Update on Vietnam: New Year’s 2018

Enjoy a few pictures to match the blog!https://1drv.ms/f/s!AhAuEmFMvIHHgoVXpb5OfCYUrz7SjQ

2018 is here! It was here 15 hours ahead of Victoria got, so there are indeed advantages of living in South East Asia (get there faster, I mean).

So just this morning I saw a guy wearing a Justin Bieber shirt while riding his motorbike. It got me thinking whether there is still anything left that surprises me about living in Vietnam after 2.5 years. And there is, a lot. Here is my 2018 countdown top 7 things about Vietnam that blow me away even after a few years here. Here we go:

7. Everything can be a public toilet for men: stop, pull out, water, move on. No place is off limits: highway, sidewalk, river... Women have it more difficult I suppose.
6. Helmets. If you ride a pedal bike in this crazy traffic, you do not need to wear a helmet. It is fair to say that people do avoid hitting pedal bikes... and kids. Kids don’t require a helmet up to the age of 9 when carried on a motorbike. I suppose if you make it to 9, you deserve one.
5. Communist propaganda. How many places are left in the world where you can still proudly take a picture in front of a fresh poster commemorating the Great October Revolution and featuring Lenin? Or having a wall of beautiful pictures of brand new luxury residential developments along with a section of pictures depicting the strength of Vietnam army, women with wheat in their hands and uncle Ho (Ho Chi Minh)? I have to say that rarely one gets to re-live their childhood. To some strange extent I do!
4. Growth. In numbers, 2017 in Vietnam was marked by 6.7% GDP growth. If one does not know what this mean, it is one of the highest growth rates in the world, with US, Canada and Europe being in the low 2s... and you feel it! In the time I have been here, behind my apartment block they built 10,000 new apartments, complete with 81 stores skyscraper that will be finished this year, making it 11th tallest in the world. Outside of my window I see an entire new city center being built on a former swamp and a shipyard converted into a luxury riverfront residential complex. Saigon changes every day, which can be very disorienting. One day I took a ride through the “new city center” development and I thought I went the wrong way because there were buildings there that were not even started a month ago! This energy permeates everything, which is one of the most appealing things about living here.
3. Entrepreneurial youth. Startup scene here is obscene! Everyone is doing business. I sometimes feel like I stand still because I work and get paid a salary while my managers trade bitcoin, buy and sell Realestate and speculate in things I would never consider. Risk tolerance here is spectacular: people borrow hundreds of thousands of USD from banks at above 10% interest rate and don’t even bat an eye! I feel like a conservative granny around Vietnamese! I will make a confession: I am now dabbling a bit in crypto currency, but just for fun. Makes for a great conversation piece.
2. Luxury. In a country that is stereotyped as one still recovering from the last war, one would not expect to find many comforts. You would be very very wrong. In fact, many things that in the western world are either exclusive or expensive, in Vietnam are considered a norm. For example, a 90 minute full body massage including a facial and a hot stone treatment will run you about 12 USD in a good place. And I guarantee it will be the best massage you will have had in your life (I had a lot of feedback from visiting guests). Makeup, nails, fashion are all basic necessities here, so shorts with socks and Birkenstocks are just for tourists.

1. Traffic. Still takes the cake. Millions of motorbikes, just as rapid snaking river that does not stop at any obstacle. Just as water, it finds the path of least resistance, often starting to flow against its own direction... yet at the same time, once you are in it, you notice a pattern in the chaos. Every little movement of the head, hesitation or honk all mean something. And when you figure it out, you join the communist driving collective, just as the borg, and flow... as a big happy family. In fact I love riding my motorbike in this rapid, because it is very relaxing in a way: you cannot think about anything else other than traffic and noise and smoke of the exhaust. Work, stress, pressures all disappear as you focus singularly at reaching your destination while dodging your comrades.

This New Year marks exactly two and a half years since I moved to Vietnam from Spain. Complete with full cultural adjustment, full immersion back into a Communist country and into noise, motorbikes, smells and sounds of a 10 Million City in one of the most populated countries in Asia, my experience has been full, to make an understatement. Needless to say, it feels like I have lived here about 10 years.

My work: it is for sure the most fun I have had in a role in my professional career. Firstly, having over 1200 staff, enormous autonomy to create and make decisions makes for a very rewarding experience. I have been able to rebuild my management team and make Vietnam operation one of the leading players within the entire company. In fact, Vietnam has become a leader in innovation and developing leading practices for the rest of the company. To develop and maintain a reputation of business leader takes much hard work, but it is worth every minute we have invested. This year alone we received 12 international awards for being top employer, top innovator and top IT Company in Vietnam. I feel privileged and excited to be part of this experience.

As for living in Vietnam, I have continued to enjoy many aspects of it. The everlasting 30 degree weather and summer is a great feature, and when I get a bit bored of it, I get to travel to Victoria and many other places for business, which provides a nice variety.

I continue in my lovely apartment with beautiful views of downtown and a great overview of how fast this country is developing. A new metro line, huge malls and residential developments are going up everywhere. This is no longer Vietnam rebuilding after the Vietnam war: that was 40 years ago. This is Vietnam with the annual growth of 7% which puts to shame most countries around the globe. Despite people having judgements about Communist regime, the freedoms and opportunities in this country are second to none. That is why you see so many foreigners coming here and ending up staying.

Traffic here remains a nightmare, with cars increasing every day as people’s incomes improve. With so much construction going on, many roads get closed or blocked and this complicates things further. My commute to work has increased on average 15 minutes each way, now taking about an hour to reach work.

On the positive note, the city is being cleaned up, lots of new restaurants are opening up and shopping abounds. We even have H&M and Zara in town. If you walk the streets in District 1, which is the center, you would not know you are in Vietnam, with the exception of ever present motorbikes and conical hats. That is not necessarily a good thing as Vietnam is slowly losing it cultural identity as it gets westernized.

On a personal front, I have been with a Vietnamese lady for the last year, after my previous relationship (also Vietnamese lady, but too successful and business focused) and I am very happy! Thuy (that is her name) came out with me to Canada this last summer, met my girls and Cathy and we had a wonderful time.

I am in Vietnam for another year by the looks of it. At the moment I do not have a clear idea of the next posting, but it may take me back to Europe or US. So here it is, my long overdue update from far far away! Now it is your turn! Happy 2018!

Enjoy a few pictures to match the blog!

https://1drv.ms/f/s!AhAuEmFMvIHHgoVXpb5OfCYUrz7SjQ