Author: emphan

I mentioned that I liked to eat the silky soft tofu dessert that’s served with ginger-infused simple syrup and sure enough, the next day my cousins summoned the tofu lady who squatted beside the house handing out warm bowls of the stuff. Creamy tofu swimming in a richer syrup than you’d normally get in the U.S., flecked with bits of caramelized ginger, with coconut milk spooned on top, which I never had in this dessert before. So simple, comforting, and delicious!

My Vietnamese doesn’t seem to be improving at all and I’m a little frustrated and disheartened by that. My kids are definitely picking it up and it’s so cute to hear them utter little VN phrases to their playmates. Even though I have plenty of interactions with my cousins, I usually stay pretty quiet because I’m so self-conscious about my poor vocabulary. Sometimes my cousins will say entire sentences in which I don’t comprehend a single word. Tom isn’t self-conscious about his limited vocabulary so he’ll participate in the conversation more, which is what I need to do. It would be helpful if my cousins dumbed it down more. Once one of my cousins was trying to ask me if the boy had any adverse reactions to honey. I had forgotten the word for “honey” and to my inept ear it sounded like he was saying “the face of a bee.” I was confused and thought maybe he was asking if the boy was allergic to bee stings and responded that I didn’t know because he had never been stung by a bee before. My cousin got frustrated and kept saying what I thought was “the face of a bee” over and over again in progressively louder tones before it finally clicked and I asked if he meant the yellow stuff that bees make. It’s helpful to try to find another way to describe what you’re trying to say, not saying the same word louder. I don’t really blame him though; he’s just not used to speaking with such an unproficient speaker. I’m more frustrated with myself because my strategy of squinting really hard and looking confused when people talk isn’t working. Maybe fluency takes longer than a month and a half?

Family dynamics can be a little tricky to navigate, especially when there are ulterior motives and awkward situations like we experienced with my dad’s side of the family. My mother’s side of the family is a completely different story. I try not to be too biased or judge too harshly, knowing that a large part of the reason why there’s such a difference between the two branches is because my mom’s family is so much more financially secure than my dad’s family. Even so, my maternal relatives are so genuinely kind-hearted, down-to-earth and good-natured that it’s hard not to be biased. Thanks to them we get to live in a mansion as long as we like. Sure, my uncle can afford the space and extra mouths to feed but there’s no reason for him to be so welcoming other than simple generosity, for which I’m very grateful. It’s unlikely that I could have afforded a year off from work or we would have cared to stay in VN so long if not for his generosity. This is pretty much as comfortable as it gets in VN. I’m still reconciling myself to the fact that this is not a traditional vacation. Amenities and creature comforts are not the reason why I’m here. I’m realizing more everyday that the purpose of my sabbatical is to cultivate relationships, to connect or reconnect with people, and to cherish those who deserve to be cherished. The upside to such an extended stay is that I’m getting to know my cousins far better than I could possibly get to know them during an average two week sojourn. It’s the day-to-day act of living and eating and being together that breeds intimacy and affection. And I have true, although not fully expressed, affection for them because they’re such cool people. They’re extremely considerate and it’s never in a calculated or ingratiating way. They just try to make us as comfortable as they can. For example, when they found out why we weren’t sleeping with our windows open, one of my cousins immediately bought a mosquito net and another cousin installed it over our bed the same day. They also gave us a tennis racket-looking device that electrocutes mosquitoes on contact. Not exactly child-friendly but an essential weapon in VN.

It’s been a struggle to get them to let us pay for anything, a drastic contrast from our dealings with Aunt #6 and her family. And even though my maternal relatives are gracious in an easygoing, unassuming manner, we’ve learned not to reveal too much about our likes and dislikes because they’re so quick to accommodate us. If you mention that you like a particular food or fruit, it’s sure to appear at the next meal. I made the mistake of letting it slip that it was Tom’s birthday as we were heading out to dinner last night. Tom swore me to secrecy because he didn’t want anyone making a fuss like they did for the boy’s birthday. When Chi Ca pressed me for the reason why we invited everyone out to dinner on a Monday night, I figured we were in the clear because we were literally on our way to the restaurant, so I confessed that it was Tom’s birthday. Word spread quickly and unbeknownst to us, a call was made to one of my cousins who was picking up her kids from school en route to the restaurant. She made a detour and arrived a little late to dinner bearing gifts and a birthday cake. These people are sneaky and they work fast. Tom was not happy with me which resulted in a scolding for my big mouth. He got over it by the time he was being serenaded in the karaoke room. These people also take their karaoke seriously.

We’re bound to be treated less like guests of honor and more like regular family members as time goes on and the novelty of the Viet Kieu wears off, and I’m looking forward to that.

