Culture shock

None so far. I've been here in D.F. for a week, and everything is going fine. Have not had any intense experience or frustrating moment. It's probably because I spend half of my day at the office, and when I come home, I was either looking for an apartment, or after I've moved, I just spend a lot of time in my room. The other reason is that my Spanish is actually functional, not like when I first came to France, India, or Peru and was totally overwhelmed. Knowing the language helps tremendously. But seriously, just walking around on the street, it hasn't been as bad as some people have warned me. I get some looks, but people don't call me names or give me catcalls that often.

I got a great room in a super nice - though a lil too bourgeois - neighborhood called Condesa. It's supposed to be one of the safest parts in towns, lots of foreigners, lots of restaurants and bars. I was walking back home yesterday (Friday) around 10 and it was happening. I've been tempted to go around and look for a job working at one of these bars. But I have curfew at 11, so that wouldn't work. The hour's the only drawback of the room I'm renting. I'm paying 2500 pesos ($200) for an all-furnished room, all services included. It's a sweet deal; most people pay 3500-4000 or more, and I've not met anyone who's paying less than 3000 pesos, so I'm pretty happy. My landlady doesn't usually rent out this room, which was her daughter's. I'm actually her first tenant. She has a friend who has an account on compartodepa who saw my profile and told her to rent it out to me. It's a little strange, but it works for me. She's very grandmotherly. I has been sick, and just now she knocked on the door, asking if she could bring me some tea. I went down to the kitchen with her, and she made hot water for me, and then pulling out honey and lemon for my tea. She's also very "miedosa" (fearful) and whenever I go out, she would ask me where I am going, how I am going, saying how dangerous it is and tell me to be careful at least 5 times and then end with "Que Dios te cuide, hija" (May God protect you).

The only thing that is not so well is that I'm still sick. I got a cold right before I left San Franciso, and usually I would cover within 2 days, but it's been a week. I'm not coughing as much, but my nose's really bothering me. For the first few days, I slept little, waking up during the night because my nose got so stuffy that I couldn't breath. Now, I sleep extremely well (on an orthopedic bed), but for the whole day, my nose is so runny that I have to blow it every 10 minutes or so. And lately, there has been blood. I googled and found that it was nothing serious. Either I've blown my nose so much that I broke some nose vessels or because the weather's too dry. I'm not worried, but it's annoying. I know so many ways to cure a sore throat, like gurgling with salt water, drinking tea with honey and lemon, eating ginger, but none for curing a stuffy or runny nose. Arghh....

exhaustion, Google Alerts, and first lesson of professionalism

Second day in Mexico City, first day at work.

I'm totally exhausted. I had a full day from 9 to 5 (starting from tomorrow, it's 8:30 to 5:30), I just spent 3 hours walking around to look for a room, and I'm still sick.

The first day was full of normal orientation stuff like who's who, where's where, until my boss, M. mentioned my blog and how it was not professional of me to portray the organization in a negative light. I was like: wait, what, my blog? what are you talking about? (*thinking: how the f*** did you come across about my blog?*) Imagine how incredulous I was. I suddenly remember that about a week ago, according to GoogleAnalytics, my blog had 4 visitors from Mexico City. Having no friends here, I was surprised but assumed that someone just stumbled upon my page through some random google link. I was dead wrong. They were my boss and her supervisors, reading one of the posts about my Mexican visa saga when I happened to mention Educ___USA. The exact quote is: "What's more, Educ___USA, the organization I'm interning for in Mexico, might not even be authorized to pay foreigners." At that time, I wrote the full name of the organization and apparently, the link was sent to the really high-up boss in Washington DC from Google Alerts. (For those of you out of the know, like myself, the program tracks down every single mention of a word of your choice - in this case, Educ___USA - posted in the net.) I myself think that all of my frustration was directed towards the Mexican consulate and definitely not Educ___USA, but I can see why they still thought that it constituted a "poor professional judgment." It was an important lesson to learn, from now on, I just need to be extra careful when I mention these proper names. I was also a little uncomfortable that some people at work have seen my blog, though I'm sure that they have tons of other things to take care of and won't go back to read it.

bye bye US

I finally got my visa on Thursday, after 6 visits to the Mexican consulate. I was sad that I would not see the receptionist and the two security guards anymore; they were always very sympathetic each time they saw me turn up at the door looking both helpless and exasperated.

Today's my last day in Oakland, and maybe in the U.S. I might not be able to come back to the States when I'm done with my internship in May. I've been thinking about the 3.5 years that I've spent here. I have changed so much and yet I am still the same person. I still feel many things that I felt when I first left home and came here the summer of 2005. But this may be something that I can better think about when I'm in Mexico.

Anyways, it has felt real good to have something to look forward to so that my days wouldn't feel so pointless. Over the next few months, I won't have to worry about how to occupy my time every morning when I wake up. I have so many plans for Mexico, to work hard, to meet people and get to know the city, to live on and only on the $500/month stipend, to have my friends come over to visit, to hopefully find a Bharatanatyam class, etc.

