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.

  • The grains of time

    By now the transition from analog to digital has almost been completed.

    Movies, music, photos and books. The old movies are easy to spot: actors using huge phones and driving old cars.

    Vinyl albums made those hissy noise when touched by the needle.

    And books, like the one I am reading, War and Peace, are so heavy. You can’t help realising that you are entering Tolstoy‘s Imperial Society.

    Physical versus digital world.

    24/7 always-on grid vs our 16-hour world (8 hours for sleep).

    People, through connection, find suitors in the old world, friending others in the new.

    More atomized more access, the new takes scarcity and locality out of the equation.

    Just Google him or her.

    Follow him/her on Twitter (despite the miles apart).

    The social graph shows his/her photos, Likes, and Time Line.

    Little Red Riding Hood was told not to trust strangers (wolf in grandma’s clothing). Now she is encouraged to click Approve, and upload every details of her waking life.

    Yet those grains of time as appeared in old B/W photos speak volumes about our ancestors. Mine always seemed to appear in groups, staring straight and standing straight. It’s as though they had all been military cadets.

    I have gone through life, never had a chance to see if my grandparents even smiled at all.

    Now, with X-Gig memory cards, we can afford to leave behind traces of happiness. Limit not ourselves to event only, since everyday is an event. Monday, Monday, it turns out that way.

    Having said that (technology enhances self-expression), I must give it to the previous generation whose movie theme music remains unsurpassed. Think of the old James Bond theme music (three cheers to SKYFALL which has just won the Golden Globe),  Moon River, Love is Many splendor Things…. You can always tell their genres e.g. Big-Band or string guitar. The 50’s gave birth to subsequent women liberation and self-expression in couture, hair dyeing.

    Those shiny  but short skirts, the boots, and low neck lines. Furniture and interior decoration was hip as well. Now, with mass merchandising, young men and women took for granted their individuality online while at the same time paying less attention to outer appearance: metro-style, with T-shirts and trans-gender jeans.

    While collegial looks are available to all, online “friending” is quite restricted. You need access to your “friend’s” page. Even then, you will know very little, besides what they wanted you to know. More access yet fewer information. Sounds like we are back to square one, with grainy B/W photos. I hope someday I come across in family’s album something resembling a smile. Maybe at the time, women colored their teeth black (to prevent cavity). Hence, the embarrassment. Or that they took pictures with a family patriarch who was stern and strict. Or the photographer had been trained to take ID photos only (no “cheese”. ) Then I remember Mona Lisa, and how we all “read” into that painting a smile that might or might not be there. Obviously, we can see it in her eyes. That smile stood the test of time, however grainy and non-digital.

  • Le Da – Tales of sorrow told by a Rock

    My birth certificate shows my parents in their early 40’s.

    No wonder my Dad’s taste for music was a bit off.

    One of his favorites however stood the test of time: Le Da.

    After all, it has something to do with the rock of ages.

    It’s very sentimental (Rock solid yet soft when it comes to matter of the heart).

    I gave it a try last night. Got a square 100 according to the karaoke machine.

    My Dad must have sung through me.

    The musical genes.

    His generation experienced upheavals: revolution, uprootedness, and twice a refugee.

    No wonder they were defined by and encoded their experience and emotion via music. A famous Vietnamese composer of my Dad’s time, Pham Duy, has just passed away.

    Other singers (The Uptight) are making their way back to performing in Vietnam: new audience, new aspiration.

    Something about a wandering soul seeking solace and wounded heart, soothing.

    America has indeed been blessed with many talents from elsewhere.

    The experience of America’s newest poet speaks well of this.

    The American Century might be coming to an end, but in its place, the American Character barely blooms, blending best in class.

    The style and confidence Viet Kieu singers (Vietnamese American) and filmmakers prove this point.

    And before you know, you will find The Boat, The Book of Salt etc.. on Amazon book list.

    It’s been since its inception that America embraces seekers and searchers.

