musings from Wheaton
I?m using the culture shock excuse to explain away my seeming inability to focus my mind fully on my Wheaton coursework. I?m not doing quality work here; I?m turning in half-baked handwritten reflections instead of well-thought out typed papers. Why is that? Well, it occurred to me today that I can?t concentrate on my studies because my subconscious is very occupied processing other things. My journal is filled with entries that break off after a sentence and a half - I keep trying to write about this, about something, but I don?t have any words. When I put pen to paper, I find that my hand wants to make a point, and another, and to connect them with a line, and another; my hand wants to draw, not to write. My mind doesn?t have words yet, it only has abstractions, images, holistic things that I can?t break down with understanding yet.

But I don?t do images. And until words come, the two things I feel drawn towards are these: first, running. Normally in life, I don?t run. I can?t run for ten minutes without a pounding in my chest, nausea, shin splints, or a death wish. But when I run (and soon enough just walk) my mind has the freedom to process and think through or just disconnect altogether. There's a lovely path through some woods and then through downtown Wheaton that makes early morning runs actually begin to be appealing.

The second thing I am drawn to: I want to go to church. I just found out that an Anglican church a block away from my apartment has 5:45 prayer every day, and if I can work up the courage, I want to go there. I want to sit silently in a church and wait for God to bring some order to my mind, to clear the spiders out of my brain, to squeegee the windows of my soul. I want the rhythm of the liturgy to reshape my breathing.

These days are just so heart staggeringly and sometimes deceptively beautiful. Today was chilly and grey and everything here is clean and open and smells like freshly mown grass. I know why America is the promised land. It?s because the air smells like green.

The city of Wheaton is perfectly apple-pie middle america, and living here is like living on a movie set. I drive through neighborhoods with wide shady streets and beautiful houses, and I see neighborhood kids playing together and fathers on bike rides with children. I see moms and strollers, I see gardens, I see newlyweds repainting their house. I find yearnings in my heart that have rarely appeared there. I would like to have a family and a house that needs fresh paint and to go on bike rides in the summer. I would like to not be alone: to plant roots that can grow.

The life I?ve chosen for this season - or the life I?ve been called to - is a mobile life, and it leaves me restless, always wanting to be elsewhere.

No: I can?t blame my discontent on my mobility. I love my mobility, and, as the oft-quoted Augustine said, the heart is restless till it finds its rest in God. I need to practice resting in God. I need to learn to trust him, to trust that he fulfills all his promises and watches over his children. I need to trust him with the people in Vietnam and accept that I?m not supposed to be there now. I need to trust him with my future in Vietnam. I need to trust him with my future and my identity, both of which feel all in flux.

I?ve been painfully aware of at least two things since I returned to America. First, I?ve been increasingly conscious of my sinfulness: of my little faith, of my little love, of my little discipline, of my self-centeredness, of my insecurity. I am too passive and non-committal, too unwilling to subscribe wholly to the faith thing, too self-protective, too molded by others? expectations of me.

And I?ve been flooded with gratitude. It is painful to see afresh how much I?ve been given. All my needs are supplied; and beyond that, even my wants are so easily attainable. I have parks and rivers and coffeeshops and cars and friends and cell phones and books and books and people and most of all family. I am nearly guilty with gratitude.

The words in my head:

i thank you God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes


(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

-e.e. cummings

And

Listen
with the night falling we are saying thank you
we are stopping on the bridge to bow from the railings
we are running out of the glass rooms
with our mouths full of food to look at the sky
and say thank you
we are standing by the water looking out
in different directions

back from a series of hospitals back from a mugging
after funerals we are saying thank you
after the news of the dead
whether or not we knew them we are saying thank you
in a culture up to its chin in shame
living in the stench it has chosen we are saying thank you

over telephones we are saying thank you
in doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevators
remembering wars and the police at the back door
and the beatings on stairs we are saying thank you
in the banks that use us we are saying thank you
with the crooks in office with the rich and fashionable
unchanged we go on saying thank you thank you

with all the animals dying around us
our lost feelings we are saying thank you
with the forests falling faster than the minutes
of our lives we are saying thank you
with the words going out like cells of a brain
with the cities growing over us like the earth
we are saying thank you faster and faster
with nobody listening we are saying thank you
we are saying thank you and waving
dark though it is

~ W. S. Merwin

This, what I am being so deeply impressed by, this, my sin and my gratitude: this is simply the gospel.

high places


I have a persistent headache. It?s nearly 11 pm on my last night in Vinh and I feel as if I?m already suffering from jet lag. Oh boy.

