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.

  • On Persuasion

    Lights, sound, camera, ACTION!

    He is back, still with “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow” for an entrance and an exit punch line “the Union, as conceived and committed to by the Founding Fathers.”

    He systematically laid out the choices, an either-or.

    He mentioned the opponent’s alternate universe , where 2+2 might not = 4.

    Or…4 more years.

    He wanted us to do some gut checks: are we letting them “double down” on ” trickle-down”?

    Are we going to rob Peter (handicapped and seniors) to pay Paul (oil rich countries and outsourcing nations)?

    Do you feel it? Maybe not yet. The lagging effect (from Fact to Feeling) of a barely resuscitated economy.

    Against the Red, White and Blue background, and with proper acknowledgment of key supporting cast (Michelle, Biden and Hillary) while the cut-away shots kept showing Clinton’s First Kid (reminded me of the Kennedy’s clan,  just as Clinton’s goodbye  evoked Carter-like statesmanship) and seamless delivery of a well-crafted value proposition, President Clinton once again established himself  as a premier speech Master, if not, Magician.

    He was more in control this time, but still on occasion, showed some emotion (I believe). And no doubt, he does care more for the world (Haiti) then just America, whose leadership in Education has slipped a bit (to no. 60).

    I majored in Communication. Specifically, media. And I know a good speech when I see one. This one is for keeps.

    Just as Reagan who concluded his reelection speech with a stunning visual “a shinning city on the hill, …” as he recounted a drive on 101 from Santa Barbara to San Francisco. Television tends to favors telegenic charisma (Kennedy over Nixon) and irresistible narrative (A man from Hope).  And we prefer personalities who can tell stories (not just sound bites) that make us feel a lump in our throat.  Last night’s speech at the Democratic Convention delivered a bowl full. Truth that hits home. Music that resonates. And a pitch that gets us on our feet. We need ALL the help, from both voters and viewers. I just know that speech was best in class. We communicate, cooperate and celebrate. Especially in hard times. Now we know who we are by the choice we made of our leaders. Both sides draw a nice picture. But this one spins really good and sounds really good. Talking about persuasion. I still believe in the idea of America, not Exceptionalism, but one as I would expect it to be.

    When in doubt, bet on America, exceptional or not.

  • Leaders as human

    We miss those towering figures from WWII (remember the canes, the hats? and the saying  e.g.”Never never give up”).

    It’s a different landscape now  (Apple, Facebook etc… with CEOs without a tie).

    So it goes. New world order.  New icons. New  profiles and preferences.

    Still, they are human. Supposedly connected with their people.

    Leaders of common people.

    Know how you feel.

    It’s been tough.

    We shall overcome.

    Let’s tap into that which is best in each of us.

    Arouse the spirits of sacrifice. Go beyond the call of duty.

    Be the better version of you.

    The spirit needs some workout just  like the body. Zumba for the soul.

    Go and prevail. Stand tall and stand your ground.

    Yes. It’s a new world order, with more participation and information.

    BRIC and PIGS. Men and women, in bedroom and boardroom, on the playground and in the background.

    Different world. More colorful world. More participation and equality. The future is calling.

  • Moving on

    I read about and followed with much interest the Penn State game this past weekend.

    Where is Joe? First he was absent on the side line, where his rolled up pants were a fixture more than signature.

    Then he went up on the booth. This past Saturday, he wasn’t there either, nor was his statue. Ohio won, but not as easy.

    The Nittany Lions put up a fight “push them back, way back”. Still, a lot went unsaid there. Just moving on. Motion forward.

    Aren’t we all!

    Labor Day, Memorial Day. First rest a bit, then Rest in Peace.

    Moving on.

    Self-deception.

    Who are we trying to fool, except ourselves?

    I read about the original cell which stays on for billions of years. I am glad we could die (rather cancer war than casualty of war). As  far as biology is concerned, we were meant to be immortal, Greek or geek.

    But then, with all the abuses and accidents, we have pretty much done it to ourselves (global sales of weapon, pornography and drugs together curtail population explosion).

    So we give the workers a symbolic rest, Labor Day. But actually, we meant for factories to have their machines deep-spayed and well-oiled.

    Farmers don’t rest on Labor Day. IT supports don’t rest either in colo centers.

    Labor Day belongs to the Industrial Revolution, the 2nd wave, with coal as the main source of energy.

    I read that in an interview before his death, an out-spoken Cardinal talked about the Vatican being behind two centuries.

