In case you hadn’t noticed
Look-y here at what I found
This Substack is about life in Việt Nam from the viewpoint of a 11-year expat who spent his first 60 years in a low-context culture.
Despite the virtual omnipresence of AI “writings”, this Substack will never use them. Everything published here uses only, unless otherwise noted, my original thoughts and words.
Original thoughts are important. Please do not use AI to write… use your brain… or you will lose it. If that is not enough incentive, then remember that AI is created 100% with stolen content from legitimate writers and creators with original thoughts, not the parasitic so-called “creators” you see on social media.
Let me point to something obvious while you take my picture
Now that most people in Việt Nam have a smart phone, the web is inundated with “pointing out the obvious” photos. OMFG!
What follows are photos I found in less than 5 minutes of searching:
And on and on and on and…
Shirtless is NOT a thing here
Yet some foreigners don’t get it. When you are in another country, there’s a good chance that some of the things done in your home country are not generally done there. A good example of that, here, is men going shirtless in public.
Maybe 0.02% (1 in 5000) Vietnamese men you see will have their shirt off as they walk down the street. It’s generally considered “uncivilized”, yet some foreigners have no clue.
Say hello to H
By now, a few are probably hoping to see a photo of my intelligent, personable, and beautiful daughter. Here it is:
A new motorbike joins the garage family
H starts high school soon and the school is significantly further from home than all three of her previous schools combined. Just before the end of the last school year, I promised her a new iPhone 17 Pro Max if her grades were good enough to get into the better school
Two weeks ago she came to me and said,
Mommy said I can have an electric motorbike so my uncle doesn’t have to take me to and from school every day.
My first thought was, “Great, instead of talking it over with me first, her mom volunteered me to buy another motorbike. Now I’m the bad guy if, for any reason, I say no.”
My second thought was that she could just use the electric bike I bought three years ago. She said it was now too small for her and that she wouldn’t ride it. She’ll be 15 in a few months; what her peers think and say about her is important, so I figured we’d trade in the old bike for credit toward the new one.
She said she wanted the motorbike instead of the iPhone. I’d thought it would be in addition to, so it’s a little less painful. I was just a little disappointed that she hadn’t asked for both; I thought I’d taught her better negotiation skills than that.
After the two minor and one scary
incidents (none of which were her fault) that brought us to take away her previous electric bike1, I was a bit hesitant. We had the safety conversation and the “you have to be home by dark” conversation, and I agreed to buy the bike.
In our initial conversation re this, she said she wanted an “electric motorbike for 19 million” (VND ~US$760). Once we got to the shop, though, it was a 50cc2 gas bike for 23.2 million (~US$930). Because of course it was. The iPhone costs 35 million (US$1330) here, so I actually saved money.
Yes, Daddy fell for the ol’ bait-n-switch. And yes, she’s spoiled.
I tried to persuade her by telling her she would have to pay for gas and the electricity was “free”, but she wanted the cool bike all her friends either have or want. What I didn’t tell her is that the up-side (for me) is that a 50cc gas bike won’t have the low-end torque of an electric bike, so rapid acceleration is only a dream.
When she was smaller, she loved going down a nearby 1/2-lane-wide alley as fast as Daddy was comfortable. We hardly ever rode near the alley that she failed to say,
Daddy can we go down (the) fast hill?
And we’d ride over and go up the hill just so we could go down. There were onion fields on either side of the hill and every time I smell onions I think of riding down that hill with my daughter.
Her lack of go-fast is just fine with me.
When the shop looked over the old electric bike, my hope that it would bring a couple hundred USD in trade was quickly dashed by a bent triple tree, three dead batteries, and a missing charger. I settled for US$60.
I was suddenly very happy that she had refused to ride it. I hadn’t looked closely enough at it after her last “off”, and by this point, I just wanted it gone.
Letting her “fly free” is very difficult. I trust her until she shows me I can’t.
Medicare Billing
With all the surgeries and PT last year, I have a LOT of medical bills.
