Loving a Vietnamese girl

Yogi007 wrote:

Sad story Matt, about the girl KIM,

I'm an Aussie and that happened in Western Australia.    Both Kim's and the "husband"  Frank La Rosa have their photos in the WA News. 

If you google La Rosa murder you'll see the article.    He was connected with some very well known criminals and time caught up with him.   The grubs that done it got 37 years.  They were serious underworld figures.

Sad to see a girl mixed up with that.   Unfortunately a bloke Yogi knows was involved in that syndicate and is also looking at "striped daylight" for many years to come.  They never learn.

Just a tip Jim (OP).  Don't get involved with anyone that likes to travel around SE Asian waters on a yacht that can't explain where it came from.

Thanks for that, Yogi! I guess the reason that Kims phone was still receiving calls for a year after her death was so the police could see who her contacts were. Admittedly she was a little bit of a rough diamond, but she didn't deserve to die like that.

Incidentally, Hung the barman at the REX hotel (I must have told this story already, surely), walked int the bar one night at the beginning of his shift wearing his waiters tux and bow tie and, striking a James Bond-like pose, right hand under the lapel of his jacket, announced to the bar patrons: The Names Hung ....... Well Hung!

@Yogi - I just googled the WA press and saw a picture of Kim and Frank Larosa. She had put on a fair bit of weight since I last saw her.

I feel very sad.

Thank you Matt!

Kennethc wrote:

Jim,

What country are you from? Where is home for you? Where in Vietnam do you stay?

I encourage you to put together a wish list on what you REALLY are looking for. Like any relationship in any country the sex and lust fades away after a few years. When Vietnamese women get older, close to 40, their beautiful features change. Then their are still all those very cute younger Vietnamese girls still out there and do not care if you are married - just trying to get your attention. Today at the golf course I had a cute caddie really come on to me and before she left for the day she came in street cloths (not uniform of golf course) to say goodbye to me. She was VERY cute.  With in one hour of me returning home she had connected to me on face book.  So the temptation is to always look at the younger ones forever. hahahhaha

On your list decide if you want future children with her. Decide where you will live. Make sure she likes air conditioning...... it is a nightmare when they start turning off the AC in middle of night. Find out if she is a vegetarian. Find out if she has any medical issue .....ask to see her blue book from medical hospital (they all have them).  Meet all her family members several times.

NEVER put her name on your bank account or your credit cards. DO NOT buy property with her name on it. Do not buy her a motor bike.

Find out what career she wants in her life. Dig deep on this.

Also, don't give her the combination to the safe like a mate of mine did and came home and all the gold and cash was gone.

Colinoscape,    I am American. I have not been to Vietnam yet..... I really just want a lifetime partner....I'm not sure as where to live, I'm thinking nha trang.
..but not sure....my business is a seasonal one so that I was thinking at first living 6 months in vn work 6 mos in America.... Idk there are many things going through my head I guess it's the time of life Im in.... being a single 50 year old male........

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Colinoscape,    I am American. I have not been to Vietnam yet..... I really just want a lifetime partner....I'm not sure as where to live, I'm thinking nha trang.
..but not sure....my business is a seasonal one so that I was thinking at first living 6 months in vn work 6 mos in America.... Idk there are many things going through my head I guess it's the time of life Im in.... being a single 50 year old male........

Well 6 months is a good start to get a feel for how things work.

Well and it allowed me to make money in the states to live in Vietnam. There are two three months Seasons here well maybe one three months the other two and a half months I have the ability to earn about $30,000 per season I should be able to leave the other time in Vietnam pretty comfortably on that I think? What do you think?

colinoscapee wrote:

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Colinoscape,    I am American. I have not been to Vietnam yet..... I really just want a lifetime partner....I'm not sure as where to live, I'm thinking nha trang.
..but not sure....my business is a seasonal one so that I was thinking at first living 6 months in vn work 6 mos in America.... Idk there are many things going through my head I guess it's the time of life Im in.... being a single 50 year old male........

