Customary.

It was plane to see.

Toronto, Ontario – The day had unfolded like an origami crane in reverse: new angles, new directions, but a return to origins. Home.

And here I was, so close. Yet, so far.

Having just unfolded myself from a seat that had clutched me for the past 15 hours from Hong Kong, I was waved into Customs & Immigration with a big red marker scrawl across my form. The clocked ticked ominously on my impending connection – my last flight home.

Why would I volunteer? You’ve never been pulled in before? Why would I go by myself? So, you’re a student? The concept of international development was completely lost on the agent.

It had to have been obvious my story checked out within five minutes as he pulled torn bus tickets, hotel receipts, maps, a thank-you card and materials related to BTL from my bags. And yet, he continued to invert every sock, read each scrap page from my notebooks and go through all of my digital devices. "You wear pink polka-dot socks?"

Maybe I should have lied and said I had more than $50 worth of souvenirs?

When I told him I had a flight to catch, he replied I likely wouldn’t make it. “I like to be thorough; some guys don’t, but I do.”

I told myself it was just because I was being pleasant with him, and that was preferable to his having to deal with a line of angry people drained from hours of travel and flights to catch. He had a job to do, and I could respect that.

But well more than an hour later, it was as expected: nothing untoward caught in his fine-toothed comb, and no available flights for the rest of the night.

So close, yet so far.

Hash Function.

Paddie-whack.

Hanoi, Vietnam – A cloud of white smoke rose skyward as fire burned in the field.

The acrid air smothered my nose as we trudged through rice paddies, tiled yellow at the foot of the mountains. Conical hats bobbed among the plants, harvesting the staple of cuisine here.

It was my last time with the Hanoi Hash House Harriers, and my final day in Vietnam. I had joined the group for three of the four weekends I was in the country, and today was cooler than previous outings – a slight breeze tickled my face.

It was a nice alternative to the 45-and-humid that had usually slapped me across it.

Farmers took small sickles to the plants, stacking them into tiny bundles atop the severed stalks. Diesel-powered engines rattled heavily and belched black smoke as threshers separated the husks of rice. Scrap was left like large piles of exhausted hay.

Nearby roads were painted yellow by grain left to dry. As the sun glimmered its final smiles, women used hoes to pile it back up and bag it.

Like the friendly locals in these fields, I, too, could only smile: this was a great way to cap off my trip.

Sssupper.

Was the waiter's name really Mr. Feng?

Hanoi, Vietnam – “Would you like some more bile?”

I can honestly say it’s a conversation I never would have imagined having.

Particularly after having just dropped a cobra’s still-beating heart into a shot glass of its own blood, mixed with rice wine. Now, it was the same process with the snake’s bile.

Bottoms up.

The lump in my chest was to be expected, but the heart stuck in there wasn’t mine.

For weeks, Katrina and I have talked of visiting the Nguyen Van Duc Snake Restaurant in the far east end of the city, but finally built it into our schedules tonight. We made a conscious effort to check our ethical concerns at the door for a couple hours, and to simply take in the experience.

Plate after plate arrived at the table: our cobra – which had only minutes before wound its way toward us on the restaurant’s floor before being hooked by a handler – had been sautéed, grilled and folded into spring rolls. There was also a surprising amount of liver, but at least everything was used.

Its skin had been fried into cracklins and we were presented with bowls of snake head soup. I bit it before it could bite me.

And yes, it tastes like chicken.

That's what I'm telling myself, anyway.

Gone Fishing.

Well planned.

Hanoi, Vietnam – “We don’t do market research,” Mr. Tien said.

“We go fishing – we just put the line in the water and maybe we catch a fish.”

It was the line of the morning, so to speak.

I continued the analogy by explaining how time consuming fishing is, and if you’re lucky to catch one, there’s hardly room for another. If you’re going to successfully market yourself, know your audience and how to reach them.

It’s a message I have been preaching for the past month.

In order to extend the impact of my stay beyond my mandate with BTL, I volunteered to facilitate a three-hour workshop this morning for the Vietnam Association of Community Colleges.

The group of 17 was engaged, active and thoughtful, leading to fruitful brainstorming sessions directed toward improving the reputation of community colleges across the country. We focused on planning, understanding audiences and putting the ‘social’ in social media.

As if to punctuate my point, Mr. Tien came up to me after we had taken a series of group photographs.

“My wife just texted me,” he said. “She told me I had been standing beside the tall foreigner.”

Female intuition?

No. Someone had already posted photos to Facebook.

Exit.

The BTL-WUSC Connection.

Hanoi, Vietnam – “I have high admiration for your work at BTL, and for your vision,” the rector said as we huddled around a board table at the WUSC office this afternoon.

We spoke in deliberate phrases and, given the structured hierarchical nature of society here, I had no option but to take it as significant praise.

“You are my English teacher and my communication teacher.”

My entire mandate, I’ve maintained my goal has been to establish meaningful connections at a personal level, rather than suggest wholesale changes. As such, I have been grateful to form a relationship with, among others, Mr. Vinh.

Since our first meeting, he has reminded me of my manager back home: aversion to the status quo, big ideas and the energy to see them through. The system in which he operates, however, is much different.

We held my exit debrief with the college today, and discussed both what I have accomplished during my time in Vietnam, and some plans for implementation.

As I flipped through the jagged scrawls etched onto my notebook’s pages, we found I have, over the past three weeks:

• Designed and developed three marketing pieces;
• Provided a marketing template, a how-to guide and basic training for design;
• Tailored a communications plan and trained staff on developing strategies;
• Provided consultation and analysis related to BTL’s marketing efforts; and
• Conducted a workshop to build capacity related to marketing, branding and communications.

