C40's Journal

Where are you and where are you going?
CS
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by CS »

There is the benefit of the marketplace in that all plans have to offer all the benefits required by law. Be careful of plans offered outside of it.

If you get really sick with this virus, those limits could quickly become important.

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

theanimal wrote:
Fri Apr 03, 2020 11:39 pm
Nice update! Looking forward to seeing whatever pictures you have. That's unfortunate to read about the poor air quality. How have you found the food? I remember slowtraveler talking about it being hard to find healthy food. Those are the 2 hangups for me. I've realized over the past month I would very much like to go. We'll see how this pandemic shakes out but I may be following in your footsteps in the future. Have all your dates and friends been locals? Have you encountered many expats?
Well.. To a large extent, the air problem can be solved,.. or, greatly reduced. If I stay in one city for 2+ months at a time, it's worth it to build a new air cleaner (about $35 on the high end). Then I can breath clean air for however many hours I'm at home. Even if the air is bad outside, having clean air for >50% of the time helps a lot and will prevent me from feeling the symptoms I described above. So I can eliminate the likelihood of perceived short-term impact. Certainly still some amount of long-term impact.

As for healthy food, yes it is more difficult, but it's still possible. I think the level of difficulty depends on how hard you're trying, and how much you're willing to spend a little more money. In the U.S., you've learned over many years how to eat healthy. If you suddenly go to a place where things are different, you have to learn how to eat healthy in that new place. So it takes extra effort. When it comes to eating out, eating healthy is often going to cost more, and also will mean eliminating many options in order to stick with the few that are healthier. So far for me given where I've been and my kitchen situations, eating as healthy as I did in the U.S. takes probably 2-4x the effort. That's for the first 6 months in Asia, or perhaps the first month+ of a new country. It'd get easier over time.

(the 2-4x number is based off the place I've lived in mainland U.S., so I don't know how this compares to Alaska)
Last edited by C40 on Mon Apr 06, 2020 9:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

CS wrote:
Mon Apr 06, 2020 9:20 pm
There is the benefit of the marketplace in that all plans have to offer all the benefits required by law. Be careful of plans offered outside of it.

If you get really sick with this virus, those limits could quickly become important.
ahh, good point. Thank you

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

—————————

APRIL 2020

—————————

Here in Vietnam, they reduced the number of new Covid cases to nearly zero. They’ve been going long stretches of 5-7 days at a time with zero new cases, and the new cases over the last 3 weeks have been almost only people who entered the country (and since everyone is quarantined for two weeks and tested, they post little risk)

They had fairly strict stay-home rules for about three weeks. Now most types of businesses are opened back up. The nearest known Covid case is about 250 miles away from where I am.



————————————————

MONEY

————————————————

Spending was quite low in March and April because I was at home all the time.

Image


I do have a bump in spending on Visas. Normally, I would have went to the border to renew my entry stamp date for Vietnam, and the 1-day trip would cost only $65. But I couldn’t do that because the border was closed. I paid $350 for a three-month extension done without leaving the country. So that will hit my spending in April, May, and June.



Here is my spending vs. income since I retired:

Image


Lately I’ve been making some investment changes to boost my income.

1 - Invest cash that I ended up with in retirement accounts. About $35k. Half is from selling some IAU (gold) shares that I had for some years. Some is from dividend cash generation, and a little bit is from selling some stocks.

So far, I’ve completed about half of this. I bought LAMR, STAG, SPG, and O. I got some good deals and some are up over 30% already. I think I’ll take it slow on the other half, waiting to see if prices go back dow. My timing turned out pretty well on this one. I rechecked gold price and was surprised it isn’t really up since I sold.


2 - Converting Vanguard funds to individual stocks. I can increase my yield by 1-3% by doing this. I have about $130k in these funds and I’ve been meaning to convert them to individual stocks ever since 2016.

I’ve only done a little bit of this so far. I need to do a significant amount of stock research to choose which to buy. I don’t think timing matters much on this and it’s not really related to current market impacts, aside from which individual stocks are up down more than others.


3 - Reinvesting house money. I sold $70k of blue-chip stocks in my post-tax account in January. This was to set aside money to purchase a house some time in the future, because stock prices seemed high. I have that money in NEAR and SHV, which gives about 2.3%. I might put that money back into stocks, which could get more income, and have potential for price growth.

I haven’t done any of this and I will wait to see if prices go down more. I’ll need to do significant research, and I will try to do it over the next couple weeks and set up a ‘buy list’ for myself. One issue with doing this is that I’ll have restarted capital gains timelines, and if/when I do another mass selloff in the future It will impact my AGI and ACA subsidy again.

This option is only a good idea if stock prices drop more. If they do, my timing will end up being very good on this one.


If I do all three, and if it goes well, it will increase my yearly income from about $21k per year to $29k. That’s such an increase that I think It’d be stupid not to do.

