Reading back over that general update post from yesterday, I realize that I sound like a broken record about my health problem and the fact that I am currently very focused on it. (And to be fair to the Vietnamese film industry, I should probably write that like this: I have a VERRRY TROUBLING HEALTH PROBLEM, AND I AM VERRRY EXCITED AND SURPRISED (?) TO TELL YOU ALL ABOUT HOW VERRRY FOCUSED ON IT I AM RIGHT NOW!!!)

So here’s an announcement: I’m not going to be writing about my health problem on this blog any more unless it’s to say that I’ve finally beaten it or whatever. Now if I develop new health problems – like nearly severing my earlobe while shaving, etc. – those are going to be on here for sure. But my plain old, tired, worn out health problem that I keep mentioning is hereby verboten on this blog.

Update re Green Bamboo Shelter

I met with the volunteer coordinator from the Green Bamboo Shelter (http://greenbambooshelter.org/aboutus.htm) earlier today, and I’m going to go to the shelter to meet the kids with her either this weekend or one night next week, so I’m pretty excited about that!

Here’s just kind of a general update about my life over here and how it’s going. I’m feeling “bloggy” today – and also I have come to realize that about 90% of my communication with my family and friends occurs through this blog now. I don’t email with people as much as I did when I was back in the states, as basically everything I am up to over here is on this blog and there’s just not much to add. Anyway, here goes:

1. Housing: Still in the guesthouse. Hoping to move out soon when Tim’s current roommate finds a new place.

2. Motorbike: I guess I have kind of gotten in the swing of the whole traffic insanity thing because I’ve started actually enjoying driving my motorbike here. Part of it has to do with my having developed a feel for the “flow” of traffic here – I’m not quaking with fear everytime I crank the thing up. Part of it is also, I think, that motorcycles are generally just kind of fun to ride. You always hear that they’re fun to ride and that you have a feeling of freedom, etc. I’ve always thought that people who rode them in the states were idiots (Mitch!) – because even if you’re the safest motorcycle driver in the history of mankind (and Mitch I know you’re not), if some other idiot in a car or truck, etc., hits you, you’re pretty much cooked. But anyway, the point is I’ve started to enjoy riding my moto over here.

I’m still working on the getting angry in traffic situation but I’m actually making progress. Every day I have numerous dumbass things happen to me – people bump into me, a girl ran over my right foot the other day, people are constantly cutting me off, etc. – that I would be well within my rights to get angry about. But I just try to tell myself that none of it is directed at me – that’s just how they drive, and even if I left Vietnam today, they’d still be driving around like that. It has nothing to do with me. Also, I finally figured that if I was going to get really angry every time something messed up happens in traffic here, I might as well just work myself up into a blind rage every time I leave somewhere and stay in that rage until I arrive at my destination – because that would be the end result anyway.

Also, the moto is incredibly cheap. I fill it up once about every week to ten days and it costs 30,000 dong, which is about $1.88 or something in U.S. dollars. You can park anywhere for 2,000 dong (about 12 cents USD). And whether you park in there for 5 minutes or all day, it’s 2,000 dong. As someone who can remember paying $20 a day to park in Seattle, 12 cents for all day is pretty compelling. I also bought a year’s worth of insurance for – get this – 60,000 dong, which is less than $4 USD. So it’s just damn cheap.

3. Vietnamese: I think it’s continuing to go pretty well. I have periods where I feel like I’m getting a lot better at it – but those are usually followed by periods where I think I don’t know what the hell I’m doing and I will never learn this damn language. I am starting to be able to understand a little more when I overhear Vietnamese people talking – not a ton, but a little, which I could never do at all until recently. I dropped my private class so I am down to three sessions of the group class per week now. I need to start studying more outside of class on my own – but it’s tough to make myself do it. I’m not going to force it, but I think it will come with time.

4. Health: I just got over a bad cold that apparently half of Saigon has passed around, so I’m feeling pretty good right now. It’s funny how when you get over being sick you feel (or at least I feel) like I had forgotten how good it feels to just feel normal! Anyway, I think my health is actually improving. I am still having some pretty intense acupuncture and visceral massage three times per week, and I think it is slowly but surely helping. It sucks – and I dread it because it really hurts – and it’s expensive, etc., but I’m going to keep doing it because for the first time in a long time I am feeling some slight but continuing improvement. Dropping the personal Vietnamese class allows me to go to a yoga class on Tuesdays and Thursdays. So far I’ve been about 5 times total, but nowhere near as regularly as I plan on going. There are also a couple of weekend classes, so my goal is to go to yoga three times per week. It’s just one of those things that feels like it’s really good for you – even though I find it hard to do while I’m actually doing it. I’ve been doing a little aerobic stuff – not as much as I was doing before because yoga has taken the place of some of that, but I’ve been swimming and running here and there. The triathlon we were going to do in Thailand in December turned out to be only a full triathlon – not a sprint-distance triathlon as we were led to believe – so we’re not going to be doing that after all.

5. Meditation: Tim and I still have our “meditation bet” in place – $100 per day for every missed day. So far, since the first week of September when we started this, I’ve only missed one day. So I owed Tim $100 for a while, but he recently missed a day as well so we’re even. I really think the meditation helps in a lot of ways. I am really realizing what an angry person I really am and how much stress I carry around with me on a daily basis. I don’t know where the anger I have comes from – but it’s a real problem and I need to get a handle on it because it definitely affects the quality of my life. Whenever Tim and I talk about this, he says “You don’t seem angry at all. You seem like one of the least angry people I know.” I guess that’s good – but it probably means that I just keep it bottled up inside me because it’s definitely there. I wrote before on this blog that my fear was that all I had done was moved from Atlanta over here and that I was going to continue to be angry – just about different things. And I’ve found that to be exactly what has happened – and not necessarily even about different things. A lot of them are the same things – poor drivers, inconsiderate people, etc. The same stuff I used to rant about in Atlanta, I rant about here – at least I internally rant because apparently I don’t seem angry. So I’m cognizant of it – and I think the meditation helps with that. And hopefully I can move beyond just being cognizant of it to actually improving it. I think enacting real change – I mean real, fundamental change – in your life versus just always talking about changing certain things about yourself, just wishing you were different, etc. – is one of the hardest things you can do. And that’s exactly what I’m trying to do over here. So it’s tough.

