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[flyingmonkey]

I was a little sleepy this morning, browsing through the books at the Fahasa bookstore on Dong Khoi. Standing at the cash register, waiting for my change, the cashier gave me an extra 10.000 dong note. I looked at the change and said, �Oh, too much, here you go,� and gave her back the note. �Oh, so sorry,� she says, and I replied, �Oh I�m not sorry, it�s okay,� laughing. �Must not be Vietnamese.� A big voice booms behind me. I am darkhaired and not very tall. I could be Vietnamese from behind. I turn to see a tall American fellow smiling. I wasn�t smiling back. �Excuse me, what did you say?� He says that for someone to give back the mistaken difference on a transaction would have to be a very honest person, so I couldn�t be Vietnamese....

I parted from him as quickly as I could and left the store. A few minutes later, as my mind cleared I decided to go back into the store. I told the staff what had happened, it was difficult as they needed a few of them to understand me and piece together what had upset me so; I really needed to let it out or it would ruin my whole day, and I managed to tell them that they should not give this man any more business, that his utter disrespect for their country belittled all of us....

Too often when I meet such blatant prejudice, I am dumbstruck by such expressions of certainty about their projections and rationalizations and overt racism. It is so hard to believe how thoughtless and obtuse we still are, how easy it is to deny a whole nation their humanity and dignity, all the while reaping the benefits of their largesse.
http://vietnam-d.blogspot.com/

[flying low]

.......................

[sigmoid]

[time to teach]

I taught in Hanoi in 2004-05 and overall had a good experience there. Being a foreigner in Vietnam, or any other foreign country where we teach English, is often a hard, mean, tough wake up call to the diversity of life and the characters we meet and run into along the way. It can take years of experience, and then some, to get used to the indifferences and insensitivities of other travelers, adventurers, and expats who like us are playing out the cards of their own lives in Asia.

To the OP, your feelings and emotions are valid no matter what you write or how others respond to it. Rage can sometimes be a good thing if managed and expressed in positive ways. But your rage seems to reflect another sort of prejudice and misunderstanding that we�re all guilty of at times � self-righteousness.

That American fellow has the right to express his feelings � which in this case were probably based on fear � just as you have the right to express yours. Regardless of his motives, nationality, or the true nature of his character, he was saying something that he thought was right or funny or true at the time, and in the end it was just one man�s opinion. That�s all it was, just words coming out of a man�s mouth. Sticks and stones�

The world is and always will be an outhouse of personal opinions. As human beings we all say and do stupid things. In a word, none of us are perfect. As we go through our lives as aging expats like me or fresh college grads making their way in the big, bad TEFL world, consider another adage from a self-help book I read many moons ago: it�s not what happens in life, it�s how you take it.

[snollygoster]

The theoretical questions "If you found a wallet full of money in the street, what would you do?" and "If a shop assistant gave you too much change would you give it back?" have been explored many times in Viet class-rooms. I have always been amazed that close to 100% would keep the money, even if they thought the shop assistant or the wallett loser would be inconvenienced.
Another question I have asked for debate is "If a stranger had an accident near you, and no one else was around, would you take his/her wallett?" Results were usually better for this question, and only 60% would take the wallett and leave the victim to die.
Opportunity, plus the motive of some extra cash when there is so little, are amazing motivators.
Therefore, although I too would like to think most people care, I have to understand the ugly American's observation from practical experience.
Personally, more than once in Vietnam have I seen accident victims robbed.
This is NOT an opinion, it's a practical observation, so please don't post about my terrible opinion.

[1st Sgt Welsh]

[deadlift]

What I find curious is why the OP is linking to a "blog" which has just one article published, from three years ago. When I read this post the first thing I thought was that there hasn't been a Fahasa on Dong Khoi for close to two years.

[snollygoster]

In HCMC my home was invaded and my wallet stolen.
Within about 2 hours, two policemen knocked on my door with my wallett and its cards intact. The cash was gone so sho can say who took that out.
There was also a guy in handcuffs. I guess he was the thief. I had to say whether I knew him or not- I had never seen him before to my recall.
Seems the moron tried selling my credit cards on Pham Ngu Lao, and one person he tried to sell to was a plain clothes policeman. KACHANG!

So not EVERYONE will keep what they can get from a wallett.

