August 20, 2025 • 40 mins
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In this episode of The Cost of Living Abroad Pod with @thestoryofkt and @evan_eh we compare the best affordable places to live and retire early in SE Asia, including a full monthly budget breakdown and discussion of the pros and cons of living in Vietnam, and Kevin tells me what it is like to be a black man in Vietnam. He also shares his experience of dating, working and living in Vietnam as an African American.
0:00 Intro - Kevin from Story of KT Youtube Channel
1:00 “It was time to leave” the USA
2:35 I sold everything & moved to Vietnam
10:00 Living in Hanoi vs Living in HCMC Saigon
17:50 what’s it like being black in Vietnam?
25:00 trash, sanitary, huge banh mi rats
28:00 Dating Vietnamese women as a black man
31:00 speaking Vietnamese & Language Barrier
35:00 Vietnam is a crazy animal
38:00 Story of KT and Starting on Youtube
39:30 “You will get scammed in Vietnam”
Full episodes available on this channel: https://www.youtube.com/@costoflivingabroad
My 60 Minute Move to Vietnam Masterclass: Watch here
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What is it like to be a black man? It's like,
(00:01):
go on, like, how did we move?
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Man? That's a loaded question. I can't put a dollar
sign or a dong sign on that, you know what
I mean. We need peace, you know, we need peace
to keep our minds right. And in the US, I
just couldn't have peace. You know. I had a weight
on my shoulders all the time, you know, as soon
as I left, as soon as the plane took off,
and I left all that behind, all that weight trip.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Today, on the cost of Living Abroad, we meet Kevin
from Story of KT and yes, we'll get to how
he met his Vietnamese fiance, but first he sold it all,
left the US and started over in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
This is Kevin's story.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Well on the cost A broad Pod. Yes, sir man,
I feel like we've been messaging for a while to right,
let's like jump straight into it. What was the moment?
Why did you leave America? When did you know what
was going to happen?
Speaker 2 (00:56):
It's funny you asked that because I knew five years
before I left. You know, I been running a business,
catering business, and I've just been burned out, man, You
know how it isn't building a business and you're just
constantly twenty four to seven on the clock. Man, it
was draining. So I left in twenty eighteen, and I
(01:18):
knew I was finished in twenty eighteen. So yeah, I
just wanted to travel the world. I mean really, I
was thirty five and I'm forty one now, and so
I knew that it was time to leave straight up.
Because rints were getting high in California, and I'm from
San Diego, so rints were getting really high, and I
(01:39):
knew that. I saw the running on the wall today.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
It was a beautiful place. But I passed through very briefly.
I used to live in Mexico, so I went like
overland down from like Chicago, Texas and SunGO. But yeah,
even then, like whenever, that was fifteen years ago, it
was expensive. It's expensive relative to the rest of the
states and the rest of California, yeah, which is already
more expensive than the rest of the world for sure.
So you're living here in Psychon now, you said, which
(02:03):
was like you, I was here for about five and
a half years before I went to the nine. Okay,
what's your cost of living look like here versus home?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Like?
Speaker 1 (02:12):
For someone who's you know, they've never been to Vietnam.
They maybe they've been to San Diego. Maybe they've just
seen the beautiful postcards. How much like real deal? How
much money you're saving when you move over?
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Honestly? Like like probably sixty percent with I mean, I
don't have to pay nearly any bills. You know. Cool
thing about Vietnam is it's pretty inclusive. You know. So
the rent is inclusive for your WiFi, your water, and
(02:44):
your trash and everything is included. My electricity I pay separate.
That's the only bills I have, So it's cool.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
I had to play like most places here fully furnished,
fully set up like latch key. You walk into the place,
you're good to go.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I choose to those places because I
don't have, you know.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
I don't have You don't have anything out here behind
I don't have anything, you know, But what'd you do
with this sto like follow up question would you do
with this stuff back home? You just go a whole hog.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
You sell everything, sold everything. Yeah so I sold everything
and got rid of everything.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Yeah, well it should be the loudest interview in history.
But yeah, okay, right, so she got a fully furnished place.
Talking one bedroom studio, which is like, what's the square footage?
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Well, one bedroom. It's not a studio, so it's a
sixty square meter sixty times Yeah, pretty pretty big one bedroom.
It has the cool layout because what I wanted was
in there when we first met and my fiancee we
first moved down here to Chiming, I was living in
Hannoy for three years, and so again i've been in
(03:56):
I've been in Vietnam almost six years, so I I've
seen different apartments and different layouts I wanted, and so
this layout I really wanted. So it's like right by
the airport, so it's literally across the street from the
international airport. It's perfect, it's quiet, and again it's pretty big,
you know.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
So well what do you pay? What's on?
Speaker 2 (04:18):
So I pay nine point five million, which is yeah,
it's super super affordable. Nine point five million, just under
four hundred US dollar. Like I said, that includes basically
everything except for my electricity.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Okay, well let's jump into the other half place then,
So you left the catering job behind food and beverage
back home. How do you make money living abroad? What
do you do?
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Yeah, so I still I own the business. Still, this
is twenty years in the business and I'm an English teacher.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Let's break down the first part first, and how do
you manage to still own the business and operate and
run it from whatever, five thousand miles away down the
side of the world.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Right, yeah, bro, So I have staff that worked for me,
that have been working for me for years, some over
ten years. Again, I've been in business twenty years, so
I started when I was twenty two. And so yeah,
I'm actually bringing that here and I'm going to start
a being It's called Being Service Academy. So yeah, I
(05:24):
want to train bartenders, food and beverage staff in front
of front of house staff so that Biannam can raise
their level of service.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
So we got this is a good one. You love this?
Do you know you know Jimmy's Pizza. No, so, Jimmy's Pizza.
Jimmy's a guy from Boston. He's got a pizza in
D seven one, D one one in D two And
there's a big hot neon sign that our other buddy
gave him the idea for this sign, and it says
it says hot pizza, Cold beer. But the joke is
hot pizza, cold beer, questionable service. Yeah, yeah, but that
(05:58):
is on Jimmy HR. But it's like it's a joke
about Vietnam, right, So, I mean that can definitely catch.
I was in I mean I did close to two
decades and restaurants back home. I did everything, man from
from washing dishes to be an allion cook, to a
prep cook to you know, like guard mons and then
up in the front of house everything. Yeah. Everything, Yeah,
(06:18):
for sure. Fifteen to thirty five years old, on and off,
I was in restaurants.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
It's not so easy, you know, but you got to
be good at that, you know. And that's that's where
my specialty is. You know, I'm all about hospitality. That's
why I love Vietnam because they're super all about hospitality.
You know, Wow, they need help with it, you know.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Then that's I mean demanding might be your spot because
the hotel's up there, right, just thinking of the tourism
and the I mean that it is a high demand,
the demand for service and labor up. And then you
land here twenty nineteen, you head up to hanois romantic, beautiful.
I guess there's some max pots there. There's sort of
like the European axpot scene with the embassy. He's in
(07:00):
the consulates, a couple of international schools. You're like, what
should like walk me through? What's it like for you?
You know, you walk down there, it's twenty nineteen, there's
twenty eighteen, twenty eighteen. I mean, have you been to
South dast Asia before? Have you been to Vietnam before?
Speaker 2 (07:18):
No?
Speaker 1 (07:19):
No?
Speaker 2 (07:19):
So yeah, it was sold everything in sight. I seem
to be twenty nineteen here.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
Yeah, you get off an airplane in LLINOI in twenty nineteen.
I mean, what hits you first? Like, what's the light man?
Speaker 2 (07:29):
So legit was traveling the world, right. I came from
North Africa to Southeast Asia. I was in Tunisia. I
lived in Tunisia for a little bit for about four months.
Then I moved to Morocco. Well, I was traveling in
Morocco and then stayed in Morocco for about a month
(07:50):
and then came over here. It was a completely night
and day, like I couldn't believe what one the rats? Yeah, yeah, huge,
like dog, you know what is that? Dog? You know,
it's like, what's going on? But my first Southeast Asian
country was Thailand, so obviously everybody goes to Thailand first. Yeah.
(08:10):
So I took the train from Thailand down to Malaysiak
So from Bangkok all the way down to basically Penang. Yeah, yeah,
it was rad. It was really rad, you know, first
time I ever did that. Then I came over here
Vietnam and my first stop was here in Ochi Min
and then I went up to Hanoi and then it
was it was nineteen happened, you.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Know, yeah, the COVID happened, lockdown happened.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
I got trapped here and then I saw the Vietnamese people. Man,
I thought they were great, you know, I saw the affordability.
I saw how Vietnam was was coming up. Man, you know,
it was super coming up. And I had never been here,
but I could feel like this country was coming up.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
Traveled affair bit I don't know. I mean I've never
mentioned for today. What do you feel like culturally your
reception and how do you side Hannoy over hoach you Min?
