May 2005 Archives

Understanding words.

What exactly happens when we learn a word? The most basic explanation is that a verbal sound is applied to an object or idea which represents the object or idea in question. Therefore, as children when we are first learning language, we must first visually see a chair and then we learn how to call this object in question by making a vocal sound. As time progresses we learn which words we should apply to emotions and feelings which we cannot see or touch, but have a presence none the less. As we grow even older, we string together or vocabulary and are eventually able to comprehend abstract ideas to which we must also apply a vocal sound or "word." These ideas can be Democracy, Socialism and so on.

Now it is relatively easy to see a chair and call it a chair. Not much brain activity is needed. However, for the more abstract and that which is not so easily understood as a chair, the comprehension of the idea may be misunderstood or not understood enough, even though we know which vocal sound 'word' to apply to it.

The two words I'm thinking of at the moment are Colony and Communism. As many of you know I have lived abroad for four years and what really keeps me motivated is the amount of learning I acquire.

Now, sticking with our focus of these two words I'd like to explain a little about the progression of my understanding of these ideas.........

Last night the we held the middle eastern carpet auction at the club. Some of the best carpets from the middle east where there and I actually learned something about them. I also saw some members dropping major cash like never before. The highest carpet went for $10,000!!!!

I would have gone home but I promised some friends I would meet them at the Underground for a drink and supposedly a party. It turned out to be a party celebrating five years since it's been open. I had a good time but about 11:00pm was beat and when I want to go I just go. It's too difficult to say goodbye to everyone so I just left. I then got a call saying I "ditched" them and they wouldn't forgive me unless I went out to Pham Ngu Lao which is near my house. So I did and didn't get to sleep until 4am. I'm getting too old for those kinds of nights and the only thing that comes out of it is that I'm tired the next day!!!

At the moment it is pouring buckets of rain which is my favorite weather. I love a good storm. Since it is now the rainy season in Saigon we get storms like this almost everyday which is great! They don't last too long unlike the drizzle that lasts for weeks back in Ohio.

Finally, question of the day.
Is "intrical" a word? I've checked every dictionary but this word is not included just yet. However a check on google turned up a lot of usage. We think it's a combination of "integral" and "intricate" but I think we will soon see "intrical" in the dictionary. Language is fluid and changes over time. I am firmly against the grammar nazis who refuse to accept new words. If you look back and see how English has changed over time it is amazing. The only caveat it to continue some structure of language that promotes brain activity and not dumb it down too much. The English language is full of "descriptives" which the normal population is only able to use a fraction of. Speaking of which this post isn't too descriptive and my word choice poor. But I'm just going to blame that on last night and my brain not working properly at the moment.

--- This post (albeit very long) is in reply to a comment left on my post (Life in Tokyo vs. Life in Saigon) on Tokyo Metblogs.

Reply to Carl's Jr.

Your reply sounds suspiciously like something my dad would say. I'm half tempted to try and trace the post and see if it doesn't originate from the Buckeye State. You're suspect!! :)

And like many of my dad's statements yours also gave me something to think about. You are right in that sometimes there is no comparison. But I think that would be a better answer if we were having a chat and comparing cities over coffee with no plans of actually moving to these places. For me, a comparison is necessary (even though my original post was extremely simplififed) since it ultimately determines where I will live

Concerning the "rut." It is possible to fall into this situation in any city, in any profession. However, I think it is important to ask yourself which location is it easiest to get out of. For example if I was in a town where the industry collapsed due to intl. trade should I stay there and try to get out of the rut or go to where there is work? The older generation was only able to look as far as neighboring towns. Slightly younger to other states. But it is just begining that people are now able to look across the world for adventageous locations,, a concept which the older generations cannot comprehend....

Today was a pretty productive day. It also happens to be my birthday which means I'm getting old. I'm now 28 and have spent almost 4 years abroad. Where does the time go?

Today we had a meeting with the Singapore health group who are really driving into the Vietnamese market. They are trying to drum up business for the excellent public hospitals in Singapore since they can do procedures that Vietnam is still incapable of. They would like to cooperate with us since the membership at the club is of very high quality and also use our facilites for some of their seminars.

Tonight was also golf night and it was good to get out of the city and get some fresh air. I used to be a pretty good golfer but really haven't played in 4 years. I can still hit the long ball but my accuracy and putting are suffering.

In most foreign countries, obtaining a work visa is like embarking upon a long quest fraught with peril and pitfalls. Unless of course you work for a huge multinational who has a very highly paid Human Resources staff. I do not work for a huge multinational at the moment and I also have another big setback in the case of the work visa. Most of the world sees a US passport like one sees a winning lottery ticket. But I have had this ticket my whole life and have taken for granted this literal Pass (port) which grants me entry to most places in the world. However, at the moment the US has been making it very difficult for foreign workers to obtain the proper documents to work. Guess who pays the price for this! American ex-pat workers do! The more the US makes it, the more difficult foreign governments make it for us. So I would like to tell you a tale of my journey in obtaining the proper documents from entry visa (easy) to work visa (mission impossible)

I'm baaack!! Long time without a post here but I felt a little like an outsider since as most of you know I'm taking a hiatus from Tokyo life and living here in Saigon, Vietnam. But I have often had to explain why I moved to Vietnam if I loved Tokyo so much. Therefore, I thought I would put my explanation here for all of you who are curious about life in other Asian countries and considering leaving Tokyo for a bit.

