Hanoi, Vietnam

What do you do if the volunteering gig you lined up for Hanoi cancels on you eight days prior to arrival?

You pour one out for the non-profit cultural exchange program (run by local college students) and you casually message about ten other organizations, praying someone emails you back.  Thankfully, Mrs. Dung answered that prayer and solidified (the day before I left Hong Kong) that YES, she would take me and YES, I would have a place to live.

Sounds perfect.  I’LL TAKE IT.

With no details other than I’d be working with kids and living at Mrs. Thao’s house (next to the sensory deprivation center), I packed my bags, withdrew ONE MIIIIIIILION Vietnamese Dong, and headed to Hanoi.  When I arrived, Mrs. Dung (rhymes with ‘noon’) welcomed me to Mrs. Thao’s house, introduced me to Mrs. Thao’s housekeeper (who would be making the bulk of my meals), and explained the situation.

• Mrs. Thao agreed to host me, but she’s not here.
• I might be moving to a different family in a few days…….and maybe a third family for the [lunar] New Year.
• I might have time to take a solo trip around northern Vietnam……. or maybe go on a family vacation to Sa Pa.
• Mrs. Thao’s housekeeper, Noome, is standing by to make me dinner.

This is the official start of the ‘what should I be doing?’ portion of my journey, where I didn’t know where I was supposed to go, when, and for what.  All I knew for SURE was that Noome was making fried rice with chicken, sausage, AND bacon (cuz she was very excited I wasn’t picky or vegan like the last German couple) with a side of spring rolls just for me.  (I had a banh mi at the airport, but I didn’t want to be rude on night ONE……. so I ate that whole, damn, delicious dish.  Thankfully, I stretched out my stomach in HK.)

DAY ONE as a teacher/nanny, I awoke promptly at 7:30am to the competing sounds of engines revving, cars beeping, roosters crowing, and my next-door neighbor hocking the BIGGEST loogie I’ve never seen.  (Gooooood Mooooorniiiiing, Vietnaaaaaam!)

First order of business was helping Noome make fried eggs on toast using nothing but eggs, bread, oil, and sound effects (due to a pesky language barrier).  Then, it was off to the races kindergarten daycare IN Mrs. Thuy’s old, brown puffy coat and ON Mrs. Thao’s old, broken motorbike.

Did I mention I have a sweet, new ride?  30+ years old.  Japanese high-quality.  Reeks of oil, low to the ground, sounds like 7-10 playing cards are stuck between the spokes, and 2 pieces of curling ribbon are holding something together.  Oh, and a foot crank needs to be kicked 10-20 times before the bike can start.  I love it.  It’s perfect.

where for art thou Mousety?

Remember when I said that the Bangkok motorbike scene was ‘ABSOLUTE MAYHEM’?  I clearly hadn’t been to Hanoi.  The traffic pattern in Hanoi has been compared to a ‘school of fish’ where cars, trucks, buses, motorbikes, bicycles, and pedestrians seamlessly converge into and upon each other without stopping or signaling.  Traffic lights and lanes are suggestions, at best, and if you’re ever wondering who has the right of way………the answer is EVERYONE.

Imagine a continuous stream of traffic from every direction.

no, EVERY direction

You’re boxed in by two motorbikes (all swerving the same way to avoid that bicycle that came out of nowhere or that woman who’s firmly planted in the middle of the street).  Cars are jockeying for position, buses are barreling STRAIGHT FOR YOU on your side of the road, motorbikes are zig zagging across ‘lanes’ with kumquat trees or complete dining room sets hanging off the back, and IF there’s a traffic light with a countdown timer, God help you if you’re in the intersection 10 seconds before or after the light change.

Driving a motorbike in Hanoi is downright comical.  Drivers do whatever they want to do and everyone else adjusts accordingly.

There’s no time to be scared (or to hesitate for more than 0.4 seconds), so you just do what the locals do.  You go with the flow.  If the 15 motorists in front of you are running the red light, looks like you’re running it too.  You signed up for the ‘local experience’ and today, that means shitting your pants through morning traffic.

thanks for the brown puffy coat, Mrs. Thuy!  do you have any pants to match?

