VIETNAM GREEN BUILDING COUNCIL

In the United States alone, buildings account for: 

- 65% of electricity consumption

- 36% of energy use

  - 39% of greenhouse gas emissions

- 30% of raw materials use

- 30% of waste output and

- 12% of potable water consumption

The United States Green Building Council and its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification program have been in the back of my head recently. 

A couple of weeks ago, I attended a going away party at the US Consulate in Saigon for an officer who was jumping ship and heading to Iraq. Although his station is in a northern territory and his job scope is primarily logistical work, moving to a war zone is ballsy. You either have huge cojones or work for The Company to make that decision.

I got into a conversation with the guest of honor, and we were chatting about how the US Government reclaimed most all of its pre-1975 land holdings when it reestablished relations with Vietnam in the 90s. (A little birdy informs us that the French Embassy used to be property of the USA.) The consulate compound in Saigon was one of the properties, however, that it did get back. But of particular interest, he mentioned that he was clearing off his desk and passing off unfinished projects, one of which concerns a plot of land in HCMC to be developed for residential purposes.  

The building will be a residential property with about 10% of the apts reserved for the consulate. The State Department intends to work with a private developer to build and finance the project and offer the remaining 90% of the units to the developer to sell as Grade-A condos. Ultimately, the handful of developer bids will go to congress for final selection. 

I asked the officer about whether or not the new building would be required to meet a LEED Silver Rating per its energy consumption as required for all new federal buildings after the enactment of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. His comment was that security is usually the primary concern of federal buildings outside the motherland and that, to his knowledge, there were no LEED buildings maintained by the State Department outside the United States. 

However, for this project, the primary use is not for the State Department, and therefore, security is not the ultimate concern. Considering that green buildings hit the trendy high road years ago, wouldn't a developer's proposal that touted a LEED certification appeal to the statesmen on Capitol Hill?

I saw news headlines in the making and passed this intel along to a prominent residential developer here in Vietnam, but the prospect fell on deaf ears. Ultimately, people are all about the Benjamins, and from a developers perspective, why would they want to spend more on construction and upfront consultancy fees, in the form of a LEED certified architect, when their exit strategy is to sell, therefore forgoing with any recouped costs achieved through reduced energy consumption. The tenants get the reduced bills, not the developers. 

Ok. So what it boils down to in this scenario is the classic tale of economics: supply and demand. If consumers want it, the market will deliver it. And if more people watched Gore's Oscar winning powerpoint presentation, the demand for green buildings would surely outstrip supply.

But to present the facts and figures specific to Vietnam's nascent green building demand, please allow me to point you to CBRE's "Vietnam is Ripe for Green" presentation delivered by Marc Townsend, known for his rapturous speeches, and a "2008 Green Buildings Market Report", delivered by Thor Kerr of BCI Asia at the Futurac Conference in March.

Oh, and there already is a LEED Certified building outside the US, and it belongs to the State Department. Congratulations Bulgaria. 

Gulliver's Travels

We seem to be all about The Economist as of late and suggest you get savvy to the pub's travel blog for highbrow coverage of the dirty business that is travel.  

So far the punters are heavy on the airline industry, but with links to interactive data charts like the Chicago Tribune's "Survival of the Fittest" graph, we've hit pay dirt. 

THE POP UP

This just in: A guerilla retail store in NYC debuts "Made in HK," a collection of independent designers from the former British outpost.  

Innovations in retail are necessary to keep the attention of us finicky consumers. Unsatisfied with the simple window treatment change, the industry invented the pop-up shop. The sole strategy of said stores is to create demand through impermanence. What is here today will be gone tomorrow. Delta Airline's Song and Target  both made wakes in '04 with successful pop-up campaigns in New York. Other luxury brands like Comme des Garcons have taken the concept mobile with a roaming store that hits major capital cities around the globe. Even Wired magazine gets in on the game with an annual holiday shop of its own in SoHo.   

Having had the pleasure to work with the illustrious and foul mouthed Tony "F*@!King" Arcabascio, I have seen the grueling process of putting together a store just to tear it down. In collaboration with Cushman & Wakefield and The New York Observer, Arcabascio and the guru of concepts, Pam Bristow, curated a series of fashion & art exhibitions with a capsule collection of trendy retail items. All said and done, we used over 25,000 issues of The Observer for the installation (see: the gigantic wall) and then recycled the entire lot just 7-days after throwing it up -- with no help, I might add, from Mr. Bones stretching his indy quad below.

 

I See Dead People{'s Books}

Library Thing, a massive network of bibliophiles, has a subgroup dedicated to cataloging the libraries of celebrity corpses. From Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin to Marie Antoinette and Tupac Shakur, the group's raison d'etre is to make public the reading lists of the departed. 

Having put together a library in the former home of Eugene O'Neill and trying to incorporate some of his reads,  I understand the difficulty of the task at hand. 

They Shoot Horses, Don't They?