The rector decided he was also looking for a step-by-step guide for crafting marketing messages, and I explained this would no longer be capacity building: I have left tools and provided training that can empower his staff to carry out this work. It’s time for the connections we established to begin to bring their ideas to life.

He smiled, and nodded.

I have volunteered to host a workshop for the Vietnamese Association of Community Colleges tomorrow morning, but my mandate for BTL is now complete.

On Deck.

The light shines brightly.

Hanoi, Vietnam – In many ways, I’m well suited for my position in Canada because I’d prefer to make others, and the university, look good.

It can be easy to hide behind the ever-shifting ink that flows from my pen: the spotlight and I aren’t really on speaking terms.

So, it was a bit of a stretch to my comfort level to be facilitating a 2.5-hour workshop at BTL this afternoon, where 23 pairs of eyes pointed toward me as the observer who has spent the past three weeks at the college.

Facing discomfort and expanding your horizons are, of course, key reasons for participating in an experience like Leave for Change. How else to grow?

I had, ironically, drawn up a deck short on words and high on imagery to get back to basics of branding, marketing and communications, and to have staff begin planning practical activities that address their flagging recruitment efforts. I used images I had taken of Hanoi to help identify audiences, and we began the process of defining who ‘BTL’ is.

From there, we pulled threads together by developing communications plans that address areas of strategic importance to the college. I wasn't there to provide answers, but to offer suggestions of things to think about, and different approaches. Share the spotlight.

Showing a picture of the college’s front entrance – and the impact it can have on both first impressions and BTL’s brand – drew immediate acknowledgements of improvements that should be made. Tasks were assigned before we left: ownership was in the right place.

Today was one of those rare instances in front of a room my nervous legs did not chatter at a greater pace than my speech. Instead, calm: it was a successful session.

And, somehow, we ran only 15 minutes long.

No Words.

Kayaking in one of nature's wonders: Halong Bay.

Being Shellfish.

Don't call me a shrimp!

Hanoi, Vietnam – I really wasn’t sure what I was ordering.

Which isn’t out of the norm when I'm here.

But I at least knew it was prawns – delicious, delicious prawns. And something about a ‘sauna.’ (A prawna sauna?)

When the plate came out, a tiny leg poked at the plastic wrap, causing it to curl like a leaf. I became curious. Raw, living prawns? What have I done?

Sushi gone wild.

Then came a heavy pot with smoking coals and lemongrass resting on top.

The waiter returned and poured a half a mug of beer into it, followed by prawns the size of my fist. They quickly blushed as the boil flowed from the dish, flavouring the air.

A quick dunk in some lime and chilli pepper salt, and dinner was served.

Once, of course, I disrobed them from their shells.

No Hhonors.

Not a gate you would have wanted to cross.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Rounding the bright yellow wall topped with crushed bottle glass and barbed wire, you discover there’s very little left of the original, infamous Hỏa Lò Prison, also derisively known as the Hanoi Hilton.

Modernity and high rises, and all.

I actually found the tone of the museum to be relatively lighthearted, in part because the propaganda has been laid on so thick and planted between pictures of US Presidents attempting to reconcile with the country it once invaded.

Victors write history.

It’s not until the end of the tour, though, you reach the death chamber’s cells, where one of two original guillotines looms overhead – its history less dull than its blade.

Doors, shorter and narrower than I, frame the cells: dark, dank and desperate. The musty odour clings to your bones in a way that speaks in voices that pass through the years. And through your soul.

Door number two? Don't want to know.

Unlike the polished display cases – including one containing Senator and former presidential hopeful John McCain’s jumpsuit – this part feels very real.  This, despite the stylized mannequins with hollowed cheeks and ribs that have been installed within them.

The doors are painted with European-styled red numbers, faded like the hopes of those who once resided there. Peeling, they speak of a bygone era, and of an anguish that hasn’t fully seeped from the concrete walls. They immediately remind you where you are.

As a knot formed in my chest, I could only hope it wasn’t from the ghost of a hangman’s noose. I felt chills.

Mission (Mostly) Accomplished.

Everybody stays away from the bus.

Hanoi, Vietnam – As the bus thundered past the sprawling Panasonic, Canon and Yamaha factories in Dong Anh, it struck me my time at the college designed to support these industrial park tenants has pretty much drawn to a close.

I had just commuted 45 minutes for a five-minute meeting, before pointing myself back in the same direction toward the centre of Hanoi.

I have one week left dedicated to a pair of workshops, a chamber of commerce event and debriefings, but I have otherwise completed my mandate – and my amended mandates – ahead of schedule.

As I watched the materials I have created get sucked into the vast tangle of a computer’s wires, I could only hope they will once again see the light of day.

And so, I sat, pinched into a tight seat with torn nylon and chipped paint, reflecting as a high-pitched children’s choir pumped through the bus’s tinny speakers. The driver opted to pass into oncoming traffic while crossing the bridge over the river.

Who is to argue? No wonder these buses are efficient.

The sun has finally been sprung from its shackles, and I have a fresh haircut. It’s time to turn the clock off and take in the transcendent splendour of Halong Bay tomorrow.

Taxing.

I wanted to scoot.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Generally even-keeled, I knew I shouldn’t be annoyed.

And yet, as the taxi driver, crawling at 20 km/h, drew his eyes to the pulsating blue dot on his phone to find where he was, I felt the red rise to my face. This is a city known for taxi scams.