    It entertains doubts and encourages determination.

    After all, it has elected not one term, but two terms, an American of exception.

    Uniquely 21st century, he always has vacation in Hawaii, a half-way between East and West. There in the cliff, you will find some rocks, some tears and some tales of sorrow only rock could last long enough to tell.

    My Dad would be passionate to join, if you give him the second mike. I wouldn’t bet on the score at the end though. Even me, I was just lucky last night.

  • Self-decoding

    Our gene distribution and mutation have a lot in common (survival instinct, reproduction, empathy etc…). But from there, each of us is different and unique: some poets, others warriors or both.

    Haruki Murakami is both a writer and a runner (100 km race).  Richard Blanco, who will recite at Obama’s Inauguration, is both an engineer and a poet.

    Leonardo Da Vinci was multi-talented. I am threading in Malcolm Gladwell’s waters here. What makes a person genius? How did they find that out? Early or late in life (Raymond Carver took writing courses late in life).

    What if we are “outliers”, but go about life undiscovered, undecoded?

    What line do we have to cross to “find ourselves”?

    10,000 hours of doing the same thing? Solving problems at the same level they occurred has never worked. Just think of failed relationships (rooted in dysfunctional families, then manifest itself later in life).

    A new generation of young Americans are defining themselves with acronyms (NYT latest on Annette Bening and Warren Beatty kids).

    Being first-wave immigrant, I serve as a bridge, for my American-born daughters to cross-over.

    They are on Facebook and Twitter. They wear jeans and use I-phones.

    They text (while I twist, well, not that old. My brother did) often times with abbreviation and speak a language of their peers.

    While I enjoyed lengthy 20-minute long CCR’s O Suzie Q and Cream’s Sunshine of Your Love, they watch viral  YouTube’s clips.

    I belong to a generation that enjoyed getting blasted at, while theirs is an uploading one (one-to-many vs many-to-many communication).

    They can “read” someone instinctively (gene mutation?), decoding people rather quickly. I meanwhile grew up learning how to  entertain guests, give them benefits of the doubt (not three-strikes-you-are-out).

    They speak in short bursts and shorthands. My prof’s however spent a lot of time setting up a theme before getting to the heart of their lectures.

    We learn to comprehend and communicate bound by technology of any given time (a tweet lasts only 140 characters, with some buffering).

    I remember sending post cards home when doing relief work overseas.

    Before I get to what I wanted to say, I ran out of room. Overseas long distance phone calls were quite prohibitive. Even now, to call back to the US from Timbuktu is quite daunting.

    Life is a crash course in understanding ourselves and our surroundings.

    It might end abruptly, and there are no final exams. We will have to rely on others to “see” for us (director’s cut or uncut, novelist, poet and priest).

    Born with this inability to see ourselves with our own eyes (only reflection in the mirror), we are humble and eager to discover more, to surprise ourselves at times: we have more courage, flexibility and nobility than we know. Only when we are in good company, in danger that a better version of ourselves emerge.

    Outliers know this early in life. Others just focus on one or two things they are passionate about. Runner-writer, engineer-poet. What if you are better in the kitchen than in the boardroom? We call them chefs and not chiefs. And it’s OK too, given today’s technology e.g. YouTube. I hope your secret sauce go viral. Just make sure you speak in short bursts when targeting younger audience.

  • Fast foods invasion

    It’s kind of redundancy. Fast foods in Saigon?

    The place has already been fast. I don’t know if fast foods will help.

    At Saigon Central (train depot), I was told to take a number and wait (the way Carl Jr would do in the US) for my fries.

    Saigon is not used to mono-chronistic tempo (first comes first served). People just cut in, last in first out. If you are fanatic and faithful to Western sense of order, you will pick a fight every time (conversely, if you went native, you might run into reverse culture shock upon re-entry to the US).

