Mon 03 July 2006

The new week finally came. I woke up at 4.30 in the morning and felt eager to step into a new chapter in life. I was gonna sign the contract of internship with SPERI this morning and would enjoy the 1st field trip to Quang Binh right in the afternoon.

I took the bus number 18 to get to the office with a rather heavy suitcase for the trip. The Institute requires the whole staff to use bicycles or public transportation in stead of motobikes. While waiting at the bustop I accidentally met a secondary classmate – Bich Thao. She was a talented student in literature when she was at school. Now she’s becoming a lecturer at the Ha Noi National University. Today is also her first working day.

It took me more than 1 hour to get to the office, 20 minutes waiting for and 45 minutes on the bus, and I arrived at 8.30 am. I didn’t have much experience using the bus, so I dropped the money when paying and nearly fell down several times. But it was cool that they turned the VOV on in the bus. Perhaps the bus driver likes to learn some English (?) That would be great! Anyway I think it is very good for other passengers, especially pupils and students.

The morning passed very quickly. We had rushed at noon as the train leaved at 1.30 pm. (But we got there quite early.) It would be a long trip and we supposed to arrived at Dong Le station at 11 pm.

It was really a long trip and I think it gave me a chance to witness the life from a new corner. I met a father and a son who are from Huong Khe, Ha Tinh. They were kind and friendly. I liked the way the father treated his son. He’s a teacher of Physics and I guess he’s a good teacher. Unfortunately, a good teacher could not understand the pharmaceutical issues. Well he took the son to Ha Noi for health examination. The boy’s nose was not good. The doctor, a PhD named Khoa from the private healthcare on Huynh Thuc Khang gave them a very bad prescription with 5 medicines and he charged 200 thousand dong for 3 of them including Berberin (my goodness!!!). He had also prescribed Efferagal and I told the father to wipe it out because the boy didn’t get fever or runny nose. Perhaps the pharmaceutical industry will lead to so terrible incidents like that, and will contribute to the unsafety of Vietnamese people’s lives especially the poor.

Some other things that I saw during more than 10 hours on the train also made me wonder about the people’s lives. Well this is Viet Nam, a developing country but we are simply growing up more than developing (sustainably).

We got to Dong Le station in Quang Binh province late at night. A problem in contacting the CIRD staff because they had got the wrong information that we would arrive in Vinh. However, it was fortunately that we got to the office safely at midnight. We even had hot water for bathing and the bathroom was much better than the one in Son Kim. So we went to bed at about 2am and did have a sound sleep .

That’s how my Monday, also the 1st working day, was going on … I’m now in a new step in life with many new things, changes and also challenges waiting ahead. So now I’m back with this Blog to mark this special and interesting period of my life.

See ya!