Today, on a whim, I asked my staff Du ( a freshman in college) to write a mission statement for our bookstore. So she spent a few hours and came up with this little gem U.S.A Books is an independent bookstore committed to providing essential English educational resources in Vietnam-a developing and loving country. We not only have an interesting and diverse selection of books, but also offer public access to all books in a comfortable, inviting, and inclusive reading environment. We order books from all around U.S.A to provide customers who care about specific subjects and life-enriching products with the fastest and the most reasonable shipping service.
We pride ourselves on offering exceptional, personalized service to the students, faculty, staff, alumni, and book-lovers and to all members of the surrounding communities in Vietnam.
We offer our knowledge, books, and services in order to help foster intellectual growth, enhance the quality of life in our community, and broaden the personal, educational, and professional experiences of our customers.
What can I say? I have the most articulate and ass-kicking group of employees ever!
I feel ashamed to reply to this with a story that I didn’t witness, it happened to a guy I went to highschool with. It’s quite fucked up though, so in that respect, I’m glad I wasn’t there to give a first-hand account.
He and his wife moved to South Africa and one night 2 burglars broke in. They managed to corner the burglars with a shotgun (don’t ask me how/why they have a shotgun) and tied them up to chairs and called the police. While they were waiting for the police to arrive, the burglars kept saying how the police would arrest them, charge them with a misdemeanor (or whatever the South African equivalent is) and after they served their short time, they would come back and rape the girl/kill them both etc. After the police arrived, the guy spoke to them and told them how the burglars were threatening to come back. The police said, “Unfortunately that’s probably what they’ll do. Everyone would be better off if the burglars were killed in self defense with that shotgun… so… we’re going to leave the room… aim for the head.”
EDIT To all the latecomers to this thread, and those waiting for me to finish it: Sorry! They dude did, in fact, shoot the burglars.
I have had my fair share of fights in Saigon. Girl on girl. Guy on guy. Guy on girl. Couple on couple. You name it. I have seen it. But never have I chanced upon a battle, where 2 gangs are using metal pipes on each other. In rush hour nonetheless.
I pulled out the camera and recorded as soon as I could but the fight ended as soon as it started. In retrospect, I dont know what is more macabre, the fact that we saw a few bloody faces or that we just stood there and nonchalantly watched it unfold.
A vendor will, in most cases, overcharge if he sees you are not a local. This happens less in the South than in the Central or the North. Some places even have it in writing (as if that makes the ripoff any less of a ripoff). Last time I was in Hanoi, I checked in a hotel for 20usd/per nite. When they saw my passport, it turned into 25usd.
In Hoi An restaurants have 3 menus, one for the local, one for the Vietnamese tourists and one for the white tourists. We got the local price that time because we were with 2 local girls.
This practice however happens not only in VN but all over the world. Last summer we had to spend a night at Ollantaytambo because the Backpacker train to Machu Picchu was full. Well not exactly. The foreigner coach was full. The local coach still had many seats available. We even tried to convince a local to buy us tickets using his ID (promising to give him the price difference between 50usd and 3.5usd) but he refused (IDs are checked regularly on the train). The next morning, after we arrived in Aqua Caliente, we had to pay 14usd vs 10.5usd for the bus ticket to Machu Picchu. Once there it was 43usd vs 22usd for the entrance ticket. In total it cost us around 100usd for being a foreigner. Even worse, it was the Peruvian government, not the people, who created the double pricing policy. What a way to promote tourism.
If you have money and connections then you start a company and get ludicrous contracts through the connections.
If you don’t, you just get an education and work for those who do.
If that still doesn’t work you set up a small shop (the classic coffee shop), borrow some from relatives and do things in cash.
If the relatives can’t or won’t help or the coffee shop doesn’t pan out, you become a street vendor or a laborer, getting paid almost nothing and everyday is a constant struggle to survive.
If no one hires you (either because you are too old, too young or entirely hopeless) you sell lottery tickets or become a street scavenger. Some have money to make a wooden cart and put recyclables in there. Others just ride around on a rickety bike. Some cant even afford a rickety bike so they just hoist a big bag over their shoulders, their backs hunched over like Quasimodo, their ghostly shadows moving slowly beneath the yellow light.