Image


Edit - oh yeah - another option I have is to collect and invest my work pension money. This would be a bit difficult to do while out of the country, but I could have my sister help. This would get me another ~$1,800 per year, putting my total dividend income at ~$31k per year. I'd be ~100% invested in stocks though. I'd like to get that money in my control, but I've left it in place because of the 3% growth they give which is better than other ~cash type investments available now.





————————————————

WHAT’S NEXT?

————————————————


Still not sure. My current entry period in Vietnam is good until early July. If I extend again without leaving the country, it might cost more. If the borders open up, I’d go renew in June. I don’t know whether borders will be opened by then, but I kind of doubt it.

So, it looks like my options would be:
- Pay more to extend another three months
- Go to some country who lets anybody in
- Go back to the U.S.

I think I will prefer to stay longer in Vietnam. For the money, It’s really nice here. The city is similar in many ways to being in the very best parts of California and right next to the coast. But it’s easier to get around, people are more sane, and real estate cost about 10% as much.

The main reason I’d want to go back to the U.S. at this point is if home prices drop a lot and I go back to buy a house. The other reason is that I miss being able to do physical hobbies. I could do/emulate some here… but it’s not the same. Like I could make a small garden on my rooftop. It’d be 1/10th of what I’d do in “a real garden”, but it’d be something.

2Birds1Stone
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by 2Birds1Stone »

Interesting investing plan. I'm curious if you're worried about any of these projected yields/dividends being cut with current market conditions? Also, when a stock pays a dividend, NAV of the shares drops by an equal amount, and in good market conditions these shares tend to rebound to the pre-payout price. In current market conditions the NAV may not recover as quickly. Just some food for thought.

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Seppia
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by Seppia »

C40 wrote:
Mon Apr 06, 2020 9:34 pm
As for healthy food, yes it is more difficult, but it's still possible. I think the level of difficulty depends on how hard you're trying, and how much you're willing to spend a little more money. In the U.S., you've learned over many years how to eat healthy. If you suddenly go to a place where things are different, you have to learn how to eat healthy in that new place. So it takes extra effort. When it comes to eating out, eating healthy is often going to cost more, and also will mean eliminating many options in order to stick with the few that are healthier. So far for me given where I've been and my kitchen situations, eating as healthy as I did in the U.S. takes probably 2-4x the effort.
This sounds strange to me
I found the food in VN to be very healthy in general, with lots of veggies and fruits, and a lot of soup.
Pho, for example is very light, has a bit of protein, some carbs and fiber. I love morning glory and ate it almost every meal, and boy were fruits amazing.

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

2Birds1Stone wrote:
Thu Apr 30, 2020 11:34 pm
Interesting investing plan. I'm curious if you're worried about any of these projected yields/dividends being cut with current market conditions?
I expect it will happen some. I'm not all that worried about it. If it looked like many companies would cut dividends and not restart for a long time I'd be worried.. but there'd be a lot of other reasons to worry then. If I could get a decent job, that'd be a good time for me to work for a couple more years and increase capital / invest more.

---------------

One thing I consider is checking with my old employer to see about working there some more. If I do that, I'd want to do it before I try to settle down long-term.. the timing would be good to work for them when I go back to the U.S... If I check in with a few different people there, it's possible I may fit into a current need or be able to talk myself into a position, work for a couple years, and boost up my savings. I think a good handful of leaders there would know they they could hire me, put me in their factory, and either have me save them a million dollars or so, or have me accomplish some important thing they need done. The challenge here would be getting back into what is a large corporation with specifically shaped pegs, and limitations because they may know (or I'll tell them) that I'm only going to work for a couple years. If I'm going to try this, the sooner the better, while people still remember me.

The other thing I consider related to income is my desire to have various streams of income from work that I enjoy, or that is simple and wouldn't bother me as long as I don't do a lot of it, or things that are basically hobbies for me. I have a whole list of things in mind like shooting portraits, selling plants/produce, selling eggs, lawncare, and others. Those would generate much lower hourly income than going back to engineering work. If I generate just $10k per year from these and continue for many years, it'd have a big impact for me. It may also make me feel better - like I'm being productive, which is a good feeling for me. I've spent some time over here in Asia at the far end of unproductively, and I don't like it.

If I could get the later options going well and feeling good, I'd prefer that over going back to the engineering work. It'd be more of a long-term setup rather than going back to working full weeks for the man.
Last edited by C40 on Fri May 01, 2020 11:28 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

On that note, lately I have been doing some 'lifestyle-design' type thinking.. focused a lot on when I go back to the U.S. and settle down long-term. Things like:
  • Hobbies / Projects
  • Type of property I want (home and land)... related to living space, and space/infrastructure for hobbies/projects/work
  • Income generation - various types of work, projects, and hobbies
  • What regions and cities I'd like to live in
On the work and income side, I've been combining various lists and notes I have of things I believe I'd enjoy doing that could generate income. Here's a list of ideas I have going so far. I (obviously) would not try to do all of them.