He was lost in the matrix of his Samsung Galaxy, as opposed to the maze of the old quarter. He didn't even offer so much as a single punch of the horn as bicycles pulled alongside. In my experience, that's unheard of.

Being dropped off a block away from my destination in rain that drove harder than he did did nothing to unfurrow my brow, especially when he had no change to offer.

“Oi zoi oi,” as the locals say. Good lord.

Over the past couple weeks, I've obviously become accustomed to the mad rush this city injects into your blood stream. It's not necessarily a good thing.

But I really shouldn’t be annoyed: while nearly double the normal fare, the 100K VND only constituted an extra couple dollars.

And driving a taxi in this city cannot be easy.

I Pity the Typhoon.

Ponchos for sale hang from the bus sign.

Hanoi, Vietnam – These days, the sun is but a passing bird.

Feeling the effects of Typhoon Kalmaegi hitting the Halong Bay area today, the city is reminiscent of a child’s Lite-Brite: pinpricks of colour set against a tableau of grey.

Bright orange fish swish in clear plastic bags hanging from racks perched atop rusty bicycles across the city.

Tinted tin roofs quilt a patchwork that blankets my sightlines and xe ôm – moto taxi – riders tuck under the backs of their drivers’ brightly coloured ponchos. They quickly become veering dots of dye set against the wet, grey pavement as drivers, too, fold all but their faces into their nylon bubbles.

Warm, tropical rains leave pencil sketches of Morse code on the horizon. With the winds, the trees join in on the Tai Chi practiced around the lakes.

Even the blocks-long flower market I pass every morning on my way to work is nearly abandoned and painted the colour of storms – but for the scattered petals consumed by puddles. Left to nature’s hand, faded umbrellas spin like tops.

As I sit for more than an hour waiting for a meeting to begin, it’s perhaps an apt metaphor.

Wins.

BTL.

Hanoi, Vietnam – You can’t change the world in a month.

Instead, my goal for this and every mandate is to try to establish meaningful connections at a personal level to build capacity in a collaborative manner. I certainly don’t have all the answers.

So, it was with great excitement I saw a normally quiet man come to life in front of his colleagues during an all-staff meeting today. He spoke passionately about having new ideas to market the college, and he wanted to build pride in the room.

We had discussed gaps in the college’s strategy during a meeting last week, when I stressed the importance of assessing the effectiveness of BTL’s tactics. If they’re not working, figure out why. If they can be fixed, fix them. If they can’t, move on to something that will provide value.

Have a plan, and don’t be afraid to change what is not working. At the time, his eyes lifted from his page with a glimmer.

He became animated and implored his colleagues by using many of the same messages he had quietly absorbed the week before. Over the past seven days, he has changed his marketing approach by getting back to the basics.

With his help, we actioned a couple of the recommendations from the four-page memo I drafted after our meeting last week.

It was one of those eye-opening moments where we found ourselves speaking the same language.

Even though we don’t at all.

A Slice of Language.

A pizza my morning.

Hanoi, Vietnam – A smiling woman arrived unexpectedly at my desk this morning, a personal-sized pizza in hand.

She laughed and visibly searched her English vocabulary for the right word.

“Product?”

With furrowed brows and a chuckle, we scanned each other’s faces for the lexicon that would unlock the secret of the doughy creation.

“Students!”

Bingo. The mid-morning snack was courtesy of the college’s Culinary Arts program, which provides students with an understanding of the tourism and hospitality industries to provide them more stable jobs.

Best of all: no delivery fees.

A Brewed Awakening.

Coffee, condensed.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Thunder crashed like cannonballs through the old quarter’s crooked alleys.

In the process, sharp cracks and baritone howls shattered my dreams. It was thunder as I’ve never heard it.

It didn’t help I had only recently fallen asleep, kept awake by the electrical buzz coursing through my veins from a too-late-in-the-afternoon cà phê sữa đá.

Almost as prevalent as Hanoi’s scooters and bia hoi are coffee shops serving this other national beverage. Vietnam is the world’s second-largest coffee producer, and here, it is enjoyed slowly throughout the day on sidewalks that wrap around nearly every corner.

Cà phê sữa đá is coffee, dark as the night that painted my windows, which has been slow roasted – often in butter oil – and served over condensed milk and fat rings of ice. It packs a punch, and I know better than to have it so late in the day.

But it’s just that good.

Re-hash.

Are you reddy?

Hanoi, Vietnam – Each step forward was a step upward.

And, as rolling valleys dotted by buffalo unfolded below us, each was a step farther into a picturesque postcard of rural Vietnam.

On a sunny clear day, though, the skies clung to me, falling heavily onto my shoulders with a humidity that sucked through my core. At 45 degrees, I became a puddle.

My second week with the Hanoi Hash House Harriers took us 90 minutes north of downtown Hanoi, and into the heavily treed mountains that frame the city’s landscape.

The day’s 14-kilometre hike wove through switchbacks and down sharp inclines, before trekking across vast rice paddies. At one point, we were forced to limbo under a barbed wire fence and a low-hanging clothesline, before emerging through the portico of a family’s house – much to the surprise of children playing in the front yard.

Throughout, wet red clay melded to our feet, trying to claim us for the mountain.

It would be a beautiful place to stay.

Marketed.

Bright Nights, Big City.

Hanoi, Vietnam – A bumblebee-sized micro-copter buzzed overhead, its blue LED lights pulsing against the night sky.

They kept pace with the rapid heartbeat of electronic music thumping out of a clothing store, its half-open maw of a metal shutter door spilling contents over the sidewalk like a lolling tongue.

