International

Xin Chao!

Chuc mung nam moi! Or, in english, happy new year! According to Vietnam’s Lunar calendar, January 23rd marked the beginning of 2012: the year of the dragon. As I arrived in Vietnam three weeks ago, I had the pleasure of taking part in many Tet holiday traditions and getting a deeper insight into Vietnam’s culture. Not to mention the rare chance to ring in 2012 for a second time! As I’m working in the countryside of Hanoi, it was even more crowded then usual. Workers from the city during this time return back to their homeland to spend time with their loved ones. The centre, by contrast, was eerily quiet. Consequently, exploring by foot or motorbike was much more convenient!

It was extremely obvious during this time just how much of Vietnamese society is oriented around the family. On new years day families will walk around to all their friends and relatives’ homes in the neighbourhood, drinking tea, eating treats, and toasting to good health.My host family was kind enough to introduce me to their extremely big (as in numerically, not physically by any means!) extended family who have all welcomed me with open arms, and even sometimes with “lucky money” offered in decorative red envelops. I also got a first hand look and taste of the Tet “drinking culture” that we were given a “heads up” about during our orientation. I think it will be the first and last time I drink red wine before 10 am on a Monday…Tet is also extremely festive. Families will purchase large kumquat and peach blossom trees to place in their homes and decorate like Christmas trees with many flamboyant ornaments. It’s been amazing watching people cart away these massive plants on their motorbikes (the preferred and most common method of transportation).

Now that all the Tet craziness has calmed, work has resumed and today signifies not only my third week in Vietnam but my first day at work, in the new year, in our new office! My placement is in the Student Services Department at the North Thang Long Economic-Technical College, in Dong Anh, just on the outskirts of Hanoi. The college offers training and employment for students according to market needs in order to ensure a stable livelihood and income for graduates. I am mostly responsible for soft skills training, assisting with english classes, and helping to sustain the college’s (relatively new) counselling service. All these aspects of the mandate are generally geared towards providing a competitive advantage to the students when they enter the labor market, and improving their overall welfare. I’m excited to get going on all my tasks, in partnership with the staff and students! Wishing you all a happy, healthy, and wealthy new year!

Allie

I cannot believe I will return to Canada in less than a week. My time in Vietnam working at North Thang Long Economic Technical College was too short. But it was long enough to gain valuable work experience and an appreciation for Vietnamese culture. I witnessed first- hand Vietnamese people’s amazing work ethic and their dedication to learning English.
Here are some highlights of my internship experience since my last blog post:

His Excellency the Right and Honorable David Johnston, the Governor General of Canada, state visit to the Socialist Republic of Vietnam included a luncheon with Canadian volunteers in Vietnam, which I had the pleasure of attending. His Excellency was interested in chatting with Canadian volunteers in Vietnam, and I spoke with his Excellency and discussed my work in Vietnam. It was a wonderful event, where I learned about all the different projects other Canadian volunteers were involved in.

For the past couple of weeks, I had been planning an English Game Day Event for the students and college staff at North Thang Long Economic Technical College a part of the Teacher’s Day celebration. Its purpose was to promote and encourage all to learn English. I wrote a proposal to World University Service Canada (WUSC) to fund the event. WUSC fully supported the event, and even gave us Canadian prizes to distribute to the winning contestants. The event was divided into two parts. The morning of the event consisted of many English games such as Bingo and giant word jumbles! In the evening, we played a Canadian themed Jeopardy game with the students. Overall, the event was a great success and I hope future volunteers will plan similar events in the future.

At the college, I am also responsible for the college’s first English club. To make learning English more fun and dynamic, I decided to organize English outings for the students. One club meeting we went for Karaoke, where all the students were required to sing at least one English song! I also organized a trip to the Hanoi Zoo. I invited other WUSC volunteers in Hanoi to join as well. I made English handouts for the students which included animals and questions to ask the other volunteers to encourage them to practice their English. All the volunteers and the students had a wonderful time at the zoo.

