September 30, 2011

Julia Shumlin

The past two few weeks in Ha Noi have been an overwhelming yet exciting blur of mopeds, rice, street vendors and strange, new words.  In this short span of time I have eaten things I never thought I would eat, crossed busy streets that I don’t know how I survived, and said enough xin lois to fill a book or two.  But the most difficult and significant part of my time here has been adjusting to the rhythm of the family that has accepted me into their home.

            My host family has been nothing but kind and welcoming to me so far, but it definitely takes some time to get comfortable as a daughter in a family that I hardly know.  For every moment of laughter and joy, I have had my fair share of embarrassing cultural mishaps and times of extreme homesickness and anxiety.

            Strangely enough, the time that I have found myself most at ease as a member of this family has been in an action of pure menial labor; washing the dishes.  The most significant advice that my parents gave me before I left for Vietnam was to help my family out around the house as much as possible.  Desperate to express my gratitude and to dispel the stereotype of Americans as lazy and unobliging, I set out to be useful in the first few days.  Due to my ignorance in the kitchen and at most other household chores, washing dishes became the one way that I could help without becoming too much of a hindrance.

            At home in the United States I will do anything to get out of cleaning up after dinner.  The idea of taking time to scrub at crusty, partially-eaten food has never held much appeal for me.  Here, this chore takes new meaning- a way to bridge the cultural gap between my family me.  It feels natural to stand beside my host siblings or cousins or grandmother, in sync as we send each dish down the assembly line of soaping, scrubbing, and rinsing.  With each dish I fall more into the rhythm, much like the comfortable flow into which my life in Ha Noi has fallen.

            Fresh in my mind is the memory of a Friday night almost two weeks ago when my mom delegated the dish-washing job to my brother and me.  All week I had not exchanged more than a few words with my brother Minh- a seemingly surly teenager of 17. As we jokingly grumbled about the tedious task (while I was secretly jumping for joy at this moment of potential sibling-bonding,) we talked more than we had the entire past week of living under the same roof.  I now realize that what I first mistook for resentment in my host brother was no more than my host brother’s shy demeanor.

            In my quest to become a part of this culture, this ordinary, brainless task has become a vehicle to achieve a level of ease with my family.  I’m sure that as I continue to get to know them better, it will become no more than a vaguely annoying chore. For now, though, I will continue to jump to action at the prospect of working beside my host family members while elbow-deep in fragrant, soapy water.