———HORTICULTURAL ———

GARDENING
  • Sell food (farmer’s market. Online. Set out front. Just set up myself somewhere
  • Sell plant starts
  • Sell house plants (clone them… clone succulents, etc.)
  • Sell Flowers
  • Make gardens in neighbors yards (for them, for money.. or for me, give them some)
  • Odd plants like ginger, food mushrooms, etc.
  • Grow Micro-greens indoors. Sell to people, grocers, restaurants?
LANDSCAPING
  • Mow lawns
  • Trim bushes
  • Rake leaves
  • Shovel snow
  • Clean roofs
  • Install plants?
  • Fertilize? Aerate?
OTHER RELATED HOUSE/LAND SERVICES:
  • Snow shovel/blow/plow (but not much at all in places I’d live)
  • Put up and take down Christmas lights
  • Clear out overgrown brush


———ANIMAL HUSBANDRY———

DOGS/CATS
  • Dog - Exercise them. Run, fetch, etc.
  • Dog walking
  • Dog training
  • Pet sitting (dogs and cats)
BEES
  • Sell Honey
  • Make products with wax. Soap, etc.
  • Remove hives from other’s property
CHICKENS
  • Eggs - for me
  • Eggs - Sell


———ART———

PHOTOGRAPHY
  • Portraits - Standard
  • Portraits - H.S. Seniors
  • Portraits - Engagement
  • Portraits - For dating profiles
  • Real Estate photos
  • Drone shots for Real Estate?
GRAPHIC ART:
  • T-Shirt Designs


———COFFEE———
  • Coffee shop at home
  • Coffee shop somewhere else. (get location? Live at comm’ property? Use trailer?)
  • Sell roasted beans (without shop)
  • Set up at some business location. like a little stand/cart? (operate like 8-11am weekdays)
  • Work as barista? Work as coffee roaster at/for shop?


———MECHANICAL ———

VEHICLES:
  • Cars - Flip
  • Cars - Basic maintenance? - Oil, coolant change, brakes, ?
  • Motorcycles - Flip
  • Motorcycles - Fix and flip
  • Motorcycles - basic maintenance - MC = Oil, valve adjust, coolant, lube points, clean/lube chain
  • Van builds - do myself and sell
  • Van builds - do for a person, paid
  • Bicycle maintenance
CONSTRUCTION
  • Remodel my house, profit when sell
  • Remodel house for quick flip [***]
  • Build something for people (kind of like the chicken coops dad built)


———PICK IT UP———
  • Firewood - Harvest, cut, dry, split, sell, deliver [***]
  • Mushrooms
  • Edibles - berries, greens, etc.
  • Dumpster diving (for food for me? Sell? give away?


———MAKE THINGS———

HYGIENE PRODUCTS
  • Deoderant
  • Soap
  • Toothpaste
  • Sun block


———MISC SERVICES———
  • Knife Sharpening
  • Coaching - work-related for individuals
  • Coaching - to help companies
  • Coaching - personal life coaching


———ON-CALL / SHORT-TERM ———

(Being available to help on short notice. Both one-off work, and ongoing availability)
  • Help people move (esp if I have truck/trailer)
  • Delivery of items
  • Removal of bee hives
  • Help old people with simple things

If you have ideas or experience to share, I made a separate thread for it here

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

I made some more stock purchases. I have invested most of the cash I had in retirement accounts. I wanted to do that anyway, so the timing seems pretty good. I've been pretty aggressive with my investment choices

I bought:
  • O (at 6%, and at 5%)
  • STAG (at 7%)
  • LAMR (at 9%, and 7%)
  • WPC (at 7%)
  • SPG (at 12%-15%)
I invested just over $40k in those. I do expect some of these and my other stocks to cut the dividends. I hope/expect that most will recover ok.

Image

I still have some money left that I could invest.
  • $70k of ~cash in my post-tax accounts. Currently invested in NEAR and SHV giving me about 2.3% yield
  • $60k of pension money that I could collect and invest. Current growth is 3% which is why I've left it in there since retiring. If stocks drop a lot more I'll invest it.
  • $120k of index funds currently yielding about 3.5%, in a retirement account. Could convert it to stocks that yield more and/or will have better dividend growth
If I do all of those, I'd be fully invested in stocks and my yearly income would be about $31k. IDK about going full stocks, but that income would be really nice.... If/when I buy a house, I'd have to re-sell socks. I will wait and see if stock prices drop more before investing that house money or pension. The shift out of index funds is something I've wanted to do since I bought them, and the timing doesn't seem that important, other than buying stocks that are particularly hard-hit now.

