Islands in the stream.

After lunch, I walked out of the noodle house and down to the corner of a very busy intersection. I had to get back to work. Up to the crosswalk I went and looked across the street to my destination. So close, yet in Vietnam, so far. Hundreds of motorcycles and taxis sped past me as I tried to determine the best moment to step off the curb and wade into the traffic. In Saigon, you never, ever leave the curb and attempt a mad dash. You must do nothing unexpected. You want to do what all the 1,238 drivers within 200 feet of you actually expect you to do. That is to step off the curb at an even pace, keep your eyes on the oncoming to make sure they actually see you, and then trust them all to swerve around you as you make an even, unchanging pace across the street.

A brief lull in the flow, and I glared at the oncoming drivers and stepped off. Working my way across the four lanes, I noticed out of my peripheral vision some movement just behind my left shoulder. I looked over to see a little ancient woman wearing pajamas and the conical hat in my shadow. She had judged that her chances of getting across without fatal injury increased exponentially in the leeward of this hulking 280 pound Westerner.

Charged with this new, unexpected responsibility, I turned back to the onrushing motorcycles and cars and gave my best glare and slowed my pace so she could keep up with me. Two close calls and one threatened motorcyclist later, I made it across. I looked back to my left as the old woman flashed me a little grin and we parted ways.

Tater and Peanut

After interviewing nannies over the last couple weeks, I now learn that I actually already have a nanny.

Who knew?

Four days and counting.

Saigon Vittles

HAIKU

A dog is missing.

He strayed too far from Master.

I hope he's not lunch.

Vietnamese cuisine is a dichotomy. On one side, it is light and flavorful. The Vietnamese eat aromatic herbs like vegetables. In fact, I don't even think they distinguish between herbs and vegetables. It is all called "rau". It is hard to order a Vietnamese dish without getting some kind of antioxidant on your plate. Most of the ingredients in Vietnamese food are easily recognizable and commonly eaten in America. There are many pork, beef and chicken dishes, as well as lots of vegetarian fare. I am a huge fan of Vietnamese food, fish sauce and all.

That being said, Vietnamese cuisine has a darker, more exotic side.

Let's start with the old stereotype... thịt chó. Dog meat. They eat it here. Now, it is still sort of a novelty to many Vietnamese. It seems that the older, more traditional folks are more fond of it, like chitterlings back home in North Carolina. I am told it is a little gamey, a little bit fatty and sweet. I'll take their word for it.

Another exotic food here is the trung vit long. Also known as the balut in the Philippines, this is a mature duck egg, usually about in the 17th day of gestation. Basically it's a baby duck, but the bones and bill haven't hardened yet. Yum! The trung vit long is boiled and served in brine. I am told it tastes like chicken. As with questions about nuclear warheads on Navy vessels... I can neither confirm nor deny having eaten a balut yesterday.

Scorpions are also on the menu here. I have not found any yet, but I know where to go when I decide to try one. They are generally served fried, and have a somewhat fishy taste. They are chewy, apparently. I think I'd prefer crunchy.

Frog legs! I went to a local market yesterday (where I may or may not have encountered a balut) and generally speaking, when you buy a critter for cookin' around here, it is alive and kicking. Literally. There were basins full of live fish, and usually there were a few frogs tethered by the legs nearby. I mentioned the frogs to my guide, Duy, who turned his nose up at them. I decided not to mention that I used to gig frogs all the time in the summers as a teenager, and ate the legs like chicken. I'll come back for them later when Duy isn't around.

Geckos. Those are plentiful around here. They are not known for selling car insurance in Vietnam. If one is so inclined, one can get lunch off the apartment wall here. I have quite a few. Maybe that's how you wind up on the menu in Vietnam, historically speaking. Slither, crawl or hop into plain view and you'll get yourself barbecued. Just like good old North Carolina.

Field rats. OK, we don't eat those in North Carolina. At least not any more. These are big 'ol fat field rats. They are something of a delicacy, especially in the central region of Vietnam.

Silkworms. I can't comment. I have only eaten one or two bugs in my life, and I think I was too drunk to remember the taste. So, I'll reserve judgment on the bugs for now.

There are some other exotic foods that I have not yet seen, and I am not really looking. One is "tiet canh", otherwise known as raw blood soup. Cow testicles are also available. I ate chitterlings back home, but always balked at the cow and sheep balls. I'll rely on others to tell me of the experience.

One last exotic food to be found here is not really food at all. It is coffee. Specifically, it is called Weasel Coffee. Weasel coffee is coffee made from beans that have passed through the digestive tract of a civet. Now, a civet is not a weasel. It is a type of wild cat, but apparently we're not standing on ceremony or semantics here. Besides, it's poop coffee for crying out loud, who cares what kind of animal pooped it? I have neither tried nor am interested in trying it, but am offering the infomation up to you, dear reader, in the event you find yourself in Vietnam craving some kitty poop coffee. Accept no substitutes however, as there is fake kitty poop coffee out there, which might not have been pooped at all. Or pooped out of a less savory animal than a civet. Or a weasel, for that matter.

Amelia

I just had to stick around. After all, my new boss was very understanding; telling me to take all the time I needed. So far, State has been a very family friendly place. Either that, or my presence at my new post is just not all that necessary right away. Probably a combination of the two. Anyhow, the reason for me lingering in the States just a little longer was that my second daughter made her appearance last week. She is a dainty little thing. She is also beautiful like her sister, but of course if this opinion were part of an official proceeding I would have to recuse myself from the process.

