life in progress...

Go RISD !!!

2008-11-18T08:27:00.002+07:00

I was just browsing through my favorite T-shirt shopping website, Threadless and noticed that they have a select section. After the click, who do I see but my old professor, John Maeda, and a bunch of designs from RISD students. What a fun and creative way to get money for scholarships! Makes me want to apply to grad school at RISD... Who knows, maybe in a few more years. Check out the designs.

In other news, I find it kinda funny how the Vietnamese help each other to avoid getting traffic tickets by the cops. This morning on the way to work, we were driving down this small one-way street with cops standing at the corner. Of course, most Vietnamese do not care its one way or not, they will drive anywhere they want. So as we are driving, we see a whole bunch people going the wrong way. Suddenly, everybody behind us is screaming at them,"There are cops at the end of the road, turn around!" and like a school of fish, every one of them just switched around and headed the right way. With all this screaming, it a wonder that the cops didn't hear....

those teen years again? damnit....

2008-10-22T11:20:00.002+07:00

I feel like a teenager again and not in the good, I have tons of energy sense. But more along the lines of breaking out and having my face covered with blemishes. I didn't really experience this when I was a teenager myself, so its a bit weird for me trying to figure out how to get my face back to normal again. I guess as you get older, your hormones sometimes changes and goes haywire. For the most part I just find it very annoying that I look even younger now. Sigh. I hope it all clears up soon.

paint allergy?

2008-07-29T19:01:00.002+07:00

I think I might be allergic to paint. I have been trying to redecorate the place that I live in and was painting the other day. After a couple of hours, I noticed some hives. They went away, but the next day, I woke up with a fever. Whoa... didn't feel so good, after downing tons of liquids and talking Tammy into making me some comfort food, her amazing burgers, I recovered fairly quickly. Yay!!! But yeah, so much for a painting career. Oh well, I'll stick to fashion and watercolors.

on hiatus

2008-03-02T23:09:00.001+07:00

Due to my current workload, I am taking a break from any form of blogging altogether. I barely have time to put in 8 hours of sleep a night, so something must GO. Unfortunately it will be this blog for the next three months. Hopefully in three months I wil have adjusted to the workload and be able to make time for blogging again.

tet in saigon

2008-02-08T07:35:00.001+07:00

This is the first year that I've spent Tet in Saigon. When you're not around family, there is not that much to do this time of year. Most of the shops and resturants are closed, since everyone has taken the holiday off to spend some quality time with the family. I've been out and about, roaming the streets of Nguyen Hue, which has been decorated with thousands of flowering blooms, lights, and statues of rats. (Will post pictures soon) Along the way, I met Hoai Linh, a famous Vietnamese comic who has a tendency to dress in drag for his skits. Bumped into a few photographer friends and spent Tet Eve chatting with them about their work.

One the first, my landlady invited me to have breakfast with her family. She's been very nice and sees me as part of the family. I just don't like imposing. Later, a friend asked me to have dinner at his grandmother's place. She is a sweet eighty year old grandmother who just can't sit still and will always comment if she thinks you're doing something improper.

As I am bending down to get something from my bag, she stares at my chest and says "You really need to wear more so you don't get sick..." Ummm... I was also wearing a jacket... Instead of a tank in this hot weather, I guess I should really be wearing a turtleneck. Sigh...grandmothers.... My friend found it extremely amusing.

I should be used to it by now....comments about my chest and bum...since all the other vietnamese women here are skinny sticks. Eat people, eat!!! There is so much food here, why don't they gain weight?

rocking in hcmc

2008-01-22T17:11:00.000+07:00

Footage from the My Chemical Romance concert. It was quite fun. Crazy the amount of people that showed up, but don't take my word for it, see for yourself:

MCR in Vietnam from Tuyet Nguyen on Vimeo.

my chemical romance

2008-01-19T07:26:00.000+07:00

As mentioned in the previous post, there is a following for metal music here in Vietnam. One of my former students asked me if I would be attending the Unite 08 concert featuring the band My Chemical Romance. Wow, really? MCR is coming here? I actually like this group. She even offered to win free tickets for me. So sweet of her. The tickets are not being sold but are instead being given out as prizes to games being played in the bars around town during the week of 1/12 - 1/19. The concert is being held on 1/20 and is sponsored by Tiger Beer.

The beer companies have been sponsoring a lot of music events lately. Just last month, Heineken brought world dj Ferry Corsten to liven up the Christmas festivities. Hopefully this trend continues and Saigon will be able to host more concerts, so people don't have to fly off to Singapore or Hong Kong any more to see artists that they like.

uncensored

2008-01-18T12:09:00.000+07:00

This week has been a bit enlightening. First off, I went to the movies with a friend to watch Ben Stiller's "Heartbreak Kid". There was a sex scene in the movie that lo and behold was surprisingly not cut out. What the??? Vietnam is quite conservative and usually any form of nudity is ripped from the movie before it is shown in the theater. But in this case, you could see the woman's entire breasts...there was even dirty talk and translations for the dirty talk. Oh my..... Whoa.... totally didn't see that coming.....