I'm doing research so I'll be ready with a list of stocks I'd like to buy and at what prices I'd do it. I'm looking at banking stocks today and some of them seem pretty good right now, but that depends on how things play out relating to loan defaults.

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Re: C40's Journal

Post by 2Birds1Stone »

How certain are you about wanting a house? I would generally keep money I knew I needed in the next <10 years out of volatile investments (ie; stocks, stock etfs, reits, etc).

There is so much uncertainty about the next few years of global economic activity that fundamentals and traditional ways of valuing companies have gone out the window. A physical and paid off home might be some great diversification against paper assets, whether it's used to offset living costs, or for future rental income.

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

@2Birds1Stone - It's a good point about being ~diversified... I'm about 65% certain on buying a house. I think it'd be within about 5 years. For me, 10 years is much longer than I'd want to hold the cash.

I think that in the short-term, two plans I have in mind could conflict:
- If stock prices drop - reinvest the house money
- If house prices drop - buy a house

If stock prices drop a lot, and I reinvest the money -- and then house prices also drop - whether it's a problem or not depends on if the stock prices went down more since I bought them.

I still expect to earn more income through either ~hobbies, self-employment, or a formal job, so I would be ok acting more aggressively than some folks. At this point I think I probably won't reinvest that money, or I may only reinvest about half of it. I'd give it more thought before doing so.. and only buy the stocks if I think it's more likely they go back up before I would buy the house, or at least not go down more (while fully understanding that I could not actually know that)

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

—————————

MAY 2020

—————————

Not a whole lot to share. Just settling more and more into living in Vietnam. I’m thinking I will try to extend my visa for another three months. If I do that, It will be getting into the late fall and the weather cooling off again, and then I may want to continue staying longer. IDK, we’ll see. Da Nang is a super comfortable place to live.

My days generally include many of the following:
  • Breakfast - now I make at home - noodles, eggs, greens
  • Going out for coffee. Doing some ‘work’, reading, relaxing. I frequent a few places and when they aren’t busy, sometimes the staff chat with me
  • Exercising
  • Going to the beach
  • Riding around the city
  • Having lunch (there’s one place I go to about 5 times a week, eating the same thing every time)
  • Spending time with the main girl I date.
  • Dates / hanging out with other women
  • Playing a video game
  • Starting to learn some Vietnamese (it’s tricky, but at least they use letters I can read)
  • A fair amount of investing work lately


————————————————

MONEY

————————————————

I made a small deal with the devil and bought a little bit (less than 1% NW) of GEO. Aside from moral concerns of owning a for-profit U.S. jail company, the stock is risky because they seem to have some looming debt problems.. and also because the ‘right thing’ to do in the U.S. involves sending way fewer people to prison, and releasing many prisoners convicted of nonviolent offenses like possessing an ounce or two of marijuana. I guess I have a cynical (practical? selfish?) mental frame on this - feeling ok with profiting from something that want to end. My cousin is highly involved volunteering to help with education and other support of inmates at prison where she lives. That’s something I would consider doing when settled down.

Image

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————————————————

PICTURES

————————————————

I’ve done very little photography in Vietnam. Here are some pictures from my phone..

Image
The neighborhoods near the city center have little alleys like this going back into the blocks. My (sort of) girlfriend bought a house and the alleys to hers are narrower than this, and people still park their scooters along the alley. So when she’s riding on the back with me, there can be only a few inches to spare on each side of her knees. She doesn’t express any fear. I often slow down to a near stop and look down to check clearance.

Image
This is near a beach, a few km outside of the city

Image
This beach gets busy in the summer, but back in January there were only a few people around

Image
Some day back in January there was a soccer game, I think it was Under 23 competition - Vietnam vs somebody. TONS of people were out, all watching in near silence with intense focus

Image
There’s a whole variety of motorcycle-laden businesses
  • Fake flowers
  • Real Plants
  • Banh Bao (Like a vietnamese version of what in other countries is a runza, pierogi, empanada, etc.). Mounted on the bike is a microphone - all salesman use the same exact recording to announce they are selling Banh Bao.
  • Other types of food. At times including an oven, burning wood, making a little trail of smoke.
  • Birds! (in cages, for pets)
  • Durian (a big smelly fruit)
Image
Many of the empty lots and empty space in the city is used for gardening and farming. It looks like they are very good at it. They often grow their plants in the same placement style that I used back when I had a garden - without rows and fully dense.

Image

Image

This is a common-looking street. Here, sidewalks are primarily for motorbike parking. People don’t walk much, and often the sidewalks are so full of bikes that it is difficult and you have to alternate between walking on the sidewalk and street


Image
Da Nang is on the coast, but there is a river that runs parallel to the coast, splitting off a peninsula that is usually a couple kilometers wide. There are seven bridges over the river in the city. Four are quite nice looking. There is this bridge, which has a long name and I just call it “the red bridge”, another bridge that has a large structure shaped and styled to look like a dragon, with a head that shoots out fire once per week, another bridge that I describe as “The orgasm bridge” because of the design on the center looking like an ejaculating shaft, and some other bridge that is really high, near the port.

