Amici's Non è Mio Amico

By Monday I still hadn’t heard back from the owner of Amici's. He hadn’t called me as promised by Huyen. So at 8pm I implemented Phase 2 of my strategy ... become so annoying that Huyen will do anything to get rid of me, ie dryclean my shirt and tie.

I called Huyen, reintroduced myself and asked why the owner had not called me back yet. 

At first she pretended she didn't know who I was.

“Who? Huh? What?” 

--It’s me! Anthony*! With the shirt and tie! You have my shirt and tie!”

“Who? Who you?”

The little ragamuffin.

-- “Anthony! The coffee! Spilled! Coffee lid! My shirt and tie … at your café! The owner. He does not call me. Why not?”

I start to realize how ridiculous this all sounds. The broken English has really stripped it back to the bone. 

“It is late. I work all day. I don’t need this. Not from you. Call tomorrow.”

-- “You promised me the owner would call me back --”

[I hear a pin drop.]

 “He will call. Tomorrow."

-- “But you said that before. And nothing.”

“He will call. Tomorrow. It is late. Go away please. I am tired.”

-- “What is his name please?”

“I can’t tell you. Please call back tomorrow.”

-- “You told me the manager would call me and now you--”

“I don’t care. I am tired.”

[Click]

That fucking bitch. I called her straight back. No answer. My heart is racing. I am a caged animal. Stir crazy. Ready to strike. Infuriated and angry and justified and mistreated ... my senses are heightened and my tongue is sharpened. My eyes are flickering and my fingers are furious. My thumb comes down hard as I press Send. 

This is Hanoi. This is not Tunbridge Wells. I soon calm down and reread my sms. 

The sms – get this – outlines how I am so outraged at all this that I will be - get this - writing a newspaper article about it. I can't quite believe what I'm seeing.

I imagine Huyen reading my sms and feel humiliated.

My watertight strategy has just sprung a huge leak.

Twittering Classes

I fucking don't get Twitter.

Although it's certainly making Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore look like twits.

Barracking

I fucking love Obama.

Full fucking stop.

Some Sole Winners are More Equal Than Others

The whole company has gone nuts over Dinh's Earth Hour iPod victory.  

Today I counted 17 emails of praise, each conceived by the careless tap of a Reply All finger. 

In most of the emails (few exceptions) Dinh is lauded for being the "Sole Winner". 

Sole winner?

Then it hit me.

It's Socialism. Everyone is equal. It’s like a school fete for retards. You have to make sure every one wins. 

Yet during one hour last week, when (most of) her lights were turned off, Dinh and made a break for another world of praise and iPods. And her peeps are loving her for it.

I want to achieve this level of popularity in Vietnam. And I want it bad. And I want it now. And for a desperate moment I nearly take my Reply All button for a spin. My victory announcement will be about how much I got paid last month for my housing allowance. Surely my colleagues, who don't even get a housing allowance, would laud me as some kind of Sole Winner for getting a sizeable one.

In the middle of all this fervour a different kind of email arrives for me. This one is not filled with joy. This one is filled with a series of stupid questions. So many stupid questions that for a moment I thought I was being telemarketed. 

For example:

"Whereabouts in document XYZ can I find the section which outlines the client's requirements?"

My answer comes in two parts:

a) It's on page 3, after the Table of Contents

b) It's in the same place you left it 2 weeks ago when you wrote the document.

Welcome back, Edwina. I hope you had a pleasant flight.

Neighbours

If you click Next Blog» at the top of this page, you are taken to somewhere quite random.

It's like the faraway tree ... you never know which new land will appear ... but you are very fucking glad you don't have live to there.

Until now. I just jumped on the Next Blog» and was sent back to Vietnam to this place. 

I am proud to live on the same street as this slogan.

I just made the mistake of clicking on it again and found Stacey's profile. In case you didn't realise, she lives in the midwest:

"Claiming my fair share of webspace, my kenzie's doodles site chronicles the journey in life with our daughter. Mama's Doodles is the outlet for my pent up creativity. Together, we enjoy making each day artful. These sites represent our daily doodles..."

I don't know if I want Stacey dead first, or dear kenzie.  My vote is on kenzie. She may be innocent but you need to cut this breeding off at the knees. It's like paying more at Coles for the cockroach baits with contraceptives in them. You're not shutting the door.

Hung Out to Dry

I was late to work on Monday because I was cleaning up for the cleaners. Turns out it was a good move.

Yesterday I got a call from the landlord. 

The cleaners have banded together and made some decisions on my behalf.

I need to follow a better laundry process.

I shouldn't be using the dryer. Yes, shouldn't. 