How does it feel? What draws you in about Hannoi?
What's the pull up there? Originally?
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Well, my fiance yeah, yeah, yeah, I met her. Yeah,
I was like, you know, Vietnamese, Vietnamese women are amazing,
you know, but my lady is amazing. Bro. So we
met when we were working together. I loved Annoy because
it was cold. Yes, I just love the fact that
(09:28):
it has seasons. That's why, you know, I'm from San Diego.
We only have hoachum in you know weather, you know,
it's either hot or it's it's raining. You know what
I'm saying. So yeah, when I met her, of course
I had to stay. You know. Yeah, she's annoying for sure,
and shout out to annoy people. But it's completely different
(09:50):
from Saigon here. So yeah, Saigon reminds me of the
US a little bit, you know, where it's more they're
more friendly. Hanoi's people are friendly, but they're just more
like step off me, you know. And for me, it's
like I felt that after three years, I was like,
I'm good. You know, I want to come. I want to,
(10:12):
I want to be I want to say hi to people.
I want to I want to I want I want
to break bread with folks, you know what I mean.
So yeah, plus she had never been here, so never so.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
Yeah, struggle with black people don't realize too, but like
a Hannoyan comes down to Saigon, the accent, the things
are different, right completely. They don't understand each other.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Literally, yeah, literally yeah. And that's the thing with hers,
you know, she she, I'll say this, she has definitely
had issues with that, with that that language, because you know,
they don't first of all, if you don't know anything
about history about Vietnam North and South, they just don't
really like each other, you know. I'm not saying everybody,
(10:52):
you know, but you can see that, you know. And
and so I have friends, Vietnamese friends who are from
the North who've come down here to Ho Chiming and
they're like, they hate it. They absolutely hate it. People
from Saigon go up to the North and Hanoi and
they absolutely hate it, you know. And so it goes
both ways, you know. But you just have to kind
(11:14):
of get used to, you know, get used to Ho
Chi Ming or get used to Hanoi. But I loved
Hanoi because of the seasons.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
For sure, we're here Hanoi, big ship. Did you feel
like obviously you talk about people here being sort of
more open. I would say a big part of it
is that Hanoi is a more traditional conservative place.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
For sure.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
We'll just leave it at that, and Saigon is a
sort of younger, dynamic hustle culture kind of right.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Like Hanoi's like Segon is like yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Yeah, like noise, like business and enterprise oriented versus like
fun you know, rule and conservative culture based hit tradition
and history all that up in annoy. And I love Annoy,
but you do people treat you differently? Is there? Literal
like Okay, I'm finding And this doesn't have to be
just being amazeable. It can also be like the XPAC
(12:05):
community of the thing, right, like like how you get here?
How are you treated? Why you decide? Okay, this is it?
I'm good.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
I like it here, like yeah, I mean Saigon is
is just a very fast paced, never sleep city, you know,
like it's twenty four hours a day here. So that's
that's one thing that's huge than Hanoi. Hanoy. People are
generally sleeping. If you're not in the Old Quarter, everyone's
(12:33):
sleeping by like ten ten thirty, you know what I mean.
So the whole city just shuts down.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Yeah, there's no like three am pizza.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
No, No, only in the Old Quarter, you know. And
I mean how often do us expats go to the
you know, to the Old Quarter or boy Van Street here,
you know, not often, you know, I know, I don't
you know. And so yeah, that was the biggest thing
for me. It was like, Okay, even though I don't
go out that often, I like the option to be
(12:58):
able to go out, you know, and then be able
to go and take my girl on a date. You know,
let's go out and have a good time, let our
air down. You know.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
So what part of Hanoi were you living in? Uh
uh oh you're in Talos. Oh, yeah, I left. The
majority of Tato has changed a lot, It definitely has. Yeah.
So Tao is like West Lake Hanoi. It's there. It's
where the biggest sort of XPAC community is congregated.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
Back like we were talking about earlier back in the day,
like twenty nineteen, that place was bumping. Man, Oh my gosh.
For sure, it's amazing, you.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Know, incredible nightlife, incredible everything.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Like, oh, for sure.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
When I first got here, I was living here, but
I would fly up to High Flung Airport, go climbing
and Catba and then like Landhall Bay and then head
to Hanoi for like, you know, a little bit. Of course,
it's a little night a night out with the climbing
guys and gals before back to Ho Chi Minh and
it was like it was lit. I mean, there are
(13:55):
you know there. It was all my parties and mansions
and all kinds of underground on concerts and everything.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Yeah, people were everywhere.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
So I lived in Mexico for for years, right, speak Spanish,
fluent Spanish speaker. I remember, like this is how I
think of Hanoi back then. One of the first nights
I went out there, I walked into a bar immediately
heard like loud Mexican slang, like real specific dialect, you know,
and so I like, I just like yelled at them
(14:25):
in that like I yelled some, like I yelled some
you know, I said a couple like a couple of
like in their dialect, you know, Like I was like, yo,
what's up your mother? Right? And they were like what me?
And then literally spent eight hours on a binge during
all night party ended up like walking on the railway
tracks with just like me and five five Mexicans, all
(14:47):
speaking like in the local Mexican dialect from where I
learned Spanish, right, And it was just like that could
happen in Hanoi. Then I don't think it does anymore. Never. Yeah, God, that's.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Post nineteen post COVID nineteen eight, it's it's dead.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Yes, quiet, man, it's.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Been quiet, Like I mean, that's probably That's a lot
of the reason why I stopped going out was because
back then it was popping, you know, everybody was here,
you know, and that's where I met a lot of
my friends where it was back then, and of course
I met other people. But yeah, man, after that, everybody's
kind of just like it was.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
You know, the XPAC community in Tailor was huge, but
also there was like the stream of like backpackers and
travelers coming through Hanois at that time felt like massive. Yeah, right,
the same way boy Van. When I first got here,
boy VM felt like one hundred percent foreign ears. And
then by the end of COVID, in a transition to
(15:45):
where if I ever walked by boy Vain, it felt
like one hundred percent Vietnamese people hang out and drinking
like one complete one eighty degree shit.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Yeah, And I'm not saying that's bad, No, that's that's
it's their country, of course. But man, well a lot
of fun with foreigners like this, Vietnam is much more.
It's much funner with foreigners here.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
And what's more cosmopolitan? Right, it's more multicultural?
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Due it was popping, It's pretty I really do miss
those days.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
How have you changed? How has Vietnam changed you?
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Right?
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Like? And you know, I'd like to talk to people
who I feel like really truly live in a place.
Occasionally I talk to people who've recently arrived. But I
mean six years and six years no matter how long
you live, that's a trunk of your life for sure, right,
that's a you're you're ambassador in this country. How's it
changed you? How are you different? How are you different? Man?
Speaker 2 (16:40):
I have peace? Yeah, I mean one, I have peace
of mind. Like that's the biggest thing man for me. Honestly,
I can't put a dollar sign or a dong sign
on that, you know what I mean? Peace? As you know,
as a man, we need peace, you know, we need
peace to keep our minds right. And in the US,
I just couldn't have peace. You know. I had a
(17:03):
weight on my shoulders all the time. You know, I
don't know where it came from. But as soon as
I left, as soon as the plane took off to
go to Europe, and I left all that behind all
that weight and it just it was just I don't
know how to explain it. Ever since then, I've never
(17:24):
felt that.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Honestly, I can't imagine what it's like to actually be
African American and have like that, that weight and that
history behind you. Like. So, one of my best friends
in Toronto is Uganda. But she grew up in Uganda, right,
and she immigrated to Canada. But we're in our thirties.
She moved to Baltimore for a job. Yeah, and it
(17:45):
was I think that's rough. Well, and obviously, again her experience,
her perspective, I don't I can't be in it, you know,
in her mind, in her body. But it was a
real intense, intense experience for her.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
Right, Baltimore is.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Rough, and you know what I say, Like again, I'm
sure moving to Canada from Uganda was also an extremely
intense cultural experience.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Guys.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
But it's welcome people, but it's different, no doubt, it's different. Yeah, okay,
so what well, so, how what is it like to
be a black man? It's like on, like, how do
you move?
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Man? That's a loaded question, you know, being being a
black man in Vietnam is it's a mixed back, you know,
because it's really good because Vietnamese people do want to
accept you know, they want to accept us, you know,
but they're they're curious. I think it's more they're curious
(18:37):
about the brown the brown skin, you know, because they
they think that US people from the West are all white,
which is kind of weird, you know. I don't know
where that comes from. But again, I haven't really had
much difficulties other than like jobs, you know, is they discriminate,
you know, they want the white skin, you know, and
(18:59):
then they pay they pay us less, you know, even
if I'm American, I have the credentials, I've been teaching
for a while, and they still pay us less. So
that's you know, we we as people still have to
to you know, rectify that. But but to be honest, yeah,
I haven't really had much of an issue. No racism,
(19:21):
I'll be honest, No racism whatsoever. I just think that again,
I get people to touch my hair.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
I was gonna say, my friend, my friend issues like yeah,
like she as a woman too. She had man touching
her hair and she was like, I'm not I'm not
okay with that man. Yeah, I like that curiosity okay,
don't touch me, right, which is real?
