics, it is running about 70 / 30 in favor of the Furama.  That isn't my battle, however, and quite frankly I don't care that much one way or the other.

The one thing for sure is that the beach and water where the Hyatt is situated is much cleaner than the more northern beach in front of the Furama.  So clean, that Diep who is an avid saltwater bather won't let me take a trip to Danang without her in tow anymore.

Diep was with me on Saturday morning when we took an early morning dip in the South China Sea.  This time of year, the sea state isn't that calm and there is a continuous barrage of waves hitting the shore. Diep had a kick board and was already out over her head when I got in the water and went out towards her. As I got over my head I realized I was drifting away from the shore and north swiftly and decided it was time to pull it back in closer to land.

Careful of Rip Tides in Da Nang

I consider myself a fairly strong novice swimmer and I am comfortable in water. I have read books to improve my stroke and can cover 25 meters in half a minute without trying too hard.  Having said that, I found myself almost in a panic after I put my head into the waves and tried to move toward the shore.  After about 12 strong strokes I looked up and realized I was still moving north and possibly further out into the sea. I did this one more time and realized I was in a rip tide.  Diep wasn't too far away and asked me a question.  I can't remember what the question was but I remember I answered her that I might be in trouble.  She offered to toss me the kick board but I told her I would be okay; just had to concentrate.  She wasn't more than 30 meters away and didn't seem to be in the same current.

There were several factors working against me, the biggest of which was that I hadn't eaten breakfast yet and was a little weak from my overnight fast.  The second was that my first effort to get back into shallower waters was a little too fast and too furious and I fatigued quickly.  I stopped working against the waves and recalled everything I knew about rip tides.

I know quite a bit, actually, but trusting myself was the hardest part of getting out of this rip tide.  I know to swim parallel to the shore until clearing the rip and not to panic. I also know I can float on my back for a very long time and that the fisherman have caught just about every large fish there is in that part of Danang's waters so, at least ,I wasn't hearing the music (Jaws theme).  With that knowledge I slowed down my stroke and moved diagonally north and toward the shore.  I eventually hit a shallow sand bar and from there got back to shore easily.  Maybe this sounds a little dramatic for a rip tide, but panic was definitely the biggest enemy I fought that day. If I had been less familiar with sea water and didn't understand rip tides I could have easily psyched myself into a tragic death.

After the moment was over, I didn't think much more about it.  I should have warned others in the office because I wasn't the only one who had a situation.  Another member of the office had his son with him and got in a much stronger rip than I. A combat swimmer, he spent thirty minutes fighting the rip and keeping his son calm and above the wave line before some life guards realized he needed assistance.  Fortunately, everything ended well for them, but for others who might be taking a swim in the South China Sea in April when the sea state is high, let this be a cautionary tale.

Surveys and Investigations

Two months ago, it was decided that our detachment would take on additional investigation and survey duties in line with some recent personnel changes here.  In the shuffle, it looks like I will be moving more in the direction of these investigations and surveys and, at some time in the future will be relieved of some of my more mundane office tasks.  I am not holding my breath waiting for those more mundane duties to be passed to someone else, but hopefully it will happen.

During this current field activity I, along with a colleague, went to Son La and Dak Nong Provinces to do two surveys.  The provinces are geographically separated by a great distance, but both of the sites lie in similar terrain - both of them are in highland country.  Fortunately, neither of the sites were difficult to access and both locations were in varying degrees of rural development.  Not so fortunately, however, my trip to Dak Nong came in conjunction with landfall of Tropical Storm Pakhar and the area experienced all-day rain and swollen streams and rivers.  We did the best we could under the circumstances, but the muddy roads and age of the witnesses forced us to look at an alternative to perambulating.  I spent the better part of two hours sitting in the back of a hard, steel tractor cart with ten other fellows moving out to and from the site.  I think I broke my ass. I became so sore on the way in that I opted out of the cart and took my chances on foot for the rest of the trip in and most of the trip out.  Some parts of the trail were so muddy, it just made sense to stay in the cart.

Vietnamese Tractor (xe công nông) taking the witnesses back to the vehicles

It has been to get out of the office and the surveys remind me much of my days as a party chief on a survey crew... the good parts.  Hopefully we will continue to develop our capabilities and I will be able to transition more into this line of work.  With more experience in analyzing, reporting and surveying sites, it may better suite me in getting a job in the U.S., if and when I see fit to leave.

Crossing swollen streams to and from the site proved to be interesting