no longer in vietnam

so, i guess this is my farewell post in this blog. it will be rather sad, as i don't know what to say to adequately describe my experiences there and my (short-term) reflections on them.

first of all, i'm back in the san francisco area and awake at 5 am because of jet lag. but it's ok because it's given me some time to think about what this whole trip was and such.

on the plane to taiwan, i sat next to two elderly women from washington state. they were rather nice and well-meaning, but i came to thinking a lot about our conversation. their first question was, "do i live in vietnam?" and then, later on in the conversation, they noted that i "speak very good english." though i know that they meant well, it got me thinking about assumptions that we make about people when we first meet them. they saw an asian face and assumed vietnamese because we were flying from vietnam. they saw an asian face and assumed english as a second language. i kind of liken it questions like, "so you're going to a be a nurse?" when people, generally older, find out that i'm in medical school because they see a female.

however, i can't say that it's only ignorant americans who do it. in vietnam, i was also looked at as a foreigner. either, i am immediately recognized as vietkieu, or i am not even recognized as vietnamese but korean, japanese, thai, or chinese. several times in the marketplace, i had someone ask me where i learned to speak vietnamese. then, when i tell them that i am vietnamese, they giggle and say that they thought i was ___ (fill in another asian ethnicity). either way, i am not full vietnamese to them because i didn't grow up there. it's sort of the same feeling that i sometimes get in the states, where i am looked at differently because i am asian. apparently, no country can claim me as their own and i can claim no country as mine.

another thing that i had time to reflect on during my flight and my sleeplessness is my desire to work abroad. though two months is not very long in terms of work time, it was long enough for me to form my own opinions about living as a foreigner (albeit, a semi-foreigner) and working in that country. meeting expats, meeting country people, it's hard for me to really put together an idea in my head of how to be able to keep in touch with the western world and live a "western style life" while living in a developing country, "helping the people," and not feel like i'm an ignorant westerner who thinks she knows everything. it's definitely a difficult balance to strike and if i were in vietnam, or any other place, any longer, i don't know how i could justify it. yes, i could say that i'm doing great work, but there are people of that country who could be doing the same work. living and working there would continually be a push-pull dynamic between feeling "at home" and feeling like a foreigner. you would want to make yourself feel comfortable, but no matter what you do, others will see you as a foreigner and never regard their country as yours.

so, i've had a lot of time to think. not that i'm totally disregarding the possibility of living and working abroad for extended periods of time. rather, i'm rethinking my motivations and the pros/cons of commiting to such a thing. after all, if i plan on being surgeon general or director of the WHO, i have to spend some time abroad.

all in all, i have had a wonderful experience in vietnam. it was full of ups and downs, revelations and self-reflections, and great adventures. my vietnamese has improved (though it is still very 2nd-grader-ish). i made vietnamese friends. i got to connect with relatives in vietnam. and i got to experience a different country on my own terms, in my own time. i wouldn't have traded this experience for anything in the world.