End of the first week

Warning, lengthy post ahead, I’ll wait while you grab a drink…

Well I’ve nearly finished my first week in Vietnam. I’ve made some good friends already, in 5 more weeks it’ll be hard to leave them. The family who owns the hotel I live in are very nice. The hotel itself has its ups and downs, but that is kind of part of the character of it. Electricity here is a transient being, unfortunately he decides to skip town during the hottest part of the day, and usually right as we’re pulling up from our morning of work. Just when we would love to sit in front of a fan and have a fruit shake, the electricity goes off, the place turns into a sauna, and fruit shakes are impossible without the blender. It’s been hard for me sometimes to connect to my loved ones back home, because without electricity, there goes the internet, but even so, I’m talking with them more than I expected. With the time being nearly opposite from home, as I’m coming back to the hotel for lunch, its midnight back home. Then when evening rolls around, the internet often goes to the same place electricity went in the afternoon. This has caused me to adopt a very odd sleeping pattern. I usually go to sleep around 9:30-10, and then start waking around midnight to see if the internet is back up, if its not, I’ll go back to sleep and wake nearly each hour until dawn. When I find it up, I’ll stay up for about an hour or so connecting with home, and then sleep a few more hours before I’m up at 6:00am. This sounds brutal, but surprisingly I’m handling it really well. I usually get a nap in the afternoons, provided we have electricity, sleeping without at least a fan is nearly impossible for me.

In terms of my experience here, it has been incredibly eye opening. The Vietnamese people are the hardest working people I’ve ever seen. The hardships that they take as a matter of course, most of us in America would leave the country over. The students at the center that I’m working at sleep two to a bed on basically a sheet of plywood, in a room that is quite long, with maybe one ceiling fan. There is no privacy. They have no refrigerator, no air conditioning, and one TV that is about 13 inches or so. Yet they seem very happy in life, and quite content with their situation. Another example is this younger guy that works at the hotel I’m living at. I woke up the other morning after not really being able to sleep very well, and decided I’d go downstairs to practice the guitar, an instrument I bought for 20 bucks if you can believe it. So I get downstairs and there’s this guy already at work, its 5am, and they don’t open until 7. I look over to the far wall, and there’s a bed made up across 6 chairs that he’s put together. That’s where he sleeps, that room is sweltering with no fans on, and of course he didn’t have any on. Since I was awake, I helped him prepare the restaurant, moving the motor bikes out onto the sidewalk, arranging the tables, mopping, etc. It turns out, he’s in school for international finance and works here when he’s not at school, and sleeps in the dining room. Can you believe it? He never complained once! I’ve got my interpreter on the lookout for a fold away cot, I’m going to hopefully make a gift of it to him before I leave. Hopefully it’ll help him get through school without a sore back. Another example are these very old women that walk the streets with a bamboo rod over one shoulder, and a basket or platform suspended from each end usually laden with produce, or some wares that they are hoping to sell. Women that old in the states are barely getting up from their soaps, let alone toting probably 40-50 lbs up and down the street in terribly hot weather. My respect goes out to the people of Vietnam.

The family that lives here has four children, which is a lot for Vietnam. Apparently, the man’s brother could not have kids, and so he picked up the slack for the family, at least that’s sort of how it was explained to me. In any case, the kids are 8, 5, 2, and one month. The 8 year old is completely enamored with me, and acts as if I’m a long lost friend every time I enter the hotel. She runs across the restaurant yelling my name and gives me the biggest hug, every day. Her name is Quynh. She’s also quite the photographer and makes her way around the camera better than I do. I’ve added a couple pics she took of me, I’m her favorite subject, lord knows why, as well as a picture of her. I have to admit, I like her a lot. Her little sister is 5 and has been a bit distant from me up until tonight when she warmed up a bit. Now, I have a feeling I’ll be getting two very large hugs each day I come back to the hotel, you won’t hear me complain about it, those kids warm my heart, and keep me from getting grumpy when I know I’m about to sit in the stale, humid heat, for another 4 hours.

In terms of the work I’m doing, its been both frustrating and encouraging. Encouraging because my students seem very eager to learn, and really seem to crave the knowledge we’re offering. They work extremely hard in mobility, often wanting to practice something again if they didn’t do the skill perfectly. They seem quite dedicated to making a difference.