Yesturday, there was an artist talk by Uudam Nguyen at San Art. I didn't know who this artist was but a few friends had asked me to come, so I did. It is most likely one of the most phallic artist talks I've ever been to. I actually felt bad, but couldn't help laughing sometimes, when the translator struggled with how to translate words such as "Got Fucked" or "Dildo". I mean those words and the concepts associated with them don't come up in public conversation often here. I found his later work and more conceptual pieces interesting though.

Another thing that I never expected to do in Vietnam was attend my first and most likely only Metal concert. So surprised that there is such a huge underground following of this genre here. I wonder why? Again, friends were going, so I tagged along to see what it was all about. It turns out that one of my former students was in a metal band that was playing that night. He spotted me and excitedly said that they would be the 3rd band on. I nodded.

All I can say about the experience is that it was Loud, I saw a bit of Moshing Action, and after 30 mins decided that it gave me a headache. Yes, so I did not stay long enough to see my former student's performance. But hey, its turns out its just not my kind of music.

delicate metal

2008-01-11T07:41:00.000+07:00

Cal Lane has some nice pieces on her website. She is an artist that uses steel as a medium for lace work. Really beautiful.

Cal Lane
Turning Steel into Lace

holiday season round-up

2008-01-09T07:26:00.000+07:00

This holiday season was spent with family and friends. My brother and his family were in town, so I was able to spend some time with my nieces. They are growing up fast :)

We all went Danang to visit more family there. Here is our Weekend in Danang together.

As for the evenings, when it was the kids bedtimes, I would meet up with friends at all the various holiday events around town. As you'll soon find out, at the heart of Ho Chi Minh City, it is a party town for the young professionals crowd. Not much of a family oriented kind of place.

And my New Year's Eve was spent with some of the creatives in Saigon. Art rules :p

On that note, John Maeda just wrote a post about Why Being Creative is Good and David Ngo answers the question "what is design?"

"Creativity is Courage" ~ John Maeda

dear readers

2008-01-08T11:19:00.000+07:00

Hello. Wow, I didn't realize there were so many people who actually read my blog. Sorry for not posting of late. I've been using Facebook instead because its been so much more convenient to share and tag photos. Also for some reason, I have not been able to access Blogger at work between classes, when I'm the most reflective. They seemed to have blocked the site completely ...

Anyways, now that you have brought it to my attention, I will resume posting on my blog again. Do accept my apologies and expect more frequent posts from now on.

~ Snowtweety

perfect moments

2007-12-17T16:32:00.001+07:00

With eyes sparking and a giggle, she comes bounding towards me
Leaps and wraps her chubby little arms around my neck
Squeezing tightly,
Her whole body tenses
Relaxes
and then she laughs

Her hair smells of sweat and innocence
I shower kisses on her already pink cheeks
She smiles and just as quickly
Sqirms and lets go
to attack yet another with her unconditional love

When she tires
We sit on the swing
I hum
as she sleeps

the comfort of routine

2007-11-22T01:49:00.000+07:00

I realize that I have not been posting a lot lately. This is partly due to me being a bit lazy and the fact that life has taken on a bit of a routine, which can be a bit boring and comforting at times. I don't really have to think about what my days or weeks entail, but know the general outlook and plan. Maybe having a set routine is a sign of getting older and knowing what you want....

Anyways, here is what a normal week for me looks like.

Mondays and Thursdays, I consult.
Tuesdays and Fridays, I teach.

Wednesdays are my day off, so I learn. I go to classes to learn more PHP and oil painting. Brushing up on coding and getting back to my creative side to balance things out. My teachers are friends of mine. Its nice.

Saturdays, sometimes I will consult, otherwise I will work on lectures or random projects.

Sundays are chill: sleep in, read, paint, maybe frisbee, and hanging out at friends' places for game nights.

Weeknights sometimes I will try yoga, go out to dinners with friends if they are free, or just around the corner by myself. People always look at me weird when I go eat by myself. They are are not used to seeing it here I guess. I like it though, watching the scene of family, friends, and couples around me. People watching is fascinating, the interactions. Its harder to do with other people cause you feel this need to have a conversation, but when you are by yourself, that need isn't there. You can just watch.

Weekend evenings are for attending events: fashion shows, art openings, going dancing and checking out new DJs.