So I should go to bed. But I have a mysterious long-held belief in the importance of writing during transitions, even if one has nothing profound to say. I have nothing profound to say.

I have this thing for high places (and, to quell any christian humorists, I?m not talking about ancient Israel and idol worship -- oh, see what growing up in Sunday school does to a person? or do I blame Erlo?).

When I was a little girl, I used to climb on top of my chest of drawers and just sit there for a while. Years later, in Italy, I did it again, and when people came into the room and saw me sitting there with an empty wine bottle in hand, they thought I was drunk. Actually, I was getting a new perspective on life - thank you very much.

Summer after 10th grade. Our last morning in Haiti, Mollie and I somehow woke ourselves up before daybreak and climbed out the hotel window onto a low roof. There, eating dry cereal, we watched a very unspectacular sunrise. But, the beauty of the sunrise wasn?t really the point, not exactly; we had escaped ?conventionality and the plague of the mundane?, which is a very important thing in the summer after 10th grade, even if pixie dust and feathers are no match for gravity and carpets and elephants will never be able to fly.

In college I liked to climb on top of Francis Hall. I?m pretty sure it was illegal, but, in my defense, I never saw any signs posted. Francis was an old building; my French classes were held there, and the parks and rec department was located there. At night, you could climb up the fire escape and a short iron ladder and sit on top of the building. From there you had a pretty good view of college station, as well as a view straight through the well-lit library windows next door. I would clamber up with a bag of m&m?s after a couple of hours at the library and be pensive and alone.

I live on the fifth and highest floor of an on-campus building at Vinh University. On the landing by the last set of stairs, there are some iron rungs stuck in the wall leading up to a small square hole in the roof, used by workmen for access. All year, I?ve been meaning to climb through the hole on the roof to see what can be seen. I haven?t, chiefly because there are usually students around during the hours when I?m awake, and I have a sneaking suspicion that the university would not look really favorably on me hanging out on the roof. ?Unconventional? doesn?t really work here.

This afternoon I realized that the campus is completely dead during ?nap time? and no one was going to see me. So I gave it a try - climbed up, flung the tin trap door open, and pulled myself up through the hole onto a small cement square of roof. I could see out, but no one could see me, because of the construction style of the roof. A perfect spot for sunbathing.

I returned to the roof tonight, after the last of my evening guests cleared out, to look at the stars. The moon was full this week, and is just barely waning now. Tonight it was big and yellow. Circling around from the moon, I can see the student hostel across the way; the lights of ben thuy bridge; the single light at the top of Quyet Mountain; the Phuong Dong hotel; the statue of Ho Chi Minh and the lights of Ho Chi Minh park; and darkness. There is summer lightning far in the distance, but the sky is mostly clear, and I can easily find the big dipper.

Stargazing is, contrary to what it might seem to be, an incredibly grounding activity. You can?t hold on to delusions of grandeur or self-importance when you?re laying flat on your back staring into the infinite distance above. You shrink down to your proper size. You remember who is in heaven and who is on earth and why your words should be few.

I haven?t taken enough time this year to look at the stars. I haven?t climbed on roofs often enough. Tonight I wanted to stretch out the moment, to expand time, so that I could just lay there in the cool wind and moonlight a little longer without it meaning that I was missing important hours of sleep.

And speaking of sleep?

Correction:
Our new teammate will be a 28 year old woman. This is definite - as definite as the last statement was. It feels like the universities are sports teams trading players.

I?m no artist. But every now and then I have this drive to work with my hands to create something. I believe it?s a basic human need. We are created in the image of our Father, and he is Creator; so, when we create, it?s not only natural, but it?s also spiritual.

Today I?ve been experimenting with different kinds of paper for creative ends. I?ve been soaking white, unlined paper in different substances to achieve a certain texture and color and age. It?s a fascinating, sensual process.

I hunch on the floor over the blue plastic basin, the rich aroma of black Trung Nguyen coffee steaming up and mixing with the heady fragrance of the fresh roses on the table. When I slide the first sheet of paper into the coffee, it absorbs the liquid slowly and unevenly. The fibers of the paper appear, unique on each sheet, like antique hidden maps, like fingerprints. I hang the soft, delicate, dripping paper to dry and begin the next sheet. Eventually the smell and color of the coffee works its way not only into the fibers of the paper, but into the pores of my skin, darkening the lines of my palms and the edges next to my nails. I swirl the basin, and the small amount of liquid rearranges itself; the grounds, the patterns formed, remind me of something a fortune teller would use to see the future. The paper doesn?t fit flat in the basin, and it scrunches, looking like a ridge of foothills with streams running through them. The gypsy with wizened brown skin and polished black eyes, with beads swinging and skirts flowing: There are yet many mountains to cross in your future.