Sargents story also reminds me when I lived in HCMC I was pretty well known by the locals at Ben Thanh market, so usually got local price. However, I often saw foreigners buying stuff, and getting quoted prices well over what I would expect to pay. Because those prices were still much lower than for similar goods back home, I never interfered, feeling the market operator has the right to do this. In the case Sergeant
mentioned I would probably have intervened too, as that was a blatant rip off. I can't say why I think its different, but to me it is.

Maybe something to do with the approach- In the market the buyer does the approaching and is invited to enter into a buying discussion, in the case of the street vendor, its the seller pushing the goods onto foreigners.

On PNL there used to be a gang posing as Buddhist monks (they never said they were but dressed in a way that suggested it) and they would stick a bowl in the foreigners faces to put money in.
My understanding was that monks dont need money but food, so one was really disgusted when I put a load of rice in his bowl-it dirtied up his money!

[1st Sgt Welsh]

Good to hear you got the wallet back Snollgoster.

[kurtz]

Am I an ugly expat? Well, I don't think so but I've been forced to have become ugly from time to time. If someone speaks to me like shite, I'll respond in kind. Like today for instance, I was yelled at to move my motorbike, I responded with an F off. If the person asked me nicely, I would have moved it for sure. This kind of behavior seems quite common in Hanoi but I give it straight back at them. Does this make me ugly?

As far as the honesty here goes, well that's quite a touchy issue. I've been robbed here and I'm sure I've been overcharged many times too. However, I have been given back money on the odd occasion too after giving a 100,000 note instead of a 10,000. Calling all the locals scammers, cheats and liars might be bigoted but they don't call in VietScam for nothing.

Money is the new religion in Vietnam. It's all I hear the locals talk about; how to get money, how much money they can save, showing off how much money they have (mmmm, why so many high end luxury cars in Hanoi now?); they love the stuff.

Just because some expat let off a little steam while waiting in line didn't warrant the holier-than-thou rant in the blog. Some people just need to chill out and stop being so sensitive.

As far as touts go, well, some people rate the aggressiveness of touts to the mindset/character of the people. There are many poor countries in the world but from my observations, the touts in some countries are worse than others. Does this say something of the character of the individual touts or the culture of the people?

[I'm With Stupid]

Hmm, I went to Thailand recently, and while I found the touts much less aggressive, but the attempted scams were much worse. In Vietnam, you might get the odd individual trying to rip you off, but in Bangkok in particular, it's like the entire tourist industry is set up to rip foreigners off, with everyone helping each other out with their elaborate, multi-layered rip-offs.

Incidentally, I've also done the "what would you do if you found a wallet?" thing in class, and found it to be similar to what I'd expect back home. Although I'm quite surprised how many of them said they'd hand it into the police. I wouldn't trust them to look after a pencil. In fact, if it was a choice between the police and keeping it myself, I'd keep it myself in this country.

[snollygoster]

Tourist scams in Thailand are very well organized-sophisticated is probably a good word although most of us think of sophisticated in a positive way.
In Vietnam, there is not the level of sophistication-Its a very individualist approach for quick and immediate return to the individual. There is little "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine". Even in ligitimate business there is little sophistication like that. There are some instances where a taxi driver will get a commission for bringing a tourist to a hotel, but thats as deep as it gets.
The Cyclo Mafia in HCMC is a good example- the only reason the cyclo driver in the shiny cyclo (Mafia) gives to the passenger to change cyclos is that the "farmer" is too old, or his cyclo is too dirty etc.
Touts almost never give the tourist a reason to buy his/her goods apart from "You buy from me- help me".
I met an immaculately dressed little boy tout in D1 who sells the usual, but he speaks English well, and does a lot of business because he gives valid selling reasons to buy his stuff. Example, "You will feel greatly refreshed with a cool drink from my cold ice-box- let me get that for you now". If you say no thanks, he politely thanks you for your time and says good bye. Next time you see him, who do you buy from? Right- not the whinging woman who tries to brush him aside and tells you how she wants some money from you.
A littler more sophistication would portray these touts in a more positive light and they would get better results.
In Danang I recall some touts selling beads on the beach, some kids approached and an older woman came and whacked them with a stick so she could sell her rubbish to the tay. She got really cranky when I called the kids back and bought a set of beads from each of them, and told her to get lost.

[1st Sgt Welsh]

[time to teach]

[I'm With Stupid]