The frustration comes in because they, they being the administration, do not inform us of events that are happening. Twice this week half the students have not been in class for various things, today it was entertaining a group of visiting Vietnamese from America. I eventually ended class 45 minutes early because I would just have to reteach it on Monday anyway. I was admittedly pretty frustrated. I really don’t like to have my teaching interrupted, especially when I’m finally getting the students to engage in discussion. That has been very difficult, they feel like questioning the teacher is disrespectful, and so are very reluctant to ask a question, even if I ask them for questions.

We’ve talked a good bit about disability in Vietnam this past week. The country still hasn’t undergone their version of civil rights. This is probably due to the fact that for the most part everyone is on even ground here; the women are probably harder working than the men, and seem pretty empowered. The group without a say, are those with disabilities. There are many with them, much of it coming from the Vietnam war and Agent Orange, which effects 3 generations of people. Kids born from grandparents in the war are still at risk for having birth defects. The country seems to take care of them, but they are sort of like lepers to the population. Here in Hue, they have a school for the blind with 60 students in it. Gabby, who’s blind, gets looked at like she has 3 heads for walking around with her cane. Due to this, I’ve begun to encourage the school to reach out into the community, and make them selves known. Many people here don’t even know they have this school, and I really think community support is the key to getting these kids working and having productive careers as members of the Vietnam society.

The tactic so far is to have the teachers, when they go out into the community to carry their canes with them. Canes are new by the way, the school had two when I got here, and Gabby had 20 she had donated from Thailand that she had not given to them yet. The idea behind carrying the cane out with them is to generate curiosity from the community and open the possibility of discussion with people about the school and to tell them what the cane means, so that they’ll hopefully be more cautious should they see the students on the roads. I’m hoping that this will at least work a little bit.

Another concept I’m trying to introduce is early intervention. This is where the child that is born with a visual impairment, or any disability actually, receives services as early as possible in his/her life so that skills can be taught in their natural order, rather than playing catch up when the child is someday brought to the center, sometimes as old as 12. This society is embarrassed of disability, and it is not uncommon for families to hide children with disabilities from their friends and communities, essentially making the child a kid in the closet. So when they do come to the school, sometimes they are quite scarred, and may not even talk. It is very sad. So if we can reach even one child born each year before this happens to them, this whole visit will have been more than worth the trouble. The students seem skeptical but are interested still in exploring the possibility. My real hope, is that out of this group of 20, a couple leaders will emerge, who will carry the school forward, even after we leave. In six weeks I won’t be able to change the world of this school too much, but I may be able to get the snowball rolling, and hopefully in a few years, it’ll be a totally different place, one where the kids are learning skills other than massage, making tooth picks, brooms, and chop sticks, and are looked at as contributing, valuable members of the community.

Here's a couple of Quynh's photos of me.

So that’s the news so far, there’s much more, but this is getting to be quite long, so I’ll stop it there for tonight. I’m putting up pictures on a picasa site, most of them won’t make it to the blog. If you are interested in looking through them, you can find them here: http://picasaweb.google.com/visionteacher. Thanks for reading, and keeping in touch, I love everyone and miss them very much.

~Mickey

First day at school

That folks, is a bicycle, and yes the person rides it that way...

Well I'm in Hue and I've finished my first day of work. On the way here from Ho Chi Minh City I rode in a plane with the propellers on the wings, that was kinda neat, never rode in one of those before. It wasn't as loud as I expected. They bussed us out to the tarmac where the plane was waiting and we climbed up the stairs kinda like the president does in all the photos :-) Of course it was a bus that wasn't all that pretty that took us to the not so stylish plane, but you know what, it got me to Hue without crashing, so I'm not complaining.