Well 6 months is a good start to get a feel for how things work.

My wife of 43 years and "war buddy" of 46 years happens to be Vietnamese. Who she is and what we have lived through together is what matters. Where she was born is irrelevant.

The important thing is to know and understand the person that you marry and her family before you get married.

Thank you! And I agree with everything you said as you say you are not marrying a nationality but a human  from what I've seen and I don't know near as much as you do about it but I think a lot of the Vietnamese especially small town girl like I am courting at the moment I think they have the ethics and the morals that we had in America in the 1950s I know there are exceptions to this but I really love the Vietnamese people that I have met and talked to both online and in person people who run a couple of Vietnamese restaurants here in my hometown I've got to be good friends with them and I just love the people

They certainly smoke like it's the 50s.

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Well and it allowed me to make money in the states to live in Vietnam. There are two three months Seasons here well maybe one three months the other two and a half months I have the ability to earn about $30,000 per season I should be able to leave the other time in Vietnam pretty comfortably on that I think? What do you think?

Are you saying that you net $60,000? Remember that if you are living in two places, your basics (housing, utilities, insurance, debt payments) won't stop there when you're here.

You should be able to live comfortably in Nha Trang for $1500 or so per month, figuring eating out most meals, renting a hotel room, and having a motor bike. That doesn't include gifts.

Credit cards are mostly useless here and when you can use them, it's often at a 4% premium. Do NOT bring a ton of cash with you. Leave it in your account in the 'States and access it via ATMs. Also ask your financial institution about having a second savings account that is NOT tied to your ATM card. Keep most of the money in the second account and transfer it into the ATM account on-line or via the app when you need it. This way, if someone gets access to your card, most of your money is secure.

Good luck to you.

Hahaha my girl doesn't smoke

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Thank you! And I agree with everything you said as you say you are not marrying a nationality but a human  from what I've seen and I don't know near as much as you do about it but I think a lot of the Vietnamese especially small town girl like I am courting at the moment I think they have the ethics and the morals that we had in America in the 1950s I know there are exceptions to this but I really love the Vietnamese people that I have met and talked to both online and in person people who run a couple of Vietnamese restaurants here in my hometown I've got to be good friends with them and I just love the people

Either we are both preceptive or we are both nuts. I also find many similarities between 1950's America(that I remember very well) and todays Viet Nam. Ten years ago, I was saying the similarities were to 1920's America.

Going back to the late 1960's in rural Viet Nam, at 16 my wife to be, was a border-line, too old to find a husband, spinster.

From my observation, it is still exceptionally difficult for a 30 year old Vietnamese woman to find a Vietnamese husband unless she is very rich and turns a blind eye toward a husbands collection of girl-friends. The fact that us foreigners tend to have higher incomes than the locals is also a plus. Many of us foreigners also tend to respect and admire intelligence and successfulness in women while many Vietnamese men see intelligence and successfulness in women as a threat.

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Hahaha my girl doesn't smoke

Sorry, I was unclear. Very few Vietnamese women smoke; about 95% of the men do.

-JohnD- wrote:

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Well and it allowed me to make money in the states to live in Vietnam. There are two three months Seasons here well maybe one three months the other two and a half months I have the ability to earn about $30,000 per season I should be able to leave the other time in Vietnam pretty comfortably on that I think? What do you think?

Are you saying that you net $60,000? Remember that if you are living in two places, your basics (housing, utilities, insurance, debt payments) won't stop there when you're here.

You should be able to live comfortably in Nha Trang for $1500 or so per month, figuring eating out most meals, renting a hotel room, and having a motor bike. That doesn't include gifts.

Credit cards are mostly useless here and when you can use them, it's often at a 4% premium. Do NOT bring a ton of cash with you. Leave it in your account in the 'States and access it via ATMs. Also ask your financial institution about having a second savings account that is NOT tied to your ATM card. Keep most of the money in the second account and transfer it into the ATM account on-line or via the app when you need it. This way, if someone gets access to your card, most of your money is secure.