On the weekend, a seemingly endless line of the Old Quarter's streets are transformed into a night market, and closed to traffic. Cars, anyway: motoscooters, of course, make like salmon, pushing their way upstream through tightly packed crowds out for a Friday evening.

The well-lit stalls seemed to continue forever, flaunting colourful trinkets and souvenirs, undergarments and Zippo lighters; jewellery, pastries, toys and t-shirts. The air, meanwhile, was punctuated by the warm smell of skewered meat, which sizzled in shallow woks drowned in oil.

A robotic drone from a loudspeaker warned to watch over your valuables, its formal tone repeated in three languages.

With locals dressing up for a date night stroll in the market, it's a microcosm of the colour, life and activity in the Old Quarter.

But watch your bags.

On Target.

Don't mask your ambition.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Questioned about my ambitious goals, I am told to aim lower.

“Things are different here.” This much is true. “Volunteers usually identify three outcomes they would like to produce in such a short time.”

I choose seven.

Having spent my past couple days designing a template, writing a user guide, preparing messaging and creating marketing pieces for three of BTL’s programs, I have achieved all but one of my outcomes by my mandate’s half-way mark.

You have to think big.

Working abroad often requires flexibility, patience and positivity: resources and training are not always the same in other countries. I can’t imagine Corel Paint has been relevant in the Canadian design community for years. Not that I’m a graphic designer anyway.

I’m just currently playing one on Vietnamese T.V.

Crop a logo out of a .PDF because there are no .jpg, let alone .eps files? Cringe, but do what you have to do.

(And leave a gentle reminder about the importance of protecting the brand.)

Advice to future volunteers: a good attitude goes a capital-L long way. Smile – albeit honestly – even if you are uncomfortable.

You’re supposed to be uncomfortable: it’s how you learn.

But, don’t be afraid to think big.

Bus-ted.

I can handle this.

Hanoi, Vietnam – As the tall foreigner on a city bus, I’m accustomed to not receiving my change.

Often, it’s just a matter of the ticket taker having insufficient small bills – which, frankly, amount to a pittance in coins back home. Eventually, though, there’s something about the principle that rankles.

A week of riding behind me, I’m becoming a familiar face. As the ticket taker fanned himself with a large stack of bills this morning, he doled change out to all the locals.

I laughed, and flashed him a knowing smirk.

After rounding up his next line of customers, he came back and deposited a 1,000 VND note into my hand and waved a teenager out of a seat.

He smiled, and pointed me over to it.

I’ll take that as my welcome to Hanoi.

The Flow of the Road.

Hanoi, Vietnam – The metallic tinge of diesel hums in my nose with the incessant drone of motorbikes, like gnats in my ear.

Streets collapse over me, as waves of scooters swirl around like an ocean's eddies.

The mayhem is hypnotic, but oddly organized. A honk, a swerve, a coursing-through, like water finding the next available open path.

Even on a relatively quiet night, though, it is mayhem nonetheless.

Pho of Love.

Pho-to.

Hanoi, Vietnam – As I tucked my chair in from a breakfast of pho, assorted Western and Asian standards, and a couple cups of fantastic coffee, the concierge and wait staff stopped me from boarding the elevator.

“We like you. We really like you.”

The cook burst out of the kitchen with a sheepish grin and a twinkle in her eye.

“But she loves you.”

I’m not sure if it’s because of how much of her food I have evidently enjoyed over the past couple weeks.

I love it here at the Church Hotel on Hang Gai, too; this place has been fantastic. In some ways, the morning's laugh was a bit of an omen for the day to come.

After a 2.5-hour meeting with the heads of marketing and recruitment, I was able to compile some best practices from Canadian institutions and make four pages of recommendations for strategically marketing BTL, while enhancing its recruitment efforts.

In the process, I was finally able to cross off two of the seven major results I built into my mandate’s ambitious work plan.

It has been a good day.

Ticket to Ride.

Hanoi's streets are a racquet.

Hanoi, Vietnam – The rains came down, and the ponchos flew up.

Yet, nothing stops the scooters – there’s cargo to transport across the city, and cell phones to be talked on as rush hour disintegrates into a puddle around us. Colourful fashion helmets like cricket players' bob by my window on the bus to BTL, as raincoats flap like capes: Hanoi’s modern-day caped crusaders.

I’ve settled into my routine of leaping onto a city bus at the last minute and bracing myself for the half-hour ride that weaves across a Red River stitched together by barges transporting sand from large scars on the river’s banks. I almost never get my $2,000VND in change, but don't care. It's the equivalent of a dime.

With each jolt in the road, the heavy plastic handgrips clack against each other like maracas. And the horns – ever the horns. Whereas taxis push bikes from the road, buses are the undisputed lions of these roads. And they aren’t afraid to growl.

Cornering the t-shirt market.

While I haven’t personally had any problems with the smog, quilted face masks are the other ubiquitous accessory in each corner of the city. Bright colours, plaids, Hello Kitty. Skull and crossbones.

A woman perched beside me on the bus had even hollowed out a baguette she used to cover her nose and mouth. This, despite having a more-traditional mask looped around her neck.

As we left downtown, the skyline offered a crooked grin as the mountains seeped through the morning fog. I had somehow previously not really noticed them smirking at me.

A quick cross of the road brought an exited shriek. Popping out of the doorway, a young girl chose to spend what is likely her only English word on me with a gap-toothed grin and a vigorous wave.

"Hello!"

There are precious few moments more tender.

Clipped Wings.

Portraits of Hanoi, Part I.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Today was one of those challenging days you come to expect, particularly working internationally.