The current issue of The Economist delivers a special report on Vietnam, detailing the country's transformation from an agrarian society to an industrial one. Chugging along with annual GDP growth rates exceeding 8%, Vietnam is going from "rags to riches," as the article points out. But with this, the country is faced with the stark reality of economic inequality and crippling price inflation, which exceeded 20% for the first four months of 2008.

Vietnam's economy is posting growth rates second only to China in the Asian region. Yet, it is still very much a third world country, and I still find myself making comparisons to the motherland and saying things like, "in New York we have this" or "this is how companies do it in the West." I realize that this is a character flaw on my part, and if one reads the fine print, the scorecard will tell them that 'Nam is the winning pony. But sometimes Big Brother's tight hold on the reins makes the writing on the wall incredibly blurry.

The Economist article is a great case in point. It appears to me that my print edition of the issue is not only missing a few pages but has also been given a fresh coat of paint. As shocked as I am thrilled to be subjected to censorship, I wonder what Vietnam-based readers are  not supposed to know? 

What's most unfortunate though is that the censor board is doing more harm than it is good. Most readers of the article have commented it is an incredibly positive piece, especially coming from a publication whose MO is to rip apart unprecedented economic booms, nonetheless communist regimes. Yes, the omitted portion suggested that democratic systems be instituted to help regulate Vietnam's explosive economy, which in my humble opinion is accurate. But the men upstairs don't look lightly upon criticism, particularly when it entails political reforms. So the handful of expat readers,who actually shelled out $8 bucks to buy the rag, are forced to get the goods online, which is what we should have done anyway considering the price tag. 

 

"The Lover"

"The Lover," a 1992 period piece set in French colonial Vietnam, depicts the sordid love affair of a 30-year-old Chinaman, played by Tony Leung, and a 15-year-old French girl. In a Romeo & Juliet-meets-Lolita setup, the French girl is poor and the Chinaman rich, and ultimately, their year and a half relationship comes to an end when the man is forced to marry the girl chosen for him by his father. 

Set in 1920s Saigon, the Lover is borderline soft-core porn with its steamy scenes of afterschool sex. The movie is an adaptation of Marguerite Duras' autobiographical novel, L'Amant, published in 1984, which means Duras was a frisky young lady growing up. 

But I now know why my father always had a soft spot for this erotic piece of cinema, and it's not because the cinematography is as beautiful as the girl. The movie was filmed at Jean Jacques Rousseau, my father's highschool here in Saigon, and is, I believe, the root cause for a generation of older men fixated on marrying younger women. Not surprising. Cherry picking is par for the course here in Asia. 

When the Tourists Flew In

The tourism economy contributes over 10% of the world's GDP. Outside of the military, tourism is the largest industry in the world in terms of monetary turnover and employment -- 1 out of ever 12 persons is employed indirectly or directly in the tourism trade. Considered a "green" industry, Tourism has no smoke stacks or oil wells directly attached to its bosom, but one could argue that the hidden costs of the tourist economy are equivocal to the pollutants of mankind's industrial progress. 

The above picture accompanied an article in the International Herald Tribune and depicts tourists jockeying for photos of buddhists in the ancient town of Luang Prabang, Laos. Essentially, the tourist economy has commodified the monks daily procession through the town asking for alms into an attraction on the daily itinerary.

While researching tourism policy, I came across this poem in a business management journal written by a Malaysian lawyer and thought it reflects the crisis of cultural degradation caused by the tourist economy. 

When the Tourists Flew In

When the tourists flew in
our island people metamorphosed
into a grotesque carnival
- a two-week sideshow

When the tourists flew in
our men put aside their fishing nets
to become waiters
our women became whores

When the tourists flew in
what culture we had went out the window
we traded our customs
for sunglasses and pop
we turned sacred ceremonies
into ten-cent peep shows

When the tourists flew in
local food became scarce
prices went up
but our wages stayed low

When the tourists flew in
we could no longer
go down to our beaches
the hotel manager said
'Natives defile the sea-shore'

When the tourists flew in
the hunger and squalor
were preserved
as a passing pageant
for clicking cameras
- a chic eye sore!

When the tourists flew in
we were asked
to be 'side-walk ambassadors'
to stay smiling and polite
to always guide
the 'lost' visitor...
Hell, if we could only tell them where we really want them to go!

- Cecil Rajendra

Homework: The Visual Display of Data

My wiz kid of a sister, Schuyler, and I have been getting into a field of study called the visual display of quantitative data. Pioneered by Edward Tufte in the '70s, the visual display of data at its most intense application has been known to sway government policy, and it certainly blows excel charts out of the water. 

See this article in the Economist for 3 of history's all time best graphs, as chosen by those snarky Brits. 

My little sister just sent over her homework, reminding me of Tufte and how much I miss New York's cafeterias. While these panels wouldn't be classified in the VDQD field, they're beautiful studies of an individual's consumptive behavior. While I might have influenced her eating habits, Nicholas Felton and maybe some others have influenced her eye for design. 

