.

This internet gaming parlor has about 24 computers, and an hour rental is but 17 cents. The owner told me he used to gross around $100 a day, but now brings in maybe $25. His 28-year-old son and 23-year-old daughter are married, but they and their spouses and kids all stay with him. He has nephews in the US who have invited him to come visit, but he's not interested, "I don't even go to Vung Tau!"

He'd rather send what extra money he has to relatives in Quang Nam, a notoriously poor province in the central, "A million [$43] or five hundred thousand [$21] dongs are nothing to us city folks, but it's a big deal to people in the province, especially if it's an old person."

He also brings his relatives to Saigon and pays for their medical checkups, since there are better doctors in Saigon than in Quang Nam.

He has 10 siblings, and during the Vietnam War, three of his brothers served in the South Vietnamese Army, while four other brothers fought for the Viet Cong. He remembers the 5 O'clock evening curfew imposed by the Americans, "If you went out after that, they'd shoot you!"

After the war, he was drafted and fought for a year, altogether, in Cambodia, "We would go into Thailand to block their supply lines and escape routes. I think it's good to serve in the Army. Every man should know how to fire a gun. During tribal days, you sharpened your spear and killed invaders, and it's no different now. If you invade, I'll kill you, and I'd join the army if there was a war." He's 57.

He believes it's important for a family to eat together, so they do that three times a day. His married daughter is actually taking university classes, so he takes her there, and back, on his motorbike, because his reaction and decision making in traffic is better than her, he believes, "I will always see my children as little kids."



.