6. Work: I’m still working with Tim right now, kind of helping him out with his existing businesses. We’re still trying to figure out some other options for us to pursue together, but it’s going a little slower than we anticipated. Part of that is due to factors outside of our control – we thought we had some investors lined up to buy a property in Cambodia to convert into high-end apartments, but the investors’ timeline turned out to be slower than we expected. I still think that will happen – just not sure when. Part of it is also because Tim’s existing businesses are busier than usual right now – which is great for him but means that he doesn’t really have the time to devote to trying to figure out new opportunities. But a large part of it – and maybe the majority of it – is that, as I’m probably repeating ad nauseum here, I am really focused on improving my health over here. That’s not just some kind of copout – that really is my priority, and fortunately I’ve got enough money saved up and it’s cheap enough here that I can live over here for a while without having too much income coming in. So work is not really my focus right now. I am confident that in time, and especially as I learn to speak better Vietnamese, I’ll have no trouble making enough money to stay over here for as long as I want to, so it’s really just not that big of an issue for me right now and I mention it here only to be comprehensive about what’s going on in my life.

7. Volunteer Work: I liked to do some volunteer work from time to time in the U.S., and since I’ve been over here I’ve been looking for something I could do as a volunteer. I don’t want to be someone who just comes over here and exploits this country because it’s a cheap place to live, etc. (I mean, there are a lot of other, far worse ways to exploit this country – trust me – but I’m definitely not into that and I really don’t want to exploit it in any way at all. If you read the history of this place, it’s certainly been exploited enough in the past.) I really want to feel like I’m helping out or giving back or whatever you want to call it. So anyway, I finally found a place called the Green Bamboo Shelter, which is a shelter for homeless street kids – to try to help them get on the right track. I’m meeting with the volunteer coordinator for lunch tomorrow, the idea being that I will volunteer to teach English at the shelter for a couple of hours each weekend amd do whatever else I can to help out. So I’m very excited about that and hopefully it will be a good fit, etc.

8. Homesickness: I still don’t feel too homesick over here. I miss my family and I miss my friends – but so much has changed for the better in my life compared to my situation back in Atlanta that it’s just hard to get too despondent about it. That being said, I am getting more and more excited about visiting the U.S. for 12 days in December. It’s not really that far off now and I’m really looking forward to it. But I feel confident that, at the end of that trip, I’ll be ready to come back over here. It’s finally started to feel like I live here now – that I’m not just passing through. I really like it here, and I don’t think I’ve made a decision in my life in a long time that I feel was as good a decision as the one to come over here. Who knows how long I’ll stay, etc., but for now it just feels like the right thing for me to be doing.

Okay, I’ve rambled on enough and that’s more than anyone probably cares to know about my life. But if anyone has any questions about anything else, feel free to email me, etc.

So about two weeks ago, on Wednesday, October 17, I “starred” in a television commercial for Dai Viet beer. (The post about how this originated is here:  Call My Limo.)

I thought I would have a copy of the edited commercial and some photos by now, but I still haven’t received them. As soon as I receive them, I will get the photos up on this blog – and hopefully I’ll be able to get the video of the commercial itself up as well.

Before I note my specific observations, here is my overall prediction for how the commercial will turn out: cheesy and completely over the top. I may seem gay in the commercial. I will probably seem mentally diminished in some indeterminate manner. Or maybe in some deteminate manner. I will definitely seem high. This is not how I would have chosen to “act” in the commercial, but rather a function of the “direction” I received, which I will explain in more detail below. But let me be the first to say – having not seen the finished commercial myself yet – that I think it’s going to be incredibly cheesy and over the top. That being said, here are my specific observations:

1. The Vietnamese are not afraid to get up at the crack of dawn.

My contact with the film crew, Vinh Phuc, told me he’d pick me up at Tim’s office at 5:00am, which meant that I had to get up at 4:00am. I don’t know about those of you reading this, but it is never really my choice to get up at 4:00am. Largely because it’s just 4:00am. But also because I am one of those people who, when they know they have to get up early, can’t sleep worth a damn. I kept waking up over and over again, looking at the clock, wondering if it was 4:00am yet. I probably got about three hours of sleep that night.

2. I should not shave when I am half-asleep.

I got up at 4:00am, took a shower, and was in the process of shaving when I somehow – and I’ve been shaving since I was about 15, and I’m 36 now, and have never done this before that I can remember – pinned my earlobe to my neck with the razor blade and nearly cut my earlobe off. I’m notkidding – I shave with a Gillette Sensor three-bladed razor over here (only because I can’t buy replacement blades for my five-bladed Gillette Fusion – thank God I wasn’t using a five-bladed razor or I’d probably be earlobe-less right now) and two of the three blades “bit” or “took” or “dug in” or however you want to say it. The end result was my earlobe was gushing blood from two long, deep slices. The only upside is I was pretty much wide awake after that happened.