Travel Warning

This is a travel warning to those coming to northern Vietnam. Beginning in early March, an outbreak of cholera has stirred up in over 10 provinces and in the capital of Hanoi. The culprit is unhygienic food sources primarily street carts. 

This is a pretty damning mark on our evolution as a developing economy. The above notice, courtesy of the New York Times' Science section, was issued during an epidemic circa 1830 in New York. Looks like Vietnam still has a ways to go before rising above the squalor conditions of 19th century New Amsterdam. 

Let's just hope that the people's committee doesn't revert to the attitudes prevalent in those times. As reported by The Times, the public's temperament was that, "those sickened must be cured or die off, & being chiefly of the very scum of the city, the quicker [their] dispatch the sooner the malady will cease." Harsh treatment, no?  

Saigon Hotpot

One of the biggest gripes that I hear from my colleagues in the tourism industry is that there's a need for more certified tour guides, who are proficient in foreign languages. Certification is an issue in and of itself, but please allow me to introduce a group of college kids who have ganged up to exercise their language skills on foreign tourists. 

Started in November of '06, Saigon Hotpot is a group of 11 core members, all matriculating at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities here in HCM City. They are all in the language program and are all at least trilingual -- some speak four or five languages. They volunteer their time to show visitors a side of Saigon that they normally wouldn't experience. Since its inception, Hotpot has taken over 90 tours with over 200 travelers from around the world. And they do it all for free, saying that they only want to share their culture with visitors and play a part in the future development of the city. They'll even do one-on-one tours, as I found out yesterday. 

I met up with one of their youngest members, Phuong, who was to be my buddy for day,  and we went out to Cu Chi, which is where the National Liberation Front staged their military attacks outside of Saigon. Famous for its network of underground tunnels, Cu Chi is an underground labyrinth that totals about 75-miles all added up. To be honest, the experience was a little numbing, and it made me curious to know the emotional challenge for American veterans to visit the site. They probably would have done the same thing I did: blow off some steam by shooting a gun. 

Albeit, I have to give credit for the ingenuity of the NLF for its guerilla tactics and perseverance against a more sophisticated opponent, not to mention the challenge it must have been to build and defend this underground camp. For every bomb the Americans dropped, these guys would turn around and use the scrap metal to create their own arsenal.

But going there with a Vietnamese "buddy" (the Hotpot crew consider themselves as friends of their guests, not tour guides) at least allowed me to see the experience from a different perspective than most travelers. We even took the local bus out there, and when the guy next to me hocked a loogy on the floor, 2-inches from my foot, the ticket agent who rides along reprimanded him saying, "there's a foreigner next to you. Show some respect." The guy smiled and said, "what does a foreigner have over me, a Vietnamese." (All this was being translated to me by Phuong.) 

At the end of the day, he was right. I have no claim over how he or anyone else should conduct themselves in public. Only the Vietnamese can determine their standards for public decency.  

When we got back to the city, Phuong and I went for a traditional hotpot meal, and I forgot all about the troubled past. 

As I was told by the Hotpot crew, they chose the name of a traditional Vietnamese dish because it symbolizes the diversity of their group. A hotpot is like a make your own soup, where you pick the base broth and then add beef, pork, fish, squid, veggies, or whatever you like, and cook it table-side. It's a melting pot of different tastes and is exactly what Saigon Hotpot is, a group of different minds and cultures coming together with strangers, who will eventually become friends.

The Art of Malt

Please allow me to introduce you to the newest member of the Saigon Single Malt Club: me. I even have the hat to prove it. 

Joining a congregation of 12 men and 2 women at the Bourbon Street Restaurant on Thursday night, I finally got the opportunity to crack open my Tuthilltown bottle of single malt whiskey from Hudson Valley -- Batch 1 and Bottle #180 of '08. I tasted more single malts in one sitting than I ever have in my life. I only wish I could have kept going. 

The gents and occasional lady of the SSMC are a sporting bunch and lively crew of expats and one or two token Vietnamese. The only prerequisite for joining -- beyond the nominal fee -- is that you have a liver the size of a football and a humor twice as large. I'm an impostor of course. 

TIMES for Phở

The Dining Section of The New York Times gets hip to Pho, the famous Vietnamese soup. Vietnam's answer to hunger -- morning, noon and night, year round -- is now the lunch lady's answer to cheap eats. 

"THE smell of a curried butternut squash soup wafts through the air as you walk into the dining room. At long tables of dark wood, beneath windows soaring 20 feet overhead, customers dine on vegetable ragout over polenta, spicy orange beef, Dijon-crusted chicken, cheese quesadillas, vegetarian pho —Vietnamese noodle soup — and spinach sautéed with garlic and olive oil.

If it weren't for the trays, and the fact that most diners are under 25, you'd think it was a restaurant. But this is Thorne dining hall at Bowdoin College here. As recently as 10 years ago, a typical campus dining experience was a cafeteria offering overcooked meat, canned vegetables and instant mashed potatoes.

But as palates grow more sophisticated and admissions become more competitive, many top colleges are paying attention to dining rooms as well as classrooms."