The Great Flood

Imagine you are Noah in his ark, Deucalion in his chest, or Utnapishtim in his boat. A god has commanded a deluge--for the world to overflow with water. You are sealed inside, warm and dry, but you can hear the storm. It is raging and roaring, the noise deafening, rushing through your ears so quickly there is no room, no time, to hear anything else. You shout to your wife but the only thing heard are waves crashing, the water overtaking the Earth as you huddle, safe in your vessel. All you can think, feel, hear is water pounding, pushing, swarming outside. You are awed by the power, thankful for blessed safety.

Now imagine you are in bed in your house. Outside it's monsooning and you are dreaming about water, about Noah, Deucalion, Utnapishtim, and all the flood myths from around the world. You are incredibly thankful that you are inside, that you are dry, that monsoons end, that, in fact, monsoons only last a few hours altogether, and that it sounds as if you are standing in the middle of a waterfall and isn't that a beautiful thought?

Through the din you sense a sharp, sudden knock. It startles you awake. Someone is yelling but you can't understand them, the monsoon is drowning them out. And then there is light as your door swings open. Your housemate is standing there, yelling about how cold it is, and still--still your head is swimming through water, unable to hear much of anything. Only now you can see, too, and you are not just hearing the monsoon, it's right in front of you; it's cascading down three flights of stairs, gushing into your room, flooding your house. You are no longer safe, you are no longer dreaming, and you are no longer dry. Everything is wet, soaked, drenched, and it is cold, like ice, freezing your toes. The center of your house has become a waterfall and it is most certainly not beautiful.

It's just past 1:30 in the morning and you are experiencing a great, tragic flood without the benevolent assistance of a higher power. The one lousy drain on your roof couldn't keep pace with the pouring rain and you were asleep, totally unaware of the devastation until, by chance, the noise like crashing thunder woke one of your housemates.

You will spend the next half hour ankle-deep in water, unclogging the drain, mopping up the mess, and sulking miserably. The whole time you will be wishing, more than anything, that you are Noah, Deucalion or Utnapishtim and that some god had prepared you for this.

My First Real Vacation

A great many things have happened since I last posted here. It feels like time has flown by. When I first told people at home that I was thinking of teaching English abroad for a year, the majority reaction was to exclaim, "So long?!" Or, you know, something to that effect. But, honestly, I've been away from home now for about seven months and it hardly feels like it. In fact, how quickly the year is passing has made me want to extend my stay. This time next year, I could be teaching English in South Korea.

That decision is only one of several things that occurred these past couple of months. February started off with my first real trip since I arrived in Vietnam. The third of February was Lunar (Chinese) New Year, so I had the first two weeks of February off to celebrate. My chosen form of recreation: travel. I jetted off to Singapore and Malaysia for ten days by myself. It was one of the most relaxing and enjoyable trips I've ever had. Having said that, there's not much to tell. I desperately needed a vacation, to relax and just have some quality "me" time. I didn't feel much like doing anything but I didn't want to do not do anything in Vietnam where everything closed for the holiday. I'd been suffering some pretty serious wanderlust for a few months so getting out and away was necessary for my peace of mind.

First stop: Singapore. (Try out it's Malay name: Singapura. Is that not so much fun to say? It's also a kind of very small cat.) Coming from the States, Singapore would seem like any other big, crowded, loud city in the world. Coming from HCMC, however, Singapore felt like a breath of fresh air--literally. It was spectacularly clean. There are strict laws about littering and where you can't eat or drink. It's also illegal to chew gum and spit, and you can bet there are hefty fines for doing either. I cannot express enough how much I appreciated the cleanliness of Singapore. It was the first thing I noticed and the last thing I thought about when I left. It's been more than a month since I was there and I'm still rhapsodizing about the complete lack of litter and general grunge. Even the metro was sparkling with no lingering odors or suspicious stains. The fast and cheap public transportation was also a major highlight for me. It was so easy to get everywhere and there were lots of things to see, do and, especially, eat. I spent two days in Singapore walking around the city and eating delicious, delicious food.

