So I've (a bit belatedly) started listening to my Vietnamese language podcasts to learn some key phrases (so far I've got "thank you" and "you're welcome") and this is turning out to be pretty difficult. Vietnamese is a tonal language so every syllable has to be the right tone, or it could mean a completely different word. I'm sure sympathetic local Vietnamese will be able to realize that the jumbled mess I make of "cam on" is actually an attempt to say "thank you." I'm interested to see how people who speak a tonal language put inflection and emotion into their speech - I don't know about you, but being a rather sarcastic person, I use the tone of my speech a huge amount in conveying my meaning.
I'm trying to figure out the best way to deal with jet lag. My problem is that all my flights together plus time spent changing planes equals 27 hours, and Vietnam is 11 hours forward, so I'm leaving at 8:15 in the morning and arriving, 27 hours later, at 10:10 at night. I'll probably be exhausted no matter what time my internal clock thinks it is and just fall asleep immediately anyway. My strategy was going to be to get a good night's sleep the night before, but now, since I'm going to see The Dark Knight at midnight tonight and my sleep schedule will be all screwed up anyway, I'm thinking that I'll just stay up really late tomorrow night and be absolutely exhausted on my first flight, so that I'll wake up for Vietnam daytime. Whatever - I bet it doesn't really matter anyway and whatever I do will probably backfire on me somehow.
Everything I'm going to pack is sitting on the floor of my room in piles. Tomorrow I just need to wrestle it into a suitcase, and on Saturday morning, away I go.
4 comments:
Wow, that's a rather long flight. I'd laugh if you told me there was a McDonalds or something in Hanoi International. Anyway, I hope the flight weren't as bad as you said.
Sleep well.
How awesome was the Dark Knight?! You are an excellent writer by the way...I'm impressed :-)
<3 your favorite roc
How has your Vietnamese progressed? Here, most haven't learned much; most of the Cam Ons sound like Game Un or Come On. Oh well. I'm trying super-hard, and sort of failing. I've gotten down some phrases for a ridiculously short conversation, I can do the whole counting thing, and I can do "please", "thank you", "excuse me", etc., I know a bit of vulgar language, and I can totally sing a song about a duck! That's about as far as my Vietnamese goes, though. I've been dubbed Nga, or Russia. A lot of the kids I work with know an equal amount of Vietnamese and English because they are deaf, so I'm learning some sign language, too. I desperately want to learn some when I get back home, but the closest I can come to Vietnamese is Chinese. Le sad.
Surprisingly, I wasn't bothered by jet lag. Were you? I mean, the flight was ridiculous, but I was busy making all sorts of friends and sleeping (and eating airplane food). Super fun...
I packed totally last minute. It was the throw everything into a bag situation. I missed a bunch of stuff, but the exchange rate is so wonderful; I've been able to buy all sorts of stuff. It's actually ridiculous; I've bought another bag for all of the nonsense that I'm bringing back home. I'm donating most of my clothes, towel, sheets to the Center, but I still need the extra bag. Travel week is going to be tough. :o
Ha, in re-reading my comment, I've realized that I've been so excited that I've ignored many rules that are necessary for an understandable message. Sorry!
Post a Comment