And so I find myself wearing a conical hat. Not just any conical hat, mind, but a red and yellow, Vietnamese flag conical hat.
Of course, I have become accustomed to being laughed at. We get laughed at simply for being westerners, the laughing becomes hysterical when we ride bicycles, and side splitting because we wear helmets. However this was a different kind of laughter, an almost approving laughter as we donned our vietnam gear to support them at the football.
It was Vietnam v. Australia, or as we were getting into the spirit of it - Viet Nam v. Uc. Of course the Australians with us were less amused at our vietrnamese chanting, but everyone else in the stadium was on our side.After living here for two months it is amazing how similar it felt to an English match. But there are still some differences - we drunk beer, but out of plastic bags, there was no hostility, only bewilderment, and of course instead of an England baseball cap I had donned a conical hat.
Similarly, at the other mass gathering I went to this week, Easter Sunday at the Cathedral, everything was so familiar - the European built church, the shepherd like Bishop and priests' outfits, the amens and the hallelujahs - but there was also the buzzing of the fans, the hymns and sermon in Vietnamese and the ubiquitous plastic stools.
I am starting to wonder what it will be like when I return to England, will I find it hard to cope with being somewhere familiar yet different? Will I freeze? Will I long for a plastic stool? And most importantly, will I walk out in front of the traffic and get run over?
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