Today my babies’ dadda is 37 and almost middle-aged! We’ve been married since our early twenties and I’m so grateful for the life we’ve built together. If I were to pen an open love letter, at the risk of sounding cheesy, I would write that you are the perfect husband and life mate for me. Neither of us is perfect, but we’re better when we’re together, and were absolutely meant to be. I hate that any words I come up with are clichés that all wives say to their husbands on their birthdays — you’re my best friend, we’re soulmates, I’m so lucky to have you in my life, etc. — but those clichés are nevertheless so true. I can tell that my happiness is the priority of your life because I make certain to let you know if I am, and therefore you are, ever unhappy, and you always try your best to remedy it. You’re consistently kind towards me, and accommodating to the point of being indulgent. When I got it into my head that I wanted to live in a third world country for a year, you obliged. I like to take credit for having the good sense to marry you as early as I did, but the truth is that when we started dating, I had such a powerful, visceral attraction to you that I couldn’t help myself. In other words, I was so hot for you that I would have married you even if you hadn’t turned out to be a good person. I’m just lucky that you turned out to be more than I could have asked or hoped for. You’re the only person in the world that I never tire of, never need to escape from. I could spend every second of my life in the same room with you and be perfectly content. You’re like a drug addiction; in the beginning you made me euphoric and now I need you just to feel normal.

Even though it’s universally acknowledged that I’m the better looking half, you compensate for your deficiencies in so many other ways. So what if you have bad breath or sneeze too much or if hair grows in absurd parts of your face, ears, and body. You take care of our home, our children, and me. I have an enhanced appreciation of you after observing how unhelpful husbands, and men generally, in VN are. When I was consumed with work, you took care of everything else. As overwhelmed as I sometimes felt, I never felt like I was doing everything by myself. You always asked if there was anything you could do to ease my stress, my anxiety, my unhappiness. We’ve fought, sometimes intensely, over division of labor and sleep, but not because someone wasn’t pulling their fair share. If you ever feel unappreciated, that I take the things you do for granted, or that I don’t notice, please know that I do notice and I’m very grateful, even if I don’t express my gratitude as much as I should. I know that I don’t have the faintest idea how to operate the pool equipment or maintain the pool. That I don’t pay bills or dust or pull weeds. That I don’t know how much diapers should cost or how to load or operate the dishwasher. That if I had to mop the hardwood floors you installed in our home I wouldn’t know where to begin because I’ve never done it before, just like I’ve never taken out the trash or made coffee or gotten an oil change for my car. That you know and do all these things so I don’t have to. And that most people would probably be shocked at all you do, without being asked, and might wonder why I’m admitting how apparently useless and utterly devoid of domestic prowess I am. I’m admitting all these things because you deserve recognition for being the wonderfully amazing person that you are, and I want to thank you and remind you, in case it’s not obvious, how very deeply loved and appreciated you are.

Happy 3rd birthday to my cutie pie! How could you not love such an adorable munchkin of a boy?

We celebrated at a restaurant where we sampled various preparations of goat – grilled, roasted, steamed, and thinly sliced – while the boy enjoyed his favorite request – white rice drizzled with soy sauce!

Since he’s allergic to eggs and dairy, we stacked some oreo cookies on a plate for candle-blowing. He doesn’t know any better so he had a great day.

Modesty is not one of my virtues, mainly because I think I’m the shit. I pride myself on my all-around awesomeness in everything except sports, geography, science, math, technology, current events, historical events, music, the arts in general, politics, and spatial intelligence. Other than that I’m pretty awesome. I really pride myself on my work ethic and skills in the kitchen. I’ve pulled more all-nighters or near all-nighters for work than I care to remember, and an extreme foodie needs to know how to feed herself competently.

