The Toilet Edition (Last time for everything)

Dear Home Team,

It’s a good pain, I guess. But these days everything we do has a tinge of “this might be (or is-for-sure) the last time …”

• Filling the motorbikes with petrol.

• Haircuts

• Buying bananas from Thương down the street

• Drinking coffee at Happy Hung’s

• Hosting a final English Club, board games night, etc.

Actually writing those 5 things into a list uncorked for me how vast the number of things there are that we’re doing the last of these days. And it’s hard.

Today was a last (hopefully) of a less pleasant sort.

What do you see in this picture?

This is a terrifying bathroom photo, and I'll explain more in a minute.  First, though, let me reassure you that MOST bathrooms here are very pleasant.  

Here's a quaint and cute one in a Hoi An coffee shop:

the video of the beautiful little WC is 5 seconds 

https://youtube.com/shorts/Ht8K_ZKsIZk?feature=share

In the Hoi An coffeeshop bathroom, they've artistically arranged for some rolls of paper to be available on branches attached to the wall.  Cute!  That TP is for your bum, yes, but it's intended to be used on pretty clean bums.  Then you're to put the pretty clean TP into the brown trash can, as it's a no-no to flush TP in many toilets.  

Video that also shows a common sign about how to use the toilet properly.

Above is a super-typical bathroom stall.  Nice tilework, everything is pretty maintained.  There's a floor-drain in every bathroom for easy cleaning.  And there's the ubiquitous bum-gun.  In-house water temperature here is generally pleasant for spraying down your dirty parts after using the toilet, and then you can pat dry with some paper goods and deposit the paper into the trash can.  Easy peasy.

So.  What made me shudder when I saw this toilet today?  Not the dubious privacy--I can assure you that I had to go bad enough that privacy wasn't my concern.  

Allow me to zoom in.

There's a scoop in the red bucket.  The white hose can be turned on to refill the red bucket.

This is terrifying.  It means ... there is no functioning flush mechanism.  You have to use a scoop of water to flush.  

That part isn't terrifying.  

The pertinent point is that there's no operational bum-gun if there's no operational water in the bathroom.  With no bum-gun and no paper, and an urgent need, what's going to happen here?  (Scooping water onto your backside doesn't have NEARLY the same effect as spraying with a bum-gun.)

So I hope that's my last time at a bum-gun-less toilet.  Ever.  But at least for this time in Vietnam.

Love,

Tim/Janet

PS.  Today we met up with an old friend to visit his house and eat banh xeo wraps together (maybe the last banh xeo this time?).

He is yet another person who spontaneously started talking about how his exposure to the people of Vision English Cafe 11 years ago taught him about forgiveness and gave him the ability to express gratitude and apology.  In his family of origin these were not valued and modeled.  He says that the host, who was like a Korean grandfather to all the young Vietnamese employees and students, showed his love to them all and changed all their lives.  What an incredible impact.

Falling Refrigerators

Dear Mom,

I know you're not a fan of heights, but yesterday I was invited up to the top floor of a friend's apartment complex where they have an infinity pool.  The heat is growing more intense here, every day a little hotter, and that doesn't convey well in the video.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/des7NYiuP8BJLxj68

You begin looking north (pause the video to see details) and you can see where Danang is reclaiming part of the bay to use for building.  Actually that reclamation project has been going on for a century and I'm really impressed by how they are shaping the coastline here.  The port is across the water at the northwest tip of Son Tra.  Then the camera pans over to another water reclamation project and the north-north bridge.  

And Dad, you taught me to drive "defensively," always looking for what might happen and being ready to stop or avoid someone else's mistake.  And as I was driving recently I realized I was calculating "how far back should I stay from the motorbike ahead of me, in case that refrigerator she's carrying comes unstrapped and falls off?"

Is that a funny sentence to think?  Do they not teach that in driver's ed?  

Granted, the fridge isn't a full size one, but it's not a mini, either.  I stayed well back but then I closed the gap and had the guy I was with snap a photo to send to you.

Love,

Tim/Janet

PS. 

Whenever we have visitors, we like to try to go see the Dragon Bridge spout its fire.  This was last Friday:

And a 5-second video:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/U6iUr4EidJeqdCMJ9

Lost in Translation

Dear Mom,

The translation software is always improving, and that's a good thing, too, because it still has had a long way to go!  We've seen some *pretty* funny translation attempts as Facebook tries to automatically translate for us our friends' "check in" posts, which are often written in slang kidspeak to begin with.  At the moment I don't have any examples of the funny translations, and who am I to complain, anyhow?

Google Translate is a lifesaver, for sure.  

And sometimes you can use the camera feature of Google Translate to good effect:

becomes

But there are nuances to how I use technology to help with understanding.  Sometimes I could generate a translation, but it's actually a picture that I want.  An example of this would be when I want popcorn kernels--a very unusual request and only sold in certain shops catering to a tiny sliver of the population.  If I type in "popcorn kernel" into Google Translate, it will probably generate a correct word, but that word may not even make sense to most shopkeepers.  And then I wouldn't know, when I show them my phone and they shake their head, whether my inquiry actually made sense and they don't have the item, or if the question was itself a dud.

So in that case I'd use my phone as a communication aid in a different way.  A Google search generates not only a photo of the item I am searching for, but also the Vietnamese words that are effective to communicate about it.

Recently I was at the tomb of the first emperor of the most modern Vietnamese royal dynasty.  That's in Huế, two hours north, where the kingdom capital was located.  The tour guide said that people would stand outside the gate of the tomb to "worship" the dead emperor, and it struck me that I really don't know all the finesse of that word as it's used and translated.  
So in the cases of real complexity, like this one, I'll ask one of my synthetic friends.  The first three paragraphs are my query, and below that is the first paragraph of several pages' worth of answer.

I don't know how long this link will be valid, but here's the rest of that conversation if you're interested:

https://chatgpt.com/share/69afe210-cf40-800b-b9d1-79f9bd77b7a8

If I'm using my phone for translation, I try to use the very simplest English phrases to eliminate accidents.  Pronouns and time-phrases are two areas where you need to keep it as simple as possible, and of course keep away from idioms.  

Ironically, sometimes the best way to simplify your language for translation is to use a more sophisticated word.  In the last paragraph I said "keep away from idioms" which sounds to us like a simpler way of saying the two words "avoid idioms."  But actually in this case your translation app will thank you for using the specific word that has only one meaning.  There are so many examples of this, where we usually use language that's a little slippery and friendly, and instead it's helpful for the translation software if we can use crisp, precise language.

Phrasal verbs such as “figure out”  “work out”  “pick up”  “get over”  “take off” look simple but are ambiguous for translation software.

Example:  “I’ll pick it up later.”  ----  could mean:  collect something, learn something quickly, improve (skills), lift something

Words like:  “retrieve,” “collect,” or “acquire” are easier to translate because they're more precise.

Yep.  This stuff is interesting to me, but I can see that it might not seem like there's much of a point.  I guess it's just what I've been thinking about in regards to using my phone more effectively as a translation tool.  Much love!

~Tim/Janet

PS. 

A group of friends from Bend is here, and it's delightful for us to show them our city.  Tonight we're taking some of them to vegetarian dinner before Vision English Club.  Tomorrow we're planning to rent a motorbike so we can all be on two wheels (when the occasions arise for us to safely convoy like that).