Overall, this has been a wonderful experience. I had the opportunity to live with a host family and get truly immersed in Vietnamese culture. The college staff was so kind and courteous to me. I will never forget their generosity. I encourage all students to participate in an internship abroad. I am currently in my last semester of studies and this was the highlight of my university career.

Since the beginning of my internship I’ve made many interesting discoveries. Although it seems like it’s now, at the end of the term of my mandate, that I make the most important ones.

I realise now that Vietnam was all together not only a discovery. I say that because I didn’t have any prejudice on Vietnamese or their culture before starting this adventure. Prejudices being based on cultural aspects, everything was new to me. I had no idea of the socio-economical reality of the majority of the Vietnamese. I had no idea on their beliefs and rituals. The only few things I knew about Vietnam is that they eat Pho, but I would have never guessed it was for breakfast! At first I didn’t know much about Vietnamese culture, and now I can say I know quite a bit!

It took time for the students to open up to us as foreigner/volunteers on their socio-economic reality. We knew that they were working alot, going to school at the same time and probably not making enough income for their hard work. It was when I had the opportunity to listen to the class presentations that I helped the students. I offered a workshop on Presentation & communication for them to be ready. I got to know that the students that are also working 8 hour days and earn about 2 millions Dongs (100$) a month and need to pay from 1 million to 1.5 million Dongs for their living accommodations, not including food and expenses, which doesn’t leave much for savings. The majority of the students are far from their hometown and their families and are trying to build a future with the resources they can access.

The students also shared a new reality that touches many families due to the economic development the country is focusing on. Everybody is working full time and most need a second job to be able to fulfill their needs. It was shared that the quality of the relationship in the family has been regressing. The parents are not present as they used to be for their children’s education and socialization. I think that this could eventually bring the young generation to gain a different culture than their parents. Not receiving the full attention from the most important aspect of socialization, their families. Also,the new generation is more and more in contact with the media and internationalization of culture. This is building the personality and values of a generation that will differ from the values of the generation preceding them, and could nourish new conflict within a family.

I discovered a few hidden aspects of Vietnamese culture since the beginning.
A big percentage of the population practice the ritual of worshiping their ancestors by praying, burning incense and offering gifts on the altar they have for this purpose in their homes, on the death anniversary and on every 15th of each month. Members of a family have a reunion each death anniversary of one of their members, have a big lunch, pray and go to the cemetery to bring offerings to their ancestors. This explains the big respect they have for the elders.

I had the chance to get to the south, in Ho Chi Ming City, which used to be called Saigon. Going there, I got to discover a very different Vietnam and noticed there are some ‘’natural tensions’’ between people from the north and people from the south, since I was able to be around many Vietnamese from the north while being there. The history explains this tension between these two parts of Vietnam where at one point separated and in conflict with each other. I grasp that these conflicts were present only two generations ago, must be imprinted in the collective memory. Finally, as much as the north venerate Ho chi minh, the leader of the revolution which won Vietnam’s independence… people from the south don’t relate to him as much.

In terms of my internship itself, the last month has been very charged and overwhelming. After planning my activities, the last month was the time to give the final result and lead workshops with the students. I am proud of the work that I did and the tools I developed for my placements. The students got to develop soft skills that will serve them to be efficient when working in team, by participating in team building activities. I also got to prepare a manual on team building that is being translated and given to the student population in order to facilitate their own teams build activities and this will also be available in English for future volunteers. I got to conduct many activity days with the teachers and other volunteers and had another workshop with the students on communication and presentation.
Finally, I am currently in the ‘’wrapping up’’ state of my internship, I finalized my activities, working on my reports and planning my goodbyes. As much as they will be sad goodbyes, I am excited to go back home. Friends and freedom are two things that I found difficult to come across here in Vietnam due to the reality of the culture that I had to accept. Before my internship, I was ready to live a new experience, live culture shock and feel a certain discomfort. I am now ready to trade this for a feeling of freedom, a social life, new knowledge, friend and family, and the comfort of feeling home.

I am only six weeks into my placement, but so much has already happened!

