Catching Up

Outside the KOTO restaurant at 61 Van Mieu

Firstly an apology that it's been so long since I last posted. Normally I aim for one a week - the trouble is Blogger has conspired against me in the last two weeks and I haven't been able to get at my blog.

In particular a big apology to Virtual Doug who I owe an answer below and an email. Check out his blog by the way - it was always good and keeps getting better. An excellent read.

So I can blame not updating my blog on Blogger. I shall try and blame not returning emails on pressures of work. Okay, okay I know...I'll try harder. Bear with me.

In truth however, KOTO is madness right now. Yes, as ever, the restaurant ticks over, the kids are magnificent and the staff are amazing. But there are pressures too. Finding the new KOTO

But the good news is that we are within a smidgen of announcing the new location. The new KOTO that will take this amazing organisation to its next step.

Weekends off have been a premium and it seems that more often than not there has been something KOTO related in the evenings. From language lessons to social events for the kids. From workshops to events. This weekend has been a very welcome relief, I had no KOTO duties for the first time in a month. It's been nice to kick back a little.

Strange though, as I was discussing with an ex-pat this week, even when work gets tough here, he claimed he still never got those Sunday-night-work-the-next-day blues. I have to agree. We all love our time off but work remains as fun, challenging and frequently simply amazing as ever.

And of course, wouldn't you just know it, just when you need every ounce of your energy - here comes the sun. The thermometer is nudging away at 40 degrees and the humidity yesterday clocked it at 89%. It drains you of every ounce of get-up-and-go. But, of course, we will prevail. And we're just starting to get the rains and the flash floods - see above for the picture of the view from the KOTO restaurant. More about that later.

So last weekend was one of the times when KOTO took priority. In the not too distant future all 80 odd of us - staff, kids and volunteers - are going on the field trip. Everybody is working hard, everybody needs a break before we open the new place. It the new KOTO is to arrive in a rush of enthusiasm and smiles then the break will be essential.

We had settled on taking everyone to Cat Ba and Halong Bay. We wanted them to camp. We wanted a green element to it all. We wanted team building - we wanted back to basics. was relatively easy - securing it has proved harder. Fitting it out and making it worthy of our friends who dine with us will be harder still. We have a budget to work with that will test all our powers of flexibility and ingenuity.


My KOTO colleagues planning for the field trip

So four of us too the after work train to Haiphong last Friday night. We stayed over night checking out hotels large enough for our group. Then it was a 5 am start to catch the ferry to Cat Ba.

The following day was a luxurious 7 am start and in between we considered and visited various islands and the national park. In the end, as pleasant as it was to be away from the hellish heat in Hanoi - nowhere quite worked. Nowhere was big enough for KOTO and now the process starts again when, next weekend, we check out another location.

A quick word about Cat Ba. Common knowledge tends to write it off these days as ruined. Western tourists now stay on boats in Halong Bay rather than come ashore. I was ready for the worst, and as happens in these cases, I was pleasantly surprised. It wasn't bad at all. Don't believe the hype.

Anyway, we got back around 2 pmish on Sunday afternoon and we got out of the taxi at the restaurant. I was there for literally ten minutes saying hi to the kids before the heavens opened and it rained.

And..yes...you guessed it..it rained some more.

And there was a little more rain after that.

In the end the restaurant flooded. A bank of towels kept the worst out of the dining area but the rest of the ground floor was underwater. We pitched in and bailed out and swept away the water as much as we could. And after three hours, when the rain had stopped and the water outside had started to subside. We were back to almost dry floors. Rain is fun - fun from the point when you can't get any wetter. After that plodging around up to your knees in the streets is pretty funny.

The pic below, I didn't get the chance to talk about but it was another weekend excursion. The Blue Dragon football team - a team made up of kids living on the streets - meet once a week, horribly early, to play football on a Saturday morning.

I've mentioned the shoeboxes of love before, donated via Carry for Kids, by the good people of Australia. Well a couple of KOTO staff were with me to hand them out to the kids there. More smiles and time well spent. I have some very lovely photos of the morning. The one below is a particular favourite.

So...finally, sorry again...hopefully when I press the save and publish buttons this story will actually make it to the blog.


Blue Dragon Kid with his shoebox of love

All that Glitters being Golden

The Glitter Ball Front of House Screen (and me - almost hidden)

How many golden memories do you get in a year? How many moments will stay with you forever?

I ask because it already seems that KOTO, Vietnam and Hanoi have already furnished me with a stack of glorious incidents I will never forget.