At Hue airport, Gabby picked me up. She's an interesting person, very brave really. What she's trying to do is pretty amazing, I hope that with our help she can somewhat pull it through, but to be honest, the deck is pretty stacked against her. She's pretty jaded and a little burnt out. She's the only blind foreigner here, and is very fiercely independent. The people I think are offensive to her, and they don't realize it. I don't think its intentional, they just don't know how to act. They call her things like Ms. Blind and stuff like that, she understands a bit of the language, and so they don't think she hears them, when in reality its very hurtful. She'll walk up to people to get information and they'll tell her to piss off, literally. They think she's begging, when she's not at all, she's a consumer like the rest of us. Because being solicited is fairly common, the people are just sort of rough about it, and ask questions later kind of attitude. She has opinions about people at the school, and I had to ask her today to hold her opinions as far as I was concerned, because I wanted the chance to form my own. She seemed to take it well. Here's Gabby and myself:

Bob is the other teacher I'm working with. He's a pretty neat guy, very accomplished in the world of business. He used to buy bankrupt companies and turn them around to be profitable. He's teaching sort of as a retirement from all that. He likes to talk a lot, and it causes me to sit and listen, or not, much of the time. I don't like interrupting people, and I don't want to step on his talking, so I'll just keep my own company. I like him a lot, but I find myself being more quiet when I'm around him, which as most of you know is not really like me :-)

I've taken on a leadership role here, Bob and Gabby are sort of deferring to me, still haven't figured out why that keeps happening to me, I need to learn to keep my mouth shut and not be so confident in my language I think.

We met at the school today and met the teachers and staff that we'd be educating over the next 6 weeks. We also met the school director. The facility is actually a pretty nice campus. The students sleep two to a bed on pallets with a really pretty sheet over it. The architecture is attractive, as are many of the older buildings in Hue. I met the interpreter that basically is assigned to me over the next weeks, her name in pronounced "knee" though I have no idea how to spell it. She's got a very fashionable haircut and is really "together". She's very aware of world politics, and seems quite intelligent. Definitely on a different strata from the every day working folks of Vietnam, who are also great people, and intelligent in their areas, but they live day to day without much awareness of the world beyond their borders. Knee is definitely different and she knows it, very self confident. I think we'll work well together, she did a great job today interpreting for me, and made my jokes funny, which is pretty good since I'm sure they don't always translate perfectly, and they probably aren't that funny ;-)

So we met for breakfast, and then went to the school. We really didn't know what to do, and Gabby didn't either. This is where I took the lead, since we were all sort of staring at each other. We met the staff and told them a bit about ourselves and what we do in the states, as well as what we'd like to do for them. Special emphasis on independence and success for blind people in their country. The culture here really respects teachers a lot. Its one of the most noble things a person can do is to be an educator. Part of that respect involves not asking questions of your teacher, its disrespectful. So when I ask for questions everyone just stares at you. In a college class in the states, if I ask for questions I need to be prepared to spend 10 minutes on them. Because of this, my teaching style really is geared with this guided discovery, Socratic method. I feel that if I can guide a student through this questioning process, they can discover the knowledge for themselves and it'll stick better. So, a little behavior modification is in order here :-)

I decided to try that, and told Knee to tell them that whoever asked the first question was my favorite student for the day, and that it didn't have to be about blindness at all, could be about anything. I just wanted to start the culture of questions. So, who asks the first question? The director of the school. What does he ask? Who I think is the most beautiful girl in the room. Wow. Now how does one diplomatically answer a question like that, when they're all definitely interested in the answer? Was pretty crazy. I said something like, its too hard a decision, it would be like picking the most beautiful star from the sky, or some crap like that. It seemed to be satisfactory and we moved along. Whoa...

That was pretty much the end of that adventure. On your left are the people I'll be working with, a combination of both students and teachers, many of them with visual impairments.

Gabby, Bob, and I have met this afternoon to brainstorm, and we're coming back together at 8 for dinner and to regroup for tomorrow. We've been told that its expected of us to host a twice daily tea. That its just expected when you have a training like this, so we have to make time in our already very cramped agenda for tea, which takes about 15 minutes each time, once in the afternoon and once in the morning.

Here's inside one of the dorms. Those are basically just boards under those pretty green blankets. The students sleep two to a bed.

In other news, I had a very tasty lunch. Can't tell you what it was, but I took a pic for you, it was fried rice, shrimp and pork, and was just incredibly good. I loved it, and might get it again tomorrow :-) Just look at that presentation! And it cost a dollar, the whole dinner.

Random pic for you:

This pic was taken by one of the students who is blind, she's not too bad a photographer, and this was probably the first camera she's ever used.

I guess that's enough for today, I'll update again soon. Keep the comments coming, I want to hear from you all!

~Me

I'm in Vietnam!

