[Vnbiz] (The Bad Habits of Vietnamese)

[ToanDucPham@GMail.com]

Dear anh Hoanh, anh Binh, anh Craig, and other CACEs,
Anh Hoanh oi, you said:
===
...
I understand Tien Phong's purposes when they post that series of
articles about bad habits of the Vietnamese.   However I seriously have a
problem with that.
First, as mentioned earlier, most problems on the list are not exclusively
Vietnamese.  Arrogance, impatience, laziness, etc...  are very abundant
in any society in the world.  When we say that these are Vietnamese
problems, we really look down on ourselves.
...
===

Well, what would you say about this article below?
===
http://www.tienphongonline.com.vn/Tianyon/Index.aspx?ArticleID=61955&ChannelID=7

Chủ Nhật, 01/10/2006, 12:45
Tự ti vĩ đại
TPCN - Một anh hàng xóm của tôi, nghèo rớt mồng tơi, sáng ngồi quán cà phê
khoe sắp được bảo lãnh xuất ngoại, mặt anh vênh lên như giàu có đến nơi.
Nhưng mấy năm anh vẫn ở nhà, vẫn nghèo.
Cũng hàng xóm của tôi, có ông khoe có bà con là Việt kiều ở nước nọ nước
kia, có ông khoe có con gái sắp làm dâu gia đình Việt kiều.
Lại có người có "bà con làm quan" hoặc được chụp ảnh đang đứng gần vị lãnh
đạo nào đó là đem khoe khắp nơi. Mặt rạng rỡ, miệng tươi cười cứ như họ cũng
sắp được làm quan hay là "quan phẩy".
Tôi từng chứng kiến một người bảo cái người có tấm ảnh chụp với lãnh đạo là
cất đi, khoe thế đủ rồi thì người có ảnh sửng cồ lên và họ cãi nhau. Không
ra làm sao cả!
Chẳng riêng dân nghèo. Thỉnh thoảng tôi nghe vài người khá giả khoe dòng họ,
quê hương có bao nhiều người làm cán bộ ở tỉnh, ở Trung ương. Sau kỳ Đại hội
Đảng là vồn vã bắt tay "chúc mừng quê anh có nhiều người vào Trung ương".
Có lần tôi nói thẳng: Tuy cùng quê nhưng tôi chưa bao giờ được gặp các ông
"đồng hương" quan to ấy. Người ta cứ bắt tay tôi chúc mừng và người ta cũng
mừng vui với tôi như thể vì thế mà chúng tôi vinh dự hơn hay sao ấy?
Một hôm tôi được mời đến một phường chứng kiến "sự kiện đặc biệt". Đến nơi
thấy có mấy cán bộ hưu trí ngồi quanh một cái bàn nhỏ phủ vải đỏ, trên đặt
bộ ấm chén sứt mẻ.
Một cán bộ hưu trí đứng lên long trọng giới thiệu: Bộ ấm chén từng được một
vị lãnh đạo hoạt động bí mật hồi kháng chiến sử dụng. Tôi hỏi làm sao biết
được?
Cán bộ hưu trí khuyên tôi bình tĩnh để nghe kể tiếp: Họ đã tìm được căn hầm
bí mật mà một lần đi công tác qua đây, vị lãnh đạo nghỉ đêm và sử dụng cái
ấm sứt này. Nhưng nơi làm căn hầm bí mật nay là vườn cây của một gia đình và
cần tiền mua lại xây dựng nên một "địa chỉ đỏ", họ nhờ tôi viết bài tác động
để xin kinh phí.
Tôi thật khó xử, mấy chục năm kháng chiến, những nơi các vị tiền bối dừng
chân đếm làm sao hết, ấm chén bát đũa các vị dùng chắc cũng rất nhiều? Trong
lúc đó các cán bộ nghỉ hưu sôi nổi bàn tán với niềm tự hào chân thành là
phường của họ có thêm địa chỉ đỏ, hơn hẳn phường bên cạnh.
Cuộc sống nghèo khổ, lạc hậu kéo dài làm cho con người Việt Nam có khát khao
cháy bỏng về sự giàu sang, vượt thoát lên cho "bằng chị bằng em", bằng thiên
hạ.
Nhưng hoàn cảnh "phép vua thua lệ làng" ràng buộc, người Việt Nam ta sinh ra
hay tìm lối thoát bằng cách dựa dẫm, không dựa được cụ thể thì "dựa hơi" và
lấy đó để tự an ủi. Một người tự an ủi, nhiều người cùng tự an ủi, có khi cả
dòng họ, cả xã, cả huyện cùng tự an ủi bởi một điều không đâu. Thật là một
tính cách "tự ti vĩ đại".
Sáu Nghệ
===

Cheers,
Em Toan.




