Fed: No home cooked meals for Scott

AAP General News (Australia)
04-06-2004
Fed: No home cooked meals for Scott

By Jonathon Moran, National Entertainment Writer

SYDNEY, April 6 AAP - Pam Scott moved to Vietnam 10 years ago and has hardly cooked since.

"I have not cooked a meal at home for more than eight years. Eating on the street is
just the way to meet people, get out there and get to know people over a bowl of soup."

she said.

Scott, 59, is visiting her home town of Sydney this month to promote her first book,
`Hanoi Stories', in which she tells of an unexpected aspect of the Vietnamese capital.

During her time in Hanoi, Scott quickly moved outside the cloistered world of the expat
world and immersed herself in the lives of the locals - cyclo drivers, postal workers
and university students.

The Western perception of Vietnam was still of a country at war and boat people, she said.

"I wanted to show this other vision of Vietnam and I also wanted probably to inspire
other people to get out of their comfort zone a bit and have an adventure," she said.

"I mean I was 49 when I decided to go and live there and I had never lived anywhere
overseas before in my life. People were stunned that suddenly I would do this but anyone
can go off and have an adventure at any time."

Scott said she found writing the book therapeutic.

"I think it sort of balanced me and let me understand that I had two homes and the
two cultures that I was moving across in," she said.

Scott has worked on numerous consultancies over the years and is credited with opening
the first English language bookshop in Hanoi.

Her latest project is a consultancy with the Norwegian government.

She has also started work on a second book.

"I decided that I would write other people's and expats Hanoi stories," she said.

"I am halfway through writing that, again showing the diversity of people who fall
in love with Hanoi and go and live there, reinventing themselves to find ways to stay
there."

Scott noted that Vietnam had changed incredibly since she first moved there in 1994.

"First off it was really quite difficult and it was mainly backpackers and you had
to rough it a bit," she said.

"But now you can go at all levels. You can still backpack or you can stay at the five
star hotels."

Despite the rapid growth and boom of the tourism industry in Vietnam, Scott said it
was still possible to experience the real country.

"In 10 years there I have seen the same amount of changes that I have in a lifetime
in Australia," she said.

"But the people are still the same and it's definitely possible to get an authentic experience."

AAP jwm/maur/br

KEYWORD: HANOI (PIX AVAILABLE)

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