And when the streets prove to be too harsh, you retreat back into the river or mountain and wait for your turn to die.
Some are good. Some are bad. This one is just odd.
Chào anh
Em là Khôi, em không biết một cái email sắp-sửa-xin-việc được viết như thế nào nên mong anh bỏ qua nếu có sai xót
Lúc nãy em có qua U.S.A Book rồi có hỏi chị bán hàng ở đó liệu có thể xin được việc làm ở đây hay không
thì chị ấy cho em cái card và bảo em email anh vì có lẽ anh đang ngủ (hoặc cái gì đó khác) mà chị không dám chạy lên kêu anh
và thiệt sự em không biết phải email cái gì cho anh….
…….
……
vì em thấy hơi một tí thiếu tôn trọng nếu liên lạc với một người rất-có-tiềm-năng-làm-ông-chủ-tương lai của em qua email như thế này!
nên em mong nhận được phản hồi từ anh để có một cái hẹn (hay cái gì đó tương tự như vậy) để bàn (hoặc gì đó khác) về công việc, vì có lẽ em tương tác nói tốt hơn là thể hiện qua email
Em cảm ơn anh
Khôi
p/s: Em thiệt sự xin lỗi anh trong trường hợp anh con người Hàn Lâm và đọc cái email này
p/s2: Làm ơn đừng chú ý đến cái địa chỉ email dớ dẩn này của em, em tạo ra nó từ năm lớp 6 và thiệt sự thấy xấu hổ vì điều đó, nó hoàn toàn không có nghĩa gì cả!!!!
According to Teleb, the author of this bestseller, a black swan event is defined as:
The event is a surprise (to the observer).
The event has a major impact.
After the fact, the event is rationalized by hindsight, as if it had been expected.
Though my story does not qualify as a blackswan event, it is still funny how random life is sometimes:
-One day I stopped on Hai Ba Trung, next to two guys speaking English. I struck up a conversation and ended up having coffee with them.
-Their name were Ben and Felix. Ben brought his friend Chris along. Chris met Ben in Vietnam, through the Cal alumn group in Saigon
-Chris introduced me to Barrend and I got a job at RMIT.
-RMIT started a football club and I brought an old friend Duy along.
-Duy brought his friend Hoang along and we played for a while but never talked.
-The field closed for the summer break and we moved to a smaller court. Hoang and I talked more.
-Hoang, seeing my ripped bod, invited me to cast for a film.
-I became a big movie star, with legions of teen followers.
Ok the last part didn’t happen… because I said no, not because I don’t possess the good looks or the dashing charisma
Customer feedbacks to me are very important. Some are good. A lot of them aren’t. Here are a few things I have done and worked well:
-Customers kept asking for certain books. So we started the “If Amazon has it, we can order it” service. This proved to be instrumental in sustaining our business. Currently we can fullfill orders of any size as well as issue red invoice if needed.
-One of their biggest complaints used to be shipping time. So I went to the US, found a really good forwarder and cut that in half. Now I can confidently say, for most orders, we can get the books here in last than 2 weeks, at a price virtually unbeatable.
-We needed something to distinguish our store against others, so I imported Pulitzer prize winners. Now we have a whole shelf dedicating to classics such as The babbit series, Catcher in the rye, The hours, March, Beloved, Empire Falls,etc. We are also known for having lots of comtemporary magazines (Vogue, Seventeen, GQ, NewYorker, to name a few), all of which are sold slightly below market price (we checked!). Plus customers can order annual subscriptions and their magazines are almost guaranteed to arrive before the month starts.
-Many foreign books have been translated into Vietnamese and become hugely popular. All we do is wait for the popularity to peak, then import the English versions. Books like Outliers, Twilight, Seven habits of highly effective people, P.S I love you,etc have sold well.
-We tried to ride the trend by designing and publishing our own New Moon-themed calendar. However, we were unable to obtain the license for printing in time. This would have been huge for us but all and all it was a lesson well learnt.
