~ Le Viêt Nam, aujourd'hui. ~
The Vietnam News

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Go-getting Vietnamese embrace their rat race

HO CHI MINH CITY - At an ultra-chic bar called Nam Kha, a well-dressed woman in her mid- 20s named Tram tells me that she's "stress." She speaks Vietnamese, but switches to English for a word heard often here. There is no equivalent in her language. The closest you can get is "cang thang than kinh" -- tension of the mind. Stress is the latest trend to hit Vietnam from the United States since

At first glance, it seems impossible: Vietnam, after all, is a country full of hard-working young people, and rural life is backbreaking for the majority. Generation after generation has known nothing but sweat and toil. But stress is not a phenomenon of simple hard work. It is a symptom associated with young, upwardly mobile urban professionals in peacetime.

One is "stress," therefore, like Huy Phan, 32, an ad executive for Tien Phong publishing company, an association of lifestyle magazines. This evening at the Nam Kha bar, he loses his voice after talking nonstop for four hours with clients, models and photographers on his expensive cell phone. "It's always like this," Huy complains. "It's my day off, but I never stop working. I'm terribly 'stress.' " Vietnam's upwardly mobile urban young are given to multitasking these days.

Next to Huy, Tram is talking on one phone, ordering a drink, conversing with another friend, and, yes, text messaging on another cell phone -- all at once. "I have a headache almost every night," Tram complains. "I never had this kind of headache until I got my new job." Her new job: overseeing dozens of young saleswomen in a cosmetic company. Huy and Tram are quick to acknowledge they are a privileged group with opportunities that weren't available to previous generations in communist Vietnam.

Just a generation ago, almost everyone had to stand in line to buy rice from government-issued stores, and moving from city to city was a Herculean task that required navigating Vietnam's bureaucracy. These days, young 20- and 30-year-olds like Huy vacation regularly in Thailand and Singapore. Huy has traveled twice to the United States. Tram flies to Thailand every few months to "de-stress." How? "I go shopping," she laughs.

The owner of Nam Kha, on the other hand, says he's not "stress." Duc Phan, 32, one of three partners who own a growing conglomerate of silk stores, restaurants and resorts in Vietnam, is gentle and calm. He tells me his secret. "I have very good managers," he says, smiling and patting the shoulder of a young man standing next to him. "They stress on my behalf." Vietnam is a hot economy, second only to China in terms of growth in Asia, with nearly a 7 percent growth rate annually and a higher rate expected for 2005. Tourism, too, is increasing.

Bob Bannerman, who works for the U.S. Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City, says he has seen a shift toward more economic and political transparency in the last few years. "More and more foreigners are coming in to invest," Bannerman says. "Vietnam wants to be taken seriously now, and there are many smart young people doing amazing things here." But success comes at a price. The newspapers are full of stories of young people who commit crimes of greed.

A story that ran recently in Tuoi Tre, a youth newspaper, is a case in point. A young man seduced a teenage girl, but when his cell-phone business went belly-up, he murdered her and took all her expensive belongings in order to pay back his debtors. Bao Nguyen, 28, a flight attendant who also owns a cosmetic store, says he must constantly purchase expensive new toys to fit in with his business circle. It is a practice among the urban young to place one's cell phone on the table upon sitting down at a restaurant. Everyone then proceeds to check out everyone else's new toy.

"I bought a $500 cell phone, and everyone in my circle has one. So I bought a new one for $1,200, and now I'm respected. It's materialistic, but in my business, you have to do it," says Bao. And yes, he is often "stress." But to "de-stress, he says, "I go to spas and get pampered. It's popular now, even among men." In a 2002 Pew Center, of 44 countries surveyed, Vietnam was the most optimistic. A whopping 98 percent of Vietnamese said they expect their children to be better off.

"Vietnamese are experiencing stress now because life is no longer routine, " says Michael, an American businessman who declined to give his full name and who has lived in Vietnam for three years. "Or rather, new routines must be learned, and learned quickly in a society that's going through enormous transition."

Yet, as someone who speaks fluent Vietnamese, I cannot help but detect a touch of bragging in the familiar complaints of the upwardly mobile. When a Vietnamese says he is "stress," he is also saying, "I'm doing something important, and I'm successful, and this is the price I'm willing to pay for it. " Huy, meanwhile, is buying everyone at the counter a drink. "I just made a big sale. Come on, drink up," he says hoarsely, just as his cell phone starts to ring again.

By Andrew Lam - San Francisco Chronicle - February 13, 2005