Good luck to you.

What works well for me is a "wire transfer" account at a local bank, in my case Vietinbank. When ever you need money call up your American Bank and have them wire the money to the VN bank account. Their are American regulations on foreign bank accounts. I would make sure that the amount in the VN account ever exceeded USD $10,000 and I'd likely limit my $$ transfers to less than $3000.00/ call and $9000.00 per calendar month and/or 30 day period.

Yes that's what she said lol "alot men smoke vn" hehe. I love the broken English Vietnamese women speak to me it's just sexy as hell haha

70 how long have you been living in Vietnam?

jimcantrell65 wrote:

70 how long have you been living in Vietnam?

Pulled into Da Nang Harbor aboard a USN Ship in 1969
1970-1972 USN, mostly down in the Mekong Delta, where I met my wife to be, and toward the end at the USN Nha Be Navy Base near Sai Gon
1972-1974 Stationed in Japan and took leave a few times inThailand for a couple of days after a week or two layover in Viet Nam trying to get my Wife's paper straight and actually got legally married during one of those stopovers in 1973.
1974-15 April 1975 was discharged from the Navy in Japan and returned to Viet Nam. left Sai Gon on the evacuation. We had two children at that time.
1995 spent a couple of weeks in Viet Nam
post 1995, I flat don't remember the details as we were employed/running businesses and raising 6 children, but many times with up to a two year duration, mostly after 2003. The current stay is around two and a half years. We bought a house in Viet Nam in 1997.

I'm guessing that since 1969, I've spent around 10 years here. Add a couple of years in Japan for time in Asia.

In the US as a US/VN family we were involved with the VN community in America.

Note, I did not retire from the Navy. I later joined the Army reserve and later retired as a U.S. Army Sargent

Wow! That's quite a resume and life history. I admire you! I guess for years after the American Vietnamese War Americans weren't welcome in Vietnam? I hope I don't bother you with all these questions but I find it intriguing fascinating. What does a typical day for you in Vietnam entail? What are your daily activities? What kind of social activities do you and your wife like? I hope you don't mind my asking do you eat street food a lot? I bet your wife cooks more than you eat out if I were to guess do you get any fishing done there? Do you have other American friends in the expat community? Or is it mostly Vietnamese people?

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Wow! That's quite a resume and life history. I admire you! I guess for years after the American Vietnamese War Americans weren't welcome in Vietnam? I hope I don't bother you with all these questions but I find it intriguing fascinating. What does a typical day for you in Vietnam entail? What are your daily activities? What kind of social activities do you and your wife like? I hope you don't mind my asking do you eat street food a lot? I bet your wife cooks more than you eat out if I were to guess do you get any fishing done there? Do you have other American friends in the expat community? Or is it mostly Vietnamese people?

Right now, my child-bride is gravely ill and barring an accident, I will almost certainly live for many more years than my wife. Along with help from her family and hired help, I spend my time sustaining my wife's life. Mostly I have lived in Vietnamese communities and have little contact with expats. Our kids are all grown and the youngest is a successful Lawyer.

The War was much more complex than most Foreigners realize and the view of individual Vietnamese varies widely. According to research in the Ha Noi archives and conversations with various people, their was considerable disagreement about peace or war.

To over simplify, Lê_Duẩn was the leader of the War faction and Hồ Chí Minh was the leader of the peace faction. Lê_Duẩn staged a coup and placed Hồ Chí Minh under house arrest and and by punishing Hồ Chí Minh's political allies was able to control what Hồ Chí Minh said in public.

"Hanoi's War" An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam

By Lien-Hang T. Nguyen, available at Amazon. Other serious research on the subject has been published by others

http://uncpress.unc.edu/browse/book_det … le_id=2850

Interesting life, 70!