In future I will be hanging my clothes outside to dry. Will indeed.

So now I am the proud owner of a contraption which has been placed "Downstairs next to the pool - on the right – the dry side".  I remember the pool as being quite wet on all sides but who am I to argue?

The deal is that I wash my clothes and leave them on top of the washing machine. The cleaners will take the clothes, string them up on this dry side, take them in when they are dry, fold them and put them away.

They love me. 

And I love them.

My next goal is to get them to wash the clothes in the first place. Lazy bitches.

Earth Hour

Last week our company held a competition for Earth Hour. I only caught the tail end of it, meaning I didn't even know about it until Dinh was announced as the winner of the iPod. She was not simply announced as the winner, but “the sole winner for the VOTE EARTH contest” who “shared what thoughts were on her minds and why she cared about our planet.”.

During this hour, competitors were asked to reflect on how they spent this particular hour and what it all means to them. They then emailed their thoughts to some four-eyed administration assistant in Ho Chi Minh City who no doubt wasted a week’s pay ranking them.

When her victory was announced, Dinh’s written entry was published alongside this glorious news. 

What a winner she turned out to be. Here are some highlights:

“This is the first time all the electrical equipment in my house are turned off ...”

[Strong out of the blocks, Dinh.]

“During this dark hour, I feel hungry as the stomach asks me for some foods ...”

[Awww … this is just plain cute …]

“Earth Hour is really a Smart Hour when it seems that I have gone through all the comments of Smarter Food ...”

[Getting hungry, lapsing in and out of consciousness. I start to realise that she won because no one knew what she was talking about. ]

“I turn on my laptop and look for smart food ...”

[Huh? WHAT?? DINH!!! This is supposed to be Earth Hour!!! The No Power Hour!!! What are you doing switching on your laptop and hungrily scouring the net?]

“And I took this photo of my time.”

[Good to see that she lit up the planet with her flash during this symbolic hour of darkness.]

"I wish to have another Earth Hour to go with the rest of Smarters :-)"

[Firstly, this doesn’t make sense. Secondly, under Dinh's definition of an Earth Hour she could have another quite easily.]

All this and Dinh now has a shiny new iPod.

I jumped onto the Earth Hour website to find a loophole through which I could appeal. I expected the Comments section to be crammed with earthy people: mainly with hippies and divorced people. Surely their inspiring words would prove a lack of commitment on Dinh’s part.

This from JennyGoGo:

 “I've NEVER voted on Idol...but if Adam makes top two, I'm throwing down to solicit every vote on Earth for that boy!!”

For one, I get the feeling that  JennyGoGo has voted on Idol many, many times. She also makes Dinh look like Al Gore.

Chicken Dance

Tried a new café near work today. As the weather gets hotter, I need a shorter walk and better air conditioning.

Using my best Vietnamese I ordered a large latte with low-fat milk and no sugar. A small cup of bitter, sugary black slurry arrived. 

Guess who walked in from the street and took a turn about the room?

    

In came Albert. None of the staff or customers even seemed to think there was anything odd about this. He was given free reign over the joint.

After a brief dance across a couple of tables, then along the top of the wall, he was gone.

I suspect that the next time I see young Albert, he will be flavouring a hearty bowl of Pho' Ga.

Selective Hearing Part I

For a few weeks I have been trying to recruit local analysts with good project experience and English language skills. We can't afford to keep flying in our project resources from abroad. We are using one of Vietnam's largest companies to help us and they mostly send us recent graduates. The average age in Vietnam is about 26 and this whole industry is new, so the talent pool is quite shallow.

I recently interviewed 2 people. People dress quite poorly for job interviews in Vietnam. Worse than they dress for work. It's odd. And Interviewee A was no exception.

Interviewee A was so wet behind the ears that I spotted something running down his neck. 

As we shook hands I noticed that A's pants had the distinctive sheen of ironed polyester. His short-sleeved shirt had large sweat stains in the armpits. His hair was 1950's (Pee Wee Herman, not Jimmy Dean) and his face was framed by long, wispy sideburns and a beard that had been refusing to grow for several years.  He looked like a 14-year-old who was held back in Year 8 because he'd been bullied. Not someone I need to stand in front of the client. Apart from that, he only understood about 25% of my questions. Apart from a couple of uni assignments he had no other relevant experience and was not strong enough to learn on the job.

Interviewee  B was much older. He looked at least 27 and had excellent English and good experience. What a relief. He had worked quite extensively abroad - Chad, Nigeria, Uzbekistan. My only concern was that he seemed to screw up his face when I asked questions he didn't understand (or see the relevance of). 

