My peculiar visit to Hanoi had become more bizarre!
I used to work at the China Daily in Beijing. I figured I I would look into similar newspaper editing (while monitored by the state) work in Hanoi, which is where a paper called the Vietnam News is based. So I grabbed a copy of the paper and found the address and strolled on over.
Anyone who visited me at Metro knows we liked to keep the crazies out, but I had emailed this paper in the past with no success. I thought if I just showed up, the worst they would do is tell me to email a CV… or talk to me in Vietnamese and we’d all stand around, bewildered. I’ve learned that being brave sometimes means you need to let go of your inhibitions, no matter what the outcome of risk-taking might be.
So I looked in the masthead and demanded the editor-in-chief to come say hi to me! One of the deputy editors came down, and said they were good for editors but “have you done TV?” I replied that I’d been on it, guest reporting the Edmonton weather on Citytv and appearing on strange panel shows on Christian television.
“Good enough, do you want to shoot this untitled project about the Tet holidays, seen through the eyes of a westerner?” I was aksed. “Oh, and this other thing about random Hanoi night markets? Can you stay for two weeks?”
I said “sure!” Pay is not as good as teaching ESL… But who cares?
Which brings me to the title of this article. Is it the title the name of a new band, or actually has something to do with life in Vietnam?
It does indeed, if you are shooting “Crossing Vietnam!” Yesterday was the last day of filming, but it was a long one… We went a couple of hours outside Hanoi to Nam Dinh Province, to the Vieng Market. This market happens only once a year, and I won’t get into the details but anything you buy there or eat there will bring you luck in the New Year.
Suffice to say, the place gets jammed with people, which made shooting TV challenging. I was meant to be looking interested while a wacky older gentlemen haggled over a pair of scissors, presumably to trim his wiry beard, when I had to swat away a hand from my ass as a pickpocket tried to steal the script out of my back pocket! Whether this will be left on the editing room floor remains to be seen.
I also blew a horn from an “antiques” vendor, even though all his stuff were imitations, and then the gelatinous-rice-pig-on-a-flower. Basically kids here love these little sticks with a little flower/cartoon character/animal on the end, which I thought was made of plasticene. In fact, it’s sticky rice! The camera crew set up and it was decided it would be good that I make one of these things with the vendor, but I was starting to become Mr. Crankypants by this point. It wasn’t like my inner diva was coming out, but we’d been at 11 hours and I’d been blasting a horn, trying to look interested at bonsai trees and now I’m making a pink pig sitting on top of a green flower out of sticky rice with 50 bewildered Vietnamese onlookers, and being told to smile while I did it.
Still, if that’s your biggest complaint, how bad can your life be? Getting outta there took forever though! Easily the most hectic traffic I’ve seen in this country, and I’ve seen some jams! Anyway, I said goodbye to the camera crew as that was our last shoot! Possibly forever? (sniff)
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