Image

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A common meal. $2.

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Often the kids will ride with a passenger (little sister or friend) riding on the back rack. Kids here go around town together - like children used to do in the U.S., but now if they do the parents will be reported and persecuted.

Image
Scooters are the normal form of transportation here. Out in rural areas, bicycles are common. Hondas rule the market, starting with these Super cubs. There are many around town but the models of this style are all 30+ years old and are used more by a few really old people and mostly by tourists/expats who want to look trendy. The next generation (most of them called “Dream”), I believed mostly produce in the 1990s, are probably the #1 most common bike on the road… Seems that if maintained reasonably well, they last extremely long. They look less trendy than the one pictures above, but still functionally beautiful, and I want one. I think it must be common for people here to have bikes with over 200,000 km or maybe more.

Image
As far as beaches in big cities go, this one is great.

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I used to go here each day for breakfast. $1.30 for four eggs, bread, and some vegetables. The couple running the business were quite old, and instead of re-opening after a 2-3 week Covid closure, they sold the business.


Image
Near the beach

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I don’t go to the beach often. Maybe a couple times a week. It’s definitely nice having it nearby though. Sometimes if I’m out in the evening, I’ll ride by and maybe stop for a little while along the sidewalk. Here, the locals only go to the beach when the sun is at a low angle - early morning and late afternoon. It gets really busy in the late afternoon. Now that nearly all the tourists and visitors are gone, it’s nearly empty during the middle of the day.

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One side of the river is built up with a nice walk and many coffee shops, bars, and restaurants facing the river. This picture is taken from the walk, facing the other side which is not really developed the same way.

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There aren’t many parks in the city. There are also extremely few places to sit down while you are out and about, aside from your own scooter or at a businesses. I’m used to how in the U.S. cities there are benches along sidewalks. It was the same way in Bangkok. You could walk and walk and walk. Nowhere to sit down and read a book except for a few rare places.

Image
This girl I date and spend a lot of time with is a true Vietnamese - at home she eats sitting on the floor. She’s a joy to be around and I’ve been having great times with her.

Dating is good here. It takes trying women out and being selective. I’d say most women here are positive and good and all that. But when dating, I end up filtering out quite a few women because of one or more of the following:
  • Negativity - About 1/3 of the women I meet here seem to want to be argumentative and to find something to be offended about. Or they regularly recount stories to me of some other people offending them.
  • Related to the previous one, about half of the women here don’t seem to put in effort during a date to make it a pleasant experience. I can try to create a good conversation and some kind of connection, but often women don’t really seem to put in effort to make it go well. I think sometimes it’s due to the first point, sometimes shyness(?), and maybe sometimes due to different dating cultures. This results in low/no chemistry.
  • Seem extremely prude
  • Seem to be materialistic/high consumption focused. This one is pretty rare here, thank goodness. Most women would be totally cool with going and sitting on a bench for a date
But, with women I like, things can go quite well. I've found that at least some of the women here are surprisingly NOT prude... plus other stereotypical Asian things like them being kind, gentle, respectful, thoughtful, submissive, family focused, frank and clear, etc.

One thing that surprised me is that nearly all the women I date have paid half of the cost without hesitation. If I suggest/try to pay all, they usually insist on paying their part. So dating is cheap here and at times no extra cost since I would have eaten out or had coffee anyway. I think, like other parts of Asia, there is some dating culture here of it being a signal the woman is interested in the man if she allows the man to pay for it all. I don’t know if that is now outdated, or if here it’s just the more independent women who want to date me.



Image
The ~girlfriend just bought this house. It’s half the width of most homes. She wanted to make furniture using pallets, so I’ve been helping her with it. It’s nice to actually do something physically productive with my hands.

Real estate in Da Nang is expensive, compared to wages. I think the average monthly income is something like $300. I think this house cost around $60,000 USD. She is a software coder/engineer(?), so she makes a lot more than $300, but still way less than the same job pays in the U.S.

I think house prices here are higher here than a city like Wichita or Topeka in Kansas… Though, if comparing cities of the countries, Da Nang would be more like the Vietnamese equivalent of San Francisco or Encinitas.

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This is the view from the roof area of my apartment. I should show the apartment here, but I didn’t transfer the pictures. It’s basic - a room of about 200 square feet, a bathroom, and a little kitchen area out on the rooftop. It’s on the 5th floor and has pretty nice views. My room is the only unit on the top floor, and the rooftop area is all mine, so there’s more privacy and outdoor space than nearly all other apartments around. Rent is $190 per month, and with utilities about $220.

