Tag: Carriage

Cyclo in the time of Google

By now, you can still see a few weather-beaten cyclos around albeit restricted to tourist quarters.

I still remember the sound of horse carriage in the streets of  old Saigon.

My kid will be lucky if she knows what a cyclo is.

She knows Google though.

Paperless and painless search. Now with semantic search.

My profile, age in particular, triggers online ads on retirement funds.

Each day, we clear out trash in our home office and online.

Meanwhile, cyclo guys paddle along, knowing that their trade is joining the ranks of old scribes, horse shoe makers and Kodak shops. And the cinema is about to close its curtain. My uncle’s cinema is now a storage.

I came back fully related to the character in Cinema Paradiso,  with nostalgia.

The underlining theme is still there: where is that old blind film projectionist/mentor ? Mine is a guitarist who has recently been out of work.

We both need a gig. Maybe it will work out for him since he has upgraded his play list on an Ipad. But not for the cyclo guy whose best day constitutes but a few passengers hauling bulky merchandise. Cyclo is now relics of a colonial past: white folks and colored coolies, on a leisurely ride along smoke-filled streets packed with motorcycles made in China. Future shock has moved on to its Third Stage (Muscle, machine and Mind), from cyclo to motor-cycle and onto Google. People are making money by a click of the mouse, and not by paddling those three-wheelers, using 21st-century skill set and not primitive strands of muscle.

Modern technology doesn’t come without criticism, starting with the Luddites onto soon-to-be-released Circle.

Consider a huge percentage of Search are on the subject of Porn, to shut it down altogether would present a dictator’s dilemma.

No turning back, or you will turn into salt. Gosh, I miss the sound of horse carriage at Ben Thanh market. I miss being skinny , vulnerable and trusting. Faith that can move mountain. That some day, I will see face to face, although only through a glass darkly in the mean time.

Wisdom comes from mistakes, not missed opportunities.

I’d rather tried and failed than failed to try.

Tell that to the cyclo guy, who ordered two glasses of sugar-cane juice, while I could barely gulp down one. All I did was googling, while he was cycling. Muscle man in the age of Machine.

 

Lingering

When honey moon is over, people are faced with bills, kids crawl and cry, temptation to compare with alternate spousal choices.

My Dad went through that struggle. I have gone through the same.

Lingering legacy.

Unintended consequences.

The result: my half-sister and me.

What to do and what to say.

Same chromosome, but with a slightly different cut of the same cloth.

I don’t hate her.

Just don’t know what to make of Dad’s lingering legacy.

Staring at me in the face.

Reminding me of my own helplessness.

Of hours spent in agony and even envy (she got more attention, a fact that did not escape my mom’s scrutiny).

Now, both of my parents have passed away.

But me and my half-sister are still here, sitting next to each other at a relative’s wedding.

What to do with each other, and what to say?

Where do you work now? while spinning the Lazy Susan.

The gay singer kept changing his tune and his voice (female then male alternate).

I turned around a few times just to find out it was still the same singer of many voices.

Cost-cutting measures.

Vietnam is better off now. The evidence shows in the proliferation of wedding reception halls to meet a young demographic demand.

No more lingering effect of the war here.

Just married.

Just do it.

No legacy, no lingering. No regret.

I was a bit under-dressed for the occasion. Given the long limo outside and the horse carriage.

Oh well, who would have guessed it’s time to wear a tux here in Vietnam.

But then, who would have thought I could be back here to begin with. Back then, the Chinese in Cho Lon cornered the wedding catering market: just Dong Khanh and A Dong. Go to the left or to the right but same kitchen. Now, it’s live video coverage, cut to live entrance.

Here comes the bride.

All radiant and ready. If only the couple doesn’t shop around any more. If only they leave not a lingering legacy like my Dad’s.

Modernity and memory

A “xe om” (scooter taxi) guy mentioned a city (Lai Thieu?) where one can find all the abandoned carriages (horse or cow).

Hearing that, I flashed back to those early days when I accompanied my grandmother on her monthly trip to receive pension.

We took a bus, and Lambretta . I always got treated to a good lunch, a special bonding. It made me feel needed albeit just a kid.

At Ben Thanh Central Market, we could still find horse carriages leisurely move about in sparse traffic.

Speaking of the here and now. Vietnam finished some “white elephant” projects recently (Can Tho Bridge, Thu Thiem underwater bridge, Da nang Dragon bridge).

For those people whose livelihood depended on ferrying passengers, modern bridges spelled the end of their earnings.

When Henry Ford tied together two motorbikes to make a four-wheeler, horse carriage operators assumed that his invention would fail (too much smoke and noise, a disruption and distraction).

Yet we all know what has happened since.

A whole industry went down the tube: saddle makers, horse shoes, horse breeding and carriage builders.

In fact, in England, taxis still keep the old sitting arrangement (where two rows of passengers facing each other).

Nostalgia.

Lost cause and lost era.

Many residents of Thu Thiem perhaps feel elated but also puzzled by this change.

People stopped in the middle of the tunnel to take souvenir photos???

Modern memory.

We leave behind our digital fingerprints and carbon footprints.

Future archivists will excavate and learn about our “elementary” approaches to using the Web.

Our kids will look back to find our social graphs quite rudimentary.

What do you mean you only post a class picture on Facebook?

Video chat that can only see your face under poor lighting condition?

Families living across the continent can’t get together over Thanksgiving dinner online?

(MCI commercial was about just that, back in 1993).

Modernity, by definition, never stops reinventing itself.

I will never find horse carriages in the city, but out in the country, cities like Da Lat , tourists can still ride a horse carriage as they do with cyclo today in District 1. Modernity or memory? I miss my grandma already despite the age gap and generational gap.

cyclo in the time of google

By now, you can still see a few weather-beaten cyclos around albeit restricted to tourist quarters.

I still remember the sound of horse carriage in the streets of  old Saigon.

My kid will be lucky if she knows what a cyclo is.

She knows Google though.

Paperless and painless search. Now with semantic search.

My profile, age in particular, triggers online ads on retirement funds.

Each day, we clear out trash in our home office and online.

Meanwhile, cyclo guys paddle along, knowing that their trade is joining the ranks of old scribes, horse shoe makers and Kodak shops. And the cinema is about to close its curtain. My uncle’s cinema is now a storage.

I came back fully related to the character in Cinema Paradiso,  with nostalgia.

The underlining theme is still there: where is that old blind film projectionist/mentor ? Mine is a guitarist who has recently been out of work.

We both need a gig. Maybe it will work out for him since he has upgraded his play list on an Ipad. But not for the cyclo guy.

Perhaps the best they can hope for are a few passengers per day, hauling bulky merchandise. Cyclo and modern supermarkets don’t go well together. Instead, it is now relegated to being a ride to a colonial past: white folks and colored coolies, on a leisurely ride along smoke-filled streets packed with motorcycles made in China. Future shock has moved on to its Third Stage (Muscle, machine and Mind), from cyclo to moto-cycle and onto Google. People are making money by a click of the mouse, and not by paddling those three-wheelers, using 21st-century skill set and not primitive strands of muscle.

No turning back, or you will turn into salt. Gosh, I miss the sound of horse carriage at Ben Thanh market. I miss being skinny , vulnerable and trusting. Faith that can move mountain. That some day, I will see face to face, although meantime, only through a mirror darkly.

Wisdom comes from mistakes, not missed opportunities.

I’d rather tried and failed than failed to try.

Tell that to the cyclo guy, who ordered two glasses of sugar-cane juice, while I could barely gulp down one. All I did was googling, while he was cycling. Muscle man in the age of Machine.