3. While I try to be respectful of Vietnamese culture, there are some “customs” I have quickly learned to despise.

So once I got my bleeding earlobe under control, I headed to the office and changed into my suit. (It was actually pretty neat to be driving around at 4:30am as there was basically no traffic and it was kind of peaceful to drive the streets of HCMC at that hour without all of the normal traffic jams, noise, insanity, etc.) Anyway, Vinh Phuc picked me up at 5:00am and we drove to his office, which was about 10 minutes away. Why we had to get up so early and be there so early I have no idea. We got there and basically sat around until 7:30am or so – me thinking the whole time “I could have slept another two hours.” At one point, Vinh Phuc and his crew walked next door to have coffee and invited me to go with them. I was bored just sitting there, and also needed something to wake me up again – the shock and pain from my cheese-grated earlobe having nearly subsided by this point – so even though I’ve been really good lately about not drinking my old nemesis the ca phe sua nong, I had one with Vinh Phuc and his friends. While we were having coffee, Vinh Phuc said to me: “We have a custom here in Vietnam. If one person has coffee, everyone must have coffee!” I wanted to say, “Yeah, well we have a ‘custom’ back in America too: If there’s no reason to wake someone up at the ass crack of dawn, we generally let them sleep a little longer,” but I didn’t say it.

4. There is at least one Vietnamese woman alive who is taller than me, and of course I was cast as her husband in this commercial.

So about 7:30am, we all got on a bus and headed to Tan Son Nhat International Airport, where the first few scenes would be filmed. The other “actors” and “actresses” – all Vietnamese except for me – were on the bus, and I started talking with one of the “actresses” on the bus ride to the airport. The whole time we were talking, I could see her eyes repeatedly darting down toward the bloody mess that was my left earlobe, so I had that going for me. She never said anything about it – just kept looking down at it thinking – I’m sure – “Damn that had to hurt. This guy must be a real jackass to do that to himself.”

So we got to the airport and continued sitting around waiting for everything to get set up, etc. We had our makeup put on (see point number 5, below), and then the director and Vinh Phuc and some other guys started telling all of us “actors” and “actresses” what scenes we were going to shoot, how they wanted us to act the scenes out, etc. Well during that process, I met my Vietnamese “wife” for the purposes of the commercial. I am not a super tall guy – I’m about 5’10” if I’m measuring (or 5’9” if the doctor’s measuring) – but I am generally taller than most of the Vietnamese men and almost all of the Vietnamese women I come across. Well, wouldn’t you know that my “wife” was about 5’9” or maybe even 5’10” – plus she was wearing high heels. So now in addition to my general feelings of insecurity about not knowing what the hell I was doing, not being able to understand 99% of the instructions being given to us in Vietnamese, walking around with what looked like a piece of raw bacon for an earlobe, etc., I have this Amazonian Vietnamese woman looming over me in every scene, making me look like a short twerp instead of the big strapping American I am sure I was supposed to be.

5. I look very weird in makeup.

I don’t think I need to belabor this one. I just look very weird in makeup. Kind of dead looking. Maybe it will look okay on film, but my impression from looking in the mirror is that it is going to look like they cast a short, dead American in the role of the visiting husband.

6. The Vietnamese love them some excitement and surprises.

Okay, so here is the basic storyline. (I think I had it wrong in my last post.) I am an American married to a Vietnamese woman and I am visiting Vietnam for the first time. We are walking out of the airport pushing our luggage on a cart when we see my “wife’s” sister and her husband (and sometimes their kids – see point 10, below) waiting for us in the crowd.

When we see them in the crowd, we are to act EXTREMELY SURPRISED!!! Then we are to actually join up with them, handshakes and hugs all around, including sometimes with their kids, and during all of this we are to act VERRRRY EXCITED!!!

We then get into a car (supposedly – this did not happen in real life – they just filmed the car – and head straight to the supermarket so I can buy a gift for my wife’s parents. Why I would buy them a gift at the supermarket I have no idea, but that’s the story. Anyway, I walk around the supermarket looking VERRRRY CONFUSED AND PUZZLED ABOUT WHAT TO BUY!!! until I see a stack of cases of Dai Viet beer, at which point I act VERRRY EXCITED AND WITH A GROWING CERTAINTY THAT, SURELY, THE PERFECT GIFT FOR MY IN-LAWS (WHOM I HAVE NEVER MET) IS A CASE OF SHITTY VIETNAMESE BEER!!! [Note: I didn't film this scene in the supermarket. I filmed it in front of a green screen and they were going to edit in the supermarket and stack of beer cases, etc., later. Why we didn't just go to a supermarket I don't know. More about this below.]

We then drive to my in-laws’ house where, when my “wife” and I, along with her sister and her husband, come through the door, we act VERRRY EXCITED AND SURPRISED!!! to see her parents and the other family members present, one of whom – my “wife’s” other sister – looked like a prostitute. I don’t know why, if you’re writing the script for the commercial, you would write in a prostitute as the wife’s other sister, but she sure looked like a prostitute to me. God love her.

Anyway, we filmed that scene about 40 times because we were apparently NOT EXCITED AND SURPRISED ENOUGH!!!, so I got to hug some old Vietnamese man – let’s call him “Dad” – about 40 times. I think I’ve just about washed the scent of his cologne – which I am confident was either Old Spice, Jovan Musk, or “Tussy,” – off of my skin now, two-and-a-half weeks later, but I still detect a hint of it from time to time.

The whole commercial is supposed to be occurring during the Tet holiday – which is like all of our American holidays rolled into one, apparently, so they had a huge meal cooked up and on the table. It looked like Thanksgiving dinner or something. So the next scene (I think – we shot a lot of scenes out of order and I’m not sure how they’re going to edit it together) is of me standing at the table with a wrapped present in front of me. I open the wrapping paper and, low and behold, someone has given me a case of Dai Viet beer! At which point I am told to hold up the case of beer as if I’m showing it off to everyone at the table and to act VERRRY EXCITED AND SURPRISED!!!

