So, she was trying to set us up.

So yesterday I went on what I'm pretty sure Mrs. Binh wanted to be a date. It wasn't all that bad. When I was done teaching, she had a taxi waiting outside with her son sitting in it, and she shipped us off to West Lake, the biggest lake in Hanoi (and it's pretty big.) The taxi ride over was somewhat awkward because I was trying to make conversation but I think he's a bit shy, and I was also trying to gage what level of English he's at. It's always difficult to find the right way to speak so that you'll be understood but you won't be talking down to them. But it got better. After we arrived at the lake, he showed me around a beautiful pagoda there, and then we went over to a nice little ice cream place by the water and had some ice cream. They serve everyone the same thing – a little glass with one scoop chocolate, one scoop vanilla, and one scoop mint on top, with a little biscotti stick thing. The Vietnamese are very classy about their ice cream, I think. Presentation is key.

While we were sitting, the conversation got better. I don't think he understood everything I said, but I think we mainly communicated well. From what I can gather, he's very close to his mother and his brother (less so his father) and his grandmother, as well. He has no problem with expressing his love and affection for people, which is a nice change from American boys. Side note: in Vietnam, many families live with the paternal grandparents, and mothers-in-law will play a large part in raising children. We'll probably stay in touch using email. He also told me that he wants to study in American someday – a lot of Vietnamese people I've spoken to do, and they ask me about how much it costs, and I try very hard not to be discouraging. It costs a lot – but there are scholarships! There are student loans! I want them to succeed so badly, but I don't know how many of them will ever get there.

We talked about his school and he told me that there aren't many girls at his school because it's a school for gifted students and apparently not many girls can or want to study hard enough to go there. Which I took great offense at. Also, he said that the school focused on sciences and math, and they don't have a Vietnamese class (the equivalent of an English class in the US) and so girls wouldn't be as interested in attending. Which I also took offense to. But it's difficult to explain how social factors would cause girls to believe they cannot achieve as much in school and so not work as hard, or be discouraged from pursuing sciences, when you're speaking a high school student who only knows English from school.

So we got some food and then he called back the taxi we had used before. We waited around for the taxi for a while, and then when we got back to the school, he waited at the bus stop with me like gentleman. You don't understand how nice of a gesture this is until you've waited for a 13 bus at rush hour in Hanoi. It takes forever.

So I got home without incident, and spent the night with Peace House people. Two seventeen year olds from Hong Kong, originally from New York, can here together and were here about a week before I realized it because I was all off doing my own thing. We get along well and it's really nice to spend time with people my own age. And we hung out with the workcamp people as well, including a Japanese guy name Ichi (I have no clue how to spell it – pronounced Ee chee) who was hilarious and a lot of fun. You make friends so quickly here that you'll never see again. We all went down the street to a “karaoke bar” and karaoked to our hearts' contents. All in all, a very good day.