Well everyone, I made it. There's so much to write about, yet I don't want to overwhelm you, so I'll try to stick with the cliff notes. The tree on the left is a ficus, its styled like a giant bonsai, well I guess it is, technically since bonsai literally means, tree in a pot. It's common here to style trees and hedges like that. You don't see just boxy type hedges, they have style. So anyway, I left on the 20th at 7:30am, and spent something like 27 hours traveling to the other side of the earth. It was crazy, the flight from Chicago to Hong Kong felt so long! I'd try to sleep, wake up, look at the clock and realize I had only dozed for like 20 minutes and still had 13 hours to go. My seat mate didn't speak any English and slept quite deeply. I felt bad waking him to go to the bathroom, he didn't get up ONCE! I had to use the restroom 3 times and felt like a little kid bothering him, but sheesh, 3 times in 15 hours isn't that bad when you think about it. So anyway, went to Hong Kong and stayed there like 4 hours. I tried to sleep in the airport but that lasted about 10 minutes before this entire Vietnamese family DESCENDED complete with yelling across the lobby at each other. I counted 17 in total with all the children. Grr, I was quite grumpy about that, tried the dirty looks, but they didn't seem to register. So I moved down a bit, and then the rest of the family showed up, so I gave up and juggled for them. They ended up being very sweet people, and a couple of the kids spoke very good English. I was called Amazing for my juggling, they all applauded, even people that weren't in the family, that's a new one, and now I can go home happy.



A plane at the Hong Kong airport.

On the plane from Hong Kong to Ho Chi Minh City I sat next to two native Vietnamese guys that were both living in the states and visiting family. One spoke much better English than the other, his name is Phan, and he actually has married a girl here in Vietnam, and had a baby with her. The crazy part is he's having trouble getting her and the baby over to the states, so since 2006 he visits his wife twice a year for about a month at a time. Isn't that nuts! He said his wife is clear to go to the states now, but they have to get the son sorted out next, and then he can bring his family home to Pennsylvania. He ended up sticking with me in the airport and making sure I got through customs and got my bag ok, he was afraid it would be lost and he wanted to help me with the language just in case. Talk about a nice person. I got to meet his family outside, just before I found the guy picking me up. Phan gave me his phone number and told me to call him if I got into any trouble, he'd come help me out. He also might come visit me in Hue, he said he's always wanted to go there, I told him to come to the school for the blind and ask for me and I'd show him around the city :-) I hope he shows up.

The drive to the hotel was crazy! The traffic is incredible here, like as in, amazing. Its no longer any wonder to me why in places like New York you have so many foreign people driving the taxis. They must be the best folks for the job, because if traffic was like it was last night in a city in the US, you'd have total grid lock from car accidents. These people are martial artists on a scooter or mini van. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that New York City probably seems like a school zone in suburbia to a lot of people from other countries. I'll try to get a better traffic pic later, but you of course have the video below which will give you an even better idea.





The room is nice and tiny, but very clean, and has wireless Internet. The people running the place are very kind. Not much to say about the place, its tiny and nice, with a very uncomfortable computer chair, this thing is tortuous. I went out walking this morning after finally going to bed at around 3:30am, waking up at 8 or something. Not too bad, really. I found this nice little place where they made a ham, cheese, and mushroom omelet plus essentially a papaya, banana, and something else, fruit smoothie for a little over 3 dollars. Pretty cheap breakfast, and I have a suspicion it was probably kind of expensive for here, I'll let ya know once I learn the ropes better. The traditional breakfast would have been a chicken with rice, more like what I would think of us lunch. I wanted to try it, but I thought I'd stay safe, as I don't need uncomfortable stomach issues when I plan to be flying and traveling.


Here's the room from standing in the bathroom.


Everywhere you walk you get bothered by people wanting to sell you stuff, its pretty annoying, but they usually leave me be after I say no thanks. There's a bunch of little old ladies carrying stuff all over the place, and the skills the people have with balancing things on scooters just adds to their traffic-fu black belts they seem to be born with.

So after writing this blog, I'll check out of the hotel, take a cab back to the airport and at 4:30 if all the stars properly align, will fly to Hue. After that I truly don't know what the next step is. You'll be surprised I'm sure to learn that Gabby has not told me. I dont' even have an address for the school, or the place I'll be living. I can only hope that she's arranged to have me picked up and just left that detail out. If not, my plan is to get to a hotel, and in the morning work my way to the school for the blind. So i'm not too worried.