Simple routine, but keeps me busy and pretty content. I'm sure most of people have their own routines as well.

navigating loneliness

2007-11-08T07:33:00.001+07:00

"Do you know what happens to babies when you leave them alone? They die...." uttered by a friend this morning as we headed to an orphanage that she works at.

My students are working on a multimedia project for her, creating an informational CD to be shown to potential volunteers, chronicaling the process for caring for these babies, some of which are handicapped and ill.

Its quite a humbling experience as you walk in and see literally dozens of babies. A couple of my students just didn't know what to do. They were afraid to hold them, touch them. There was this fear of the vunerable and fragile, I guess.

These babies are resilient though, that's why they are still here. How can you be afraid of babies? Its so easy to make them happy. Just a little touch and smile and their eyes light up. Even so, some are just not ready to reach out and make that connection. These children don't really have a choice about whether or not they are left alone.

Which is very different from adults. As we get older and become more self-reliant, in some of us, there is this preference to be alone and dwell in loneliness because its more productive somehow. I read an article this week on Charles Shultz, the creator of "Peanuts" and the man liked to be depressed, he clung to it.

But "He's an artist." That's always the explaination, isn't it. A brilliant artist is most likely a depressed artist. They draw creativity from their depression. Having been there once, I might just have to agree, depression is very productive creatively. But if depression is always a part of the equation of being a brilliant artist, I choose not to be. I guess I'm not hardcore, I don't live for my "Art", I live for my happiness.

What then are artists seeking to accomplish in their work? Is it understanding more? Communicating? Bridging a gap among different communities of people? Creating empathy? I attended an artist talk this evening and listened as these international artists spoke of their work. The majority of it was about finding their "identity", reaching out to their community to seek answers, or showing the beauty in the life of ordinary working people.

Yet as I left the event early and waited for my xe om driver, I looked back at the glass doors of the gallery. A crowd of local people had gathered outside, curious, peering in at the group of artists, yet afraid to go inside, feeling unwelcomed. One local women did go in to clean up a spill and was quickly asked to leave. Why couldn't she stay? What was oh-so-important that someone had to shoo her away?

As she stepped out, everyone around her asked, "What is it about?" "It looks like an important meeting." Although she only experienced just a glimpse of what was inside, she was somehow privileged, part of something that people on the outside weren't.

Sigh....Lofty talk about art for and about the people, yet the people that are being used/portrayed in some of the work do not feel welcomed enough to go in and see it? WTF? So what if they don't understand the language. One can still appreciate art and music without knowing the words.

Way to go, you're really connecting with the community now. If I was a smoker, I would have had a smoke then. What a long day its been. I am privileged and I am grateful, I will remember that.

Below is an article about Charles Schultz.
Passages: The Life and Times of Charles Schulz

spoken word

2007-11-04T09:39:00.001+07:00

Was going through some of my archive DVD's and found an old video I took of Bao Phi at the APIA Spoken Word Summit in 2005. Check it out :)

Bao Phi Spoken Word from Tuyet Nguyen on Vimeo.

teaching again

2007-10-25T09:52:00.000+07:00

I started teaching again a couple days ago and I'm actuallay pretty excited about it. The projects that the students will be working on will give them industry experience working with clients. Woo-hoo!!! One is for an animation studio, another for a fashion company, and possibly two working with orphanages and non-profit groups. Should be an interesting semester. Excited :)

aquafina pure fashion

2007-10-06T08:08:00.000+07:00

I attended the Aquafina Pure Fashion Show last night. It was a very long show that could have been edited a bit more. Imagine over 35 different collections.... The event started at 7:30pm and didn't end until 10:30pm, 3 hours + is way too long. Lot of great designs, one even incorporated glowing LED lights. Pictures will be uploaded shortly :)

Some of my favs from the show:

Blue jersey knit dress from NTU

Gray jersey knit dress from NTU

Below are all from student designers. Very impressive.

I love the tiered ruffles.

This one is just fantastic. Great for an intergalatic costume party.

This is the one with the glowing blue LEDs. Ran out of memory, so wasn't able to take a photo of it in action. Very cool though.

saigon's week of art

2007-10-04T01:26:00.000+07:00

Apparently there is a whole week of art events going on now. I missed one at the beginning, but managed to catch another one of the events today. You're away for 2 months and no one sends you mail anymore! Sheesh....

Anyways, back to ART. Today I attended "Future, Tuong Lai" , the opening exhibition of a new gallery called San Art, an independent artist space run by Dinh Q. Le, known for his woven image tapestries.

Its a great space for local artists to show their work. What's also great is that they have a reading room where you can browse through art books and magazines. Its a small library right now, so will need donations to grow. Anyone interested in donating? Yay for more BOOKS !!!!

Another art event begins tomorrow, "Le Mois de L'image" ( A month of images ), from Oct. 4 - Oct. 20. Participating Venues include the Musee des Beaux-Arts de HCMC, Galerie Quynh, Idecaf, and the Association des Photographers.