With some Canadian volunteers, I went to Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island! We swam in the South China Sea, explored the caves, lay on the beach, went squid fishing, and enjoyed some delicious seafood. This weekend, I am attending a community college conference with my supervisor in Ho Chi Minh City. I hope to acquire knowledge to better assist my college and learn new teaching methodologies. In the upcoming weeks, a mountain trek is planned for the college staff, where we will participate in English activities as well as team-building exercises.

My placement is at North Thang Long Economic Technical College. Soon after arriving at the college, the students performed at the college’s opening ceremony. The festivities included: pageants, traditional Vietnamese songs and dances, as well as hip-hop free style dancing! All the talented students pleasantly surprised me. We also all enjoyed a very lovely luncheon with all the guests. Afterward, the teaching staff took another volunteer and me for karaoke. They sang some lovely Vietnamese love songs, while I listened attentively. This is an example of how welcoming the teaching staff has been during my stay. Any future intern will receive the same wonderful treatment.

I am settling into my placement quite nicely, and have a wonderful and busy schedule! At the college, I am responsible for the English club; English events, assisting in the English classes, as well as aiding my college in proposal writing. English Club is a great way for me to interact with the students. We play a variety of educational games, as well as practice conversing. Each week we have a different theme in order to bring unify to each session, and I enjoy starting the meeting with an English song. Proposal writing is an asset to the college in order to request funding. In the upcoming weeks, I will co-facilitate a proposal-writing workshop, and will learn a great deal of knowledge, which I will relay to the college. I will also assist on proposals writing by the college to request funding from a variety of Non-Profit Organizations. In Vietnam, Teachers’ Day is November 19^th. I am coordinating an English event, to celebrate this joyous occasion. This celebration will include many Canadian activities and educational English games. I hope this event will be a great success, and I will upload photos of this event for my last blog entry.

Nous voilà déjà au mi- stage!

C’est incroyable comme le temps passe vite. Après avoir accordé quelques temps afin de concrétiser quels seront les projets à entreprendre en lien avec mon mandat de stage, j’arrive à concrétiser les projet a entreprendre afin de répondre a mon mandat de stage en lien avec les besoins de mon placement de stage. Après quelques semaines d’expérience dans un milieu de stage, je vois qu’il faut garder une ouverture face à mon emploi et ma gestion de temps. Comme mes activités dépendent de la disponibilité des professeurs, je dois demeurer disponible et avoir un horaire flexible.

Suite à une rencontre avec le responsable des affaires étudiantes et l’organisme d’accueil (WUSC), nous avons choisi de prioriser des activités de « travail d’équipe », de préparation à l’emploi et un séminaire sur l’inégalité entre les genres car ces activités répondent bien aux priorités de l’organisme d’accueil. Pour l’instant nous nous concentrons sur ces points. L’administration du collège souhaite que toutes les classes puissent bénéficier des ateliers et des séminaires.

J’aurai deux groupes d’étudiants à animer chaque semaine afin de les amener à gagner quelques aptitudes face à la résolution de problème, la résolution de conflit et la communication. Je dois donc trouver et mettre en place de nouvelles activités pour chaque semaine. (J’aime bien le fait de revoir et de pouvoir travailler avec les mêmes groupes. C’est ainsi que j’ai pu noter le cheminement du groupe et des participants. De plus, je me sens de plus en plus confortable et accomplie au fur et à mesure que j’anime plus les activités. Les étudiants ont bien aimés les activités et ils ont apportés plusieurs points intéressants sur le « développement » apporté par les activités (confiance envers leurs pairs, confiance en soi, estime de soi, écoute, collaboration, etc.) J’ai pu remarquer leur intérêts et participation grandissants lors des activités. Ces commentaires/reproches/feedback positif etc. me font voir que les activités font une différence pour ces gens et l’effort que je mets dans la préparation et dans l’animation d’activité vaut la peine. C’est valorisant…

Au début de mon stage, mon superviseur désirait que je participe aux classes d’anglais, mais après avoir vécu une semaine normale d’activités de groupe, nous avons dû apporter des modifications à mon horaire de travail .  J’ai établi avec lui que je n’assisterais plus aux cours d’anglais car, selon mes observations,  le groupe n’avait besoin que d’une des deux stagiaires. J’ai donc proposé d’investir ce temps dans mes recherches et dans ma planification d’activités et d’atelier que j’animerais auprès des étudiants.

