.

Dinner tonight at Mr. Hĩnh's, shown here shirtless. He's a housepainter mostly, but also a fisherman. His wife works at our plastic recycling plant and as a farm laborer. Mr. Hĩnh drinks way too much, way too often and, worse, he's always pressing you to drink too.

In Ea Kly for nearly 40 years, Mr. Hĩnh was among the first Vietnamese to settle here. He told me about stealing fruits and maniocs from the Rade to avoid starvation. Now, he has a reasonably spacious house.

I didn't want to drink rice wine any more, so I went to lie down on the hard couch in his living room. With the door and windows open, a few insects flew in, attracted by the lights. One kept bouncing against the concrete walls and tin ceiling, and he had to be super well built, for he kept making this very hard sound with each hit. Like a pinball, this bug kept bouncing around the room, so should he hit me, I thought, I would be the one injured!



.