In the lower portion of the picture, you can see parts of a military area that I live next to. It’s cool because it results in this good view since the buildings are small. Also, they play inspirational trumpet music on loudspeakers at certain times every day
  • 5:30am (wake)
  • 7:30am (work)
  • 12:00 (break)
  • 1:30 (work)
  • 5:30 (leisure)
  • 9:30 (bedtime)
Last edited by C40 on Wed Jul 08, 2020 8:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

ertyu
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by ertyu »

Thank you for this write-up. I love VietNam, so this was half-nostalgic, half-inspirational. Awesome!

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Re: C40's Journal

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Damn, I am now seriously contemplating how safe it would be to get some Vietnamese take-out...

The immigrant kids I used to teach would ride their bikes in the city streets doubled up too. That didn’t worry me, but the way they would sometimes pop out from in between two parked cars right into fast traffic did.

I think there is some universality to “letting guy pay indicates interest”, but in other contexts it can signal the opposite. For instance, I am less likely to let man pay for coffee on first date if I am not interested at all, but I am more likely, for instance, to let him pay me for helping him paint his shed if I am not interested in long-term committed relationship.

theanimal
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by theanimal »

I really appreciate the detailed write up! Looks like you are making the most of your experience. What has it been like socially outside dating? You've mentioned before that you've had difficulty finding friends in Vietnam, is that still holding true?

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C40
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by C40 »

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JUNE 2020

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[sorry, I wrote so much that now I don’t want to proof-read and edit]

I extended my Vietnam visa entry stamp for another three months, so I’m set here until the end of September. I’m getting to the point where I think I’d like to settle in here for another, I don’t know, year or so. It looks like the U.S. will continue on the Covid roller coaster of closures, openings, safety requests being seen as political, many people not caring, etc… and more related to BLM and social progress - boiling over, violence, etc. (and hopefully some progress that is beneficial long-term).

I haven’t explored options in detail. I think they are:
  • Keep going on tourist visa. My visa is through Jan 2021.. Then I can either keep getting 3 month agent/bribe extensions, or if the Laos border is open, do a border run each 3 months (and then with new rules starting this year, I will also have to go to the immigration office each month in Vietnam to basically check in and pay $10, which sounds like it should be pretty easy)
  • Get a work permit and TRC (temporary residence card) by actually working. What kind of work? Teaching english is the default white person job here. It seems like in some cases it is as simple as showing up at a school, being, white, and having a passport from the U.S. (or UK, Canada, Australia). I think some schools would arrange the work permit and maybe TRC for me, and some would not. I wouldn’t want to work that much, ideally earn no more than $1000/mo, which would require up to 65 hours per month of work.
  • Get a work permit and TRC in less, uhhh, standard ways. Not sure about the details of this but it is possible. Visa agencies and other groups set up or connect with shell companies that will hire someone on paper in order to get them the permit and TRC. But sometimes the government notices and then the person gets ‘blacklisted’ (asked to leave Vietnam and banned from coming back for some time)
I think the route to go is probably either the first or second one. As long as the borders are closed, I think I’ll be able to keep extending 3 months at a time using an agent, which costs about $100/month. Once the borders open, I could start going to the Laos border once every three months and it’d be cheaper.

I don’t think I’d mind working some, as long as:
- The work doesn’t annoy me too much. (for example, I ain’t gonna spend many extra hours creating lesson plans and grading homework)
- It gets me a legit work permit and TRC
- It doesn’t mess up my U.S. income and taxes..






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MONEY

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Spending was a little higher in June because I bought a motorbike. I had rented one for three months because I thought I might leave after that. The new bike is a 2008 Yamaha Jupiter. It’s 135cc or so, and carbureted. It has a 4 speed semi-manual transmission. There is some kind of automatic clutch. So you don’t need to use a clutch lever. The first gear is so low that it pulls, as my girlfriend said “like a bull”. I think that 1st gear is for use on farms, steep hills, or pulling trailers. I bought it for $230 which was a decent price. It has 66k km, and looks like it was driven through bushes at some point (scratches all over the front).

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The fuel mileage is miserable for a bike like this, only 27 km/l (66mpg). Before buying it, I looked up mileage ratings for this model, but could only find numbers for the newer versions which have fuel injection. Those are almost double (60km/l).

Perhaps some adjustments to the carb would help. The bike smells like it runs too rich. It also dies at idle after a few seconds when warm. I’m not familiar with carb tuning so IDK if there is an obvious change to help both of these. Does a carb have separate adjustments for air/fuel ratio and idle speed? Would it need a different jet to make it less rich?


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Had my first hit of dividend cuts. From SPG and PAG. More to come I’m sure… My strategy as of now for the current and coming economic disaster is to use cash I have to buy more stocks at low prices, keep most/all of my current holdings, and hope that I come out ahead in the end.

