Week 1: Freshers Week!!

First of all, apologies to those who have been patiently waiting for the first instalment of this blog, from the moment I arrived it has been a bit of a rollercoaster!! I will try to retrace my steps and thoughts from the last 8 days...

The journey here was long but relatively painless... Bristol to Heathrow (2hrs), Heathrow to Kuala Lumpur (12 hrs), Kuala Lumpur to Ho Chi Minh City (2hrs) and finally from the airport to my apartment (1hr). I was on the same flight as the head teacher (Mr) Gary and his wife (Mrs) Mandy as well as a new drama teacher (Miss) Linzi. This was the first time I had long hauled and despite having an early start, I was unable to sleep on the plane but 4 movies and kept me going for the duration! 17 hours worth of travel and we were taken straight to the school for a brief tour. Then it was back to the apartments.. all of 2 minutes walk from the school - happy days! I'm on the top floor of a recently built apartment block and I was pleasantly surprised at the standard of my apartment - spacious living room with kitchen, TV, internet access and then separate bathroom and bedroom with two balconies! The fridge was stocked with essentials and there was a fresh roll of toilet paper! I tried to get a little sleep but knew to combat the jet lag I couldn't afford myself too much.

The school is situated in district 7 of Ho Chi Minh which is pretty much in development with lots of apartments being built by the Vietnamese. They have come from rural areas and live in tin huts by the building sight, washing themselves with hose pipes at the end of each long day. Waking up to the sound of metal on brick was not in the brochure!

The city centre is a cheap taxi drive away and luckily all the taxis are air conditioned - although the drivers do not speak a word of the queens and can't read maps so it has been quite fun trying to get here and there! The most obvious and craziest thing you notice here is the sheer amount of mopeds and scooters zipping to and fro across very busy roads - making crossing the road a hair raising experience - the schools advice is to just walk in a straight line and do not stop!!! Traffic lights exist but are vastly ignored and bikes seem to just skilfully and nonchalantly weave in and out of each other, honking horns not in frustration but to make others aware of their presence! It's a must see!!

After my brief siesta we met some more new teachers who were already here. We met Mike who was the first here (arrived 4th august) and was here alone until Adele and Danny arrived (both having taught in China for the passed two years). We headed for Phu My Hung which is the nearest place to district 7 with any life and, wanting to ease ourselves into the culture gently, landed in an English pub called The Tavern where I had fish and chips!! Well, don't want to shock the body too much to begin with! We enjoyed a few local beers and got to know each other, before heading back to catch up on lost sleep.

Breakfast came in the form of a local noodle bar adjacent to the school. The bar offers a range of Vietnamese style cuisine at anything from 20000 - 40000 Dong (around a pound!) and beer or coffee for around 50p. It was clear this place was soon to become a regular haunt and stop off point for a morning/afternoon iced coffee or evening beer.

After breakfasting we decided to see what District 1 had to offer. Armed with sunglasses and a pocketful of Dong (given to us by the school to tide us over) we got a £2 taxi and set off for the bright lights of Ho Chi Minh City. WOW... what a sight! On top of the traffic, I was overwhelmed with the amount of street sellers, rickshaw's, lack of pavements and the cacophony of shops that were selling everything you could ever want or need. Bartering is the done thing with the street sellers and shops in this area, westerners always ending up paying more than locals - I have yet to practice my bartering skills yet through politeness and the fact that the starting price seems to be relatively cheap anyway! The people in this area speak no English and write prices down on little notepads for the negotiations to begin. We took an overpriced rickshaw around to a mini market and eventually we able to pay and shake him off after following us around for at least half an hour offering to show us the sights of Ho Chi Minh!

The Vietnamese are a very proud nation with a gulf in classes highlighted by how the separate classes live work and breathe in the same space... You walk past a BMW dealership and next a dried squid seller. Tin shacks in residential areas pepper high rise luxury apartments with security guards. The gulf in class is obvious but does not seem to faze the people - the police seem to always be sat outside cafes sipping tea and smoking, content that everything is all in order.

By the next day, more people had arrived and it was time to stock our fridges. A troop of us headed to Lottomart, a supermarket on the edge of Phu My Hung with a department store and multi-cinema complex attached. All the films are in English with subtitles and cost just over a pound. This was a more traditional supermarket where things were a little easier to find if not a little more expensive than the market stalls. Chickens feet, crocodile and some exotic looking fruits were all available as well as less outlandish products. After checking out, although still a modest sum to spend on a weekly shop in comparison, I realised it would be cheaper to eat out than it is to taxi to the supermarket, buy your produce and then prepare it! Well, saves on washing up I suppose!!

