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Teaching children in Vietnam

Vietnam and its many quirks
Olivia Case taught in Vietnam...

"Vietnam is amazing. I love the people, the places, the shops, everything. The markets have an unbelievable variety of food, most still wriggling. You also have to be a little careful with the wine - I thought it was rice water at first but, at 40% alcohol content, it‘s a little more potent than that! Beer is the equivalent of 9p, silk scarves about 30,000 Dong (just over one English pound) and there are some lovely local artists. There is a stunning jazz club - two hours of live jazz every night. It is just mad! The only thing that is difficult (apart from the roads... you have to close your eyes and pray every time you step off the pavement) are the names of our Vietnamese friends. They are all so similar, Jung, Hung, Phung, Dzung, that I normally hedge my bets by making a random consonant sound, followed by ‘ung!‘ You always get a reply, but not normally from the person you were addressing, or even someone you know! Crazy.

The Vietnamese themselves are the most lovely people, although they do treat Westerners as something of a novelty, especially if you have light hair as they are all so dark. We have been stopped a good few times so that people can have their photos taken with us - mainly at the tourist attractions. It‘s unnerving.

Apart from that, we are having some Vietnamese lessons. Very hard - today we had six hours of teaching, and learnt how to say hello - there are eleven different ways so far, and we haven‘t even covered the whole spectrum yet. It varies depending on the age and status of the person you are addressing, and there are also five different tones, so the same word can mean different things depending on the way in which you say it - you have to be careful! Our teacher is so patient but we all ended up in hysterics today as we were finding it so difficult. The idea is that Dzung will say the same word but using the various tones, and we will repeat it after him, learning in the process. The trouble is, you say the blooming word in question about 15 times, and he will randomly yell in the middle of your recitation - "Yes! Yes! That one! That one is right!" And you‘re like, "Which one was right?" "That one, the last one" "Which one was the last one, I don‘t know which one the last one was!" And he‘s like, "The one before the one when you stopped!" And someone else goes, "No, the one before that one. The third to last one!" And you‘re like, "WHICH ONE!" And by that point, you‘ve no idea where you are, or where you were, or who you are for that matter, or even what the word was in the first place, so you start all over again!

I‘m also doing a bit of extra teaching outside of the school, to earn some extra money. My friend was supposed to be giving lesson to this family, but then more and more of them wanted to learn... aunties, brothers-in-law, sons, daughters and so on, so Sabs and I offered to help out. It was funny, two of them turned up at our apartment to start their lesson, and Edian, who is supposed to be teaching them, had gone out drinking! We had to tell them, er, sorry, your teacher‘s down the pub! We haven‘t started at the school yet but I‘m looking forward to it - apparently teachers are some of the most respected people in Vietnam.

The guesthouse we are in is so much fun - like a Vietnamese Faulty Towers. When we arrived there was no hot water, both drains in the bathroom were blocked and the sink leaked... after four girls had showered in the morning you were wading through water! The group of volunteers is very mixed, an Australian, some English people, a Belgian/American, another 28 year old Aussie Journalist and so on... it‘s mad but so fun!"




Name: i-to-i
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