The MAIN reason I am taking a break from Tokyo is I was afraid of Corporate Japan. I spent three years teaching English and two learning the Japanese langauge and culture and then I up and left! Why did I do this? The answer lies in the quality of life....

Today I went to the 15th of May School Fundraiser. Pictures here. The school is a grassroots charity, which helps disadvantaged children in District 1, HCMC. The kids put on an excellent show of Hip Hop dancing and diversions such as juggling and acrobatics. There were also silent and live auctions plus an excellent buffet provided by the Caravelle Hotel.

Last night was an interesting one. I attended a "Software Solutions" companies opening party at the Sofitel and met a few guys in the computer industry. It was only Japanese and Vietnamese except for me and one other guy. The presentation was also only in these two languages and it reminded me of my extremely poor vocabulary and how hard it is to maintain said vocabulary.

I had to duck out at 8:00pm to go meet two friends who were in town from America at the Saigon Saigon bar. One is a Phd. candidate at Yale and her boyfriend who is a civil rights lawyer also from Yale. We had a really great conversation drawing parallels between the "Communist" system here and the Capitalist system in the United States. It was interesting to find that as they can search houses here and we think of it as "Communism" the same thing happens in the USA, especially in minority neighborhoods. I guess the pretext is finding "illegal aliens" but they could say that here as well since some foreigners have not registered their guests/residents in their house properly. So we foreigners tend to think of this as "Communism" but it's not really that different from what goes on in the USA. Another is corruption. Here if you are connected your life will be easier on all fronts. It's the same in the USA is it not? My lawyer friend informed me of much of the rampant corruption going on with the police especially in Chicago. We also discussed free speech. There are some things better off left unsaid here but I heard that some right wing companies in the USA refused to do business with the "lefties" and in certain parts of America it is Taboo to speak about certain things. I don't want to get more specific on this. Finally, there was the idea about workers rights. Here the government has laws to protect the worker. In the US back and England during the Industrial Revolution things were not so good for the common worker. Also, in the 1920's (not so long ago) there were also teams of police called "Strike Breakers" on the payroll of the big companies. I read an article once that Capitalism was able to adapt and get labor laws in place. However, the author was unable to see that Communism was also able to adapt as it is doing now with opening the economy and relaxing many laws. My own conclusion is simply that any system can work so long as you take out human greed which at this stage in our development is impossible. There will always be greed and therefore every system is a bit flawed.

After the Saigon Saigon bar my friends had to go since they had to catch a flight in 8 hours. On the way out I met some more friends who were going to a different bar. But on the way there I saw some other friends drinking at the Qing wine bar and sat with them for about 2 hours. Now I'm up at 10:40am and gotta be at the conditioning class at the gym. Hope I have the energy for it!

I had so many problems with my last MT configuration that I had to reinstall everything. So I lost some of my old rants, but have pasted them in the excerpt....

oui, je peux parler français un petit peux aussi. Mais aunque j�Laime parler le langue français bcp, tout les français ici peux parler l�Langlais trés bien. Donc j�Lai pas bcp de fois oú je peux practiquer ce langue. Donc je voudrias utiliser ce blog pour écrire en français des temps en temps. Je sais que mon français c�Lest un catastrophe comme mon professeur souvant dit, mais c�Lest dommage parce que je vais practiquer ce langue jusqu�La je parle bien.

El razón que tengo este catagoria es solamente que a veces quiero practicar mi español. Es una pena para mi porque me gusta estudiar idiomas pero todo el mundo habla íngles bastante bien. Entonces tengo este catagoria para no olvidar este idioma y tambien a veces quiero hablar sobre gente que no entiende Español!

Today was actually not so adventuresome. However, today the Buddhist funeral infront of my house ended. The old lady who spoke to me in French not 6 months before and told me to "Firmez le porte doucemont" passed away. They then erected a shrine and had chants, prayers and visitors for three days. It was really something to experience and I had never seen anything like that before.

Also, two days ago I went to the Norwegian "Constitution Day" reception hosted by the Ambassador of Norway. It was very nice but in a town like this it's not uncommon to be able to go to these things if your an expat. This town is pretty small and if you can network and get a job in a foreign company it's not difficult to be invited like in other cities. I really never thought I would be able to attend events like that though at age 27.

Today I decided to try and tackle my movabletype problems one more time. Before, I had trouble with the comments, archives and basically any link that Movabletype was supposed to take care of. So I deleted the whole thing, downloaded the new 3.6 version and reinstalled everything. This time I made sure everything was uploaded in ASCII mode that was supposed to be and lo and behold, everything works now!!!!! I can't believe it! So now here I am at 11:00pm trying to replace all my old links and add more content. I'm pooped.