I finished teaching my last two periods of the semester, came home, turned on Lauryn Hill, and started dancing.

Some very uninformative news
The third ELIC teacher who has been chosen to join me and Sandy next year is an unknown 22 year old male with no teaching experience. And that's all they could tell me just yet.
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Ok, I'll admit, I've been a little apprehensive about going home for the summer. I remember the reverse culture shock that I felt when I returned to the States after 5 months in Europe, and this summer the reverse culture shock will be much more drastic, I'm sure. But suddenly, today, I am completely ready to go home. I'm tired and dry and empty, and I'm especially tired of being a foreigner.
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This morning I had quite the experience. Well, let me begin at the beginning.

Yesterday morning I drove from Vinh to Cua Lo, the beach about 30 minutes outside of town. While I was driving there, a woman rode up next to me and said, "Where are you from? I want to practise my English with you." we had a fairly brief conversation and she invited me to stop at her house for something to drink. I politely declined, and she invited me to stop there the next day on my way back to Vinh. I murmered somthing noncomittal, nodding as she pointed to her house, and then zipped on down the road.

My retreat to the beach, which was actually an assignment for one of my Wheaton courses, was ok - I studied, reflected, wrote, etc., and ignored the shouts of "Tay! Tay!" {"foreigner" in Vietnamese} whereever I went. Before I went to bed, I asked the hotel proprieter to (as he usually does when I stay there)plug in my electric bike so it could rechare overnight.

This morning, about five km down the road from Cua Lo to Vinh, I realized that he in fact had NOT recharged my bike. I didn't have enough power to get to Vinh. But Vietnam is a small and friendly world, so I stopped at the house of the woman I had met on the road yesterday, and I recharged for an hour while we talked about English and family and Ho Chi Minh City and gardens. And I was off again. Until, three km outside of Vinh, when I ran out of juice again, and was going about 3 km/h. Suddenly two of my student friends showed up, took one look at me, and said, "Can we pull you?" For the final three km back to the university, I held Trung's hand tightly as their motorbike pulled me along. Perhaps illegal.

And that is how my 30 minute trip became 3 hours. And now I'm off to teach four periods. I may not update again for several weeks...

What size do you wear? A new way of measuring

I'm a size "large" in Asia.

Today I went to Nino Maxx, which is apparently a new chain of clothing stores in Vietnam. It was really nice -they had linen shirts(as opposed to the market, which sells a lot of polyester). I wanted to try on some pants, but I didn't know what size to try. The helpful saleslady picked up a pair and wrapped the waist around my neck. Seeing that it went all the way around, she nodded her head and handed me the pants. Is my waist really supposed to be the same size as my neck? Sigh. Weight loss program, here I come.

Speaking of weight loss programs. Yesterday a group of students in my speaking class had to perform an advertisement (like a tv commercial or something). They decided to advertise white bread and dirty water as a new, improved weight loss program. I got a big laugh after the advertisement when I said that it was not only a way to lose weight, but to lose health and even to lose your life.

What am I going to do when I come home and everybody doesn't laugh at my jokes? When I can walk down the street without all eyes on me? So much less attention... (I'm looking forward to it).

HALLOWEEN - no, really, HALLOWEEN
Well, there?s good news and bad news. Which first?

Always the bad first. Friday night I was occupied exterminating a cockroach when Eponine wandered out the front door. She often wanders out and goes to Sandy?s room or to look over the porch. But this time, while I wasn?t looking, she wandered down the stairs and out of my life. I couldn?t find her.

You know Eponine?s classic song in the Broadway musical? Imagine my cat singing it now: ?And now I?m all alone again, no where to go, no one to turn to?? -- and don?t call me overdramatic.

The good news. A few weeks ago I announced that fresh milk is now sold in Vinh (previously, we could only get ?long-life treated milk?). My lovely country director joked, ?Fresh milk in Vinh!! Next thing you know you?ll have pizza delivery.? At least, we thought she was joking. And I think she thought she was joking.

Today in class one of my students was looking at a restaurant menu. I took it from him. ?Halloween Pizza and Spaghetti?.
?Is this in Vinh?? I asked him desperately.
?Yes, a new restaurant,? he answered, a little perplexed by the starved look on my face.

According to the menu, ?Halloween? opened four days ago and serves pizza, pasta, hamburgers, fries, sandwiches, and salads.

