http://www.durksen.com Occasional Opinions, Observations, and Obfuscation Thu, 17 Jul 2008 03:54:17 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Does anybody remember the "song" Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen) that filmmaker Baz Luhrmann unleashed on the world in 1999? A litany of advice to young people originally written by Chicago Tribune writer Mary Schmich, read by voice actor Lee Perry over a remix of Quindon Tarver's "Everybody's Free ... http://www.durksen.com/wear-sunscreen/ I will leave Vietnam in five weeks’ time. Between now and then I have only one weekend without commitments. My parents will be here for two hectic weeks at the beginning of July. The end is barreling down on me. MCC has provided reading material to help us prepare for the ... http://www.durksen.com/on-preparing-to-leave/ Someone known by the rather inscrutable handle "v!Nc3sl4s" has posted a pretty decent video of Hanoi traffic to the video sharing site Vimeo. The time-lapse video of an intersection near Hoan Kiem Lake adds considerable excitement to an already dramatic experience by speeding everything up. The video really gets good around the ... http://www.durksen.com/it-looks-worse-sped-up/ I have uploaded two photosets from my trip to Laos. Click the pictures below to enter the albums. The first is of Luang Prabang, which I wrote about previously. Luang Prabang: The second is of our MCC regional retreat in Vientiane. Expatriate service workers living in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos came ... http://www.durksen.com/a-look-at-laos/ How humid is it in Vietnam these days? Shoes stored for a month on an otherwise dry tile floor end up looking like this (I cleaned the shoe on the right for comparison): Mold grows on clothes, books, shoes. Anything, really. That's how humid it is in Vietnam these days. http://www.durksen.com/how-humid/ How hot is it in Vietnam these days? At a red light, motorbike drivers now jostle for a spot next to a truck or bus to enjoy its shade. That's how hot it is in Vietnam these days. http://www.durksen.com/how-hot/ My photographs from India are finally online (I recently suffered a mild crisis of hard disk space). Clicking the picture below should take you to the album. Alternatively, click here to go to the album on Flickr. http://www.durksen.com/india-array/ I've shown up in a few places around the web lately.  These links are mainly for friends and family who like to keep tabs on me. Rachel and Anna blog regularly about our shared experience in Hanoi with MCC's SALT program. Erin, a SALTer in Cambodia, posted pictures of our exploits in ... http://www.durksen.com/sightings-elsewhere/ According to Martin, a German tourist I met last year on a boat in Halong Bay, the Lao city of Luang Prabang is one of the most spiritual places in the world. I wasn't exactly sure what to expect based this passing comment, as I do not consider myself particularly attuned ... http://www.durksen.com/luang-prabang-laos/ If you don’t know much about Laos, fear not: you’re probably in good company. Before we begin today’s brief geography lesson about one of Asia’s more obscure countries, a word on the country name. Laos is pronounced as one syllable, not two, with a diphthong resembling the pained expression ‘ow’. ... http://www.durksen.com/the-land-in-between/ I am perched in the brief window of time between my return from India and my departure for Laos tomorrow afternoon. I am back at work in body, but my soul remains with the School of Peace just outside Bangalore, India. I plan to write my experiences with the School ... http://www.durksen.com/the-school-of-structural-analysis-and-social-transformation/ There are things you can buy in Hanoi, Vietnam, that might surprise you. For your reading enjoyment, I have put together a short list here. $1 DVDs. For less than the price of a movie rental back home, you can pick up the latest George Clooney film from any one ... http://www.durksen.com/things-you-can-buy-in-vietnam/ Mennonite Central Committee works exclusively with local development partners in Vietnam, rather than working alone.  The theory behind this, and I believe it to be a good one, is that it's better to build sustainable development capacity in a country than to move in, give money to particularly needy individuals, ... http://www.durksen.com/mcc-vietnam-projects/ It seems I rarely post about the work I do (exceptions are here and here). For the most part, I spend my days trying to decipher sentences like this one: It was also recommended that 10 kinds of trees used for land evaluation should be used and land map adaptation 1:10,000 should ... http://www.durksen.com/feng-shui-einstein-and-basketball/ Rather than offer a formal apology for amount of time that has passed since I last posted here, I would point you toward my Flickr photostream, which is where most of my energy has been directed lately. Translated roughly, the titular question of this post means, "Did you enjoy Tet in ... http://www.durksen.com/t%e1%ba%bft-%e1%bb%9f-vi%e1%bb%87t-nam-co-vui-khong/ I have a new camera, a Canon Rebel XTi, and two prime lenses. People who know me can attest to my excitement about this. New photographs will appear in the Photos section of this website. Click the link in the right sidebar to see my new albums. Photos taken with my old ... http://www.durksen.com/a-new-camera/ Some people maintain a constant disposition and reputation wherever they go. We all know these people. "Oh, he's always been that way," we say. Or, "She'll never change." They will try the same jokes in every crowd. They will take the same approach to every problem. They will be unfailingly ... http://www.durksen.com/in-vietnam/ I read once (maybe it was twice) that new arrivals to a foreign country are the most likely to write a book on its culture. Once you live in a place too long, you start to realize that your assumptions and hypotheses are about as accurate and useful as ... http://www.durksen.com/the-price-is-right/ With the weather in Hanoi turning cold and dreary, and with the remnants of some throat infection - finally succumbing to the antibiotics - still making me cough, and with the holiday season now over, I've begun to notice more acutely the things I miss from home. While this may seem ... http://www.durksen.com/missing-out/ In the Christmas narrative, Mary and Joseph arrive in Bethlehem to find that there is no room at the inn. I am sure every traveler who has experienced the same situation has reached for this comparison; please bear with me as I do the same. Traveling with two Canadian friends ... http://www.durksen.com/plan-e/ From Christmas in Vietnam 2007 A word of wisdom from the wise: if you're planning to head downtown on Christmas Eve in Hanoi, leave yourself lots of time. Despite the fact that Vietnam is predominantly Buddhist (if only nominally), with Catholics comprising around 10% of the population, I have never before seen ... http://www.durksen.com/christmas-at-the-hanoi-hilton/ From Carmen and Leon Visit I am sure it has already been said many times, many ways, but it is always interesting to see the familiar through the eyes of an outsider. I had intended to follow up an earlier post on some surprises I encountered in Vietnam with another ... http://www.durksen.com/through-new-eyes/ This past weekend I was privileged to take a trip with my host family to their village home, about 45 minutes outside of Hanoi. The village is populated mostly by the elder generation and young children. Those of working age, like my host father, have migrated to the city for ... http://www.durksen.com/village-people/ I love maps. This probably stems from an insuppressible need to place things in their proper context. For those who appreciate context, I have provided a satellite map of Hanoi, highlighting a few places relevant to my daily life. Click the placemarks to see what they represent. The ... http://www.durksen.com/my-hanoian-life-on-a-map/ Hanoi Traffic If anyone who reads this blog is a SALT stalker (that is, a parent or friend of an MCC SALTer who regularly reads other SALTers' blogs), the 'day in the life' post is one that will be familiar to you. Examples can be found here, here, here, here, ... http://www.durksen.com/i-read-the-news-today-oh-boy/