Dear Friends,

Once more, much time has lapsed since my last report. Let me work backward this time.

Yesterday, was a humourous day at school. Our Korean students learn French, while all others learn Vietnamese. My grade nines have taken to calling each other by animal names; a practice birthed by the fact that one of my students looks like a bunny. In drama class, after the former student returned from French class (during which she learned the word for a male chicken), she declared to Nguyen, "You are a coq." I casually and almost without thinking told her that one should not really say this in English, because the aforementioned word is slang for penis. My more English savvy, yet still conservatively Vietnamese student, hid their faces in their hands, while my lower level EFL students looked at me with bewilderment. My most proficient English speakers then attempted to explain in the most circuitous ways, that certainly avoided any proper or improper names of sex organs, what exactly the faux pas was. Upon actually realizing her slip of tongue, Alice let out a chorus of "I didn't mean, I didn't mean, I didn't mean." To alleviate her embarrassment, I gladly shared a censored version of my near slip up with the dignitary's name at the Grand Opening Ceremonies (see an early entry in which I regale you all with the tale of how I nearly called the most important man in Vietnamese education Mr. Boob Pussy by means of incorrect pronunciation). She seems somewhat relieved.

Thankfully, due to these circumstance, we had already established and clarified the term "private parts," so that today's conversation was slightly less awkward. My students are currently making a movie poster about a short story centering on Scrabble. For this assignment, one of my students had googled images related to the game, and had discovered a treasure chest of Scrabble related comics. One comic featured the tag line, "This always happens to me at family game night" and displays a teenager with the letters posed and staged to spell "clitoris." My student was ready to paste this puppy to her poster, so I had to provide a small sex ed. vocabulary lesson, once more.

In addition to taking on a new career as a sex education teacher, I am pursuing lots of new and interesting things.

Last weekend, I went with Kay and Cheratien to the Gallery of Fine Arts. The place is a rustic, peacefull, relatively unpatroned, and compelling colonial relic--yellow chipped paint, blue glazed cement pillars, broken yet beautiful stained glass. Just enough decay to make it magnificient

For dinner, Thao Pham took us to the northern outskirts to a restaurant in the midst of a park.
We paid an entrance fee to eat a gluttonous amount of happiness-inducing Vietnamese
food. A cool evening and a walk through the park.

I met with an interesting group of individuals last Wednesday for a "life coach" session. Interesting. I gleened some excellent insights and met some interesting people.

Friday was Mid-Autumn Festival here in Vietnam. The kiddies made and decorated dragons, then we paraded through the streets. A dragon dance troup and drum team came to the school and performed in the street as our children watched from the sidelines. I was almost crying with glee while watching the young children's faces and hearing their screams of joy when the dancers passed them by. We had mooncakes and hot tea, then my grade nines played hide and seek in our anything but ample sized room. A good friday all in all.

This past Sunday, Jeremy and I attended church at Notre Dame Cathedral. Jeremy picked me up on his bike, and I enjoyed the breeze against my bare legs. We arrived just in time to hear the choir's opening song, which was quite nice (I haven't heard an overwhelming amount of good Vietnamese singers). The sermon was a frightening conglomerate of all expected cliche conservatisms of the Catholic church: a talk on the sanctity of marriage, which openly condemned divorce in "any circumstance" and pointedly stated that marriage or sexual relations between "men and men" or "women and women" sends the actors to hell. I found myself with similar considerations as when I attended church in Kenya-- often "imported" religion is played out as a stock character sketch, consciously activating all the most obvious controversies. I was more intrigued than upset. More contemplative than indignant. We then had lunch at one of my favourite restaurants in the city, which has just relocated. The new location is less raw, which I think is a shame, but it was nice nonetheless. We sat in the park and listened to a troupe of young males picking away at their acoustic guitars. I navigated the street, realizing that I am more familiar with the city than I had thought. Headed to the bookstore, then to meet our friend Thao. We went to our friend Hand's house, who just moved. We had a celebratory lunch. She had cooked us an amazing spread, and we all enjoyed cool tea and food for some hours. We discussed all matters of life--domestic abuse, homosexuality, sexuality, slang phrases, and the list goes on. We laughed a lot, as well. Riding back to Thao's house, I sat with ease on the back of her bike, and thinking about how comfortable and zestful life is here. Jeremy took Cheratien back home, and I took a sai om ride. My driver speedily navigated traffic, landing me home in record time. He was thrilled when I gave him an extra 75 cents above our negotiated price.

Things on the go:

The school clothing drive is coming to a close. I have convinced about 4 other teachers to join me on the trek to the remote village this coming weekend to do some teaching and deliver the clothes. Right after school, we will take a van and drive for about 6 hours. We will stay at a small home, then take another two hours to reach Don Duong Village. We will spend some time teaching and getting to know the Khoi children, distributing clothes, and providing them with lunch. Not a bad way to pass a Canadian Thanksgiving. Still, I will miss apple picking and eating copious amounts of food at Aunt Marie's: a Thanksgiving classic.

We are planning a halloween "Trick-or-Treat" for the scholarship program.

Planning a day for the Ben Tre children to come to HCMC--things are shaping up, with many sponsors and great activities.

I have been volunteered by my principal to be on an executive committee to spearhead projects to increase parent-teacher communication---a difficult task in a school where the majority of parents do not speak English.

Cheratien and I will be responsible for the Christmas concert, which we have been told must be spectacular. Ekkkkk. We are going to cultivate our stars in our after-school drama club: a club which is shaping up to be a significant amount of hilarious!

Anyway, I am going to do some pre-bedtime reading and head to bed.

Much love always!

K