New House - New Job!

Three month after leaving IBM, I rented a house in Da Nang and started teaching at the Duy Tan University on Monday :) Life is great!

My new house is so spacious :) I feel like a princess! It is only 500m away from the beach :)

Oh and I forgot to mention, I rented a motorbike :) So all is good!

Very interesting experience on Monday teaching 2 classes after each other for 2 hours from 7-11am! The first class is very well behaved and eager to learn. The only challenge is that the students have very different levels of English from Elementary to Intermediate and this is a very wide range. Well, I will manage somehow. I signed a contract for 6 weeks and then lets see what happens. I would like to keep my options open just in case something better might come up ;)

The second class is as I said very challenging. There are some students in the class who have not really any interest to improve their English. So they are chatting to each other all the time instead of paying attention. But as you can imagine, I can be very serious in that case and I was very strict with them. Otherwise I would feel sorry for the students who actually are interested to learn. I am giving listening and speaking classes and there is a lot to do to improve their pronunciation. Anyway, I love my first class and soon the 2nd one will be fine as well ;)

Yes, I rented a house! So cool :) It is such a gorgeous place - spacious, by the sea, 15 min to work with my bike. It has cable TV, 2 double bedrooms, kitchen, 2 bathrooms and a terrace. What more could I have wished for?! Visitors :)

I have a Vietnamese Landlord and if something needs to get adjusted or fixed to the wall you have 10 people in the house....unreal! That is so Vietnamese. They cannot stay alone.

We also got a new bar, which just opened last Friday! Great place and I didn't know that there were at least 50 Western people in Da Nang! Was a nice evening.

On Sunday I finally drove with my motorbike to Hoi An. Took me 50min, but it was worth every minute. I had a delicious meal at the river - grilled beef in Banana Leafs :) So tasty. Life is great! Thinking about to drive there again on Saturday for a nice day out.

And what is happening in your life? Please put some comments on the blog. It is always so nice to read :)

Da Nang Beach :)

Can life be better?! What a gorgeous beach here in Da Nang, the water is crystal clear and I can walk from my guesthouse room from the University to the beach. Well, it is a 45 minute walk, but I don't care. In the end you have a brilliant refreshing swim in the sea!

There are a lot of decisions to make this week and in the following. I got a job offer from a local University here in Da Nang. They want me to work quite a lot of hours and they don't have any other Western Teacher here whatsoever. Not many resources available here either, no course books etc. So lets see what agreement I can find with them. I think it would be something to start off with, but I don't want to sign a contract with them. Had another interview today with an English Language Institute run by an Australian and I liked it a lot. They will let me know hopefully in the next 2 weeks if they can hire another teacher. Keep your fingers crossed for me please, because I think this would be the right thing to do.

For the time being I am staying in the guesthouse of the University which is actually a guest room directly in the University building. It has internet, a TV and is pretty central in Da Nang. Guess I can stay here until I find an apartment etc. to move to.

I was checking out the possibilities to rent a motorbike and it looks like it is possible. So hopefully soon, I will renting one and then I can go to 'Hoi An' the lovely town with all the tailors and good food, which is only 40min away from here :) and of course it is by the sea as well so I can bring my swim suit!

Talk soon

Pictures from the Train trip

Train trip from Hanoi to Da Nang

This trip is the best train journey you can have :) I took this train now the 3rd time and I am always amazed of it. Gorgeous scenery and impressive landscapes with beaches you just can dream of....and this all by looking out from a window from a train!!!

What do you think?!

I shared a cabin with five Vietnamese people, only one was able to say some words in English to me to have a kind of a conversation ;) To the rest I talked with my hands etc.

In June and July it is holiday season for the Vietnamese and the people from Hanoi are coming down to Central Vietnam with their families to have some days vacation by the sea. This was also the reason why it was so tough to get a train ticket down to Da Nang in the first place.

But it was worthwhile and I feel already much more relaxed than in the last 5 weeks.

