Travelers in Saigon

The hardest thing I’ve had to do was to decide what I should do after graduating from high school. Because I didn’t have any plans for my future and I didn’t know which job I should choose, so it’s very difficult for me to make a decision. So after consulting with my family and my teachers, I decided to choose a vocational school that doesn’t cost much as I don’t have high-level academic skills and my family is not very wealthy. I really want to learn and pursue the job I like, to be a mangaka, but I’m scared I can not earn a living in a long life with my favorite job. So after thinking and worrying a lot, I decided to choose medical trade just to have a qualification even I don’t like it. I may regret my choice but who knows the right choice is? (花, from Japan)

One of my co-workers lives in the north of the countryside in Thanh Hoa. Last year we became friend and she invited me to come to her family during Tet, to kinda see what Tet was like. At that time, I didn’t have the money to leave the country, stuck alone in SaiGon I decided to take a bus and visit her family. I got to stay in a little house in the countryside for a whole week. They let me try all of these foods and I became friend with her little brother. After that, when I was on a road trip, I went back up to the north and I passed their village for 2 nights. Surprisingly, they still remembered and even offered me to stay with them. While I was staying there, they taught me some Vietnamese (they dont speak English so we used google translate to communitcate) and let me tried some bizzare foods such as duck blood. It was such a cool, authentic experience. (Luc St. Laurent - Quebec, Canada)

I was about 23 years old at that time. When I was in Africa, I got kidnapped. I was very lucky to be alive. I went to the post office, and the postmaster was very bad. He pulled me and kept me from the behind then he locked me up. And, he was going to sell me to people going to Africa, and the American people were doing a survey by ariel plane, looking for information, just see if there's a moment of me at the mountain. And they see me going in there a few months before. So they say they'll not do anymore survey to the government until I went out of the Post Office. So I was in there for about 4 days, and the Postmaster was just hiding me. And I was very lucky to get out of there alive.
(Christine, from Australia)

I grew up in a country town in Australia. My father was a farmer and we were way way up in the country (far away), so it’s just living alone with the animals, all the chores we had to do on the farm were very interesting up bringing. So we have horses, pigs, sheep and also many things to look after. So it’s a very good job, and all my memories were on the farm, away from the big city (Jeff, Australia)

My friend said we must stick with each other like a sticky rice cake.

The best time I remember the most was when I was studying in the UK, I enjoyed my time there for 3 years. Besides, I could go to European countries for traveling. I like to travel a lot, always try to travel at least once a year. That's why I am here. This is the first time I have come to Vietnam. Everything is beautiful but the traffic is crazy. I enjoy shopping, going to Ben Thanh Market, try Vietnam foods but they are a bit sweet!

When I came here, I came with the idea of knowing more about the history, so my focus has been to visit museums and places of art. Based on that, what I like the best are museums. And if I have to tell you which museum I like the best so far, I would tell the museum of art in Ho Chi Minh city. I like the museum because I am learning about history from the Vietnamese perspective. So that I can know more about the American war.

I have two brothers and one sister. My youngest brother was born with just only one leg and the doctor told him that he wouldn’t be able to walk but now he’s 9 years old and he can walk and he runs and he plays tennis on a wheelchair for England (John, England)

I came here because a company wanna let me come to speak about human trafficking. It is when little kids are taken from their family and they are may work or do a thing that they don’t want with foreigners. And a lot of time they are in the Red Light District or staying up late at night to do things with foreigners. It’s not a good situation. And so I came here just speak about human trafficking (Jamal Robinson, U.S.A.)

I came to Viet Nam because I ‘m working here. I work in an NGO called ISEC. My project is with 2 colleagues from Indonesia and also a team of Vietnamese volunteers. We go to school and deliver s*x education because in Viet Nam people are a little bit shy when talking about s*x and also about contraception protection about condoms so that why we were there and tried to make it more easy to talk about them. We’ve been to a district I forgot the name but it’s very close to the Cambodia border – It’s very poor there and there are a lot of problems so we’ve been there for a 2-day trip and teach them s*x education as well (Diana, Germany)

In Indonesia, I met a guy who was playing guitar in the evening, on the beach, near the restaurant. And there was another guy coming to him and he told him that the next evening he wants to ask his girlfriend if she wants to marry him and it would be very very nice from the guitar guy to play on that evening. He said yes. And the next evening, I went there and I really saw the guy with the guitar, the girl and the... well, the guy. And he asked her if she wanted to marry him and that was just the right time when the guy with the guitar started playing and that was a very lovely moment in Indonesia.

Who is the most influential person in my life? Jesus Christ! Why? I’m a follower of Jesus Christ. He lived a long time ago. But he loves me and he died for me on the cross, may be you never heard that. And he rose from the dead and he is alive. Today, he’s resurrected and he is coming again someday. And I follow him as my God and he is the most influential person to me. He took away my fear. He gave me piece in my heart. I now have a new love for my wife, who was back in America. I have a new love for people of VN and for the people of the United States and for the people who are different races than me then we can live in peace and Harmony and love, and Jesus Christ has helped me do that.