    No wonder, the first thing a foreigner sees is the sign, which says “US citizen” this way, the rest, that way. Get in line.  One at a time. Orderly Departure and Entry.

    Burger King, KFC and now Starbucks, preceded by a bunch of Filippino and Korean chains.

    Pretty soon, one cannot distinguish this city from any other in the world: cosmopolitan, clean and charge it baby (burgers and fries, cappuccino and pizza).

    The West is taking over the rest.

    When Fareed Zakaria talks about the Post-American World, he meant The Rise of the Rest. But what does that mean? Indian IT workers begin to go clubbing, Chinese tourists begin to take up coffee habits at Forbidden City’s Starbucks, and Brazilian go-go dancers start shopping at Victoria Secrets?

    It’s a blended world, of which America happened to be the lead influencer.

    Fast foods, fast pipe etc… are manifestations of mass markets, whose principles are rooted in auto manufacturing (which happened to be an offspring of the old industrial world).

    It seeks not high-end Tiffany base. Just the lowest common denominator: limited decoration, fast turn-around and a lot of marketing hype (to look hip, westernized, with I-tunes music in the background). Thomas Friedman noticed  that any two countries with a McDonald are least likely to be at war with each other.

    The French once boycotted against McDonalization and Disneylandization. They wanted to enjoy slow foods (multiple courses). It’s the slow growth view. The anti-globalization view.

    The clash in Seattle not too long ago was a wake up call.

    In It’s a Miracle (by one of former Pink Floyd members), we learned about “McDonald in Tibet”. It’s a miracle (with sarcasm).

    Now, all you need is fast foods for Saigon fast lane. As if the place is  not fast enough. Actually, what took them (fast foods chains) so long? The place is way ahead of the curve. I have seen people stop their scooters, ask for a light, and zoom along with cigarette to go. Starbucks might have to have their Zippos ready for drive-bys. It’s smoking fast here.

  • An American Invention

    Dr Lloyd Tran never stops and hardly sleeps. For a right reason. He is an inventor at heart.

    He started out as a chemist. Then worked for huge corporations such as Monsanto. Then he invented and manufactured his own drug release device in Irvine, CA (right at the time companies started to look elsewhere to outsource and offshore). After a stint in nanotech, he found his niche in CleanTech e.g. solar panel, EV battery etc… His most recent invention: electric car conversion.

    His students built on top of what they had learned from AC/DC (I thought that was a band).

    So far, they have de-gutted a few Porches , VW, and even Jaguar as gliders to install EV components (power train, A/C and even cruise control). I test drove the green Porche and found it quiet, fast and futuristic.

    I don’t see how others can’t do it. Just find a problem, ask why not and solve it.

    Tesla is getting first-prize for this year Electric Vehicles (the S series).

    Toyota, embattled with lawsuit and litigation, is a bit cautious and conservative. But even then, Toyota won first-prise in EV race cars. It has released its first three-wheel EV concept car also.

    What’s the waiting? EMR (Electronic Medical Record) and EV. Or we just wait to admit everyone into ER?

    We don’t lack the know-how. We lack the will to change. To rock the boat. All the while, we are told to think “out of the box”. Maybe the “box” or the boat, needs to get out of itself.

    One way is to travel. To see how other species go about their days (water jars on their heads in the desert, automobile glider on buffalo cart in Vietnam etc…). I wish I could show you a picture of the latter which I saw on One Vietnam Network.

    The point is, we take the path of least resistance by default.

    Changes are mentioned only in passing. But men like Dr Lloyd saw an old Jaguar, hauled it back and made something amazing out of it (Jaguar ironically is now own by Tata, former colonized now owns empire’s jewel, after a change of hand at Ford).

    If I were to be Tata owner, I would contact Dr Lloyd Tran, and ask to see the all-electrified Jag.

    What used to be a symbol of luxury is now also hip and cool (environmentally friendly). I took that  smog-filled Jag to state inspection. Now, I heard that it is smog-free (zero emission).