In 2008 and 9 I travelled the Mekong Delta extensively clearing UXO ahead of seismic surveys. In one place a lady came out of her house on a river bank and asked me if I had come to collect the crashed helicopter that still lay at the bottom of the river, where it  had fallen from the sky during the war.

In another place, we were told that a US ship had rolled over in the river (apparently due to too much deck loading) and had deposited dozens of 500lb bombs in the river.A magnetometer scan of the river bed showed a significant number of ferrous signatures around that point.

At one location I noted that the bomb craters from a bombing raid had deliberately avoided the villages on high ground and all the craters (5 of them) were in the rice fields away from the villages. This seemed to point to two things: 1. Since the craters were in a straight line and equidistant from each other, except for the last two which were twice the distance apart of the rest, the was a UXB where the fifth crater should be. 2. The pilots appear to have deliberately avoided hitting the villages.

In one village it was very clear that an artillery unit had been stationed there as there were stacks 0f 105mm HE projectiles in several places. The local were using some of them as markers for plots of land.

There is a canal that runs from the north of Chau Doc westwards along the border with Cambodia. When the invading Khmer Rouge were chased back into Cambodge by the NVA, they dumped all of their arms and equipment in the canal. Again masses of ferrous signatures confirm the stories that we received from local farmers about these activities  - and the fact that the farmers themselves were in the habit of dumping mortar bombs and artillery rounds in the canal when they were found during ploughing the fields.

Apart from the professionally interesting things I discovered during my time in the Mekong Delta, I was fascinated to find that down in the southeastern areas the language predominantly spoken by the older people was (is) Khmer and not Vietnamese. Also most of the pagodas are decorated with Khmer scripts.

We daily visited many seemingly deserted villages shimmering in a timeless heatwave, that came alive in the evenings with people gathering to drink coffee and tea (and chew betel nut in some places).

for most of my time there, the Mekong was a muddy brown tint, but during the rice harvest the waters became strewn with rice seeds and husks and after that the water turned bright green with some kind of algae.

That period of my life was very fascinating and now that I am here semi permanently I am enjoying life more than I ever did before.

70 years old wrote:

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Wow! That's quite a resume and life history. I admire you! I guess for years after the American Vietnamese War Americans weren't welcome in Vietnam? I hope I don't bother you with all these questions but I find it intriguing fascinating. What does a typical day for you in Vietnam entail? What are your daily activities? What kind of social activities do you and your wife like? I hope you don't mind my asking do you eat street food a lot? I bet your wife cooks more than you eat out if I were to guess do you get any fishing done there? Do you have other American friends in the expat community? Or is it mostly Vietnamese people?

Right now, my child-bride is gravely ill and barring an accident, I will almost certainly live for many more years than my wife. Along with help from her family and hired help, I spend my time sustaining my wife's life. Mostly I have lived in Vietnamese communities and have little contact with expats. Our kids are all grown and the youngest is a successful Lawyer.

The War was much more complex than most Foreigners realize and the view of individual Vietnamese varies widely. According to research in the Ha Noi archives and conversations with various people, their was considerable disagreement about peace or war.

To over simplify, Lê_Duẩn was the leader of the War faction and Hồ Chí Minh was the leader of the peace faction. Lê_Duẩn staged a coup and placed Hồ Chí Minh under house arrest and and by punishing Hồ Chí Minh's political allies was able to control what Hồ Chí Minh said in public.

"Hanoi's War" An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam

By Lien-Hang T. Nguyen, available at Amazon. Other serious research on the subject has been published by others

http://uncpress.unc.edu/browse/book_det … le_id=2850

Very sorry to hear of your wife's illness let us hope for an improvement in her condition. My thoughts are with you and her.

Yes the war was a very complex thing. I gathered that from my travels in S Vietnam and also from the work I did in clearing UXO from a low mountain near Udon Thani in Thailand, where the US Air Force had a munitions drop zone. The mountain was an area where aircraft returning from bombing missions over Vietnam would jettison any remaining ordnance before landing at Udon Thani airport.