One of the reasons why I felt I needed, and deserved, a sabbatical so urgently was that I was starting to feel sorry for myself for working so hard. I honestly believe that I need more sleep than the average person and was convinced that I was getting far less than the average person, which was causing great unhappiness. My entire existence centered on work and trying to make up an ever increasing sleep deficit. I routinely chose work over sleep, and sleep over spending time with my family. At the time it felt like I was acting out of necessity rather than choice, and even though I knew I was facing the same struggles that countless other women face, my working mom martyrdom felt very lonely. I felt entitled to a break from everyday life. At the beginning of my sabbatical, witnessing how so many VN people idled their days away only reaffirmed my sense of entitlement and self-pity. Able-bodied and able-minded workers are underemployed in VN, and retired seniors like my aunt and uncle reenact the same leisurely, unvarying routine everyday: rise at dawn, take a morning stroll, eat breakfast, read the newspaper, eat lunch, take a nap, watch soccer/news/soap operas, eat dinner, take an evening stroll, wash up, early bedtime. Except for an occasional visit to or from relatives, each day was indistinguishable from another. I thought, these people have it so easy. Imagine how much our collective quality of life would improve if only the U.S. would institutionalize the afternoon siesta. Napping after lunchtime seems like such luxury but throughout many parts of Asia and Europe, it’s expected. What’s also expected in VN is the flagrant oppression of women. Women are certainly oppressed in the U.S. but usually in subtler, more insidious ways. In VN, and indeed most of Asia, women are simultaneously tasked with women’s work and men’s work and continue to be victimized by domestic abuse. Men do not do women’s work, period. A staunchly patriarchical and chauvinistic society such as this one is rife with examples of true female martyrdom. Case in point: my uncle’s eldest daughter and my oldest female cousin, Chi Ca.

Chi Ca is in her early forties but looks at least 10 years younger. She has to be one of the hardest working people I’ve ever met. She’s also exceedingly helpful. If she’s in the vicinity of anyone performing a chore or doing anything remotely unfun, she jumps right in to help. It’s not unusual for the rest of the family to be sitting around chatting while she’s alone in the kitchen chopping, cooking, washing, sweeping, wiping, scrubbing and generally just always working. Right now as I type she’s mopping the spiral staircase as she makes her way down to the floors of my uncle’s palatial mansion, as she does everyday. She literally works from dawn to dusk, and often beyond, which is actually an improvement from her former married life, when she routinely went to bed after midnight and rose at 3am. Before her divorce several years ago, she worked ceaselessly to support her two children and her husband’s drinking habit. He was also in the habit of accruing mistresses and gambling debts. In addition to his infidelity and overall fecklessness, he was physically abusive. You’d think that such a scoundrel easily cinches the title of Worst Husband Of All Time, but his behavior, and Chi Ca’s experience, are all too commonplace. Time and again I hear tales of downtrodden and horribly mistreated women who persevere through unimaginable trials for the sake of their families, all the while suffering unspeakable depredations at the hands of their husbands. When I see firsthand how hard Chi Ca works, and hear about how hard she’s always worked and what she’s been through, I realize that my own work ethic and perceived sufferings don’t hold a candle to hers. As much as I whined about sleep deprivation, I certainly averaged more than three hours a night. And although I’ve always been self-motivated to work hard, I’ve never known what it’s like to be motivated by fear of bodily harm or hunger or the need to avert disastrous consequences. My children’s survival and prospects have never been seriously threatened or endangered. My husband is a loving, caring, respectful, supportive life partner, which is, in many respects, the opposite of the quintessential VN husband. I don’t have it so bad after all.

Chi Ca is also a superb cook who puts my kitchen skills to shame. It’s not that I don’t think I’m capable of achieving her level of culinary expertise (eventually, after years of practice), it’s just that the extensiveness of her repertoire of dishes and the mastery with which she executes them are awe-inspiring, and humbling. Mine pale in comparison. I won’t be bragging that I’m a bad-ass cook until I get back to the U.S. As for Chi Ca, she’s not opposed to the idea of coming to America. If you or anyone you know might be interested in an insanely hard-working, kind, competent divorcee who’s a fabulous cook, let me know.

My uncle rented a van so that our 22 person entourage could spend a day at Vung Tau, a locals beach that’s about an hour and a half from Long Khanh. Because beach day is serious business, we rose at four in the morning and were on the road by 4:30. We were in the water by quarter after six. Even though the sand was silky soft and the ocean was as warm as bathwater, the beach suffered from what much of the country suffers from; its inhabitants don’t take care of it. Several times as I was swimming I freaked out thinking that a jellyfish had grazed me, only to discover that it was a plastic bag. The litter on the beach was so disgusting that when workers arrived with their rice hats and straw brooms, I spent a little time helping them collect debris because I couldn’t stand to see my kids playing in sand littered with so much garbage.

Our meals at the beach, however, perfectly illustrate the paradox that is VN. The family brought a tiny charcoal grill and butane stove and feasted on fresh crab, shrimp, grilled fish, squid, spareribs with French bread, stir-fried egg noodles with beef, and for the grand finale busted out fish hotpot in a tangy Thai-style tom yum broth, served with fresh greens and rice noodles. I can’t imagine that very many American cooks would attempt such an undertaking in the comfort of their gourmet kitchens, let alone outdoors. Americans are all about convenience. There’s no shame in ordering a pizza and calling it a day. My uncle’s family, however, does not take any shortcuts when it comes to food. These people lugged all these ingredients and prepared all these amazing meals at the beach. I’m starting to understand that my obsession with food is part of my ethnic, cultural, and familial heritage.

