August: Life Outside of Work and Home (aka “Culture”)

I am attempting to categorize life in Vietnam in order to share my experiences. Not sure if this culture post will work, but here goes…

Our first few weekends we explored District 1 with friend Helena Spector–art museums, restaurants, etc. Lots of walking and learning to navigate traffic. During the week days, we explored the area around our apartment in Thao Dien (District 2)–small boutiques, shopping areas, food stores and, again, restaurants. Lots of walking and taxis. (I have yet to grab a Grab.)

Navigating traffic, eating awesome food, learning to walk around broken and trashed sidewalks is easy. Learning to think in dong rather than the dollar requires little mental calculations. There are some aspects here that are more difficult–Like professional work expectations. Learning to navigate Scout’s international school is challenging, too–online always shows the best of a place, but reality is something else. For example, based on last year’s brochures, there should be many outside of school day activities. Great! Reality: Except for some team sports, nothing is offered outside of school time. I have been looking for interesting activities in our district, but am finding little.

I am appreciating how much Anchorage has to offer, and also am understanding that because we know Anchorage, we also know how to partake in all that it has to offer. I need to be patient.

I keep thinking about culture. One definition is “What people know and believe, what people do, and what people make and use.” I will likely end up writing an academic post about what we are experiencing, so in order not to bore any readers, I will stop now and instead post some pictures to give you a sense of some limited ideas of the cultures I am experiencing 🙂

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