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, it's real. I mean, but they they'll come and
touch my hair, they'll talk to me if when I
have a beard, they touch my beard, they touch my
skin and they're like, oh, very beautiful. And aka it's
like when the vietname is say oh very beautiful. Either
they really mean it or they are just trying to,
you know, have an excuse to be like you ugly motherfucker.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
You know, you know you're so beautiful, you know, but
I know that. So this is I don't only have
ever talked about this on camera. People touch my kids,
oh okay, and that's part of the culture here. People
touch my kids. People I don't know touch my kids.
Strangers on a bus, on a train, on a plane,
on the street. Yeah, people touch my kids. And that's
(20:25):
not something. My kids, I should say, are Vietnamese, They
Vietnamese passports, they were born here. Because somebody might be
watching for this video the first time they've never seen me,
heard me. So my kid, my wife is from Saigon.
My kids are you know, mixed Vietnamese Canadian. But I
come from a culture where it is not it ain't
don't do that not cool? For people who don't know
(20:46):
to touch your children, right. I have no idea where
that like culture, where that comes from. I mean, I
think there's definitely a different concept of personal space here
for sure.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Man. I've had I've had guys, like multiple guys. I've
had multiple men try to grab my junk.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
That's weird.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
It's weird. Like they'll they'll try to, you know, hey,
you know, tap you on the ass and be like
hey man, you know, like and I'll be like, dude,
what are you doing?
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Bro?
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Like it is not okay, you know. And so you know,
I see a lot of expats. They they'll go, they'll
fight back and foot No, the Vietnamese don't do that. Well, no,
they freaking do that, you know, And you have to
educate them, man, you know, because again we come from
the same culture of like, you don't get into people's
personal space, you know. So that is a problem sometimes.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
You know for me.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
But again because I'm not in people's personal space. You know,
I'm never in people's personal space. They always seem to
come come to me and I'm be like and I
try to you know. It's cool, but.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Not so much. Man. Although uncles, especially in country uncles
will like do they'll do like arm patches and to me,
I've never had anon try and grab my junk here.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
But it's weird. It's really weird, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
I have had a lot of women touch me here.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Yeah, and like.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
You know, just like like why you brought you brushing
me back in the grocery store aisle, you know, a
lot of touching, like a lot of touching. And at
first I was like, is this a come on? Is
it not thing?
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Curious?
Speaker 1 (22:27):
But then there's also like who I was talking to
someone else. I was talking to someone and he was saying,
like and this happens too, where someone just like walk
up and like like post up, like directly in your area, right,
And so that's I mean, that's just real. That's that's
cultural for sure. Okay, so let's roll with the culture thing. Sure,
have you learned any of Yeah, I'm learning.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
How's that?
Speaker 1 (22:50):
How's the language barrier?
Speaker 2 (22:52):
It's huge, It's it's definitely huge. Luckily my fielance, she
speaks Enoup English. I'm I haven't really taken it seriously.
I'm more of the type who hears tones first learned
the vocabulary. So since being here in six almost six years.
I've gotten down the tones. Okay, the tones are okay.
(23:14):
I can hear the difference between north central and south.
I can hear that. Now what are they saying? I
can catch a couple of words right, But I'm just
learning vocabulary at this point, just learning what this, what
this means, what this means. I could read some of
the signs.
Speaker 1 (23:30):
I was to say, we must be the officer kind
of learners, because pretty quickly I learned how to read
manus and signs like when I was driving and stuff.
But I am like tone dah man. I think it's
like it's it's deeper than just being me. It's like
it's a mean problem, like you know with music. I
am off what I'm saying. I'm bad. And I had
(23:51):
gotten to the point after five years here where if
she was speaking slowly and I was really locked in,
I kind of understood. My mother in law kind of
understood my mind really slow, really both focused, locked in.
She speaks zero English, which is interesting. She's in America
right now, she's living there with my brother in so
there's that goes both ways. Right. As soon as we
(24:14):
moved to denand gone right because everything my ear picked
up on was the Psychonese dialect. As soon as I
moved to Denaan, I felt this like crushing psychological blow
of like, oh my god, I'm aut five years. I'm
back to zero. I'm back to goddamn zero, and like
that sucks. And I mean part of it's mental, but
it's like I really felt that way, like truly, you know,
(24:37):
like all right, let's ten me to some other like
like straight up culture shock, things like you know, the
personal space thing, the touching thing, what's something that you
know you got here and you were just like what up?
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Well, the sanitary everything's like it's not the best sanitary place,
you know, clean the place here. The road's full of
tr I mean we come from clean areas, you know.
The air you know, it's not clean, you know, anywhere,
you know, except for the north, the north North. But
(25:11):
even then that's you have China's small coming in, you know.
So yeah, the trash, the big rats running around. I
remember the very first time I came to like, I
probably got here. I was here a day. I went
that same as soon as I landed. I landed at night,
so then I went around my hotel to get a
bang me. Yeah, and it's a sandwich upon me bang
(25:35):
me sandwich. And I remember eating in a little spot
like this and it was I saw a rat that
just ran. It was inside and it was huge. It
was like this, you know, like the bang me you know,
it was like that, you know, and it was inside
and they came out of the kitchen and I just
went like, what the hell is this? Why am I?
(26:00):
You know, like this is you know, and I you know,
since then, I've been like, that's cool. You know. The
rats is fine. They're part of the you know, they're
part of the allure, you know. But at the end
of the day, like, yeah, that was probably the biggest thing,
is the trash. But again, I was traveling the world,
so I kind of knew what to expect as far
as like garbage and cleanliness and everything else. So but
(26:25):
but what really I didn't. I didn't know what Vietnam
looked like. So that was kind of the biggest like
like you know, mind, you know, mind fucking you know,
was like, damn, I Vietnam looks really cool. Actually, you know,
it's built up, you know. And so just like many
people you know, back home, they asked me, like, yo,
(26:45):
do they do they have electricity, Do they have Wi Fi?
Do they have blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
Okay, well that's a good one. Let's talk about that too.
There's also a really exaggerated like rural urban divide here,
for sure. So tell people, you know, just like three
or more things about Saigon that you love about Saigon,
you know why you've chosen to live here, Things that
you didn't expect to have here or whatever find here
that it pleasantly surprised you.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Brother, for sure. So Number one is the weather. I
love the heat. Like when I lived here, I lived here.
This is the second time I've lived here before, I
lived in twenty twenty to twenty twenty one ish, so
almost twenty twenty two, so about a year and a half.
First time, it was way too hot. It was just
(27:31):
way too hot. I remember having ac on twenty four
hours a day. Literally. Now it's cool, it's like pretty moderate,
and you know here, so now the weather's great, it's
even better now. You know, I love this weather. You
know it's it's not so hot. The Bengmese, the Komtam.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
The food. No bro just hopped off a bike and
just both took out the camera, brother, be careful, So
the bang me the weather? About me? What about like
the city? Like you're talking to the architecture.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Yeah, so I'm not a big architecture guy, so I
could care less, you know, as long as we got
electricity and it then following my head, I'm good, you
know what I mean. But yeah, I mean it's cool.
I mean I didn't know what to expect. So the
architecture is cool. But I'm not that. That's not my thing,
you know. I'm more of like, you know, at that time,
I was like the women. You know.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Oh, so let's let's go into that. Yeah, that happened.
I've never pretended I stayed here for any reason other
than the fact that I got married and have kids. Yeah. Yeah,
power to it. I love it. It's the love of
my life.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
But also like that's why I didn't keep going. Yeah,
how is the dating experience? Tell me about you know,
the whole process? Start to finish.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Dayton, Dayton as a black man. You know, it's good.
I'm not gonna lie, you know, so I wo Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
We don't. We don't have to tell you today.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
I'm going super loud.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
Didn't even on main Street.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
It's like this is on the side road to jeez.