The best meal I had was shared with a German girl I spent a day with. We had walked all over Chinatown and the city center for about eight hours and ended up in Little India for dinner. At the Banana Leaf Apollo our meal was served on (I've sure you've guessed) banana leaves laid down as place mats. We both ordered the chicken set meal, which included a cabbage dish, a potato dish, basmati rice and mouthwatering, falling-off-the-bone spicy chicken. The food was so amazing that we neglected conversation for more than 15 minutes as we dug in with gusto.

Other than the cleanliness and all the amazing food, what also struck me about the city were the people and the architecture. Singapore is made up of Asians from all over. I hadn't seen so many different people of all shapes and sizes in a long time. A Singaporean man told me, however, that despite the diversity in the country, there is very little co-mingling; the Chinese stick with the Chinese, the Indians stick with the Indians, the Malaysians stick with the Malaysians, etc. For such a small country, I don't know how these divisions hold, but it is interesting nonetheless. As for the architecture, virtually all of the skyscrapers, of which there are a great many, as well as the buildings in general, are unique and interesting designs. I know nothing of architecture, but it seemed very innovative to me and, mostly, fun to look at. There were sloping roofs, malls with bubble designs, blue windows, giant TVs, rooftops that look like snowboards and even a giant microphone (that tragically looks more like a durian...) that is the opera house.

So, while I didn't really do a lot--I only went to one museum and a few mosques and temples--I felt like I saw a lot. I love walking around new places. It's really the best way to see and get to know a city. Each full day in Singapore, I walked around the various cultural areas for about ten hours, and I loved every minute of it.

The only downside I encountered was how insanely expensive the city is. To go from eating lunch for about $0.75 to $10 felt so wrong. In the end though, I was on vacation and the food was so fantastic that I got over the prices quickly and just went with the flow. Also, the rampant consumerism is frightening. I read a joke somewhere that if Singapore had a national sport it would be shopping and I couldn't agree more. There are massive malls everywhere. You can't turn a corner without coming across another one. For some, this is probably not a downside, but I have never enjoyed shopping and I certainly don't go on vacation just to buy things, so I think I have to add that to my list of dislikes. I know that alone would have turned me off if I had arrived straight from the States, but as I didn't, I could easily forgive all of the things designed for people to own more things than they could possibly need. Did I mention how clean it was?

Needless to say, I left Singapore feeling refreshed and delighted to be off on another adventure. After spending way too much money on a bus ticket, I made it into Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for Chinese New Year's Eve. This turned out to be a mistake. In Singapore, there were lots of festivities going on, including a free outdoor concert on the floating dock in the city center that I happened upon my second day there. In Kuala Lumpur, there was nothing going on as far as I could tell. I thought I'd stumble upon something going on for the New Year but the only thing related that I ended up seeing (besides all the decorations and advertisements, including something called a "Prosperity Meal" at McDonalds) was a small Chinese dragon dancer show in a mall... Other than that, there's not much to say about my stay in Kuala Lumpur. I found it very boring. Even walking around the city wasn't very interesting. It felt like any other big, ugly city in the world. I did meet some interesting people in the hostel I stayed in, but that's about it.

My next stop was a small town on the Southern coast of Malaysia called Melaka. It was very, very touristy but somehow it felt sleepy and relaxing. Again I stuck to my usual: walking everywhere and eating as much good food as I could get my hands on. I lucked out to be there over a weekend because that's when there is a night market in Chinatown. Prowling that both nights was awesome. The red Chinese lanterns swaying slightly above the crowd provided the main source of light and set the whole street aglow. People were selling everything from windup toys to handmade jewelry to ShamWow mats and mops. Absolutely the best part was the street food. I dined on chocolate covered strawberries, little egg tarts and the most miraculous, brilliant treat yet: a potato on a stick that was then cut into a spiral, spread out, deep fried and then sprinkled with any number of toppings--instant chips! I probably ate too many of these...

I spent my last day in Singapore doing the exact same things as I'd done the rest of my trip. My trip may sound boring but the simple pleasure of being able to walk anywhere and everywhere was too good to pass up. It's so difficult to walk in HCMC, so I took every opportunity to enjoy free, open sidewalks and real, working stoplights and crosswalks that drivers pay attention to.

I'm back to working too much and living a terribly boring life but, for the most part, it's a good one.