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: San Francisco

  • The-Man Band

    He is the man. My man. Summer night 40 some years ago, he practiced his guitar on the roof behind my house (like a line in Your Song). Today he is still playing, whistling and singing. On previous trips, I watched him perform along with two other members in an outdoor cafe. Slowly, it winded…

  • Sur le pont

    Oakland Bridge that is. The one got fixed by a China-based sub-contractor. Now, down the dock and downtown, Occupy pledges to stay for the long haul. Gertrude Stein once said of Oakland: “there is no there, there” (hence, no center to be occupied.) When crossing that bridge, I thought of New York City (sprawling California only…

  • Asian self-awareness

    In some cultures, people felt ashamed to put on clothes, or if they dressed at all, they would go to the middle of the house in plain view instead of the far corner (where it would draw more attention to the act of changing). Au contraire, at 24-hr fitness, I notice most of the corner…

  • 3D and 4G

    At the most elementary level, we got the chip set. That is about to change, from “flat like a sheet of paper”” to 3D chip, announced Intel (which made Applied Materials jump to its 3.9 Billion acquisition of Varian Semiconductor to keep pace). Our world is about to change once again, not to the tune…

  • Heterogeneous country, homogeneous thought

    Google CEO blurted out what we all know (that tech moves at 3 times faster than other business sectors, who in turn, are 3X than the government). We are analog-built e.g. eating,  buying and thinking habits, while techies thought processing power is on a different plane e.g. Cold-War B53 bomb in TX is finally being disassembled and junked. A…

  • Austin

    Tech campus turned Mall (still keeps the “DOMAIN” name). Borders out of business, but Apple store is thriving. Austin, ranked as most tolerant city in America, saw Chinese Graduate students hang out leisurely on a Sunday afternoon, complete with rocking chairs, very well be made in China. Welcome to America. Welcome to Starbucks. What’s your name buddy? My…

  • When truth shows up

    On the list of “cities that might get worse”, many are from California (Stockton, Bakersfield…but surprisingly, San Francisco as well). Even with and despite boosted help from Tinsel Town. My first impressions of Los Angeles were formed back in the midst 80’s, during the commercial real estate boom (remember Michael Douglas and the Japanese gangs, or automobile…

  • Marketing genius

    Charlie Chaplin would keep filming until he got it perfect (100:1 filming ratio to get the ladder to swing just right etc…). In “the Kid“, the little girl would throw rocks at windows, while our handyman walks right behind to fix them. Gillette would give away razors just to sell the blades (HP has done…

  • Where have they gone?

    Subtitle “Time to remember”. When I was in high school, the consumer society began to take shape in Vietnam: beer, cheese, cigarettes, toothpaste and vinyl music albums. Then we moved on to AKAI tape. By the time I got to the US, the first item I purchased was a portable cassette recorder (to record music…

  • All about finishing!

    How would you like to keep up at third place, just to have your legs give in at the last-minute? That’s what happened to SF track star, who managed to crawl to the finishing line. http://abcnews.go.com/US/injured-high-school-runner-crawls-finish-line-push/story?id=12298473 In the late 70’s, it’s all about running. Then we learned more about knee injuries. So we took up…