So dating as a black man has been it has
its benefits and it has its negatives, right negatives are
you know? They always every time I talk to them,
they're always like, the girls are like this, and I'm like,
at first, I didn't know what that meant. But then
(29:25):
you know, I realized what that meant, you know, and
then so there's that automatically shuts down eighty percent of
the Vietnamese girls straight up period. So so now it's
twenty percent, twenty percent of the of the females here
(29:46):
are you know, they're they're into foreigners, you.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Know, yeah, I think that's foreigners in generally, like eighty
or ninety percent of Vietnamese women don't like, don't date
anyone who's a foreigner, Yeah for sure, right, Like, yeah,
I mean it's such a language barrier.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
For them, it matters more, you know, for them, it
matters more than for us, you know, just because you know,
for them, they're more shy than we are. You know,
I've dated girls who don't even speak any English, and
I've been like, you know, we got to talking and
we're just doing this type of stuff, you know, sign
(30:20):
language and Google Translate, and yeah, it's cool for like
a couple times, but if you're seriously trying to like
go out with someone, yeah, I'm like, bruh, I need
somebody who speaks English, you know, or at least a
little bit of English, you know. I could, I could
deal with that, you know.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
And I think that, Yeah, that's language and culture. Language,
culture food so so close in it. And I'm like,
I mean, there's so many struggles in a relationship as
it is. If you can't even if you have no
shot at communicating with each other in words, you're at
such a huge distance. And I hope too. There's one
of the things I feel is people here and in
(30:58):
general in the world, people are embarrassed about it. Right,
if their English skills aren't good, they're embarrassed about trying
to communicate. Like a lot of people here speak a
small amount of English, will be like reradicent or worried,
I think, shy to speak English because they feel like
I'm not going to say it right, And they don't
realize too, Like I come from a country there's, as
you do, two hundreds of English accents.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
Yeah, right, I've heard a.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Bunch of different Vietnamese accents in Toronto, where I grew
up before. Okay, really, yeah, there's tons of second these there.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Oh, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (31:25):
They all went in seventy five big community.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
So same in San Diego, but.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Also from all over the world, right, and so it's
normal to hear English spoken in lots of different ways
and to just be like whatever, no thing right, But
here it's like there's correct an incorrect, Yeah, for sure,
in different reasons, for sure.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
And I mean, and I think a lot of them
they just we don't care, you know, Like this is
what as a teacher, that's why I tell my students, guys,
we don't really care, you know. Us foreigners don't care
if you make a mistake, you know, like if you
just tried, just it's like if you just try, then
will help you, you know. But the reverse, the reason
(32:06):
why I don't speak Vnmese is because when I do
speak Vinmese, they're like.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Yeah, people literally don't understand it. There's no familiarity. So
like one of the things I say a lot is
that I say like I can I can count to
one hundred and d tomes. That doesn't mean people can
understand me.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
Yeah, and that happens. Well, I mean literally I still
drive up to a gas station and say give me fifty.
They hand over forty. You know what I mean. Let's
talk about how you got your job teaching English. So
you didn't come from a teacher background or teaching this background.
You are obviously an American native English speaker. How did
you get into that? Did you do trainings? You look
(32:46):
for a job before you got here, you know, break
it down.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
So I had my degree already. I'm a business manage
from Major so I had that. I went to online
tessel Tepal course in the UK. It was out of
the UK, and then I just got everything off legalized.
I did. I only I got a job here once
(33:10):
I landed here. So the funny thing is is the
border closed ten days or fourteen days after I got here, right,
And I traveled for about around Vietnam for like maybe
a month and a half like so we were the
borders closed for a month and a half. They opened them.
Then I started traveling up did the Hajseang Loop, the
(33:33):
Hajang Loop, and then for two and a half weeks
after the Hajanng Loop, I went and started looking for
a job because I had to pivot. You know, my
business was not doing good and so yeah, so I
found I found it myself. So I found it myself
and just going on job boards, word of mouth. I
(33:55):
worked with Apex.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
That was the first, the first don't okay, don't work
for Apex if you're coming to get business. Oh they
are okay, Yeah, you got to do. Get in touch
with Alex a Ninja teacher. So he does like an
in person TAFL training here in Ochivan City, or you
can do an online training with him. Either way, just
get in touch with Alex a Ninja teacher, check out
(34:16):
his YouTube channel whatever. He will sort you out and
connect you properly without any of that.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
Apex ounces luckily I got paid though I got paid.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Yeah, good, good to do that. So obviously then teaching
is a great way to get a long term visa
to actually end up saying any kind of work, or
if you're engaged, now you get married another option that
the TRC can't wait. Yeah, first the TRC for me,
then the TC spousal. So we're in that same but
we won't talk about visas. What are some just your
like logistic procedural advice. You know, I sell a move
(34:48):
to Vietnam masterclass over anyone watching. It's just like a
basically like a frequently answered questions like how to set
up your banking, how to find an apartment, how do
you know anything you need to do in the first
thirty one hundred and eighty days. What are some of
the things in your first thirty one hundred and eighty
days here you wish somebody had helped you out with, right,
that for someone watching you could help them out with.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Yeah, for sure, that's a really good question, man, because
I tell my audience as well the same things. It's like,
talk to someone, right, even if it's not me, talk
to someone, how not to get scammed, you know, where
not to get scammed and who I can trust? Right,
And as far as like apartments, getting a good rental agent,
(35:33):
good job, a good job, you know, getting a good recruiter,
you know, making sure that you know just to alleviate
all that bs you know.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
And yeah, well, whether it's me or it's Kevin or
at someone else, there's a lot of people. There'sn't a
huge number of cks pass in Vietnam, Yeah, but there's
enough that anything you're worried about doing someone else has
done before, and it's always gonna be worth it to
reach out and ask that person, right for sure.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Don't be shy. I've got to reach out because Vietnam
is it's a crazy animal, you know it is.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
And that all the rules, regulations, expectations, customs may or
may not be enforced, and they're probably totally different than
what you expect anyways, for sure. For how let's give
them a quick little anecdote. How did you find the
great deal in the apartment you're in now that you
seem to love out by the airport? I will walk
us through the process of that.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Well, because I've been here for so long, I know
how to move, you know, I know how to move
and figuratively and literally know how to move, and so yeah,
I just trust my gut. I know exactly how to
what to look for. That's important.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Did you do like an in person search? Are you
on face?
Speaker 2 (36:48):
No? So I was finding it up up in Hanoi,
So we found the place. So luckily, my lady has
some family and friends here, so they so we found
on right, we went on one of these Vietnamese websites.
Probably I don't know how to say that that's the
(37:09):
one that that is lifesaver. Like most of those listings
on there are pretty good, you know what I mean,
They're pretty good. But that's where we found our place.
So we just looked for that place and found it.
Then we had one of her friends come and meet
with the agent before we moved down here. They checked
(37:31):
them out. It was all good. They showed us on
video everything with video called. So it's good to have
someone where you're moving so that they can go and
talk to the agent. I know it sounds like a
ton of work, and it kind of is a ton
of work, but you're going to be much happier in
the long run.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, And I would say if it's your very first
time here, don't sign anything until you've lived in a place.
Do a short term rental first the first month, get
a service department and everything. He's furnished too, right, Yeah,
it's not you can just turn a key and walk. Yeah,
like this literally the place across the street where a
boy Simon Lafty is saying, there's a perfect service livapool apartment,
(38:10):
right and just find it online walker in Yeah, for sure,
amazing man, Thank you so much for coming on the
cost of living in broad Plod Kevin. Where can the
people watching and listening and find you?
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, man, so I do much like my bro, my
brother Evan does here. You know, I have a YouTube channel.
It's called the Story of KT.
Speaker 1 (38:32):
The Story of KT big graphic right.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
And so yeah, yeah, I was. I literally was one
of the first, uh if not the first African American
male that didn't content here. So yeah, man, if you
guys are there looking for cost of living expat life,
you know, travel life throughout and dating, business and English teaching,
(38:57):
that's what I do, man, So I'll teach you guys
how to to basically do what Evan's doing.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
You know, they cannot be underestimated, right, Like, if you're
actually coming here, save yourself time, save yourself money. Man,
there's a lot. It's just you're gonna be overwhelmed, for sure.
You're going to be over So ask for help and
get a bit of help. Because if you have that
help at the start, whether it's someone like us or
a girlfriend or just a local person you meet out
(39:23):
of work or whatever, somebody gonna help you. One hundred
kind people have done it before.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
And the thing is is like I said, if I
wish I had someone like us that I could just
message and say, hey, man, ask a bunch of questions,
set up a consultation with and be like, hey, ask
everything everything you need.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
You know, I had like a great job before I
got here, but they tried to put us in a
terrible apartment. Yeah you know what I mean. Like the
HR was terrible with her visas like everything, you know
what I mean. And it's like the job is great
and it stayed great. I worked there for five years,
but the HR it was terrible at doing these of stuff.
The apartments they tried to put it in were in
a crappy place and twice as much as they should
(40:05):
have met, you know, like all that stuff. That stuff happens.
