Stuff Vietnamese people like

International Women’s Day is marked on March 8 each year and considered as a non-public holiday in a few countries, including Vietnam. The day might be inherited from Russia (formerly the USSR). Though Vietnam Women’s Day (October 20) is also important, March 8 is considered as the official Mother’s Day for Vietnamese people.

On this day, guys in Vietnam (pretend to) like giving flowers, greetings and/or gifts to their mothers, sisters, wives, daughters, girlfriends, female friends, female teachers, female classmates, female bosses and female colleagues. Vietnamese women like the day because it’s one of few days they don’t have to rub the floors, do all the cooking, the washing up and many other things.

Along with Teachers’ Day, the day is meant to corrupt your youthful innocence. Even it’s on Saturday or Sunday (the days off school), you’ll have to give your female teachers special gifts, or else you’ll be in trouble. Still, the kids like International Women’s Day because they may learn to sing March 8’s songs rather than maths or history.

If you’re a girl, you still need to wait for your turn to check out in the supermarket this day even though you’re the only woman there. In Vietnam, the day doesn’t apply to “female strangers.” If you’re a guy, remember that giving gifts is not equivalent to giving alms. It should be comprehended as an art, not a duty. If you don’t feel like giving flowers or gifts, greetings are enough.

P.s.: Many Vietnamese women don’t like flowers from fathers, brothers, colleagues, or friends.

Vietnamese people like to take photos. They have polarized into two groups: photojournalist wannabes and nude model wannabes.

Vietnamese photojournalist wannabes try to own semi-professional digital cameras so that they could prove to others they are taking the art of photography seriously. These people sometimes travel alone to the countryside to find picturesque sceneries. You will find these so-called scenery photos featuring at least a person. Vietnamese people like jumping in the photo because they think they will make the photo more beautiful. But often, when these photographers can’t leave the city, you will easily find them on the middle of the road taking photos of a dead rat or a traffic jam from many angles.

Vietnamese nude model wannabes outnumber the photojournalist group, because they don’t need to buy expensive cameras. They have to arrange an appointment with photographers (or the above-mentioned photojournalist wannabes). Even if they are willing to pose nude for free, they will need to queue up a long line in front of the studios. Because they’re desperate to keep up with the fashion trend, these people usually take photos of themselves, with their cellphones or webcams. It will save their time, and even their money (yes, sometimes they have to pay for their own nude photos taken).

If you happen to see a photo collection of a Vietnamese acquaintance, give good comments on the artful work (even if it’s not close to art) and ask her/him the circumstances behind those photos. You’ll have a bunch of stories to tell your friends later.

Vietnamese people like to pimp their ride, be it a car, motorcycle, e-bike, bicycle, or helmet. They think that people will easily recognize them by their own fashion because they’re like ninjas on the street. The more expensive a bike is, the more colorful it looks.

If you see a Vietnamese with a bike like the one in the picture, don’t ask them if they are a fan of MotoGP or anything. It’s a recipe for disaster and shame. Vietnamese people aren’t ready for humiliation yet, because 9 out of 10 people don’t know what 46 means, who Valentino Rossi is, or what you are talking about.

Remember that a helmet is a thing for Vietnamese people to prove they’re fashionable. They wear anything that looks like a helmet the way they like it. In Vietnam, it has never been and will never be a form of protective gear worn on the head to protect it from injuries. In the first place, how could riding as slow as 20-30km/h possibly bring any damage to the head?

That fashion, Vietnamese style, peaks fast and is now incorporated into other things like cellphones, laptops, anything they can stick a decal on. Don’t tell them their fashion makes your eyes bleed. They don’t feel hot in the jacket under 32 degrees centigrade. They feel safe in that winter wear. If you’re a man, don’t tell a girl that her face mask and ankle-high skin socks wreck her whole look. She’s keeping her beauty for you.

Traveling alone is economical and fun. Usually, Vietnamese people go online to find information about the place they wanna go and then they start saving money to go there. Some Wednesday afternoon, they suddenly don’t wanna work/study, and the next Thursday morning, after taking a few days off work, they are off to travel on their own with a camera and a backpack.

It’s not easy to travel without a friend, but usually their friends have parents and children and friends and pets and jobs and hopes and plans and memories and futures… and all that they can’t leave behind that fast. And if they have to wait for a team, they’ll have to wait for like another 6 months.

So, some Vietnamese backpackers find companions online, just to make new friends and get their photos taken on the road. Taking photos is an important thing to do for Vietnamese travelers, because they wanna show others that they have been to Singapore, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, China, etc. when they get back.

Traveling abroad is a a trend for those who think they are good at English. Vietnamese people feel the need to do it the way foreigners do it: discover new cultures with only a map and without a guide, find the values in places tourists don’t go to or can’t go to. Back home, they try to make you envy them by talking about their pilgrimage as if they were Christopher Columbus just discovering the Americas.