Don’t get me wrong, staying at my uncle’s mansion definitely has its perks. It’s luxurious by any and every conceivable VN standard, and pretty awesome by many if not most U.S. standards. I only cause unnecessary heartache for myself by making these comparisons but I can’t help it.

One issue is the lack of air conditioning. My aunt’s apartment in Saigon had an air conditioner in the bedroom so we could at least sleep in comfort (if you can call a urine-smelling queen size mattress pad for a family of four comfortable). My uncle’s bona fide mansion does not have AC anywhere. Partly, I’m sure, because the ceilings are so high and the rooms are so enormous that AC would be impractical, but mainly because it’s unnecessary by VN standards. Long Khanh is, on average, at least ten degrees cooler than Saigon and the nights are relatively cool. Locals find it perfectly comfortable. Viet Kieu like us find it tolerable part of the time, but most of the time it’s still too hot to be comfortable. (I’m a wuss when it comes to cold, but not heat. I’d set my office thermostat at 80 if I could get away with it. When the temperature drops below 70 degrees in Las Vegas you’ll find me in flannel pajamas under a down comforter.) Nights in Long Khanh are reasonably cool but we don’t dare sleep with the windows open because we’re traumatized by our mosquito battle wounds.

Mosquitoes are the bane of our existence, even with bug repellent, which I don’t like to have to spray on our kids all the time. The marble fountain with fish must have seemed like a cool idea when they were designing the house but it’s turned out to be a breeding pool for mosquitoes. Also, the house’s gigantic windows are often opened to air out and cool down the interior, but no screens were installed. It’s like an insect sanctuary in here.

Another issue is the bathroom. We have issues with VN bathrooms in general. The bathing/shower area typically isn’t partitioned from the rest of the bathroom, which means that anytime anyone bathes or washes their feet, the entire bathroom floor gets wet, so anyone needing to use the toilet or sink afterwards has to walk over a wet floor. This doesn’t sound like a big deal and in the grand scheme of things it really isn’t (I’m pretty much used to it at this point), but as an American, the sensation of getting your feet wet when you’re not bathing is weird and not enjoyable. Materials and fixtures in VN are of such shoddy quality that even though my uncle’s mansion is just a couple of years old, the bathroom faucets are already rusted and leaky. The plumbing wasn’t installed properly so water leaks onto the floors whenever we use the sinks, another reason why bathroom floors are always damp and gross.

Power and water outages are not uncommon. It’s particularly inconvenient when you’re in the middle of bathing yourself and your kids and everyone is covered in suds when the water shuts off for 20 minutes. Laundry doesn’t seem to get really clean in wimpy VN washing machines and ends up smelling like the surroundings in which it was line-dried, so you’re usually wearing not-quite-clean, musty, linty clothes.

The kitchen doesn’t have an oven or dishwasher. I don’t bake so the lack of an oven isn’t a complaint, it’s just a curious observation. The family uses a countertop appliance when they need to broil or grill something and baked goods are purchased fresh from the nearby open air market. Another curious observation is that there are only two burners on the stove, so if a lot of food needs to be cooked, which always seems to be the case, additional countertop hotplates or burners need to be plugged in. The lack of a dishwasher impacts my life a little more. At home I might not care as much because between my husband and mom, I could go for months without washing a dish (yes I am spoiled). In VN it would be bad manners if I didn’t wash dishes or at least try to wash dishes after every meal and it would be unseemly for Tom to wash dishes because he has a penis. Not sure why that should matter but it does. It shouldn’t be surprising that my uncle’s mansion doesn’t have a dishwasher when restaurants in VN don’t have automated dishwashers. I’ve caught glimpses of women squatting on restaurant kitchen floors washing never-ending piles of dishes. It seems so inefficient. Recently my uncle threw a dinner party for a couple dozen of his friends, and in an effort to be helpful, I hunched over the sink (I’m a giant among VN women, so the sink is really low) for what felt like hours washing endless stacks of rice bowls, serving bowls, dipping bowls, and utensils. I can’t even imagine what it was like to clean up after the 500 guest event that my uncle hosted last year! The only thing I can say in favor of manually washing a billion dishes is that you’re never washing them alone. Someone always steps in to rinse and stack or relieve anyone who’s been washing too long. It’s also an opportunity to bond and chat with your fellow washer, and the act of huddling together over this age-old chore evokes a sense of female camaraderie.