What I now find very interesting nowadays though, is that the Communism that we in the West all feared so much and which was the purported reason for the Wests intervention in Vietnam, is actually nothing like the Communism that gripped Russia and the Eastern Europe. Being of Polish extraction, I visited Poland in around 1964 when the ICRC notified us of some relatives living in Poland that had survived the Gulags of Siberia and the concentration camps of Poland and Germany. To say that I found the conditions that the population lived under in Poland at that time "shocking", would be to understate the facts.

Great stuff guy anything like that you would like to add I just love it you've had a quite fascinating life yourself!

I am very sorry 70 to hear about your wife I know that must be very hard! I am happy for you and that you have had a great life together you have a great family and your children are successful. That's what life's about you're in my thoughts and prayers look forward to chatting with you some more

eodmat

Thank you for your kind wishes. Her condition is incurable and terminal. But on the brighter side; she may, if that is her wish and I pray that it is, be sustainable for a period of a few years rather than months or less.

Perhaps the worst of Communism was in Cambodia. I got to see some of that from the Tân Châu Hồng Ngự area. during the war

So very sorry your wife is I'll..
But happy you have had a wonderful life together... Have a great family and successful children! You are in my thoughts and prayers.... I look forward to chatting with you some more I am very social and love making new friends it's one of the Elements of Life that make it worth living

jimcantrell65 wrote:

So very sorry your wife is I'll..
But happy you have had a wonderful life together... Have a great family and successful children! You are in my thoughts and prayers.... I look forward to chatting with you some more I am very social and love making new friends it's one of the Elements of Life that make it worth living

But happy you have had a wonderful life together. So true, it has been really wonderful

Thank you

I found myself pondering the differences in communism and our life here in the United States. In many ways we have become more of a socialist country then some of the socialist countries haha like my lady friend told me about Vietnam if you don't work you go hungry here and United States the government pays a lot of people for being Deadbeats kind of interesting

The best thing to do is get here and see how you feel. If your lady friend starts talking marriage within the first few months, RUN. Don't take advice from guys who sit in a bar all day, as most of them only know what's going on within a radius of 500 mts from the bar they sit in each day. Your best friend is common sense, make sure you use it. I do feel from what you have written that you are quite smitten with this lady even though you have never met her,very dangerous indeed.

colinoscapee wrote:

The best thing to do is get here and see how you feel. If your lady friend starts talking marriage within the first few months, RUN. Don't take advice from guys who sit in a bar all day, as most of them only know what's going on within a radius of 500 mts from the bar they sit in each day. Your best friend is common sense, make sure you use it. I do feel from what you have written that you are quite smitten with this lady even though you have never met her,very dangerous indeed.

Colin is talking good sense here. Follow your logic and common sense rather than emotion when you get to Vietnam.

In my case I knew my wife for four years before moving here full time and lived with her for another two years before making the 100% commitment. So I was very sure of what I was doing - what were were doing I mean.

I now have a situation where I hate to be anywhere without my wife, which means that as far as possible we travel together to wherever I am working. It isn't always possible and the Solomons was a place too far,as was Funafuti. Iran was just too......... I can't say dangerous except that she is somewhat impulsive and will throw her arms around me or kiss me for no other reason that I am close - and she always wants to hold hands - all things that can get you into serious trouble in a place like Iran. And at the time I was there is was quite dangerous for Brits and Americans just to be there.

Anyway, caution - and step by step!

Well and I admit that but I try to temper that with some common sense......I have been unlucky in love and I am quite lonely for female company and attention. But I do appreciate your good advice and though it may not seem like it I do listen and take it into consideration

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Well and I admit that but I try to temper that with some common sense......I have been unlucky in love and I am quite lonely for female company and attention. But I do appreciate your good advice and though it may not seem like it I do listen and take it into consideration

Well listening is what its all about, then making a decision on what you think is right.

