It struck me in a taxi on the way to the airport this morning – how does this city keep moving with such chaos occurring on the streets all around me.  I have just spent two days dashing around Saigon, or Ho Chi Min City to give its more modern name.  The purpose of my visit was to speak with some of the schools in the city – 3 of them have just completed short trips with us over the past 6 months and 3 of the schools had expressed an interest in starting up service orientated experiences.  It is always a bit stressful dashing from meeting to meeting, in the intense heat, always in a taxi with a driver who assures you in very broken English he knows exactly where the next appointment is, and blatantly doesn’t.

Anyway, during this dashing around, and mainly on the dash to the airport this morning, it hit me square between the eyes – how does this city continue to keep moving amongst the chaos.  2 wheels are the preferred method of transport amongst the populace – well perhaps that is inaccurate, a nice air conditioned car might be the preferred option but is unachievable on the average Vietnamese income.  And so its onto 2 wheels and perhaps they really do prefer it because 2 wheels seem to have priority over 4 (2 wheels good, 4 wheels bad to twist a quote from a group of 1980’s pigs!).  Nowadays most 2 wheels are powered by an engine and not legs, although there are still plenty of bicycles amongst the throng.

But back to the chaos theory – everyone is moving on their own set route, dodging and weaving, thousands upon thousands of random journeys (not random to the person doing it, hopefully that’s planned or in some way thought out loosely), criss cross the city and the other plethora of journeys.  And when I say criss cross, I mean criss cross - inches away from each other in varying directions, at varying speeds, filtering across each other, horns blaring continuously……and yet no-one seems to collide, the city keeps moving, and you don’t see any of the rage and anger you might expect in other parts of the world.  And when I checked with my taxi driver about what time to leave for the airport and would we hit any rush hour traffic he said no, which surprised me since we were heading into the maelstrom at 8 in the morning.  But now I get it….the randomness, the chaos actually makes the city work.  In other big Asian cities (Bangkok and every visiting businessman’s nightmare, Jakarta) there is a semblance of order and hideous hideous jams.  But actually this order is superficial – it looks ordered with its lanes, signs, tolls and rules.  But scratch below the surface and people are actually ignoring the regimentation – they are pushing in, (constantly), and abusing each other – horns are less frequent but they are usually accompanied by some kind of gesture and look.  There is a serious lack of respect for others - they are simply an impediment for you to get on with your busy day.  And actually this is extremely common in the west where I grew up, no matter how big or small the town or city.

Now heading back into the apparent carnage of Saigon’s rammed streets.  So yes it does appear completely chaotic, random, messy and liable for disaster at any second.  However scratch below this chaos and you will find something……order!  There are unwritten rules and courtesies, people understand you have no choice but to drive your moped across 3 lanes of oncoming traffic to turn down a side street, and it works.  Cars stay in the centre of the road with the bikes on the right near the curb, cars slow to let bikes pass, the horns are gentle reminders to move a little to the left or right.  There is no anger or rage.  I suppose it’s a look of resignation or gentle acceptance that you need to push across in front of oncoming traffic – its just the way it is and there is no need to get all worked up about it.  Although you need to have nerves of steel or be a born and bred “Saigonese” to venture on the city streets.

And so based on this crazy randomness, Saigon works. Chaos is actually working very nicely thank you very much.  And so where does this leave us….what can we learn?  Well even though I see chaos working there is a time and a place.  My job is to plan, execute and manage safe and challenging expeditions and trips for young people.  And in doing this I don’t like chaos – I want everything planned, thought through and and “what if’d”!  So that is our challenge at Camps International – providing such a trip amongst the chaos – but the trip wouldn’t be such an experience if the teams did not see and experience the chaos first hand – so its all about providing the chaos but in a controlled environment.  Having said I like everything to be planned, I also recognise that randomness is an essential element of all trips – and it usually occurs in strange places, strange events when you least expect it, which sometimes are a nuisance but looking back that was what made the trip more interesting, away from the norm and the mundane.

We have a lot to learn from the streets of Saigon – patience, respect, acceptance are just some of them.  And so next time you’re stuck in a jam or perhaps wishing people would get out of your way or quit pushing in and breaking the rules, wherever you may be, just consider the chaos theory for life. 

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Hiya im just wondering that if your going on this trip if you want to chat as i want to get to know people im going with and it would be nice to establish some friendships :D

Thanks  from Louise xx

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April 22nd is Earth Day, it's only a few short days away! This year, Earth Day's theme is themed after A Billion Acts of Green: our people-powered campaign to generate a billion acts of environmental service and advocacy before Rio +20.

We intend to plant A LOT more trees than usual on April 22nd so watch this space

If you would like to take a pledge or do something small to mark the day, click HERE to visit the Earth Day website...

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If there is one thing everybody in the world knows about Kenya, it's the fact that we have THE BEST long distance runners in the world! No doubt most of you would have read the news that's buzzing across the papers about this weekends London Marathon.

Mail Online has this great story (click HERE for the full article)

A massive congrats to Emmanuel Mutai who won with the fastest time in the race's 31-year history and Mary Keitani who won the women's race!

It's an exciting year ahead for Camp Kenya as we prepare for this year's Sports Development Expedition and next years Olympics. Yes, we will definitely be doing our bit to make more runners like Mutai and Keitani...

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So during my time in Muhaka I met Juma Omari, he helped us build his Grandmother a new house.

We spent a lot of time talking about his dreams to be a pilot and this really stuck with me, that money was the only obstacle in his way, and he knew deep down he may never have the money to go to Secondary school let alone achieve his pilot dreams. So when I got home I spoke to Nicci and Neil, the owners of the theatre company I work for, Ariel Company Theatre www.arielct.co.uk

They agreed that we should raise the money for Juma, so on Friday, 15th of April, our young actors, did an african workshop. Due to their hard work and awesome performance we managed to raise over £300 pounds for Juma. It costs 16, 000 kenyan shillings per year for him to attend kinondo secondary school he now has all 4 years paid for.

So thank you Ariel Theatre Company, thank you to all the parents that supported their kids in this workshop and supported Juma and his education.

Going to Kenya was  humbling experience and I'm so glad that our students, who are 5 to 12 years old, took on board how important it was to raise this money for someone who not only lives in far worse conditions than us, but has to pay for his education; something we so often take for granted.

Also, massive thanks to Dipesh for all his support in making this happen! Go Camp Kenya!!

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Is anyone thinking about going to Kenya from 5th of January to the 29th of March 2012? Would like to start getting to know people that are thinking about going. Right now I'm not too sure if I am actually going away so would be nice to talk to a few people thinking the same!

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