    He must be referring to the image of  Sheep May Safely Graze while parishioners “flocking” to the only village church.

    I think it’s Marshall McLuhan who coins the phrase “global village”. Even then, he  meant the mass brought together by mass media (Tower of Babel analogy) in a one-to-many broadcast. Little did he know, we now have many-to-many conversation, originated and uploaded from the ground level. As of now, everyone got their 15-minute of fame on Facebook (Famebook?) and 140 characters on Twitter (modern-day AP) – as in United Breaks My Guitar.  Perhaps even we, at one time or another, think, maybe the world can use a few personal computers, as Watson used to think back in 1943.

    Institutions and individuals, both are behind the times. I caught myself a few months ago in a moment of prejudice. I heard a ringtone rap music. Not from urban blacks. But with Central Vietnamese accent. The combination shocked me, then it delighted me the second time around. But my knee-jerked reaction was “you must be kidding?” One would expect to hear Northern Vietnamese accent  in songs, not Central, and when it comes to rap music, it’s the American quintessential, not Vietnamese. If this long Depression does us any good, it’s a wake-up call. It humbles us . Yes, it’s the “end of men” as titled in an upcoming book, but by the time the “end of women” comes about, it’s the beginning of the machine age.

    The point is, early adopters will keep on adopting (space tourism, echo tourism, edu- tourism, medi-tourism )

    And the richest among them, will keep moving beyond Beverly Hills and Betty Ford clinics to “the Island” to do some serious make-over (spare body parts replacement and rejuvenation). Versailles-style ($17,000 leather boots).

    Go ahead and protest. Show some guts and show some skin. By the time we do, they no longer find some use for fur coats to cover their once wrinkled bodies. They already got new ones put in. Talking about moving on. Just make sure we don’t become the Pharaohs of the 21st century, embalming ourselves to no avail.  Where is Joe Pa? Ohio won again. Shuck!

  • Moon Cake

    You can’t possibly finish one all by yourself.

    In fact, when I was a kid, I remembered it got cut up not into four but eight pieces, like we would with a Costco pizza.

    Slices of sweet moon cake, in all varieties.

    Big confectionary  revenue every year in China and Vietnam.

    Although it’s a Children Festival,  adults are in for those cakes as well. Later, it evolves into an occasion for gifting, and acceptable bribing.

    Sweeten the deal.

    It’s almost as if  business and adults  have hi-jacked what few festivals  children got left for themselves.

    Let’s face it. In the West, we got Halloween. Then college students hi-jacked it with frat’s costume parties. Even at work. So Halloween spreads to other unintended age groups.

    In the Far East, we see similar phenomenon: the commercialization and co-opting of  traditional events by the Retai industry.

    As long as you can “create” a “first” event. Next year, it will become the Second X event, then Third…

    Some events no longer reflect their original raison d’etre. Hence, a need for self-created tradition  (South by Southwest, TED). Somehow, cultural legacies are associated with “uncoolness”.

    Malcom Gladwell recalls his Jamaican aunt (light-skinned) disown her dark-skinned daughter when she met a light-skinned man. In Outliers, he makes a case for cultural legacy,  which, after extensive analysis, proves to be the bedrock of  immigrant success. Personally I also found American cultural tapestry as strength (German Beer Fest, Irish pipers, Little Italy etc …helps induct me to early American immigrants) and not weakness. Case in point. I often run into bi-racial couples who took their half-breed children to these festivals. The “foreign” spouse indeed finds those cultural events fascinating. Perhaps he/she hopes to find some clues into the make-up of his or her spouse, or to simply please him/her culturally.

    And it’s only fair. Because to marry into a dominant culture, one has to sacrifice and let go things that are deemed “strange” e.g. instant noodles, chopsticks (in California, sushi and Pho restaurants are actually operated by Korean business people, rather than Japanese or Vietnamese).

    So this Blue Moon, full moon and Moon Fest. Go out and join the “strange” people. They have their reason behind the season. Find out the fairy tale, their  pre-Neil-Armstrong perception of the Moon. It goes well with Slow Rock. Makes for a perfect slow dance, while the children are occupied with their own lanterns. The commercial world does go ahead of us . But then, maybe they know us more than we do ourselves. After this weekend, watch for the Halloween pumpkin stand. Coming around the corner, literally.