At the end of the interview I gave him some feedback: "You are obviously intelligent and experienced and have excellent English. However, sometimes when I have asked you a question you look bored, or look at me like I'm an idiot. If you do this with the client they will think you are arrogant. That is my only concern." He screwed up his face, then said "I'm trying to be honest with you in this interview because we will work together. I have another face for the client." Hired.

I informed the agency that we would take B, but not A. I arranged for B to start this morning. 

This morning I received a call from B at 9am. He was on time, but at the wrong location. He was at our client's head office. No one knew who he was or who I was or where he should go. 

I called him back and spoke to A, who answered his phone. I knew it was A because he couldn't understand me. He was also waiting there at the client office, with B, for me to arrive.

I asked them to please come to my office and called the agency immediately. The person I spoke to confirmed that, yes, both had been sent to start today. I told her we had only selected one. She said "Then just pick the one that you want and send the other one away". I told her we had already done this - that is what the interview process was for. I insisted that she call A and explain that there was a mistake. She said "Oh - so you are too nice. You want me to be the bad one!" I said yes, I did, so please call A and tell him they got it wrong. No need to be bad. 

The last thing I needed was a line up. It's not a brothel after all.

About 15 minutes later I got a call from reception to say that I had a visitor. I went to the reception desk to find both A and B sitting in the lobby waiting for me, eager to start their first day's work ...

Best Email Strapline Ever

Some people quote Einstein at the bottom of their emails. Some quote Deepak Chopra. Even Oprah gets the occasional guernsey.  This from Hong:

Kind regards,

Hong

The courtesy of a reply, even if negative, is always appreciated: thank you.

Email Response Message of the Day

This just in. 

"I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message. This is a permanent error; I've given up.  Sorry it didn't work out."

Vietnamese in 8 Easy Steps

As far as I can work out, the whole country is run on 7 words:

1. Saow;

2. Boim;

3. Ding;

4. Coum;

5. Meuo;

6. Owm; and

7. Baa.

When you ask someone for a word in Vietnamese they will select something from this list. They will also ensure you do not leave them until you have pronounced it correctly 3 times.

Later, when you go to use that word with someone else, this new person will stare at you blankly for 4 awkward attempts before admitting that they have no idea what you are saying.  After much effort on your part and no help on theirs, they will understand. They will then tell you that this word is never used normal conversation. It is too formal, or too informal, or only for an old man, or only used in the south, or a type of mango. They will then select another word (from the remaining 6) and not let you go until you can pronounce it correctly.

This process of elimination will follow you down a conga line of 5 well-meaning teachers until you have pronounced 7th and last remaining word correctly.

At the 8th person, you will be stared at blankly for a bit before being advised to use the original word. This (and only this) is the word you should use. It is easiest one for foreigners to remember, and everyone will understand what you mean.

Scabby Blue Propositions

Whenever eating out in Hanoi, it is almost guaranteed that someone will approach you brandishing a fistful of used, dirty, blue plastic sandals. They will hold them up to your face, point at your feet and ask you to consider something.

It even happens when you're wearing thongs or trainers, which rules out a shoe polish.

Whether you sit indoors or outdoors. Whether at a street stall or a fancy schmance restaurant. Whether you're upstairs or downstairs. Probably even while working a plough. Someone will inevitably approach you with a scabby blue sandal proposition. 

I don't really know what they're proposing, but I want in.

Jeffrey Dahmer Jacuzzi

We went to a restaurant last night on Truc Bach lake. The dining area was basically some mats laid out beside the footpath, across the road from the kitchen, with low Japanese style tables. There were a few rats scuttling in and out of the water and along the mats. I thought "let's go eat Italian" as I squatted down to take my place.

4 girls sat down and take our order. They were interrupted someone from a nearby table coming over to us with 2 shots of some clear liquid. We knocked these back with a hearty "Xin Chào Việt Nam" before resuming our order. 

Neither of us was particularly hungry. After much confusion and clarification, using a menu with no English and no prices, I thought we had each ordered a bowl of Pho Ga.

10 minutes later a waiter brought out gas cooker, then a massive pan of hot broth, then a huge bowl of leafy greens, then two packets of noodles, then a whole raw chicken (cut up).

We realised then that the enthusiastic girls who took our order were probably just there to upsell. Actually it was not really upsell. It was more a case of ignoring what we want and giving us what they have. Of course when too much food started turning up, they were nowhere to be seen.

Our waiter lit the cooker and opened the lid of the pot. She grabbed my chopsticks and started putting pieces of the chicken into the broth. First the head, then the feet, then some other ambiguous pieces until about half of the chicken was gone. Apart from what appeared to be an anus, the only other parts left on the plate were the wings, breast and legs: the Colonel Sanders bits that I'd normally want first.