On 9/30/06, Tran Dinh Hoanh <tdhoanh at gmail.com> wrote:
> [Vietnam Business Forum]
> Dear Brother Binh & CACC,
> Thanks, brother Binh, for the clarification.
> I understand Tien Phong's purposes when they post that series of articles
> about bad habits of the Vietnamese.   However I seriously have a problem
> with that.
> First, as mentioned earlier, most problems on the list are not exclusively
> Vietnamese.  Arrogance, impatience, laziness, etc...  are very abundant in
> any society in the world.  When we say that we these are Vietnamese
> problems, we really look down on ourselves.  We sound like the Japanese,
the
> American, the French don't have such problems or they have less than we
do.
> That is wrong.  We cannot fix any problem when we diagnose the wrong
cause.
> As far as I can see, typical human weaknesses (arrogance, looking down on
> the poor, impatience, laziness,...) is about the same in any society.  The
> difference in the level of development is in something else.
> Second, many of the "bad habits" listed are not even "bad
habit."  Example:
> Smiling.  Smiling before, during, and after talking is a very good thing.
> Smiling makes us relaxed mentally and makes everyone else happy.  Why is
> such a bad thing?  I remember reading Pham Quynh's Gi Cung Cuoi (Smiling
to
> Everything) when I was high school.  Pham Quynh was consider one of our
very
> influential culturalists and intellectuals of the early 20th century.  He
> heavily criticizes us Vietnamese for smiling all the time.  Obvious he was
> studied with the grumpy French and grumpy Confucians, so he hated smiling.

> For many years I believed in Pham Quynh until I realized that smiling is a
> very good thing.  I would love my employees to smile all day.
> We tend to take habits of foreign countries (that are more powerful than
we)
> and say they are  good.  And our habit, if different from a foreign habit,
> then that is a bad thing.  Maybe our habit makes us poor and backward?
> Ten years ago, the Singaporean government had to have a "Smile" campaign,
to
> tell the Singaporeans to smile.  And here in Vietnam we say smiling is
bad.
> Isn't that crazy?
> (Of course, in international trade, we need to understand body
language.  I
> would say: "If you talk to a European and an American, when you want him
to
> know that you are deadly serious, you don't want to smile, because they
may
> misunderstand your smile.  Other than that, smile as much as you can,
> because smiling is always a winner").
> So, my big problem here is that we look down on ourselves so much that we
> even think about our strength as our weakness.  That is a serious serious
> serious development problem.  If a beautiful girl keeps thinking that she
is
> ugly or a smart girl thinks that she is stupid, she will have a lot of
> problem trying to develop herself in life.
>
> Third, so here is the big problem that I see in our society:  We look down
> on us and measure ourselves by the other people's standards.  We go to
> France and learn not to smile so much, then when we come back to our home
we
> say 'smiling is bad."  Come on!
> We need to be confident in our own culture and strength.  Tell the world
to
> visit Vietnam because we are "The Land of Smiles"  (Could someone please
> forward this to Vietnam Tourism and submit it for its slogan. Maybe we
will
> win some money for a round of Pho for everyone in VNBIZ).
> Another example is Buddhism, for years as I grow up, Buddhism is
considered
> by the Vietnamesee intellectuals as backward and obsolete.  Today the
> Westerrn world is discovering it as a very sophisticated and peaceful
system
> of thinking and living.  Tell the world to visit Vietnam because we have
we
> are the "Land of Zen" (Please forward this to Vietnam Tourism too).
> Another "bad habit" is that we Vietnamese don't like confrontation. When
we
> work we want to compromise, get consensus, and make everyone happy.  By
> Western standard, this is "weak, lack of direction, and unclear."  Well,
we
> Vietnamese have our own way to master things.  Focus on our ability to
> compromise and to gain consensus, master this art, so that we will become
a
> master in the art of building consensus.  This is a great skill in
business
> and politics.  As a nation, let's use our skill to be the Peace Maker in
> this world full of conflicts.
> Fourth, instead of presenting a list of "bad habits," I would encourage
> people to present a list of good habits to learn instead.  We don't have
to
> say, 'We Vietnamese are lazy."  We just have to say "We must work hard to
> win."
> Don't say, "We Vietnamese are impatient."  Just say "We must be patient to
> win.'
> Don't say, 'We Vietnamese are wishy washy."  Just say, "We must be strong
> and decisive to win."
> Don't way, "We Vietnamese are socially irresponsible."  Just say, "We must
> be socially responsible to win."
> When some one does something wrong, tell him that he is wrong: "You are
> socially irresponsible, Mr. Xuan."  But don't make it a "Vietnamese
thing."
> Focus on ourselves and our strength.  Encourage each other to learn good
> habits.  Forget about the bad habits, if you learn the good, you
> automatically eliminate the bad.
> We need to focus solely on the positive, positive, positive.
> We need to erase all negative thinking and negative talk from the face of
> the earth.
> Then we will be champion.
> Have a great day, brother Binh and all.
> Hoanh
>
> ___________
>
> On 9/30/06, Binh, Vu The <binh at netnam.vn> wrote:
> > [Vietnam Business Forum]
> > Dear a. Hoanh et CACC,
> > Thanks for sharing ideas/opinions. My interest about Japanese &
Vietnamese
> > is not related to
> > >> When we rely on things outside us, we don't make progress.
> > I will try to go back from the beginning of this discussion thread to
make
> > my opinions clearer.
> > Brother Toan posted some of "the bad habits of VIetnamese".  From my
> views,
> > those "bad habits" are quite similar to lots of Vietnamese people,
> > especially the one who have been growing up and staying in Vietnam,
> > including the youngsters who were born after 1975.
> > A. Hoanh replied:
> > >> Why do we have to focus on our so-called "weaknesses" so much?
> > >> Why do we have to always focus on how bad we are in this, how weak we
> are
> > >> in that?
> > >> Why do we have to be so obsessed with our own so-called "weaknesses"?