Some more random pics for you:
This is down the street from my hotel, not too bad on traffic here.


I'll update you all again soon, next stop Hue! Miss everyone very much.

~Mickey

Almost time to leave

Hey everyone, so I'm getting the final things together for departure. I bought bug repellent, some waterproof gear for Melissa's camera, and a guide book. I'm only planning to take two bags and a carry on. We'll see how that works out. Melissa and I are leaving for Jax tonight, hopefully getting to the airport by 5:30am, since its international. I'll fly to Chicago, then to Hong Kong, and then to Vietnam. I'll stay in Ho Chi Minh City that night, I've just found out that someone will be meeting me at the airport, talk about celebrity status. They'll take me to a hotel, and I guess pick me up the next day, though I don't know that fact yet. At around 4:15ish the following afternoon, I fly on to Hue, and then from there go to the school. I'll finally arrive in Hue on the 22nd. I lose a day crossing the time zones, but will gain it back when coming home.

Melissa is doing pretty well, she's of course been teary, but its crunch time, and in our rush we haven't had much time for too many tears, though I've found a few minutes for my share. You all probably will not hear from me until at least the 23rd, but who knows, maybe the 22nd. So don't worry! I'll contact Melissa and let her know when I'm in HCMC, probably by email, so she'll know that I'm there safely and will hopefully then contact the parental types to let them know. I'll miss everyone very much, I look forward to the adventure, but the departure is definitely bitter sweet. So friends, the next time we talk, I'll be on the other side of the planet, and hopefully with at least a couple pictures to post for you!

~Mickey

A little more of what I'm up against

Ok so we're still set for leaving. It looks like I'll be flying out of Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) around 4:15 June 22nd. So I'll have nearly a full day in the city to explore, and hopefully not have to lug around my luggage while I'm doing that. While typing this, FED EX just showed up with my VISA. That's incredibly fast, the company just got this paperwork Thursday morning, and they must have sent it out Friday to have gotten here today. That's fast, considering the Vietnam website said 4-5 business days, and I couldn't get in touch with the embassy for a week. Really impressive. So here's a plug for www.rushmypassport.com for all your traveling to foreign country needs :-)

In other news, Gabby has been more forthcoming today, its weird I've probably emailed her 5 times back and forth this morning already. It looks like I'll be staying in a hotel, and she says it'll have a computer! Hot Dog! I'm guessing with internet, so Melissa and I can more easily stay in contact, that'll be very very good. So what's she's told me this morning is that I won't really be working with students, but with the teachers. She says she can arrange to have students there if I need them, but that it would mostly be teachers. Oh and the teachers "really lack motivation". This is very troubling, I don't feel totally comfortable myself teaching someone to travel in that traffic, yet she's wanting me to teach someone else how to teach a blind kid to travel there? Without students to practice on? And they're "unmotivated"... Sheesh. I told her we'd probably need some students and that I wouldn't feel comfortable essentially signing off on someone to teach until I saw some demonstration of proficiency.

For those that are not in my field and so wouldn't know, doing what they are asking me and Bob to do, it takes for us to learn it, approximately 2 years of course work. To teach O&M usually takes an additional year of training. I'm only there for 5 weeks. I'll be working through an interpreter, and with people that probably would rather I just left them alone, from Gabby's description of them. I feel like I'm always dooming and glooming here, but I really think that Gabby doesn't know what she's asking for. I'll try my best, and hope it all works out. From what I understand, it seems like ANYTHING I bring to the table will be an improvement over current conditions. It sounds like I need to bring some morale to the table as well as some skills, perhaps these people don't realize the potential that people with visual impairments have. Its easy to think that blind people can't do anything, when they are truly quite capable when given the opportunity and people to properly teach them in the way that they learn best. Should be crazy fun, can't wait to keep you updated.

As the challenges mount, it creates even more determination for me to get over there and do my best. At this point, its humorous to think of all the "walls" that are before us, but that in itself, offers a bit of freedom. How can I possibly screw this up, when anything I do is going to be much better than what they have already? Talk about feeling a sense of liberation. Just a few more days and off I go...

