Saigon Sci-Fi Orange

Sunday 7^th November

My teenage students asked me tonight why I chose to come to Vietnam, and didn’t I think I would find the pollution, climate and all the other problems of living in a developing/communist country too difficult and challenging. They seemed to accept it when I explained that I’ve only spent one of the past six years living in Britain, so although Vietnam may be more difficult to live in than Italy or Japan, it's a challenge that I do have some experience of.

Ironic then that, following a massive electrical storm this evening, I arrive back in Backpackerland to a power cut. I’m writing this (in Word to copy, paste and upload later) by the light of a single candle. A candle, moreover, which has just started spitting alarmingly. Excuse me while I go and move that plastic bottle sitting next to it…

… Talking of electrical storms and things spitting alarmingly, the rainy season here continues, and has even apparently settled into a pattern over the last few days of bright, clear, hot mornings with beautiful blue skies, broken around 3-4pm by torrential rain, gloom and lightning. Those of you on Facebook may have seen my status update yesterday. Just before dusk the sky turned orange. Saigon Sci-Fi Orange. I have never seen anything like it. It was a lurid, dark, acidic something-very-unpleasant-and-acrid-is-burning-somewhere orange. Luckily, this weekend the rain has pretty much stopped by the time I finish work at 8.30pm, leaving me to splash home through the puddles in my flip-flops; there being nary a taxi of any kind – two or four-wheeled – to be had when its wet.

Of course, although I did tell my students some of the story of how I found this job I didn't divulge the shallow truth that I was dazzled by the pictures of Vietnamese beaches on the ILA recruitment website. Strange, really, considering I’ve never been a beach baby. I did, however, tell them the main thrust of the story. That after a particularly bad, stressful week in Italy, Baggy and I both spent the weekend on the Internet looking for other jobs. And the aforementioned website made it all sound too good to be true. Okay, I didn't tell them that exactly either. I actually said it waxed lyrical about how wonderful Vietnamese students are. Which it does.

And, so far, I haven’t any reason to contradict it. Sure the kids can be lively, and much of Induction week was taken up talking about classroom management issues, and the kinds of discipline/rewards systems teachers here use. But compared to some classes I’ve taught (naming no names!) they are quite easy to control. Plus with all kids classes (including the 18 year olds, for heavens’ sake) you have a TA (Vietnamese teaching assistant) in the room with you – two in the 4-6 year old classes.

This probably represents one of the biggest teaching challenge for experienced teachers. Although in Italy the teachers we work with on the PONs are in and out of the classroom all the time, somehow this more permanent presence feels different, and slightly awkward at first. The TA’s role includes not just sharing the responsibility for discipline, but also all the attendance registers, admin and, even setting and marking homework. For the teacher, this feels double-edged. On the one hand, you're freed up from the irritating paperwork following each lesson. But on the other, it feels oddly as if you’re not completely in control. And, of course, the TA’s vary in what they do and how well they do it. The previous lesson notes for the kindergarten class I covered yesterday said simply ‘colouring activity’. In a two-hour lesson?!! I think there might have been more to it than that!

I also wonder how far their presence in the classroom gets in the way of you’re developing a relationship with the students. We shall see…

For me, too, there is the swing back to the more games-orientated approach to EFL in Asia, after the necessity of keeping the wild animals in their seats in Italy. How many board races can you fit in to a lesson before the kids get bored (probably long after you yourself have)? And, if you do a grammar presentation, is the TA sitting there ready to bitch about the lack of games?

Away from the classroom, my main challenge is now finding an apartment, and the next question is can I afford to stretch to somewhere as plush as Steve and Louise’s? Whatever, the answer to that one (and all advice welcome) I am getting really tired of the guesthouse now. The noise, the hit-and-miss cleaning, and the still living out of a suitcase. I do know that I won’t really feel settled here, and by extension won't be as happy at work, until I do find somewhere permanent of my own.

However, compared to the dull hum Steve reports hearing from their 16^th floor apartment, the noise here can, at times, be almost entertainingly surreal. I was woken up before seven the other morning by what I can only describe as sounding like a deafening New Orleans-style Jazz funeral procession with extra drums! I have no idea where or what it was coming from. I was still too close to unconsciousness by the time it stopped to drag myself out of bed and find out. It was one of those times when you gradually become aware that the noise isn’t part of your dream but is coming in from outside. And yet, I have a feeling it made more sense in the dream…

Well, the candle is burning down, my laptop battery is running low and the power shows no sign of coming back on. In fact, there was a huge bang outside about half an hour ago. I think ‘tis time to call it a night. Tam biet for now. xx