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

  • Never Let Me Go

    A while ago, 14 Vietnamese women were found and freed from Baby101, a Taiwanese outfit operated outside of the law in Thailand. They were paid to be surrogate mothers (artificial insemination or otherwise), whose future babies would be put up for adoption. Baby, never let me go. Newsweek has a piece about anonymousUS.org, an organization which seeks to organize “kids…

  • Winning is contagious!

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: If you need to be motivated as I do, watch the Winter Olympics. You will share peak emotions, peak performance and peak mountain spots of Vancouver. Everybody loves a winner, and the winner loves to savor and share that moment . We empathize with their struggle, their trial and…

  • Wake me when October ends

    Limits to power. Limits to growth. Speed limits. We finally see ourselves in the mirror. Dying, decaying, decomposing. Long live Blue Jeans, T-shirt and Rock “n” Roll. 60 Minutes capitalized on their archive footage to show us the evolution of John Kerry. Our evolution, from idealism to realism. The aging process that takes a toll…

  • Decoding America

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: It’s a grand title. But the intention is put up some guide posts to mark the new (Lonely) American trail Or else, new comers to America, reading Orientation web sites only, would end up like the Oregon couple who trusted solely on GPS readout, without consulting paper maps. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100102/ap_on_hi_te/us_stranded_motorists…

  • Reflections of my life

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: ” I am changing everything” …Like Holden Caulfield, catcher in the Rye. “Oh I don’t want to die..”. The future that I once fret is my current present. “All my sorrows”….were for nothing. They said 90% of our worries didn’t materialize.  Yet we keep worrying. Like a plague. Dec…

  • Reflections on connections

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: The medium (social network) resembles Amazon software source code (we recommend to you these people, read their profiles). You have to open a personal account like you would at Harmony.com, and boom, you start the handshakes : “Hello, my name is…”. Personal branding 2.0. Except, when it comes to…

  • the Nguyen

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: In college, I could just tell when teachers got to my name: they couldn’t pronounce it. To save time, I just said “here”. This was Penn State, late 70’s, when a name like Carter from Georgia could barely register in Washington Belt Way. Now a random walk on the…

  • globalize, empathize and digitize

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: It’s Kitchen God day in Asia. Super Bowl weekend here in Miami. And the DOW is down across the board. Oh when the Saints oh marching in…. People were guessing, just like Mr Watson, that maybe the world can make use of a few computers, or move to digitization…

  • Traditions: collide and compromise

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: East meets West. New Year and Valentine’s. Families vs lovers. In Vietnam, with a strong Confucian foundation, filial quality stands above all else. So on that first day of this year of the Tiger, sons and daughters are expected to show up first thing at the parents’ door steps.…

  • Luxury brands beach-heading VN

    Originally posted on Thang Nguyen 555: It started with Gucci and LV. More will be coming to test the warers, from McDonald to KFC , from Starbucks to Burger King.   Everybody is into location, location, location. I look at the city as if it were a big fairground, where interested parties are staking out their prime…