Speaker 2 (40:08):
You will get scammed here, if.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
Especially in Sagon, in the city especially, I'll.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Say this, you will get scammed here no matter what,
one way or another, You're gonna get scammed. Now talk
to someone so they can alleviate. You know how many
times you get scammed, you know what I mean? So
you get scammed once, that should be enough, right right,
that'll open your eyes. So yeah, listen to this man again.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
They're so pumped about it.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
Glad to have you finally, Yeah, yeah,
What is it like to be a black man? It's like,
(00:01):
go on, like, how did we move?
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Man? That's a loaded question. I can't put a dollar
sign or a dong sign on that, you know what
I mean. We need peace, you know, we need peace
to keep our minds right. And in the US, I
just couldn't have peace. You know. I had a weight
on my shoulders all the time, you know, as soon
as I left, as soon as the plane took off,
and I left all that behind, all that weight trip.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Today, on the cost of Living Abroad, we meet Kevin
from Story of KT and yes, we'll get to how
he met his Vietnamese fiance, but first he sold it all,
left the US and started over in Vietnam.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
This is Kevin's story.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
Well on the cost A broad Pod. Yes, sir man,
I feel like we've been messaging for a while to right,
let's like jump straight into it. What was the moment?
Why did you leave America? When did you know what
was going to happen?
Speaker 2 (00:56):
It's funny you asked that because I knew five years
before I left. You know, I been running a business,
catering business, and I've just been burned out, man, You
know how it isn't building a business and you're just
constantly twenty four to seven on the clock. Man, it
was draining. So I left in twenty eighteen, and I
(01:18):
knew I was finished in twenty eighteen. So yeah, I
just wanted to travel the world. I mean really, I
was thirty five and I'm forty one now, and so
I knew that it was time to leave straight up.
Because rints were getting high in California, and I'm from
San Diego, so rints were getting really high, and I
(01:39):
knew that. I saw the running on the wall today.
Speaker 1 (01:41):
It was a beautiful place. But I passed through very briefly.
I used to live in Mexico, so I went like
overland down from like Chicago, Texas and SunGO. But yeah,
even then, like whenever, that was fifteen years ago, it
was expensive. It's expensive relative to the rest of the
states and the rest of California, yeah, which is already
more expensive than the rest of the world for sure.
So you're living here in Psychon now, you said, which
(02:03):
was like you, I was here for about five and
a half years before I went to the nine. Okay,
what's your cost of living look like here versus home?
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Like?
Speaker 1 (02:12):
For someone who's you know, they've never been to Vietnam.
They maybe they've been to San Diego. Maybe they've just
seen the beautiful postcards. How much like real deal? How
much money you're saving when you move over?
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Honestly? Like like probably sixty percent with I mean, I
don't have to pay nearly any bills. You know. Cool
thing about Vietnam is it's pretty inclusive. You know. So
the rent is inclusive for your WiFi, your water, and
(02:44):
your trash and everything is included. My electricity I pay separate.
That's the only bills I have, So it's cool.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
I had to play like most places here fully furnished,
fully set up like latch key. You walk into the place,
you're good to go.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I choose to those places because I
don't have, you know.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
I don't have You don't have anything out here behind
I don't have anything, you know, But what'd you do
with this sto like follow up question would you do
with this stuff back home? You just go a whole hog.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
You sell everything, sold everything. Yeah so I sold everything
and got rid of everything.
Speaker 1 (03:20):
Yeah, well it should be the loudest interview in history.
But yeah, okay, right, so she got a fully furnished place.
Talking one bedroom studio, which is like, what's the square footage?
Speaker 2 (03:34):
Well, one bedroom. It's not a studio, so it's a
sixty square meter sixty times Yeah, pretty pretty big one bedroom.
It has the cool layout because what I wanted was
in there when we first met and my fiancee we
first moved down here to Chiming, I was living in
Hannoy for three years, and so again i've been in
(03:56):
I've been in Vietnam almost six years, so I I've
seen different apartments and different layouts I wanted, and so
this layout I really wanted. So it's like right by
the airport, so it's literally across the street from the
international airport. It's perfect, it's quiet, and again it's pretty big,
you know.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
So well what do you pay? What's on?
Speaker 2 (04:18):
So I pay nine point five million, which is yeah,
it's super super affordable. Nine point five million, just under
four hundred US dollar. Like I said, that includes basically
everything except for my electricity.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Okay, well let's jump into the other half place then,
So you left the catering job behind food and beverage
back home. How do you make money living abroad? What
do you do?
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Yeah, so I still I own the business. Still, this
is twenty years in the business and I'm an English teacher.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Let's break down the first part first, and how do
you manage to still own the business and operate and
run it from whatever, five thousand miles away down the
side of the world.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Right, yeah, bro, So I have staff that worked for me,
that have been working for me for years, some over
ten years. Again, I've been in business twenty years, so
I started when I was twenty two. And so yeah,
I'm actually bringing that here and I'm going to start
a being It's called Being Service Academy. So yeah, I
(05:24):
want to train bartenders, food and beverage staff in front
of front of house staff so that Biannam can raise
their level of service.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
So we got this is a good one. You love this?
Do you know you know Jimmy's Pizza. No, so, Jimmy's Pizza.
Jimmy's a guy from Boston. He's got a pizza in
D seven one, D one one in D two And
there's a big hot neon sign that our other buddy
gave him the idea for this sign, and it says
it says hot pizza, Cold beer. But the joke is
hot pizza, cold beer, questionable service. Yeah, yeah, but that
(05:58):
is on Jimmy HR. But it's like it's a joke
about Vietnam, right, So, I mean that can definitely catch.
I was in I mean I did close to two
decades and restaurants back home. I did everything, man from
from washing dishes to be an allion cook, to a
prep cook to you know, like guard mons and then
up in the front of house everything. Yeah. Everything, Yeah,
(06:18):
for sure. Fifteen to thirty five years old, on and off,
I was in restaurants.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
It's not so easy, you know, but you got to
be good at that, you know. And that's that's where
my specialty is. You know, I'm all about hospitality. That's
why I love Vietnam because they're super all about hospitality.
You know, Wow, they need help with it, you know.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Then that's I mean demanding might be your spot because
the hotel's up there, right, just thinking of the tourism
and the I mean that it is a high demand,
the demand for service and labor up. And then you
land here twenty nineteen, you head up to hanois romantic, beautiful.
I guess there's some max pots there. There's sort of
like the European axpot scene with the embassy. He's in
(07:00):
the consulates, a couple of international schools. You're like, what
should like walk me through? What's it like for you?
You know, you walk down there, it's twenty nineteen, there's
twenty eighteen, twenty eighteen. I mean, have you been to
South dast Asia before? Have you been to Vietnam before?
Speaker 2 (07:18):
No?
Speaker 1 (07:19):
No?
Speaker 2 (07:19):
So yeah, it was sold everything in sight. I seem
to be twenty nineteen here.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
Yeah, you get off an airplane in LLINOI in twenty nineteen.
I mean, what hits you first? Like, what's the light man?
Speaker 2 (07:29):
So legit was traveling the world, right. I came from
North Africa to Southeast Asia. I was in Tunisia. I
lived in Tunisia for a little bit for about four months.
Then I moved to Morocco. Well, I was traveling in
Morocco and then stayed in Morocco for about a month
(07:50):
and then came over here. It was a completely night
and day, like I couldn't believe what one the rats? Yeah, yeah, huge,
like dog, you know what is that? Dog? You know,
it's like, what's going on? But my first Southeast Asian
country was Thailand, so obviously everybody goes to Thailand first. Yeah.
(08:10):
So I took the train from Thailand down to Malaysiak
So from Bangkok all the way down to basically Penang. Yeah, yeah,
it was rad. It was really rad, you know, first
time I ever did that. Then I came over here
Vietnam and my first stop was here in Ochi Min
and then I went up to Hanoi and then it
was it was nineteen happened, you.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Know, yeah, the COVID happened, lockdown happened.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
I got trapped here and then I saw the Vietnamese people. Man,
I thought they were great, you know, I saw the affordability.
I saw how Vietnam was was coming up. Man, you know,
it was super coming up. And I had never been here,
but I could feel like this country was coming up.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
Traveled affair bit I don't know. I mean I've never
mentioned for today. What do you feel like culturally your
reception and how do you side Hannoy over hoach you Min?
How does it feel? What draws you in about Hannoi?
What's the pull up there? Originally?
Speaker 2 (09:06):
Well, my fiance yeah, yeah, yeah, I met her. Yeah,
I was like, you know, Vietnamese, Vietnamese women are amazing,
you know, but my lady is amazing. Bro. So we
met when we were working together. I loved Annoy because
it was cold. Yes, I just love the fact that
(09:28):
it has seasons. That's why, you know, I'm from San Diego.