Sightseeing in Hanoi and Good-Bye

Last week Thursday I finally said good-bye to Hanoi :) It is a nice city, but too noisy and hectic to live there for more than 5 weeks. You can find some pictures from my last sightseeing tour before I got on the train going down to Central Vietnam.

My first Vietnamese Wedding in Haiphong

If you believe it or not, but I got invited to a Vietnamese wedding this weekend in Haiphong. One of the translators, Trang that I worked with during my CSC Assignment from IBM got married in her hometown. There are so many impressions; it is so hard to know where to start. We took a bus from Hanoi to Haiphong Saturday morning at 8am and we finally arrived at Trangs house at 11.30am. Well it sounds so straight forward, but it actually wasn’t. You need to take a Motorbike to the bus station, 2 different busses and then we got a private Motorbike ride from some of Trang’s friends :)

When we arrived we had some lunch with Trangs family and most of the people from the village. It was in the garden of Trangs grandmother’s house where they built a big tent to get some protection against the sun. In the afternoon we sang karaoke and went to a beach nearby. The groom had to leave the bride’s family as the tradition is that he is coming the next morning with his whole family to pick the bride up with some of the guest to celebrate in his village/town.

So we were singing some karaoke on Saturday night and went to bed pretty early. I was so fortunate to get an own room with my own bed in Trang’s uncles house. That was the first time I slept in a real Vietnamese House incl. bed. The Vietnamese don’t sleep with a mattress. They just sleep on the plain wood,; pretty hard you can imagine, but it was so quiet, I really enjoyed this! We had to get up at 6.20am and to be at the bridges house by 6.45am. The groom arrived with his family and a lot of presents at 7am. After a lot of pictures were taken we all got on a bus to go to the grooms place. Around 40 Vietnamese and myself ;)

We drove for almost 3 hours until we had to go on a small little car ferry to go over to the other side of the river. The grooms place is in the middle of rice fields, which have amazing colours from green to orange to yellow to red! Breathtaking beautiful :)

We had lunch again with the entire guests and some people from his village and the couple changed the rings in front of all the guests.

After that, the brides guests were leaving again in the bus to Haiphong. I stayed a bit longer and was able to get a lift from the groom’s boss who actually owns a Car Company in Hanoi. He is also involved in the government somehow as they were driving a government car – Toyota Land cruiser with 9 seats and leather interior! Some people in Vietnam are rich!!! That’s for sure. However they were so nice to drive past a lovely beach, so I had my first swim in the sea since I arrived. Yippie!

An amazing 2 days I have to say! Thanks to Trang who invited me to her wedding. So appreciated!

Teaching Course passed successfully

Who would have thought one year ago, that I would be a certified Cambridge English Language Teacher to Adults today? Yippee! I have passed and with an above average. I feel soooo good :)

These four weeks were intense and a lot of hard work. But it was all worse-while! I enjoy teaching and that was and still is the main aim.

Now a new area is starting with making a decision where to go in Vietnam. I would love to go to Central Vietnam to a city called Da Nang. However, I need to find a job there. I got a job offer from the Apollo Institute to teach in Hanoi or in Haiphong, but I don’t want to stay in Hanoi. About Haiphong I am not sure yet. I would prefer Central Vietnam so. Let's see if I have the guts to go down there and just try to find something.

After living for almost 5 weeks in Hanoi I am looking for some more quietness. Hanoi is unreal busy - you have so much noise all day. The only time which is really quiet is from 11pm - 6am. Living in a city with over 6Mio people in Vietnam is very different to Dublin ;) This week will be very exciting so to see where I will go. Keep your fingers crossed that I find a nice place to work and live.

Attached you can find a few pictures from our party with the students from the Elementary and Intermediate Level which we had on Friday to say good-bye.