Flash forward to my first day of school via the school of fish highway, I’m having a gay old time dealing with traffic from every direction (including motorbikes ZIPPING out of alleyways without braking), trying to navigate on roads that all sound the same (‘so I’m taking Le Hong Phuong to Hang Dong to Trong Dong, past Nha Trang and then a quick right on Ton Duc Thang?’), and reteaching myself how to drive a manual bike (with gear shifting) IN TRAFFIC.  On the fly.

At one point, I had a full-blown giggle attack.  My bike died at a red light and while I sat there downshifting and then FOOT CRANKING the fifteen to thirty-five times necessary to revive it……. the light turned green and cars and motorbikes started to honk and whiz by me, missing my feet by about one-inch on either side.  It was all too ridiculous.

Less funny was my first-ever motorbike accident in 11 years = day ONE in Hanoi.  A guy on a motorbike DARTED out of an alleyway, clipped my front wheel, and didn’t look back as EYE flew over the handlebars and the guy behind me flew into me.  Hip bruise, leg gash, and two dirty palms later, I dusted myself off……. accidentally snuck into the WRONG heavily-guarded kindergarten (long story) ………. before finally arriving at work.  Quite an eventful day, and it was only 10am.

After discovering that motorbike accidents in Hanoi are commonplace rites of passage that don’t receive any sympathy………I settled in at an arts & crafts table, making explosion books with 6-year-olds (thanks Pinterest!).

I taught Ruby how to braid her purple, plastic pony’s hair and explained the prevalence of the messy side bun in the American wedding industry……. I read storybooks about rabbits and ducks and monkeys who wouldn’t go to bed……. I changed Simon Says into a ‘Let’s Wiggle’ game (cuz watching kids wiggle is my new favorite) ……. but MOST of my time was spent playing zombie.

You see, I don’t have kids.  At least, none that I know about.  My M.O. with children is to rile them up, drop a chaos bomb, and then hand them back to their parents when they become uncontrollable giggle-monster energy machines.  I have zero authority and I let kids walk all over me from the minute we meet.  Oh, you want to climb on me and pinch my nose & mouth shut?  Don’t do it for TOO long, I might pass out.  Oh, you want to use my body as a punching bag or a pillow or a napkin or a cup holder or a bottle opener or anything else you need?  Your wish is my command.  (Especially if it’s playing zombie for 8-16 hours a day.)

I don’t want to brag, but I am SUCH a good zombie.  It might be my best character acting to date, judging from the INSANE AMOUNT OF JOY on the faces of these little kids.  My first rendition, not so much (I went a little too hard with the ‘eating your brains’ storyline and scared the SHIT out of two girls who didn’t want to play anymore cuz they were too scared), but after tweaking my approach, my ‘zombie wants to tickle you’ version 2.0 was much more successful.

All I had to do was squint one eye, bug out the other, and TERROR WOULD STRIKE AGAINNNN

mrs. dung was an EXCELLENT paparazzi

After playtime school was over, Mrs. Dung and I walked to our respective motorbikes while five kids chanted in unison ‘I want to go with Taylaaaaaa’.  Appreciate the vote of confidence, kids, but HOW MANY OF YOU AM I SUPPOSED TO TAKE?!?  They all rock paper scissored for who would get to ride with me, and thankfully……. I only had to take two.  (Bi, Bong, and Ice Cream jumped on with Mrs. Dung, while I was sandwiched between Ruby and Chu.)

It seemed like Mrs. Dung was TRYING to lose me.  She kept zooming through red lights five seconds after they turned red and I would have to white-knuckle right on through the intersection as cars from both sides closed in on us.  I know I said I wanted the local experience but now I have two Vietnamese children with me and one of them is singing Annie’s ‘Tomorrow’ at the top of her lungs.

Whiiiiiiiiiiiiiich was strangely comforting, so I started singing it too.  Can you imagine any corporate America merger, acquisition or sales cycle more pressure-cooked than reteaching yourself manual transmission as you dodge oncoming traffic, while keeping a lock on your Speed Racer chaperone and belting out ‘bet your bottom dollaaaaaaaaar, that tomorrowwwwww, THERE’LL BE SUNNNN!!!!!’

Let’s be clear: I wasn’t singing for Ruby and Chu; I was singing for me.