Now, with about ten days to get acquainted with her, I'm going to leave her and head off to Vietnam. I'll see her again soon, as Mrs. Warpiper and Tater will bring her over in a couple months. When I think about the separation and feel sorry for myself I think about all the men and women in uniform who do not have the options I do; to be able to pick and choose when I leave to perform my duty. I wonder what it must be like to be away from your child for a year. Or, to not even see your kid until he or she is already smiling and starting to walk. I could have stayed longer. Looking now at the past short week that seemed like it would be so long back when I planned it, I wonder if I shouldn't have taken longer.

For the time being, I'll subsist on Skype and Vonage, and try to find the inspiration for a nickname. People are only touched with divine inspiration so many times, and I burned up a lot of it on the perfection that is Tater.

Coming out of my cave.

Winter is drawing to a close. The bear slowly comes to life from his long drowse, digs his way out of his hole, and greets the sun.

I am sorry for being underground for so long. Language training, although very rewarding, does not inspire me to do much other than go to class, study, and well, that's about it. Yesterday after a very stressful week in class, I took my language test and reached my proficiency goal in Vietnamese. Talking with a colleague who just passed his Bangla (Bengali) test, we agreed that the feeling is not like graduation from college where you feel elated. It is less of a happy feeling and more of a sensation that you have instantly lost 50 pounds. Maybe I don't feel elated because there is still so much to do. Make arrangements for packing up out stuff, moving to Potomac temporarily to await the arrival of a new baby, cleaning up loose ends at FSI, preparing for another assignment at Main State, trying to sell the truck, trying to get set up for adding another kid to the "official" family as far as the State Department is concerned, et cetera et cetera.

I have been employed by the State Department for almost exactly one year. I have yet to actually go out into the world and do what I was hired to do. That will change very soon. In spite of the fact that I have done nothing but train since arriving here, the experience thus far has been quite rewarding. That is the positive. If I can find a negative so far, it is that you are never really not busy. Even when you're not at work, there's always something that needs to get done. I addition to performing whatever your assigned duties are, you also have to take care of yourself and your family. That means that when you aren't at work you still have mounds of bureaucratic paper to move. Police work was always busy, but once I went home and took the uniform off, my time was generally free.

Not yet having been to post, I still cannot comment on the life overseas. That being said, I like to be frank about these things in case you are reading this blog trying to decide if the Foreign Service is for you. Personally, this was one of the best choices I have ever made. However, trotting the globe is not so simple as hopping on an airplane. You'll live out of temporary apartments and hotel rooms enroute to that plush, exotic locale, and once you get there you'll have just enough time to get settled before you have to pull chocks and go somewhere else. You have to condense your life and the lives of your family members down to 7000 pounds and then further condense it down to a few hundred pounds that will get you through until the 7000 pounds of your life catch up to you in Timbuktu. For me, it is an adventure. Shucking off hundreds of knick-knacks and unnecessary belongings is like shedding skin to me. For others, it is not a stable existence and therefore stressful.

In a couple days, Mrs. Warpiper and I will condense our lives down to two 50 pound bags per person while the rest of our stuff goes on the slow boat. We'll move to Maryland for a few weeks to await the new wee bitty one. A week or so ofter the baby comes, we'll separate as I go to Vietnam and leave the family behind for a couple months. After they join me, our lives will arrive on a ship, packed in boxes. Hopefully we'll finally get settled in so we can enjoy another year of feeling like we finally "live" somewhere. Then we'll move again.

Like I told you, it's an adventure.

Thumbs Up, Daddy!

Went to Chevy Chase this week to get a look at the new wee bitty one....


That's my girl!


In other news, Vietnamese training is, well, ongoing. Where all the time has gone I cannot tell, but if there is anything akin to purgatory on earth it must be the intensive language training at FSI. You are not in the hell of your former job/life/whatever, but you are also not in the heaven of your first post. In a way, it feels like I have plunged into the darkest jungle of the Congo, cut off from man and civilization and I am just waiting for a "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" moment when I come out the other side.

In actuality, it really isn't that bad, but you do seem to sort of go into a kind of suspended animation where your social and family life all grind down to a snail's pace. I also recently experienced the phenomenon known as "the wall." It was as if I just stopped absorbing any Vietnamese for a week or two, and I also felt like I had forgotten some of the simplest things I had learned in the first weeks of training. I have heard tell of tears of frustration at this point in training. Fortunately I have not melted down, but there have been moments when I wanted to go kick something, for sure.

I found that my remedy for the frustration was to review all the things I have already learned. The sheer amount of this language that I do know is very encouraging, I just had to remind myself that I do in fact know a lot of Vietnamese, and can actually have a coherent conversation using the language.

Somebody thinks we're beautiful.

Nation names in Vietnamese fall into two distinct groups:

1. Cognates

2. Names that actually mean something.

For instance, cognates are recognizable, like Thái Lan or Canada. Non-cognates have absolutely no rhyme or reason. Germany is nước Đức, Australia is nước Úc, and Belgium is nước Bỉ. (By the way, "nước" simply means "country.")

America is nước Mỹ. It never occurred to me to ask my instructor what that word actually means. During class, we translated "United States of America." It is Hợp chủng quốc Hoa Kỳ. The first three words literally mean "united states." The interesting part is the last two words. Hoa means "flower," and kỳ means "flag." In Vietnamese, our nation's name literally means "United States of the Floral Flag." Apparently the Vietnamese think we have a busy flag. I never thought of it that way, but as flags go, ours IS a little busy.

The word for America is nước Mỹ. It means "beautiful country." Americans are người Mỹ, or, "people of the beautiful country".

I'll take it.