Mexico, here I come.

some more photos from Chicago

And last, we bought this gorgeous wedding dress for $2.40 at the best thrift store i've been to (and i've been to many). It fit Jordan perfectly:

the two-price system (chính sách hai giá)

In the early and mid 90s, when Vietnam first opened its doors to foreign visitors, the two-price system was a given. It was not just grocery shop owners who would quote a price 10 or 20 times higher to a foreigner than to a local, but even train and flight tickets would cost twice as much. The rationale was that all foreigners were far richer than Vietnamese, and if they had enough money to travel around, they must have been able to afford the price difference. The official system was abolished in Vietnam about a decade ago, but I recently discovered that it actually just moved abroad.

When I was at school, I tried without success to renew my passport because the Vietnamese embassy would not pick up my calls. This time, being in San Francisco, I could just walk to the consulate to hand in my application. Before I set out, I spent a whole evening listening to horror stories about the consulate from the Vietnamese family I'm staying with - they've dealt with the consulate on several occasions, having lived here for more than 15 years. Anyways, the bone of the story was not although the official price is $50 and the process time is 5 days (as listed on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs), if you indeed pay $50, you will have to wait at least a month. If you want to get your new passport faster, be willing to fork out a couple of hundred bucks. And the more urgent you need it, the more they'll charge you. They're ruthless (không có tình người). All the while, I was asking myself: Should I bring with me a print-out from the Ministry's website and argue with them, because I can't let them do whatever they want? Or should I just give in to this system; it's not worth getting in troubles, especially when I need to get this done, and it's not in my power anyways? I decided on the former. But truth to be told, it was more because there was no way I could throw away $200 to renew my passport. To hell with that.

In the end, I was lucky to get my passport within the same day for $90. I told myself that the difference was tolerable, considering that it's "rush" though I well knew that it was not true. It would have cost $180, but I got a 50% "student discount" (yes, it does sound like they were being really nice). They actually wanted to charge me the full price since I already graduated, but I managed to talk them out of it. I really did not have a job, and I was still under my school's sponsor.

Anyways, I was waiting for my passport at the consulate, I talked to a cute half-Vietnamese guy who was there to apply for a tourist visa. They made him pay $115 for a --hold your breath-- 1-month visa. He asked me sheepishly: "Don't you think it's rather uhm steep?" And I was like: "What do you mean "rather uhm steep"? That's outrageous." Do some comparisons: My 6-month visa to India cost $40, to Peru $30. To the U.S. it was $131, but for a whole year. I didn't have internet there to check the official price for him. But this is what I found later:
less than 1 month: $40
1 month - 6 month: $70
6 month - year: $110
This is what I'd call steep, but at least not outrageous.

Btw, my friend Trang renewed her passport in Vietnam and it cost 200k VND (about $12). Do they really think that people living and working abroad are all uber-rich? Bullshit. There are dollar millionaires in Vietnam, and what about those living and working in countries whose standard of living is comparable to, or even lower than that of Vietnam?

Go Vietnam go!

a resting (lazy) week

every day:
I sleep 9 hours, sometimes more,
I read about 7 hours - I finished Harry Potter 5, 6, and 7 in four days and a half,
I feast on Vietnamese food every lunch and dinner - that's more than all the Vietnamese food I'd had in 3.5 years at Wesleyan.

I'm still here at Trang's uncle's waiting to hear about my Mexican visa. The consulate's giving me hard times. They refused to give me a tourist visa and wanted to give me a work one instead, which would take one to five weeks to process. I'm supposed to start work next Tuesday and should have been in Mexico City by now. What's more, Educ___USA, the organization I'm interning for in Mexico, might not even be authorized to pay foreigners.
Not at all sure what to do. I would love to leave Oakland. I'm not doing anything here, and I feel like I'm already overstaying and can't freeload for much longer. I'm a little tempted to give up this whole Mexico thing, withdraw my visa application, take out my passport and go somewhere, anywhere. But I'm still clinging to the little hope inside me - I've already done so much to try to make this happen, including getting a new passport in one day - maybe with just one last push, this will go through and I'll make it to Mexico, though a little late.

before laziness settled in...

I had a pretty hectic couple of days when I first got to the Bay Area.

I flew from San Diego to San Francisco, accompanied by Duong. We took the BART, SF's subway system, from the airport to Oakland, waited an hour at the subway station, took a cab in the end that cost $70 to go to Trang's uncle's place, 2.7 miles (4.5 kms) away. We thought we'd stay there but then decided to spend that night in SF instead, paid for two dorm beds in a hostel last-minute and ended up sleeping together in only one.

The next day, with Trang, we walked about 9.5 miles (16 kms) around the whole city. SF is a darn hilly city. We walked up the hill on Grant Street in Chinatown, down again at the end, uphill and downhill, and uphill and downhill again while crisscrossing Lombard, the "most crooked street in the world". We then hit the harbor and decided to walk along the beach to the Golden Gate Bridge. On the map, it looked like it'd take a couple of hours, and I was certain that we could take some kind of bus or shuttle on the way back from the bridge; it shouldn't be that bad.