Then there are a couple of scenes where we’re sitting at the table making toasts of one form or another. We had to keep filming those scenes over and over again, because apparently some people weren’t complying with our “direction”, which was in Vietnamese so I’m not 100% sure, but judging by the way everyone was acting was something like: I WANT TO SEE HUGE, SHIT-EATING, CHESHIRE CAT GRINS ON EVERYONE’S FACES!!! I WANT TO SEE EVERYONE SO VERRRY EXCITED AND SURPRISED (why surprised during the toasts, I’m not sure but that’s what it seemed like – maybe just surprised that any of us ever let ourselves get roped into filming this lame commercial) THAT IT LITERALLY SEEMS UNREAL. NOT JUST SURREAL (which it also seemed), UNREAL!!!

Then I think at the end of the commercial there’s a 3D, animated deal involving a can of Dai iet beer. Doing what I’m not sure. But if I had to bet, I would bet that the can is supposed to somehow seem EXCITED AND SURPRISED!!! And over that will be my voiceover saying “Bia Dai Viet, bia cua moi nha!” (“Dai Viet beer is the beer of every household!”) Since I am not on camera when this is said, and since it seems like anyone in the commercial (or even just an announcer type) could have said this, I am not sure why they thought they needed to have the American – the only person involved in the whole operation who CAN’T speak Vietnamese – say this, but that’s what they wanted.

I think the commercial ends with one of the toasts we filmed earlier. Anyway, the “official” storyboard they gave me is below. I am the really good looking white guy with the goatee and the chiseled features, of course. I did have a goatee the first time I met Vinh Phuc, so maybe that’s why he drew it up that way. I had shaved it off by the time we actually shot the commercial though (see the above about my shaving experience), and I never had the chiseled features, so maybe that was just wishful thinking on Vinh Phuc’s part.

7. I may have lung cancer.

Again, this is not one that needs to be belabored, but nearly everyone on the set was chain-smoking cigarettes the entire day long.

If I remember correctly, at one point the 3 or 4 year old girl playing my “wife’s” niece asked me if she could “bum a Pall Mall.”

If it is truly possible to get lung cancer from second-hand smoke, I’ve got it for sure.

8. The Vietnamese are not afraid to form a crowd.

So while we were filming at the airport, there were about 200 people crowding around watching us film. At first it made me kind of nervous and self-conscious, but I quickly just tuned them out. Whenever we’d break from filming and I’d walk back over to have my makeup touched up or to get some water or whatever, they’d all watch me like I was some movie star and they just couldn’t figure out who I was. I kept expecting someone to ask me for my autograph, but that didn’t happen. It was kind of cool, though, and I can definitely see the allure of working in film. During one break, I spoke to Tim on the phone to tell him how it was going and I told him about the crowd, etc. I said “It’s like they think I’m Brad Pitt or something.” Tim said, and I thought this was pretty good, “I assure you they don’t think you’re Brad Pitt.”

9. The Vietnamese film industry doesn’t care much about crowd control.

So we’re filming in front of the main exit of Vietnam’s largest international airport, which you would rightly expect to be kind of a busy place, and there are thousands of people entering and exiting the airport and just generally milling around. And we’re filming these scenes right in the middle of all this – with full on cameras, lights, etc. – so you might think that someone would put up some ropes or barricades or something to keep people from wandering into the middle of our set and destroying the take, right? Not a chance. We were already having to film these scenes numerous times because of the multiple actors involved, kids, etc., and we’d be right in the middle of filming and some 80-year-old woman would walk right through our scene, completely oblivious to the cameras and lights, heavily made-up corpse looking people, etc. So we’d cut and start it all over again. This happened about – and I’m not exaggerating – 50 or 60 times.

10. Just like child actors in America, Vietnamese child “actors” are apprently also spoiled and doomed to equally Todd Bridges/Danny Bonaduce-ish fates.

So I am not sure if the two kids will even make it into the commercial – we shot a bunch of takes with them and a bunch of takes without them. But my “wife’s” sister and her husband were supposed to have two kids – one boy who looked about 5 or 6 and one girl who looked about 3 or 4. The boy was okay throughout the day – especially considering what a long day it was, but the girls – yes, girls with an s – had some issues.

The first girl shot about two takes at the airport before she decided she wasn’t going to do it anymore and had a complete, hysterical meltdown. The entire operation came to a halt for literally about an hour as we watched the girl’s mother try to get the girl to continue to “act”. The girl was screaming, crying, hyperventilating, stomping her feet, etc. The mother was getting increasingly angry – my thinking was that they obviously weren’t going to get paid if the girl didn’t finish out the day, so the mother was desperately trying to get the daughter to cooperate.

We’d start filming again, then the girl would freak out again and we’d stop. Finally, after an hour or hour-and-a-half of this, they said forget it and called in another girl to act the part. She got there about half an hour later and was much better.

Later, however, when we were filming the scenes around the dinner table, we were taking a break for some reason and my “wife” and I and the little girl and a couple of other people were sitting around the table. It was very hot in the room because they had all of the filming lights on, etc. So I happened to look over at the little girl and she was displaying the universal human signs for “I am about to throw up in my lap.” I pointed this out to my “wife”, who quickly tried to explain in Vietnamese to the other people standing around that they needed to get the little girl away from the table, etc., when all of a sudden the little girl just lost it all over herself.

So they carted her off and brought in another girl – who was actually just the daughter of the people whose house we happened to be filming in – to sit in for her during the dinner scene. Again, I don’t know if you will even see any of these kids in the finished product or if they’ll be edited out, but that’s your “behind the scenes scoop” about what really went down.

11. The Vietnamese like bright colors.

This is just generally true – they like really bright colored clothing, furniture, etc. We were picking out furniture for our office and the choice would be between just normal, modern looking furniture with wood tones and metal fixtures or some crazy looking furniture with bright yellow laminated wood and bright green fixtures and if we asked the staff what they liked they’d go with the yellow and green every time.

