Fitting in in my home away from home

The other day on a 3-hour bus trip back to Hanoi from a field trip in Nam Dinh province, I found myself reflecting on what it means to call a foreign country “home”, and what that means for development work. A foreign country CAN feel like home, and for me, Vietnam has become a country I can say I feel “at home” in. I have people I care about here, I have a routine here, I have a place to live here. However, no matter how long I am here I will never be able to go a day in Vietnam without sticking out as a foreigner in some way… whether it’s because I don’t speak the language fluently, I make a cultural mistake, or simply because of the way that I look. It can get frustrating when people act a certain way or say certain things to you just because you're a “Westerner”. I know when I walk down the street and I hear the word “tay” (which means Westerner in Vietnamese) it is usually not meant in an offensive way, but at the same time, sometimes I just want to turn around and say “Yeah, I’m white, what’s it to you?!”.

Don’t get me wrong, I by no means think that Vietnamese people are prejudice or unwelcoming when I say they treat me different for being a foreigner.In fact, most of the time foreigners get treated specially in most situations... except maybe when it comes to negotiating prices. I just think the frustration comes from the fact that I don’t think twice when I see a “foreigner” back in Canada, and I wouldn't treat them differently simply because they are not from Canada. Seeing people from all over the world is part of daily Canadian life, and not necessarily part of daily Vietnamese life (especially in rural areas).

Looking past these feelings of frustration, I have come to terms with the fact that if I am going to work in development, I’m going to have to get used to “sticking out”. I cannot change the fact that I am a Westerner, no matter how humble I may act or how much I assimilate myself into whatever culture I work in. As a development practitioner who plans to work abroad, I will always be a guest in someone elses' home… trying to understand and solve problems that I will probably never have to face myself. That fact both excites me and terrifies me at the same time. Placement so far has given me a little taste of what it feels like to try and solve these complex problems, but I know I’ve only scratched the surface.

What I did this Christmas vacation

Happy New Year readers! After 2 weeks of traveling around South East Asia for the holidays, I’m back home in Hanoi and it feels pretty good! I figure since a lot of people have been asking how my trip was, I should write a blog post about it (as difficult as that will be). I apologize in advanced for the length of this post, but I’m goning to try to do my best to summarize the trip of a lifetime that I had! If anything, this blog post is for me to try and document my experiences and thoughts while traveling.

My adventures began in Bangkok, Thailand where I meet my fellow INDEVOUR Darrelle, who is working in Nepal. It still blows my mind that I even got to travel with an INDEVOUR on placement in a completely different country! In Bangkok, Darrelle and I did many of the temples and museums, and took in as much history of the country that we could. We did indulge in the more touristy things like tuk tuk rides, massages and shopping on Khao San road, but that was all part of the experience for sure. We even meet up with another Vietnam INDEVOUR, Danielle, and her mom too! 

After 2 days in Bangkok, we found 2 other INDEVOURS Mahmoud and Zain and took an overnight bus/ferry to Koh Tao island where we did our scuba diving course. While the journey there was not the most fun, the beautiful beach and scuba diving certainly made it worth it! Diving has to be one of the most surreal experiences of my life. When you breath underwater, and see fish and coral reefs up close for the first time, it just blows your mind! I’m totally hooked on the adrenaline rush diving gives you, and I plan on getting my advanced certification over time. Besides diving, we explored the island quite a bit (with various means of transportation…) and, of course, enjoyed the beautiful scenery! It was a wonderful place to spend Christmas day too, and my friends certainly made it one I’ll never forget, with “presents under the tree” and everything.

After Koh Tao, Mahmoud and Zain went back to Bangkok, and Darrelle and I got on another ferry to go to another Thai island, Phuket. Phuket certainly was more touristy and busy than Koh Tao which I wasn’t a huge fan of, but we took advantage of the beach and shopping during our short 24 hours there. After Phuket, Darrelle and I hoped on a plane to Penang, Malaysia. Now I’ll admit, when I first thought of places I wanted to travel to while in Vietnam, Malaysia didn’t come to mind, but I was so happy that I ended up going there! So many things about Malaysia surprised me. The amazing public transit (we didn’t take a single Taxi while in Penang), the incredible food, and mix of cultures especially! In a single day, I bought a tailored Sari in the best Little India I’ve even been to, visited a floating mosque, and passed Hindu temples, Christian churches, Chinese girl schools, and Buddhist associations. All these cultures and religions were interacting and living together perfectly… it made even Canada seem less multicultural then I thought it was! Penang is also known for its food, and it certainly didn’t disappoint! I ate the best Indian food I’ve ever had, and tried traditional Malay dishes like Laska and Char Khoy Thao. Penang’s also one of the main nutmeg producers of the world and was part of the spice war, which I learned all about at the Penang Tropical Spice Garden! Darrelle and I also climbed the famous 5km, 30 degree, Penang Hill! The trek up was exhausting of course, but the view and feeling of satisfaction at the top were spectacular! It was pretty cool to ring in the new year in Penang too. Darrelle and I meet some other backpackers on New Years eve (some of them Canadian!) to celebrate, and saw some beautiful fireworks at the Penang City Hall.