We started walking, it was quite fun at first, and then the wind got stronger, it got colder, the dim sum we'd had for lunch started disappearing, but we saw the silhouttes of the Bridge veiled in the fog, it got bigger, it must be quite close, so thought I. We kept walking. The wind started really blowing. Our hair got real tangled. We kept walking, and we kept walking. At several point, we weren't even sure if the path we were on would lead to the Bridge, we asked some of the dog walkers and they said yes, so we stepped forth. We set out on the beach around 12:30. It was 2:30, then 3, and 3:30, still, we still can't see the end of the path yet. We asked another man walking in the opposite direction just to make sure that we're indeed on the right path, and he replied: yes, you can see it, but you won't be able to pass it. You can't touch it because there's a fence. It didn't sound very assuring but we had no idea what he meant exactly. We were trailing our feet when we ran into a bench and decided to take a break to decide the next step. Duong looked totally disshelved, no trace of energy left on her face. I could walk more, but I was getting worried because she had a flight to catch in 3 hours. Trang, who had been there before with her uncle, talked about a place higher up where you could walk on the bridge and asked us if we would want to continue. We looked at each other, saying: no, looking at it from here is enough. We can see that it's long and it's red, we don't need to touch it, we should turn back and go home now. Despite saying that, i had no idea how we were gonna make it back to the hostel. I was firm that once we reached the bridge, there would be some kind of bus or shuttle that we could catch to go back downtown, but we're nowhere near that place. We're on the beach. To our left, there's indeed a parking lot, and there seemed to be a path leading up with a few cars, but there was not much traffic, and the bus definitely does not pass by there. I suddenly saw a car coming out, it was gonna turn around at the parking lot. It slowed down, the driver looked out of the window to see if any cars were coming out. I sprang on my feet, waving my hand. I said to Trang and Duong that I'd flag down the car; I didn't even wait to hear their reply before running out towards it - there was just no way to walk back to town. I could see the quizzical look on the driver's face, but whatever - we were not walking anymore. There were already 3 people in the car, 2 guys in the front, and one girl in the back. With us 3, that'd be a little of a squeeze, which we of course would not mind, but i wasn't sure if they would be ok. But there was no harm asking at that point. I asked them to take us to a bus station, i had no idea where the nearest one was, or even where there would be one. To my relief, the driver agreed and we all squeezed in the back, still having no idea where he was gonna take us, maybe just out to the main road and then we'd start looking for a bus stop sign, but he seemed pretty certain where he was heading too. We started making small conversations in the car. Turned out that they were from Kazhakstan (i'd actually thought China) which really curioused me - i'd never met any Kazhak before. And up and up he drove - still no idea to where, so I asked. And he said, oh, i'm dropping you off at the bridge - there is a bus stop there. Trang, Duong, and I looked at each other - incredulous - we couldn't believe our luck. We were so relieved that we got a ride so that we wouldn't have to walk - but we were ready to jump on whatever bus to get back downtown. And luck instead was taking us to the Bridge - woo hoo. The moment we stepped out of the car, we thanked the Kazhak a million times, and started laughing like crazy.

SoCal

The Golden State

Las Vegas

My old friend, Duong, came to pick me up at the San Diego airport on the 31st. Duong was, and still is in my group of close friends from middle school. We hadn't seen each other for 4.5 years, since I left for college the summer of 2005 - how time flies. We left almost immediately with two more friends of hers. Direction: Las Vegas. So was *everyone* else. It took us 8 hours, instead of the usual 4. The traffic was absolutely insane - it was at times as bad as sitting in a cab in Times Square - it drives you nuts 'cause you are *not* going anywhere, and it seems like it'd be 5 times faster walking.


Back




Front




The line




We, fortunately, made it to Vegas safe and sound. Unlike these guys - and many others - who were pouring gallons of water into their overheated engine.




(btw, going back on the 2nd was just as bad)



Have never seen a more artificial city where you can let yourself be so superficial. It was the same almost everywhere, casino after casino, mall after mall - a show of repetition and imitation. All the casinos/hotels have names like Paris, Venetian, New York, Egypt, etc. And I don't want to pass judgment, but I saw some of the saddest people there. What's so fun about sitting for hours in front of a machine and mechanically pressing one button every two seconds with your fingers?




That said, it was a hell lot of fun for New Year's Eve. We did not go to any fancy clubs. We were just outside rubbing our arms with thousands of people, counting down to the new year, to the new decade. Each hotel had its own fireworks, so we kept turning left and right to catch the show. For me, that's what new year's eve's about: lights, sound, people, the more the merrier.

i'm on the top of the world

Middletown, CT: 2F (-17C)
Chicago, IL: 3F (-16C)
San Diego. 75F (24C)<-- this is where I am

Happy New Year everyone! May the new year and the new decade be filled with meaningful moments and beautiful encounters. Live and let live :)