Brixton

Electric Avenue (sign at the very top of the picture)

Many agree that London was built on the backs of POC. A modern tragedy of this history is that it is ignored. In a United Kingdom Parliament debate, Claudia Webbe stated in Column 33WH that “black history is taught in only 10% of all schools.”

This is among a few reasons I chose to study “Diversity in London” as an elective course. History is written by the victors, so a personal value of mine to dig deeper to understand the truth of any new space I occupy. When the real story is ugly, it may be romanticized or just hidden altogether. So I basically wanted to cut to the chase right away.

In my diversity class, we read “White Teeth” by Zadie Smith, which didn’t shy away from stories of identity, cultural heritage, and the lives of immigrants in London.

I highly recommend this book, and engagement with historic museums and areas around London. Such as, the Museum of Immigration and Diversity, Chinatown, Camden Town, Kingsland Road, Migration Museum, Brick Lane, The Archives, and Notting Hill.

One special place I was lucky to have a tour of is called "Brixton". This tour was through my school but not led by my teacher. We were guided by local blue-badge tour guide, Anne-Marie Walker.

We learned about the U.K version of America’s “KKK”. They called themselves the “Teddy Boys”. They supported the Oswald facist party, and dressed in Edwardian style.

In 1959, the West Indian Gazette came about, and Claudia Jones proposed the Notting Hill Carnival.

*keynote for U.S. readers: in England, Asian people are referred to as “oriental” and  African/Caribbean people are called “west Indian”.

This carnival is important because it was an attempt for unity amongst constant racist tension and hate crimes throughout this time. 

Caribbean immigrants were not allowed to open a bank account or mortgage, so they had to band together as a community to get a house. There were up to 8 rooms per house, and entire families, like Anne-Marie’s, would live in a room with no running water or facilities. 

In 2017, the U.K. acknowledged their Caribbean soldiers for the first time. 

Though Afro-Caribbean culture is still prevalent in Brixton, gentrification is currently pushing out immigrant families who created a life there. The average price of one house is a million dollars. 

Brixton is rich with culture and incredible food, so if you find yourself there, take in the street art, stroll down electric avenue, and try a vegetable patty at East of Eden.

While you’re there, it will be beneficial to pay special attention to Brixton’s complicated history and current struggles with gentrification.

Thanks for reading :P

Stranded in Dubai

Ah, the juxtaposition between my Grandma (Bà Thuy) escaping communist Vietnam as a war refugee, and ME grueling desperately for entrance into Vietnam as a sweaty, naïve, backpacking…American tourist. 

To credit myself, I’m not unbearably sweaty, I do have a cute suitcase, and I did as much background research as possible.

But what could have prepared me for a 10 day layover, heatwaves, sandstorms, yellow fever, and… falling in love?

After I hugged my London companions goodbye, I embarked on what I already knew would be an unruly flight. I booked a cheap flight to Hồ Chí Minh City, and my layovers included Tel Aviv, Dubai, and India.

In 30 hours, I expected to be in Hồ Chí Minh city, Vietnam (the new Saigon) sharing a bowl of phở with my friend Truong, and finding family members that I hadn’t seen in 11 years. I was so excited to exercise the Vietnamese language I had been practicing.

The trip to Israel was the noisiest flight I’d ever been on. There were so many children, and at some point two seats were freed up next to me. Upon seeing this, an Israeli mother asked me if her baby could sleep there. 

Being half asleep myself, I said oh but of course! :))

I woke up with a baby I didn’t know sleeping on my lap, and went straight back to sleep. The mom couldn’t stop laughing and thanking me. So that’s the tone this adventure begins on. Crowded and silly.

I used my visa to get on my next flight to Dubai, which was difficult, but manageable. I felt excited about my layover in Dubai, because it was supposed to be 14 hours, so I could leave the airport to adventure.

When the tall, wide, UAE doors slid open, I was introduced to a gust of pure dry heat that I had never before met.

Men dressed in long white Dishdasha and women in a long black Burqa. It seemed as though everyone and everything moved slowly. Because how could anything move enthusiastically through this weather - summer in Dubai? 

My breath was ragged and I’m sure my lungs looked as though they’d tumbled and shriveled in a drying machine. 

I took a taxi to the Marina mall to begin my adventure, and when I went to pay the taxi driver, my credit card was rejected because I had a SIM card in my phone, which didn’t allow me to approve my purchase. 

So, I took out my debit card and used an Emirates Islamic ATM at the mall, to give the taxi driver some cash. 

Next, the ATM flashed “FRAUD SUSPECTED” and proceeded to…swallow…my…card. 

This is where things get interesting. A security guard lent me money for the taxi, and we went to Western Union so I could pay him back. Then we went for lunch and he got me into the Burj Khalifa by telling the management that I was a celebrity’s assistant. I found that last part out later. 

I thought this was the end to a pretty cool adventure.

HOWEVER. When I returned to the airport to check into my flight, I was denied entrance because of four things.

1. I didn’t have my India visa

2. My Vietnam visa said the wrong checkpoint

3. I didn’t have my yellow fever vaccination certificate

4. A sandstorm was coming

Ohhhhh no.