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Of course I’m nervous that most everything will totally tank and not recover for 10+ years.






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Pictures
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Here’s another dump of phone pictures from the last month…

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At the fan store..

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At the paint(?) store. They mixed up some polyurethane for the pallet furniture. By hand. With a really strong solvent. No gloves or anything. I wonder if this poor lady has cancer yet.

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Started getting juice/smoothies pretty regularly.

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Here’s an example of how simple transportation is in Vietnam. Things are basically set up for scooter/motorbike use. This is the beach. You can just drive up and park right by it. From the road to the beach in like 20 seconds.

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A lunch of delivered food at home with the girl. See her feet are wet. It’s a Vietnamese thing. You rinse your feet off when you get home. And, you eat sitting on the floor.

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There are four unique bridges one after the other on this river. This one is made like a long dragon. Each Saturday evening at 8:00 there is a display at the head of the dragon. Fire balls shoot out of the mouth. Then water. I finally saw it last weekend and, given that there were like a thousand people gathered to watch, the fire and water were quite small and underwhelming.

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OHHHHH, Look at that!

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I’ve only explored outside the city a little bit. I should more. I will some time. I do plan to go to Hanoi with the girlfriend for about a week in June. She’s going up there to drop her kids off with her mom for a while during their summer break. So I’ll go up to and meet her when she gets back to Hanoi. There are a few interesting places that I’m looking forward to going to (the mausoleum of Ho Chi Minh, and the house where he lived. Seems he was also a minimalist and like simplicity…. or, perhaps, wanted to set a good example and not live an overly luxurious life..

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I now have a routine of going out for coffee every single day. There are seriously so many coffee shops in Da Nang that maybe all the population could inside coffee shops at one moment. There are new coffee shops opening continually (and probably closing. One of my favorites, where I became friends with the owner, had to close this month). The coffee quality is interesting. Vietnam grows and exports a HUGE amount of coffee. Most of it is really cheap and poor quality. The traditional coffee here is using low quality robusta beans, and made really strong and extremely bitter. Then they mix it with condensed (and very sugary) milk. As far as coffee goes, it’s horrible. But that’s what people are used to here and they like it. There is some amount of specialty/third-wave coffee here (those are just words to mean “good” coffee).

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So, between the eating out, coffee, and juice, I’m living quite luxuriously. I do really miss my old habit of making the coffee myself, including roasting, and I look forward to when I can do that again. I suppose if I really wanted I could probably start roasting here, and make cold brewed or pour-over coffee. I’m not sure about availability of green beans, but I could probably talk some shops into selling me some of theirs.

But, I’m quite sure I’ll keep going out for coffee. I like the change of scenery, getting out of the apartment, and especially the people watching.


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The beach gets really busy with locals near sunset. It’s a very wholesome vibe. Now that the borders have been closed for a few months, there are fewer and fewer white people around. I like being in places where there are a bunch of Vietnamese and no other foreigners.

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I’ve been reading some books about Vietnamese life, culture, and government. One thing that fascinates me is the concept of neighborhoods (really, sections of neighborhoods, about 50 households) having a “warden”. That warden is a resident there, perhaps chosen by the residents. Usually an old person. They serve a role of both helping the residents, and identifying/stoping/reporting criminals, and encouraging people to live in the ideal Vietnamese ways. In the more old-fashion areas, the Warden goes to the home of each resident like 1-2 times per year. They discuss the ways in which the family wants to improve (there is a list of them). Once the household has achieved enough of these - it’s kind of like the boy scouts - they get some yellow certificate to hang on the wall in their house announcing they are a “cultured/civilized family”. When enough of the houses in the neighborhood are ‘cultured’, the neighborhood gets or claims a ‘cultured neighborhood’ status. Supposedly they put signs at the entrance of the neighborhood announcing it. Most of the ones that I translated are usually more like Socialist/nationalist/patriotic propaganda phrases. If I remember right, this one says something like “The people living for one party, one constitution”.

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Something that has stood out to me in the last month - I’ve witnessed a trend of physical abuse/violence. It’s not uncommon for a young cat to hang around at a coffee shop. IDK whether these are ‘shop cats’ or belong to an employee. At one shop, some people were petting a skinny young cat. Then, the young man who had been petting, used his phone to hit the cat in the head. Not super hard, but, it stood out to me.

Then the next week I was having dinner with the girlfriend at a nice chiken/rice restaurant. There was a small dog on a chain. A guy who works at the restaurant became mad at the dog (IDK, maybe it peed in there?). He had lost his cool and was really mad, and was yelling at, hitting, and kicking the dog. The poor little dog was squealing and howling.

Then about a week later, I was walking out of a convenience store. There was a young man and woman sitting at table outside the store, with a guitar. It’s a fairly common place to hang out. As I walked out, the guy (sitting), kicked the girl, who was standing in front of him. He kicked her hard in the stomach. I was pretty stunned. As I walked by, the girl had a really sad look on her face like the was about to break down. We made eye contact for a moment. Then she went inside the store. It seemed like the was friends with the worker inside.