Vietnamese students are so much fun and so eager to learn. It a real pleasure to work with them :))

Halftime :)

A lot of happened in the last two week.... it felt like being on a roller-coaster ride! Everything started on the Sunday afternoon 2 weeks ago after somebody decided to steel my notebook from my backpack when I got on the bus - took 5sec and it was gone.......anyway I am over this now. Decided to buy a new MacBook again and not taking it anywhere anymore except leaving it in my hotel room. But back to the start of the CELTA course. We are 12 people from completely mixed backgrounds, age differs from 21 to 68 and we're from Australia, US, Jordan, France, UK, Germany, Sweden. The school and CELTA program is very good. Our 2 trainers are very experienced and we all can learn a lot from them. And we already had to teach on our 2nd day! So far I have taught 5 times, lessons of 40min. There is a lot to prepare beforehand and we also have assignments to submit for specific deadlines. However the students are so motivated and cute. It is really rewarding to teach them. You really have a feeling that they got something out of it after your lesson :) After one week living further outside from the city centre I decided to move into a hotel close by the school. So happy that I did that, as I save a lot of time now which I did spend on traveling on 'xeom's' (motorbike taxis), sometimes in the lashing rain in the morning :) We have around 38 degrees and it is unbelievable humid. I am so glad that it at least rains every 2nd or 3rd day for 30min or so. Then at least it cools down a few degrees.

The time here is flying as the course is so busy. I am working every evening and also at the weekend, but only 2 more weeks to go and then I hopefully can get my certification and look for a teaching job.

Hanoi is very busy. There are around 5-6Mio inhabitants and it feels like the city never stops before 11pm and starts already at 6am :) So my plan is to go somewhere to the Middle of Vietnam after the course to teach down there where it is a bit more quiet and closer to the sea :) Very adventurous times ahead.....fingers crossed everything works out.

My 5th day in Hanoi

I almost can't believe it myself but I am back in Vietnam. In-between motorbikes, taxis, bicycles...noise everywhere and it is hot! Humidity is as high as in September last year and it is only May ;)

I am staying with a friend a little bit further outside at the Westlake. My translator Lan helped me to organize a bus ticket for the full month of May - the application form was of course in Vietnamese and I couldn't understand a word ;)

So nice to have somebody local here which I can meet on a regular base. I already got a homemade vietnamese meal and ate a few baguettes and a lot of pineapples :)

Will meet all the other teachers tonight for dinner for the first time and tomorrow my course is starting for 4 weeks. I am excited, nervous and really looking forward to it!

Christine ( where I am staying right now) brought me out on Friday and yesterday to meet some other friends of hers. Very good to get to know people: Japanese, British, Australian, American's, Indians etc. - feels a little bit like in Dublin at the beginning.

Even met a teacher who was teaching for the Apollo Institute previously and where I will start tomorrow. He said there are a lot of teaching opportunities here and I should also look at his company he is working with now. So fingers crossed everything goes well, I hopefully can start to teach soon :)

Talk soon.

Kerstin

Golden Triangle & Laos

We got up very early this morning to head out to the Golden Triangle where Laos, Thailand and Myanmar Boarders are meeting. We went up on a hill and were able to see all 3 countries. Stunning view and amazing feeling - worthwile getting up so early :)

Another 2.5 hours bustour and we arrived at the boarder of Laos where we had to say goodbye to our Thai Tourleader Mrs. Beam and we welcomed Kham La - our Laos Tourguide. We took a small boat to go over the Mekong River to Laos to the imigration office where we applied for our Visa's. This was so easy going - we all were ready in 20min and were even able to swap money into Laos "Kip". Great service and very efficient :)

I was so happy to be finally in Laos where I was always keen to go. The scenery is just stunning. We had 2 great days traveling on a slow boat down the Mekong River. It was also a great opportunity to get to know the other travellers in the group as we had a lot of time to chat. We stoped inbetween at a Hmong village - one of Laos hilltribes - these people are really poor and shocking traditions from a womens point of view. Just some taste: A man is picking his future wife - the parents of the girl will not know where they are going to live and will not see the daughter again until a baby is born. The women is not allowed to give birth to the baby in the "house" or "hut" - she needs to go into the woods, get the baby there and stay there 4 weeks. Then she is finally allowed to come back and stay with the father, get married and live in the house again. Also in that Hilltribe it is tradition that the man can have more wifes etc.....there was much more, but I better stop writing now ;)