We only have hoachum in you know weather, you know,
it's either hot or it's it's raining. You know what
I'm saying. So yeah, when I met her, of course
I had to stay. You know. Yeah, she's annoying for sure,
and shout out to annoy people. But it's completely different
(09:50):
from Saigon here. So yeah, Saigon reminds me of the
US a little bit, you know, where it's more they're
more friendly. Hanoi's people are friendly, but they're just more
like step off me, you know. And for me, it's
like I felt that after three years, I was like,
I'm good. You know, I want to come. I want to,
(10:12):
I want to be I want to say hi to people.
I want to I want to I want I want
to break bread with folks, you know what I mean.
So yeah, plus she had never been here, so never so.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
Yeah, struggle with black people don't realize too, but like
a Hannoyan comes down to Saigon, the accent, the things
are different, right completely. They don't understand each other.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Literally, yeah, literally yeah. And that's the thing with hers,
you know, she she, I'll say this, she has definitely
had issues with that, with that that language, because you know,
they don't first of all, if you don't know anything
about history about Vietnam North and South, they just don't
really like each other, you know. I'm not saying everybody,
(10:52):
you know, but you can see that, you know. And
and so I have friends, Vietnamese friends who are from
the North who've come down here to Ho Chiming and
they're like, they hate it. They absolutely hate it. People
from Saigon go up to the North and Hanoi and
they absolutely hate it, you know. And so it goes
both ways, you know. But you just have to kind
(11:14):
of get used to, you know, get used to Ho
Chi Ming or get used to Hanoi. But I loved
Hanoi because of the seasons.
Speaker 1 (11:22):
For sure, we're here Hanoi, big ship. Did you feel
like obviously you talk about people here being sort of
more open. I would say a big part of it
is that Hanoi is a more traditional conservative place.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
For sure.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
We'll just leave it at that, and Saigon is a
sort of younger, dynamic hustle culture kind of right.
Speaker 2 (11:41):
Like Hanoi's like Segon is like yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Yeah, like noise, like business and enterprise oriented versus like
fun you know, rule and conservative culture based hit tradition
and history all that up in annoy. And I love Annoy,
but you do people treat you differently? Is there? Literal
like Okay, I'm finding And this doesn't have to be
just being amazeable. It can also be like the XPAC
(12:05):
community of the thing, right, like like how you get here?
How are you treated? Why you decide? Okay, this is it?
I'm good.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
I like it here, like yeah, I mean Saigon is
is just a very fast paced, never sleep city, you know,
like it's twenty four hours a day here. So that's
that's one thing that's huge than Hanoi. Hanoy. People are
generally sleeping. If you're not in the Old Quarter, everyone's
(12:33):
sleeping by like ten ten thirty, you know what I mean.
So the whole city just shuts down.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
Yeah, there's no like three am pizza.
Speaker 2 (12:38):
No, No, only in the Old Quarter, you know. And
I mean how often do us expats go to the
you know, to the Old Quarter or boy Van Street here,
you know, not often, you know, I know, I don't
you know. And so yeah, that was the biggest thing
for me. It was like, Okay, even though I don't
go out that often, I like the option to be
(12:58):
able to go out, you know, and then be able
to go and take my girl on a date. You know,
let's go out and have a good time, let our
air down. You know.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
So what part of Hanoi were you living in? Uh
uh oh you're in Talos. Oh, yeah, I left. The
majority of Tato has changed a lot, It definitely has. Yeah.
So Tao is like West Lake Hanoi. It's there. It's
where the biggest sort of XPAC community is congregated.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
Back like we were talking about earlier back in the day,
like twenty nineteen, that place was bumping. Man, Oh my gosh.
For sure, it's amazing, you.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Know, incredible nightlife, incredible everything.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Like, oh, for sure.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
When I first got here, I was living here, but
I would fly up to High Flung Airport, go climbing
and Catba and then like Landhall Bay and then head
to Hanoi for like, you know, a little bit. Of course,
it's a little night a night out with the climbing
guys and gals before back to Ho Chi Minh and
it was like it was lit. I mean, there are
(13:55):
you know there. It was all my parties and mansions
and all kinds of underground on concerts and everything.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
Yeah, people were everywhere.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
So I lived in Mexico for for years, right, speak Spanish,
fluent Spanish speaker. I remember, like this is how I
think of Hanoi back then. One of the first nights
I went out there, I walked into a bar immediately
heard like loud Mexican slang, like real specific dialect, you know,
and so I like, I just like yelled at them
(14:25):
in that like I yelled some, like I yelled some
you know, I said a couple like a couple of
like in their dialect, you know, Like I was like, yo,
what's up your mother? Right? And they were like what me?
And then literally spent eight hours on a binge during
all night party ended up like walking on the railway
tracks with just like me and five five Mexicans, all
(14:47):
speaking like in the local Mexican dialect from where I
learned Spanish, right, And it was just like that could
happen in Hanoi. Then I don't think it does anymore. Never. Yeah, God, that's.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Post nineteen post COVID nineteen eight, it's it's dead.
Speaker 1 (15:01):
Yes, quiet, man, it's.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Been quiet, Like I mean, that's probably That's a lot
of the reason why I stopped going out was because
back then it was popping, you know, everybody was here,
you know, and that's where I met a lot of
my friends where it was back then, and of course
I met other people. But yeah, man, after that, everybody's
kind of just like it was.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
You know, the XPAC community in Tailor was huge, but
also there was like the stream of like backpackers and
travelers coming through Hanois at that time felt like massive. Yeah, right,
the same way boy Van. When I first got here,
boy VM felt like one hundred percent foreign ears. And
then by the end of COVID, in a transition to
(15:45):
where if I ever walked by boy Vain, it felt
like one hundred percent Vietnamese people hang out and drinking
like one complete one eighty degree shit.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Yeah, And I'm not saying that's bad, No, that's that's
it's their country, of course. But man, well a lot
of fun with foreigners like this, Vietnam is much more.
It's much funner with foreigners here.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
And what's more cosmopolitan? Right, it's more multicultural?
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Due it was popping, It's pretty I really do miss
those days.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
How have you changed? How has Vietnam changed you?
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Right?
Speaker 1 (16:23):
Like? And you know, I'd like to talk to people
who I feel like really truly live in a place.
Occasionally I talk to people who've recently arrived. But I
mean six years and six years no matter how long
you live, that's a trunk of your life for sure, right,
that's a you're you're ambassador in this country. How's it
changed you? How are you different? How are you different? Man?
Speaker 2 (16:40):
I have peace? Yeah, I mean one, I have peace
of mind. Like that's the biggest thing man for me. Honestly,
I can't put a dollar sign or a dong sign
on that, you know what I mean? Peace? As you know,
as a man, we need peace, you know, we need
peace to keep our minds right. And in the US,
I just couldn't have peace. You know. I had a
(17:03):
weight on my shoulders all the time. You know, I
don't know where it came from. But as soon as
I left, as soon as the plane took off to
go to Europe, and I left all that behind all
that weight and it just it was just I don't
know how to explain it. Ever since then, I've never
(17:24):
felt that.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Honestly, I can't imagine what it's like to actually be
African American and have like that, that weight and that
history behind you. Like. So, one of my best friends
in Toronto is Uganda. But she grew up in Uganda, right,
and she immigrated to Canada. But we're in our thirties.
She moved to Baltimore for a job. Yeah, and it
(17:45):
was I think that's rough. Well, and obviously, again her experience,
her perspective, I don't I can't be in it, you know,
in her mind, in her body. But it was a
real intense, intense experience for her.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
Right, Baltimore is.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Rough, and you know what I say, Like again, I'm
sure moving to Canada from Uganda was also an extremely
intense cultural experience.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Guys.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
But it's welcome people, but it's different, no doubt, it's different. Yeah, okay,
so what well, so, how what is it like to
be a black man? It's like on, like, how do
you move?
Speaker 2 (18:17):
Man? That's a loaded question, you know, being being a
black man in Vietnam is it's a mixed back, you know,
because it's really good because Vietnamese people do want to
accept you know, they want to accept us, you know,
but they're they're curious. I think it's more they're curious
(18:37):
about the brown the brown skin, you know, because they
they think that US people from the West are all white,
which is kind of weird, you know. I don't know
where that comes from. But again, I haven't really had
much difficulties other than like jobs, you know, is they discriminate,
you know, they want the white skin, you know, and
(18:59):
then they pay they pay us less, you know, even
if I'm American, I have the credentials, I've been teaching
for a while, and they still pay us less. So
that's you know, we we as people still have to
to you know, rectify that. But but to be honest, yeah,
I haven't really had much of an issue. No racism,
(19:21):
I'll be honest, No racism whatsoever. I just think that again,
I get people to touch my hair.
Speaker 1 (19:28):
I was gonna say, my friend, my friend issues like yeah,
like she as a woman too. She had man touching
her hair and she was like, I'm not I'm not
okay with that man. Yeah, I like that curiosity okay,
don't touch me, right, which is real?
