Vietnam Day 40 (7/17/09)

I was so much more comfortable on the bike today. I still deliver warnings to anyone riding behind me that my riding may be sporadic when I approach bridges, motorbikes, or chickens along those tiny paths leading to the school, but I'm getting better at avoiding a lot of these obstacles. Today I rode over some of the medium-sized stone bridges for the first time, which is a big deal for me because they may not be very high but they're still super-narrow and I always feel like I'm going to fall into the stream. There are still some really high bridges that I'm not sure I'll ever be able to ride over but at least I've made some progress.

I've been helping some with the painting of the school whenever I have a break from work on the toilet, but today the painting crew encountered an obstacle you don't often find in the U.S. so far we've been putting up primer, but today the contractor opened up the actual paint for the first time only to discover that it was fake - it wasn't really paint, just a milky liquid with yellow food coloring. We've been warned about fake goods since coming to Vietnam (not mimic goods that just have fake labels, but fake goods that actually don't serve the function they're meant to). Somehow I always imagined that only foreigners get taken in by these scams and that locals can tell the difference, but now I realize that was completely off.

The toilet project is coming along quite nicely. The cement base dried quickly enough that we could start laying the bricks for the walls. I mixed concrete mortar again today, an arduous process similar to mixing cookie dough but on a much larger scale involving shovels. Today was the first time it wasn't questioned that I would help with shovel in hand and it was quite refreshing. Once we finished mixing, the contractor went to work. This guy is an absolutely ridiculous human being. He's incredibly strong and efficient at his job (he mixes concrete and lays bricks so fast he makes us all look lazy). He's really nice too, though he does have his quirks - when he was talking to Wen earlier he had his hand on Wen's lower back and as he kept talking the hand moved further and further down. I'm sure he was just being friendly and I know guys touching and holding hands is normal here, but even the Vietnamese roommates thought that was pretty awkward.

I made sure Van Anh told the contractor that I wanted to help lay bricks. I was hoping he'd lay the first two layers and then I'd be able to just align the bricks I was laying with the ones already there. Unfortunately, the contractor found it more amusing to give me my first chance by laying the very first layer of the wall. Before I jumped up to start, he put extra pressure on me by joking that he had a wife and kids at home and didn't have time to redo it if I screwed up. It wasn't too difficult, though it was hard to figure out how far on the edge of the concrete floor to start and I was pretty slow going. The process was made slightly more nerve-racking by all the people who'd come to watch the silly American girl try to lay bricks - half a dozen children along with several members of the People's Committee and other contractors had turned this into a spectator's sport. I must say I performed pretty well though. It may have taken me a lot longer than it would have the contractor, but I produced a decently straight row of bricks (straight enough to rival the contractor's row) that will forever be the foundation for this structure. It was really quite fun and I wish I could lay more bricks, but the contractor wants to finish on the weekend when we don't come in, so I guess that was my only shot at it.

After all the work was done, drama ensued. Yesterday, I'd checked for my cellphone at lunch and found it had been stolen out of my purse. When Van Anh reported this to the People's Committee, they snapped into action. Since it's such a small town and everyone knows each other, it wasn't hard to figure out who'd taken it and I had my phone back within half an hour. Apparently, one of the kids had taken it while everyone was occupied in the back yesterday. I had my suspicions about who it was but I didn't want to confirm them at the risk of treating him differently because of the incident (though I can't really see myself doing that in any case). Van Anh and I went to great lengths to convince everyone that I wasn't angry and didn't want to turn this into a big thing. The People's Committee however has its own way of doing things and they weren't about to take my advice on this matter. They proceeded to sit down with Van Anh and draw up a number of official documents for us to sign - by official documents I of course mean hand-written letters on lined notebook paper. They then took my phone back from me for about an hour until they could return it to me with all due pomp and circumstance. I was taken to an office at the People's Committee headquarters where the boy who'd taken the phone, his grandmother, and an out-of-uniform comp were all sitting around a desk. It was the same boy I'd expected, a tall skinny kid with a mushroom haircut. I tried to give him an encouraging smile but he did his best to avoid eye-contact with me. His grandmother apologized for the boy but said he was just a curious kid (a fact I understood full well) and that she would teach him better next time. I made it as clear as possible to everyone in the room that it was really alright. I turned to the boy whose head was drooping into his chest, his cheeks flushed and dripping with tears. I patted him on the shoulder, gave him a smile and said "see you in school" in Vietnamese (since we were most worried that this incident would keep him from coming back to class). I felt so sorry for him - the crime really wasn't severe enough for all the People's Committee put him through and he only had to go through it because I'm a foreigner and the government is desperate to save face.

The rest of our break was spent back at the cafe where we were attacked by children bearing flowers. Nhi, Ha, Yen, and the other Yen, along with some of the other schoolgirls stuck dozens of flowers in our hair. Some were less flattering than others - for instance I ended up with a random purple flower hanging down in the middle of my forehead, not a good look for me. They guys didn't escape either, Ming and Wen ending up with the most out of anyone because the flowers fit so perfectly in the crooks of their glasses. To avoid insulting the girls, most of us left the flowers in during classes in the afternoon. It's possible we lost some credibility because of how ridiculous we looked, but it was fun. However, it may not have been the best day for reporters from the local newspaper to be there snapping pictures. We're essentially celebrities here, so the photographer followed us around, rather obnoxiously getting in our faces when we were trying to teach. Not that there was much teaching to be done of course. We once again had only English class for the whole two hours, so half of us stood around with literally nothing to do. I made quite an effort for a while, trying to engage the two trouble-makers in the back row. One of them actually turned out to be a really good kid with pretty good English pronunciation when he tried, but he was under the influence of the truly unruly boy. This older boy was all trouble, not doing any of the work and noticeably mocking me in Vietnamese. Nevertheless, I stood there at there bench in the back for the entire period, but after that there was nothing more I could do - they'd reached their limit with me and I had nothing else to do but join the rest of our idle volunteers outside. The saddest part of the day though was that the boy who'd taken my phone never showed up. Then again, he did have a very emotional day so I'll just have to hope he's there on Monday.