I know a guy here years ago who was warned by many people to stay away from a certain girl(ex bar girl) he of course was convinced she had changed. Even his friend of 30 odd years try to tell him, in the end he gained the nickname "no ears" as he just wouldn't listen. Then he found out she was seeing about four guys all throughout Viet Nam, he believed that she was visiting relatives. So finally he lost the plot, she went to the police, he paid a huge fine and a lesson learnt that could of been avoided if he wasn't so damn pig headed.

Sometimes we hear things we don't want to hear, but when it comes from somebody who has resided here for 12 years, it may be worth listening to. Good luck.

colinoscapee wrote:

jimcantrell65 wrote:

Well and I admit that but I try to temper that with some common sense......I have been unlucky in love and I am quite lonely for female company and attention. But I do appreciate your good advice and though it may not seem like it I do listen and take it into consideration

Well listening is what its all about, then making a decision on what you think is right.

I know a guy here years ago who was warned by many people to stay away from a certain girl(ex bar girl) he of course was convinced she had changed. Even his friend of 30 odd years try to tell him, in the end he gained the nickname "no ears" as he just wouldn't listen. Then he found out she was seeing about four guys all throughout Viet Nam, he believed that she was visiting relatives. So finally he lost the plot, she went to the police, he paid a huge fine and a lesson learnt that could of been avoided if he wasn't so damn pig headed.

Sometimes we hear things we don't want to hear, but when it comes from somebody who has resided here for 12 years, it may be worth listening to. Good luck.

I know that it sounds like we are all saying the same thing. And we pretty much are. But, their is absolutely no profit to any of us involved. We've all been in more or less your shoes. I got out easier than a lot of the others because I actually listened to what people told me and did not marry the(American) girl. "Unlucky in love" is pretty well defined as refusing to understanding the woman involved.

Absolutely! Makes sense to me!

Big Jim,

I think that if you weren't deeply concerned in the first place, you never would have asked for advice here.  I say follow your heart and do what you think is best.  If it doesn't work out, well, you will join the ranks.  However, if it does.......................

Thank you brother! No actually I'm not really concerned because if it were fake I will figure that out pretty quickly this is not my first rodeo. But I have learned through the years to get advice and opinions from people who know and who are already there I know there are enough women in Vietnam that this is not the one I believe I will find one I am interested in Vietnam if nothing else as a retirement destination or part-time retirement destination I can't wait to get there and visit and get a feel for Southeast Asia

Jim, relationships can fail anywhere. at the same time successful relationships also exist. you said it yourself that your girl doesn't ask for anything and seems to be independent. judging a good character is your trait, so their really isn't anything to be afraid of in the first place. no reasonable person would be a girl a house after a few dates, unless of course you're loaded and money is no object.

Yes sir that is correct and we have been talking for several months..she asks for nothing and promises nothing...but we are definitely getting more comfortable with each other. We learn about each other's culture she shares pictures and videos of her classroom and students...her vegetable garden ( trees she calls them) her meals she's eating out or cooking ( we both like food) her mom and dad's fruit and coffee trees ( they have 4 hectares) we talk about each other's hopes and dreams. I think she comes from a very good family. Strong Catholic Christians. Her parents go to Daily Mass. She does not she goes to mass once a week but is very spiritual in very moral or at least appears to be could all this be a sham? Possibly but I don't think so if I'm wrong I'm wrong and Life Will Go On but if I don't pursue it I will never know at least in visiting Vietnam and at least getting to know her a little bit face to face I so look forward to the journey

Cossmo, another thing that makes me feel good about her as I have seen her friends(sisters she calls them) warn her about getting too involved too quickly. Of course I have to hit the translation button and read between the lines as it doesn't Translate correctly 100%. But she says to them" don't worry sister I take it slow one step at a time" and one of them said to her" okay sister have fun." Her friends sisters as she calls them are all teachers at the school she teaches at it has 1,500 students and 150 teachers.