This will be a busy week :)

1 day left

2007-09-28T10:12:00.000+07:00

So I have one day left before I can use Facebook again.

Not one day has passed where Facebook has not been mentioned by friends both old and new. "Oh yeah, you can get in touch with me on Facebook. Email? You want my e-mail? Why? Its on Facebook." Christ....

With one week off, I've realized that Facebook is a CULT!!!
When the hell did the rest of the world join? Its so much easier to get in touch with people and find contacts there.

Is this how everyone else that is NOT using this site feels. Annoyed that they are somehow left out of the loop?

So what was the upside of this? I actually got a lot more work done and found that people seemed to be missing my presence. Got more text messages and emails than I've gotten in a while. Awhhhh... how sweet.

As for the rest of my week, its been busy, littered with meetings with potential web clients, finishing up one design, mini-breaks here and there.

Last night, I finally tried "painting" with Uyen-My. My painting was of a sheep stuck in a man's fro. Its weird. I had nothing to look at. Yeah, don't ask me to paint from my imagination. I suck at it. Usually, I do tons of sketches and research first before I begin a project. Very much a planner. Spontaneous strokes here and there is so not me.

Gonna buy a few canvases this weekend and attempt to paint a "bike" for my sis Kim. Wish me luck :)

damn nice graphics

2007-09-21T11:56:00.000+07:00

Transformers: The Best Special Effects Ever?

I love watching this movie for the amazing graphics, so smooth and well-done. Just saw it again this week. This is when you really need a big screen to appreciate it all.

gelaskins artist interviews

2007-09-20T08:48:00.000+07:00

Gelaskins just started a blog with interviews of their artists. The first one is Nanami Cowdroy. Her "Blowfish" skin is the one I bought for my mac.

Art On - Vol.1 with Nanami Cowdroy

just one more game

2007-09-20T08:14:00.000+07:00

I'm playing one last game of Scrabulous on Facebook with my sister Kim before taking one full week off from that addictive social networking site. Usually I don't get addicted to things. Its very unlike me. The side benefits of this are that most likely I'll be blogging more. Woo-hoo! Man, my page needs pictures. ( When did it become so text heavy) Next on the list :)

getting local

2007-09-20T00:08:00.000+07:00

I've been trying to be good and cutting back on western food, eating more and more Vietnamese food. Sometimes its hard. I get cravings for burgers and chips, but there is also a lot of great Vietnamese food out there that I have yet to try, I'm sure.

Earlier tonight, Ha took me, Kym, and Kevin out to one of her favorite seafood places in District 4. There was this amazing Curry Shrimp dish, really strangely shaped long mussels and oh man, Crab with Tamarind sauce, one of my favorites. Unfortunately, I haven't been carrying around my camera of late, so have no pictures. But next time, I'll be sure to take some and post.

no more drama

2007-09-16T10:00:00.000+07:00

Its been a strange month back here. Several people I know have broken up or gotten separated from their partners. From the outside looking in, its got me wondering,

"So what makes a relationship last?"

Relationships are complex, aren't they? Or do people make them that way out of boredom, lost of interest?

From what I've seen of successful relationships, they can be very simple. It has a lot to do with communication, mutual respect, trust, and a complete acceptance of the other person, of who they are, not trying to change them into a version that you think is better. Easier said than done, I know. It takes effort. The fact that it takes effort though does not make it complex. Counting from 1 to 1 million is challenging, but that is fairly simple. It just requires a great deal of patience and fortitude. Little steps at a time.

People only change of their own volition anyways, not for anyone else. In the end, they must see that there is some kind of advantage for them. It may sound harsh, but people are selfish. This is not a bad thing, its logical.

Example: "What is best for ME?", "What is best for MY wife?", "What is best for MY kids?" , "What is best for MY family?"

There is reflection of self in all of these statements. So for a relationship to work, you do put your self-interest first. That self-interest may of course include that of your partner's and your family's. You are then willing to make sacrifices and compromises for the greater outcome for all involved, but in the end it still boils down to "What are the advantages for me?" "What will make me happier?"

So cut the drama and be honest, we're all selfish. "What's in it for me?"

Hey! Where's the "Love"? you ask.... Love is selfish. Love also fades, what's left is Loyalty and treating the other person fairly.

the knock-off business

2007-09-07T16:42:00.000+07:00

An interesting read on the knock-off industry and what fashion designers are doing to fight against it. Quite amazing the huge effect that the internet has played, to the point where knock-offs enter the market before the originals do. A ridiculous turnaround time of just 14 days for samples. My goodness.

At least orginal prints can be copyrighted.

Before Models Can Turn Around, Knockoffs Fly