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.

Tag: Agent Orange

  • War’s reluctant start

    It’s true a century ago with the assassination of an Austrian baron. It’s true half a century ago with one ( or two) incidents in the Gulf of Tonkin. It’s true this very Labor weekend, even when we all saw photos of little bodies – dead by chemically induced weapon. Labor Day traditionally meant as…

  • Learning as motivator

    From papyrus to paper, from microfiche to microphone, we use technology for knowledge transfer. Learning is a great motivator. Once started it never stops (in my death-bed, I probably still ask the attending nurse what all those charts mean, and why not this and that). Don’t believe in learning curve (as if once you got…

  • Reflections of my life

    ” 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 21st or 23rd (Mayan Calendar). Just…

  • Ennobling

    You don’t have to be rich or poor.  Nobility is a choice. A willful act of service. A realization that your words, which might injure someone, be best left unsaid. WWII servicemen, having seen and heard all there was to be experienced, have put themselves through school (GI Bills) and affected the change we see…

  • Ma Belle

    She hit all the right notes. Struck the chords. Evoked the emotion. Great speech arouses. Got the audience on their feet. They were waiting to hear, not for a hand-out but for a herald. Together we can. But the disconnect is when it comes to action: People simply don’t believe either side i.e. the propaganda, the…

  • Twice, it’s alright

    I did everything twice. It’s become a pattern. It’s become a pattern, 6th grade found me fumble from a French-system to then Vietnamese system, so I ended up repeating my 6th grade at two different Middle Schools. Then, my freshman year got interrupted (by the White Christmas song that was played on US Arms Force radio, the…

  • Time to change

    Change bears a different connotation to different people. In the 60’s, change threatened the status quo (Hell No, we won’t go). It’s inevitable that we need to adapt (from jukebox to boombox, from paper-back book to e-book).  A few years from now, we would rather be dead than getting caught carrying  a hard-back book (today’s…

  • Forgetfulness is necessary

    In clinical terms: selective memory. Speak ill not of the dead, for instance. Auto-biography is another version of selective memory (before actual amnesia). For me, to see Dow Chemical opens a polymer and acrylic factory in Vietnam, roughly 40 years after Agent Orange got sprayed over the same landscape, is a great example of collective…

  • If this were my last day

    I would hold the door for the person behind me as always. I would call people whom I have avoided and face those dark alleys once petrified. I would lay down my guards, strip off my veneers, and empathize with others. I would clean up my desk, make my bed and re-arrange my shoes. One…