Thang Nguyen 555

Cultures on Collision Course

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With some short-term relief work in Asia/Africa and long stint in Telecom, Thang also earned a B.A. at Pennsylvania State University. M.A. in Communication at Wheaton Graduate School, M.A. in Cross-Cultural Communication at Gordon-Conwell Seminary, Boston. In addition, he earned a CELTA – classes taken in Hanoi for cultural re-immersion.

Author: Thang Nguyen 555

  • My 70’s

    Needless to say, my hair was long, my pants were bell-bottom and my shirt shiny. I spent half of that decade in Vietnam, the other half in America. But the youth culture helped bridge the cultural gap: we had already listened to James Talor, Gordon Lightfoot, Neil Young, Elton John before I jumped on to…

  • Papa’s shoes

    When you karaoke in Vietnam, you are likely to hear Papa along with Hotel California and Casablanca. Something ends with an “a”. I have blogged about Mom’s Ao Dai. So to be fair, here is “Papa‘s shoes“. At lunch, I was joined by a boy and his Dad (it’s common in Asia at peak hours…

  • Convenience and conservation

    Plastic or paper? Here or to-go? Before we know it, billions of mindless decisions are made everyday. Taylorism (efficiency down to the smallest detail) has found its way into fast cars and fast food. Even into our every-day use of language: just a sec, ASAP, bs. There is no excuse for snappiness. We have stood by…

  • Seasons and symmetry

    Traffic in the past few weeks has come from the opposite direction: country side to city streets. Tet is over. We had joy we had fun we had seasons in the sun. Now it’s time to ramp up, to deliver. There are things that can only be understood in hindsight:  a failed marriage, a single…

  • Fateful beach

    When I heard that the beach (Vung Tau) was overcrowded during the long Tet holidays, I tried to imagine the sand, the surf and the separation (forced) I endured years ago. We drove through neighborhood barbed wires and violated curfew, the day before Saigon fell, to spot escape routes. I tricked my family into stopping…

  • Teen boys’ dreams

    It’s all there on my friend’s web site: the seating lay-out in the classroom (three jr-high students to a table) I drew up 40 years ago. When you click on a name, it pops up a few byline and that friend’s mushy words about “summer time” or “we will never be this good as a…

  • Underneath is Love

    Companies outsource Y2K tech work, then while at it, their software development. From manufacturing to marketing, R&D to customer care , jobs went overseas to cut costs. Then we tout culture-building, crowd-sourcing etc… The truth is, we did not care about our customers or corporate culture. Yet, it’s culture that reinforces brand. Weak corporate culture links to…

  • Time, on whose side?

    Just like an old-time movie, friends met yesterday to rehash. We mentioned briefly the passing away of our friend’s brother: nerdy, good old boy and an ATM machine service man and family man. In short, the least likely candidate to die young. Yet, he had been long gone (by now 3 years). Earth, Wind and Fire…

  • Watching Victor Vu’s film

    The Coke, (pop) corn and cinema. Heroes of Destiny. Boom, bang! karate kid! Justified violence (revenge). Boy meets girl, boy almost loses girl, boy gets girl in the end. Happy Ending. When the bewitched Empress released her grip, she broke the chain of self-perpetuated violence. It’s like cutting the credit card when you  are a…

  • Shame and Stigma

    Making small talks on New Year‘s morning, I mentioned various distant relatives, among whom a handsome ping-pong playing cousin of mine. I remembered him as 60’s looking, hair, glasses and short shorts. He was later married with kids before got  sent to re-education camp. While he was away, his wife had an affair and made…