Kids are sometimes violent to each other also. It’s usually like this:
- A group of kids hanging out at the beach
- One kid walks up behind another, jumps in the air, and kicks another kid in the back. Usually he kicks a smaller child.
- The victim gets mad and picks up some sand to throw at the kicker.

The violence here is basically always a bigger person hitting someone smaller than them. It’s not like in the U.S. where, when kids (play)fight, it’s often like one boy vs another, and they’re facing each other, and doing it as willing combatants for fun. Or, I’ve seen a lot of fights of man vs man, where it’s pretty competitive. But here, that doesn’t happen. It’s basically just a bigger person abusing someone smaller.

I don’t see this kind of thing often, but it’s surprising how it happens out in public, in plain view, even at a restaurant by the worker. In the U.S., you generally ‘can’t’ just kick a chained dog or a small woman out in in public like that, or you might have an ass-whooping or an arrest coming. Here, I guess it is more accepted.

I think women are sometimes violent. The old-fashioned ones use sticks to hit a dog or their children. But I think that happens mostly out of view.


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The girlfriend doing a little prayer/ceremony for her new house.

Last night I saw a HUGE spider in her house. I’d seen one like that in there before.. She explained that it lives there and already did before she moved in. So she lets it be. There was a fairly similar situation with a mouse that came up from a hole that a water pipe goes through. She has a much more respectful view of animals and space ownership. In the U.S., the thought of any animal inside ones home is more like “Fuck you, this is MY house. Get out! DIE!”.

There were some cockroaches and ants in there at some point, and she got some kind of grapefruit oil to spray so cockroaches and ants would go away. She said she sprayed some of it on the spider. Then the spider was drunk/poisoned and acted strange for a while, and now it moves around more slowly than before. I asked her why she sprayed the spider, since she decided to live in harmony with it. She said it was like a prank. Now she feels guilty about it and wonders if she might have caused bad karma.


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More juice


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More coffee. This day, when I was about halfway done with my coffee, they gave me another bottle. I tried to say “you already gave me my coffee” but they wanted to give me another. I don’t know why. Maybe as a gift. Maybe to make me like the place more. Maybe because I am a white guy and was sitting outside, which might attract more customers(?).


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See the small chairs? They’re about 1 foot (30cm) tall. That’s common here. At times it is annoying because I have long legs, and getting my legs and feet in place under a table can be like a yoga puzzle. The ones in this picture are nice because I can put two chairs right against each other and sit on both. My body/butt is not super wide, but it’s better because chairs can be so small here.




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Girlfriend made dinner for me one night. I took this before she brought the rice, sauce, and asparagus. She’s really caring and helpful and likes to do things like cook for me… help me find something I need to buy… when I don’t sleep well, brings me tea that is supposed to help… offers to sew my pants that need repair… makes me a smoothie… gives me a massage.. things like that. It’s more common for Asian women to be like this than westerners, though they are definitely not all this way. Some women I meet describe themselves as lazy, say they never cook, etc.


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I had a hell of a time trying to translate this one. A guy at the coffee shop I’m in tells me it says “there is nothing better than freedom"


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Most of the shops that do have specialty coffee also look trendy. So inside those shops there is a steady steam of 18-25 year old girls in groups. They buy coffee, drink 0-50% of it, then spend an hour taking pictures of each other with their phones. They have a lot of experience in posing for their pictures.

2Birds1Stone
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by 2Birds1Stone »

Vietnam looks absolutely wonderful, C40.

I'm really curious to see/read your thoughts and pictures when you start exploring more of the countryside. Still hoping that the wife and I can make it to SE Asia this winter, but it's not looking very good.

ertyu
Posts: 2893
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by ertyu »

oh how lovely <3. my geographically deprived ass particularly appreciated all the coffee and coffee shop pictures, balm for the soul.

The violence is a thing, yeah, sadly.

Don't bitch about the small chairs, these all used to be plastic :lol: try long legs *and* weighing a lot :lol:. I'm sure they still are plastic at street vendor stalls as those are easier to transport.

Your gf's house is really cool.

Glad you're happy and thanks for the pics dude.

rube
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by rube »

Looks like you are having a great time!
I was last year in Vietnam for a few days after a business trip and I liked it, I wouldn't mind to stay there for some time with my family.
Thanks for the update.

sky
Posts: 1726
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Re: C40's Journal

Post by sky »

The carb jet is what sets the fuel to air ratio when running at speeds above idle. To solve the die at idle problem you could screw in the idle screw 1/8 of a turn, then test it out, and repeat until fixed.

A new jet and a carb rebuild kit may be in order. A new carb is another solution.

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