> > I don't think "we" - Vietnamese nowadays are focusing so much in the
> > weaknesses. Instead, as I quoted in the previous message, Vietnamese are
> > quite optimistic to express their "strength" such as smart,
hard-working,
> > fast-to-learn, etc.
> > >>Of course, we should be aware of our weaknesses and limitations, just
so
> > >>that we know our Self.
> > >>And we should improve our weaknesses as much as we can.
> > >>... we have to focus on our strength, our advantage, not on our
> weakness,
> > >>our disadvantage.
> > Agreed. But it seems that Vietnamese nowadays forget to see about the
> > weakness, the bad habits. So generation by generation, the bad habits
> could
> > not be improved. Some newspapers are trying to raise the awareness about

> > this, including "Sport & Culture" magazine, which has a very interesting
> > column "Người xưa cảnh tỉnh - Thói hư tật xấu của người Việt". I don't
> know
> > if you have chance to read it, as there's no online version.
> > >>Should you focus on your strength, say, a very logical mind, to become
a
> > >>mathematician instead?
> > >>If you body is slender and light, should you try to be a body builder
> > >>instead of a swimmer?  And as a nation, should Vietnam focus on the
> > >> >>industries it can't do so well, instead of the industries it have
> great
> > >>competitive advantage?
> > The problem is the bad habits are not related to the born-characters,
but
> > related to the educational and family systems. It's not related to
> physical
> > limitations.
> > When the kid throw rubish to the road (a bad habit), should his mother
> stop
> > him and educate him not to do that? Or she just forget it and focus on
> > motivating him in mathematic to win the "math olympic" competition.
> > Those "bad habits" are listed with the intension for Vietnamese people
to
> > improve themself/ourself. Self-improving is the key point to make people
> > being perfect.
> > Seeing the light side of the Moon is nice, but forgetting the dark side
is
> > dangerous. I'm sure that all of the VNbiz members don't have much the
"bad
> > habits" listed, as they/we are educated well, I guess. But for lots of
> > Vietnamese people, this is a really an issue. Living here day by day, >
> working here day by day, you will see it.
> > Forgetting the "bad habits" of Vietnamese people: we will be dreamers.
> Those
> > are one of the key challenges to keep Vietnam not yet in the top
countries
> > of the World.
> > Just my humble opinions,
> > Have a nice weekend,
> > Binh.
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