Waiting

I finished my research methodology section yesterday and sent it to my boss for comments, so here’s hoping he doesn’t think it’s a disaster. I don’t think he’ll necessarily think it’s really a disaster, but I haven’t done this kind of thing before, so I’m trying to keep my expectations low-ish. We’ll see what happens! This means, however, that I’ve got to wait around a little. There are project related things to do, but they’re not going to take up the whole day, that’s for sure. That kind of stuff should definitely pick up in the next day or two, giving me lots to do next week. I think I’ll be staying here all next week, returning to Karachi on the 18^th, and then after that…who knows? I should still be leaving on August 10^th, spending a week in London with family there (all of whom are safe and sound, thank God), then coming back to the US on the 17^th. I’ve also booked a trip to Boston for the weekend of August 27^th, about which I’m really excited. There’s a good chance that I’ll be coming back here in the fall – at least, I hope there is. It’s all good experience for me, so I certainly won’t object, despite the reality of being away so long hitting me over the past few weeks. Besides, I’m not a big fan of winter, so I won’t mind skipping part of it this year! (The unfortunate part is that I love fall. Ah well, I don’t envision living somewhere without four seasons on a permanent basis any time soon, so I’ll have plenty of other chances to experience it.) It’s funny, the things that don’t always occur to me. The highway engineer on our project is in her 40s and she’s never seen snow, which I can’t conceive of. I’ve had a few pairs of wool pants made, and when I told them I wanted them completely lined, they looked at me as though I had three heads and politely informed me that it was very heavy material. However, since I live in a country with winter, it’ll come in handy. Besides, it’s wool – I would foresee scratchy chafing-type issues without lining.

And that’s really all I want to say on the subject of chafing.

We’ve scrapped our trip for the weekend, which is actually fine with me. I’m caught up (I think) on what I need to do here, and I’d like the chance to relax over the weekend with nothing to do. Not that being here has been particularly stressful, maybe I’m just used to having lots of “Mandy Time”, like I do in the ‘stan. I probably shouldn’t get used to it, though, because I’ll get back to my real life eventually!

I’ve almost been run over by a wide array of vehicles over the past few days, the closest of which came from a taxi cab that made a very sharp corner and almost took me with it. The thing that’s tricky is that the traffic lights and walk signals rarely provide sufficient direction as to when it’s safe to walk. At some point, I’m sure I’ll stop remarking on the nature of traffic in Vietnam, but for the time being, it still continues to fascinate me. For example, today I saw a guy driving down a city road today with a 15-foot steel beam strapped to his scooter. It kept dinging against the surface of the road, sending up little sparks whenever it did so, and making it see-saw along the side, which perpetuated the dinging. But the driver didn’t even seem to notice, he just kept calmly puttering down the road. I suppose that if you have to transport a 15-foot steel beam across town and your scooter is the only way it’s going to happen, an all-encompassing sense of calm is a distinct advantage. I just wouldn’t have wanted to see him in one of the massive traffic circles that are inevitable around here. I don’t need to see anyone get clotheslined by a steel beam. If I thought that kind of stuff was cool, I’d probably also watch those Ultimate Fighting Champion matches and Muy Thai boxing or something.

In a complete non sequitur, I’ve been reading a lot about poverty in Vietnam, and it’s staggering to imagine. I still think that it’s a different order of magnitude as compared to Pakistan, but it’s a huge problem here, too. I don’t know why poverty seems worse in Pakistan, it just does. Maybe there are more support resources here, maybe the climate is more forgiving, I don’t know. But the people I’ve seen here who are dirt poor still seem to have an easier time than in Pakistan, and they don’t have it easy here, by any stretch. I think part of it has to do with the systems in place. Many, if not most, parts of rural Pakistan are still under a feudal system, where the “benevolent” landlord allows haris to work his land in exchange for some of the profits from what the land produces. The problem is that benevolent landlords are few and far between, and unless a miracle occurs, haris spend their lives becoming more and more indebted to the landlord, and end up with nothing, not even wages, in some cases. Social systems in place to help the destitute are riddled with corruption, and the money they disburse rarely, if ever, makes it to the neediest people. The root causes of poverty in Pakistan are not only rooted in scarcity, but they’re also very structural in nature, and will require a huge cultural overhaul if anything is ever really going to change. However, the people in power want to stay in power, and the majority of the poor are so disenfranchised and disempowered that I can’t imagine they’d be able to marshal the resources to stand up for themselves and really effect change. This isn’t a unique scenario, it plays out to greater and lesser degrees all over the world. But that doesn’t make it any easier to witness.

I don’t know enough about how the socialist system works here in Vietnam to really comment on it, but I can’t imagine a system that would be worse for its participants than what Pakistani haris have to deal with. It feels as though there are more safety nets in place here, and while corruption is also a problem, I don’t think it’s on the same scale. I could be wrong about that, clearly, but that’s my first impression here. But poverty here is still staggering, and it's strange to see poverty in a land of such abundance. Driving through the agricultural lands, you see nothing but lush crops, and it seems unthinkable that anyone here could go hungry. However, it happens, just as it does in the US.

I'll be off, then. I got up early to go running this morning, which was good, but now I'm tired. So I think it's time for me to go veg out.