When I asked for another set of chopsticks she pointed at the ones which she had abandoned in the raw chicken. When I played dumb and insisted on another pair, I think I saw a faint eye roll.

The chicken's head kept bobbing around the pot throughout the meal. It seemed to slowly lose its buoyancy at various times, only to turn up camoflaged under a leaf of spinach in the ladel. Tricky thing.

Although the chook head spent its last moments circumnavigating the pot as his memories slowly dislodged from his skull ... I feel it was a worthy end. So I gave him a name. Darren provided my best meal yet in Vietnam.

By the end of the meal we'd forgotten all about the feet. Until they both popped up, on queue, like an Esther Williams finale.

This is how it all ended. [Click to enlarge]

As she cleared the table our waiter noticed the vignette which had unfolded in the pot, and laughed.

Two-timin' Trang

Given Trang's sticky fingers and low motivation levels, I arranged a meeting with another language teacher last Wednesday night.

Her name is Hoa. She seemed nice on the phone. Good English skills and a healthy (if random) dose of giggles.

She was 10 minutes early. I was 5 minutes late. It was supposed to be the other way around. She called me on arrival to say "Hi it's me Hoa where are you the guard won't let me in and I'm on the street are you still coming how far are you away thanks come soon thanks."

When I arrive she's sitting on the couch in the lobby area. She seems quite comfortable.

Me: "Sorry I'm late. Nice to meet you. How are you?"

Hoa: "I'm cold. Cold from waiting for you."

Me: "But it's not cold outside."

Hoa: "Yes but I've been riding my motorcycle. So I'm cold."

I unlock the door and we go inside. She walks in and says "You should not live alone here. Why do you live alone. That is not good." I tell her that's the way it is, to which she replies "That is not good."

She then explains that her rates are $10/hour and when I ask her why it is so expensive she tells me to go to her web site and it's all there. She then asks me if I've ever learnt Vietnamese before. I say no. She screws up her face. I say is there anything wrong. She laughs and says no, there's nothing wrong, but are you sure you've never learnt before? ... nothing ever? No, I say, I'm afraid not; nothing. 

"Oh ... no. Oh no."

-- "Oh no? Why oh no?"

"No. No Oh no. Just oh."

-- "No? Oh. Oh."

I miss Trang.

Do you have my Laundry Bag?

Last weekend my local laundry didn't return my drawstring laundry bag (linen) with my clothes. It's a really nice bag that I stole from the Shangri-La hotel in KL, so worth keeping.

This morning I went back to the laundry and asked her if she had it. She had no idea what I was talking about. So I performed a mime, using a bag (plastic) as a prop. Still nothing. Act 2 was based on the theme of "last week". Nowt.

This needs to be done in Vietnamese. So today I asked my colleague to write down a phrase to ask for it. I told her maybe it would be good practice. This is what she wrote:

Cho tôi hỏi chị có thấy cái túi giặt là của tôi để quên tuần trước không? Cái túi vải (không phải nhựa) và màu trắng.

This is fucking ridiculous. I do no know what one of these words means. Surely there is a shorter way to say "Where's my laundry bag?".

Nevertheless, I have printed it out and I am going back there tomorrow. I am going to take out that phrase and make her listen to me struggle through every syllable until she understands. I am not going to show her the paper. As I've always (always) said, if the laundry lady keeps your linen bag you must be sure to make her next counter experience as painful as possible in order for them to never do it again.

Clean Sweep

Part of my rent includes a cleaner three times/week.  In the lease I nominated Monday, Wednesday and Friday as my cleaning days.

This means that every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning I have a mad scramble to clean up before leaving for work: making the bed, putting rubbish in the bin, washing up etc.

During my apartment hunt I looked through many "occupied" apartments in Hanoi. This was often while they were being cleaned. I was amazed at how messy they were, with shit everywhere and caps off things and food out and clothes strewn everywhere. 

Around the same time, I read a blog about how lazy and lordy the foreigners become with the maid service. I'm not that type of foreigner. I'm the type of foreigner who doesn't know how to negotiate his lease. And now needs to manipulate the maids to fill the gaps.

So I'm now trying to manipulate my cleaners into doing more for me, via a carefully crafted exercise in reverse psychology. And it's working.

Compared to the Filthy Potato apartments I saw previously, I am a saint. I want there to be so little for them to do in the apartment, that they are compelled to do other things. On average, they would have 1-2 hours cleaning in the other apartments and in mine there would be 10 mins.

Last weekend I generated (and binned) a lot of rubbish and my bin was overflowing. 