Finalement, du côté découvert culturel, le fait de vivre en famille d’hébergement ajoute une belle perspective à la culture que nous découvrons. Les gens sont très accueillants, sympathiques, et surtout patients! La discussion à l’aide d’un dictionnaire Anglais-Vietnamien n’est pas toujours évidente, mais elle est bien enrichissante! Nous découvrons de différents paysages, saveurs, rythmes de vie, culture…

La découverte et l’apprentissage me font grandir ☺
Tam Biet !
Mélodie

Xin Chao (Bonjour)!

Il y a déjà deux semaines depuis mon arrivé à Hanoi.

Un mot pour définir cette ville serait “CHAOTIQUE”!
En y arrivant, je me suis retrouvée parmi les scooters motorisés, les voitures, les embouteillages, le bruit des klaxons, l’absence de code de conduite de la route; c’est un sentiment d’inconfort que j’ai premièrement ressenti. Autrement, c’est avec les petites découvertes que le Vietnam est arrivé à me charmer.

Parmi les petits charmes du Vietnam, le fait de pouvoir s’assoir sur des petites chaises d’enfants pour manger de la soupe traditionnelle “Pho” le matin parmi les Vietnamiens, et de découvrir leur bouffe et les fruits. Voilà que mon expérience de stage à l’international s’avère être toute une aventure, surtout lorsqu’il faut sans cesse communiquer à l’aide d’un dictionnaire Vietnamien- Anglais!

À l’accueil, WUSC a offert une semaine d’orientation afin de nous préparer au stage, et pour nous familiariser à la culture vietnamienne et au travail à l’international. Les informations présentées sont très pertinentes car nous avons pu créer des liens entre les objectifs des différents organismes engagés, les politiques sociales et priorité gouvernementale et nos mandats de stage.

Lors de notre orientation générale, nous avons eu l’opportunité de rencontrer une Docteure qui travaille dans un centre médical en intervention face au VIH Sida. Elle a su répondre à nos questions et nous a informés sur les questions sociales liées au VIH Sida, le pourcentage de la population rejointe et atteinte, les régions les plus affectées et les liens entre le VIH Sida, le trafic et la toxicomanie.

Nous avons également eu la chance de rencontrer certains membres de l’ambassade canadienne qui nous ont informé sur les intérêts du gouvernement canadien au Vietnam ainsi que les priorités de l’ACDI. Connaître ces points d’intérêts m’ont permis de faire le lien avec mon mandat de stage. Certains commentaires et informations soulevés ont piqué ma curiosité parce que j’ai pu remarquer certaines contradictions entre les engagement et les intérêts des gouvernements. En somme, on parle de monoculture dans le centre afin d’augmenter l’économie versus le notions de durabilité et d’autonomie pour les communauté des régions du nord. L’intérêt des compagnies minières internationales en réponse à un sous-sol riche versus l’investissement économique ou des ressources humaines des pays étrangers dans le développement du Vietnam.

Lors de la première semaine, il m’a été frappant de voir le grand nombre de femmes qui travaillent dans les marchés d’alimententation ou dans la rue a vendre tout se que l’on peut imaginer, des produits ménager au cure-dents ! Je me suis demandée où travaillent les hommes? En réponse. j’ai appris que le plus grand secteur d’embauche au Vietnam, est l’industrie d’assemblage; le Vietnam fait l’assemblage de produits importés des autres pays de l’Asie.. Depuis quelques années, le (gouvernement du Vietnam travaille à assurer une meilleure qualité d’environnement de travail et un meilleur salaire pour ces employées. Ceci fait en sorte que certains investisseurs perdent leurs intérêts face au Vietnam et vont vers d’autres pays de l’Asie afin d’obtenir une force de travail moins coûteuse. Je vais approfondir plus amplement cette question/enjeu dans mon rapport de stage car mon placement de stage est dans un collège technique donnant la formation aux futurs travailleurs de ces industries.