    Can’t wait to get back and give it a test-drive. It might blow me away (fast and furiously quiet).

    For now, I put this out as a challenge: be world citizen. Solve problems where ever you may see them. Think first as a technologist, then a marketer (and last as a politician).

    Before you know , you might even get elected. I know how hard and challenging the task was to transform an ICE Jaguar into an EV one. But the team did just that. All I have is “three cheers” to an American Invention. It is right here in our back yard (behind the city’s dump). One man’s trash is another man’s treasure, that which once was smog-filled now turns smog-free.

  • Secret sauce

    I met a pianist last Sunday. When he told me he was 65, I almost flipped. He happened to be a Judo trainer as well. Wow! He looked 45.

    Another friend of mine, Jazz musician and software expert, also looks young for his age. What’s the secret sauce? Shirley MacLaine doesn’t look 78.

    You might say, oh well, actors and actresses take care of themselves.

    How about us? Don’t we want to take care of ourselves?

    We are actors of our life scripts. That’s the secret sauce.

    Stand in front of the mirror, rehearse, rehearse, rehearse.

    Breathe in , breathe out. Sing out loud, in and out of the showers.

    Most New Year resolutions are health-related e.g. losing 10 lbs….

    But the goal must be rooted in the subconscious and lived out habitually.

    I am sure the pianist had logged in 10,000 hours of Judo practice (he broke many of his bones, just like Jackie Chan).

    Still, he wore cross-training shoes, jeans and stretched short sleeves. I am sure he could hang out with his son (who was trying out for the US Olympic Judo team) and be mistaken as “one of the boys”.

    Our life expectancy has increased to around 77 years. Like companies , we are “Built to Last”.

    Take aways from most admired companies: agility, flexibility and discipline to follow through. Front-line employees are empowered and educated to make judgment calls.  But most importantly, leaders must be able to take a step back and do a pre-morterm analysis (the O ring in Challenger, the release valves in TMI nuclear reactor).

    Problems are systemic, built up over time like dental plaque .  Meanwhile, people are creatures of habits i.e. taking the path of least resistance. Voila! Recipe for disaster. Everyone is just doing his or her job logging in 10,000 hours of minimum wages.

    I noticed the pianist fingers on the key boards after he had told me who he was (Judo trainer).  I tried to see if he could still manage those graceful spreads. He did play a bit harder than most. Strength and swiftness, controlled yet flexible.

    Our time is now. Use the opposite force to our advantage. We have tried to use our own one too many. Try it the other way. Be agile. Be flexible. Be open-minded. It might work. It’s the secret sauce I have seen in musicians and martial-arts experts. When you are multi-talented, it triggered something else, some place else in the brain. Use it.

  • Slippery Saigon

    I went out for my morning jog in slippery Saigon.  I was hoping for cooler weather. Now that my wish was granted, I begin to have second thought: if it’s cool here, it means somewhere up North, people are freezing, or boats and houses destroyed.

    We live in a connected world and leave behind carbon footprints.

    A cigarette tossed into the wild could ignite a forest fire. A harsh word, ill-thought-out and unsolicited comment could damage a child’s self-esteem.

    Should they be protected, insulated and shielded from the pain-filled world out there?

    How much “reality” should a show depict to open a child’s eyes?

    When 9/11 happened, my then 10-year old could not comprehend its magnitude.

    Now, my second kid and I are “following” each other on Twitter. Cool!

    Back in my time, my parents hardly ever sat down with me, much less “follow”. I am a product of multiple generations, where an uncle, a cousin, an aunt and now nephew, all chipped in with unsolicitated advices. It’s our version of social compact.

    But when this social compact broke down, it’s quite ugly e.g. to pay down gambling debt, a father/mother would offer their daughter(s) as payment (to be an unpaid maid or concubine – a phenomenon not unheard of in the bordering towns near China and Cambodia).