In many ways, this is one of the reasons opportunities to work abroad are so beneficial: with an open mind, you can gain a greater appreciation for other points of view, concepts of time and how other cultures manage their day-to-day lives. And you develop your soft skills.

None of this is to say I wasn’t mildly frustrated as I sat in my cubicle awaiting my 9:30 appointment this morning. When she finally arrived at 11:30, she explained she hadn’t been briefed on what she was supposed to do, and left anew.

I began to think the meeting had actually been scheduled for 9:30 a.m. EST.

Instead of returning, she was replaced by Mr. Viet at 2 p.m., and I was finally able to get down to a couple tasks on the day’s schedule. I was at least able to use the found time to begin crafting a workshop I plan to deliver a couple times toward the end of my mandate. Flexible, I can do.

I capped my day off by shedding some of the Hanoi heat from my scalp. In the middle of rush hour, I stopped at a roadside barber and peered into his mirror, nailed to a tree. We didn’t share a language, but I’ve become decent at pantomiming what I need.

In a matter of minutes, we had gone from his thinking I needed directions, to shaking my hand in appreciation.

Plugging the clippers into an extension cord slung over a concrete wall, my hair fell to the sidewalk, and with it, the day’s frustrations. Tomorrow is a new start.

A New Week.

These baskets aren't heavy.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Unlike many, I love Mondays.

To me, they offer a new start, and another chance to make change in my life, and, if I’m fortunate, someone else’s. The weekend break takes last week off the burner.

The sun shines brighter, my footsteps feel lighter.

It’s with this in mind I approach today, and my efforts to better understand BTL College and its objectives so I can potentially begin to offer some suggestions for how they might expand their ability to market themselves and communicate with potential clients.

I’m so fortunate to have this opportunity; this Monday is even riper than most others.

Bring it.

Hustle.

Lights of my life.

Hanoi, Vietnam – “Motorbike?” “Shine!” “Sir!!”

Each call comes with a little more urgency, the sound of sandalled footfalls in step with the pleading cries: “One dollar!!!”

In Hanoi, there's no question there's sufficient hustle to match the bustle. On each corner, everyone is just trying to make a wage – which doesn't mean it's not tiring. Indignant shoe shiners refuse to understand why I have no desire to have them shine my sport sandals. Unchastened, they produce small vials of crazy glue to repair some unseen flaw.

I smile, and carry on.

A motorbike taxi driver with a large, fake rose tattoo on his arm offers to give me a tour of the city. When I say no, he offers to take me to a bar tonight. “Woman?” Everything’s a hustle of some sort.

I step over tools spread across the sidewalk as a welder shoots fire like the dragons that are so prevalent around the city. There are cannibalized parts of scooters and motorbikes in need of repair, which is not surprising given that there are an estimated three million motorbikes in this city of seven million.

Meals on Wheels.

Older women with rusty brown bicycles haul baskets of flowers and fruit; others light small barbeques on the sidewalk to grill skewers of meat for sandwiches. Regardless of the time of day, young women offer baskets of donuts that appear fresh from the fryer.

There’s no shortage of food, coffee, shops, bia hoi, or activity.

With so much going on, it’s very easy to get lost in Hanoi.

Which is often the best way to see a city, and to take its pulse.

Hash Tag.

Holy crop, it's hot.

Hanoi, Vietnam – For an hour, we rode a rickety pink bus whose seats were so small I could taste the sweat brewing on my knees.

At 34 degrees with 82 per cent humidity, I had also begun to question my desire to take a hike in the countryside.

I had been invited on my first hash, having no idea what it was, or what to expect. Promised an opportunity to get out of town, meet people, get some exercise and have a few beers, though, I knew it was exactly why I had resisted the temptation to over-schedule my free time in Hanoi.

Hashing clubs have existed around the world since the 1930s, claiming to be "drinkers with running problems." From the link above:

“Hashing is an exhilaratingly fun combination of running, orienteering, and partying, where bands of harriers and harriettes chase hares on eight-to-ten kilometer-long trails through town, country, and desert, all in search of exercise, camaraderie, and good times.”

Branching out and leaving people behind.

As part of the walking – rather than running – group, we followed our hare and searched for sporadically placed mounds of flour that marked our path – except where unimpressed locals had taken exception and washed them away. Almost immediately, we were diving through bamboo and banana leaves as we wiped sweat from our brows. Dragonflies helicoptered overhead.

We ended up in little villages and in rice paddies, where farmers with traditional conical hats huddled under faded umbrellas to tend to their crops.

Emerging near the Red River, cows huddled, nonplussed. The beer truck awaited, but we were more keen to simply melt ice all over ourselves – which did not take long. Moving on, friendly locals were surprised to see a group of foreigners traipsing through their gardens, and smiling children stuck their heads out of gates to practice their 'hellos.'

As we circled up at the end of the day, cups of beer were thrust into our hands to chants of "Down, down, down..."

The whole day – including transportation and unlimited beverages – cost 150,000 VND (about $7CDN), and was an excellent opportunity to experience things tour companies don't provide, and to meet a nice combination of locals and ex-pats.

From a personal experience standpoint, it's the highlight of my trip so far.

The Whole Song and Dance.

Team work, and Team not-so-work.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Before the day's heat drops like a hammer, women move silkily around Hanoi's broken sidewalks.

It’s an early morning ritual to practice tai chi under Vietnamese willow trees, which hang languidly around the lakes. Some believe they hold ghosts.

Riding a bus with shocks that feel like a bouncy castle, we coursed along the Red River to welcome a delegation from Seng Kang Secondary School in Singapore this morning. The ride cost .50 and took about a half hour as the courteous ticket taker directed riders to specific seats.