Actuellement, mon plus grand défi est la barrière linguistique. Il faut ainsi demeurer très attentifs, calmes et essayer de trouver plusieurs synonymes lors d’échanges avec les Vietnamiens, garder son calme et trouver plusieurs synonymes. Ceci dit, je suis enthousiaste de découvrir les réalités que vivent cette population et vivre une nouvelle expérience.

Tout reste à voir!
Tam Biet! (Au revoir!)
Mélodie

It is about mid-way through my time here in Vietnam, and so far, the experience has been amazing and enlightening. Since I cannot go into detail about everything, I’ve decided to focus on communities.

Probably the thing that has really hit me most is the presence of a real community of ex-patriots – people who reside either working, studying or volunteering in a country not their own. I had no idea that this even existed. There are people from all over the world who have hardly anything in common except for the fact that they are in the same location as you are, and can communicate with you in English. Suddenly, when you are so far from home and friends and family, these seemingly small commonalities build quick strong bridges.

Perhaps it is only out of necessity, but people are very welcoming to others and so willing to include another foreigner into the pack. Some are here for the longer term, others for shorter stints like myself. The thing I most hoped but least expected to find when I came to Hanoi was a community I felt I belonged in.

The Vietnamese people I have interacted with are also very warm and welcoming. Many people in my area know one another and will stop to say hi when bicycling to the market, or will sit outside together playing Co’ tu’o’ng, or Chinese Chess. There is still an intense gap between myself and the community in which I live – mostly because I am the only non-Vietnamese in my neighbourhood, and certainly because of the language barrier. Every day that I walk to work I am greeted my some new person just saying “Hello!” for the pure entertainment of having me turn around and wave or smile or respond back with “Xin Chao!” to which they laugh and snicker amongst themselves. Sometimes I feel like a novelty, other days like a movie star.

The community I have found at the college I work in is very much similar among the students. My supervisor, however, speaks English well enough to communicate effectively, and translates much of the conversations I am present for. I am so grateful for this. Many times I have been invited to dinners and celebrations as a special guest, and am overwhelmed by the hospitality I receive. The office atmosphere is very warm and without many of the social boundaries between bosses and employees that one would expect in Canada. It is common for the Vice Rector to come into our International Cooperation Office and sit and chat with my supervisor over green tea and longan fruit.

Overall, the relationships that I’ve made between fellow WUSC interns in my area, friends from the college, my host family, select English speakers from the community gym I joined, as well as the ex-pat scene have made this adventure memorable and taught me more about the value of genuine connections, exchanges, and interdependence. I’m looking forward to experiencing more!

I am only six weeks into my placement, but so much has already happened!

With some Canadian volunteers, I went to Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Island! We swam in the South China Sea, explored the caves, lay on the beach, went squid fishing, and enjoyed some delicious seafood. This weekend, I am attending a community college conference with my supervisor in Ho Chi Minh City. I hope to acquire knowledge to better assist my college and learn new teaching methodologies. In the upcoming weeks, a mountain trek is planned for the college staff, where we will participate in English activities as well as team-building exercises.

My placement is at North Thang Long Economic Technical College. Soon after arriving at the college, the students performed at the college’s opening ceremony. The festivities included: pageants, traditional Vietnamese songs and dances, as well as hip-hop free style dancing!  All the talented students pleasantly surprised me. We also all enjoyed a very lovely luncheon with all the guests. Afterward, the teaching staff took another volunteer and me for karaoke. They sang some lovely Vietnamese love songs, while I listened attentively. This is an example of how welcoming the teaching staff has been during my stay. Any future intern will receive the same wonderful treatment.