    WE HAVE A BIG 21st CENTURY PROBLEM: TECHNOLOGY IS MOVING FASTER THAN OUR CAPACITY TO ABSORB IT, WHILE OUR CULTURAL MORES STAY IN THE BACK WOODS OF EMERGING COUNTRIES.  People are still auctioned off, raped, murdered and mutilated over a fake I-phone, for instance. In India, gangs raped bus passenger or Swiss couple who camped out.

    Our Western liberal mind screams out when hearing about these incidents.

    Then we shrugged it off when the Mafia in Chicago make their extortion route.

    Hollywood even made money on these film-noir genre. Hypocrisy? Absolutely.

    Who am I to judge? Who am I to carry the chip on my shoulders (Hey Jude).

    In What the Dog Saw, Malcom Gladwell pointed out that although imaging and images have better resolution, our capacity to read them (intelligence) will have to increase ten fold to make it effective.

    So we need to keep up with our own invention. The tool has become the teacher. This begs a related topic: our capacity to reflect. To think about our mistakes (committed or omitted), to change course. This integrative skill differentiates us from mere technologists (repetitive) order takers (reactive). Back when the 3 networks (TV) ruled, the anchor who could ad-lip was highly sought after. He/she had the skill to see and describe reality in context and in step with what were happening  real-time. Peter Jennings did that during 9/11. After having a smoke, he died of lung cancer. He crossed that journalistic line, from being an observer to being a participant of that same drastic event.

    It’s still slippery outside. I promise myself not to slid and slide in the rain. Now is the time to reflect on slippery Saigon. On our capacity to keep up with modern technology. Just have to stay away from the clans who somehow manage to crawl on Facebook, trying to “friend” you with unsolicited postings. Something isn’t going to change, or avoidable. Just like the wet weather here today.

  • The things they still carry

    The war novel with similar title was surprisingly good. I have known about it for a while, but couldn’t get myself to “carry” it home. Until now. Until it’s translated into Vietnamese.

    It’s the opposite of reading Bao Ninh‘s The Sorrows of War in English.

    Both novels had the same setting, same period, same conflict, same ending (went down with whatever they were carrying, on their bodies and on their minds).

    Sorry winner and lucky loser.

    All the while, the sound track for that same period was Proud Mary (you don’t have to worry, for people are happy to give).

    In The Things They Carried, supplies were chopper-ed in (chocolate, cigarettes and C-rations). The military industrial complex was “happy to give”, from Hartford, from MN etc…

    Rolling, rolling, rolling on the river.

    I could barely get through the first few chapters, reading about the members of this fictitious company as they went down, with the things they carried (one of them even carried sleeping pills – for eternal rest).

    We can now look back, with recognized names like J. Kerry, J. Fonda etc… at a  safe and rational distance, away from the heat of Kent State and Watergate and My Lai.

    I have seen the things people here in VN carry, on their shoulders, on their scooters.

    But inside, unless they sit down and tell me, the hidden things that they still carry are scary.

    Those with vivid memories are dying one by one, on both sides of the Pacific.

    We got scholarly volumes and doctrine (Powell) on the conflict.

    And we eventually got Burger King and Dunkin here in VN. It’s like the tunnel is finally closed  with sign which says “Go away, leave the past alone”.

    For here or to go?

    It’s Future Land now. Happy Land. Disney Land. Dream Land. It has to be.

    Yes. Young students carry a lot with them today: book bags, smart phones,  eye glasses, cigarettes, lighters, even IDs. No dog tags. No Zippos. No memories.

    Just a bunch of “nic’s” and passwords. Everything is in the Cloud. On Facebook. On Drop Box and Mail Box.

    To search for them. Easy. Just Google. In Vietnamese, or English. No translation needed. Sorrows of War or The Things They Carried. Instant access.

    Perhaps that war, Vietnam that was, was the last  “hardware-driven” conflict.

    No wonder, the things they carried, seemed awfully heavy and burdensome when viewed from a light-weight I-pad.