So when Vinh Phuc and his buddy came over to our office a few days before filming to check out the suit I was planning on wearing to make sure it was okay, he also looked through my shirts and selected a shirt for me to wear in the more casual scenes. So of all of the shirts I had, he picked this crazy bright orange shirt that I had handmade in Bangkok back in 2004.

I said “Are you sure you want me to wear that one? How about just a blue shirt or something?” but he insisted that I wear the Halloween shirt. On the day of filming, I even took along some extra, more muted shirts and asked him again if he wanted me to wear one of them. But he again said I should wear the orange shirt – so when you see me sporting this crazy bright orange shirt you’ll know why.

And, true to form, when I came downstairs wearing the orange shirt, my Vietnamese “wife” and a couple of other people on the set told me that my shirt was “dep”, which means handsome. So there you go.

12. You will work for your $100 per day in Vietnam.

So Vinh Phuc picked me up at 5:00am and I didn’t get home from filming until 8:30pm that night. And all of that was for what will end up being a 50-second commercial. I can almost sympathize with real actors and actresses when they complain about the long shooting days, etc. The difference is, however, that I made $100 and they are making millions. Also, they get all of the fringe benefits that come along with being a Hollywood actor or actress – I got to go back home to my shitty $250 per month guesthouse. Alone.

Anyway, when we were finally finished – or so everyone thought – about 7:30pm, we were all clapping and were in the process of walking to the restaurant across the street together when the director said they weren’t done with me. So then we filmed the green screen scenes.

The first scene was supposed to me on my ride into HCMC for the first time. They sat me in the back of a Ford Escape with my window rolled halfway down. I was on the passenger side and the camera filming me was on the driver side. The green screen was behind me. So my “direction” was to look forward as if I was AMAZED AT SEEING HCMC FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME!!!, then to turn my head and look out the side window toward the green screen, continuing to be SO EXCITED THAT IT APPEARED I MIGHT BUST A BLOOD VESSEL IN MY HEAD/NECK/FACE/CHEST/BACK AREA!!! So we start shooting this scene, and the director keeps telling me MORE EXCITEMENT!!! MORE SURPRISE!!! So I keep getting more and more over the top. He finally told me that when I turn back to look out the side window, I should be – and I swear this is true – SO EXCITED THAT I AM LITERALLY STICKING MY HEAD OUT OF THE WINDOW TO GET A BETTER VIEW!!! So that’s what I did. I’m not proud of it, but that’s what I did.

The second green screen scene was the scene where I am in the supermarket searching for an appropriate gift for my in-laws and stumble upon a stack of cases of Dai Viet beer. Again, he kept making me reshoot this scene over and over again – each time telling me MORE EXCITEMENT!!! MORE SURPRISE!!! So this should be ridiculous as well.

13. Vietnamese kids are apparently EXCITED AND SURPRISED!!! by beer as well.

So at some point during that interminable day, I was sitting in the living room of the house we were filming the dinner table scenes in and watching them film some scene I was not involved in in the kitchen. From what I could tell, the scene involved my “wife’s” sister taking a case of Dai Viet beer off of the kitchen counter and putting it down on the table in front of her 5 or 6 year old son, at which point the kid had apparently been “directed” to GO COMPLETELY APESHIT!!! She’d put it down and the kid would start clapping and cheering for the beer.

They reshot the scene about 30 times. I couldn’t understand the “direction” they were getting, but I can only assume it involved the kid being told to be MORE EXCITED AND SURPRISED!!! Why a 5 or 6 year old kid was supposed to be all excited about this case of beer – and why the kid’s mom was presenting a case of beer to her child in the first place – I really have no idea.

So those are my observations. According to Vinh Phuc, everyone thought I did really well and he’s already asked me if I would be in another commercial for him – this time it’s a milk commercial. I’ll keep you posted as to how that goes. I am sure it will be VERRRY EXCITING AND SURPRISING!!!

Unlike many of you who promised (threatened?) to come visit me in Vietnam, my friend Mary Ellen from Atlanta is actually coming here in a few short weeks!  She and her friend Tony will be arriving in HCMC on the evening of Saturday, November 17th, and will be flying back on the evening of Saturday, November 24th.  (There was going to be a third friend coming with them, but she had to cancel at the last minute due to some family issues.)

Now that’s a short trip to Vietnam.  Because of the length of the flights, jet lag, etc., I generally recommend 10 days to two weeks, but I understand that with work, etc., a lot of people really can’t spare more than one week.

But even with only seven days to work with, we’ve been able to come up with what I think is a pretty compelling itinerary for them.  So, to give you an idea of what’s possible in even a seven-day trip, here’s what we’ve worked up for Mary Ellen and Tony so far:

Sunday, November 18: HCMC

We will just take it easy and explore HCMC itself, go out for a nice lunch and dinner, do some shopping, let Mary Ellen and Tony acclimate to the time change, etc.

Monday, November 19 – Tuesday, November 20: Mekong Delta Tour

Mary Ellen and Tony are going on a two-day, one-night tour of the Mekong Delta.  I did a three-day/two-night version of this back in 2001 and it was a great trip.  You really get a feel for rural Vietnam, and you spend a lot of time on boats, which is cool.  Here’s their itinerary for the Mekong Delta trip (total cost $157):

Day 1:
19 Nov 07: Saigon – Mytho – Cantho (L)
08h00AM: The guide pick you up at your address and journey to Mytho where you will board
your sampan for a cruise among the Dragon, Unicorn, Turtle and Phoenix Islands. On the
way, visit a small factory producing handicraft made of coconut.
On Turtle Island, you will visit a typical orchard and taste their exotic fruit. Afterwards,
you will board smaller boat for a more adventurous cruise on the Xep Canal, set amongst a
forest of palm trees. Next you will ride a horse-driven cart to Mr Tam Nen’s garden, for a
honey tasting session. Continue by boat To Turtle Island, where lunch will be served, a
selection of Mekong delicacies.
After lunch, journey to Cantho, arrive Cantho check in your hotel in Cantho around
18h00PM. Night at Golf Cantho Hotel.

