Singaporeans have Singlish. Chinese have Chinglish. The Latin community has Spanglish. Where’s Vietnamglish? Vietglish? Vietnameseglish? See? You can’t even make a decent word out of the combinations! What I’ve found strange about Vietnam is that there really isn’t that much English spoken outside of the tourism industry....
I don’t have an Italian grandma. But if they’re anything like older Vietnamese women, I don’t think I’m missing out much. I recently went to a family get-together and enjoyed an awesome meal of Vietnamese food. There was chicken ragout, egg rolls, rice flour pancakes stuffed with...
I love tennis. As a kid of 7 or 8, I remember our whole family going down to the local courts to hit the ball around. When we got home, I’d put the wooden racquets into their braces which had to be tightened with clamps. I’m not...
I recently had house guests, dear friends who I’ve known for years. A sweet couple and their two little kids, aged 7 and 10, cute as a button. I knew the family from when we were all living in Cambodia. They’ve since relocated to the countryside of...
There’s this sad love song by Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand called “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers”. Don’t ask me why I know it. Seriously. I don’t know. Probably too much karaoke in my wayward, misspent youth? In any case, the song opens with: You don’t bring...
There’s something about unwrapping a package that reduces even the most “adult” of us into a giddy child. Maybe it’s the memories of better, more innocent times. Or just pure, unadulterated joy that seems so hard to come by in later life. Whatever the case, I loves...
I remember getting my first ever model kit as a kid. I was excited because all the kewl kids seemed to be “into” putting together model planes and cars. And by kewl kids, I mean nerds. (Confession time. It’s a bit hazy, but I think I hung...
I remember the first time I ever visited Ho Chi Minh City. I was walking with a local friend when she very nonchalantly crossed the street, inadvertently leaving me paralyzed on the other side, an image of the 1980’s videogame, Frogger, flashing through my mind. For those...
Nature has a way of warning us when things might be bad for us. Bright colors = Poison. Loud rattling = Stay away. Bitter taste = Toxic plants. See? It’s not that hard. So you’d think that basically the most hideous, unwelcome-looking fruit known to man with...
Last weekend, I took a trip out to the countryside with some friends. Along the way, I stumbled across this very unusual, incongruous crossing sign. We’re in Vietnam, where the average Vietnamese feels disturbingly comfortable wearing pajamas in public. So where the Ministry of Transportation got this...