  • Twitter and Tolstoy

    My new-year resolution is to get through Tolstoy‘s monumental “War and Peace.”

    The characters and ethos were deliberate and elaborating (everyone wants a piece of the inheritance while the man was dying etc….).

    Visitors were announced at the gate (no intercom), received at party etc….

    Tolstoy’s imperialistic people have time on their hands. We don’t. We tweet, text and retweet.

    But man’s nature remains the same: greed, exhibitionist, illusion of grandeur.

    Trapped in their place and time, would we be doing any better?

    How much is man a product of nurture vs nature?

    With chip speed doubles every 18 months and Google Kansas City SuperFast Broadband, where do we go from here (or do we wish to go on to infinity?).

    The I-pod cannot get smaller (Shuffle).

    A tweet cannot be shorter.

    If someone could think of something to debunk Facebook and YouTube, they probably would.

    Faster, more efficient and more savings. All fine. But that doesn’t explain Newtown, 9/11 and gang rape in India. (as of this edit, it has just happened again, this time, to a Swiss couple).

    Stuff that Taleb coined “black swan” in human nature.

    It’s a vicious cycle. We think like this because we are taught to reason, to ask question (Socrates). But then we are inside the system, like cog in the wheel, unable to have the bird-eye’s view, to see the weakest link.

    With new Congress sworn in this week,  I sincerely wish the freshman class have fresh eyes, and hopefully, committed hearts.

    May they live out their terms and their years with honor and worthy of our votes. Just hope that while they tweet, they would remember Tolstoy. We still live reflexively as cavemen, with Black Swan and blind spot. Our blindness is built- in, and should not be viewed as a weakness. Just is. (no one has ever seen their eyes with their own eyes). But then, we need someone to point that out. We need a team. A partner. Someone who is both prophetic, yet pastoral. Condemn and console. Yes, we are imperfect products of our times. Just as Tolstoy’s people, of theirs.

  • Above and Below

    I live next door to a convent and behind a restaurant/bar. The differences are quite obvious: Above and Below.

    One life style is to focus on the afterlife, the other , this life.

    For the weeks leading to Christmas, I heard rehearsals and refrains on one end, toasts and talks on the other.

    Both found an intersect: human frailty (life is too short!).

    But parted company at different conclusions: invest in the afterlife vs burn baby burn.

    Paul Anka’s My Way speaks to man’s deep desire and yearning for self-assertion “I did it my way”.

    We are endowed with different set of genes.

    Combined, we shall conquer, Our Way.

    I am not proposing Purgatorial compromise.

    Just 1+1=3.

    We would all be better off learning how the others feel, and fail, how we could be of help, or send for help.

    Instead, we close our eyes (and ears), mumble a few thoughtless words, and secretly wish the problems (in this case, person) would go away.

    Of course, we all are going to go away (Life is too short)

    But in the here and now, we share the commons, and together we can conquer.

    It’s better for students to learn the science and art of being fellow human first, than for them to learn the high art and science of above. Or, as a compromise, I propose a triangle: Above, You and I. In other words, the person we are interacting with deserves full and equal weight in that triangle at each  encounter and engagement (after all, we are all Mercy’s presence to each other).

    We know Life is too short. We appreciate each passing moment and memory.

    We realise each one of us is far from being perfect. The burden is not on us to “decode” them, or “fix ” them. Just acknowledge that we are weaklings, our weakness is their strength, and hopefully, vice versa.

    That’s why we need each other, even enemies. In Joyeux Noel, opposing sides agreed on a cease-fire to celebrate Christmas. All Alpha Males. Farewell to arms. Just toast. Just below, but thanks to Above (the Reason of the Season).

    What a beautiful picture. Very moving. And it could be found in the here and now, even in enemy’s camps. I know, I know, you want to do it your way.

    I am just saying, this is “My Way”, not necessarily Above-or-Below forced dichotomy.