Moving abroad with Scottie: Expats in Vietnam

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Meet Scottie-Southeast Asia Edition 

So you went abroad to teach English what made you choose Vietnam? 

I made the decision to move to Asia maybe 6 years ago and I made the decision to teach English, because through google I had realized that the best opportunity to live outside the United States and make a decent living (without a really high professional degree or job experience) would be teaching English. It was an easy intriguing job to do- fresh out of college. 

 I decided Asia because it would be different from the west, like going to Europe would be to similar. I researched about East Asia: like Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China, and then Southeast Asia.

Those are kind of the three main areas I had considered going too. China to me seemed overwhelming, too populated, too big, and very restricted. I was intimidated to adapt to life in China because I had never left the United States before so I felt like I wasn’t really ready to take that on. In Japan and Korea it had seemed that there were more standards, which kind of sounds bad, but it seemed like you needed to have more job experience. And also you had to work more hours and pay more in living expenses- more demanding. 

I was thinking, well, I had no experience, I’m fresh out of college and I didn’t want to go to a place that is going to be more difficult. So then it came down to Southeast Asia, where it’s a little bit easier to go in as a new teacher.

The cost of living is lower, there’s a lot of good food, a richness of culture. It came down to Thailand and Vietnam- it was mostly bloggers and online posts who said they had a better experience in Vietnam.

These bloggers were saying Vietnam was a really wonderful culture, wonderful things to do, easy to get a job plus well paying. And I just took my chances and trusted what I read online.

The questions Scottie had in the end were;

• what is the pay rate
• What is the cost of living?
• How many hours do people work a day?
• What is there to do?
• How much experience do you need?

Practical questions. All signs pointed to Vietnam and led me to Hanoi. 

What has been your craziest experience in Vietnam?

Oooh ,my craziest experience in Vietnam-I definitely have top 3.  One crazy experience was one night I went to a party wearing a cute top and short shorts-My shorts didn’t have any pockets, they were like trash. So I was holding my phone the whole party and I ended up losing my phone. Someone had to call me a Grab car, which is like Uber, I didn’t end up taking my motorbike that night..

It was around 5:30 am and before I went into my house I sat on the street to smoke a cigarette. I wanted to enjoy the last moments of my night. So I sat on the street and there was this street dog who is always on my street and I was friends with him at this point. I was petting him and he was being a little frantic that morning. He ran up to some lady that was pushing her cart so she can go out to work and sell food. He was  trying to hump her leg and he was barking at some people down the street. Generally he was being a little bit crazy, and I felt bad for those people. So I was telling him to shut up and come here. One of the times he came back I was petting his head and he bit my hand very hard. He kind of just lock jawed my hand and I was waiting for him to let go. When he finally let go, he bit again and I was like oh shit I’ma have to get away from him.

Twelve hours later I started to realize rabies is a really big risk and Vietnam has the second highest death rate of rabies in the world and plus if you get bitten by a dog on the street, you should seek medical attention.

I only had 10 US dollars that night, and I was waiting to get paid so I was broke, and I had no phone and I was starting to worry because I  started reading more and more about it on my laptop. Your hands and specifically your fingertips are the second worst place you can be bit because rabies travels via nerves and it kills you when it reaches the nerves in your brain. Your hands are covered in nerves.  Worst place to get bit is on your head or your face, and the second is your hands, especially your fingertips.

My whole hand had bites , little bleeding dots and my fingertips as well. I knocked on my neighbors door and borrowed 40 dollars and wrote down directions to a hospital. These are directions for street names that are not in English, that I didn’t know. I reached the hospital and they told me  I don’t have what I need and sent me to another address, which didn’t have what I needed either. 

After about 3 hospitals, I was getting overwhelmed at this point. I was really stressed because like time is ticking I don’t want the rabies to reach my brain and I don’t want to die.

You don’t know that you have rabies until you are dying. There’s no way to diagnose it until you have symptoms, once you have symptoms you are going to die so it’s kind of like there is a risk you just need to take care of it as soon as possible and I was already more than 24 hours into the bite. 

The internet said there used to be a lot of companies that supplied what i needed. I didn’t need the vaccine, I didn’t need the preventive vaccine, I needed actual antibodies taken from a person or a horse that had already been exposed to rabies. I needed that to be  ejected into my body so it would immediately kill any rabies that was in there. There used to be a lot of people supplying this stuff, shipping it all over the world and now there is way less like I guess underdeveloped countries need to start making it for themselves.

Eventually I found a western hospital that would cost about 600 USD to get that treatment, I had no money, I had ten dollars. I was like what am I going to do? I was so scared and I sent an email to one of the doctors and I asked him if there was any way I can do a payment plan. This was kind of an emergency and I’m really stressed and I really need this treatment. They told me if I left my passport there they would give me the treatment immediately and they would keep the passport until I paid 600 dollars.

I had 3 weeks left until I had to do my next visa run and I had to pay this and get my passport back. I got the treatment and that night where I got injected they had injected me in 4 different places. It swelled up to the size of a tennis ball and it was extremely difficult to sleep..

Eventually everything was fine. I paid it back  and I didn’t die of rabies. It was worth it and it was definitely one of the craziest experiences I’ve had here.

What’s your biggest culture shock? 

I feel like culture shock happens in a subconscious way that it’s not so obvious when it’s happening. One culture shock for sure is personal space because there is not really a concept of personal space here it’s just a more crowded place here and yeah so like haha people will just stand right next to you or touching you and it doesn’t mean anything. In busy fast food restaurants where there is a line, people cut alot and they stand really really close together and that was difficult alot for me and um yeah that was a big culture shock 

Any advice you would give for one moving abroad?

The advice I would give and maybe this is a controversial answer…save more money than your planning on saving because I thought that I had enough and I ran out quickly.  I had very very little money when I landed in Vietnam and it added a whole new layer of stress and life would have been way easier to adapt to.  For sure you can do it and adapt with that financial stress but your mental health is going to have to be in tiptop shape and it’s hard when you’re adapting to so many new things and so many little stresses that it’s hard to keep them all in check and not get overwhelmed. Save more money than your planning.

Start taking language classes as soon as you arrive it will make your life easier and learn the language. Because even if you think, “I’ll only be here for a year it’s not really worth it”-Show some respect for the locals. It will make life easier for you and make life easier than them.

Learn something, have fun expand your knowledge, expand your mind and learn a  new language and people will really appreciate that even if your pronunciation is bad it’s really helpful to be able to say a simple sentence when you want something and have fun! Be patient, a big piece of advice you are going to have to find a lot of patience, maybe you should start meditating now so you can build up some patience. 

-Interview done by Lateisha for November 2020 issue of Ayme Magazine