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yeah, it's real. I mean, but they they'll come and
touch my hair, they'll talk to me if when I
have a beard, they touch my beard, they touch my
skin and they're like, oh, very beautiful. And aka it's
like when the vietname is say oh very beautiful. Either
they really mean it or they are just trying to,
you know, have an excuse to be like you ugly motherfucker.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
You know, you know you're so beautiful, you know, but
I know that. So this is I don't only have
ever talked about this on camera. People touch my kids,
oh okay, and that's part of the culture here. People
touch my kids. People I don't know touch my kids.
Strangers on a bus, on a train, on a plane,
on the street. Yeah, people touch my kids. And that's
(20:25):
not something. My kids, I should say, are Vietnamese, They
Vietnamese passports, they were born here. Because somebody might be
watching for this video the first time they've never seen me,
heard me. So my kid, my wife is from Saigon.
My kids are you know, mixed Vietnamese Canadian. But I
come from a culture where it is not it ain't
don't do that not cool? For people who don't know
(20:46):
to touch your children, right. I have no idea where
that like culture, where that comes from. I mean, I
think there's definitely a different concept of personal space here
for sure.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Man. I've had I've had guys, like multiple guys. I've
had multiple men try to grab my junk.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
That's weird.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
It's weird. Like they'll they'll try to, you know, hey,
you know, tap you on the ass and be like
hey man, you know, like and I'll be like, dude,
what are you doing?
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Bro?
Speaker 2 (21:17):
Like it is not okay, you know. And so you know,
I see a lot of expats. They they'll go, they'll
fight back and foot No, the Vietnamese don't do that. Well, no,
they freaking do that, you know, And you have to
educate them, man, you know, because again we come from
the same culture of like, you don't get into people's
personal space, you know. So that is a problem sometimes.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
You know for me.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
But again because I'm not in people's personal space. You know,
I'm never in people's personal space. They always seem to
come come to me and I'm be like and I
try to you know. It's cool, but.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
Not so much. Man. Although uncles, especially in country uncles
will like do they'll do like arm patches and to me,
I've never had anon try and grab my junk here.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
But it's weird. It's really weird, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
I have had a lot of women touch me here.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Yeah, and like.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
You know, just like like why you brought you brushing
me back in the grocery store aisle, you know, a
lot of touching, like a lot of touching. And at
first I was like, is this a come on? Is
it not thing?
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Curious?
Speaker 1 (22:27):
But then there's also like who I was talking to
someone else. I was talking to someone and he was saying,
like and this happens too, where someone just like walk
up and like like post up, like directly in your area, right,
And so that's I mean, that's just real. That's that's
cultural for sure. Okay, so let's roll with the culture thing. Sure,
have you learned any of Yeah, I'm learning.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
How's that?
Speaker 1 (22:50):
How's the language barrier?
Speaker 2 (22:52):
It's huge, It's it's definitely huge. Luckily my fielance, she
speaks Enoup English. I'm I haven't really taken it seriously.
I'm more of the type who hears tones first learned
the vocabulary. So since being here in six almost six years.
I've gotten down the tones. Okay, the tones are okay.
(23:14):
I can hear the difference between north central and south.
I can hear that. Now what are they saying? I
can catch a couple of words right, But I'm just
learning vocabulary at this point, just learning what this, what
this means, what this means. I could read some of
the signs.
Speaker 1 (23:30):
I was to say, we must be the officer kind
of learners, because pretty quickly I learned how to read
manus and signs like when I was driving and stuff.
But I am like tone dah man. I think it's
like it's it's deeper than just being me. It's like
it's a mean problem, like you know with music. I
am off what I'm saying. I'm bad. And I had
(23:51):
gotten to the point after five years here where if
she was speaking slowly and I was really locked in,
I kind of understood. My mother in law kind of
understood my mind really slow, really both focused, locked in.
She speaks zero English, which is interesting. She's in America
right now, she's living there with my brother in so
there's that goes both ways. Right. As soon as we
(24:14):
moved to denand gone right because everything my ear picked
up on was the Psychonese dialect. As soon as I
moved to Denaan, I felt this like crushing psychological blow
of like, oh my god, I'm aut five years. I'm
back to zero. I'm back to goddamn zero, and like
that sucks. And I mean part of it's mental, but
it's like I really felt that way, like truly, you know,
(24:37):
like all right, let's ten me to some other like
like straight up culture shock, things like you know, the
personal space thing, the touching thing, what's something that you
know you got here and you were just like what up?
Speaker 2 (24:50):
Well, the sanitary everything's like it's not the best sanitary place,
you know, clean the place here. The road's full of
tr I mean we come from clean areas, you know.
The air you know, it's not clean, you know, anywhere,
you know, except for the north, the north North. But
(25:11):
even then that's you have China's small coming in, you know.
So yeah, the trash, the big rats running around. I
remember the very first time I came to like, I
probably got here. I was here a day. I went
that same as soon as I landed. I landed at night,
so then I went around my hotel to get a
bang me. Yeah, and it's a sandwich upon me bang
(25:35):
me sandwich. And I remember eating in a little spot
like this and it was I saw a rat that
just ran. It was inside and it was huge. It
was like this, you know, like the bang me you know,
it was like that, you know, and it was inside
and they came out of the kitchen and I just
went like, what the hell is this? Why am I?
(26:00):
You know, like this is you know, and I you know,
since then, I've been like, that's cool. You know. The
rats is fine. They're part of the you know, they're
part of the allure, you know. But at the end
of the day, like, yeah, that was probably the biggest thing,
is the trash. But again, I was traveling the world,
so I kind of knew what to expect as far
as like garbage and cleanliness and everything else. So but
(26:25):
but what really I didn't. I didn't know what Vietnam
looked like. So that was kind of the biggest like
like you know, mind, you know, mind fucking you know,
was like, damn, I Vietnam looks really cool. Actually, you know,
it's built up, you know. And so just like many
people you know, back home, they asked me, like, yo,
(26:45):
do they do they have electricity, Do they have Wi Fi?
Do they have blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
Okay, well that's a good one. Let's talk about that too.
There's also a really exaggerated like rural urban divide here,
for sure. So tell people, you know, just like three
or more things about Saigon that you love about Saigon,
you know why you've chosen to live here, Things that
you didn't expect to have here or whatever find here
that it pleasantly surprised you.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Brother, for sure. So Number one is the weather. I
love the heat. Like when I lived here, I lived here.
This is the second time I've lived here before, I
lived in twenty twenty to twenty twenty one ish, so
almost twenty twenty two, so about a year and a half.
First time, it was way too hot. It was just
(27:31):
way too hot. I remember having ac on twenty four
hours a day. Literally. Now it's cool, it's like pretty moderate,
and you know here, so now the weather's great, it's
even better now. You know, I love this weather. You
know it's it's not so hot. The Bengmese, the Komtam.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
The food. No bro just hopped off a bike and
just both took out the camera, brother, be careful, So
the bang me the weather? About me? What about like
the city? Like you're talking to the architecture.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Yeah, so I'm not a big architecture guy, so I
could care less, you know, as long as we got
electricity and it then following my head, I'm good, you
know what I mean. But yeah, I mean it's cool.
I mean I didn't know what to expect. So the
architecture is cool. But I'm not that. That's not my thing,
you know. I'm more of like, you know, at that time,
I was like the women. You know.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Oh, so let's let's go into that. Yeah, that happened.
I've never pretended I stayed here for any reason other
than the fact that I got married and have kids. Yeah. Yeah,
power to it. I love it. It's the love of
my life.
Speaker 2 (28:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
But also like that's why I didn't keep going. Yeah,
how is the dating experience? Tell me about you know,
the whole process? Start to finish.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Dayton, Dayton as a black man. You know, it's good.
I'm not gonna lie, you know, so I wo Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
We don't. We don't have to tell you today.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
I'm going super loud.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
Didn't even on main Street.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
It's like this is on the side road to jeez.