  • Rain-bow start

    It’s not an optical illusion. It’s real.  Has always been there and it’s called light. But somehow, this afternoon, at the start of my run around the park, I saw a rainbow. Nature conspires to create a rainbow for Southern California. Breath-taking is its beauty.

    People paused and took pics from their I-phones. It’s a rare sight indeed, consider there wasn’t even a drop of rain.

    It’s always been there.  Just another way to show itself, light that is.

    We need sunlight and its photosynthesis effect.

    The cycle of dawn to dusk.

    We keep hearing “life is too short”. And then, we hear that in places like Alaska, the days are long.

    Which is true? People must be talking about Kairos vs Chronos.

    Timeliness vs the conventional 24-hour cycle.

    (BTW, it’s news cycle now. So we all know what happened with Isaac upgrade to Hurricane category 1, or  GOP kicks off their meeting in Tampa,  etc…).

    We are inundated with trivia. News that trigger curiosity but trivia still.

    Then we learn to tune out the top and the side bars (advertising).

    Then we grow desensitized and disengaged. If world citizens are “compassion-fatigue”, not so much because they wore themselves out from doing good, but because they threw the baby out with the bathwater i.e. news, as presented to us in current forms-  that they might miss out an opportunity to engage or be warned.

    I got a good laugh today, when my roommate showing off his once-$600 film camera. Who would sell him films and develop them nowadays?

    Change comes that quickly.

    And might you, the guy is still young. Not your grandfather with his black-and-white momento.

    So, we get on, with RIM down, Nokia down, Sony struggles and Amazon rules (the Cloud).

    That quickly.

    But nothing is new. All that happened before. Just like the rainbow I saw today.

    Just another way for nature , which has always been there, to be in our face, with a new spin on an old story line. Inviting and daring discoverers to go where no one has ever set foot before.

    RIP Neil Armstrong. You got to see that picture of them in an isolated trailer, with President Nixon looking in from the outside.

    It could have been their coffins, given the 60’s P.O.V.  In fact, there had been a prepared speech,  just in case they didn’t make it.

    Now, with giants’ shoulders as platform, let’s stand tall, be confident and grateful that we have less fear of the irrational. And best of all, a majority of us will have long to live, love and  learn more than those before us, who I am sure had seen an occasional rainbow as I did today, and perhaps had also wondered: is it an act of God? Is this lucky or what? To have such a symmetry painted on the sky, for free and for all.

  • Sand and Storm

    Isaac is sweeping through the Keys in a Northwest arch as seen in previous storms.

    Paradise bills come due. This summer we have seen an eerie absence of tornadoes (too dried to happen).

    Paradise’s sand box are put on high alert.

    The last time, a political convention that got that much press attention before it gets started was Chicago 68.

    This time, the National Guards are also mobilized, but for a different reason: to help with eventual and possible evacuation.

    Grab your bag. Essentials only: toothbrush, toothpaste (shared), eye glasses, underwear and change of clothes. Well, maybe a paperback, normally for beach reading.

    I used to have my class do an exercise in forced ranking: what if you could only bring five things to an isolated island.

    It makes for group discussion, collaboration and debate.

    What would you bring if you were to live in the Keys this morning?

    Tow that camper away with everything in it and sit in traffic?

    Remember not to forget the I-phone charger, for storm tracker.

    I know I would bring my daughter’s pics, even though they are already in a flash drive.

    I heard of DropBox. Maybe I should open an account (a safe?) there in the Cloud.

    Valuables and all that remains.

    A lifetime of memory and momento.

    What is life?

    Play time and work time, hurt and healing?

    Sand storm and sand box.

    Some of us are defined by crisis, others crown.

    The higher the climb, the steeper the fall.

    Just part of the roller-coaster ride.

    In other time, Florida Keys are picture perfect. You can’t get enough of it.

    But then, one has to live with these North-ward weather patterns, as if everything “negative” seems to have come from somewhere South, if it fits your prejudice. People who reached a certain maturity have come to accept that trade-off : you can’t have paradise without penalty, sand without storm, at least in this life, at least on this Earth.

  • Monsoon and Moonfest

    Overhearing some people talking about rain in Dalat, Vietnam‘s mountainous area, I thought back to a time and a place where innocence was shred like old skin. You see, growing up in Vietnam even in the midst of the war, was still something to be cherished. You might have neighbor’s funeral with flag draped over coffin, but you could also have free reign during Moon Festival. Lanterns and lighting, of all kinds.