I was given the front, rather than the tiny red plastic stool placed in the middle of aisle. My aching knees thanked him.

The students put on some Singaporean songs and dance, and played in the courtyard with local students, tripping over each other in games designed to inspire a high level of teamwork. "Soft skills" has been a term I have heard repeatedly since arriving, including by the head teacher from Singapore: "Mastery of core skills is no longer sufficient," she said.

The rest of my day was spent scoping out my activities for the next few weeks with the ever-helpful Mr. Viet, and attempting to conduct a marketing scan of Bắc Thăng Long College's current and proposed activities. I have thus far had some difficulties locating strategy, as "things change quickly here."

And yet, in other ways, change does not, in fact, come quickly.

My first week, however, is complete.

Fingers to Keys.

Who are you calling fat?

Hanoi, Vietnam – It was like having the weight of Hanoi’s looming humidity lifted when I finally got down to my mandate for the full day.

It’s not that I'm unappreciative of having the opportunity to see the city and to let some of the jet lag seep from my body, but I am here for a purpose. And time, frankly, is short.

So, it was with fingers a-flurry I filled the screen with pixels, preparing a draft of my work plan for the next few weeks and crafting a series of interview questions for Mr. Vinh so that I can begin to understand the College’s strategic direction, current marketing initiatives and potential opportunities.

While the unemployment rate in Hanoi is only two per cent, a significant majority of the population is underemployed and not working in their fields of study, which has led to needs for re-training. Colleges, however, suffer from an inferior reputation to universities, regardless of whether they provide direct leads to jobs.

It’s similar to many traditional views in Canada that have only recently begun to shift.

If felt good to work. The two-hour lunches with a leisurely trip to the café, however, still take a little getting used to.

But not as much as those drowned in rice wine.

Dinner and a Show.

Curry in a hurry.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Amidst a symphony of horns, it was dinner and a show.

I ventured out on my own this evening to become better acclimated with my surroundings, and found myself perched high above one of Hanoi’s large roundabouts near Hoan Kiem Lake at rush hour.

Sitting on the third-floor patio of Legend Beer, I found the chicken curry to be nothing to write home about (although I am, ironically, doing just that), but their dunkel was a nice treat to celebrate my first day at work. This is a country known more for basic adjunct lagers and Bia Hoi than microbrews, so it was a particularly nice find at the end of my street.

Below, the ballet of scooters left me mesmerized.

Absolutely fascinating, this seemingly organized mayhem.

First Day of Class.

Things are looking up.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Coming off a September holiday weekend, I felt a little like a kid embarking on his first day of school.

Which, in many ways, I was.

The roads were swollen following Independence Day, which signifies the return to school in Vietnam. Children gathered onto scooters – young girls outfitted in smart white blouses with red ribbons tucked neatly under their collars – and I melted into traffic with them.

With my equivalent to an elementary literature primer, I’ve begun perfecting my Chào buổi sang/tối (Good morning/evening) and Cám ơn (thank you), adding to words I had learned previously. I was only missing an apple for the teacher.

Today was my first day at the modest, yet expanding, campus for Bắc Thăng Long College (BTL), where I met with the dynamic Rector, Mr. Vinh, Mr. Viet, Mr. Hiep and a couple long-term volunteers for the first time.

Mr. Vinh is a man of many ideas, and the two-hour meeting dissolved at times into an ever-expanding vision for my mandate before Ms. Ngoc attempted to narrow it once more. I am, after all, only here for three-and-a-half more weeks.

Strolling through campus.

Despite the fact many of these anxious discussions were carried-out in Vietnamese, I found it fascinating to see how many times I felt I knew exactly what the Rector was getting at based on his facial expressions and body language. He reminds me in many ways of my manager back home – which is a good thing.

Big vision and a desire to make necessary change are attributes with which I can very easily get on board.

Mr. Vinh invited us to a celebration lunch at a Korean barbeque-style restaurant, where we feasted and I was challenged to try to tell the difference between Saigon and Hanoi Beers. Priorities.

Despite not being a drinker, our host led several rounds of cheers in order to make me fell welcome.

And I do.

The City is Alive.

 You said you'd like the red one?

Hanoi, Vietnam – Chickens and roosters squawk, perched on scooter pedals. Women, leaning on plastic stools, twirl noisemakers, attempting to drown the constant bark of horns.

Pinwheels spin dizzyingly in front of walls of intricate silk, spun in reds and pinks. Entire stores of locks shout like a brass section.

A couple pops popcorn into a giant bag, as a mustachioed man spins cotton candy from a cart. There is so much to see and hear and smell; it’s sensory overload.

Katrina and I decided to get lost in the city today for the national holiday. Of course, you can't really be lost if you don't have a destination.

We covered the four sections of central Hanoi during a 10-15-kilometre walk that took us to a wet market full of fish, flopping in small buckets; bags of live frogs trying to get a leg up on each other; and mounds of intestine destined to become sausage casings.

Jail birds.

We stumbled upon the massive Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum and the Presidential Palace after watching swan pedal boats glide across West Lake. In the moment, we found unexpected serenity on its banks. Sometimes, stumbling across things is the best way to see a city.

We were chided by a banana vendor and strolled down heavily treed avenues where branches appeared to lock fingers above us. And, we likely ended up in areas we weren't intended to see.

The angular streets left our compasses spinning, and bent. As we finally approached the ancient quarter, the skies, too, came to life.

The thunder claps: an ovation.

A welcome, now that the real purpose for my visit is about to unfold.

Orienting Myself.