Day 2:
20 Nov 07: Can Tho – Saigon (B, L)
Breakfast at the hotel.
Early Departure to see the Cai Rang floating market, perhaps the most colourful and
bustling of all the markets in Vietnam. Depart the floating market by boat to Rach Ngong
canal, then your visit at Binh Thuy ancient house.
After lunch in Cantho, journey back to Saigon. Arrival at Saigon around 18h00PM.

I’ve never been to the Golf Cantho hotel – which is in the city of Cantho – but it actually looks pretty nice (and a lot nicer than the hotel I stayed in on my Mekong Delta trip in 2001 – mine was a little “budget”): http://www.golfhotel.vnn.vn/Information4.aspx

Tuesday, November 20, 2007 – Thursday, November 22, 2007: Danang/Hoi An (Beach Trip)

So they get back to their hotel in HCMC about 6:00pm on the 20th, and we will head straight to the airport for an 8:00pm flight to Danang.  (I am going to go with them on this part of the trip.)  We won’t be staying in Danang – we’ll be staying in Hoi An, which is about 30 miles south of Danang.  Hoi An is a cool little town with a lot of historic architecture.  It’s known for its shopping and especially for it’s hand-tailored clothes.  There are a ton of little tailor shops who will hand-tailor clothes for you very cheaply.  I bought my infamous “$40 Vietnamese suits” in Hoi An back in 2001.  But Hoi An is also very near some super nice beaches – including the famed “China Beach”, which is beautiful.  Also, Danang is near the de-militarized zone (“DMZ”) from back in the Vietnam “Conflict” days, so I think there are a bunch of military/war-related tours, etc., you can do if you’re so inclined.  I figured that rather than just going to a beach and bumming around for two days, this at least gives us the option to do that plus some other stuff if we get bored.  We’ll just rent motorcycles on the 21st and play it by ear.

In Hoi An, we’re staying at the Lotus Hotel, which appears to be pretty pimp:

http://www.hoianlotushotel.com/gallery.asp

And we’re staying in the “Japanese Deluxe” suites (picture above at top) – which are their high-end rooms and go for $55 a night.

Thursday, November 22 – Saturday, November 24:  Angkor Wat (Cambodia)

On Thursday, I fly back to HCMC and Mary Ellen and Tony fly on to Siem Reap, Cambodia.  They’ll spend at least Friday the 23rd – and possibly part of Saturday the 24th – touring Angkor Wat with a guide.  Angkor Wat is one of the coolest places I’ve ever been.  I went there the first time in 2001 and was completely blown away.  I went there a second time in 2004, and it was equally impressive.  The only negative was that in 2001 – three years after the Khmer Rouge dissolved – there were still not very many tourists there.  By 2004, tourism there was wide open and the experience was a lot different.  Still an incredible experience, but definitely different.

Anyway, I think I spent three full days touring Angkor Wat in 2001.  (That was with old Laura Stella, for those of you who know that story.)  One day is really not enough, but you can definitely hit the high points and it is still a neat experience.  You get up really early and watch the sun rise over the main Angkor Wat temple.  Then you explore around the different temple ruin complexes all day before hiking up a nearby hill to watch the sun set.

The above are photos I took at Angkor Wat in 2004.  There are more of them at:  hww3.blogspot.com

I’m trying to hire Mary Ellen and tony a good, English-speaking guide.  Since they’ll only be there one day, it’s imperative that they have a good guide who knows the history of Angkor Wat, can explain the architecture, knows the high points to hit, etc.

They’ll be staying at the Prince D’Angkor Hotel & Spa, which I’ve never been to but looks nice.  They’re getting a “special promotion” deal which includes transport to and from the airport, breakfast, and a “complimentary drink and cold towel” upon arrival for $98 a night:  http://www.princedangkor.com/index.html

These hotel prices are actually pretty expensive for SE Asia, and you can definitely stay cheaper, but these hotels will be really nice and since it’s only for a few nights, why not do it up right?  Also, their flights while they’re here (from HCMC to Danang, Danang to Siem Reap, and Siem Reap back to Saigon) total $425.

Anyway, Mary Ellen and Tony will fly back in to HCMC sometime on Saturday the 24th and we’ll just hang out in HCMC until their flights later that night.

So I think that’s a pretty good seven-day trip!  I am excited about them coming – it will be fun to show friends around Vietnam.  I hope some of you will come visit soon as well!

[Update: No one has emailed me to complain about this post or anything, but I've been thinking about it and want to say the following:

I hope it does not come across as anti-American in some way because I am not anti-American. When I was young, growing up in the Bible belt south, I was extremely conservative and patriotic, and I recall when I read about Vietnam while I was in high school my slant was always "We could have won that war if we'd fully committed to winning it and let the military do what it needed to do to win it." (Another slant was that if all of the hippie protestors hadn't made it so hard on our government and military, we could have won Vietnam.)

Over time, however - and this really doesn't have anything to do with my having moved to Vietnam; I think my views have just changed - I've mellowed out a lot and at some point I came to believe that even if the above were true (and I personally think it is), the real issue wasn't whether we should win the war. The real issue was whether we should have even been at war in Vietnam in the first place. And for a long time I have thought the answer to that question is no - and reading the book discussed below just confirms my feelings in that regard.

But I did not mean to come across as anti-American in general because I'm just not. Also, my feelings about Iraq are not as strong. There are a lot of parallels between Vietnam and Iraq - so many that it's really frightening to me - but I have to just keep hoping that the leadership today is not as clueless as the leadership back in the 1960s and 1970s appears to have been, and that there is some plan out there that I just don't understand. I'm not optimistic that that's really the case, but I hope it is.