    Monsoon rain during the day and dry crisp air at night, formed a clear line of sight to chi Hang (Moon Lady). I imagined seeing the Moon man hanging on to the magic tree (per fairy tale). Later on, when Neil Armstrong  (who has just died) stepped foot on it, as Curiosity Rover now roaming Mars, science was waging war on our hand-me-down heritage. Fable or fact? Fiction or non-fiction?

    If you were to grow up during my time, you couldn’t have helped questioning everything: kids on the opposite side of the world were doing the same thing, asking if the “outsourced” war thousands miles away were worth the sacrifice. Meanwhile, computer geeks just coded their nights away in A/C- humming labs. If we can zoom the camera out , we will see dry and hot day in California and Seattle (where Bill Gates was taking a bus for computer timeshare) and the post-rainy Moon Festival night when I was skipping with lantern in hand. Got to have those cakes and candles.

    Sweet tooth and sweet innocence. A whole festival dedicated to our young age group. Who said in Asia, only older people are respected. We (kids) ruled!

    Then that innocence was shattered as reports about the unwinnable war got out with CBS dailies. Cronkite walked the ground of the US embassy and delivered a one-two punch in bullet-proof vest and helmet: it’s a stalemate.

    Johnson knew then he wouldn’t have a  chance to convince the public the other way, after all, “that’s the way it is”.

    Truth and fiction, fairy tale vs glass-encased moon rock.

    In full view, we knew something was going on, but “what it is, ain’t exactly clear”.

    So I grew up hurriedly, burned my  Moon Fest candles quickly and swallowed that sweet cake in one bite.

    Fast forward to this day, again, hot in California, and rainy in Dalat, I smile to myself: it sure has been a wonderful childhood amidst of war. The intense fighting only made coming of age all the more precious.

    Blood was shed to protect our playground.

    I now realize why I keep coming back for more . I wish for other kids to feel what I felt: an appreciation for life, albeit amidst danger. Despite having threats from all sides, one could still do some self-validating, self-legitimizing and story-telling (to generation next). Now, that’s pre-computer-age coding and culture making. That’s buying time in a society on the verge of collapse. Now, we see children with I-pads in hands, but disrespectful and unappreciative. The age of Entitlement is overtaking the age of Enlightenment. And no one seems to “cry, my beloved country”. The Monsoon suddenly brought back sweet memories of  MoonFest. Monsoon continues still, year after year, but not my MoonFest,  which exists only in faint but never faded memory.

  • Unseen hands

    that manipulate interest rates, oil price, appropriate and earmark budgets for the commons.

    Adam Smith must be talking about the abstract “invisible hand” of a free market, while in reality, we all feel there are levers behind the scene with successive hands, tinkling and adjusting. Some are automated, by self-improving algorithms.

    One example of the devastating works of this unseen hand was seven or eight years ago, when people in Southern California driving to Arizona and Las Vegas to buy houses. People who were NINJ (No job, no income).

    The unseen hand that was supposed to regulate, didn’t.

    Now, they uncover a bunch of Ponzi schemes. Quickly, these poster boys are put away, or at least, taken out of their nice homes in Colorado.

    I do buy things to sustain. Hence, I am a consumer, but refuse to be called consumerist. I don’t follow the cult of purchase for purchase’s sakes.

    I don’t buy to stimulate anything. If the economy can’t get cranked by itself (with 7 Billion of us buying things day in and out), then all the unseen hands in the world can’t help it.

    At least, there is some good news from the Michigan Consumer Confidence Index. And Wall Street chart starts looks like a slanted V-shaped recovery. Let’s hope so. Rally, rally, rally. Oil price goes up. Confidence is up. So is the temperature.

    If you don’t hit the store by 10AM, forget it. The USA weather maps shows red-hot regions in the South. It’s global warming. And we need those unseen hands to regulate the thermostat as well. I am not against hands. Just encourage them to tinkle with the right buttons, while letting the market regulate itself, in the noble Adam Smith tradition.

  • Be sure to bring some flowers

    That voice which slows toward the end of the song as the chord changes:
    “If you’re going to San Francisco…” accompanied by the 60’s signature tambourine, has died. But his one-hit wonder stays, perhaps more famous than the city itself.

    It’s a state of mine. A period in history, with in-depth expose by Tom Hayden and Tom Brokaw. A new explanation and “a vibration” (today, we got “going viral” ). People in motion.  Keep moving. Keep evolving. Keep changing at the grass root level.