It took about eight hours before Sandy and I got ourselves to Halloween. Great restaurant. Interesting restaurant. The mint-green walls have crucifixes on them, and the tv plays mtv asia. Sandy and I both got personal pizzas (about seventy-five cents each). While waiting, we watched a table of four high school girls giggle and grimace over the strange food they had ordered - salad, pizza, pasta carbonara, and spaghetti Bolognese. It was like watching adventurous American highschoolers self-consciously try sushi for the first time. The pizzas were fabulous, and the dishes we saw at the other tables looked good too. Granted, nothing was exactly like it would be in America, but it was a HECK of a lot closer than anything else in Vinh. And - get this - free delivery. Friday night pizza and a movie, here we come.

In other news, we had a long and unusually cool spring (according to my sources), but the summer is here. I gave my first exam today. We have at least one teacher friend coming to visit Vinh on Friday. I?ll be home on June 7. Time is flying, almost too fast. Ok, maybe not too fast.

What are you? Do you want a Vietnamese husband? (by Sandy Gannon, teammate extraordinaire)
These are the 5 standard questions that almost every Vietnamese person you meet will ask when they first meet you.

Where are you from?
How old are you?
What is your name?
How long have you been in Vietnam?
Do you have a husband yet? or How many kids to you have?

A few other common ones are:

Why aren?t you married yet?
Do you want a Vietnamese husband? Why not?
How long are you going to stay in Vietnam?
How much is your salary?
Is that enough?
How old are your parents?
Are your parents well?
After spending the weekend in the countryside meeting the family, relatives, neighbors and friends of 4 different students I am sure that I have answered these questions and more a hundred times. Near the end of the weekend my students would just answer on my behalf instead of translating for me directly as they knew the answers by heart.

But my absolute favourite question was put to me on the beach on afternoon. I was surrounded by a crowd of people trying to ask me questions in broken English. Then one young boy called, ?What are you?? Over the laughter of my students I calmly replied that I was a person, and asked him what he was. That incident became the joke of the weekend, and the story was repeated to everyone family and friend that we met.

My students were amazed at the attention that I received from everyone. There was constantly people calling out, ?Hello!? or ?Tay! Tay-wa!? which means ?foreigner? in Vietnamese. I am fairly used to it now as everywhere we go we are stared at, yelled at, pointed at. It is part of life here. But it surprised my students. After a few days of it they started to get tired of all of the attention, and I think they were able to understand a little of what it is like for me.

I traveled to a small town about 40 km north of Vinh called Dien Chau, which is the home of my student, friend and Vietnamese tutor Thuy. I stayed with her family for 2 days. Two other students - a girl and boy, Giang and Vien - also came with us. We spent Friday visiting Thuy?s family, walking around the town, visiting the local market, and the beach. Thuy has a very large extended family and it seemed that every other person in the market or town that we met was related to her in some way. We stopped to chat and drink tea with countless relatives and neighbours.

That evening as we were eating dinner a number of neighbours and relatives came to see this foreigner that they had heard about. A number stayed to visit, others just looked in the window or door, smiled or waved, but were to shy to come in and talk to me. In the evening we went for a walk and met more of Thuy?s relatives and so of course drank more tea, visited, and answered the important 5 questions. It was a really a lot of fun, even it was draining at times. I was able to practice a lot of Vietnamese, and some of my students were surprised at how much I could say and understand.

On Saturday two other girls that live in Dien Chau joined us and we traveled by motorbike to visit Vien?s village. Vien is the poorest student in his class, and he informed me that his family is the poorest in the village. His family are farmers, and his father and brother make wooden ploughs when they aren?t working the fields. Vien warned me numerous times how small and poor his home was, but even so it was hard to believe when I saw his home. His house was smaller then my room here at the university, which I think is pretty small, and 5 people lived there. There was enough space for two small double beds and a few chairs. The walls were falling apart, the mosquito net over the beds had been fixed and darned so many times it looked like a web of stitching. The smell of the pig sty that was attached to the side of the house wafted through the open windows and blended with the scent of the wood shaving from the side of the house where they made the ploughs. The roads consisted of small dirt paths barely wide enough for 2 motorcycles to pass each other.

His family were so happy to meet me and Vien?s classmates. They welcomed us into their home and did everything possible to make us feel at home. While the others stayed and rested Vien took me around the village to introduce to me his relatives and neighbours. I have never seen him so happy or so proud. It was very humbling. I mean who am I? I am just Sandy, nothing special. But I was treated like a visiting queen. There has never been another a foreigner in their village, let alone their home.