~Mickey

Plane tix are in, visa is in the works, hopefully, the comedy continues into its next act

Hi Friends! Ok, so when I last left you it was in a state of disappointment. Now I feel like that passenger in a car right before the vehicle just barely hits the car in front, you know, where you are mashing your foot to the floor wishing you had your own brake pedal? Yeah I'm that guy.

I got my itinerary in, so plane tickets are a definite reality. Here's the rough and dirty schedule. I leave Jacksonville airport at 7:30am on Friday June 20th. I travel to Chicago, then from Chicago to Hong Kong, and from Hong Kong to Ho Chi Minh City, arriving at 10:10pm local time. The total travel duration is something like 27 hours, yummy. I then must find my way from the far south end of Vietnam to the middle of Vietnam, not knowing the first word of Vietnamese. So it should well and truly be an adventure. I've put the map back up so you can see this for yourself. Here's where the comedy of this leg of the trip really comes into play.

May I introduce to you Bob Parker? Bob, is a teacher at the Florida School for the Deaf and Blind, and is also going to Vietnam, he's a Leo and enjoys long walks on the beach... :-) Just kidding about the last part, I have no idea if he likes beaches.

Anyway, he's going to be in charge of academics, I pity him, that doesn't sound fun at all. He's a really cool guy so far. We've talked on the phone a couple times trying to compare notes and come up with a more complete picture, since we each seem to have different pieces of the puzzle. So Bob also leaves for Vietnam on the 20th, he also leaves from Jacksonville airport. His flight is also approximately the same duration. This folks is where the similarity ends. Bob leaves Jax at 9am, an hour and a half after me, he then flies to Atlanta, from Atlanta to South Korea, and from South Korea to Hanoi, the far north end of Vietnam. I think he arrives like 11:30pm or something. He then has to make his way from the north end of the country to the middle of the country. Now, why they didn't put us on the same flight is totally incomprehensible to me. We're leaving the exact same day! Its like some sort of reality TV show, where they deliberately introduce adversity just to see how the players deal with it. I told him we should race to Hue, see who gets to the school first.

So that's the latest on that front. My visa paperwork was sent off yesterday, all told that will cost me about $300. Expensive, considering I was initially looking at like $25. I'm now having an agency handle it for me as this is the faster way to do it, since its so very last minute. Its costing me an extra $80 but they'll hand deliver the paperwork to the embassy and pick it up as well, dropping it into next day mail for me. I was told that trusting it to the embassy alone can be risky, I believe it since I couldn't get them to answer the phone for a week. So if the Visa miraculously comes through in time, I'm definitely going on this trip.

I found some enrichment for you folks. This first video is called the sights and sounds of Vietnam. Its beautiful. None of it is shot in the city. Both of these were produced by the same guy. For the non-technical in the crowd, the big play button on the bottom left of the video screen, if you click it, the movie should start playing. Send me an email if you have trouble.


Vietnam Sights & Sounds from v!Nc3sl4s on Vimeo.

This next video gives you an idea of traffic in the cities of Vietnam, this one is Hanoi, where our new friend Bob will be arriving. The city I'm landing in is supposed to be the worst. Here's a quote from the blog I pulled this vid from:

"That video was shot late at night when the traffic is light... In HCMC for example about 12K people die each year from motorbike accidents. The moto rental people don't rent to foreigners because they figure its a given they will wreck the bike. It's really hairy driving or even walking in either city... When I come back home to Thailand it's like driving in a ghost town by comparison. Of course it isn't. Vietnam and parts of India are the worst I have ever tried to navigate."

So I'm going to be teaching blind people to travel in this. I will really have to spend some time studying the traffic there before I risk a student in it. A friend of mine mentioned this morning, If I can teach there, I can teach anywhere. Please notice the total absence of any sort of traffic control device. It absolutely amazes me that there aren't any accidents happening in this video. When a light goes out here on a simple four way, people start freaking out. Truly amazing.


Hanoi crazy night traffic from v!Nc3sl4s on Vimeo.

I'll update as more comes available. I'm not sure who all is reading this, I'd love to get comments, they're at the bottom, or even emails. Sorry if its wordy, but I want you to truly share this adventure with me. I can't believe how crazy it is so far, and I've not even left the US yet. Don't forget to subscribe in the box on the right so you can get the updates as I write them. Love you all.