    No one wanted to be “institutionalized” (One flew over the cuckoo’s nest). Individualism championed by groups and movement, ironically. Out of the box, out of the can.
    We got Papillon, the Great Escape (both played by Steve McQueen, a San Francisco’s familiar face).  We got the ethos (youth), the prop (flower), the non-verbal greeting (peace symbol), the hair, the costume (Indian fashion) and an anthem.

    I first heard the song right before Tet 68. School was closed due to the uprising throughout South Vietnam. With a lot of time in my hand, I practiced the guitar. San Francisco over House of the Rising Sun, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road over both.  The girls (older than I) were with flowers on their hair.

    Later, when I had a chance to revisit Vietnam, I looked up an old classmate who had been paralyzed, When I played the guitar and sang for him, who lied motionless in bed,  he requested San Francisco (people in motion).

    My friend was one of the “gentle people” I have met in my life. He is into poetry, music by Trinh Con Son (Vietnamese Bob Dylan). And he got paralyzed for rescuing some kids who were standing under a fallen iron gate.

    People in motion, people in motion. But my friend has stayed immobile.

    And the singer of that signature song has died.

    Somehow, I don’t think it would end here. I know the spirit lives on, in San Francisco. People are passionate about the city, its livability, environment and ethos.  Legislation there is fierce and uncompromising when it comes to sustainability. After all, we want to see flowers grow there, along with civil liberty and civil rights.

    Even so, be sure to bring (and wear) some flowers when you go there.

    The Bay areas get nice weather, gentle people and lots of hills. I even ran a Bay-to-Bridge race once, just to take in the scene. And the Chinese New Year Parade there is the event not to be missed. That era, those street corners and the people once flocked there to search (for a new explanation) and share (laying foundation for today’s internet peering, open source, wikipedia and interoperability) under one huge umbrella: McKenzie’s San Francisco.

    Heck, I was just trying to get to Middle School in Vietnam. And I just stopped short of wearing some flowers in my hair. Instead, we settled for those flower stickers, along with the peace symbol, despite living at the height of the war. RIP Scotty.

  • Enduring trends

    Technologists are enthusiasts. Their progress are documented in hockey-stick trends. Meanwhile  we as ordinary human are still reacting out of fear as if we were still living in caves. The reptilian brain vs rapid rise of chip speed, guns vs germs, technology vs anthropology!

    As early as 1950’s, graduates would hear something like: “boy, you get that desk job, stay there, work your way up and cash out . You will be set, boy.” In short, seniority and being an institutional memory keeper equal “iron rice bowl”.

    Not in the 21 century. Take Yahoo. A darling of Silicon Valley (I am still using yahoo mail, reliable), but increasingly, moving into the slot left vacant by AOL. (Facebook, if not careful, might fall into the MySpace hole).

    When I took Science, Technology and Society at Penn State in my senior year, I realized then that not all technology were meant to take off, or were a blessing. They are both blessing and curse. (I must give the US Post Office some credits for converting its entire fleet to Electric Vehicles a years back).

    These trends will stay with us:

    – socks (short or long)

    – jeans

    – baby pics, mobile apps

    – slow rock (romantic)

    – sunset, virtual or real

    – kind words, kind gesture, roses

    – birthday cakes

    – tomb stones or equivalent if cremated

    – shoes, shorts and sandals

    – contact lenses (as flat screens)

    – vitamins, although God knows what they put in there.

    The Economist has its cover story this week about our human body, as composed of bacteria cells.

    But how come those bacteria got vibrated with Streisand’s Evergreen? With Nocturne? Chopin and Bach?

    Until technologists learned that we are more complex than the mind can understand, then they get somewhere.

    Invent only that which benefits mankind, stuff that people can use. Don’t chase lab stuff only. Solve  problems:

    how to get your hair done the quickest way in the morning, how to get to work using the best route, nearest gas station that charges less (or use EV) glove compartment that can store today’s aviation sun glasses, games that kids can play and learn something while at it, profile  algorithms that make friends out of strangers. Science, Technology and Society. When they plugged in the electricity for the first time at the Chicago fair, many thought it had been Heaven. Now, we took it for granted. Let’s hope for some break-through, even when many will fail. Try again. Keep in mind, the reptilian brain. How we still react like cavemen. Still love like cavemen. And yes, jealousy still is a big part. Those are enduring trends you can bet on.