when nice just isn't enough
yesterday i was going to update my journal when out of the blue the unassuming young vietnamese lab assistant named the anh started randomly speaking to me in vietnamese. now it is true that i am in vietnam and should take every opportunity i can to speak vietnamese, however the circumstances under which i was expected to perform were daunting. i had just come in from the torturous mixture of heat and humidity that had been plaguing me for 5 hours + and i merely wanted to pop in and pop out of the computer lab. this intense climate makes me crabby and irritable and these feelings were only exacerbated by the knowledge that i would have to remain in the hot lab, speaking in vietnamese on subjects that i didn't care to talk about. in addition, a talk with the anh is never brief as he is very persistent and is ever-oblivious to the fact that he is being bothersome. i tried my best to look annoyed and busy and resisted speaking in vietnamese for as long as possible. and as always he persisted with the random questions, using words i didn't know and ones that he couldn't explain in english. this only worked to heighten my annoyance. however, the final blow came when he asked me the same questions that he asks me everytime we talk....why don't i want to live in vietnam? why don't i want to work in vietnam? don't i like vietnam? set free by the ringing of the telephone, i escaped with my nerves hanging by a thread and my heart on the verge of exploding.