Meet Oanh

I mentioned before my friend who I met to have milk with one night. We originally met in the same coffee shop because she came in to order for her work, which is right next door. She saw me and just stood next to me, looking at me and grinning.

So I grinned back.

Seriously, she wouldn't stop grinning.

Finally, I asked her if she spoke English and she nodded vigorously and then paused and said, "So, so." We tried to talk for a minute and I gestured for her to sit, and she sat. Her name, I discovered, is Oanh (pronounced like the name Juan). She told me that she would like to learn English and that I need to practice my Vietnamese and she broke into an impromtu lesson of the Vietnamese alphabet. I didn't argue, but repeated like a robot. When she had trouble communicating something in English, she would break into a stream of Vietnamese like I might understand that better.

After about 15 minutes, someone came and said something to her (get back to work, maybe?), and we exchanged phone numbers, and agreed to meet again. At first I felt overwhelmed by her texts, but now that I know her a little better, I think they are hilarious. She always types in all caps and her language is really entertaining(I'm not making fun. I love it). Here are a few samples:

"HI CAROLYN. WHAT ARE YOU DOING NOW? ARE YOU HEALTHY TODAY?"

"I'M FINE THANKYOU. ARE YOU TEACH ENGLISH? I'M AN ACCOUNT BUT I SPEAK ENGLISH VERY BAD."

"I DON'T THINK SO BECAUSE VOCABULARY OFF ME IS VERY LITTLE. ARE YOU TEACH ENGLISH?"

"ALL DAY YOU DON'T GO TO MY COMPANY. I WAIT FOR YOU. WHAT ARE YOU DOING. I LEARN HISTORY NOW."

"OH YES, IF YOU LIKE, YOU CAN GO TO MY HOUSE BUT MY HOUSE IS THE POOR. ARE YOU VERY FUN?"

"ARE YOU GO TO BED? GOOD NIGHT AND HAVE A GOOD DREAM. THANK YOU VERY MUCH."

So, Oanh and I ended up meeting together for a couple of hours to look over some English and Vietnamese. I'm not sure how much either of us learned, but we finally set a time to go to her house. So after fellowship and lunch on Sunday, we were late to meet her, and she had been waiting for some time. She didn't seem annoyed, only more excited to see us. She took us on a bus for an hour, trying to teach us new words all the time. Meet Oanh:

We got off the bus and took a dirt road. The dirt road led to a dirt path. The path shrunk and we walked single file, moving off to the side when a motorbike approached. We walked past rice fields, papya trees, and other plants. Oanh's English is better than my Vietnamese, but that's not saying much. As we walked, she picked different plants and herbs and placed them in our hands enthusiastically, saying the Vietnamese name clearly. It was like our own private tour. She introduced us to all of her relatives along the way. She rambled on and on to them in Vietnamese, very proud of her visitors. I picked out the word 'America (go me, whoo)'.

Finally the three of us arrived at her house and her mother and three sisters were so welcoming to us. They are definitely poor and seemed to only own a small plot of land amidst many other farms. Oanh's father is sick and my understanding is that he has been for a long time. He just lay on his side on what looked like a table in the middle of the house.

Oanh's mother brought out a pepsi and split it between Erica and me and they cut up fruit for us and happily watched us eat while they had none. Oanh's nephew was passed around and I forgot that there was a langauge barrier. We followed Oanh around the yard and she picked every ripe cherry to give to us. She showed us how she fished using a net on bamboo. We sat on the porch and she sang to us.
Finally she shoved plants in our hands as parting gifts, along with some crackers, cherries, an unidentified fruit, and a quarter of a pomegranete for each of us, and we walked the dirt path to the dirt road to the road to catch the last bus home. Her cousin is the bus driver of bus #9 and she yelled to him where to tell us to get off the bus, and waved goodbye with her signiature grin. What a wonderful friend to have.


You can't tell in this video, but we thought it was so funny how she would pull up the net, finding it empty, and say, "No." and walk resolutely a few feet away and try again.

If you can't hear on this one, Oanh is just pointing out the rice and telling us in Vietnamese. They have many words for rice--different types, cooked, uncooked, half cooked, broken, I don't know how many there are...