Read About Me Somewhere Else Now!

At some point, I decided I ought to have my own website. And I could write code for it and stuff! So.. go to my new blog thing, and then update yer bookmarks!

FYI:

I haven't forgotten about my blog—or all of my faithful readers / adoring fans! Expect a new post on the weekend with all the wonderful details about: Xmas, Việt Nam winning the Suzuki Cup, New Years, and.. more!

Chúc mừng năm mới! / Happy New Year!

Busy Weekend Already!

Yesterday evening one of my colleagues at the Hải Phòng Department of Education invited me to a concert: RockStorm! So around 6 o'clock we had some dinner—snails and looooooots of vodka, and then phở—and then we headed off to the concert. It was nothing like I've ever seen in Việt Nam, as most people tend to prefer softer/poppier music or folk/traditional music. Hard rockin' music just isn't as big a draw. All the bands were pretty mediocre (it's just not my kinda thing either!), but it was interesting to see anyways. Almost all the bands had a really bad keyboard player, and during their set the songs would get progressively softer. Boooooo power ballads!

This morning I went to an English/Christmas festival at a primary school called Minh Khai, which was pretty fun. The kids sang songs and danced, read poems and stories in English, etc. I helped out by asking them questions in a short game. If they answered correctly they got a present from Santa! And at the end they presented me with a gift, which made me feel uncomfortable; I hardly did anything. I certainly appreciate how kind and friendly people are, but they shouldn't have given me a gift. It's too much! Anyways, I think I might need to re-gift it..

I think tomorrow I'll attempt to shop for some sort of jacket, as it's getting chilly in the mornings and evenings. At the very least, I should buy a scarf.. before I get another cold.

Việt Nam to Modernise Education

I didn't have to work this morning, so I took the opportunity to enjoy a cup of coffee and read the newspaper. In doing so, I found this interesting article. Some points in the article can maybe give you an idea of where education is at now in VN (I'm not quite enough of an expert to give a highly detailed account—yet! Just you wait).

According to the draft, by 2020, 80 per cent of Vietnamese should graduate from senior secondary school, 100 per cent of districts should have regular educational centres, 95 per cent of communes and wards should have study centres and 65 per cent of labourers should have got training.

Sometimes it's difficult for me to gauge just how many kids make it beyond primary school (which is grades 1-5), but I think 80% is a decent figure to reach for. But more importantly, there is a definite disparity between schools/facilities in the city and in the countryside; focusing to bridge that quality gap seems really important to me.

The draft also set targets that 99 per cent of children and 90 per cent of ethnic minority children should attend primary schools at the correct age, 70 per cent of disabled people and 95 per cent of poor children should receive assistance to attend school.

The minorities and hill tribes (all the peoples in this list, except for Kinh/Việt, seem to get the short end of stick sometimes. A greater support system for them would be great, but I'm not sure how achievable that 90% figure is (in the near future). Oh, and WUSC Việt Nam has also been involved in a project related to this: click here to watch a video!

Professor Dr Nguyen Huu Chau, director of the Viet Nam Education Institute, the institution that compiled the draft, said that the draft had 11 solutions to help implement the above targets, including solutions to renew educational management and affirm the key role of teachers and principals in the education system.

I sometimes wonder about these sorts of vague mentions of "solutions." Does, "renew educational management and affirm the key role of teachers and principals," just mean clamp down and be more strict? It very well could mean that! Classrooms here are so different; kids can't really ask questions. Whatever is taught to them, they take at face value—and that's all there is to it. (Of course, other country's systems aren't perfect either.. but it would be nice if Việt Nam's educational system was more willing to accept a bit of open-mindedness and free thinking)

The draft should have criteria to build some international – level universities and should focus more on a moral education for students, said some.

More internationally recognized universities would certainly be a good thing, but a focus on improving primary, secondary and high school education first might be more practical! Việt Nam's primary education is pretty good, I'd say, and it's the reason why the country has a high rate of literacy. But still, I think too many kids miss out on secondary and/or high school education. I guess all levels of education can be developed simultaneously, though, if it's all planned out adequately.

Anyways, read the article! It's interesting.

Train 1 - Bus 0

Reasons why train travel is always better than bus travel (in Việt Nam):

• You have more space! On a train, seats are in groups of four, with two seats facing the other two, which provides for more leg room. In each little group of seats, the four passengers have enough space to move around a bit, stretch their legs, etc. But on a bus, all the seats face forward (with very little leg room!). Also, on a bus even if all the seats are full the driver will keep accepting passengers to stand/sit in the aisle. That can get really hectic on a busy ride. The train station, however, should only sell as many tickets are there are seats. Isn't that nice!


• More storage space too. The overhead racks have lots of room for bags, and there is a cargo car for the really big stuff. The baggage racks on the buses are usually pretty tiny..


• Trains are on tracks, so they have to drive fairly straight/smoothly. Roads and highways are much more unpredictable, and buses are constantly speeding up and slowing down suddenly, swerving left and right (nearly colliding with oncoming traffic!) to pass slower moving vehicles. Lots more people over here seem to get car sick, and after having been on a few bus trips it's no wonder as to why! Of course, under the right circumstances the bus can be enjoyable too—but the train feels more reliable to me.

I think what I need to do is find the best time of day for taking the bus; a time of day when traffic is light, and there are fewer passengers. Maybe really early in the morning? A 6AM bus, perhaps? I'll be taking the bus to Ninh Bình next week, so I'll test that theory out! (Train tracks don't run between here and there, so if I wanted to take the train I'd have to go: Hải Phòng > Hà Nội > Ninh Bình. Which is just silly!)

Workshop/Meeting in Hà Nội

After lunch I'll have to end my peaceful visit to Ninh Bình, hop on a bus, and head for Hà Nội. There's a two day workshop-meeting-thing at the WUSC/CECI office for all of the Uniterra volunteers in Việt Nam; we'll mostly be talking with each other about experiences we've had so far working in different parts of Việt Nam. And I hope they'll have some information to offer us about Uniterra phase two! (The Uniterra programme's funding runs out in March, and we're all waiting patiently to find out of CIDA will provide more funding. And then we'll have to wait and see if Việt Nam will still be considered a priority and/or if there will be any positions here at all!)

On Tuesday morning I have to do a ten minute talk/presentation about my experiences working in Ninh Bình, which I am entirely unprepared for. I'm expected to make a little PowerPoint presentation (who bothers with PowerPoint for a ten minute talk, anyways? Talk about overkill), so now I have to go and half-bake some sort of silly presentation.

Web Programming is Tedious

And had I been able to recall that fact in September, I might have negotiated myself into another teaching job! Well—it's not so bad, but I'd much rather be writing code for 'normal' software that doesn't run in a web browser.

The goal is for me to be done the website for Nguyen Tri Phuong primary school at the end of this week, which I think is doable. But... I'll still have to go back to the school at least once next week to explain to their computer guy how everything works. (And I wish I could just have a couple more days to polish everything off! Grumble, grumble, grumble...) And speaking of next week! Uniterra has arranged a two day workshop-like-thing for all of the volunteers in Việt Nam. That's on Tuesday and Wednesday, so I'll head for Hà Nội on Monday. And I figure that I'll spend the weekend in Ninh Bình, which I'm sure will be a fun time. So basically I just have to focus on working hard tomorrow and Friday, and then I'm free until Thursday or Friday next week.

And in other news: Mr. Long, my friend and colleague from the Department of Education, has lent me his classical guitar. Between working, finishing off a Master's degree, and spending time with his wife and kids, he's too busy to ever play it. So he very kindly offer to let me take it!