Day 4: Fun and Games!

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Today we started off the day with a presentation on Vietnamese culture and history at UEF. We started off by learning about how the local people of Vietnam were formed from regional migrations of people from Western Asia. The Chinese also contributed in numerous ways to the culture of Vietnam in ways such as Confucianism and farming techniques. An interesting difference between Vietnamese history and American history is that Vietnamese history goes back to the BC era with nomads, sects, and kingdoms. In language class, we learned the Vietnamese alphabet, which consists of 29 letters. Ten of these letters are vowels, and each vowel has 6 tongues (tones or pronunciations), which denote different meanings for their use in the same word. We also learned how to carry on a simple conversation in Vietnamese while using proper pronouns. I really enjoy Vietnamese class; it is fun to learn and speak in such a different and difficult language. Also, we get some good laughs out of language class when we learn how to pronounce new words and phrases. Our teacher is awesome and really patient, which makes learning Vietnamese much easier. For lunch, we ate rice and beef stew at the school.

After lunch, our UEF student friends had an afternoon of cultural exchange and games planned to do with us. We started off the activities by breaking into 6 groups, so each group had about 2 Pitt students and 5 UEF students. The first activity involved translating Vietnamese phrases about Vietnamese customs and cultures and comparing them to American customs.  Learning these customs is For example, it is appropriate for Vietnamese of the same gender to touch or hug in public, but it is not appropriate for people of the same gender to do so. Next, we had a dancing competition where a Vietnamese student would dance for 30 seconds and we would have to practice and repeat the dance they did. My team made it to the final round but lost to the other team. Next we played charades, and then we had a competition where one person from each team had to hold another person from their same team and rotate them as any many times around their body as they can without dropping them. It was pretty funny. Another game we played involved trying to catch a piglet that was in a pen. The piglet was adorable but I think this game is illegal in the US. We also played a few other games before ending the afternoon with a small ceremony. My team, which was represented by Nino and me, actually won first place for the day! Also, my Vietnamese friend, Lizzie, was on my team! All the teams then won a box of treats, which consisted of chum-chum fruit, dragon fruit, orange cookies, sprite, and some cupcakes. Now we have some awesome snacks in the hotel! The fruit was so delicious! We had a small dance party with the Vietnamese friends and also exchanged gifts. We gave them Pitt shirts and Pitt and Steelers key chains while we got some awesome Vietnamese decorated pots, magnets and magazines.

In the evening, the UEF students came and took us to get Pho (pronounced Fa) for dinner. It is a famous soup in Vietnam, which consists of beef, noodles, and chives. The noodles were good, and reminded me of Ramen noodles. Later at night, a group of us went a rooftop restaurant, which had a awesome view of District 1 in the city! It was fun-filled day!