Finally, and this is almost a cliche to say - and is hopefully obvious - but any issues I have with Vietnam or Iraq are with U.S. political and military leadership, not with the troops that were actually in Vietnam - or were or are in Iraq. I have a ton of respect for those people for putting their lives on the line, and I have several friends who either were at one point or are currently in Iraq - and I hope if they read this post before I updated it here they didn't take it the wrong way. My hope is that by the time Iraq is over - and hopefully that will be sooner rather than later - it will be clear that the lives that were lost or altered as a result of this war were lost for a real reason and not for some "theory" that is subsequently debunked as I believe was the case with Vietnam and the "domino theory."]

Over the course of my life, I’ve read a lot of books about the U.S. “war” in Vietnam – which, as I either learned from this book or knew earlier but had forgotten, was never really a “War” as the U.S. never actually declared war on Vietnam – thus the Vietnam “Conflict”.  In either 9th or 10th grade, I read a book called Vietnam: A History, by Stanley Karnow – which I remember being very good.  (This is around the time I was reading stuff like Richard Nixon’s two-volume autobiography, etc., so go figure.)

I’ve also read a number of additional books on Vietnam since I’ve been over here – the best up until now being Fire in the Lake by Frances Fitzgerald.

But yesterday I just finished what was by far the best book I’ve ever read on the Vietnam “Conflict” – Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War by Michael Maclear.  The book does an incredible job of placing the Vietnam “Conflict” in context – starting with the century Vietnam spent as part of the French colony of Indochina (along with Laos and Cambodia – Vietnam was called “Cochin China” at the time by everyone except the Vietnamese, who called it – and still call it – Việt Nam).

The book examines the U.S. involvement in Vietnam – which began prior to 1954 when Vietnam was still a French colony.  The story of the ultimately successful struggle of the “Viet Minh” – the insurgent movement led by Ho Chi Minh – to attain Vietnam’s independence from France is very interesting – and definitely set a telling precedent for the U.S.’s subsequent experience in Vietnam.  (The chapter about the decisive battle of Dien Bien Phu made me want to read an entire book about that battle alone.)

But the most interesting, and troubling, part of the book – to me – involved how the U.S.’s involvement in Vietnam escalated to the level it ultimately did.  It’s easy, of course, to look at the Vietnam “Conflict” in retrospect and say “I can’t believe we did that,” etc.  But, honestly, after reading this book, it’s literally difficult to believe that we really made so many of the decisions we made, and took so many of the actions we took, with respect to Vietnam.   I would read certain sections and just sit there kind of numb thinking “How in the hell could we have been so blind?”

I think it would be really hard to read this book and come away with the feeling that the U.S. should have ever had anything to do with Vietnam.  The only compelling justification that the U.S. had for being in Vietnam was the “domino theory” – that if Vietnam fell to communism, the rest of Southeast Asia – and potentially countries as far away as Australia and New Zealand – could fall right along with it like a series of dominoes.  Unfortunately, that theory was ultimately proven wrong.  Vietnam did fall to communism, and currently has been a communist country for 32 years, yet the other countries in Southeast Asia never did, similarly, fall to communism.  It’s just completely tragic to think that nearly 60,000 U.S. lives – and millions of Vietnamese lives – were lost – not to mention the extreme effects Vietnam had on U.S. culture, etc. – which the book also does a good job of chronicling – for a “theory” that was ultimately demonstrated to be invalid.

There is a mind-blowing passage discussing Clark Clifford’s replacing Robert S. McNamara as the Secretary of Defense in 1968 – seven years before the war finally ended in 1975.  As one of Clifford’s first actions, he convened meetings with a number of senior military officials to discuss the U.S.’s strategy for winning the war.  He was amazed to learn that the U.S. literally did not even have a strategy for winning the war.  The only “goal” was “attrition” – basically hoping that North Vietnam would get tired of fighting and quit before America did.

It’s also hard to read this book without considering what is going on today in Iraq – there are so many parallels it’s just hard to avoid.

Here are some interesting quotes from the book:

Charles De Gaulle warning John F. Kennedy about Vietnam in May 1961:  “The ideology that you invoke will not change anything . . . . You Americans wanted, yesterday, to take our place in Indochina, you want to assume a succession to rekindle a war that we ended.  I predict to you that you will, step by step, be sucked into a bottomless military and political quagmire.“

President Lyndon Johnson admitting to his biographer, Doris Kearns-Goodwin, that his decision to commit ground troops to Vietnam was motivated in part by domestic political concerns:  “He said, ‘I knew form the start what the choice involved.’ He said if we got involved in that bitch of a war over there my Great Society was going to be dead.  And yet on the other hand, if he let the war go, and he let the South Vietnamese lose, then he was afraid that all of the old traditional anti-Democratic party feeling – you lost China, you lost Vietnam – was going to come screeching at him.“

Vietnam Ambassador (and former General) Maxwell D. Taylor telling President Johnson in 1965 that it would be an error to commit U.S. ground troops to Vietnam:  “The ‘white-faced’ soldier cannot be assimilated by the population; he cannot distinguish between friendly and unfriendly Vietnamese; the Marines are not trained or equipped for jungle guerrilla warfare.”

Activist Jerry Rubin talking about the 1968 riots at the Chicago Democratic Convention:  “I felt throughout the war that I was a patriot, a nationalist, fighting for America.  In the year 2000 without a doubt we’re going to look back at the Sixties and say that the people who represented George Washington, the real patriotism of America, were the people who were opposing the war because the war was against America’s interests.  It hurt America.”

Television commentator Eric Sevareid regarding the commitment of the North Vietnamese society to win the Vietnam “Conflict”:  “You weren’t really fighting just a military force.  You were fighting a society, a society equipped with a total faith.”