On Monday I came home to find an extra bin in the kitchen. They also found some leftover baguette that was on a plate and delicately balanced it across two glasses. I don't know what it meant, but it was considered so I liked it.

I have been using a shelf in my wardrobe to keep dirty clothes. I don't know how to use the washing machine so the pile is growing.

On Wednesday a lovely green laundry clothes basket was left in the bathroom. No written warnings or letters for me to sign. Just new stuff provided by those with the real power in the building.

I eventually found the user manuals, in German only, and attempted to do a load of towels. I couldn't work it out so left the towels in the washing machine and the powder next to the machine.

On Friday morning during my clean up, I raised the stakes. I took out clean dishes and cutlery and piled them up on the sink as if I'd washed them myself. I am doing my bit.

I arrived home to find towels washed, dried and folded. There were also flowers in the vase. And there was an apple resting on the manuals for the washing machine, keeping them open at the right page.  I don't know what it means, but I am beginning to like these fairies.

My next step is to keep the apartment SUPER clean over the weekend. But I won't do my washing. I will leave the lovely green basket sitting neatly beside to the washing machine full of clothes.

If this works, the iron and the ironing board out are coming out by Friday at the latest.

When I get them into the full swing of executing a total care and maintenance framework--and only then--I will start to crank up the mess.

Dirty Stupid Fat Potato

When I was travelling in Vietnam last year with Scott*, we made up a nickname for all westerners: they are potatoes. While the original usage of potato in slang was quite specific**, we rebadged it to refer to all foreign whiteys.

Here's why. Compared with the locals, we are bigger and fatter and whiter and often a bit of a sweaty mess. Combining these attributes with poor language skills and a low tolerance for heat, we must look like potatoes. Common variants are "fat potato", "stupid potato", "dirty potato" and so on. 

Once you understand this, you must realise that most daily events are designed to reinforce your current potato status. Likewise, I now use this term to explain all situations where I don't get my own way, am not understood, or am generally potatoesque. I know my place.

For example, yesterday I went to buy a bottle of water and I tried to say "How much?" in Vietnamese. She didn't understand. So I said it again. She still didn't understand. So I said it again. She shook her head. So then I tried English. No result. So then I pointed to the water and pointed to my money and said "Dong". She held up 6 fingers and I paid.

As I paid, I mumbled audibly to myself: "Fuck off and stop wasting my time you Dirty Stupid Fat Potato".

_________________________

* Not his real name. His real name is Ben.

** Etymology note. Westerners who primariliy chase Asian men are called "Rice Queens". Asian men who primarily chase westerners are called "Potato Queens".

Callback's a Bitch

I called Huyen, the Manager at Amici's, to ask about my shirt and tie.

It took a while to explain what I wanted (for the first few minutes she thought I was placing an order). But when we got to the topic she realised who I was.

Huyen's feeling is that if this had happened at the store, no problem. However, it happened 2 minutes after I left the store. There is justnoway she can prove whether, within said 2 minutes, I had tampered with the lid or not. ("I was not there. You were away. How can I know what happened?")

I explained to her that I drink coffee every day. And my ability to drink coffee is quite advanced. And this has never happened before. And this is not my fault.

She had a giggle and said "I don't know what the problem is. I don't understand."

Me: "Please, Huyen--"

H: "It's Huyeern"

Me: "OK. Please Huyerrn--"

H: [Giggles]"No it's Hiuarrn"

Me: "OK Please Hiuarrn"--

H:  "No no it's--"

Me: "Can we get back to the coffee please? Please ... [pause, decide to merge her name into the next word]... Hiuarrnderstand please that this is not my fault. Your product was not made correctly."

H: "You tell me this. But I don't know. They don't tell me this. You tell me this only."

Me: "Huh? Hiurnyway ... Can you give me the phone number of the owner?"

H: "No. He is not here."

Me: "Can I speak to him?"

H: "No. I can pass him a message."

Me: "Here is the message. Tell him that I live at number 56 on your street. And your coffee is good but it is expensive. And you have many foreigners in your cafe. If he does not do the right thing I will tell many, many people not to come back to your cafe ever again. So give him my number please. Ask him to call me. " [Of course, little beknownst to Hrrryeeennn, I know no one here.]

H: "Ok. I will tell him."

I don't think she gave a shit though. Time will tell.

Coffee sequel

Went back last night to claim my shirt and tie. No one had a clue what I was talking about.

Not a good sign for me.

The manager? She will be in at 10am tomorrow. Her name is Huyen and they gave me her mobile.

Not a good sign for them.

It's much easier to get a shirt washed than change your mobile number.