Tuesday, March 30, 2004
Landed
Just barely
I am now in Vietnam and, though I've only been here an hour, have a growing list in a small notebook of observations and things to blog.
Thai Airport: There was a golf course in the middle of the runways. I mean, like, 50 meters away from the landing strip. Sign says it's Thailand's oldest golf course. I immediately think about security concerns. Also, in the airport bookstore, there were books like "Classic Gay Love Poetry," "Sex and Power," and "Japanese Photography" that looked a lot more like pornography (but classy, high class porn at that).
At one point, immediately after thinking about something good/how I was fortunate in some way (I forget what it was now), I found myself saying in my head "illhumdolliah" and then mentally doing the sign of the cross (forehead, sternum, left, right).
Wondering: Will Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Thai men profess their love on the streets to random passerbyers (namely, me)?
Remembered: A Vietnamese girl from City High, exceedingly quiet, with broken English; she kept to herself, but now I'm thinking it probably wasn't voluntary isolation, but the confused, complicated space of being uprooted. I hate to admit that I forget her name now. She wrote a story in English class about fleeing on a boat from Vietnam. Or maybe that was from a newspaper profile of her. The details are blurry, but she came to my mind.
I noticed the stream of lights on the road from the plane and was confused because they didn't move in the way I'm accustomed to...because they weren't cars--they were motorbikes. Lots 'n lots of motorbikes. In Malaysia, helmets are required (unless you're Sikh and wearing a turban). Here, I saw only 2 helmets. Face masks (presumably to protect lungs from pollution) were far more common. But if you ask me, the greater risk comes from having your head bashed in from an accident...Three people to a bike...a few women riding in style, side-saddle. Even some old-school pedal bikes (which I haven't seen in KL).
I have this slight superiority complex when it comes to the backpackers I see heaving their big bags around town, holding maps and looking up and down streets. The fact that I live there somehow elevates me. Well, this morning when I left my house, backpack strapped on, I realized I'd have to come to terms with being in that self-denigrated position. To any other person on the train, I was just as green to Malaysia as the next foreigner (and I didn't have my handphone to pull out to prove otherwise, a favorite trick of mine that shows I fit in.)
Joan Didion: "Tourism: Recolonization by any other name?"
Just barely
I am now in Vietnam and, though I've only been here an hour, have a growing list in a small notebook of observations and things to blog.
Thai Airport: There was a golf course in the middle of the runways. I mean, like, 50 meters away from the landing strip. Sign says it's Thailand's oldest golf course. I immediately think about security concerns. Also, in the airport bookstore, there were books like "Classic Gay Love Poetry," "Sex and Power," and "Japanese Photography" that looked a lot more like pornography (but classy, high class porn at that).
At one point, immediately after thinking about something good/how I was fortunate in some way (I forget what it was now), I found myself saying in my head "illhumdolliah" and then mentally doing the sign of the cross (forehead, sternum, left, right).
Wondering: Will Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Thai men profess their love on the streets to random passerbyers (namely, me)?
Remembered: A Vietnamese girl from City High, exceedingly quiet, with broken English; she kept to herself, but now I'm thinking it probably wasn't voluntary isolation, but the confused, complicated space of being uprooted. I hate to admit that I forget her name now. She wrote a story in English class about fleeing on a boat from Vietnam. Or maybe that was from a newspaper profile of her. The details are blurry, but she came to my mind.
I noticed the stream of lights on the road from the plane and was confused because they didn't move in the way I'm accustomed to...because they weren't cars--they were motorbikes. Lots 'n lots of motorbikes. In Malaysia, helmets are required (unless you're Sikh and wearing a turban). Here, I saw only 2 helmets. Face masks (presumably to protect lungs from pollution) were far more common. But if you ask me, the greater risk comes from having your head bashed in from an accident...Three people to a bike...a few women riding in style, side-saddle. Even some old-school pedal bikes (which I haven't seen in KL).
I have this slight superiority complex when it comes to the backpackers I see heaving their big bags around town, holding maps and looking up and down streets. The fact that I live there somehow elevates me. Well, this morning when I left my house, backpack strapped on, I realized I'd have to come to terms with being in that self-denigrated position. To any other person on the train, I was just as green to Malaysia as the next foreigner (and I didn't have my handphone to pull out to prove otherwise, a favorite trick of mine that shows I fit in.)
Joan Didion: "Tourism: Recolonization by any other name?"