Anyway, enough rambling – the bottom line is if you want to read an excellent book on the Vietnam “Conflict”, I’d start with this one.

So I spent all day – and I mean all day – last Wednesday shooting my commercial for Dai Viet beer.  It was an interesting day and a lot of fun, and I’ve been meaning to post about it ever since but I’ve just been lazy. 

Also, I didn’t take my camera to the shoot because I thought it might be unprofessional or cheesy to be snapping photos on the set.  Well, as I will detail in my upcoming post, I don’t care if I had hired Ken Burns to make a documentary about the making of my beer commercial – I still would have been the most professional and least cheesy aspect of the commercial shoot.

There was a VP of Dai Viet beer there all day and he was taking tons of pictures.  At the end of the day, I asked my contact with the film crew – Vinh Phuc – to see if he could get the Dai Viet beer guy to burn his photos onto a CD for me and he said he would.  Vinh Phuc called today and I will be doing my “voiceover” – where I get to say “Bia Dai Viet bia cua moi nha!” (Dai Viet beer is the beer of every household!) – he’s picking me up at 11:00am.  He said he was going to have the CD of photos for me tomorrow.  Yo never really know over here, of course, but if he actually has the CDs for me, that will give me extra motivation to go ahead and write my post about the film shoot.

Vinh Phuc also told me last week that he would give me a DVD of the finished commercial once it’s edited, etc., so if I can I will post the finished product on my blog as well.  If it turns out half as cheesy as I think it is going to be, it will be pretty funny.

Anyway, by procrastinating this long to write my post about the commercial, I may now be able to include some photos.  We’ll see.

I just confirmed the details for my trip home to the U.S. in December.  I was originally going to head back on December 15th and head back during the first week of January.  But I had a problem getting a flight back to Vietnam on EVA Air (the Taiwanese airline that I prefer, get frequent flier miles on, etc.) before January 11th, and I just can’t be home for almost a month.

For one, it’s very expensive in the U.S. compared to Vietnam, and I would spend as much in that month as I’d normally spend in three months over here.  Second, I can’t miss that much of my Vietnamese class – I would fall way too far behind.  And third, I think I would be ready to come back to Vietnam way before the month was out.  It’s not like all of my friends in the U.S. are going to be off of work and able to just hang out with me all of the time while I’m home, and I’d rather be over here than sitting around there.  Finally, I think I will start to miss Vietnam if I stay home too long.

So here’s the deal:  I moved my flight home from Vietnam from December 15th to December 19th.  And I fly back on December 31st.  So I’ll be home for twelve days – and out of Vietnam for exactly two weeks.  That way I won’t fall too far behind in class, etc.

The only bummer is I obviously won’t have as much time to travel around and see everyone I was planning on seeing while I am home – especially with Christmas right in the middle of my trip.  But I’m sure it will all work out.

I booked the return leg of that December 31st trip for June 1st, so I’ll be back in the states again in early June.

[Sorry I haven't been blogging lately - just haven't been feeling it.]

On Friday, Nhung and I went to watch the filming of Hay Chon Gia Dung, which is the Vietnamese version of The Price is Right!  Nhung manages Tim’s business importing nutritional supplements from the U.S., and I work with her a lot on that business.  She is considering advertising our supplements on Hay Chon Gia Dung, and the producer offered us free tickets to check out the show in person.

Here we are on the way to the show:

Here’s Nhung cheesing out with her ticket:

And here I am doing the same:

Here we are in the stands:

Crowd shot (I was the only white person there):

Blurry shot of stage, including the Vietnamese Bob Barker:

Shot from side of stage:

So it was pretty fun – the show is an exact copy of The Price is Right.  Same music; same games; same big spinning wheel for the “Showcase Showdown,” etc.  Nhung says they “license” The Price is Right.  I think it’s more likely that some Vietnamese guy happened to catch an episode of The Price is Right on late-night satellite television and figured “Hell, I can do that.”

The “set” was the inside of a high-school gym.  The backdrops, games, etc., were predictably crappy – a lot of the lights were burned out or flickering, you could tell the backdrops were cut out of plywood, etc.  After they rolled out one of the games, they realized that it didn’t work so they had to roll it back in and brought out a different game to play instead.

Filming also started an hour late, so we weren’t able to stay for the whole time.  But of the six contestants we saw get called down while we were there, two of them shook my hand as they made their way down to the floor.  As the lone white guy, you get a little extra attention.

Actually, when we were entering the building and getting our nametags and numbers, etc., the owner/producer of the show was there at the front desk.  He asked Nhung if I spoke Vietnamese well because he always wanted an American contestant to play.  Alas, Thursday was not his (or my) lucky day, as my Vietnamese is still very bad!  But maybe someday I too can be up on stage speculating on whether a box of Vietnamese kleenex is 13,000 dong or 15,000 dong.

My niece C’s birthday was this past weekend.  She’s officially achieved “big girl” status as she’s now 3 years old.  I had a video call with her on her birthday. 

During the call, the maid who lives in our office here, Ut (not to be confused with the maid Ut that lives at Tim’s house – this is a different Ut (also pronounced “Ope”) was in the office I was in cleaning.  I called Ut over and had her wave at C and then Ut and I talked a little bit in Vietnamese.  It apparently freaked C out because she got very shy and quiet and wouldn’t say very much more.

But she was very cute – as you can see for yourself from the above photo of her getting the el sombrero treatment.

New baby Hugh Henry (I have to throw Henry in there even though they’re just calling him Hugh) is doing good – he’s apparently going to live up to the hoss status he displayed at birth, as he is already up to 11 pounds!  He’s had a cold so was having some trouble sleeping at night, but he’s getting over it and everyone says he is the sweetest baby ever.  I am so excited to meet him – and to see O and C again – in about two months.

Here he is looking like a sleeping dalmation:

And I can’t leave O out of the mix: