Tortuguita

I think Vietnam is done with online learning *knocks on wood* - we spent the better part of 18 months online, and we're all over it. I learned that despite how long I romanticized a "work from home" scenario, I hate it. I can't do it. It's not for me at all - and I'm better off probably for knowing that now, and not continuing to romanticize it.

What I've learned in this time is how I want to be in the world. I want a physical job, I NEED a physical job. Working at the cafe was ok at times and great at others, because I walked to work and occasionally got to stock heavy cans of beans and other heavy things. Mentally I can't wrap my head around a gym sort of habit, the idea of working out for the sake of it is something my subconscious won't let me commit to, but a physical job? Yes, please.

Sorry, I titled this life lately - so I'm in Orlando, D spent a month home as well. We have one more school year in Hanoi and then will be saying goodbye after 4+ years. We set out with a vague plan of 9 months to 5 years, so we're staying within that plan I guess. I thought I'd be miserable, every year it seems harder and harder, but when I think about the pressure I'd be putting on D if we were to go home sooner, it makes me realize this is worth it. We're just very ungrounded, is all. D lives well on shifting sands, I do not.

Teaching has been pretty fun, mostly because the kids are awesome. I've been teaching first grade almost exclusively with a couple dips into 2nd grade since I've been here. I'm 30% of the way through an M.Ed at University of the People, and it's been really rewarding. I'm posting more about that on a separate blog - honestly I'd really like to establish a "home" online, too, and not have 9 different blogs.

D and I have been teaching online for the last month and a half. I have 2 first grade classes, he has 1 2nd and 3rd grade class each. Internet is terrible here and it's extremely time consuming to do everything because of that. Instead of brainstorming, talking things out, and doing physical activities, everything is online, and it's really difficult. I know I'm not alone in this, but it is still something I dislike about my life right now. The kids, at least mine, don't know anything different because they're in 1st grade. I can't wait to meet them in person and play games with them.

I spend a lot of my procrastination time (because that's what my life feels like, work and procrastination from work) playing Pokemon Go. Because we've been on a neighborhood lockdown it's been a sanity saving reason to go out for sneaky walks, and something to look forward to.

mI've been bingeing aesthetic homesteading videos. They're all from either Northern Europe or Asia and it drives me nuts that more Americans don't make *quiet* homesteading videos. Not everything has to be big bold fonts with big bold voices. I don't want to watch that, it doesn't inspire me. I feel like YT is saturated with loud American how-to videos but nothing about like... the joy of it, the beauty of it. And as someone stuck in an urban environment where my big window view is of the next apartment 10 ft away, I want to live vicariously through people homesteading in my home. I found some land for 7k near my home and am having homesteading fantasies. I'd love to grab a simple service job, keep my expenses low, and build a small life on a plot of land.

So a lot of my time is spent dreaming.

I'm still in school, a few terms away from graduating. The terrible internet has made that difficult as well.

This is our fourth wave of Covid - all of them beyond the initial one have been fueled by holidays. After Summer holidays, we started school a month late. After Tet we started school a month later, and now after a 4 day weekend we're seeing UNPRECEDENTED cases, coupled with a huge crackdown on Visas of foreigners.

We're reaching the time that would have been our summer holiday anyway, so I'm appreciating the break so I can focus on my classes a bit more. I'm finishing my undergrad in Anthropology and will go straight into a M.Ed. in Curriculum and Instruction - all through SNHU online. It's been a dream, to be honest, and I'm eager to tell anyone who wants to know about how lovely it's been to work with SNHU after my nightmares at Seminole State College, Valencia College, and the University of Central Florida. I should be done with undergrad in February. The chart shows what I've got left, and then the Master's degree through SNHU/Learner's Edge.

It feels ideal to stay in Vietnam as long as I'm in school, and I have a great work situation right now. We live a hop, skip, and a jump away from our really beautiful school, and our boss is very motivated to keep us. He's been very helpful with this Visa process and with anything we ask him for.

Hopefully all works out well :)

Things are changing in Vietnam and I'm not sure how long I'll be staying. I'm trying to take it on the chin, and let the gAang inspire me. Whenever they had to leave, they just left, and figured things out along the way. I never wanted to stay in Vietnam as long as I've already been here, so going home would be a-ok. I'd like to stay and continue doing what I'm doing, because it's extremely rewarding and I love my life with Diarmuid, but if I had to go home it would be ok.

We moved to a small apartment building in a lovely neighbourhood. The end of our lane has a small shop for snacks, a soup shop, a nem shop, and our laundry lady. 2 minutes walking up the road and we're at a beautifully maintained lake, which is clearly a community gathering stop for fishing and recreation. 5 minutes walking up the road and we're at a grocery store that has everything we could ever need. 8 minutes walking up the road and we've got coffee shops galore, that have fancy things like kombucha and guava/pandan juice. 12 minutes walking up the road and we're at our work. The new place is smaller and doesn't have a great view, but the advantages are many. It would be a shame to leave only a few months into them, but if that's to be the case then I'll enjoy my time here as if it's a vacation.

I'm planting project seeds for a possible return to Florida. I miss my plants and friends and can't wait to get back into that world. I do wonder how I'll be able to do things carless, because one of the main things I've learned here is that CARS ARE WEAPONS and it's absolutely mad that everyone has one back home.