My biggest promise to myself on these travels that I KNOW will be crazy, is no crying and no mental breakdowns. This moment of rejection was the closest I’ve gotten to breaking that promise. But what help would that be? All I could do was laugh.

A quote I always seem to come back to during times of adversity is “Everything will be OK when you are OK with everything” -Michael A. Singer

5 hours later, I’m hanging out with some flight attendants that are my new friends because I’ve spent so much time at this airport. 

One of them took me to dinner when their shift ended, and gave me some cash for a hostel. My experience in Dubai was: everyone being ridiculously accommodating, feeling bad about me losing my debit card, and then blaming their religion when I questioned their kindness. Also, here they put ketchup on their pizza.

The sky was blanketed in fog when I woke up. Wait not fog - SAND.  

The sandstorm hit, something I’d never seen before.

Ok I feel like this blog is getting long so let’s wrap things up and not get too detailed. I made extremely interesting friends at the hostel that came from places I’d never seen: India, Morocco, Pakistan, Egypt, Uganda, and Texas. lol

I had so much fun, plus got myself together by getting a new Visa, yellow fever vaccine, and a DIRECT flight ticket to Hà Nội.

My friend from India celebrated her birthday and drew mehndi on my hand as I was leaving. Indian culture, food, and people were so amazing to be around in Dubai, and made me really want to visit India. Oh but now I want to see Egypt too.

My flight attendant friend hooked it up with a “friend pass” that got me an insanely cheap ticket to Vietnam on the "world's greatest airline", Emirates. It was a very fancy flight. But they didn’t ask to see my visa, yellow fever vaccine, or flight ticket. wow

That was an amazing end to my 10 day layover in Dubai and my mom is still trying to send the flight attendant homie some Hawaiian chocolates and macadamia nuts, as she does. 

Overall, I’m grateful that everything went wrong in Dubai. Because everything went right, too.

But when I touched down in Hà Nội, I nearly cried. 

I didn’t realize how desperate and eager I was to get here. Though it had been 21 years in the making, of me yearning for this panoramic place that I’d only read about in my Grandmother’s book, and heard about from my Mom.

Vietnam welcomed me like a warm hug from an old friend. With a fanny pack strapped snugly to my stomach, I triumphantly took in all the purple passion fruit, baby banyan trees, scooter traffic, and communism, that surrounded me. Which you will read aall about in my next blog!

From Quarantine to First Step's Out The Door

 * When in Korea, I picked up the habit of journaling to keep track of my mental health and overall my thoughts on things i've encountered and typically how I felt after a "normal" day as someone studying abroad in Korea. With that being said, this blog entry will showcase initial feelings of me during quarantine and my first steps out into the wide city that is Seoul!

Today is officially my first day? In Korea and it honestly felt amazing to just be able to be able to say that I finally made it here. From the long taxi ride from Incheon --> to my quarantine Airbnb, I felt as though I was about to be on an adventure of a lifetime and it would be an understatement if I said I was excited. (The photo to the right is the picture I took of my walk to the health center). After 3 days of being stuck in my temporary home, I was excited to be able to independently walk to get my first covid test of three. (Little did I know I chose an Airbnb right across the street from my university where the health center was). Taking a look back on today, I was so happy to be able to take a step into the world as someone studying abroad. Even though it was extremely cold outside this morning and I was frightened at the idea of anything happening, however I was able to safely walk to my location and overcome the language barrier of being a foreigner trying to get a covid test! stressful but happy day - 1 Point!

--> Transitioning to initial thoughts and moments when freed from quarantine

One of the first thoughts I had today was "will I be able to make friends" while moving into my dorm and "how was I going  assimilate into being a college student abroad all alone". However, what a lot of people don't tell you is that almost everyone is thinking the same thing you're thinking. Unless these are people that are traveling from the same university, everyone is operating the same and is just as new as you are. So what does that mean? Don't be so hard on yourself! 

Shortly after moving in, the exchange student group chat on Kakao was buzzing full of people wanting to meet for dinner and plan trips around South Korea before the semester! And guess what happen, you met people and now you are going to the National Seoul Museum (Picture to the right). And you are going to skiing for the first time ever! Also, you met your international exchange buddy and his friend! (turns out these will be two of the funniest people that you have ever met). They've both been to Hawaii and are extremely cool and diligent people, I am actually extremely lucky to be paired up with him because we are actually very compatible!

Overall, although these last couple of days have been mixed with meeting a lot of different people from a lot of different places, these are the moments that are truly going to set the precedent for the rest of my time abroad!

--> Transitioning out of my journal entry (Here are some pictures from the beginning of the semester that have many memories attached to them!)

The story behind this picture is actually really interesting, when preparing for our ski trip we took a very long bus ride to a resort and it was a totally empty and really eerie! Thankfully one of my friend's had knew someone nearby and was able to drive us to a different ski resort!

(Here we are on the lift and I am honestly trying too hard to be cool because I was extremely scared and thought I was going to get hurt. ALSO******** Snowboarding is way harder than skiing, however snowboarding is way cooler looking hehehehe)

One thing I did enjoy a lot about dining in Korea (with the fact that all food is good food) is that there are a ton of rooftop diners! Here is a group picture for a friend's birthday at a burger restaurant and the view was beautiful!