Yes I'm still doing the nine to five (and the rest) but it's (for the most part) a nine to five pleasure. Not a grind. Nothing is routine, everything is exceptional.

This week there was another moment I will never forget. Our very good friends at the United Nations International School (UNIS) held their annual ball in our honour. UNIS already do so much for us. They host our kids for sports once a week, they lend us equipment, they support our events.

The deal was this - they sold the tickets, we did the catering, and we took the proceeds. A scenario to warm a fundraiser's heart.

Called the Glitter Ball - everyone attended in full-on bling bling. They even made the kids specially spangly t-shirts.

So, after much organisation we were there. Thirty-odd of us in all - split between the kitchen and front of house. We cooked up some amazing food and the compliments were flowing. It was no easy task. The kitchen especially had a mammoth task feeding 150 people - they performed admirably.

But there was no doubt about the high spot. At one point, when the food was served, and the trainees had seen to it that everyone had a full wine glass, we were invited up on stage by the band.

That's all of us, on a hardly expansive stage. And so there we were, in front of a cheering crowd, flash bulbs going off and a standing ovation.

So then the beat started and the guitar kicked in and the singer "La la la-ed" - and suddenly we became the KOTO choir. It was the full-on Band Aid/Live Aid moment as we Hey Jude-ed away to the adoring crowd. Kids were beaming, clapping their hands and swaying and I was grinning like an absolute idiot.

Like I said. Another moment I'll never forget.

Glitter Ball was my baby. I thought (if you'll permit me to indulge myself) it went off superbly and the praise has been fulsome. For my part there was a level of pride involved. It was a big event that I really wanted to prove myself dealing with. While my arse was on the block for this one - it worked because of the dedication and professionalism of the whole team.

I had a heart to heart with the boss here this week. In short it went well, very well. And in truth I needed to hear it too. In all walks of life whatever you do you need a pat on the back occasionally. When you have the job of your dreams then maybe you need to hear it all the more - because being without that job would be unthinkable.

One thing I can't get my head around here is just how soft I have become. I go through life in Vietnam with that same feeling that you get watching a chick flick weepie. There seems to be so much emotion around that I always feel that I'm just another sad (or happy) story away from bursting in tears.

I've always been a bit of a softy but this place brings out the worst in me in that respect. Is it just the KOTO thing? Is it Vietnam? Is it in some way about being so far from home and family and friends in the UK?

Whatever it is, it is punctuated by a million moments of sheer euphoria. Like a lovesick fool I want to climb the one-pillar pagoda and shout "I LOVE VIETNAM" to the whole of Hanoi.

KOTO is an unbelievable organisation staffed by the most amazing people. Vietnam is just beautiful. Hanoi feels like home.

Consider this a thank-you letter for making me so welcome - and thank-you too to our special friends at UNIS.


The Kitchen Crew

It was sunny, then...

First came the sun then...

It's been scorching recently. The heat nudged the thermometer at 42 degrees centigrade on Friday night and we've been alternatively sweating and cooling off under air con ever since.

Maaaaaan...it's hot.

But then, just as us westerners were huddled in our ultra air-conned office that makes the locals shiver and run for it, we heard a rumbling noise. At first we thought it was the KOTO kids in the upstairs class room rattling their chairs.

Then it happened again. And then the heaven's opened.

Okay here comes the rain. Not THE rain you understand - THE rain comes in June and July, but this was a little taster.

We sat in the open, but sheltered bit, of the training centre and watched it pour down - distracted every so often by amazing sheet lighting and a pretty blustery wind. At one point we had to shut the rolling metal shutter as the wet was coming in horizontally.

By then it was home time...and we had the choices of either suffering the rain or trying to wait it out. I waited an hour or so, it didn't go anywhere. So I thought I might make a quick dash on a motorbike. But as ever, like the world over - when it rains there is no transport.

So, in the end I started to walk. For a while it was okay. Then I reached our street's lowest point and there were the floods. Just as I was being a wussy westerner and trying to decide whether or not to ruin my Birkenstocks - a bus came past. And with it came the wave.

So...no point in trying to stay dry any more. So in I stepped - to just below my knee. As I had been warned - the worst part are the warm bits. That'll be the sewage overflow then. Nice. And just what was that that squidged between my toes?

But I got home and despite the slight rankness of it all - it was actually quite fun. Clothes in the washing machine. Birkenstocks scrubbed. Me washed, washed and washed again.

So...ploding in sewage? I can do this.

Bring it on...bring on the rain.

The rain I can take....it's just the heat that's killing me.