I am settling into my placement quite nicely, and have a wonderful and busy schedule! At the college, I am responsible for the English club; English events, assisting in the English classes, as well as aiding my college in proposal writing.  English Club is a great way for me to interact with the students. We play a variety of educational games, as well as practice conversing. Each week we have a different theme in order to bring unify to each session, and I enjoy starting the meeting with an English song. Proposal writing is an asset to the college in order to request funding. In the upcoming weeks, I will co-facilitate a proposal-writing workshop, and will learn a great deal of knowledge, which I will relay to the college. I will also assist on proposals writing by the college to request funding from a variety of Non-Profit Organizations.  In Vietnam, Teachers’ Day is November 19^th.   I am coordinating an English event, to celebrate this joyous occasion.  This celebration will include many Canadian activities and educational English games. I hope this event will be a great success, and I will upload photos of this event for my last blog entry.

Two weeks ago, in the midst of a rainstorm all the World University Service Canada (WUSC) volunteers arrived. After an extensive day of traveling, I had to carry my luggage up four flights of stairs to my accommodations for the WUSC orientation week, before departing to my host family and placement tomorrow.

Since then, WUSC arranged some wonderful excursions for the volunteers. I have been sightseeing and getting well acquainted with the city. We visited many museums, markets, temples, and pagodas. The culture shock hasn’t been too drastic because WUSC has done such a great job of integrating us into Vietnamese culture.

The only difficulty has been getting accustomed to the traffic, which has been described by other volunteers as “organized chaos”. Here to cross the road, you have to step out into heavy traffic, and hope that the motorized vehicles either stop or swerve out of the way. I am surprised that none wears a helmet to get across the street. The only advice given to us, was walk with conviction, and do not hesitate.

One thing that required no adjustment was to the delicious food and coffee! I have been eating noodles and pho non stop since I arrived! I love the food so much that I took a cooking class at a culinary school where I learned how to make northern style spring rolls (Viet – Nem Ha noi).

We also received Vietnamese lessons, and every chance I get – I practice with the locals. Unfortunately, they have difficulty understanding me since my pronunciation is incorrect. Hopefully by the end of my internship I will be able to act as if Vietnamese is my native tongue.

The shopping here is phenomenal. No matter what your style is – you will be able to find what you want at affordable prices. Unfortunately, if you are not viet sized you may have a bit of a blow to your self-esteem. I wouldn’t consider my size morbidly obese – compared to the average Viet – I am huge. Sometimes I don’t even fit into the XXL size, and am forced to seek comfort in a bowl of noodles- thus feeding the cycle of insecurity.

At first when I was a little bit home sick, I Invited a fellow volunteer for some Vietnamese shopping. For me shopping is the ultimate pick me up. To me, being surrounded by so many beautiful clothes is such a comfort. To go to all the stores and see such an extensive collection of fashionable items at really affordable prices – all my worries and concerns vanish into the 94% humidity. So I suggest for any volunteer to figure out the one thing that warms their heart, to find it in their city, and go do it whenever they feel home sick.

It has already been almost a month since I took the long trip home from the other side of the world.  Aside from the initial jet leg and the lack of fruit, I am glad to be back home, and to see my friends and family.  Since I Had classes as soon as I arrived back to Canada, I had no choice but to adapt quickly back to Canadian life, however, I am often still reminded that I am not in Vietnam any more (mostly when I cross the street).

I would have to say that the two main lessons that I learned from my internship are to be patient and to ask as many questions as possible.  From experience and from what I have heard is common for other interns too is that plans change, don’t happen at all, or there just simply are no plans at all.  With discovering this early on in my internship, I realized that there was only so much that I could do in such situations, and rather than stressing about, I just had to be patient and go with the flow.  Also, with going abroad, I was obviously exposed to many new things which left me wanting to know more.  So as advice to other interns, ask as many questions as possible, and take every opportunity that comes your way because before you know it you’ll be back in Canada.

In terms of ending my mandate, I found it very difficult to leave Vietnam since I had developed so many close friendships over the three months.  Reflecting back on the past three months it all seems so surreal and difficult to put into words, but nonetheless this internship is surely something that I will remember forever.