MEANWHILE, I kept seeing flashes of Mrs. Dung’s face in her rear-view mirror, watching me with this open-mouth smile and laaaaaaughing.  Loving every minute of it.  She kept turning around, as she was driving, and screaming back at me, ‘VIETNAAAMEEEEE MOMMYYYYY!!!  YOU A VIETNAMEEEE MOMMYYYYYY NOWWW!!!’ before busting out laughing again.

(Mrs. Dung was loving it primarily because she waited until DAY THREE to tell me that I was her FIRST VOLUNTEER IN TWO YEARS who was ‘brave enough’ to try Mrs. Thao’s motorbike.  But you offered it to me so nonchalantly!  You said it would be ‘convenient for me to get around!’)

we made it alive.  barely.

Alright, ENOUGH.  I’m putting my foot down.

Literally.

We made it to lunch and I have to Fred Flintstone-skid to a stop with both feet.

Lunch turned out to be the kindergarten company’s end-of-the-year banquet with catfish hotpots, roll-your-own goat spring rolls, frog legs, rice wine and bizarre party games like single lady pop-a-balloon on single fella’s lap or double-meaning compound word guess.

I didn’t know what was going on, but I knew three things:

• The pork salad, pigeon sticky rice, and fried dry rice with spicy fish sauce were pho-nomenal.
• I instantly adored the female announcer/emcee as she had this huge smile plastered on her face…….and the whole room erupting in laughter. Granted I couldn’t understand aaaaaanything she was saying, but her inflection was so cheerful and inviting and every sentence sounded like a joke.
• Vietnamese rice wine is VERY strong. Drink it out of a thimble.  Or, if you can find glassware from a Barbie Malibu Dreamhouse, use that.

To finish off day one (we’re still on day one in Hanoi), I ate dinner back at Mrs. Thao’s house with her kids (Soc, Mai Chi, and Dragon) and Noome (the housekeeper).  We watched the opening ceremony of the Olympics……. everyone made fun of me for using my chopsticks incorrectly…….and Soc (the eldest son) explained what I was eating after Noome showed me how to eat it (using variations of the word ‘ehh’).  ‘Ehh?  Ehhhhh.  Ehhh?  EHH.  Ohhhhh, that’s braised fish!  Ohhhhh, that’s guava – I thought you just bit into a LIME!  Ohhhhh, that’s green marbles!  Wait, what are green marbles?’

Two weeks teaching playing with kids was a dream.  Not enough time to fulfill my goal of raising an entire generation of Vietnamese children with thick, Midwestern accents………but it’s a start.

After work (and sometimes in-between nanny sessions), I would still carve out much-needed time to myself…….either scootering over to my favorite coffee cart and getting a 75 cent Bac Siu (Vietnamese coffee that’s more like an entire glass of condensed milk with a splash of coffee- ‘it’s coffee candy milk!’) or recharging my batteries with a sightseeing stroll through the Vietnam Military History Museum…… or the Temple of Literature…… or the Hoa Lo Prison ’Hanoi Hilton’ (that has this great ‘Finding Memories’ exhibit to increase understanding & closure from the Vietnam War) or Old Quarter or night markets or FOOD.

Vietnam is an EATER’S PARADISE, y’all, notorious for flavor (packs a punch), freshness (vegetables & herbs), and frugality (almost everything’s under a dollar).  Hanoi is known for their beef noodle pho (with Chinese fried dough soaked in the broth), bahn cuon (rolled cake/rice rolls made with various local mushrooms & sprouts), banh chung (pork, mung bean & sticky rice cakes), egg coffee (brewed coffee, condensed milk & a chicken egg yolk which tastes like a smoother, more sugary latte with the consistency of egg nog), banh cha (butter cookies made with PORK FAT), and mooncakes (how can a grilled Chinese sausage roll be THAT sweet?!).

I need to keep reminding myself that this is a food marathon……… but how can I stop eating when everything’s a dollarrrrrrrrr.

Sincerely,

Taylor

aka. Vietnamee Mommy

aka. Zombie Nanny

aka. Pho’king Stuffed

gotta go……… kids need to get home for dinner

p.s. helmets were not mandatory for the children……. but EYE wasn’t getting on without one…

#safetyfirst #notamom

p.p.s. check out my instagram @shegone.girl for more pics & videos