One month in

One month in...
It doesn't really feel like it. One month I am still getting lost and ordering butter instead of beef soup...the wrong accent can be disasterous. The project manager's name is Ngoc, which if pronounced wrong means "stupid". Luckily, I can't really pronounce either so I just say my own version of his name which means nothing. Which I think is better.

Although I am somewhat of a confused oburoni, it's comfortable here. Well, not the weather, but life in general. Vietnam is an interesting country in that its growing economically very quickly. At least that's what I've seen from my small corner of Hue. In Hue there are all the aspects of a highly developed country: large hotels, offices, roads, electricity...but then there are also power cuts, street food shacks, and traditional villages a 10 minute bike ride away.

Being an oburoni (foreiger) is also a complicated experience. There are a large amount of tourists, but also an expat community. I'm not sure where I fit in, somewhere in the middle. I'm interested in this expat community from an almost anthropologic approach...they all share a certain traits - individualism, headstrong, maybe cynicism. I don't know what the right adjectives are but I definitely feel that there is something that brings them together - something that they share that makes them want to live as an oburoni forever. I imagine its a strange way of life. Even if you've lived here for 20 years, have a Vietnamese spouse and maybe even children, on your way to the grocery store you undoubtly will hear "Hey you, where are you from"?!

Which brings me to another point. "Hey you!". I feel somewhat accosted when this is yelled at me in English, but I think the aggressiveness of it is mostly because of the way the Vietnamese phrase translates into English. In Vietnamese, there are endless pronouns. Gendered pronouns for people older than you and younger than you, and different pronouns depending on how large the age difference is. I believe there are also different pronouns for your mother's brother, your brother's cousin...on and on, but those I haven't really had to use. Back to "Hey you". Vietnamese is all about the pronouns, and I hear people around me addressing each other with pronouns rather than their names. While in English I'd probably say "hey Emmy", in Vietnamese, I would say be "chi o". Which directly translates to "hey you [girl who is slightly older than me]". AHhh this turned into a grammar lesson. Which should end here.

Tomorrow I'm off to the beach for a festival! Who knows. I hear there will be good food so I'm sold.