~Mickey

Communism meets capitalism, yet beuracracy conquers all

Ok, so more frustration. After attempting to talk to the Vietnamese Embassy all last week, having never gotten them to answer their phone. They finally answer this morning, only to further complicate my situation. So here's the skinny on what's going on.

I need a Visa Approval Number. This is something according to the website for the Embassy that my "host" should get for me. Gabby says she never got this number, but my concern is that because Gabby is visually impaired, she may not know she has the number, it could be sitting right there on the paperwork. I've emailed her about this several times now, and she's, as reported before, bad on communication. Its been 4 days since I last heard from her, and I'm supposed to be leaving the country next Saturday as of the last communication. So anyway, I finally get someone to answer the phone at the embassy this morning, and in very terrible English she tells me that my host should have the number, and she can't understand why she doesn't. But if I'd "Like the embassy to help me" it will cost an additional 80 bucks. So the visa that originally was only going to cost like 25 dollars, after I pay the expedite fee, since I'm now RAPIDLY running out of time, and I pay the increased cost for multiple entry over 3 months, it'll cost me $150. The multiple entry, I hadn't thought about needing, but apparently since I'm so close to Laos, and other countries, if I go over there I'll need the multiple entry visa otherwise I can't go back into the country. So its recommended that I do this now rather than get stuck later.

So this trip, that is volunteer on my part, and is supposedly all expenses paid, is starting to get expensive. I mean, a trip to Vietnam for 150 isn't a bad deal, but I'm beginning to get quite frustrated, and am worried that this whole thing is going to unravel at the last second. I still don't have any idea if the tickets have been purchased, or if they have, what the date is. I requested that it not be the 21st or 22nd because Melissa is working those days. She never responded about that either. I don't want to pay the 150 only to find out that Gabby had the approval all along, or to find out that Gabby doesn't get me the tickets, and I wasted 150 and am not going to Vietnam after all. I don't think they offer refunds...

So all in all, if this falls through, I guess I'll find a Vietnamese restaurant somewhere local, then go play in some really bad traffic with a blind fold on, and call it my summer experience. In other news, my dad is coming up on Thursday and we're going to spend a few days doing outdoorsy father/son stuff and exploring some rivers in his new Kayaks, so at least there's that to look forward to. Hopefully more positive stuff on the next posting.

~Mickey

ps. There's a subscription box on the right of this post that you can put your email into and it'll automatically send you an update when I make a new posting. Just thought I'd point it out.

Getting everything ready to go

So, I thought I'd join the latest century and write a blog. It took me awhile, and I needed a good reason to do it. I didn't think most people would be interested in just the random drivel I have floating around my head put to paper, er um, put to digital, so I wasn't going to do it until I had a good reason. So, what's that good reason you wonder? Well I'm going to be staying in Vietnam for the summer. This first post will be a tad long since I'm going to attempt to catch everyone up to where we are today. Also, I tend to sometimes be long winded in my writing, I'll make my apologies for that now. Perhaps you'll just want to look at the pictures instead :-)

I wanted to get this started before I go to Vietnam, so that when I'm there I won't have to fuss with the minutia of making the blog, I can just type and publish.

How this came about is sort of interesting. A couple weeks ago I received an email sent out to many of the vision teachers in Florida. It said that a graduate from the Florida School for the Deaf and Blind was working at a school for the blind in Vietnam, and that they were interested in bringing over a couple Teachers of the Visually impaired for about 6 weeks in the summer. Its a volunteer position, but travel, food, and lodging would all be taken care of. I had not really considered even applying because frankly I'm a softie, and did not like the idea of leaving my lovely wife for 6 weeks. I mentioned it to her over dinner though, just to make conversation about the great opportunity for someone to see Vietnam. Melissa asked me if I had applied. I said, "No way, I'm not leaving you here for 6 weeks." She reminded me that working internationally, in not so wealthy countries, with people who are visually impaired has been something I've talked about since I was in school. She also mentioned that it was a pretty incredible opportunity, and I should at least apply. So I did, and what do you know? I got it.

Since then I've been pretty torn, both of us are mildly depressed. I really am excited about the opportunity to do this amazing experience, but it also makes me very aware of how very important Melissa is in my life, and how much I'll miss her. She's also been in and out on the tears, pretty much I think, feeling the same way I am about it all; wanting me to go, and yet being pretty bummed about it at the same time. So its been a little tough around here lately.