We’ve been in Hanoi almost 2 years now, and have decided to move house. It’s for Arya’s sake, really, but today’s 5 minute commute to work made me realize it is also very much for us! The apartment is smaller, but it is cheaper, closer to work, and our very own vs. a room in a shared house. We’re in Thanh Xuân now. 

We’re looking at a third wave of Covid-19 here in Hanoi, and in Vietnam. Here was our timeline for 2020: January: Covid appears. Borders close. Schools close. March-April: Everything is still closed, schools start to go online.  April-May: Schools go back in person. Low to no Covid numbers, no deaths reported. Borders still closed. August: 2nd wave of Covid as people are on their summer holidays, schools delay opening for 2-4 weeks, government is quick to shut down the 2nd wave.  September: Schools open.  That’s it, that’s our 2020 in Vietnam. We were closed from the end of January to Mid-April, and then delayed a bit in August. Now, Lunar New Year is 2 weeks away, and we have an astonishing number of suspected cases seemingly overnight. I’m hoping the proven competence of the government will nip it in the bud, with the motivation of upcoming Tết. 

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Unrelated, D and I are moving house. Our current home is great, has infinite plusses and very few minuses, but one big glaring minus is our cat, Arya, cannot roam without our presence. It’s a shared house, and we don’t feel comfortable leaving our bedroom door open for her, so she can only roam the house when we’re home. She NEEDS roaming for her own sanity, we’ve found, and we’re unable to go on any holidays more than day trips because: She needs to roam. She doesn’t like other people. A cat sitter will not be able to corral her from the house back into the bedroom if they let her roam. Therefore, we haven’t been on any holidays longer than 3d2n, and that one was possibly the one that set off MONTHS of her aggressive behaviour towards us. 

Plus the new place is cheaper, and a 5 minute drive/15 minute walk to our work. Commute time is cut significantly - right now it’s a ~20-30 minute drive and an unpleasant theoretical walk. It is a smaller place, but it’s a whole apartment so she can roam freely, hide from a cat sitter, and still entertain herself freely. We just have to keep the place clean/minimal - A TRUE TASK for 2 messy hoarders. 

Life so far, in our year and a half here in Hanoi, is very life-like. I forget sometimes that we’re immigrants, expats, living in another country. Language barrier is a problem, of course, but in general we’re just living our very low and slow lives. Neither of us have the mental space for much of a social life, though I’m proud that D has kept up his karate. I have recently signed up for a Southern Italian herbalism course, so that will hopefully keep me grounded a bit. It’s hard for me to establish any kind of routine because I keep getting sick or hurt or something. I’m just getting older, and Hanoi isn’t helping. Pollution isn’t a huge problem like it was last year, but it’s still here. The water is hard, I don’t know where to get fresh herbs and plants to brew, the ones I know, and I’m desperate for ones I know. I KNOW I could learn more, but wellness is such a mental battle for me, I know what works for me, and I’m distrusting of new things as a rule.  Anyway, a regular day M-F looks like this: 5:45-6am Wake up, get ready for work 6:30 Ride motorbike to work 8 Start teaching 11-1 lunch and nap break 4 Finish the day 430 Usually go home, lately anyway. We used to stay super late and I think Arya may started to feel abandoned, but now we come home early and with that + Gabapentin I think she’s getting better! 5:15-9 Dinner, movie, work Bed Looking at a schedule like this it looks like there’s so much time in the day. Maybe I should start keeping minutes and see what I’m doing. I don’t procrastinate that badly, I’m pretty good at planning, it’s just the mental load of school/thinking about the kids/curriculum. It takes up a lot, and I’m terrible at compartmentalization. 

I’ll go grab the laundry, do a meditation, start the Southern Italian course, work a bit, and have dinner. 

I've realized this many times over, and am realizing it again. Full time mental work stifles creativity. I have no interests, no hobbies, I feel so disconnected. It is a part time job to have any life outside of my job. I miss writing, I miss dreaming, I miss drawing, reading, singing, creating. My ex was constantly annoyed by my frequent big ideas, "I'm gonna do this project!" time after time, but honestly that is a sign of a HAPPY, HEALTHY, me. And without that, I'm blank. I'm dull. I miss that mental space so much. This is what happens when people start building a life together. They fall in love with who they are in a certain time, and then something like this happens, where they need to start providing for their lives and lose their mental space, creativity, romantic notions, connections to time, space, and other.

It is effort I don't have in me to pursue the things I know will make me happy. It's like Mary is trying to tell Gianna, you'll be happier if you call your friends. But when you can't muster it, what then? When I feel like any break I get I have to rest, what then? Especially in this city where I fall ill way more often than I did in Orlando, or rather I can't do much about it like I could in Orlando. I had not only an apothecary available to me, but a robust support system. I never wanted. I was never floundering wondering where I could get x, y, z, or how I could communicate with the Dr. my real concerns. Trade off, I can actually get to a doctor now, so there's that.

I have no big updates - life is going on day by day.  There was a typhoon this past weekend, but we’re pretty far inland so we just got buckets and buckets of rain, flooded roads, and intermittently scary winds. Classes were all cancelled on Saturday.