{"id":59,"date":"2008-10-25T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-25T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/?p=59"},"modified":"2024-04-01T16:35:08","modified_gmt":"2024-04-01T16:35:08","slug":"an-evening-at-phoungs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/?p=59","title":{"rendered":"An evening at Phoung\u2019s"},"content":{"rendered":"

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We are invited to eat with Phoungh, a former teacher in the rural province where we will be teaching next, now a driver in Hanoi. He has heard we are interested in cooking and wants to cook with us. We eat on a low plastic table adjacent to the double bed. His brother and Bien join us. Beyond the bedrooom\/sitting room the kitchen is a balcony; people pass through. The communal toilets are downstairs; the type where you fill up your container from a cool deep trough.<\/span><\/p>\n

The company is delightful and talk ranges widely. Last year when the Vietnam war was broached Bien just said ' that is the past, we look to the future now' but this evening it is different. I contribute the fact that I demonstrated in Grosvener square about the war as a teenager. I still remember vividly the horses and the violence of the police. Peter and Bien talk about their fathers' wartime experiences; our families, their hopes and plans, their country. The cooking lesson has been carefully prepared, with a suitable amount of participation. We squeeze and mix and sprinkle; we throw handfuls of fragrant green herbs in with fish sauce, lime, chillis, we wrap and roll in delicate rice paper. Delicious!<\/span><\/p>\n

It's late. Halfway back in the taxi I realise I have left behind my marked up map for my first day working in the street kids centre tomorrow. Faster, faster,  <\/span>back over the overpass, blaring horns, a million motorbikes back to the dark impenetrable alleyway where Phoung lives. Then back again to the University Campus 7 kilometers away. It was a good evening. We were treated like friends. I realise that what I loved was its homeliness; eating in someone's home rather than university canteen, food hall, street stall or internet cafe or East meets West restaurant. We resolve to get ourselves a bit more cutlery at the market. Later we hear that we will be living in Phoungh's father's house in the village next month, and his mother is a mean cook. Colin says there is nothing there but buffalo and rice fields and the schools where we will be teaching. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  We are invited to eat with Phoungh, a former teacher in the rural province where we will be teaching next, now a driver in Hanoi. He has heard we are interested in cooking and wants to cook with us. We eat on a low plastic table adjacent to the double bed. His brother and… Read More »An evening at Phoung\u2019s<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","category-vietnam"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=59"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":200,"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59\/revisions\/200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=59"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=59"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deidremac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=59"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}