Hanoi, Vietnam – The sun is setting in the distance, making tall clouds appear to be mounds of cotton candy.

The clouds broke after a day punctuated by heavy rains, which may serve as a metaphor for having some of my apprehension relieved during a local orientation at the WUSC offices. The session was another positive step in trying to understand the contributions I hope to make.

I will be spending the next few weeks reviewing the marketing strategy at Bắc Thăng Long College, trying to understand its competitors, developing messaging and making recommendations related to professionals best suited to implement the College’s marketing initiatives.

Apparently, 80 per cent of the College's students come from the nearby industrial sector, which was hard hit during the economic crisis, resulting in tremendous downsizing. As most of the remaining local industrial-zone labour force does not require specific skills – they’re mostly repetitive-task assembly line roles – the College has found it necessary to expand its catchment area to recruit.

Specific objectives like this should help drive the strategy. The next step will be to meet with College officials on Wednesday, and to begin to put ink to a work plan.

In the meantime, tomorrow is a national holiday, and high on my list is seeking out another cà phê nâu đá – which Ngoc had me order in Vietnamese today. It was easy to see why everyone raves about the country’s traditional dark roast coffee mixed with condensed milk and served over ice. 

I was the one getting an education today.

Food for Thought.

Nice Buns.

Hanoi, Vietnam – We dropped down a smoky, fragrant alley, alight with charcoal fires and blackened skewers of uncooked meat. Lunch time.

In each stall: mounds of crab – tinted pink – small barbequed fowl or large brown snails, plucked from their shells with a pointy awl. The omnipresent heat became cloudy, my eyelids fluttering in the acrid air.

Women sat on the ground behind cardboard shields, fans placed beside small charcoal fires. We folded ourselves onto blue plastic stools that could not have been more than six inches high. I felt like the 'clown on a tiny tricycle' act.

There are times being 6"3 can be a disadvantage.

But out came glasses of iced green tea and bowls of vermicelli and grilled pork for our lunch of Bún thịt nướng. Loosely chopped chili peppers added some heat to a day that smoked as it was. I got chopstick practice, wrestling pork and noodles from the savoury broth, enjoying every bite. All this, and lunch for the four of us came to $5.

Aren't you jelly you didn't try this?

Our guides decided we needed dessert as well, so we proceeded to a stall of jellied…everything: corn, bananas, taro, and several things I could not name.

As my eyebrow climbed, the woman in the stall took a scoop of each, placing it into a glass before topping it with milk and passing us a bowl of shaved ice we were to add.

It wasn’t something I would not have ordered back home, but it was sweet and tasty enough.

I was particularly thankful for our excellent guides as I’m not sure I would have eaten in the market on my own on the first day. I certainly wouldn't have known where to start.

What an impressive introduction to Hanoi.

Tour de Force.

Toy street: ironically, not a place for kids.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Machine-blown bubbles seeped into the humidity as we wove through a street of toy stores. Around us, a cacophony of colour – doorways framed by bright plush and plastic objects of desire for squealing children.

And still, the scooters. So many scooters.

I was quickly surprised, however, to see how assertive I had become with traffic. With some common sense, crossing the street amidst the mayhem actually came pretty naturally.

It’s a form of organized chaos: the jabs of the horn, the flash of the lights. The sheer volume (exhibit a, to the right).

Turning onto another street, buildings full of mannequins with pointed heads, curved like turretella shells, grinned at us through second-storey windows. We were glad to have guides today.

I've been dragon these doors around.

We visited many of the city's key sites, including Hoàn Kiếm Lake, and the Temple of Jade Mountain. We visited the Temple of Literature, which hosts the Imperial Academy, Vietnam’s first national university. It was built in 1070. (!)

Founded in 2879 B.C., Vietnam is an ancient country.

We also visited the Museum of Ethnology, and learned about some of the country’s 54 ethnicities and 53 minority groups. The site included full-scale ethnic houses from across Vietnam, and hosted a performance of a traditional water puppet show.

It was helpful to learn about some of the culture and history, and it was obvious our guides were proud to be sharing it with us.

Given my mandate here, it helps to understand the audience.

Buổi tối tốt Hanoi.

Local flavour.

Hanoi, Vietnam – Curling my eyes open, I am greeted by a thunderstorm that lights up the clouds like Chinese lanterns. Below, Shanghai glows orange against the darkness. Still more than an hour to go.

We land in Hanoi under a rusty scythe of a moon, and I am immediately embraced by the familiar leafy aroma of the tropics, and by the humidity, which clings to my every pore like a grieving widow.

The drive from the airport seems endless – so close now – taking well more than an hour to travel 25 kilometres into the city. The ground vibrates from the endless rows of scooters, carving new directions to find Saturday night. Red lights – where they have them – appear to be nothing more than decorative.

A young girl, clutching to her father's flapping windbreaker, wears no more head protection than a plastic tiara.

After 26 hours of travel, it is nice to see the smiling faces at Church Hotel, and even nicer to have dinner and a couple beers unexpectedly arrive in my room.

Let this experience begin.

Land of the Rising Sun.

Tokyo A Go-Go.

Tokyo, Japan – My body is numb, leadened by several false starts at sleeping, by my contortionist’s effort to fold origami legs into a comfortable position, and by chasing an ever-present sun.

It has been daylight the entire trip west, to the Far East.

Jarred awake from restless sleep, the warm roasted aromas of coffee cut the stale cabin air: twelve hours of mouths agape in the face of flickering screens.

It is a new day, and yet, just a continuation.

Ironically, as we land in Japan, the sky is a drapery of cloud.

Burning Rubber.