So dating as a black man has been it has
its benefits and it has its negatives, right negatives are
you know? They always every time I talk to them,
they're always like, the girls are like this, and I'm like,
at first, I didn't know what that meant. But then
(29:25):
you know, I realized what that meant, you know, and
then so there's that automatically shuts down eighty percent of
the Vietnamese girls straight up period. So so now it's
twenty percent, twenty percent of the of the females here
(29:46):
are you know, they're they're into foreigners, you.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Know, yeah, I think that's foreigners in generally, like eighty
or ninety percent of Vietnamese women don't like, don't date
anyone who's a foreigner, Yeah for sure, right, Like, yeah,
I mean it's such a language barrier.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
For them, it matters more, you know, for them, it
matters more than for us, you know, just because you know,
for them, they're more shy than we are. You know,
I've dated girls who don't even speak any English, and
I've been like, you know, we got to talking and
we're just doing this type of stuff, you know, sign
(30:20):
language and Google Translate, and yeah, it's cool for like
a couple times, but if you're seriously trying to like
go out with someone, yeah, I'm like, bruh, I need
somebody who speaks English, you know, or at least a
little bit of English, you know. I could, I could
deal with that, you know.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
And I think that, Yeah, that's language and culture. Language,
culture food so so close in it. And I'm like,
I mean, there's so many struggles in a relationship as
it is. If you can't even if you have no
shot at communicating with each other in words, you're at
such a huge distance. And I hope too. There's one
of the things I feel is people here and in
(30:58):
general in the world, people are embarrassed about it. Right,
if their English skills aren't good, they're embarrassed about trying
to communicate. Like a lot of people here speak a
small amount of English, will be like reradicent or worried,
I think, shy to speak English because they feel like
I'm not going to say it right, And they don't
realize too, Like I come from a country there's, as
you do, two hundreds of English accents.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
Yeah, right, I've heard a.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Bunch of different Vietnamese accents in Toronto, where I grew
up before. Okay, really, yeah, there's tons of second these there.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
Oh, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (31:25):
They all went in seventy five big community.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
So same in San Diego, but.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Also from all over the world, right, and so it's
normal to hear English spoken in lots of different ways
and to just be like whatever, no thing right, But
here it's like there's correct an incorrect, Yeah, for sure,
in different reasons, for sure.
Speaker 2 (31:42):
And I mean, and I think a lot of them
they just we don't care, you know, Like this is
what as a teacher, that's why I tell my students, guys,
we don't really care, you know. Us foreigners don't care
if you make a mistake, you know, like if you
just tried, just it's like if you just try, then
will help you, you know. But the reverse, the reason
(32:06):
why I don't speak Vnmese is because when I do
speak Vinmese, they're like.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Yeah, people literally don't understand it. There's no familiarity. So
like one of the things I say a lot is
that I say like I can I can count to
one hundred and d tomes. That doesn't mean people can
understand me.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1 (32:25):
Yeah, and that happens. Well, I mean literally I still
drive up to a gas station and say give me fifty.
They hand over forty. You know what I mean. Let's
talk about how you got your job teaching English. So
you didn't come from a teacher background or teaching this background.
You are obviously an American native English speaker. How did
you get into that? Did you do trainings? You look
(32:46):
for a job before you got here, you know, break
it down.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
So I had my degree already. I'm a business manage
from Major so I had that. I went to online
tessel Tepal course in the UK. It was out of
the UK, and then I just got everything off legalized.
I did. I only I got a job here once
(33:10):
I landed here. So the funny thing is is the
border closed ten days or fourteen days after I got here, right,
And I traveled for about around Vietnam for like maybe
a month and a half like so we were the
borders closed for a month and a half. They opened them.
Then I started traveling up did the Hajseang Loop, the
(33:33):
Hajang Loop, and then for two and a half weeks
after the Hajanng Loop, I went and started looking for
a job because I had to pivot. You know, my
business was not doing good and so yeah, so I
found I found it myself. So I found it myself
and just going on job boards, word of mouth. I
(33:55):
worked with Apex.
Speaker 1 (33:56):
That was the first, the first don't okay, don't work
for Apex if you're coming to get business. Oh they
are okay, Yeah, you got to do. Get in touch
with Alex a Ninja teacher. So he does like an
in person TAFL training here in Ochivan City, or you
can do an online training with him. Either way, just
get in touch with Alex a Ninja teacher, check out
(34:16):
his YouTube channel whatever. He will sort you out and
connect you properly without any of that.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
Apex ounces luckily I got paid though I got paid.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Yeah, good, good to do that. So obviously then teaching
is a great way to get a long term visa
to actually end up saying any kind of work, or
if you're engaged, now you get married another option that
the TRC can't wait. Yeah, first the TRC for me,
then the TC spousal. So we're in that same but
we won't talk about visas. What are some just your
like logistic procedural advice. You know, I sell a move
(34:48):
to Vietnam masterclass over anyone watching. It's just like a
basically like a frequently answered questions like how to set
up your banking, how to find an apartment, how do
you know anything you need to do in the first
thirty one hundred and eighty days. What are some of
the things in your first thirty one hundred and eighty
days here you wish somebody had helped you out with, right,
that for someone watching you could help them out with.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Yeah, for sure, that's a really good question, man, because
I tell my audience as well the same things. It's like,
talk to someone, right, even if it's not me, talk
to someone, how not to get scammed, you know, where
not to get scammed and who I can trust? Right,
And as far as like apartments, getting a good rental agent,
(35:33):
good job, a good job, you know, getting a good recruiter,
you know, making sure that you know just to alleviate
all that bs you know.
Speaker 1 (35:45):
And yeah, well, whether it's me or it's Kevin or
at someone else, there's a lot of people. There'sn't a
huge number of cks pass in Vietnam, Yeah, but there's
enough that anything you're worried about doing someone else has
done before, and it's always gonna be worth it to
reach out and ask that person, right for sure.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Don't be shy. I've got to reach out because Vietnam
is it's a crazy animal, you know it is.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
And that all the rules, regulations, expectations, customs may or
may not be enforced, and they're probably totally different than
what you expect anyways, for sure. For how let's give
them a quick little anecdote. How did you find the
great deal in the apartment you're in now that you
seem to love out by the airport? I will walk
us through the process of that.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Well, because I've been here for so long, I know
how to move, you know, I know how to move
and figuratively and literally know how to move, and so yeah,
I just trust my gut. I know exactly how to
what to look for. That's important.
Speaker 1 (36:46):
Did you do like an in person search? Are you
on face?
Speaker 2 (36:48):
No? So I was finding it up up in Hanoi,
So we found the place. So luckily, my lady has
some family and friends here, so they so we found
on right, we went on one of these Vietnamese websites.
Probably I don't know how to say that that's the
(37:09):
one that that is lifesaver. Like most of those listings
on there are pretty good, you know what I mean,
They're pretty good. But that's where we found our place.
So we just looked for that place and found it.
Then we had one of her friends come and meet
with the agent before we moved down here. They checked
(37:31):
them out. It was all good. They showed us on
video everything with video called. So it's good to have
someone where you're moving so that they can go and
talk to the agent. I know it sounds like a
ton of work, and it kind of is a ton
of work, but you're going to be much happier in
the long run.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, And I would say if it's your very first
time here, don't sign anything until you've lived in a place.
Do a short term rental first the first month, get
a service department and everything. He's furnished too, right, Yeah,
it's not you can just turn a key and walk. Yeah,
like this literally the place across the street where a
boy Simon Lafty is saying, there's a perfect service livapool apartment,
(38:10):
right and just find it online walker in Yeah, for sure,
amazing man, Thank you so much for coming on the
cost of living in broad Plod Kevin. Where can the
people watching and listening and find you?
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, man, so I do much like my bro, my
brother Evan does here. You know, I have a YouTube channel.
It's called the Story of KT.
Speaker 1 (38:32):
The Story of KT big graphic right.
Speaker 2 (38:36):
And so yeah, yeah, I was. I literally was one
of the first, uh if not the first African American
male that didn't content here. So yeah, man, if you
guys are there looking for cost of living expat life,
you know, travel life throughout and dating, business and English teaching,
(38:57):
that's what I do, man, So I'll teach you guys
how to to basically do what Evan's doing.
Speaker 1 (39:02):
You know, they cannot be underestimated, right, Like, if you're
actually coming here, save yourself time, save yourself money. Man,
there's a lot. It's just you're gonna be overwhelmed, for sure.
You're going to be over So ask for help and
get a bit of help. Because if you have that
help at the start, whether it's someone like us or
a girlfriend or just a local person you meet out
(39:23):
of work or whatever, somebody gonna help you. One hundred
kind people have done it before.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
And the thing is is like I said, if I
wish I had someone like us that I could just
message and say, hey, man, ask a bunch of questions,
set up a consultation with and be like, hey, ask
everything everything you need.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
You know, I had like a great job before I
got here, but they tried to put us in a
terrible apartment. Yeah you know what I mean. Like the
HR was terrible with her visas like everything, you know
what I mean. And it's like the job is great
and it stayed great. I worked there for five years,
but the HR it was terrible at doing these of stuff.
The apartments they tried to put it in were in
a crappy place and twice as much as they should
(40:05):
have met, you know, like all that stuff. That stuff happens.
Speaker 2 (40:08):
You will get scammed here, if.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
Especially in Sagon, in the city especially, I'll.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Say this, you will get scammed here no matter what,
one way or another, You're gonna get scammed. Now talk
to someone so they can alleviate. You know how many
times you get scammed, you know what I mean? So
you get scammed once, that should be enough, right right,
that'll open your eyes. So yeah, listen to this man again.
Speaker 1 (40:33):
They're so pumped about it.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
Glad to have you finally, Yeah, yeah,
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