Crate of 333 beer (local stuff) and shopping under arm we made it back to the apartments where we met even more new arrivals. In true British fashion, we decided the easiest way to get to know each other was to hit the town! So 16 people, most new to Vietnam, some (including me) new to Asia set out to... The Tavern! (Come on, it was the only place we could direct the taxi driver too!) We all sat down to line our stomachs and find out each others names, where they're from etc. The Tavern does also do some Vietnamese food, so I plumped for the bangers and mash! After a few Tiger beers, the hardcore 9 detached from the group and ventured into the centre to find the Irish pub Sheridens where en route we bumped into the U19 Vietnam football team celebrating something or other... a few more beers, a cheeky sambucca and a jaegerbomb and we were all set to descend on the cities infamous Apocalypse Now nightclub. Drinking, dancing and pool ensued and we were suitable ready for Bedfordshire, citing 'jet lag' the guilty party for how we would feel in the morning!

We did not start our induction until Friday so a few more days exploring, settling in and getting to know our new colleagues was just what the doctor ordered! Time to also try to make my apartment look more 'homely' - this was difficult seeing that the 35kg I had packed into my suitcase had to be reduced to 25kg before they would let it on!

Induction day was very chilled out, we met the SMT (senior management team) and they talked about the school and gave us a guide on how to survive in 'Nam. Lunch was had in the school canteen and we were then shown around the school. I have my own classroom!!!! (have not had one to call my own for 3 years!!). The evening was another Irish bar affair with some existing staff as well as the SLT (oh and also some sambucca!)

Saturday morning consisted of the head and his wife taking us around various places to buy food and necessities. We started off at a local market which offered a variety of essentials such as toiletries, towels, earthenware, cheese and live seafood killed and prepared in front of you! The smell was hard to take after a night on the town, but we all managed to hold in there... even when we saw live frogs tied together (so they couldn't hop away, although I thought with a bit of teamwork they could all jump one direction at the same time and jump free - I didn't mention this to them in case their executioner got mad). We moved on to the next bowl (next stage) where they had been skinned and decapitated! Unbelievably, they were still moving.. urrrrrrrgggh!! We moved swiftly on to the Diamond Plaza which is the swanky mall in the centre near the Notre Dame Cathedral. Here was like walking into a posh London Mall with all the names you would expect at the prices you would expect, it felt like a total warp out of HCMC. Gary then took us around to a couple of Deli's and Gourmet shops where you could buy western products like cereal, English cheeses and MARMITE! His justification for giving us the western tour was that we would find 'Vietnam' ourselves by walking down the streets and in 6 or 8 weeks we may be feeling a little homesick so would be grateful of a few home comforts!

Back in time to watch a couple of LIVE Premiership football games on ESPN which we get FREE in our apartments and in the local pubs. We get 3 live games on a Saturday and 3 on a Sunday!! Good times!!

Sunday saw 8 of us follow the advice of this year's lonely planet guide and Taxi out to a water park (which has a loop the loop!) on the outskirts of HCMC... only when we got there it had been demolished! We found another one a little closer but the Taxi ride ended up costing us over 500000 Dong! (30000 to the pound, you work it out, I've had to do it enough times!) Anyways, a good time was had and we were back in time for the last 2 footy games.

Monday was paperwork day: due to the communist nature of the country we have to have all of our certificates notarised and legalised and undertake a rigorous medical before they can issue our work permits. I had been fairly slack and not got mine completed so the school are taking care of it! In the evening, 4 of us decided to go for a 'quiet' drink and headed to our beloved Phu My Hung where it was a bit too quiet so I was persuaded to head to the famous 'backpacker district'. WOW... totally different from what I had seen so far.. a wealth of bars with neon lights, blaring western classics and people on the streets beckoning and grabbing you into them offering two for one drinks and all that jazz. We thought it was very funny as we were now being treated as visiting backpackers when really WE LIVE HERE!! Few beers later and we were on our way back to more secluded and sedate district 7.

It feels like I have been here for ages but it's only been just over a week. Serious stuff starts tomorrow at school so the 'settling in'/holiday is drawing to a close and the work begins. One thing I haven't mentioned is the weather. We are in 'rainy' season: It has rained once since I have been here and temperatures are topping 30 nearly every day and the humidity is at least 80%. This means my maid has had to do my washing slightly faster due to my limited wardrobe I brought!

Think that is all for now... to those that were considering joining me out here at some point, there is plenty of space in the apartment and I guarantee you will be blown away!

All for now, promise to not leave it too long until the next instalment!! Hope you are all well and enjoying the summer.

Dorian

Ps: Check out the photos added to 'blog 2'