The communication from Vietnam has been much less than ideal. I don't know if this is due to the country's infrastructure, or the communication style of the person I'm working with, but it'll take 3 and 4 days to get a response at times, and then when I do, it rarely addresses all my questions. I have a lot of questions! As of Sunday night I was still pretty confused about details, and I sent Gabby (my contact in Vietnam) an email that basically said, "Look, in less than a month, you are wanting me to travel literally to the other side of the globe. If I don't get some solid information soon we may have to cancel this adventure." She's been great since then, and we've emailed multiple times a day for the past two days. I think from her perspective she's probably feeling like she's doing a ton of stuff for this trip, and really focusing on it, but from where I sit, I feel pretty out in the cold. She was also ill from a bad pastry last week. So anyway, that's getting better now that I put on my assertive hat.

Alright, some details about my upcoming adventure. The school for the blind is in Hue, Vietnam. If you click on the map, you'll see Hue right in the middle of the country in the very skinny piece. Its pretty close to the division between the old North and South of Vietnam. Its best known for many historic monuments and temples. I hope to get some good pictures of these that I can post here for you all to see. Hue is pronounced a bit like "whey" as in Whey protein. Vietnam itself, for those that aren't up on their current Vietnamese history is a communist country. Its northern neighbor is China, and has a lot of historic cultural influence from the Chinese, and was indeed, like much of this part of the world, once ruled by China, though according to Wikipedia this ended in the 10th century, so its been a little while. It is considered a pretty safe place to travel, and is a huge up and comer in the tourist department in the Asian region. Read here if you want to learn more, I know wikipedia isn't always the most reliable, but for information like this, its pretty good.

Apparently the most dangerous part of Vietnam today are the roads. I intend to get some photos of them, but the traffic there looks very, very bad. In, I believe it was the Lonely Planet guide book for Vietnam, its basically recommended that one avoid roads when at all possible. They even mentioned that sometimes you'll see bodies covered up on the side of the road where people just pulled them out of the way and covered them, so that traffic could resume. They do not have 911 there. Hue is not considered as bad as most of Vietnam, but its still not good. The ironic part of this is that I'll be expected to teach blind people to travel in this mess :-)

I'm not required to get any vaccinations but its been strongly recommended that I get a Hepatitis A vaccine. So I'll be doing that very soon. Its also recommended that I make a portable pharmacy to take with me, as western medicines are not the easiest to come by. I'm also going to be applying for my Visa. Its pretty guaranteed that I'll get it, I just have to go through the paperwork of it all. I'm going to Hue during its rainy season, and I've been told that its pretty rainy, as in daily, and lots of it. When one reads the books, the time I'm going is kind of the black out period for visiting Vietnam due to weather, so it should be a great time. My dad bought me some rain gear this past weekend, and I'm pretty certain I'll be using it, a lot, so thanks Dad! If its anything like Costa Rica, another country with lots of rain, the people don't stop what they're doing because of rain, if they did, they'd never accomplish anything. So, I'm pretty sure I'll be expected to work in the rain, and traveling as a blind person in the rain presents many additional problems. So we have the problem of not seeing so well, check. Traffic with no discernible rules, check. Oh and rain, which will dampen out our main alternative travel sense when our eyes aren't useful, check. Alright then, lets go traveling!

As of this morning, the tentative dates for my being in Vietnam are June 21st-August 1st. Melissa's birthday is August 3rd and its a personal priority that I'm home to celebrate that with her. Its going to be very hard on both of us being apart for so long, and I couldn't be more proud of her for supporting me through this process when she knows that with no fuss at all, if she asked, I'd stay. Some days I kinda wish she would ask. Its pretty much an emotional wash in terms of staying or going. I'm excited to go, but the prospect of leaving her, and home for that long, fairly balances the scale. After yesterday and today, it would appear that my going is a definite reality, though I'll be totally committed when I see the plane tickets.

I'll keep you all updated through this space, I don't know how good communication will be from there. I know they have internet, and hopefully we can all stay in touch through my blog, and you can stay updated as best as I can on the experience. It seems much more efficient since I probably won't have much time to individually email. So watch this page for more updates as time and this experience moves forward.