Soon after I first qualified for Medicare, I learned NOT pay a provider’s estimate for my portion of services they were about to render. I tell them that Medicare does NOT require that and I will gladly pay whatever Medicare doesn’t pay — AFTER Medicare pays. They push back a little the first time, and then they always give in.
The reason for this is that if I pay that estimate, the provider will only bill Medicare for the amount I didn’t pay. The provider’s estimate is always high and had I paid up-front, I would’ve paid too much.
The other thing I always do is check the Medicare Summary Notices (MSN) before paying any bill. If the provider’s service isn’t on an MSN, I put off payment until it is.
For example, one provider billed me $2240.46:
It took four phone calls to them before they finally billed Medicare correctly and got paid. Two days after my final phone call to them, I got another email:
I saved $2235.
Well worth paying attention and making a few phone calls.
An exception to my Medicare-pays-first rule was my prosthetic leg. Because my 20% was over US$13,000 and they’ve had people who hadn’t yet paid take off without paying, I agreed to pay when I got the leg.
Then, when the MSN came, it showed my responsibility as just under US$12,000.
I emailed the provider asking, basically,
WTF?
Less than a week later, I received a refund of US$1137.65 from the provider.
(Un)authorized Billing
Something I learned the hard way is that once you authorize a charge to your credit card, the vendor/provider can bill the same card again without your authorization — even after the card was cancelled for fraud. I learned this when the hospital where they did my amputation and subsequent surgeries charged my card that was still “on file”. When I called AmEx, they told me this was allowed because I’d previously authorized a charge from them to that cancelled card.
I had to tell AmEx to block the hospital from charging that card — even though the card had been cancelled for fraud. The same is true for paying with a credit card via Apple Pay.
Although it means an extra minute of typing for each bill, I deleted all saved credit cards and Apple Pay authorization from all providers and vendors. That way, they only get paid if I go on-line and type in the card information.
Vũng Tàu, Việt Nam
Vũng Tàu, a beach town east of Sài Gòn, was one of two “major” places in Việt Nam I hadn’t been. So, a few weeks ago, I went.
I could’ve missed it and not been any worse off. Maybe better.
One morning, while on my way to breakfast, I passed Golden Bakery. It had a long line of patrons, while a bakery two doors down and another across the street had none. I love a good chocolate croissant, so the next morning I joined the queue.
While waiting, I perused the two-sided menu:
The smallest quantity I saw purchased was two and one person bought 12. I bought one just to see what it was like…
and left most of it on the table at the coffee shop down the street. It tasted awful!
Looking back, I should’ve tried something from one of the other two bakeries. They may not’ve been to VN tastes, so I probably would’ve like them.
Ice Cream?
Vung Tau wasn’t finished disappointing me.
I ran into someone I knew, and we decided to chat over ice cream at a spot they said was very popular. I should’ve known…
I ordered three scoops — one pistachio, one mango, and one chocolate. They each tasted as I expected, BUT…
They were hollow!
How do you make a hollow scoop of ice cream???
We had a good laugh over it. Since the chances of me returning to VT are about the same as me winning this week’s PowerBall, I didn’t bother to remember the name of where NOT to go for ice cream.
More Trike Mods
A few months ago, I wrote about getting my motorbike converted to a trike. Later, I had the suspension upgraded and the gearing made more torque-y.
A couple weeks ago, I added two USB-C PD charging ports and an SAE motorbike battery charging port.
I’d previously had an SAE pigtail hanging down from the steering column that I never liked the look of. This is much better.
Have an awesome July!
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I took these three incidents — especially the last one — as the universe saying she wasn’t ready for a powered bike. I just hope she is now. So far, she seems to be.
In Việt Nam, riding a motorbike with a 50cc or smaller engine does not require a driving license.
I promised my mom and myself I wasn't going to ride a scooter in VN -- and broke that promise and had a wonderful time tooling around Hoi An after a tutorial from a friend. It was a magical day. Safe travels to H!
Dang! H may not have been going fast enough for a beheading but maybe a vertical blade on the wind... screen? Shield? Whatever the glass bit in the front is called. Like cropdusters have.