last gasp

Vietnam is a smoker's heaven.

When I first got here I smoked Vinataba.  They're roughly 25p a pack.

Two months later they were all I could taste from the moment I woke up.  I noticed too that my already non-pearly white teeth were further yellowing.  I switched to Marlboro.  A whopping 40p a pack.

Compare that to home when, last time I was there, they were £5.

So smoking in Vietnam is kind of a bargain.  It's social too.  Smoking with the guys at work is what you do.  Guy things include bia hoi, smoking and coffee.  Girls eat fruit and drink tea.  I think it's fair to say we have the best end of the deal.

And I have noticed just how many volunteers smoke.  I wonder if they rationalise it the same way I do.  The longer I do this, the longer I am not paying into my pension.  Simple.....instead I'll invest in smoking, then I won't need a pension.

Joking aside there is something in the smoker that lives for the day.  The habit maybe bad but the sentiment isn't necessarily.

Smoking in Hanoi is easy.  While the west is slowly marginalising the smoker, in Hanoi you can light a cigarette in a restaurant and nobody complains.  I've smoked through meetings.  In trains you have the corridors and my morning xe om routine is buy egg butty, put it in xe om's basket, put on sunglasses, switch on the music, light a cigarette and let's go.

I'll leave the dangers of smoking piece and the effect of tobacco on Vietnam to someone else.  It's all valid but my heart isn't in it.

Because, I've just smoked my last cigarette.

Okay so I'm partly writing this so that I'm shamed into keeping it up.

But after a long hot summer when it was too stifling to do anything but drink iced coffee and smoke, I feel lousy.  I've worked from my bed today as I've been hit by a second bug in a month.  I reckon my immune system must be at an all time low.  I feel crap.

So the cigarettes have got to go.  It's a tough time to do it with the new restaurant and the bike ride not far away.  But these things can work in your favour.  Past attempts to quit have at least lasted a few months and in that time I have this incredible nervous energy.  No doubt it's as irritating as hell to live with but handy for getting things done.

Sometimes I invent things to do simply because I can't sit still.

So be warned.  I'm going to be a pain.  If you're giving up then Vietnam turns from cigarette heaven to absolute hell.  There will be no hiding from the omnipresent Vinataba.

Shame.  I really fancy one right now too.

Comments

[amadbrownwoman]

goodluck!

i also quit smoking here in vietnam and i know just how difficult it is.especially when most establishments;restaurants, bars,cafes etc permit smoking. until now, i know only one cafe in HCM which has a smoking and non-smoking area.and as you've said, it's cheap.

for me smoking has become a booooring activity (when I was smoking) and i hated the taste in my mouth when i wake up in the morning (before i even smoked a stick).which i think is why i'm able to resist.

don't be fooled though. i'm still resisting.

smokers anonymous?? (hell no!)cheryl

[omih]

I love(d) smoking. Sure the smell is nasty and your breath stinky but I like the social side of it.

And I like those times when you smoke and contemplate. When you listen to music or look at a view and the cigarettes gives you an excuse to do nothing but listen or look.

But at 35, for the first time I feel that they are starting to damage my health. My lungs feel more constricted than they used to and I'm getting colds and flus.

I'm getting older, I need all the energy I can get. I don't want to lose it to smoking.

Oh and congrats on quitting. I'll let you know how it goes.

[jim]

5 years and counting and its actually pain free. Here is Scotland there is a ban on smoking in any enclosed public spaces, which includes shops offices restaurants pubs stations even football grounds! Its great smell free zone. Well apart from the farting but that's another story.

Goodluck with the attempt and with the new restaurant

[teresa]

I can't give you any "I did it, you can,too" story because I never have smoked. But I will echo your 'I'm getting older' sentiment and at 36, I can feel that my body just isn't the spry young thing that it used to be. My lack of heart-healthy exercise is what I'm trying to overcome. So everyday you will fight to stay smoke-free and I will fight to get in my hour walk. I have a feeling we'll both be struggling, but it's got to be good for the body, right?!
-t

[Jon Hoff]

2 years for me - I quit in Korea, where smoking is just as popular as Vietnam. There's no easy way to do it but by god it's worth it in the long run. I still salivate when someones smoke curls into my nostril, but it's the stink on the clothes that kills it. Horrible.
Good Luck!

[omih]

Thanks Jim and Theresa,

I must admit as a smoker, smoking bans never bothered me. At work no seemed to care if I had a dozen smoke breaks a day when smoking was banned - as opposed to smoking while working at my desk. It certainly shortened the day.

And I also prefer to smoke outside. Non smokers don't realise that even smokersdon't much like smoking smells - for example I hate smoking carriages on trains.

Teresa, it's a sad fact of life getting old. If I'm going to have the kind of life I want, I don't have to be a marathon runner but I have to be fit. I'm sick of niggly little things slowing me down.

By the way just been to the docs about that flu and it appears to be some form of sinusitus. I realised while I was relaying my symptoms that many of them I had had for months.

So I'm loaded up with drugs to sort it and obviously my smoking didn't help it before.

Here's hoping that my blocked sinuses will clear all the faster without cigarettes.

It's almost two days. Okay not much but I'm proud of myself all the same.

[omih]

John,

Agreed. The stink is the worst. But you're right, a newly lit cigarette smells fantastic.

Still, two days and counting.

[girl]

Well done on the quitting.
I am a smoker, and found VN to be a great place to do it compared to the west (even though I often got frowned at by VN women around me because smoking is "khong tot". But, as I tried to explain, i just dont like fruit or tea too much!)
I have been setting the (everchanging) quitting date this year, but one thing I know is I MUST give up before going back to VN.
I hope you are now on 4 days and still counting.

[omih]

Yes four days on and counting. It's all good. Just in the last stages of flu though so it's only now that I am starting to want one.

I know about that everchanging quitting date. I started while I was at college but promised myself I would quite when I was no longer a student.

Then it was 25, then it was 30. Most recently it was when i had "dependents".

But just sick of feel unhealthy.

[Debra]

Just stumbled onto your website, and thank you SO much for taking the time to this info and the photos to. I will be in Hanoi in about a week (CELTA then teaching) and very excited.
:)
D