Not the Golden Gate.

London, ON – Trees stood like cigars as we wound through Pennsylvania's Ricketts Glen State Park. Billowing fog imitated puffs of smoke hanging in the canyons, and the wet bark even smelled like tobacco.

Around the bend stood Smoky the Bear.

Orange detour signs dotted the landscape, pointing our (alternate) way home on what was generally an uneventful return. In this case, uneventful is a good thing.

The road is a good lover, but home is where the heart is.

Vitals:

• Time: Nine hours
• Distance: 664.3 kms
• Weather: Sun, fog, heavy rain in Niagara Falls
• States/Province: Pennsylvania, New York, Ontario
• Wildlife: None

X Marks the Spot.

"Hi, can I get your number? I'm sin-gull."

Wilkes-Barre, PA – "X marks the spot. Dig for the treasure," said the exasperated father resting on the towel next to us, hoping to placate his excited kids.

"No. There's actually no treasure," the young girl replied with a shrug and a crinkled eye. Her younger brother took off eagerly, shovel in tow.

Before long, the same shovel wreaked destruction on a large sandcastle they had built as a family. The mother's defeated sigh sounded like the lazy rattle of reeds lining the boardwalk.

Salt air breathed over my neck at Rehoboth Beach, and a pair of dolphins rollicked in the surf near the shore. Blue umbrellas flapped in the cool breeze, duelling the sun's heat. Ocean, I love thee.

We were covered in just enough sand to add a layer of grit to the car's floor mats for the drive home. The road beckoned to shorten the haul, so we grabbed one last taste of seafood at Medings Seafood and wound once more through the hills to Wilkes-Barre.

Having been foiled on Sunday, we finally got to visit Breaker Brewing Company, and were impressed by samples of beer flavoured with mango, lemongrass and tomatoes.

It was worth the second attempt.

Vitals:

• Time: Five hours
• Distance: 378.9 kms
• Weather: Mostly sunny
• States/Province: Delaware, Pennsylvania
• Wildlife: Dolphins

Hipsters Beered.

Dogfish Head: off-centred.

Rehoboth Beach, DE – Smoke twisted from the wood fire, dancing in my nostrils. Beer-infused brats squirmed on the grill.

A steel fan rattled and spun, offering only a whisper to the  humidity, but ensuring my taste buds danced along. Bunyan’s Lunchbox was cooking.

Nearby, a large Steampunk Treehouse rose from the ground with gnarled, rusted arms, pointing the way into Dogfish Head Craft Brewery in Milton, Delaware.

The brewery bought the sculpture constructed of recycled and reclaimed materials for $1 in 2010, following its previous life as an installation at the Burning Man festival. Shipping cost considerably more.

A pair of wooden clunks: yelps of delight. A family celebrated a successful shot on one of the two well-groomed bocce courts on the front lawn.

Thank brew very much for heading to Dogfish.

Lunch under the sun featured bratwurst, chowder, beer pickles and the much sought-after 120 Minute IPA.

Prior to touring the facility, too, the brewery offered four free samples, which we eagerly scrawled onto spare bottle labels and waved toward well-informed staff who shared knowledge about how each brew is made. Mission accomplished.

We made our way back to Rehoboth Beach, where we capped off the day with oysters at Henlopen City Oyster House, and some of the most beautifully cooked scallops I've had. This is what a drive to the coast is all about.

It was no doubt time to meander down the boardwalk lining the beach as the arcade's electronic pings and rings washed over not only the waves, but a day fully enjoyed.

Interlude.

From the waves, it a-piers.

a line in the sand

Drawn in the sand
and to the tides;
to the currents,
and to pasts, remembered
and forgotten;
the sea washes away
lines previously drawn,
and all this history
that still breathes
inside of me.

Memory curves inside each ripple,
slipping from my grasp;
as footsteps vanish,
it becomes easy to forget
the thoughts that once twirled here.

Dewey Lewis & The News.

Shouldn't it be 16.0 to create a Dewey Decimal?

Dewey Beach, DE – The morning was spent carving through creases hewn in the Earth, trees and rock lining a slalom course through the hills.

Against this natural backdrop, steel windmills loomed, marching like soldiers in and out of the fog.

Pennsylvania brought theme-park roads, each curve smooth and unrelenting. I played the role of whack-a-mole, popping up in my seat to peer around corners and ducking again as we dropped gears on steep descents.

Dilapidated barns – haunted fun houses – spotted the fields, bearing faded grins belying a more colourful past.

We stopped at Breaker Brewing Company in Wilkes-Barre, PA for lunch and faced a nod to the state’s puritanical history: closed on Sunday. It seems every trip has an event like this. Onward.

We arrived in Dewey Beach, Delaware unwilling to drive any longer. Before us stood a creaking wagon tugged by a van; it even had free Wi-Fi. For $5, the Jolly Trolley would take us and various other beach goers around town, eventually dropping us for dinner at the original Dogfish Head Brewpub.

Having pointed ourselves through the trees for a thousand kilometres, we had arrived at our destination at the sea. Our table was soon dressed with crab and corn chowder and fried pickles battered with Dogfish Head's 60 Minute IPA, which was paired with IPA truffle mustard. Delicious.

With the Jolly Trolly to take us home, there was, of course, also beer, including a porter brewed with 30 lobsters: Choc Lobster. Clever.

This is the good stuff.

Vitals:

• Time: 13 hours (with one hour delay for an accident)
• Distance: 1,001.2 kms
• Weather: Mostly sunny
• Province/States: Ontario, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware
• Wildlife: Deer, Wild turkeys