As I was passing by the American Consulate last week, I saw something that really made me sad. There was a young Vietnamese girl just coming into her mothers arms and putting her head on mom’s shoulder. She had a few tears and with all the documents in her hand I knew what had happened.…… Continue reading Saigon Stories – Heartbreaking
Month: July 2005
Japan Stories – Trouble in Roppongi
Trouble in Roppongi By tok_matthew July 30th, 2005 @ 6:43 PM Life in Tokyo Every month I receive an update from the American Embassy about Visa info, security situations, etc. I usually never read it since the visa info doesn’t apply to me and the rest just tells us that the rest of the world is still…… Continue reading Japan Stories – Trouble in Roppongi
Japan Stories – Climbing Mt. Fuji
Climbing Mt. Fuji By tok_matthew Perhaps one of the most exciting, yet least attempted things to do while visiting Japan is climbing Mt. Fuji. It is quite close to Tokyo and only takes about an hour and a half to the fifth station of Mt. Fuji by bus from Shinjuku Station. I attempted the climb and…… Continue reading Japan Stories – Climbing Mt. Fuji
Institutionalized
The one problem with blogs is that we do not revise and correct what we write. An idea comes into our head, and we write it down, without being able to correct, revise or find faults with the idea. But then again, that takes a lot of time and perhaps, it is beneficial to not…… Continue reading Institutionalized
Influences
Tonight I watched a movie about delinquent high schoolers who were taken to an “Enlightenment” session where the evil principal put in brain implants to make them “good” students. This got me thinking about influences or perhaps the more disparaging word called brain washing. We grow up surrounded most likely by a group of people…… Continue reading Influences
Saigon Stories – Food Posion
Here in Saigon the food is excellent but one must be careful where one eats! A lot of foods have natural bacteria and most westerners are not accustomed to certain types of bacteria found in the food here. It sounds disgusting but every six months foreigners have to take some medicine to “de-worm” themselves because…… Continue reading Saigon Stories – Food Posion
Saigon Stories – Annoyances living in Saigon
Living in Saigon isn’t all flowers and fuzzy bunnies. Sometimes there are annoyances as well. Overall though, there is no violence and it is very peaceful here. But I’d like to list some of the things that can be annoying. 1. Police raids on bars – Sometimes the police will enter a bar and all…… Continue reading Saigon Stories – Annoyances living in Saigon
Saigon Stories – Thoughts on Poverty
For most of my life I had defined poverty as having little monetary means. I would look at how the “poor” lived in the ghettos and slums and the violence that raged there. However, speaking with a good Vietnamese friend yesterday at an extremely modest, (those in the west would say poor) beer hoi I…… Continue reading Saigon Stories – Thoughts on Poverty