The perks — delicious home-cooked VN food at every meal, scheduling your day around eating, reading, and naps, getting to live in a mansion, among others — definitely outweigh the drawbacks, but leave it to me to find something to complain about.

I had bragged to friends and acquaintances that I would be spending most of my sabbatical at a rich uncle’s mansion in Long Khanh attended by household servants. I wasn’t exaggerating about the mansion part; any dwelling with a marble fountain in the living room qualifies as a mansion. The decor is not what I would have chosen but it’s lavish in its own, uniquely VN, style. The sheer scope and grandeur of it is stunning. It’s 4 stories high and has 9 massive bedrooms, 11 bathrooms (that we know of), a karaoke room, a rooftop deck, an elevator and a tikki hut with fish pond. When I say massive, I mean MASSIVE. I thought our bedroom at home was spacious but the rooms in my uncle’s mansion absolutely dwarf any room in our 4,200 square foot house in Las Vegas. There’s an atrium running through the center of the house that allows you to look down into the marble fountain from every level.

As for household servants, technically they’re my uncle’s daughters and daughters-in-law, which in VN are the equivalent of servants. I’m also not exaggerating when I say that some of the finest meals I’ve eaten in VN, or ever, have been at my uncle’s home. My cousins are phenomenal cooks; I would put them on par with chefs at some of the finest restaurants I’ve patronized in the U.S. (but only if you love VN cuisine as much as I do).

We had spent a few nights in Long Khanh before embarking on our trip to Da Nang, with the intention of making it our home base for the rest of our stay in VN. Long Khanh is a couple of hours northwest of Saigon and a much more reasonable place to live. There are still mosquitoes and litter everywhere, but the roads and traffic conditions are much better. My very first day in Long Khanh, a manicurist appeared at my uncle’s home and gave me the most meticulous (and at less than a dollar, the absolute cheapest) pedicure I’ve ever had. As she worked on my toes, I snacked on luscious ripe papaya that had been picked from my uncle’s garden that morning and thought to myself, “A girl could get used to this.” After our Da Nang-Quang Ngai-Nha Trang-Phan Thiet “adventures,” we didn’t have the stamina to make it back to Saigon and decided to take the shorter trip back to Long Khanh to rest before our next expedition. The first day upon my return, the same manicurist arrived to give everyone mani-pedis. I had been honored the first time because I thought the manicurist had been summoned especially for me. This time, I realized that she had a standing appointment with the household for weekly in-home manicures, pedicures, and facials. My uncle and his family are a bunch of ballers.

Shit like this can only happen in VN. As we slept and woke and got ready for the day and prepared to depart from Phan Thiet, there were behind-the-scenes machinations underway causing things to happen that we never would have imagined. Phone calls were being made, connections were being unearthed, strings were being pulled. Over the decades several generations of Tom’s family have lived in Phan Thiet, which was proving to be a provincial village consisting of an intricate network of family and friends. The concept of small towns where everyone knows everyone seems like a relic of bygone times, to be found only in books or romantic comedies, but in VN they really exist. Turns out that the granddaughter or grandniece of Tom’s aunt is a travel booking agent for shuttle vans and buses, and not one to be trifled with. She called the scam artists directly and threatened to cut off all of their business if they didn’t return our camera bag. Another granddaughter or grandniece of Tom’s aunt happened to be dating the younger brother of the skinny sidekick and vowed that she would never marry into a such a disgraceful family. The husband of some distant cousin had friends and connections in the police force who were willing to intimidate the scam artists into submission. Over the course of a day and a half, a dozen or so of Tom’s relatives and their connections plotted and conspired and contrived to get our stuff back, and in the end they were successful. The scam artists were eventually shamed and harassed into returning the camera bag to the Viet Kieu. It’s so unbelievable how the events unfolded that it’s comical. I was beyond frustrated with our situation yesterday and overly harsh in my judgment. I continue to get frustrated when VN isn’t like America even though I myself have said they are too different to be compared. Maybe an American travel company would have returned our camera bag without any fuss, but it’s not usually the case that an American community would have banded together to force a wrongdoer to right his wrong. When the camera bag was returned to Tom, he caught a glimpse of the abject poverty in which the skinny sidekick was living with his wife and baby, who was sleeping on the floor of a tiny, squalid room. Maybe the reason he’s a scam artist is because it’s the best living he can eke out for his family. Desperate people are driven to do desperate things, and unfortunately a poor country such as this one is filled with desperate people. It is also filled with fiercely loyal people, people who cherish the bonds of family more than many Americans can imagine, and people who adhere to a different, but perhaps equally compelling, code of ethics. Vietnam is still such a mystifying and bewildering place, but today it endeared itself to me a little bit more.