From Penang, Darrelle and got on another plane to Singapore, where we meet up with yet another INDEVOUR, Jordan, who is working in Botswana and traveled South East Asia over her holidays too! Again, the public transportation in Singapore was awesome! We were navigating the city like locals on the subway our whole time there. We did all the main tourist attractions of course, like the Singapore flyer, Marina Bay park, the merlion statue, Botanic Gardens, and Chinatown. It was so interesting how developed Singapore was, especially after I read about the extreme poverty and struggles of the Chinatown migrants just 50 years ago.

The last stop on travels was Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Like Penang, the mix of cultures there was also such a cool thing to see! I noticed mainly Muslim and Hindus as the dominant religious groups in Kuala Lumpur, which I gathered by the dress, customs, and places of worship I experienced. My favorite part of Kuala Lumpur was the Batu caves, which was few Hindu temples and monuments built into a cave! We also visited some museums, the National Mosque, Central Market, Petaling street, and Petronas Towers.  It was so much culture and history to take in, I loved it (even if we did get trapped soaking wet on a tour bus for 3 hours in traffic)! Our trip ended really well, with spontaneous fireworks on our hostel rooftop while we were playing cards on our last night.

So that’s what I did on my crazy 2 week adventure.  I got to see and do many amazing things… and now that I’ve had some time to reflect on the experience, here’s what I think I take away from it all:     

      1. I’ve got the travel bug bad! The whole trip, I couldn’t wait to see more places, eat more new foods, and try more new things. I loved learning about the place I was visiting from the locals themselves, and reading about the history.

      2.Take time when traveling to take in your surroundings, and appreciate the little things. It reminds how lucky you are to be having the experience you are. I mean, I got to do and see things and do things not many people have, like being blessed by a Monk in Bangkok, scuba dive over Christmas, and eat lunch with a monkies right above my head in Penang… how cool is that!?

      3. I’m more adaptive to my surroundings then I thought I was. I suppose while living in Hanoi, I got pretty used to not having things that I have back in Canada (in terms of brands, restaurants, services). While traveling, we ran into some of those comforts of home. I admit I indulged in Starbucks, but I was never tempted to go into any other “Western” place I saw simply because I was missing it.

      4. North American public transit has a long way to go! If my friends and I could get ourselves around almost only by public transit in 3 different countries, it can happen in Canada too.

      5. True blending and coexistence of cultures fascinates me, especially in places where I wasn’t expecting to experience it, such as a “developing” part of the world like South East Asia.

      6.Trips don’t go 100% as planed, and you have to take the good with the bad. I may have had a bad experience with an unreasonable motorbike rental shop in Koh Tao, but I also had a great experience with the hospitality of our hostel staff in Penang! You have to not worry when things go wrong, and not sweat the small stuff. You’ll laugh about it later anyway!

      7.It’s okay to be touristy sometimes. It’s part of the reason you travel and way you take in local culture, right?! Just don’t take any pictures that will offend anyone, and do your best to follow cultural rules. Everything else is fair game
8.The people you travel with determine the kind of trip you have. I am so happy that I traveled with the friends that I did, because they are all as outgoing and open as me! They made the experience the life-changing one that it was, and I think it made our friendship even stronger.
9.As amazing as traveling is, home really is where the heart is. On Christmas, my heart was of course in Canada with my family and I missed them more than I can say. But when my fellow INDEVOURS and I were comparing our placement experiences, I would get waves of homesickness for Hanoi. Even now, I keep thinking of all the little things that I will miss about Vietnam when I have to go back to Canada in a short 3 and half months.

Wow… that really is a lot of learning crammed into two weeks. And I want to say thank you again to the friends that had this experience with me! Now that it’s all over, it’s time for the home stretch of placement, and a trip to the Philippines at the end of January over Tet for me!

Until next time, Internet…