We then spent the afternoon exploring some local caves and countryside, including a hill covered in bushes of wildflowers of such hues that I have never seen. Bright orange-yellow, vibrant purples, pale pinks, it was breath-takingly beautiful. We could see many of the local young boys out with their buffalos grazing in the fields. From the top of the hill we could see Vien?s small village, and fields of rice and vegetables. We drove around the countryside stopping periodically so I could take photos or to check out different vegetables that I have never seen growing before. And when I say drove around ? think dirt bike racing, or 4x4 driving on motorbikes. Don?t tell my Mom but I had a ton of fun on the motorbike as we flew along the paths, passing bicycles, buffaloes and the occasional ox cart.

That night we went to Huong?s house back in Dien Chau for dinner. I once again met numerous relatives and neighbours and was treated like royalty. This weekend was probably one of the best times I have had here in Vietnam. I enjoyed spending time with these students so much that I didn?t want to come back to Vinh even though I was totally exhausted. In a way I was disappointed that I didn?t get to spend very much one-on-one time with Thuy or any of the students. But I know that just by the act of visiting with their families, meeting their friends and seeing their hometown I have been able to establish deep foundations for our relationships in the future. I plan to follow up with each of the students that I visited with this weekend. The conversations and questions will come in time. I just need to be patient. Next year I hope to have the opportunity to visit the homes of many more students. To meet their families and friends. To develop a deeper understanding and love for the culture and life of the Vietnamese.

wandering to and fro
May 3 2004 11:14 am Well, here is what I should be doing: replying to a passel of emails (sixteen, to be precise) that I have received and not yet replied to - grading homework projects - lesson planning for this week, in which I will teach six or eight extra classes - or perhaps writing a paper for Wheaton. But so far this morning I have avoided all of those things, and so now I will continue to avoid them, for a little while.

On Friday I met with class 42a2 - well, really, about half the class, plus some boyfriends and neighbors - at 5 am by the school gates. It wasn?t until six that we actually boarded the bus and hit the road for or 200 km journey to the Phong Nha Caves (a UNESCO world heritage site). About 30 km before we got there, a woman on a motorbike ran into the back of our bus. Now, though you might suppose that since SHE was the one who hit us, we wouldn?t be held responsible, but that would be false. Our bus was?bigger?I guess that made us somehow culpable. We stopped and our bus driver accompanied the woman (who was unhurt) to the hospital for x-rays. And we sat. in the sun. for over two hours.

And I experienced the generosity of the Vietnamese people. One family who lived on the side of the road let a few of us come in and lay on their bed to ?rest? while we waited for our bus driver to return. We laid there, we laid in front of the fan, we ate cucumber and pate sandwiches, and we waited.

Finally we were on the road again and made it to the caves. Because it was a holiday, the place was packed with Vietnamese tourists, and so we got to wait another hour and a half to get tickets. This waiting was made bearable by ice cream and seven up in the shade.

To get to the caves, we rode in small, brightly-painted boats for about half an hour until we reached the mouth of the water cave. Inside, we rode for a while and then disembarked and hiked back into the cave a bit. After that, we reboarded and floated over to the ?dry? cave. We had to hike up a couple hundred meters to reach the entrance to the cave, and then we could hike into the cool darkness of the cave.

I got home from the caves around 9:30 Friday night, and left again Saturday morning at 8:30. This time it was to Ha Tinh with Lucy to visit Hallie?s hometown. Hallie?s family lives about 50 km away from Vinh in the countryside. Her father, mother, and younger brother live in a three-room house. The bathroom is a hole in the ground and the ?shower? a cement cube with a low faucet and a basin. Her father is a retired soldier and her mother sells pork meat.

Hallie?s family was very hospitable and made me very comfortable. I spent most of Saturday at the beach with Hallie and her friends from high school. New foods I ate: some kind of clam, some strange small bird, and some thing too crunchy wrapped in green leaves and fried. Foods I politely avoided: the stomach of the chicken and the heart of the pig.

I slept in the bed with Hallie and Lucy and woke early the next morning. Her mother usually gets up at three am to get the pork meat, and then she sells it out of her house from about four until six or seven. After some noodles for breakfast, Lucy and I motorbiked it back to Vinh, stopping on the way to visit a memorial for twelve young girls who were killed by a bomb while they were repairing a supply road during the Vietnam-American war.

When I came home, I was feeling a little under the weather, and I climbed into bed and watched Legally Blond one and two. Perhaps I was in need of a little stupid American culture.

I?ve put some photos from the weekend on my main website.