Vietnami tuba: Thoughts & Pictures

Without even noticing it, I’ve started to call my temporary rent room here “home”. For me it’s hard to distinguish between a homely feeling and a feeling of familiarity. Is home a place that’s just very familiar and comfortable, or is it a space that your loved ones occupy, or both ? I’ve been living apart from home for 2 and more years now and the foundation of the word “home” is shaky. Maybe that’s why living here, ~12 200 km away from the real home, for the 3^rd week doesn’t seem to have changed my feeling of security.

Staying far away, however, has helped me acknowledge everyday things that I always took for granted when I lived in Estonia. For example, not understanding anything that the people around you are talking about for a prolonged amount of time creates a feeling of restlessness (not the case in Estonia). Crossing roads that have no traffic rules makes me thank all sorts of beings of divine power that I paid for an expensive health insurance before coming here.

The noise pollution in Saigon is not something that comes from just the traffic – it is rooted in the culture. For example, people are constantly talking and there doesn’t seem to be much room for sitting silently. Also, entertainment is essential – you can find a big flat screen TV even in the poorest shack or in a construction site, where men (and women) sit a circle on the dusty ground and watch soap operas. I wouldn’t have expected this from a country where the major religion is Buddhism. When I walk on little streets and peek into people’s homes (you can’t help it here – homes’ doors are open and all the interior is very well seen from the street), I often find a Buddhist altar and a 40 inch LCD TV sitting side by side.

How trash is handled is also very different. For anyone coming here: don’t expect to find a local eating place that has a clean floor. People throw their waste on the floor and it’s normal everywhere. It’s also nearly impossible to find a trash bin and every day I face a dillemma: whether to throw my litter onto the ground or not? Mostly I do it very secretly, but even if someone saw me cowardly laying my ice cream wrapper on the ground like a true imbecile, nobody would care. I’ve read that the irresponsible treatement of waste is taking its toll on Mekong Delta, one of the supreme sights in the South of Vietnam, and a place I’m going to visit next week or a bit later. Pictures of that shall be uploaded.

Spending time with the locals every day has also made me familiar with some other manners and beliefs of theirs. At a dining table, nobody will close their mouth when they’re eating. Perhaps they’re extracting more pleasure out of eating like that, since aside from tasting the food they’re trying out its acoustic properties too ? The dining tables here never offer a knife, but instead a pair of chopsticks, a spoon and a fork. Imagine eating a great big piece of beef like that. Quite savage.

Yet another weird dish: self-service springrolls. Materials given: rice paper
(when I bent it, it sounded like plastic and it didn't really taste much like
anything), beef, angelhair vermicelli (very thin rice noodles) and some herbs.

Lately I’ve been going out in the city at evening and day a few times and tried to ask locals whether I can take pictures of them. I’ve been frustrated to learn that every time I kindly ask their permission, they sort of take a strong defensive position with their arms held as a cross and knees bent, kung fu style. I’ve mostly been taking pictures of people without their straightforward permission before and some have started screaming at me. Today I was really delighted when I got the permission of a very interesting kind of old man (and his wife) to take some photos of him. He is one example of the reason why I truly like Vietnam and even Saigon: in the midst of all this chaos and third world conditions, there are beautiful people and heartbreaking stories. There is always more than meets the eye.